Review! It Felt Like A Kiss by Sarra Manning

Meet Ellie Cohen, one of the most perfect girls in London.

Ellie manages a swank Mayfair gallery, but it’s her life that’s a real work of art. Great job, really good hair, loyal friends, loving family. It’s only her succession of lame duck boyfriends that ruin the picture.

Oh, and the world-famous rock-star father she’s never met, who won’t even acknowledge her existence.

Then Ellie’s perfect life is smashed to pieces when her secret is sold to the highest bidder and her name, face (and pictures of her bottom) are splashed across the tabloids. Suddenly everyone thinks she’s a gold-digging, sex-crazy, famewhore.

Enter David Gold. Charming and handsome David Gold. On paper he’s even more perfect than Ellie, if only he wasn’t her father’s ruthlessly ambitious lawyer whose job is to manage the crisis – and her. He certainly doesn’t think that Ellie’s the innocent party and she doesn’t trust him at all. So why is it that every time they’re alone together, damage limitation is the last thing on their minds?

Review: I'm a big fan of this author's writing and I was so excited to read this book. The structure of the book was very interesting. It covers Ellie in present day London but  also has flashbacks to when her mother was in London, and around the time that Ellie was conceived. I love parallel storylines like this (of course they both came together in the end) but I did find it a little hard to get into at the beginning. I felt a little like there was a storyline that I should know something about but I didn't, like I had missed something somewhere. When I got into the flow of the story, however, I really enjoyed this dual perspective, and found it added to the excitement of what was going to happen to Ellie in the end. 

I wasn't sure initially how Ellie would deal with the problems posed to her in this book, I worried that perhaps, she would crack under the pressure, but then I remembered that this is a book written by Sarra Manning and so of course Ellie would be a kick-ass feminist heroine with friends and family of exactly the same ilk! She was a wonderful character because she never lost hope, wanted to continue to work and strived to be independent through the entirety of the novel. Her mother was equally strong and just didn't seem phased by any of the drama going on around them, when again, she could have crumbled under the pressure. 

The relationship that developed over the course of this novel was an interesting one. I kind of saw it coming but I almost didn't want it to happen. This is unusual for me, but nevertheless I still had some aww moments during the ending and the sexier scenes between the two characters were excellently written. I really liked that this book was set in London, it became another supporting character almost and gave as much to the storyline as the quirky people who worked with Ellie at the gallery and her mothers interesting acquaintances. 

Although this book was long in terms of pages, it really wasn't a difficult story to read and didn't feel like it dragged at any point. Because of the drama unfolding in the story it had plenty of pace! Overall I really enjoyed this novel and it definitely lives up to the standard set by this authors other adult novels. I have a couple of her other titles sitting on my shelf and will definitely be reading those very soon!