Welcome to Sugartown

By: Carmen Jenner

Narrated by: Rupert Hamilton, Jenny Walters

Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins

Publisher's Summary

Ana Belle never wanted anything more than to hang up her apron, jump on her Vespa, and ride off into the sunset, leaving Sugartown in the dust.

Elijah Cade never wanted anything more than a hot meal, a side of hot arse, and a soft place to lay his head at night where he could forget about his past.

But you know what they say about wanting: You always want what you can't have.

Nineteen-year-old virgin Ana is about to discover that's not quite true because a six foot three, hotter than hell, tattooed Aussie sex god just rode into town. He's had a taste of her pie, and he wants more - no, really, Ana bakes pies for a living, get your mind out of the gutter.

She'd be willing to hand over everything tied up in a big red bow. There's just one problem: Elijah has secrets dirtier than last week's underwear. Secrets that won't just break Ana's heart, but put her life at risk, too. When those secrets come to light, their relationship is pushed to the breaking point.

Add to that a psychotic nympho best friend, an overbearing father, a cuter than humanly possible kid brother, a wanton womanizing cousin, the ex from hell, and more pies than you could poke a...err...stick...at.

And you thought small towns were boring.

Welcome to Sugartown.

Content warning: Intended for a mature 18+ audience. Contains explicit sex, oodles of profanity, and a crap-tonne of awkward.

©2013 Carmen Jenner (P)2017 Audible, Inc.

Baby Girl - Annoying

I don't know if it was because I was looking for a rom-com and this wasn't that, but I didn't love this. I wanted to slap Ana for almost every choice she made. I just didn't get why she would put herself in some really terrible positions. Don't get me wrong, no one deserves what happened to her no matter what dumb thing she does. But I called each and every thing that happened. From the Elijah telling her to run and her stopping to ask "what's going on" to going off with the guy who besmirched her name in the first place.

I know she was 19, but no one should be that gullible. I just got so frustrated with her at every turn. I wanted Elijah aka Ethan, to just move on.

I was definitely more interested in Holly and her situation with Cooper and then Jackson.

I'm conflicted as to if I want to continue with the rest of the series.

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

YUCK!!! ***CAUTION*** ***SPOILERS AHEAD!!!***

******SPOILERS******SPOILERS******SPOILERS******SPOILERS******SPOILERS*******

I started liking the book, and I was rooting for the underdog hero (Elijah), but that changed as the story progressed. I know the main characters are young, but even young people have to have a YUCK factor, even if they are dumb and get in trouble - which I'll explain later. I didn't like the heroine (Ana) much, and Elijah lost me soon after.

Ana has a bad reputation in town thanks to her entitled jackass of an Ex (Scott), who dumped her because she didn't sleep with him, and then painted her as the town hussy. The whole town (including Ana's dad) believes him. Then Scott started going out with another woman (Nicole) right after destroying Ana's reputation.

In comes Elijah. Ana and Elijah fall for each other, they start the back and forth dance, until Ana tells him she loves him - Elijah doesn't say it back. Ana wants Elijah to be her first, but Elijah stops it. Elijah and Ana go for a motorcycle ride, and things start to unravel. During that outing they are attacked by Hell's Angels members. They almost die in that accident, and Ana is molested and almost raped in front of Elijah who losses it, and by sheer luck is able to get loose and kill their attackers including the one who was about to rape Ana.

They are taken to the hospital where Ana gets a cast for her broken arm, and decides she doesn't want to see Elijah anymore for not telling her he was a member of the Hells Angels. Elijah tries, and tries to get Ana back to no avail. 3 weeks go by and Ana and her friend Holly go to the Pub where she encounters Elijah at the pool table with Nicole hanging all over him, so when her ex Scott walks in, she asks him to buy her a drink even when she hasn't spoken to Scott since their incident. After a while she doesn't see Elijah around, and decides to go to the bathroom where she finds a couple f^&*$# agains the bathroom wall.

And here starts my YUCK factor:

At first Ana doesn’t know who the people are, and she stands there like a statue noticing the guy with his pants around his ankles, and the woman with her legs around his hips while he pumps into her. It finally dawns on Ana who they are. Nicole looks at her and smiles. Ana is still rooted in place. She hears as Elijah tells Nicole "God you feel so fu#$%^& good!" and shortly after he is done, Nicole tells him “I think we have an audience” he turns his torso around as he is still inside Nicole, sees Ana, says "fu%$" and that is when And runs out. Elijah follows her, and after he catches her, not only she allows him to touch her, and kiss her, but she lets him put his “dirty fingers" inside her (YUCK!!! YUCK!!! YUCK!!!) all this happens while she can still feel the smell of sex on him! How disgusting is that??? Him putting his fingers INSIDE her not even 2 minutes after he had those same fingers all over another woman while having sex with her in a dingy bathroom???. HELL-TO-THE-NO!!! She lets him, even after saying "NO" then that is when Elijah tells her he loves her. REALLY??? Good timing, huh?

As if that is not enough, the next day he goes to ask Ana for forgiveness (again), and after a bit of back and forth they end up kissing and dry humping when he says... "God you feel so fu%$#& good!" and she stops cold, and he has no idea why. They finally break-up for good.

After moping around for a month, Holly once again gets Ana out of the house to go to a bonfire where she encounters Scott who invites her to go drink something stronger and she goes with him to get drunk. She kisses Scott, and Scott responds by kissing her back, which she describes as "sloppy" compared to Elijah. She suddenly wants to stop when Scott starts groping her, but he doesn't budge. She scratches his face trying to get away, but he hits her making her pass out. She comes to feeling the pain of being raped. Finally she head-butts Scott, but he hits her hard again, and she blacks out.

We go to Elijah who has been trying to drink his sorrows. away, and deciding to go get laid when somebody knocks on his door. He opens to find Ana all bit up. He hopes it is not what he thinks, but it is. He asks and asks until she tells him what happened, omitting the name of who did it, but he can guess. He tries to convince her to call the police and go to the hospital but she doesn't want to. She asks him to help her wash "him" away, and he does. That is when he sees the bites on her breast, and other marks left on her body, and he cries with her.

There's still more but my rant is too long already, and I have wasted more time than I should have in this book.

I do not recommend it, and I can't understand how this book got so many 5 Star reviews.

Great Story! great narration!

I enjoyed this book from a new to-me author and narrators and it was a great recommendation...this is the first of three books in the series so I’m looking forward to the next ones!

I need an Elijah Cade!

This book was such a surprise, random read for me. I made one of those posts on facebook--you know the one where I ask for recommendations and tons of people respond--and the author happened to see my post. Of all the authors who commented with names of their books, this one jumped out at me. Maybe it's the cover, maybe it was the great synopsis the author gave me on that little post, or maybe it's the fact it's in the romance package so I was able to try a new author AND new narrators relatively risk free.

It's gotta be one of those things, right?

Anyway, on to this book. Elijah Cade comes strolling into town and catches the eye of our Ana Bell. Watching this romance grow and develop is not something I will be forgetting anytime soon. And the twists and turns and the SHOCKING MOMENTS that Jenner throws our way, aren't easy to handle, they aren't light, but they are so true and authentic within the story that I can't think of a different path these two could have taken to find each other.

As far as narration, I'll be honest, I've never heard either narrator before, but that didn't deter me. In fact, I dove right in and LOVED the accents! Granted, these are probably two people who are actually Australian so they don't believe they have an accent, but for me they do! And I loved feeling as if I was actually in Sugartown, in Australia, living life right along with Elijah, Ana, Holly, and Sam. It felt so real and I listened to this so frequently that the little voice in my head took on an Australian accent--which is only super weird if you think too much about it.
But really, Rupert and Jenny will have me as a fan for as long as they want to make audiobooks. I'm in.

Great read

I really loved this book only complaint I would have is that when Ana caught Elijah with Nicole she let him touch her. I get the kids but have some respect for yourself.