One Night in Paris by Lucy Felthouse

The Basics:
One Night in Paris by Lucy Felthouse
Tirgearr Publishing
Book Two in the City Nights series
Erotica
Published June 26, 2014
Source: Received from author in exchange for an honest review.
Amazon.ca

Why I picked up this book:

I liked the concept.


Blurb:

Jacob is nearly forty, and has recently come to the sudden realisation that he’s not doing much with his life. Sure, he’s got his own successful business, but what’s the point in earning lots of money and not doing anything or going anywhere to spend it? 
He’s in serious danger of being all work and no play, so he starts to rectify this by organising a twenty four hour layover in Paris en route to a meeting in Dubai. Whilst there, he goes on a bus tour of the city, and there meets Annabelle, a fellow Brit who’s studying in Paris. There’s clearly an attraction between the two of them, so when the gorgeous Annabelle makes an indecent proposal to help Jacob fill his time in Paris, who is he to refuse?

My thoughts:

I really liked the premise of this book - it's a pretty straightforward concept, entirely reasonable for a short erotic story. Unfortunately, I don't think the connection between the characters was strong enough to support the book.

My main problem was with Jacob. It's his perspective we're given throughout the book, and the vibe he puts out the entire time is nervous and anxious. He seemed to me to be rarely enjoying the moment with Annabelle, which is challenging in erotica. When they were having sex, I wanted him to be more focused on that activity.

I found some of his reactions to be a little silly for a forty year-old man - particularly one who travels internationally, is his own boss, and seems like he should be a little more worldly? I guess that's an unfair presumption to make - anyone with his or her head down, focused on work and not on a social life could legitimately act a little high school-esque.

Unfortunately, I really couldn't understand what attracted Annabelle to him. The dialogue between the two felt a little unnatural - and I can't help but think some of my general inability to connect with these characters may simply be due to the short format and the need to achieve so much with so little word count. That said, once the sex started, Jacob's appeal became clearer: he knew his way around a woman's body, bringing Annabelle a lot of pleasure, and and that was a big plus.

The sex was chatty and playful, more so than I expected. I thought there was some creativity here - I liked that the idea of being in Paris was really emphasized. There's a sort of learning the landscape of Paris that could have played out well against learning each other's physical landscapes. I thought that the sense of anxious excitement (not only at the prospect of getting laid but also the heightened thrill of some of the sexual scenarios played out in the story) was well conveyed in the book. This is going to sound odd, but I also appreciated the book's attention to time. Rather than jam in every famous Parisian landscape, One Night in Paris picks a few highlights.

Bottom line:

This short erotica didn't really do it for me. My main problem was not believing the couple as a couple when they weren't getting physical. To each their own though - I suspect many readers would be just as enchanted by Jacob as Annabelle is. Still, I recommend passing on this one and picking up one of Felthouse's other erotic stories, such as Stately Pleasures which I reviewed earlier this year.

2.5 stars
For fans of erotica, exhibitionism, lust at first sight