Title: Doctor Playboy (Boston’s Billionaire Bachelor 4)
Author: J. Saman
Published: June 6, 2022
Publisher: Independently Published
Readership: Adult
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Rating: ★★★★
Content warnings: Parent with cancer, hospitalisation
I received a copy of Doctor Playboy from the author in exchange for a fair and honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
He was older. Impossibly gorgeous. And had no clue I existed.
Luca Fritz was the worst sort of playboy, constantly falling in and out of love with every woman he met. I used to spend hours of my life staring at the huge Fritz mansion from the window of the staff house dreaming of him. By eighteen I’d all but given up my fantasy, set to go off to The Conservatory in London to follow my dreams when fate stepped in with other ideas.
That summer I was young. Innocent. And forbidden to him.
I knew when we succumbed to the explosive passion between us that he would inevitably ruin me.
I wasn’t wrong.
Four years later, fate decides to step in again. I’m offered my dream job as a first chair cellist for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Only I know what comes with it.
Luca Fritz.
On opening night, he comes barreling back into my life. Desperate for a shot at his second chance. A second chance I have no intention of giving. Now a brilliant neurosurgeon he thinks he knows exactly the right way to crawl back not only into my bed but into my heart.
I don’t care how persistent, unexpected, or clever he is. I am not that love-sick teenage girl anymore. It’ll take a hell of a lot more than panty-melting smiles and heart-stopping encounters to win me back over.
This cocky playboy is about to learn that all’s fair in love and war. And this is the latter.
DOCTOR PLAYBOY is a 120k word STEAMY and EMOTIONAL second chance, age-gap romance. It is a standalone in the bestselling Boston’s Billionaire Bachelors series featuring Boston’s hottest billionaire doctors and the women they fall head over heels for!
I stumbled across this series while reading doctor romances for my Doctor Romance Reading Vlog this month, and despite the fact that I’d only read book in the series I was intrigued to read Luca’s story (given I’d read about his twin in the previous book).
Doctor Playboy is a second-chance romance with an age gap that starts when Raven is 18 and Luca is 29. Luca stumbles across the daughter of his family’s head of security playing the cello when he’s at his lowest point, recovering after an injury has side-lined him from his career. Raven and Luca know that their relationship might be side-eyed, but for a month, they make each other happy until Raven has to make a choice between following her dream or following Luca. Luca’s decision breaks them apart and four years later Raven is still nursing the hurt from their separation. Now successful in her own right, Raven is back and if Luca wants to win her back, he’s got to pull out all the stops.
I enjoy an age-gap romance and this one was handled with a deft hand. Before we get to the first conflict, we see that Luca and Raven bring out the best in each other, despite the difference in their age and lived experiences. They have the support of family and friends (for the most part) and are happy. The conflict arises because they’re simply at two different stages in their lives and Luca makes a decision that he believes is in Raven’s best interest (more on that later).
After the time jump, Raven’s returned to Boston and is a lot more confident in herself and her abilities – aside from the odd bout of stage fright – but she’s terrified of coming face to face with Luca agin. Which is a challenge because she’s close with everyone in his family, having known them for so long. But unlike in the past, she’s not willing to take his first attempt (or his second, third or even fourth) at rekindling their relationship at face value. He hurt her and she is no longer willing to accept anything but everything. And she makes him work for it, which I appreciated.
I understood why Luca made the decision he did for Raven (even if I don’t agree with him making sole decisions on behalf of her) because he didn’t want her to miss out on her dream. In an ideal world, they probably would have sat down and had a proper conversation about it rather than what actually happened, but this is a fiction novel and some dramatic conflicts are expected. I did get frustrated when he continued to try and make decisions for her once she returned, but she quickly put him back in his place.
The supporting cast was fantastic – it was great to see that both of them had allies willing to support them both and care for them both even while they’re muddling their way through what they want their new relationship to be. There’s plenty of family and found family elements in here, and lots of characters who appear in previous books.
This book has a lot of heart for a steamy contemporary romance and I’m invested in all the characters.
Noveltea Corner 