Stay Until We Break by Mercy Brown

Title: Stay Until We Break (Hub City #2)

Author: Mercy Brown

Publisher: InterMix

Release Date: June 21, 2016

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

What happens on the road stays on the road in the latest New Adult novel from the author of Loud Is How I Love You.

Twenty-one-year-old Sonia Grant, a business major, has big plans for a career in the music industry. So when she's offered the job of manager for her best friend's band, she jumps at the chance for some real life experience. When her number one crush, bassist Cole McCormack, jumps her the first night on tour, she hopes she's in for three weeks of some hot backstage action, too. But Cole turns out to have more up his sleeve than she or anyone realized.

Nobody knows that Cole is on the road to party like a rock star one last time before quitting his dream to take a more practical job and settle down. What he hadn't planned was to fall in love with a girl he believes is out of his league. Will Cole play out the rock star fantasy he thinks Sonia wants from him, or tell her the truth and take the chance that she'll either break his heart or make an even bigger dream come true?

Mercy Brown’s debut, Loud Is How I Love You, has to be among my favourite books from this year. There was something about the story that worked for and that got me majorly excited about what was to come from this new author. So Stay Until We Break? I loved it just as much as the first one.

I would like to officially nominate Stay Until We Break for best opening of a book ever. Seriously. Go read the opening paragraph of this story and tell me you don’t want to read the rest of the story immediately. That it doesn’t immediately make you fall in love with Sonia. Or that it doesn’t make you laugh all while nodding your head in a agreement. Because I totally did all of those things just after reading one paragraph. If I didn’t already know I was going to love this story. That paragraph alone would have sold me on it. It was just that great an opening. But moving on to the rest of the story which, spoiler alert, I also absolutely loved. Much like with the first book in this series, Loud Is How I Love You, I got completely sucked in to Stay Until We Break. There’s just something about reading about this particular group of people as they go about trying to make it in the music scene of the 90s that works for me. I just didn’t want the story to end because I just wanted to keep spending time with these people. And the romance you might be wondering? It’s hot. Like, REALLY hot. And I loved every single page of it. I couldn’t get enough of Sonia and Cole and their tour romance.

I adored Sonia and Cole (if you hadn’t figured that out already). I seriously loved them and I would have been perfectly happy to keep reading about them forever. I loved the sort of push and pull that was always there between them, the way neither one of them seemed to think that they were what the other wanted, needed, or deserved when in reality they were pretty much perfect for each other. Granted there were plenty of bumps along the road while they were figuring that out, but I loved seeing it all happen and feeling like I was part of what was going on between them. Besides Cole and Sonia, and this is something I also mentioned in my review of Loud Is How I Love You, what I love the most about these stories is all the other relationships outside of the romance. There’s such a fantastic bond between all the members of band that makes for fantastic friendships. And though I might be repeating myself (no “might” about it, I am totally repeating myself) I want to be best friends with all the people in Stay Until We Break, I want to go on crazy tour adventures with them. But for now, I would just settle for more books about them. 

Mercy Brown’s Stay Until We Break was absolutely fantastic. I loved every single page of this story and couldn’t help but want more. And I’m definitely hoping more is coming in the form of a book all about Joey. Because I would most definitely read that.

Loud Is How I Love You by Mercy Brown

Title: Loud Is How I Love You (Hub City #1)

Author: Mercy Brown

Publisher: InterMix

Release Date: January 19, 2016

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / B&N / Indigo

One girl’s heart gets rocked to the core in the first novel in this sexy New Adult series.

Twenty-one-year-old front girl Emmylou knows that getting her band noticed in the ’90s indie rock scene will be no easy task. She definitely knows better than to break the number one rules of the band: Don’t sleep with your bandmates! But after she ends up having the best sex of her life with her guitarist, Travis, she finds following that rule is a lot harder than it sounds.

When the band gets the gig of their dreams, making it big seems just within reach. But Emmy’s inability to keep her hands off Travis threatens everything they’ve worked for. Can Emmy find a way to break the rules and not blow the chance of a lifetime?

I am totally guilty of judging books by their covers. Let’s be honest, it’s something we pretty much all do. Sometimes, a pretty cover ends up leading to a disappointing story. But with Mercy Brown’s Loud Is How I Love You, the story was even better than the cover.

Emmylou knows that getting your band noticed is hard. Especially when you’re just far enough from the big city to compete. But she’s determined to make it. And wheat’s going help her and her band make it? Following some simple rules, the most important being to not sleep with one of her bandmates. But that’s easier said than done. Especially since Emmy can’t stop thinking about the one night she spent with Travis, her band’s guitarist, and her best friend. All Emmy wants is for things to go back to normal, especially with the band’s big shot at getting noticed is within their grasp. But Emmy doesn’t know what normal is anymore. She just knows she wants the band to succeed and she doesn’t want to lose Travis. She just has to find a way to make both work. But that’s easier said than done.

I first found out about Mercy Brown’s Loud Is How I Love You when the cover was revealed. And I totally judged the book by its cover because I knew I wanted to read this book before I even read the description. Then I read the description and it confirmed that I wanted to read this book. Then I kind of forgot about it...until the last couple of weeks when people started talking about it again and it reminded me that I wanted to read this book. And then I read it and, guys, I can’t even begin to explain how much I loved this book. I loved reading about this band trying to figure things out in the mid-1990s in New Jersey. I loved the romance in this story. I just loved the story in Loud Is How I Love You so freaking much. And, honestly, I don’t really know how to put that love into words. Just know that if you love music, if you love romance, if you just love good stories then this is a book you need to read. Just the fact that it’s set in the 90s indie rock scene should really be enough to get you to pick up this book. I mean, who doesn’t love a bit of nostalgia?

I’m pretty sure the reason I loved Loud Is How I Love You as much as I did is because of the characters. No joke, I wanted to be best friends will all the members of Starts on the Floor. Beyond being a band, they were just this awesome group of friends and they seemed like they always had such a great time together. So many times while I was reading, I was just cracking up at their interactions and conversations with one another and it just made me want to be friends with these people even more. But most of all, I just really want to be friends with Emmy. I loved the way her brain works. The way she would have these inner monologues that would go on tangents that didn’t really seem to make sense but they actually did. Maybe that’s because that’s how my own brain has a tendency to work. But at the end of the day I loved her. And then there was Travis. Who, obviously, I loved. Did I mention that I loved basically everyone in this book? But back to Travis. He was pretty freaking fantastic. As much as I loved Emmy, at one point I wanted to yell at her to get over herself and stop pushing Travis away. But it all worked out and I was happy.

In case it wasn’t clear, I loved Mercy Brown’s Loud Is How I Love You. I loved the romance, I loved the friendship, I loved the music, and I loved the 90s throwback. And I can’t wait to read more about this band and their friends in Stay Until We Break.