Priest, by Sierra Simone

This book was recommended to me approximately 2392362931 times on tiktok. It was sold to me as a steamy, smutty, taboo love story. I was told this book would completely rock my world.

And you know what? It completely did.

---

You may have to chug a mug of belief suspension to get over the fast pace of the first few chapters (seriously, it felt like they met and then ten seconds later the Priest was ready to sin) but once Simone hits her stride, boy howdy does she hit it! It took a couple reading sessions to truly get into the book, but after that I sat down and didn't look up for hours.

The characters, Father Tyler and Poppy, feel incredibly real. Both of them have their own trauma and issues that affect them, and in turn their relationship, but those issues are things they work through both on their own and with each other. Their physical chemistry and eventually true feelings for each other aren't the magical cure all you see in other novels- they do the work and come out the other end better for it.

The setting was familiar to me, being from this particular corner of the Midwest, and the town and its people felt familiar too. We all know the 100 year old grandmother who runs the church, the busybody, the ex. We all have either been to, through, or are from a town that sits in a bubble outside the nearest major metropolitan area. This feels like a real story, with real people, which provides an amazing backdrop to the drama happening to our main characters.

And then there is, of course, the smut, the sex, the explicit material, whatever you want to call it. It's in this book, and it's in it a lot. There's some definite sacrilege going on, so if that's not what you're looking for, perhaps look elsewhere. While Simone has a beautiful love story happening, she intersperses it with some of the raunchiest scenes I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

If you're looking for an incredible love story that's not shy on the character development, and the smut, look no further. Sierra Simone has your back!