Black Lace - The Gift by Portia Da Costa

I’ve been a fan of Portia Da Costa since reading The Accidental Call Girl. When I saw this as book of the month with the free dream bullet I couldn’t resist.

I loved the way the story was written; the characters had depth to them, having met previously, although Sandy doesn’t recognize Jay at first as he’s been heavily scarred due to a car crash.

The book had some twists and turns in the storyline, even though one or two were predictable.

It had some great sex scenes taking place in a variety of places in a variety of ways, providing plenty of one-handed reading.

I will admit, reading erotic fiction is a guilty pleasure. I even enjoyed reading 50 Shades in a don't-tell-my-friends kind of way.

When The Gift by Portia Da Costa arrived, I got my nose stuck right in, and it turns out it's one of those books you just can't put down. Even though you can guess what is going to happen, and even though a couple of bits did make me roll my eyes, you still have to read it all before you can put it down.

I'd definitely recommend getting this book, especially if you enjoy reading and have some time spare.

I'll be honest - I wasn't expecting much from this book. The blurb doesn't exactly give much detail so I thought this would be another cringey, poorly written erotica. I was very pleasantly surprised to find that was not the case.

The Gift is written in third person, however it shows both Sandy and Jay's points of view, which I found very useful. I found myself drawn to the characters, especially Jay who was intriguing - I loved how the first chapter was from his point of view and set the tone of the whole book. Sandy seemed like a real, natural woman, which was very unusual but definitely a good thing. I found the chapters to be just the right length, not too long so that I got bored but just long enough to be sufficiently detailed and interesting.

I found the erotic scenes tasteful, without any cringe-worthy words usually used in this type of book. There was one that made me laugh, 'love hole' if I remember correctly, which described the entrance to the urethra in a penis - I thought it was a little bit unnecessary.

I must admit that the book was extremely predictable. I found myself knowing exactly what was going to happen most of the time. The ending left me wanting to find out more and I thought the epilogue wasn't adventurous enough, but it was still nice, although again - highly predictable.

The book didn't exactly turn me on, but I thought it was well written and a pleasant read. I also like how elegant and simple the cover is, it goes well with the overall theme of the book.

Overall I greatly enjoyed reading the Gift.

I have never read any of Portia Da Costa's previous books so I was really looking forward to reading this one.

The story revolves around Jay and Sandy. Jay has had an accident which has left him horrifically scarred, physically and mentally. But he had a brief encounter with Sandy years previously and never forgot her.

I really enjoyed the book and found myself getting lost in the story. I didn't mean to but I read it over a couple of days. I think she is an excellent writer as it was well written and easy to read.

I'm not really sure what else to say as I don't want to give anything away... I liked that the story was more original than a lot of other erotic fictions. The sexy bits were very sexy and definitely got my imagination running away from me.

I'd highly recommend this book to anyone who likes a bit of light erotic reading. I'll be looking out for Portia's next book.