All He Wants

Gibbs (the pseudonym of romance novelist Susan Johnson) hops on the Fifty Shades bandwagon with a bland but steamy billionaire/college student erotic novel. Widower Dominic Knight is a successful but emotionally withdrawn venture capitalist. A financial crisis at his company leads him to hire new MIT graduate Katherine Hart, who, rather inexplicably, has an excellent reputation in forensic accounting. They manage to stave off their mutual attraction for a while, but when only a week is left on Katherine’s short contract, she and Dominic can’t help winding up in bed together. While their mildly kinky sexual encounters deepen their feelings, there is little drama or spark elsewhere in the story. Neither exhibits more than token resistance to the relationship, and Dominic falls for Katherine immediately, offering no challenge to her sassy independence. The elegant prose is often hampered by clumsy exposition and jarring shifts in point of view. This first entry in a planned trilogy is diverting but not especially satisfying. (July)