My Prerogative – Sasha White

White, Sasha. My Prerogative. (New York: Penguin, 2008). ISBN – 9780425223406.

Main Characters: Kelsey Howard and Harlan Shaw

Related Works: Many characters from other books appear or are mentioned.

• Kelsey works at Valentine Ward’s club – Risque. Valentine Ward meets Samair Jones in Trouble.
• Kelsey refers to Val’s friend Karl Dawson. Karl Dawson meets Lara Fox in Wicked.

Description from book:

Kelsey Howard is happy with the single life. She has great friends, a fun job tending bar, and a nice apartment. Not to mention the freedom to enjoy a few wild sex games with strangers – the riskier the better. But what she’s really looking for in the darkness is love. Then Kelsey realizes she’s got a stranger watching her every move – and every move she makes is arousing them both. In fact, not only is she not scared, she thinks she may have finally found her soul mate – especially when she meets the mischievous mystery many in the flesh. That’s when the fun and games really start, and Kelsey realizes just who far she’s prepared to go for love.

My Thoughts:

Ok, this was another one of the times when I went to Borders and found a book on the shelf before the release date. This time, I admit, that I was specifically looking (hoping, might be a better word) to see if I would be lucky enough to be able to get my hands on the book before September 2nd. I was psyched to find the book – 1) because it was Labor Day weekend and I had time to read and relax, 2) because I was interested in reading about Kelsey because of comments made by the author herself about reactions to the book and 3) because Wicked and Bound are two of my favorite books.

Generally, when I read books, I just go with the flow. I don’t often think too much about the reasons why I like a book. I might spend a bit more time dissecting things when I don’t like a book, but not formally. As a rule, I stay away from books that are often classified as women’s fiction – which I label friendship stories. I am not interested in that – and there are a whole group of authors that I stay away from because this is the type of story that they write. So many of these books center around groups of women and their lives. When I read a book, I am looking for romance. It doesn’t particularly matter to me if the books are considered to be typical romance types or erotic fiction. Sex can be romantic. Do I need a happily ever after? I admit that I prefer it. If I think a book doesn’t have a HEA, I have to read the end first. This allows me to read the book and get to know the characters in a way that fits in with the ending. Then, I don’t get disappointed. As for a HEA, I don’t need promises of undying love and marriage – just a notion that the main characters (I don’t even care how many there are of them) are happy.

So, I was a bit surprised that a reviewer didn’t finish My Prerogative because it was too “womans fiction-y” (taken from Sasha White’s blog post). I didn’t find it to be so. Sasha White does have a tendency to dig deep into the psyche’s of her female characters – and I guess I can see that this tendency combined with the fact that Kelsey and Harlan don’t actually meet until almost mid-way through the book might make the book seem non-romance-y. However, I found the relationship between Kelsey and Harlan to be quite romantic. Harlan put time, effort and thought into trying to break through Kelsey’s barriers. To me, one of the most romantic points in the book was when Harlan took Kelsey to Granville Island to look for a wedding present for her sister (and for some other stuff too 🙂 ).

So, ultimately, I definitely enjoyed the book. I like to think that I “got” Kelsey – even if I got her in my way. She is a woman who seems to have always felt as if she was different from her more conservative family – one who wasn’t her going to be happy with a “regular” 9-5, desk job. She enjoys sex, but has always been able to run roughshod over the men she let in her life. Harlan is the first man to challenge her, to see through her tough shell and be able to figure her out- and more importantly to be able to accept all of the facets of her personality. Kelsey seemed to feel the need to expose the most dramatic, most difficult parts of her personality to the men in her life and then get disappointed when they were not up to the challenge. I don’t really think that she isn’t a traditional heroine. She is a woman looking for love and acceptance, she just happens to be more sexually active than many. I actually like to see heroines that are more accepting of their sexuality. I think this is a good thing.

Read first August 31, 2008