Mia Hopkins

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST • A gangster hiding from his past. A single mom fighting for her future. Can she show this bad boy the man he’s meant to be? “A powerful, honest look at love as both a motivation and a risk.”—The Washington Post “Heartrending, raw and beautiful.”—USA Today’s Happy Ever After blog My name is Salvador Rosas. Back in the barrio, my past is written on the walls: ESHB. Short for East Side Hollenbeck, my father’s gang—my gang. Hell, it’s a family tradition, one that sent both my brothers away. They used to call me “Ghost” because I haunted people’s dreams. Now I’ve got nothing going for me except a hipster gringo mentoring me in a new career. An ex-con making craft beer? No mames. Still, people in this neighborhood look out for one another. That’s how I became Vanessa Velasco’s unwelcome tenant. Chiquita pero picosa. She’s little, but with curves so sweet they’re dangerous. I remember Vanessa from the old days, the straight-A student with big plans. Plans that were derailed by another kid stupid enough to think he was bulletproof. Now Vanessa knows better than to believe in empty promises. There’s fire in her . . . and if I touch her, I might get burned. I’m trying everything I can to go straight. But when East Side Hollenbeck comes calling, I might have to risk it all to find out if there’s a future for Vanessa and me. Because she’s the only one who can quench my thirst for something real. The Rosas brothers will return in Trashed! Praise for Thirsty “Thirsty held me captivated from its first page to its last with its heartrending, raw and beautiful story. . . . Mia Hopkins sublimely blends blunt realism with romantic fantasy and sharp-eyed social observation and delivers a happy-ever-after that is much more than a neat conclusion to a love story. . . . A singular reading experience.”—USA Today’s Happy Ever After blog “Thirsty is a brilliant read. There are good writers, and then there are writers that just leave you in awe. And Mia Hopkins has definitely left me in awe after reading this novel.”—Hypable This standalone novel includes an excerpt from another Loveswept title.

An Eastside Brewery Novel

Thirsty

Lauren Sullivan

OK, wow. How in the world did I get lucky enough to read two such different but equally amazing books in a row? This is a unique sort of romance book, considering it’s first-person POV from Sal’s point of view.

“’It’s not as easy as you think it is, Vanessa.’ I say.
She narrows her eyes at me. ‘It’s not as complicated as you want it to be, Sal.’
[..]
‘What do you mean by that?’ I whisper. I can hear my own heartbeat, pounding blood through my body.
‘I mean,’ she says quietly, ‘my whole life people have been trying to tell me what I am. A nerd. A good girl. An honor student. A slut. A whore. A failure. They were wrong each time. No one else is going to tell me who I am. Never again.’
She’s right. But her situation is not my situation. ‘That may be true for you. For me, it is complicated.’
‘The word complicated is nothing but an excuse to keep from thinking clearly and making a clean choice. It’s a coward’s word.’"

Sal “Ghost” Rosas has been in prison for five years for car theft, and after his release he goes back to his old neighborhood. He’s sleeping on one of his old gang friend’s couches, working two overnight cleaning jobs, generally keeping his nose clean and saving up money to rent an apartment for when his brother gets out of prison in a few months. While he’s been in a gang for most of his life (as has the rest of his family) he’s overall a good guy – he crashes on his friend’s couch, and when his friend cheats on his wife and leaves her, Sal still keeps coming around to help clean the place up and takes his friend’s wife and her kids to the church carnival. He works hard – he leaves in the dark, commutes via series of trains and buses, and comes home before dawn. He’s also brutally honest with himself about his chances of making anything of himself, with his conviction and the fact that once you’re a gang member, you’re always a gang member – as his own father learned. While he earned his nickname in the gang for other reasons, Sal’s pretty much a ghost now, working a job that nobody really notices, not really making an impression on anyone around him – “[u]nderpaid, often exploited, ignored, dismissed.” Vanessa is the girl everyone thought was going to get away from East LA – until she got pregnant by another gang member and had to give up her dreams of going away to college. Instead, she went to the local community college while living with her grandma and raising her daughter. She’s hardworking and stubborn, but still loving and sweet with her daughter and grandma. Sal’s noticed her since they were in school together, but thought he never had a chance with her. When her grandma offers Sal a place to stay in return for clearing out their old garage, it almost seems too good to be true. Of course, you can probably guess what happens next!

“’Do I look guilty?’
‘No.’ She stares at me a bit longer. She touches my cheek with the tip of her finger and it feels like a match igniting against my skin. ‘You look like you’re in pain.’
There are people who dance around what they mean and hide what they know. There are people who talk to you and ask you questions not because they care to know about who you are or what you feel but because they want to know how to exploit you, how to use you for their own purposes, and how to use your pain against you. Vanessa does none of these things. She gets right to the ugly part of the matter and shines a bright light on it. I suppose that’s what accountants are supposed to do. See where the numbers are wrong and shine a spotlight on them. To say, ‘Here’s where you’re weak. Here’s the hole where the money’s draining out. Here’s how to fix it.'”

Sal is buried under so many expectations of what he’s supposed to be – tatted ex-felon from the eastside – that it’s hard for him to be who he really wants to be. Vanessa helps him learn to say no to things that don’t fit his vision for his life, rather than just going along with whatever will get him attention, and grateful for it. Their relationship is good for Vanessa because it gives her something to focus on for herself – not for her job, or her daughter, or her grandma – oh, and lots of seriously steamy sex. Watching the two of them work out how a relationship would work was sweet and oh so fulfilling.

“’It’s a process, Sal. Just like brewing beer.’
‘What is?’
‘Making . . . making a man. Making yourself.’ He pauses. ‘You know, you remind me a little of myself back then.’
I put down my fork. What do I have in common with this skinny white dude? ‘What the hell are you smoking?’”
 
As for cons – the book ends on a serious bombshell. Not exactly a cliffhanger, but holy crap, I want to read the next book NOW. I also wish Ms. Hopkins would’ve went into Sal’s mental health issues more. Otherwise – I pretty much loved the whole thing!

Overall, this is an intense, delightful romance. Highly recommended!

I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Jolie

I love a book with an anti-hero. Sometimes I need to read something a little darker than the other books I have read. Something that is more true to life than the romances that I love to read. I got it with Thirsty.

I will warn you guys, Thirsty gets off to a very slow start. But it is worth sticking around for. Oh, so worth it. The author lays the groundwork for Sal and Vanessa’s romance in those first few chapters. More importantly, she explains how Vanessa is connected to Sal.

Sal was trying to rebuild his life after going to jail for 5 years. Trying to stay away from the gang that he was born into is hard. Even harder is trying to keep away from Vanessa. Vanessa is his unwilling landlady who is also the widow of a fallen gang member. Can he stay out of trouble and the gang? Or will he go right back into the lifestyle that he was born into? Will Vanessa and his love survive? Or will it become a casualty?

I loved that the author made Sal imperfect. I loved that he acknowledged that he did wrong in the past and he was trying to move past it. His anxiety attacks and the resulting self-harm made my heart hurt for him. I also like that he was a quiet guy. He didn’t have much to say. I thought that he did make a good try at trying to stay away from the gang. It was hard for him, seeing that he was living in the neighborhood that they ran. But I had to give him credit because he tried so hard to stay away.

I thought Vanessa was kind of witch with a b in the beginning of the book. But I got to thinking about it and you know what, I don’t blame her. She was trying to keep her daughter and grandmother out of the gang. So when Sal shows up in her garage, I don’t blame her for blowing a fuse. He also brought back memories of her husband, good and bad. As the story went on, though, you could see her defenses going away. The only thing that she asked of Sal when they got together, was that he stays out of trouble.

The sexual tension and sex in Thirsty were through the roof hot. Sal was a horny guy from page one. I knew that the sex was going to be good when the scene with Sal masturbating in the shower was hot. I wasn’t disappointed when they had sex. What got me, and what I liked, is that Vanessa and Sal were into kinky stuff. I don’t see enough of the kinky stuff written in romance books. I loved it.

I didn’t see the romance between Sal and Vanessa at first. It was all sex, which was fine with me. The night of the carnival was when the romance part of the book hit me. Sal was heads over heels for Vanessa. But it was rocky because of Sal’s gang association. When certain events happened in the book, I didn’t blame Sal for leaving or Vanessa for kicking him out.

Besides the plotline where Sal is trying to rebuild his life, there are a couple other major ones. There is the plotline with Sal’s father, who died when Sal was in jail. He was greenlighted by the head of the gang. But there is a twist in that plot that surprised me. There is also the plot with the gang and Sal’s relationships with different members. Both of those plotlines were not resolved at the end of the book. They were both left open.

The end of the book was sweet. I loved seeing how far Sal had come from the beginning of the book. Not going to lie, I did have some happy tears towards the end of the book. The epilogue, though, was fantastic.

The author does include a note to the readers from the author. Let’s just say that I am glad that she had such in-depth access to information that helped created her characters.

I would give Thirsty an Adult rating. There are some graphic sex scenes. I wouldn’t recommend for anyone under the age of 21.

I would recommend Thirsty to my family and friends. But with a warning about the sex scenes and violence. I would also reread this book. I enjoyed reading it and connected with the characters.

I would like to thank Random House Publishing Group, Loveswept, and NetGalley for allowing me to read and review Thirsty.

All opinions stated in this review of Thirsty are mine.

**I chose to leave this review after reading an advance reader copy**

Thirsty An Eastside Brewery Novel

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