He Sees You When You're Sleeping By: Lori Foster Series: Dean Brothers & Friend Book Number: 1 Star Rating: Sensuality Rating:

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Synopsis

Booker Dean fell for his neighbor, Frances, from the moment she moved in next-door two months ago. At the time, Booker was involved with another woman, so he and Frances became platonic friends. Even though he's known that the relationship with his girlfriend, Judith, has been over for at least a month, Booker hasn't been able to find quite the right way to break up, so when his brother tells him that Judith hit on him in a big way, Booker couldn't be happier. Now he's going to pull out all the stops to make sure that he gets the one gift he really wants for Christmas...Frances.

Review

I thought that He Sees You When You're Sleeping was a little light on the plot and character development. It is basically all about the hero, Booker, finding out that he is finally free of a past romantic entanglement. He then immediately sets out to get the heroine, Frances, into his bed, and a whole lot more. I normally enjoy the friends to lovers theme, but even though Booker and Frances had been hanging out as buddies for the past two months, I still felt like things moved too quickly for them. I liked Frances and respected her for keeping things purely platonic between them even though she had fallen for Booker almost as soon as she moved in next-door. She also insisted that he officially break up with his ex before they could start anything with each other.

There was just something about the way that things developed with Booker though, that didn't quite sit well with me. He had fallen for Frances while he was still involved with another woman, Judith, and then he strung Judith along for a full month even though he knew that the spark was gone from their relationship and it was essentially over. The author says it was because he was a nice guy and was looking for just the right way to break up, but in the end, all it accomplished was making both him and Judith unhappy and drove her to try to cheat with Booker's brother. When Booker realized that he didn't have to do the breaking up (which felt like he was trying to take the easy way out), he then immediately went to Frances with what I thought was a rather arrogant attitude, as though he didn't expect to be turned down. He did soften up later on, and I thought that them baking cookies together and talking through the connecting wall of their bedrooms was rather cute. The love scenes were pretty steamy which I would expect from Lori Foster as this is an area where she seems to excel in her writing. Since I've only read one other story by Ms. Foster, I don't know if including the ex is a typical thing for her to do, but the other story had this element too. While I don't mind if the hero has a past with other women, I don't care to hear about those exploits or to have the "other woman" play any kind of role in the story. I'm also not a fan of two brothers casually dating and/or sleeping with the same woman. That's something that just seems like it would be very weird and complicated in real life, but was treated very casually in this story.

He Sees You When You're Sleeping is the first in a trilogy of novellas titled Dean Brothers & Friend. The third story, Playing Doctor, features Booker's brother, Axel, as the hero and the second story, Some Like It Hot, has their friend, Cary, as the hero. From what I could tell in this novella, Cary seemed like a fairly decent guy, but Axel's extreme playboy persona did not endear me to him at all. Even though these two are both doctors which I usually like, I probably won't be in any hurry to pick up their stories. Overall, He Sees You When You're Sleeping was an OK read, but I just didn't feel connected enough to the characters or plot to really love it. I know that a lot of romance readers rave about Lori Foster, but I'm beginning to think that her style may not be for me. I might give her another chance with a full-length novel though, before throwing in the towel. He Sees You When You're Sleeping is found in the Jingle Bell Rock anthology.

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Lori Foster

Themes

Christmas Stories
Friends Before Lovers