I was lurking on Kboards one day, and stumbled across an author asking for a cover critique.  It was a nice, romance-type cover, and the name of the book Ache sounded like this would be an erotic romance.

But the synopsis the author gave made me head straight over to Amazon and load books one and two onto my Kindle. I graduated high school in 1983.  Although I only flirted on the fringes of the punk scene, I couldn’t resist a romance steeped in images from my youth. The fact that the main character is 18 (I’m not a huge fan of YA novels) didn’t dissuade me. 

And I loved it.  Everything from the garage bands, the cassette tapes in the Nova, the girls with big, permed hair.

Connor is a tortured teen, but he’s not your typical angsty tortured teen.  He’s had a terrible childhood full of abuse and death. Eventually this all turns into a rage that fuels both his music and his occasional hero tendencies. He’s on the right side of town one night, about to crash a yuppie party, when he comes across a girl about to be raped.

Drunk and weighing about sixty pounds less than the attacker, Conner still intervenes and saves the girl at the cost of his pride and a whole host of bruises.  There’s a connection, a moment of magic between the pair of them, but when Connor wakes up the next morning, head throbbing from the beating and a hangover, he can’t remember her name.

Two years later he wonders if the blond beauty, Shauna, who works in the bank could be his mystery girl from that night. Would someone like her ever go out with a punk guy from the bad end of town?

I’m not going to spoil the story, but I ended up rooting for all the kids with pain – buried and not-so-buried, in their lives.  I ended up hoping they all find a love that heals.

And yes, the new covers are awesome!