Ruin Me by Jamie Brenner

The sexy New Adult e-original from Jamie Brenner, in which Lulu has everything except the one thing she never knew she desired—until now.

She lives in a world of beauty.

His life is shrouded in darkness.

When they meet, she must choose between everything she has and the one thing she has always desired.

Lulu Sterling thinks she has it all figured out: with one more year left at NYU, she’s spending her summer interning at her mother’s iconic art gallery, determined to overcome the long shadow of her father’s suicide and prove herself to her critical mother. With her boyfriend, rising artist Brandt Penn, Lulu also hopes she will finally experience the love and desire that have always eluded her.  But passion comes where she least expects it in the form of a brilliant, reclusive street artist known only by the tag GoST, and Lulu must decide how much she is willing to risk – and how far she is willing to go --  to claim it.

 

Ruin Me was a quick and easy ready with very interesting characters, but they all seemed to be doing their own thing.  While I wasn't as intrigued with the plot as I could have been, I was taken in by the way the author told the story. The only real connection I felt between the characters was when they were trying to manipulate others for their own agenda or beginning to find their own way in life.

Lulu was probably one of the only characters that were actually trying to break free, so her manipulation of the situations I could understand.  She had a powerful mother Anna who owned an art gallery and she was determined that Lulu would soon take an active role after college.  Anna had the perfect man, Brandt who was an up and coming art star for Lulu and all she needed was for Lulu to get on board with the plan. Her father had committed suicide and while Brandt looked perfect on paper, he was far from her dream man or anything she desired.  

It didn’t matter the years of grooming her mother had spent getting Lulu to this point, it took one trip outside for fresh air during a showing for Lulu to see GoST do his art work on the side of a building.  The freedom and beauty that came from street art had drawn her in long ago, but GoST was a mysterious artist that she wanted to meet. The art work that her mother was promoting would never fill her heart like street art would.  The freedom and flow that she saw on the side of the building was what she longed for in her own life and GoST might just be the man to open the door for her.

Along with the twists and turns of Lulu trying to decide if she should break free from her mother’s demands and the planned future to embark on a life with GoST, she is going to have to deal with Inez who is Anna’s assistant.  As plans start to be disclosed Inez is going to have to take things into her own hands to secure her own future.  Things get interesting with Inez; she is the villain you love to hate at times, yet you can feel the desperation in her that motivates her actions.

GoST is a character of his own, mysterious, driven and yet not as confident as I felt he was portrayed in the book.  I felt I could see a weakness in him that made him connectable to the reader.  As driven and inspired by his art as most authors are, he was not one to jump into a relationship with anyone.  He preferred the invisibility that his kind of art gave him but Lulu was going to be a challenge to him.  I will state that I loved how the author made this relationship not start with a roaring fire, but with a spark from what would be considered the kindling of their lives and allowed the characters to direct their own path as the story goes. 

When I started thinking about this review I was going to give it a three, but the more I think about the style this author used, I believe it deserves a four star rating.  She not only explained New York, she painted the scene in a way that I could envision the streets, the art work and the environment around the characters.  She wrote about the behind the scenes activities in the world of art, the competition, the need to be one step faster than others, just to secure your financial security perfectly.  I could almost feel the intensity in that business and it also made me sad that the love of art was lost due to the need to succeed.  She developed the characters in a way that leads me to believe they were truly in charge of the direction this story was going to go.  Nothing seemed forced with them; they were allowed to take their time while not letting the story drag.  She has a rare form in her writing that I do appreciate so I would recommend each of you give this book a chance and see if she opened up a new form of writing for you as she did with me.