Tainted Black by Shanora Williams

This was much more than I had anticipated. The author pitched everything at this and it not only took it all the book fought back – this was two characters who were prepared to stand toe to toe in order to have their story heard!

Chloe is a loner, with no friends and a less than stellar home life, she is thrilled when she gets a new neighbour and the opportunity to finally have a best friend.

What she hadn’t anticipated was the connection that she was going to feel towards her friend Izzy’s father, Theo.

But in the blink of an eye when his world is torn apart, Chloe knew that she would be the one to catch him when he fell.

She would be the one to help heel his heart and to give him the strength he needed to be not only the father Izzy needed but the man she, Chloe adored.

This is described as taboo, but to be honest I actually didn’t think it was.

Yes, he was much, much older than Chloe but what’s age but a number!

He was her best friend’s father – uncomfortable I get that but your heart has no definition of time, no limit on the age of who it loves.

It was awash with anger, drama, passion and lust but it was sympathetic, empathetic, charming, sensitive and poignant.

Our hearts are meant to love and to be loved, sometimes convention may try to dictate the manner of how we control that emotion but keeping a love like they had contained was always going to be a lost cause.

The author did mix things up a bit and I have to say the ending caught me unaware. It wasn’t at all what I had anticipated.