Author: Penny Reid
Series: Laws of Physics #1
Genre: New Adult Contemporary Romance
Release Date: February 11th, 2019
Source: E-galley from Social Butterfly PR which did not influence my
My rating: 4.5 stars
Synopsis:
Forced to lie to protect her sister . . .
From the New York Times Bestselling Author, Penny Reid
One week.
Home alone.
Girl genius.
Unrepentant slacker.
Big lie.
What’s the worst that could happen?
Mona is a smart girl and figured everything out a long time ago. She had to. She didn’t have a choice. When your parents are uber-celebrities and you graduate from high school at fifteen, finish college at eighteen, and start your PhD program at nineteen, you don’t have time for distractions outside of your foci. Even fun is scheduled.
Which is why Abram, her brother’s best friend, is such an irritant.
Abram is a talented guy, a supremely gifted musician, and has absolutely nothing figured out, nor does he seem to care. He does what he feels, when he feels, and—in Mona’s opinion—he makes her feel entirely too much.
Laws of Physics is the second trilogy in the Hypothesis series; Laws of Physics parts 1 (MOTION) and 2 (SPACE) end with a cliffhanger.
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My Review:
This was such a great story, and such a page-turner! If I hadn't started reading this on a "school" night, I could see that I would probably have stayed up and read late into the next morning. I loved the characters a lot. There was one scene, with donuts, that was hilarious1 Of course, I had a few questions about how in the world they couldn't guess something was up when for one thing, I don't think that Mona's sister would probably be much of a Harry Potter fan, like Mona was. So to me that seems like it would have sent up a red flag. But since she was discussing that with Abram's mother and sister, I guess it isn't as big of a deal. They wouldn't know. Ugh, it ended on such a cliffhanger, and I need the next book now! Great story so far!
I guess I need to go back and read the Elements of Chemistry series too, so that I can get all the characters filled in. That is one thing I love about this author, how she can connect all these characters so easily. So that you're getting a brand new story, standalone, but you get connections to other stories and characters you loved if you have already read the prior books.
Excerpt:
My
stomach rumbled, long and loud, and I pressed my hand against it. Grunting into
the darkness, I tossed off the covers and stood from Lisa’s bed. Food on my
mind, I slipped out of the room and down the stairs. The kitchen was dark, but
instead of flipping on a light—which might’ve alerted Abram as to my
whereabouts . . . which he probably didn’t care about so long as “Lisa wasn’t
doing anything crazy”—I crept on quiet feet to the fridge and opened it.
Momentarily
dazzled by the bright light within, it took several seconds of squinting and
blinking before the scant contents became visible. I frowned. In addition to
the pizza box, two suspicious-looking containers of Chinese takeout, and various
condiments, I found: shredded cheddar/jack cheese blend, a zucchini, a half a
pint of mushrooms, and hot salsa. Opening the hot salsa, I smelled it, and then
I dipped my pinkie inside and tasted it while examining the lid. It looked,
smelled, and tasted fine.
Placing
my finds on the island counter, I shut the fridge. The sudden extinguishing of
the bright light meant that the kitchen was now pitch black. Shrugging off my
lack of sight, I extended my arms and blindly felt my way over to the pantry
until my hands connected with the torso of a person.
A
person.
A
PERSON!
I
jumped back on instinct, my leg hitting one of the stools at the island counter
and sending it crashing to the ground. My heart in my throat, I screamed,
turned, and darted forward, but my feet tangled with the felled stool and I
pitched, bracing myself for a gravitational collision with unseen wooden bars
and a granite stool top.
But
then strong arms caught me, deftly spinning and lifting me into the air. Cold
dread rushed through my body, tensing every muscle. I couldn’t think. I didn’t
think. Instinctively, my legs and fists pumped, fighting against my captor.
Rocks in my throat as I readied another scream, a hand covered my mouth just as
I belted it out.
“Whoa!
Calm down. It’s me.” Abram’s voice at my ear soothed, his bulky arm a tight
band around my torso, my back to his front, my feet not touching the ground.
“Calm down. Shhh. Calm down.”
Hot
breath teased my hair and neck, and I stilled, relief at discovering it was
Abram didn’t quite chase away the viral panic still attached to my hemoglobin,
coursing through my veins. I shook. I was shaking. And I was gasping through my
nose, greedy for air.
Perhaps
he heard or felt my strained breathing because his arm loosened, lowering my
feet to the ground, and his hand covering my mouth slid away. “Are you okay?
Are you hurt?”
“I’m
fine,” I said, not sounding convincing. Truth was, I felt like throwing up.
“Can you, uh, let me go?”
His
arms immediately fell away and I stupidly rushed forward, once more crashing
into the stool.
I
heard Abram mutter a curse under his breath just as he caught me again, lifting
me off the ground again, and saving me—again—from another gravitational
collision. This time he turned us away from the stool and carried me across the
room.
I
didn’t fight him this time. In fact, I relaxed into him. Wired and exhausted,
but mostly embarrassed, I allowed myself to be transported without protest. We
left the kitchen and I was finally able to see dim outlines of furniture and
walls, courtesy of the streetlamp illumination spilling through the windows of
the living room.
Abram
carried me to my mother’s favorite piece of furniture in our house, a gold
velvet chaise lounge said to have once belonged to Napoleon’s sister, Pauline
Bonaparte. Depositing me on the soft surface, Abram crossed to one of the
Tiffany lamps and pulled the chain, bathing the room in soft blue and yellow,
colored light filtering through the stained glass.
He
then returned, knelt in front of me, one hand on my leg, the other cupping my
cheek. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,”
I said, cleared my throat, unable to lift my eyes higher than his black
T-shirt, and said again, “Yes.”
He
blew out a breath, pushing his fingers through my hair. By doing so, he forced
my chin up and caught my gaze. That wrinkle of worry appeared between his
eyebrows, and his very pretty eyes—which glowed and sparkled like polished
amber cabochons—moved between mine.
“You
really freaked out.”
I
stiffened, gritting my teeth and yanking my head back, out of his reach. “I
didn’t know you were there.”
Watching
me with watchful watchfulness, he let his hand drop slowly until it rested on
my left leg, next to his other hand which covered my right knee. “I said your
name—twice—when I walked in.”
“I
didn’t hear you.” I glanced from his eyes to where his palms were hot on my
skin. “And I couldn’t see. I’d just shut the fridge, my eyes hadn’t adjusted.”
“Did
you think I was a robber?” His left eyebrow lifted as did the side of his
mouth, just a hint.
Clearly,
he was trying to lighten the mood. Unfortunately, I still felt shaky. And
embarrassed.
“I-
I didn’t think,” I admitted, releasing an unsteady breath. “I wasn’t thinking.
Sorry I fell.”
“No
need to apologize. It wasn’t like you could help it.”
“Yeah.
Gravity can be such a downer.”
He
made a light, laughing sound. “What?”
“Uh,
nothing. Whatever.” No physics jokes!
His
frown returned, his fingers flexing slightly on my legs. “Are you sure you’re
okay?”
Reaching
for his hands, I removed them from my knees, setting them away. “I’m really
fine. I just don’t like—”
He
glanced at my knees. “Being touched?”
“When
it’s unexpected.” I crossed my arms.
“That
makes sense. But your reaction, even after you knew it was me—” He paused and
sat back on his heels, as though debating how to continue and finally settling
on, “It was a big reaction.” Abram continued to study me with his big, pretty,
knowing brown eyes. “Hey, I would never hurt you.”
I
winced, just a little, my gaze falling to my knees where his hands had been. I
wanted to huff a laugh and roll my eyes, maybe say something like, I know, don’t be ridiculous.
But
the word “Okay,” small and fragile sounding, slipped out instead. I immediately
wished it back, because I didn’t understand it. I didn’t know why I’d said it,
and I hated not knowing.
Get ahold of yourself,
Mona. Pull it together. You are fine. Nothing happened.
Meanwhile,
he continued his examination of me, I felt his stare, assessing my downturned
face. “Out of curiosity, and no big deal if you don’t want to say, but did
something happen to you this last year?”
My
back straightened and I sucked in a slow, deep breath before asking calmly,
“Like what?”
“You’re
very . . . different than you were before.”
“Because
I don’t want you touching me?” I tried to infuse my words with challenge,
strength—wanting to shake off any earlier impression of weakness—and mostly
succeeded. Peeking at him, I gauged his reaction from behind a hastily built
wall of dispassion.
But
then Abram dropped his chin to his chest, a massive grin lighting his features,
and the fragrance of him hit me. My lashes fluttered as though he’d blown dust
in my eyes, penetrating my wobbly wall of dispassion and sending it crumbling
to the ground.
God,
he smelled so good, and—unlike visual stimuli—I couldn’t stop whatever cascade
of relaxing, soothing, melting awareness smelling his scent set off.
Unthinkingly, I leaned forward an inch, chasing and inhaling the smell of him
while he cleared his throat, like he was trying not to laugh.
Why
he was fighting a laugh, I didn’t know, but the apparent genuineness of Abram’s
struggle to subdue his grin only served to increase his attractiveness.
A moment later,
he lifted his eyes and they connected with mine. He’d conceded to a shy smile.
It was quite a smile.
“Yes,”
he said.
“Yes?”
I parroted dumbly. What were we talking
about? And would it be weird if I buried my nose in his neck?
“Yes.
You not wanting me to touch you means that you are very different now than you
were before,” he explained.
I
appreciated the completeness and thoroughness of his sentence.
My
cheeks were hot. I pressed my hands against them while I examined him with
suspicion. What was he doing to me?
“How
so?” I asked, hoping to keep him talking so I could hunt down the splintered
pieces of my concentration.
His eyebrows
pulled together as his shy smile became a smirk. “You’re telling me you don’t
remember?”
“Tell
me your version of events,” I demanded, side-stepping a lie and still holding
my cheeks.
“Uhh
. . .” He scratched the back of his neck, peering at me like I both confused
and amused him.
I
was used to confusing people, but not amusing them. My cheeks burned hotter.
“Do
you even remember?” I pushed, knowing
my tone was belligerent.
He
made a sound like he was choking on a laugh. “Yes. It’s hard to forget waking
up to a naked girl in my bed.”
Jaw
dropping, my eyes grew to their maximum diameter.
Naked. Girl. In . . .
bed?
“Are
you serious?” I whispered, my mind darting in all directions, attempting to
form a reasonable hypothesis for Lisa’s behavior and coming up completely
empty. Suddenly, I couldn’t catch my breath.
He
shook his head, giving me an astonished once-over. “You honestly don’t
remember?”
My
mouth opened and closed as I struggled to speak, but it was no use. I was too .
. . I was too many things. Shocked. Confused. Incredulous. ANGRY.
LISA!
What
had she been thinking? She’d been eighteen! How would she have liked waking up
to find a strange, naked, eighteen-year-old boy in her bed?
I
was beyond shocked. I was horrified. I was electrocuted by the reality of my
sister’s brazen-slash-creepy quotient, because I couldn’t imagine doing
anything in the same sphere of possibility. I was beginning to believe that if
my twin and I were represented by a Venn diagram, our only areas of overlap
would be physical. A minor sliver of shared corporal characteristics, and that
was absolutely it.
“Lisa?”
Blinking
at Abram, and promptly becoming tangled in his searching gaze, I realized he
was still there. And I was still here. And my hands were still pressed against
my cheeks as I warred with what I now identified as hot mortification.
What else could I
do? I shot to my feet and marched out of the living room, dropping my hands and
running up the main staircase.
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Space
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Time
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