I’ve been wanting to read this for a long time and since I was in a slump, I decided to take the plunge. And what a plunge it was!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, we love romance but Jasmine and I will read anything. I needed to shake things up so this book happened. If you are a sensitive reader this book is not for you.

Celeste is a sexual predator who became a teacher just to prey on teen aged boys.  Yes, it was as cringe worthy as it sounds. I didn’t know what to expect when I started this. I didn’t expect to be totally enamored and fascinated with Celeste. Being in her head was like nothing I ever experienced before. Celeste was highly intelligent, narcissistic, cunning, evil, and downright disturbing at times. The crazy part is, I found all this out in the first chapter. I won’t go as far as to say I was a fan of Celeste’s, but I will admit to being an invested spectator. I was totally immersed in this train wreck of a story. The writing pulled me in effortlessly. So much happened in this story and I’m still reeling from the experience.  I honestly don’t know where to start.  This was a heavy read. It took me days to read it. I had to seek counseling from my hubs and take numerous breaks.

Celeste was determined to find the right boy to have a “relationship” with. She finally chose Jack and things went to shit after that. I mean, jaw dropping moments ensued. Sheesh! The lengths Celeste would go to get what she wanted and keep her secrets was bonkers. It’s terrifying to think that there are people like Celeste in the world. I don’t know how I feel about this book. I knew I was buying a ticket to crazy town, but ended in deranged town, then wtf town! This book was wild.

I apologize for my crazy review, but this book made me that way. I don’t know what to say. This story line was not an ideal one, but it made me feel everything. It took me somewhere I would never want to go in real life. This story was a journey of epic proportions. I would love to see where these characters end up 10 years later.

5 wtf stars

Natasha

Blurb:

Celeste Price is an eighth-grade English teacher in suburban Tampa. She’s undeniably attractive. She drives a red Corvette with tinted windows. Her husband, Ford, is rich, square-jawed, and devoted to her.

But Celeste’s devotion lies elsewhere. She has a singular sexual obsession—fourteen-year-old boys. Celeste pursues her craving with sociopathic meticulousness and forethought; her sole purpose in becoming a teacher is to fulfill her passion and provide her access to her compulsion. As the novel opens, fall semester at Jefferson Jr. High is beginning.

In mere weeks, Celeste has chosen and lured the lusciously naive Jack Patrick into her web. Jack is enthralled and in awe of his teacher, and, most important, willing to accept Celeste’s terms for a secret relationship—car rides after school; rendezvous at Jack’s house while his single father works late; body-slamming encounters in Celeste’s empty classroom between periods.

Ever mindful of the danger—the perpetual risk of exposure, Jack’s father’s own attraction to her, and the ticking clock as Jack leaves innocent boyhood behind—the hyperbolically insatiable Celeste bypasses each hurdle with swift thinking and shameless determination, even when the solutions involve greater misdeeds than the affair itself. In slaking her sexual thirst, Celeste Price is remorseless and deviously free of hesitation, a monstress driven by pure motivation. She deceives everyone, and cares nothing for anyone or anything but her own pleasure.

With crackling, rampantly unadulterated prose, Tampa is a grand, uncompromising, seriocomic examination of want and a scorching literary debut.