Hi, everyone!
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for BE YOUR EVERYTHING (The D’Angelos Book #2) by Catherine Bybee.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an excerpt from the book, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Description
From New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Catherine Bybee comes a romance about childhood friends who marry in Vegas and embark on a wild ride to find their happily ever after.
With two protective older brothers and a traditional Catholic Italian mother, it’s surprising that Chloe D’Angelo can manage a date without someone in the family naysaying her romantic choice. And Dante Mancuso…oh, no. Her brother’s best friend is not a dating-app right swipe.
But when they are left unsupervised on a late night in Vegas, all of that changes. Add in a Vegas wedding chapel and a couple of “I dos” and Chloe wakes up with a ring on her finger and a hangover. Dating Dante was always a secret desire, but marriage? The rift that this news would cause in her family has the both of them keeping their nuptials to themselves as they scramble to undo their Vegas mistake.
Dante knew the rules: Chloe was off limits. Only he can’t stop once his mind starts to believe she might be his forever. Just as their attraction deepens, Chloe flees to Bali, desperate to clear her head.
All Dante has to do is keep her brothers from killing him and convince her that they are meant for each other. But first, Dante has to find her.
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61021730-be-your-everything?ref=nav_sb_ss_1_18
BE YOUR EVERYTHING
by Catherine Bybee
Montlake Romance
On sale November 15, 2022
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My Book Review
RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars
BE YOUR EVERYTHING (The D’Angelos Book #2) by Catherine Bybee is another wonderful contemporary romance about members of the D’Angelo family who are a traditional Italian family. This story features Chloe who is the baby of the family and her brother’s best-friend, Dante. While this is the second book in the series, you can easily read it as a standalone, but you will love this family so much, I know you will want to go back and read the first book When It Falls Apart.
Chloe D’Angelo loves working at her family’s restaurant, but she has bigger dreams. Her dream trip to Bali must wait until after her oldest brother’s wedding. The entire bridal party is off for a Las Vegas weekend to celebrate before the wedding. Chloe has always had a crush on her middle brother’s best friend and now in Vegas, she is ready to show Dante what he has been missing by avoiding her as they grew up together.
Dante Mancuso is like a third brother to the D’Angelo brothers. While growing up, he was known as a player, and he has kept the reputation even as he works in Italy and only returns to visit his family and the D’Angelo’s. Now, home for the wedding and looking to set up a branch of his business at home, Dante is finding Chloe difficult to resist even as he knows he is breaking the brothers’ code of not dating their sister.
But crazy things happen in Las Vegas and Dante goes all in and he and Chloe run into a Vegas wedding chapel. The next morning, they know they are going to cause family upheaval, so they decide to keep the marriage a secret. As their attraction grows, Chloe flees to Bali and Dante is going to have to prove to her they are meant to be together.
I loved this story and the entire series to-date is entertaining and fun. I lived in an Italian neighborhood for many years and the traditions and family bonds are very accurately portrayed in this series. From the nonnas keeping an eye on everyone and the close-knit families and Sunday mass, these stories take me back to this neighborhood. Chloe and Dante are fully drawn characters and their relationship is believable and the sex scenes were not gratuitous. All the characters are realistic and make me want to be a member of their family and community. This book has everything I am looking for in a contemporary romance and I did not want it to end.
I highly recommend this contemporary romance, this series, and this author!
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Excerpt
“Go! I don’t want to see any of you back here until Monday.”
Chloe stood outside the back door of their home in Little Italy, surrounded by both her brothers and her soon-to-be sister-in-law. They all had small suitcases at their feet as the Uber van pulled up to take them to the airport.
Mari, their mother, had a hand on Francesca’s shoulder as they saw the bachelor/bachelorette party off.
“Mama, are you absolutely certain?” Luca, the husband-to-be, her over-worried oldest brother, couldn’t stop the concern that crossed his face anymore than he could the love he had in his eyes for the woman at his side.
He and Brooke were the real deal. Head over heels, all in . . . completely lost in each other.
Chloe couldn’t be happier for them.
They needed Vega. Boy, did they need two nights in Vegas.
“I ran this restaurant before you were born and after with all three of you jumping around. I have it, Luca. Go. Just don’t get married. Wait until you come back for that.”
“What about babies?” Gio, the middle child and smart-ass in the family, asked.
“That you can do,” Mari said with a wink.
Brooke knelt to Franny’s level and gave the eight-year-old a kiss. “Listen to your nonna.”
There were hugs and waves as Giovanni, or Gio, as he was more often called, shoved all the suitcases into the back of the van.
Gio took the front seat as the rest of them climbed into the back.
“I can’t believe you talked me into this,” Luca said to his brother. “Busiest time of the year.”
“It is not. That’s in the summer,” Chloe argued. It was the last week of November. The family restaurant was fully staffed and ran like a well-oiled machine, even with three of their employees out at the same time. “It’s going to be nothing but family and friends, celebrations and ceremonies from here on out. This is the last chance for you two to let loose until it’s all over.” Chloe reminded them.
“You mean until after Christmas,” Gio said.
“Right.” They weren’t taking their honeymoon until after Christmas. After they returned a week into the new year, then it would be Chloe’s turn to get out of town. Her long-awaited tickets to Bali were burning a hole in her pocket.
This was her last opportunity to cut loose until it was all over as well.
Chloe watched their family home disappear from sight. It was a four-story building with the family restaurant on the bottom floor. The second story was the family home where they’d all grown up, and the third floor was where LUca, Brooke, and Franny now lived. On the very top was what used to be guest quarters but now was the bachelor pad that Gio took over. Secretly, Chloe was hoping Gio would find Mrs. Right and move on himself so she could occupy the upstairs apartment as her own space. She loved her mother, but living with her was getting old. As an Italian, Chloe wasn’t going anywhere until she married, that’s just the way things were done in her culture.
“Franny is going to be okay, right?” Brooke asked Luca as they settled in for the short ride to the airport.
Chloe rolled her eyes.
Francesca, Luca’s daughter from his first unfortunate marriage, was probably already elbow-deep in gelato and milking Mari for all the attention and goodies a nonna could give her.
“She’ll be fine,” Luca said, kissing Brooke’s forehead.
The ride to the airport took less than ten minutes, a perk when you lived in San Diego and everything was close.
Getting through security and waiting in the airport would take longer than the actual flight to Vegas, but it beats a long drive across the California desert any day of the week.
“Thanks again for inviting Mayson to join you guys,” Brooke said to Gio and Luca.
“He’s a friend of yours. He’s a friend of ours.”
“Besides, we need even numbers,” Chloe added. As she said that, she saw Salena waving them over to her side before they entered the TSA line.
“Vegas, baby!” Salena all but yelled for everyone to heard.
Chloe tossed her arms around one of her dearest friends for a hug. They’d known each other before braces and periods. As ride-and-die friends went, Salena was someone Chloe could count on to be there.
“We could have picked you up,” Gio said.
Salena, who lived in Little Italy as well, shrugged. “It’s okay. I had JOey take me.”
“Joey? Do I know Joey?”
She waved a hand. “Flavor of the month.”
Gio narrowed his eyes. “You’re worse than me.”
“No one is worse than you,” Chloe and Salena said in unison.
The three of them fell in line behind Luca and Brooke, who were arm in arm and whispering in each other’s ears.
“They do know that we have separate rooms, right?” Chloe asked her brother.
“Yes.”
“I don’t think that’s going to matter,” Salena added.
“Divide and conquer. Once everyone arrives, we have dinner, pull straws on who is in charge for the night, and go to our separate clubs.” Gio lowered his voice. “We’ll give them tomorrow afternoon to knock it out.”
Chloe laughed. “We may never see them again.”
Salena nudged Chloe’s shoulder as they inched their way up the line. “Is Dante flying directly from Italy?’
Just hearing Dante’s name had Chloe standing taller. Gio’s best friend, and the one boy that had always been “off-limits” for oh so many reasons, was the cause of many sleepless nights.
The man only grew more beautiful with every year that passed.
And he knew it.
And the women knew it.
All the women!
“He’s already in the States. New York, He’ll be in Vegas about an hour after we land.”
Salena nudged Chloe again with a grin once Gio turned around.
Stop. Chloe mouthed the word without sound.
Once they moved through security, they found their gate for the forty-five-minutes wait to board the plane.
Salena and Chloe sat with their luggage while the others went to find coffee and water for the flight.
“Are you prepared for a weekend with Dante?” Salena asked once they were alone.
Chloe shook her head. “Listen to you. It was a high school crush.”
Salena laughed. “I’m pretty sure it started in fifth grade and never ended.”
“He’s lived in Italy for the better part of five years.”
“And every time he comes home, you forget how to speak.”
“That’s not true.”
Salena glared.
Okay, it was a little bit true. “I did better last year.” It helped that she stayed out of his orbit that time around and he was only home for a month.
“How long is he staying this time?”
“No idea,” Chloe said. Her cell phone pinged, grabbing her attention.
She opened her messages inside a dating app she’d been on for a few weeks.
“Who is that?” Salena asked, looking over her shoulder.
Chloe glanced at the image on her screen, the one she’d swiped right on. He was thirty, no kids. Worked somewhere in La Jolla. “His name is Eric. We’ve been texting for a few days.”
“He’s cute.”
“I thought so.”
His text came through, asking what she was doing. She started typing.
“Have you met him yet?”
Chloe shook her head, finished her message about the bachelorette party in Vegas.
“Are you going to?”
Three dots indicated he was typing.
:Only if he asks.” As progressive as she was, she found it necessary for the man to take the first steps.
“You know . . . if you stack the desk with dates while Dante is in town, it might be easier to be around the man.”
Salena had a point.
Chloe’s phone buzzed.
How about meeting for coffee when you get back? Wednesday enough time for you to sleep off the hangover?
Chloe showed the message to Salena.
“Say yes.”
Her friend was right. Chloe needed all the help she could get when Dante was home. If her attention was elsewhere, maybe he’d lose his appeal.
She agreed to coffee with Eric on Wednesday and told him she’d get in touch when she returned.
“I have a feeling this weekend is going to be one for the record books,” Salena said as she watched more passengers arrive for their flight.
“It’s likely the one and only time I’ll be in Vegas with both my brothers.”
“Considering how they’ve helicoptered you since your papa passed, that’s not a bad thing.”
She’d been seventeen when their father died. Luca became the head of the family while he had a one-year-old and a failing marriage. What a crappy couple of years that had been. Now, things are looking up. For all of them.
She’d finished her college classes and earned her business degree. But instead of working for someone else, she wanted to do something on her own. She blamed her family for that. Yes, she waited tables at their restaurant and, honestly, liked the job. But what she loved more than anything was teaching yoga. Her trip to Bali was supposed to happen the year the world shut down, and it was only now that time and the world’s health were giving her the opportunity to go. She knew, somehow, that the trip was going to guide her to whatever her path was going to be. Maybe she’d start her own studio or her own online channel. Brooke had a boatload of knowledge about marketing and was on board with helping her start up. Financially, Chloe had banked nearly everything she’d earned from the first day she started working and was more ready than most to begin her future.
Her father, in all his wisdom, had taken out a life insurance policy that their mother had divided and put into investment plans for each of them. Luca immediately put everything in his name to his daughter. Giovanni was itching to invest in a vineyard. The resident sommelier wanted to spend time in Tuscany as much as she wanted to spend time in Bali. So, while they did pull shifts waiting tables, doing what had to be done to make the family restaurant run, it wasn’t their lifelong ambition. Well, Luca was the chef, and that was his life’s choice . . . and she and Gio were thankful for it.
“They promised not to act like big brothers in Vegas,” Chloe said.
“Yeah, well, they aren’t going to the same strip clubs we are.”
The image of her brothers holding a hand over her eyes made her smile. “Thank God for that.
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About the Author
Catherine is a #1 Wall Street Journal, Amazon, and Indie Reader bestselling author. In addition, her books have also graced The New York Times and USA Today bestsellers lists. In total she has written thirty-six beloved books that have collectively sold more than 10 million copies and have been translated into more than twenty languages.
Raised in Washington State, Bybee moved to Southern California in the hope of becoming a movie star. After growing bored with waiting tables, she returned to school and became a registered nurse, spending most of her career in urban
emergency rooms. She now writes full time and has penned the Not Quite series, The Weekday Brides series, the Most Likely To series, and the First Wives series. Learn more about Catherine and her books at www.catherinebybee.com
Social Media Links
Website: http://www.catherinebybee.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorCatherineBybee
Twitter: https://twitter.com/catherinebybee
Tik Tok: https://www.tiktok.com/@catherinebybee1
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2905789.Catherine_Bybee
Purchase Links
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09Y5FV1LR?notRedirectToSDP=1&ref_=dbs_mng_calw_1&storeType=ebooks
BN: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/be-your-everything-catherine-bybee/1141400366?ean=9781542034883
BAM: https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Be-Your-Everything/Catherine-Bybee/9781542034883?id=7850591409347
Thank you!!
You are welcome! I love the family!