Audiobook Review: Settling the Score by Eden Winters

Outed and dumped on national television by his rising star boyfriend, Joey Nichols must face the bigotry of the locals in his small Southern town alone. His dreams of a happy-ever-after lie crushed at his feet.

Novelist Troy Steele has an axe to grind against Hollywood heartbreaker types. Transforming Joey into a gorgeous, unobtainable hunk would be payback worthy of Troy's poison pen. It's a brilliant way to get back at Joey's image-obsessed ex-boyfriend and the movie producer who's mutilating Troy's novels.

What begins as simple revenge may tangle them together in something far more complicated. Living well may be the best revenge, but Troy and Joey could rewrite that to loving well.

Narrator: Joseph Morgan
Listening Length: 10 hours and 45 minutes

Reviewer: Annika

Normally I’m a huge Eden Winters’ fan. I’ve loved so many of her previous books, which is also the first reason why I decided to pick up this book. The second being the narrator Joseph Morgan. I love listening to new (to me) narrators. And it didn’t hurt that I found the premise of the book to be very interesting. Sadly the book didn’t live up to my expectations. Which is so sad, because when I look around I see so many readers loving it. It kind of makes me wonder if I read the same book as everyone else?

The only character I even remotely liked was Joey. Though I can’t really say that I’m head over heels for him either. It almost feels like Winters went out of her way to create characters that are extreme in every way.

Take Joey as an example, doormat extraordinaire. Everyone talked to him like he was a child, instead of the grown man he was supposed to be. He felt like someone who’d had grown up in an abusive home. Afraid to take up space, to have opinions or even speak his mind. He was almost childishly naïve. When told he was unlovable as he was, and needed a makeover to attract and keep a man he never questioned it. And if he made all the changes others wanted for him first then would be worthy of love? Hell no! I know that sadly this is the view by many today, that the surface needs to be perfect for you to matter. But it just felt wrong to me.

I’m not against changing your looks or life, but you need to do it for the right reasons – for yourself. And because you want it, not because others tell you to. It would be one thing if Joey had asked for the make-over, but he wasn’t. He wasn’t even consulted of what was going to be changed. Only ordered to do this or that. That’s something I’m never going to be okay with.

Then there was Ryker. A jerk in every way – if he had a single redeeming quality I didn’t see it. He literally went out of his way to cause as much hurt for Joey as he possibly could. He gave off this slimy vibe that I wanted to take a shower every time his name was mentioned.

Lastly we have Troy, the second main character. He was someone I never warmed to. The way he treated Joey, as if he was a possession rather than a person didn’t sit well with me. It came across as him using Joey to further his own end, and that Joey should be happy with the scraps he deemed necessary to hand out. Their relationship, such as it was felt majorly imbalanced and far from equal.

Joseph Morgan was an okay narrator, or reader I should probably say. Because sadly he was not feeling what he was narrating. At times he did try for adding some passion and feeling, but it fell short. It didn’t feel genuine. He did distinguish between male and female characters but not really the individuals. It wasn’t a bad narration in any way, but it Morgan isn’t a narrator that I’ll go look for either.

A copy of this book was generously provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.