Here's my review for the third book in the Dirty Air series. Enjoy!
Wrecked by Lauren Asher – Dirty Air #3
Enemies-to-lovers: 9.5/10
Forced Proximity: 9/10
Emotional Rollercoaster Read: 9.5/10
Sports Romance: 8.5/10
Steam: 9/10
Enemies-to-lovers. Forced proximity. A bad boy and strong-willed heroine both tormented by their pasts. Sizzling chemistry. Laughable banter. Addictive world of F1.
Lauren Asher has done it again! Wrecked is the third instalment in the Dirty Air series of sports romance, and it is amazing. It follows the story of Jax Kingston, who you meet in the previous books, and Elena Gonzalez. Elena is introduced briefly in Collided but it’s not until Wrecked that we get to see her fully and learn about her story. Jax is the British bad boy of the F1 circuit, whose notorious partying and womanising constantly lands him in the press for all the wrong reasons. McCoy, the team he races for, orders for him to clean up his image and they hire Elena, a PR expert, to help.
She’s tasked with keeping Jax in line and making him seem like a golden boy to the cameras; but neither one of them predicted the tension between them, or their tainted souls haunted by trauma. With a lot riding on this job, Elena tries to fix Jax’s image, but the racer is far from thrilled and keeps pushing her away. The push and pull between the two escalates and reaches a point where Elena pushes her way in as Jax spirals, and he breaks through the barriers guarding her heart. Will Elena learn why Jax keeps everyone at arm’s length? And will Jax help heal Elena’s broken soul?
Jax Kingston is the sexy British playboy, who goes through women, drugs and booze faster than he races on track. He’s known for his wild ways and partying adventures but everything the public sees is fake. It’s a masquerade that Jax wears to hide the truth from everyone – even his best friend Liam. Nobody knows the real reason as to why he buries himself in unhealthy habits apart from his parents. His friends care about him and want to help stop him from self-destructing, but no one is successful. It’s only when Elena is hired to work with him that he begins to open up, no matter how hard he tries to fight it.
Elena Gonzalez. A sassy, determined Mexican woman, with a gut-wrenching past. Elena is a PR expert trying to build her business and pay the bills for her grandmother to stay in a good care home; her best friend, Elias, is Jax’s racing partner and helped her get her foot in the F1 world. Elena needs the money and so she accepts the job to work with Jax. As time goes on, she learns who the true Jax Kingston behind the façade is, and she sees pieces of herself in him. Broken, jagged pieces tainted by their past…or in Jax’s case, his future. Elena is tormented by a childhood trauma and has worked for everything she has, but when Jax worms his way through the walls she’d built, she finally lets herself be happy.
When I read the first two books in the Dirty Air series, I didn’t like Jax all that much – he was my least favourite racer out of the four. However, when I read Wrecked, I fell in love with his character (Oh, how I wish book boyfriends were real!). The layers of characterisation Lauren created are amazing. Jax is cold and self-destructive and appears heartless, but he’s also sensitive, sweet and desperate for, yet scared of, happiness. Elena is a smart woman, who knows what she wants and will work hard to get it, and isn’t afraid to call people, mainly Jax, out on their bulls**t; but, she has strength within her that rivals that of many. The story behind Elena’s childhood and the scenes where she’s tortured by it are utterly heart-breaking.
The emotions in this book are raw and real and you can feel the character’s pain. You can taste their happiness and you can experience their love. Jax and Elena’s story is beautiful and expertly written. Their love is unique and their journey to being truly happy is one of the best I’ve read. Wrecked is one of my favourite books with a favourite trope of mine (enemies-to-lovers) as well as one of my favourite book couples!
You should definitely read it – and the extended epilogue! It will give you all the feels and you won’t regret it!
Click the cover below to buy Wrecked on Amazon or get it from free on Kindle Unlimited.
Disclaimer: I own the edits, not the images