Behind the Bar by PC Zick is Book Two in the Behind the Love Trilogy

Behind the Bar is Book Two in the Behind the Love Trilogy

Behind the Bar is Book Two in the Behind the Love Trilogy

Susie and Reggie return to the Behind the Love Trilogy as the main characters in this romance. Susie and Reggie have been together since high school. When they watch good friends Dean and Leah find happiness, they both know something in their relationship must change. Susie believes that means marriage; she didn't expect it to be Reggie deciding they needed a break from one another.

While on break, a handsome publisher comes back to Victory to sweep Susie off her feet, while the voluptuous Sally Jean works her charms on Reggie. Meanwhile, the Victory Tavern owned by Reggie grows into a star attraction for the town. Dean and Leah help, and Susie’s sister Lisa returns home and provides Susie some much needed answers to the questions about their father. Reggie nearly loses everything in a bet that jeopardizes the Tavern. Secrets revealed bring more questions. When Reggie realizes Susie is the woman he loves, Susie must decide if she can ever trust him again.

Before either of them can move forward to a life together, they must realize their past does not define them.

P.C. Zick began her writing career in 1998 as a journalist. She's won various awards for her essays, columns, editorials, articles, and fiction. Today, she writes romance and contemporary literature with her pen drawing plots filled with love, hope, and forgiveness.

Links:

Website: http://www.pczick.com

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Behind-Bar-Love-Trilogy-Volume/dp/1500455474

REVIEW ONE

I was given this book for free in exchange for an honest review. I did not read the previous book in this series, so that may be why I didn’t feel much of a connection with the characters. It has a good story line, and the character building was great. However, I didn’t feel like there was a lot of spark between the main couple. I didn’t feel like there was much passion except when they were fighting. It is more of a sweet story, then a romance. Like a movie on the Lifetime network, it leaves you warm and fuzzy from the great ending. Suzie and Reggie have come to a crossroad in their relationship. Suzie wants more than Reggie is willing to give. After Reggie suggests they take a break from each other, there is a major fight and they split up. A former crush comes back to town, and tries to tempt Suzie away from Reggie. At the same time an old friend tries to become more than friends with Reggie. During their split, secrets start to come out in the light of day in their personal and professional lives. One of these secrets ends up getting Suzie mugged at gun point. This leads to Suzie questioning a lot of things about the past. Suzie goes to her sister for answers, and ends up with more questions about their family past. Reggie is tormented about his family past as well. In the end both Suzie and Reggie have to decide if they can put the past to rest and be together, or go their separate ways. I really liked the characters in this book. They fight, argue, and forgive. There is a lot of love; I just didn’t feel much passion. It is like the main lovers were in a rut just going about their everyday lives till there was too much frustration for it to continue to be the same old thing. I liked the storyline, but it didn’t suck me in. For me it was not a book that I just had to stay up all night to read because I couldn’t stand to put it down, but I still really enjoyed it.

B. Mulder

For TJs Virtual Book Tours

REVIEW TWO

Disclosure of Material Connection:   I received this book for review from TJTW Virtual BookTours and the author.   I was not compensated nor was I required to write a positive review.   The opinions I have expressed are my own.   I am posting this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255:   "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising".

Susie is at a wedding.   Her boyfriend, Reggie, comes off as being a little self-centered.   He continually gets asked a certain question that he doesn’t want to answer.   You’ll find that you want to yell at Susie but then you’ll realize that she won’t hear you no matter how loud you’d get.  

Our author has created a book that can be a quick read but it can also be frustrating.   If you have just a few hours that you want to spend reading a book then you may want to check this one out.   But be

warned, some of these characters can be very frustrating.   You wonder how they got to the point in

which we first meet them. One thing that may help is that if you haven’t read Behind the Altar, which is book one, what a great time to catch up on the series.

I found that until I got to around the halfway point, I was easily distracted.   But even though I thought Reggie a total jerk, there was just something that caught my attention and I just didn’t want to put the book away.   The author also had me feeling that Susie is just too good for him.   Which ends up being a great incentive to see what’s in store for her characters – how is she going to finish the trilogy?

A positive about the story is that I had no trouble picturing every scene as it unfolds.   A negative was how Reggie treated Susie.   But then again there are men out there that do treat women that way and that just adds some realism to the story.   Is it a story I would read again?   If I wanted the complete trilogy experience then yes I would.   If I considered it as a stand-alone would I read again?   Probably not.  

I just didn’t feel that Reggie and Susie had a connection that loving couples should have.   And there were other interesting characters that I would love to read more about. My experience with this book didn’t turn me off from reading more of what this author has to offer.   Not every writer has the same writing style and readers have to broaden their horizons and check out authors they’ve never read before.   And because the book wasn’t a totally bad experience, I would go back and read book one so that I can get ready for when book three comes out.

L. Reynolds

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REVIEW THREE

This is awesome book about love and betrayal. Susie has been with her boyfriend Reggie for 5 years. When they attend their friends wedding Dean and Leah. Everyone is asking when Reggie will ask Susie to marry him. Reggie love Susie but he can not see himself as a married man, after what his father did to his mother. Reggie decides that him and Susie must take a break from each other. Susie is really hurt, Susie see Sally Jane hanging around Reggie more and more. When Susie learns that Sally Jane has gotten Reggie to agreed to book a band at the Tavern,the pain is to much for her.   Sam ask Susie out when he learns that Reggie has broke it off with her. Their first date does not turn out well. Trevor comes to town and tell Reggie that he their to collect the money owe to him, little does he know that the FBI is going to arrest him.Susie heads to New York to see her sister Lisa and get away from everything, she learns that she is pregnant. Susie also wants to know what truly happen to her father, Lisa tells her all see knows and say that she needs to ask Reggie, Dean and Sam.

When Susie arrives back in town, she goes to Reggie to find out the truth. Can Susie over come all the betray she feels that Reggie has done and still have love for him?

OVERALL IMPRESSION OF THE BOOK: This book is a love and betrayal triangle story. The ending is surprising. This is a must read of a totally love story and romance.

V. Lee

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REVIEW FOUR

P.C. Zick’s, Behind the Bar, is a tale of two lovers, Reggie and Susie caught in the miasma of ghosts from the past, the shadow of childhood fears and the unrealized confusion of dissimilar hopes for the future. At the start of the story, both love each other deeply while not yet with heart and soul.

Zick’s skillful blending of tension, untruths and complex relationships has the reader enthralled as each new sub-plot unfolds. High school friends with a dark secret, a woman's buried memories from an unhappy childhood and the legacy left by parents who were themselves not whole nor healthy as adults, make it clear that Susie’s fairytale dreams were only that - dreams.

When all seems lost and never meant to be, the author brings to a satisfying close, a story of love that is, always was, and should ever be. After all, when you start from the premise that two individuals, hopelessly and irrevocably in love, is the ideal precedent for marriage, the reader hopes to the very last word that it will be so for Reggie and Susie. Find out if Susie and Reggie will also have the fairytale wedding and life together, when you read, Behind the Bar.

Though I found many aspects of the entwined relationships to be amusing, I also found the background story to many of their problems, hang-ups and attitudes equally fascinating. There’s no bond like old team mates, and there is no bond stronger than that between sisters and best friends. I recommend this book to romance enthusiasts for many reasons. One, the author captures a setting and placement in time that presented so that it is easily visualized. The second reason I recommend this book is that the various couplings are done with a fine enough brush that the details serve to contrast and complement the varied relationships very well. Though more for any reader than just fans of romance, the qualities which clearly mark this for a romance book, are crafted with refinement and care so that any reader can enjoy the reading as I did.

T. Jones

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REVIEW FIVE

With this book, I loved the characters.

The author brought me into the story with the emotional roller coaster of life.

With the ups and downs of a relationship being told of, the main couple lived together, worked with each other,loved each other. He had problems with marriage due to his parents marriage. She had problems with trust also due to her father.

Most of the story is in a small town setting where the main characters lived,loved and grew up together. Friends became enemies, lovers did not trust each other due to the insecurities of their own. They learned that there is more to their past than what is remembered. She blocked what happened the night her father left and her mother was taken to the hospital. Her mother came home and beat her mother so badly that she lost a baby. This later left her mother depressed and no will to live.

The father , she thought left, was killed when he walked out in front of 2 of the towns fab four high schools football heros. These 2 later turned to financial geniuses, who were into gambling and loan sharking.

This story has many twists and turns, most make sense, a few are harder to understand until you get further along into the story. It keeps you turning the pages with these twists in the story.

The plot of this chapter in the series revolves around 1couple, her sister and her ex, the previous story in the series main characters, getting married. This is what leads the male to believe he should not get married because of what his father told him as he was leaving his mother. "I only married your mother, because she was pregnant" the trapt man belief that he did not want to end up in.

P. Smith

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