Ashley Morgan has her life already planned out after graduation. She'll return to the family home and take the reins of the family business. However, things don't seem to go her way. Instead, her father hands over the management of Morgan & Hall to his protegee, Jamie Standley. Upset, Ashley storms out, tearing up a gift from her father in the process.
Three years later, after her father's death, Ashley is forced to return to the family home for the reading of his will. There, it's revealed that both Jamie and Ashley will receive a share in the business. That is, under one condition...that the pair work and live together for a year.
Faced with the prospect of losing to Jamie, Ashley reluctantly agrees. Even though it means she'll be forced to live under tha same roof as Jamie, the man who effectively ruined her future, for an entire year...
Ashley is convinced that Jamie has always had other motives. That he cannot be trusted. And now she's going to get her own back. If, of course, she can manage to ignore Jamie's charm...
Okay, so the plot of The Inheritance is rather exciting. Guy takes over girl's dream, girl gets angry, they're forced to live together, she vows to get revenge. Even though the romantic aspect sounded (and was) entirely predictable, the rest of the premise was what interested me. However, I felt a bit let down by this book.
The main issue? Ashley. Ashley comes across as a spoiled, immature teenager throughout this novel, constantly throwing tantrums. At the beginning of the novel I was starting to warm to her, until she tore up her father's gift and stomped out. Whilst cohabiting with Jamie, she is incredibly stubborn and often quite nasty. I was expecting more from the 'revenge' aspect of this book, but instead, all I seemed to read was Ashley throwing another tantrum, or doing something incredibly childish. (For example, texting Jamie's staff and arranging for the lab to be closed for three days, thus risking lack of pay for the employees and risking missing an important deadline.) And why?
Because Jamie dared to sleep on her favourite sofa.
Due to this, halfway through the book I could see her father's point. And Jamie's, for that matter. I wouldn't trust Ashley to run a business either. So I found it hard to sympathise with her.
She came across as friendly to Jamie one minute, mean the next, constantly holding a grudge even when he was trying to be friendly. Thus, there were quite a few arguments throughout the novel that really weren't needed. I could have forgiven this had the characters been teenagers, but they were not. Ashley is a twenty-four-year-old woman, but acts like a spoilt thirteen-year-old. Her behaviour was a huge distraction from the plot, which I felt had a lot more potential.
That said, this is my own personal opinion, and other readers could think differently. (And like I mentioned before, I'm not a huge reader of romance). Angie Coleman has a nice writing style, and I'd love to read more from her in future. I certainly wouldn't let this one put me off reading her future novels, but this particular book just wasn't for me.
Rating: 3/5
Thank you to Netgalley for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
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