In It to Win It by Sharon C. Cooper

e-Audio, 09:03:42
Narrated by: Zenzi Williams
Release Date: December 13, 2022
Published by: Books on Tape
Read from: December 14-15, 2022
Companion to Business Not as Usual 
Source: PRH Audio (I received a copy of this book from the Publisher in exchange for a just and honest review. This did nothing to influence my review.)
TW: Death of Parents mentioned
For Readers Interested In: Romance, Black Romance, Second Chance Romance, Adult, Spice Level 2 (Smex happens, but nothing is shown/described), Realistic Fiction

    Two entrepreneurs compete for a property, but secure the biggest win of all—each other—in this second chance romantic comedy by USA Today bestselling author Sharon C. Cooper.
     Spoiled, fickle, and flighty are only a few adjectives that have been used to describe Morgan Redford. She’s never had to worry about money, but she’s determined to build a career on her own and do something meaningful with her life—by helping children who are aging out of the foster care system. She has her eyes on a property that a family friend is selling, which is perfect for these young adults to live in, but her competition is someone she never expected…
     When Los Angeles real estate developer Drake Faulkner learns that his eccentric mentor is selling property that is perfect for his portfolio, he jumps at the chance to buy it. But he soon learns the billionaire has other ideas: buyers must compete in an Iron Man competition of sorts for the property. Drake refuses to play along with this ridiculous demand…until he finds out Morgan, his ex who left him years ago without a word, is one of the potential buyers. No way is he letting her—Little Miss Self-Absorbed—win the property he wants. Bitter? Yes. Petty? Probably. But as the gauntlet of games heats up and forces them to face the past, they are met with a pull that feels all too familiar.
     Now, if they could only keep their eyes on the prize and off each other—but who’s to say they can’t do both?

*MY THOUGHTS*

For whatever reason I didn’t think was going to be a companion to Dreamy’s book. I think because that one was so weird on it’s own lol A girl with her head in the cloud wins the lottery AND gets her rich af boyfriend? Well this one is her sister in law, and I figured that it wouldn’t be as weird because it wasn’t her blood relative if that makes sense. But no, it was also weird lol I’m assuming that’s part of Cooper’s FMC’s personalities.

Ok so first things first, the main characters. I LOVED Drake. He raised those twins from nothing and gave them a life they loved when I know most people doubted him. He worked his ass off and even though most of his life isn’t shown in this book, I found myself still being super proud of him. And for him to come out on top like he had? I was like a proud aunt to those kids lol

Now Morgan was nice, but she was really weird lol I thought we’d gotten over that since this was Karter’s sister, but nope. Morgan wasn’t weird so much as she had weird things happen to her. I didn’t dislike her, but I thought she put herself into these positions. Like the running away from things that seem hard? I didn’t care that she never seemed to grow up. Like she did the same thing she did in college, no matter what she said she’d do. And I didn’t understand that. There was no character growth, no arc and it seemed like she wasn’t interested in moving.

Their relationship was ok. I wasn’t as invested because I didn’t like Morgan I think. She was great when her and Drake were together, but I didn’t exactly care for her while they were apart. Now for the tea, Drake is an old flame of hers and Idk, I LOVE second chance romances. I’m one who doesn’t like instalove, but I also don’t like to see them not kiss until 5 chapters to the end. Second chance romance is a good balance for me because there’s always those residual feelings there. And that’s exactly what this one had. I could tell from jump that Drake still had feelings for her as much as he didn’t want to and I could tell that she had feelings for him even though she acted as if she didn’t. When they finally got it together, tho, it seemed seamless. It was really the only part of this that seemed believable.

Now I know this is fiction, but Lordt bffr this is set in a contemporary setting. There has to be something that has some stuff that is real. Like man, come on I know being clumsy is real, but someone actually doing and carrying out this competition for a building just didn’t seem real. I didn’t understand. And again, I get it, it’s a fictional world. But Lordt this was even less believable than the first. I think it was just the writing style with this one tho. Because there was even more than one “I let out the breath I didn’t know I was holding.” I don’t remember it being in the first one even once, but this one had it multiple times. Idk, it was giving weird.

The ending was hella rushed for me too. Idk, I figured out way before she did what was going on, and I knew it was going to freak her out. What I didn’t expect was her doing the exact same thing as she did last time. Like GIRL. And then when this happened, once he found her, she told him and it was like BOOM story’s over. Like you’re not going to unpack why she keeps running from him? You’re not going to give her a chance to redeem herself? Because right now she just seems to be the untrustworthy person he was saying she was. I get that it was because he loved her etc and what they made together, but they should have had a talk or SOMETHING. I think not giving us that talk and instead giving us an epilogue was a cop out.

I didn’t even know this book was coming out until I saw it pop up on the app. Pair that with the content issue and I was a little sad about this book. I wanted it to be like the first, with Dreamy chasing wigs and being loud and proud of who she was no matter her circumstances. This was quite different and I can’t say I preferred it.

Overall, I give this

I ended up rounding up for Goodreads