But I Love You

by Peter Rosch

On the well-intentioned dare of a friend, model and recovering addict Lisa Denton meets Alicia Lynn Wilde, Manhattan’s hottest matchmaker to the city’s elite and the mind behind an exclusive, very lucrative singles service built on a misguided ideal, lies, and Midwestern blue collar work ethic. Alicia’s brief encounter with this new stranger quickly begins to unsettle her meticulously curated world, and throws Lisa unwittingly into a series of unsavory—possibly lethal—events already set in motion when one of Elite Two Meet’s members claims to have been sexually assaulted by two high-profile clientele.

282 pages, Paperback

First published May 31, 2014

About the author

Peter Rosch is the author of What The Dead Can Do, Future Skinny, But I Love You, and My Dead Friend Sarah, and other dark fictions, many born from the addictions he chased while living in New York City. He’s sober now but remains an addict’s addict: he can turn anything fun into a serious problem.

Reviews

[Aditi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why are you the way you are?
asks Alicia Lynn Wilde to one of her prospect for the Elite Two Meet's members club, in the book, But I Love You written by Peter Rosch. Elite Two Meet, Alicia's brainchild, is a club of elite and super-rich, single men and women, and is built up on delusional beliefs and lies.

But I Love You is a dark love-story, although it was a one-sided love-affair, more of an obsession and possession over someone. The underlying story is a sweet love-story, but since, it's a one-sided affair, it turns quite bloody at the end.

“If you're that obsessed with someone, why would you kill her?
Humans are full of contradictions.”
----Ai Yazawa, a Japanese Magna author
Because finally when you realize that you can't possess that person's heart, who you love so deeply, then you feel like killing them and taking their souls out of them, and maybe that's a contradiction.

Thanks to the author, Peter Rosch, for sending me over a copy of his dark novel, in return for an honest review.

Elite Two Meet an exclusive and a very posh club for a very elite class clientele and it is Alicia's brainchild, who hand-selects the members with so many rounds of interviews and background checks. The book opens on 7th of August, with a murder of a woman. Then the book jumps to five days prior to 7th of August, and we are introduced with Alicia, who is vulnerable and is running after the recovering drug-addict cum socialite, Lisa Denton. But soon a sexual assault follows on one of Elite Two Meet's members, Chris, who works in a cosmetic company and she accuses of one of Alicia's high-profile clientele. Detective Johnson jumps into the investigation and soon Chris's false allegations are brought into light, followed by the confession of her heart's desire towards Alicia. She gets obsessed with Alicia, from stalking her to doing every possible thing to bring Alicia's attention towards her. But her love was dark and soon a number of murders turn up, making Alicia's life more complicated.

If you don't read this book, you're going to miss out something really unusual and unique. The author's uniqueness of penning down this tale is quite evident from his flawed yet remarkable characters to his voice and narration. Firstly, his style of writing is something to look out for, it'll intrigue you till the very end. The author's characterization is well-developed and he had a solid grip on all his characters, which had a twisted mind of their own. Although it was a love story, still it was very gripping and quite dark and raw emotions are evident from reading about these characters.

You should definitely read this book, to cherish the two most unusual characters of this book, Chris and Alicia, who lights up the whole book with their demeanor.

[Mark Matthews · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been waiting anxiously for Rosch's follow up to My Dead Friend Sarah and was happy as hell to snag an advance review copy of "But I Love you". I was already a fan, but now I'm an avid follower. His writing style captures the hidden nuances of human thought and behavior and is lyrical with an edge But I Love You is full of rich, deep characters, and a plot that earns the readers full attention to the page. It is a story of high-stakes dating by conflicted and flawed characters with so many wonderful layers that get peeled back page after page. This novel seems uniquely New York, with fragile metropolition characters. Conflicting motivations of the players collide, and each plot twist that is served up is more delicious and rich than the one that came before. Five Stars to this fabulous read by a wonderful, intelligent writer.

[Barbara Tsipouras · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first time I got a free copy from an author who is asking me to write a review. That's why I try to be not too short without telling too much.

About two weeks ago I read My dead friend Sarah – and fell in love with Peter Rosch's writing style. I'm glad that his style hasn't changed. Obviously he loves to create long twisted sentences full of sarcasm, details, a little humor and an enormous vocabulary (for me as Non Native Speaker quite a challenge). With two or three sentences he makes you feel the akwardness of a situation or the odor of a place. It's really amazing.

In My Dead Friend Sarah I didn't really like neither Max nor Sarah. In this book it also takes some time to get to know the not really lovable characters but you learn to understand them and to feel with them.
Did you ever wonder what's going on in an insane mind or why, when and how an alcoholic is drinking? This book will put some light on it.

This is not a crime novel even though there are quite a few crimes nor is it a love story. Perhaps you could call it a psychodrama about unanswered love mirroring the insanity of our society.
In the end I felt a bit like Alicia: “Her emotions – half a dozen or more – were bouncing their way around inside of her, pounding from within, and looking for her to help them escape“ - just missing one crucial emotion: hope.

If you're looking for an optimistic or funny book with a typical happy ending make a different choice.
If you appreciate awesome writing style and want to emerge in someone's mind this is a must-read!



And because I really love this book I suggested to Peter to translate it in German. Now, after struggling with his lovable sentences I finally finished the job and hope this book will find many readers of both the original and the German edition.

[Agnieszka · Rating 2 out of 5]

English review below the German.

Ich habe dieses Buch von der Übersetzerin mit der Bitte um eine ehrliche Bewertung erhalten. Trotz bester Absicht habe ich in mehreren Ansätzen 30 Prozent geschafft.

Das was ich gelesen habe, war intelligent, unterhaltsam, spannend und witzig geschrieben. Das Wesen der Figuren wurde wie die Schalen einer Zwiebel nach und nach aufgezeigt.
Die Geschichte selbst fängt mit dem Ende an, dann erst wird zum Anfang vorgespult und dann erst werden nach und nach die Zusammenhänge und Verflechtungen aufgedeckt.
Wie bereits gesagt, es ist ein sehr gutes Buch für das ich mich jedoch leider nicht erwärmen konnte.

I got this book from the German translator with the purpose to read it and write an honest review.
First things first: The fact I didn't like the book has nothing to do with the book itself - I was even looking forward to read it but it wasn't my cup of tea.
The book is very well written and it is not only intelligent and entertaining but also thrilling and fun.
The story line started with a bang, with a statement usually expected much later within the story line then you got the bits and pieces and all the facts along the way.
Also the characters were introduced by bits and pieces like you pull the layers of an onion until you get all the pieces together.
Like I said a really good book - just I couldn't connect with it.

[Lori L (She Treads Softly) · Rating 4 out of 5]

But I Love You by Peter Rosch is a highly recommended love/con story. You're just going to have to read it to figure out how that combination happens, but perhaps life is a con of some sort.

First, you know right at the start that somebody dies on August 7th in But I Love You, then the story jumps back to August 2nd and you will begin to figure out what is going to happen - or you will think you are figuring out what is going down. Yup, expect a twist or two in this wild ride of.... almost an anti-love story, but I digress.

Alicia Lynn Wilde runs the Elite Two Meet dating/single's service. Elite Two Meet is exclusive and all the members are carefully vetted by a very controlling and tightly wound Alicia and her very controlled staff. Chris, one of the members of her service who is obsessed with Alicia, is becoming a nuisance with her constant texting and calling. Alicia is interviewing prospective customer/client Lisa and is clearly smitten/obsessed with her. Add to this garbled jumble a lot of self-medicating, many varied sycophants, some simple-minded co-conspiritors, and Rosch self-confessed love of the run-on sentence and you'll begin to see that this is not a simple love story.

Despite the run-on sentence part, Rosch is a very good writer and carries But I Love You along on that strength and the twisty plot. This is a cast of unlikeable characters with a number of obsessions, be it people, success, appearance, or the previously mentioned self-medication. I'm glad I had the time to read it in one sitting. I like one reviewer who compared it to a Shakespearean tragedy where the characters are to blame for all the mishaps that befall them. It's a train wreck waiting to happen - and Rosch lets you know from the start that the train wreck is coming. You won't be able to predict how or why, though.


Disclosure: My Kindle edition was courtesy of the author for review purposes.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

someone i know told me to read his first book, which i did, and i loved it. that ultimately got me into his blog, which is as hilarious as it is dark. the same person told me he had written a new book. again i read it, and again i loved it. there's something about his writing style that always reminds me of fight club and the like. just like his first book, i read this one in only a few days. again, not because it's dumbed down, it's just a page turner. give it a read. i think you'll like it. i'd wager eventually he'll be writing movies.

[Mary E. Hastings · Rating 5 out of 5]

I received this through First Reads Giveaways.

It was really good. Peter Rosch has such an awesome personal style and flair. His book was both humorous and insightful, and I had a lot of fun reading it. A friend told me that I should I check out his other book... I can't remember the name. "My Dead Aunt Sarah" or something... that doesn't sound exactly right, but it was something like that.

Anyway. Long story short... I loved this book so much that I fully intend to look up the other book on amazon and snag a copy. I am definitely a Peter Rosch fan now.

[Helen Brumfield · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book for free in a Goodreads First Reads. It took me several chapters to get into this book, and when all the mayhem started, I really liked it. It was hard to like any of the characters in this book, you certainly don't want to be friends with any of them, BUT they make for an interesting read, because these kind of people do exist! If you like a bit of mystery and murder you will like this book!

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was extremely thrilling and romantic novel, it kept me interested right up to the last page!

I was one of the fortunate few to receive a complimentary copy from GoodReads FirstReads and the author.

[Heather White · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was my first Rosch novel. I found it SO verbose - really difficult to get through. Such a shame, because it had good characters and a really interesting story. I was confused many times throughout. The payoff should have been the ending, but I felt cheated when it ended so abruptly.

[Martin Bihl · Rating 3 out of 5]

to see my review, please visit: http://the-agency-review.com/but-i-lo...