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My thoughts after reading Extreme Love by Abby Niles

Nearly every woman, unless she’s a supermodel, can think of a guy she felt completely flustered being around. The guy who she felt was totally out of her league. Who made her hands shake, heart flutter and stomach quiver whenever he was around. Just being in the same room with him was more stressful than a root canal. Well, that’s Dante “Inferno” Jones to Caitlyn Moore. He’s the toned, muscular fighter who oozes sex appeal and can have any woman he wants. She’s the once overweight, insecure girl who’s not used to attention from anyone but the “average Joe.” So when Dante sets his sights on Caitlyn it flusters her—and then some.

Extreme Love follows the relationship of Dante and Cait’s relationship. Dante is exactly what you’d expect him to be, gorgeous, muscled, tanned, self-assured. He could have any woman he wants and they all throw themselves at him.

Cait is the good girl. She’s pretty, but doesn’t see it. She’s always had a weight problem. Although she’s lost weight a considerable amount of weight and is physically fit, she still sees herself as the pudgy girl. She’s not at all self-assured and compares herself to the woman at the fighters’ parties who are dressed in “barely there” outfits. It’s at one of the after fight parties that she goes to with her friend whose boyfriend is a fighter, that she meets Dante. She can’t figure out why he keeps coming around her and it completely throws her off-balance.

Cait’s initial reaction to Dante doesn’t stop him from pursuing her, however. But it turns out there’s a few roadblocks in their blossoming relationship. A big one is that Cait hates what Dante does. She doesn’t like the fights. And he lives for them. Then there’s Dante’s training, his trainer, his opponent, and Cait’s ever present low self-esteem issues. The cards are definitely not falling in their favor.

The writing was done well. Characters came across as real and relatable. They were flawed, just how a character should be, because we are all flawed. Perfect characters aren’t relatable, Ms. Niles did a good job making sure her characters were “human.” Cait did get a little on the whiny side and at times became annoying, but for the most part it was easily over-looked.

I was very impressed by the weight issue and how it was handled in the story. I love that the female character wasn’t a size zero and actually had curves and was (gasp!) a size twelve (Oh, the horror!). And despite that fact, Dante was attracted to her…what? Really? A woman with curves can be attractive? Hell yeah! And thank you Abby Niles for writing two great characters showing us that! And let me just say…the love scene was so freakin awesome! Dante just made me swoon. He was so damn patient helping Cait get past her insecurities, but man, it wasn’t lacking in the heat department. Wow.

Bottom line: I enjoyed Extreme Love. Would I recommend it? Yes. Would I read it again? I just might. I liked the characters. I loved the weight issue that Ms. Niles addressed and how she addressed it. I was disappointed a little by the ending. I think the author was going for shock value and while I understand the intent to ramp up the ending, it kind of fell flat for me. Although, that’s just my opinion and based on the character involved (no spoilers here!) I can see why/how the story leaned that way.

FIVE stars: I loved the premise of the overweight girl losing weight but always feeling like the ugly duckling (been there, done that), based on that I give the book five stars. It was an enjoyable read and had a deeper meaning than most NA books on the market today. Abby Niles did a great job of telling young women that they don’t have to starve themselves to be a size two to be beautiful and wanted by a man. Curves are sexy, ladies. Rock ‘em!