REVIEW: Winning the Boss's Heart by Hayson Manning

Winning the Boss's Heart by Hayson Manning
Publisher: Entangled Indulgence
Publication Date: September 9, 2013
Rating: 4/5 stars
Get it: Amazon | B&N

Mason Christian has twelve weeks to flip something old into something new for his Japanese client, and then he’s getting the hell out of Footsteps Bay, New Zealand. Not even his temporary cook and secretary—the feisty, luscious Billie McLeod—will deter him. There’s no denying she makes him feel alive. More alive than he’s felt in three years...

Billie has one dream: save enough money to go to college. That’s why she’s agreed to work for hard ass, all-business-no-pleasure Mason Christian—a man who has every intention of destroying through "modernization" the town’s most cherished historical home. But before she can say see ya, she realizes she’s signed the dotted line and is contractually bound for eighty-four days.  Working with male perfection every day is awesome with a capital A—as long as they can stick to a hands-off policy that gets harder every day...

My Review

I didn’t think I would absolutely, positively dig this book so much as I do! What Hayson Manning created in Winning the Boss’s Heart was such a gem. I was so swept away by the characters and the quickness of the book and just the homey feel that was weaved in. 


I thought I wouldn’t like Mason at all because he was just so demanding and cold and closed off. He even had the audacity to call his assistants by numbers instead of their names and expects them to work long ass hours. I kind of wanted to hit him upside his head and ask him what his deal was. But oh, the pain that he showed and the bottled up guilt softened my heart for him and I completely get why he was the way he was. After such a tragic loss and how he continued to blame himself, I could see why he thought the perfection he once had was all he ever would have. He totally drowned himself in work and became so walled in. I wanted to open his eyes and his heart and just make him see that there was so much out there. 

And I think Billie does the job. Here was this quirky woman who had big dreams of going back to culinary school, who had a strange but cute dog, who never stopped talking, who made every area like it was well lived in, and someone who totally challenge Mason. And that is why I loved Billie from the very start. She had more character and personality for her and Mason and everyone around. She was silly and sometimes spoke without her brain and mouth communicating and she wasn’t afraid to just banter right off with Mason. Billie was a person with so much energy and life, she was the light that Mason so desperately needed. 

These two were always at each other’s throats, but I loved them because they were exactly what the other needed. It was obvious from the start that their professional relationship would be different because of Billie’s extraordinary personality. She got under his skin and he had no choice but to let her in. Those little glimpses of him feeling something for her were the best parts for me. I especially loved the easy banter between them though most the time Mason would get angry or frustrated it was still so entertaining and made me laugh out loud. I was surprised by the amount of humor, the affection and even the hurt that both characters had or felt. For me, it was the characters that gave this book that comfort easy to read feeling and I’m so glad I picked it up!