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Cash Braddock #4

Journey to Cash

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Cash Braddock | Book 4
Cash Braddock thought everything was great. Her drug business sold for a nice chunk. She’s opening an art gallery. And she’s finally free of the Sacramento Police Department.

But then the mother she hasn’t seen in twenty-three years knocks on her door, and Laurel Kallen, the ex-girlfriend who broke her heart, rolls into town. Oh, and Laurel has a message: Cash’s former business partner is back and wants to kill them both. Which is a real bummer.

Cash is no stranger to the consequences of her poor decisions, but this time everyone and everything she loves might pay the price.

Genres
General Fiction

ebook

First published January 1, 2021

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About the author

Ashley Bartlett

11 books43 followers
Ashley Bartlett was born and raised in California. Her life consists of reading and writing. Most of the time Ashley engages in these pursuits while sitting in front of a coffee shop with her girlfriend and smoking cigarettes. It’s a glamorous life. She is an obnoxious, sarcastic, punk-ass, but her friends don’t hold that against her. She currently lives in Sacramento. (from the author's website)

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5 stars
43 (53%)
4 stars
29 (36%)
3 stars
7 (8%)
2 stars
0 (0%)
1 star
1 (1%)
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
Profile Image for Diane Wallace.
1,276 reviews107 followers
March 8, 2024
Fascinating read!
Such an impressive conclusion to the 'Cash Braddock' series w/ this book #4.
Highly recommended series!
Profile Image for Lex Kent.
1,683 reviews9,428 followers
January 16, 2021
4.25 Stars. Cash’s last adventure. This is the fourth and final book in the Cash Braddock series. I’m really sad to see the series end. This series is great, but it’s also one of the more underrated WLW series out there. Not in actual ratings -because they were good- but in how many people have read this. I think Cash being a drug dealer is what turned people away, but I’m so glad I gave it a chance because the series gave me such enjoyment. This series is clever, witty, funny, heartfelt, angsty, and exciting. Each book in the series got better and better (with book 3 being my absolute favorite) and this is a series I will happily reread again and again.

This is the type of series that every book is very connected. This is NOT a series that you want to jump in on any old book. Starting at book one, Cash Braddock, and learning all the characters and how everything fits, is important in being able to enjoy every book that follows. Each book picks up where the other left off and Bartlett loved to end the books on cliffhanger moments. So if you are interested please read these books in order.

Since the books are so connected, it’s hard to write a review for a finale book without spoiling anything so I’m going to be vague here. It was sad knowing I was reading the finale Cash book but I was happy with this ending. It is hard to say goodbye to so many characters that I love. I’m a big Lane, Andy, and of course Cash fan. Who would have thought a drug dealer character would probably crack my top 20 all-time fav lesfic characters. She is so snarky, but in the witty and not annoying way, with a really good heart. It was nice to see how much she did grow over this series and even in this finale book.

I’m keeping this review on the shorter side for me. I feel like it is too hard not to accidentally give anything away and I know there are so many people who have not tried this series yet. If you could not tell but I absolutely recommend this to romance, crime, and humor fans. I really am going to miss this series but this was a good ending that I’m happy with.

A copy was given to me for a honest review.
Profile Image for Jude in the Stars.
943 reviews647 followers
January 11, 2021
Sometimes life is quiet for a while and then a lot happens in one day. Like that day when Cash’s supposedly dead mother shows up at her door and Laurel reappears, all bruised and battered, after seven months who knows where. Cash doesn’t exactly have time to be really mad at her since her former business partner is the one responsible for Laurel’s injuries, and is planning to kill them both.

I have mad respect for people who know when to stop. You create terrific characters and don’t want to let them go, and it’s perfectly understandable. But there comes a time when they’ve done everything they could do and more would be too much. Take Cash Braddock, for example. She is growing (a little) and her snarkiness is getting a bit old, which makes it perfect for the final book in the series. I’ll be sad to see her go but the time is right.

As I wrote in my review for one of the previous books in this series, I never thought I’d love a drug dealer so much. Cash Braddock is one of my favourite characters ever: she’s smart, funny, relatably flawed. She’s a survivor and an emotional coward (her words, not mine) but also unconsciously ready to grow, despite what she wants others to think. She’s more than willing to break rules and laws she believes are absurd or unfair but she has more morals than many people I know.

Journey to Cash is fun and exhilarating and fast-paced, surprisingly so since the characters spend a lot of time waiting, but Bartlett keeps the rhythm up with banter and delightfully funny dialogues. And Cash isn’t the only fantastic character, they all are. They tend not to have very distinctive voices but it doesn’t really matter, I enjoy the dialogues too much to care. Do not read this book as a standalone, though. Many of those great characters from previous episodes make an appearance, and I had to go back to book 3, Cash and the Sorority Girl, to remind myself of who was who.

Journey to Cash is a very enjoyable and fitting end to an excellent series. I’ll miss Cash and everyone, but I have faith in Bartlett to come up with more morally grey yet totally lovable characters.

ARC provided to Les Rêveur for an honest review.
Profile Image for MZ.
432 reviews125 followers
January 8, 2021
4.25 stars. A fantastic ending of the series! All books in the Cash Braddock series are great and this one is no exception. Snarky, super sarcastic dialogues, an interesting mystery, some action, and it gives the final chapter of the romance. Everything comes together in this book. I don’t think this is the best book in the series (for me that is still ”Cash and the Sorority Girl”), but I enjoyed reading it very much.

I strongly recommend reading this series in order. Each book has its own storyline, but in the end (so, in this book), they all come together. I think there is too much background info and knowledge about the characters that you’ll miss if you were to read this as a standalone. This is also why I won’t go much into detail on the contents of the book, to prevent giving spoilers on the previous books.

Cash’s past is catching up with her. Her former business partner wants to kill her and this message is delivered by her ex-girlfriend who broke her heart. The mystery of this book, or perhaps a better description would be the chase, starts a bit slow. There is a lot of info and it kept my interest, but there is not a whole lot of excitement at the beginning of the book. This picks up during the second half of the book though and soon I found that I couldn’t put it down.

I love Cash and Kallen, they are flawed, their romance is/was rocky, but they are still perfect for each other. I like that they constantly seem to challenge each other to the point where they have to reconsider some of their life choices. Cash has a heart of gold, but is also brash and obnoxious and has a strong aversion to the patriarchy and especially to the police force. One thing I liked very much in the previous books was that the interactions between Cash and Kallen made me think about values and morals that that are generally considered “normal”. But the world is not black and white, good or bad. In this book the dialogues were again excellent, but my only comment on this book would be that I missed the balance in the conversation. It was very one sided from Cash’s perspective and thus deeply negative towards “the system” and “cis-hetero white males” and were I enjoyed entering the “grey zone” in the previous books, I felt this book pushes the reader back into a “black and white” (judgmental) world, only now the other way around. I would have liked to see more of the balanced grey area, like in the previous books.

I can easily recommend this book if you’ve read the other books in the series. It is an excellent conclusion of the series. Almost all secondary characters make a reappearance in this book, and it feels like coming home. For those who haven’t read the previous books and like a morally grey main character (a drug dealer), some mystery elements and romance, I highly recommend reading the entire series, they’re great!

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Profile Image for Tiff.
385 reviews221 followers
December 16, 2020
Journey to Cash by Ashley Bartlett, one of my most favorite books of the year. I absolutely love the Cash Braddock series. There is nothing like this series in all of lesfic. Its creative, dynamic, and smart. Time after time, Ashley Bartlett has delivered exceptional writing. Every single book in this series deserves praise because it is absolutely outstanding. If you have not read this series I cannot recommend it enough. 4 books, all 5+ stars.
Profile Image for Agirlcandream.
723 reviews4 followers
January 2, 2021
Journey to Cash gives us one more chance to spend quality time with our favourite and now retired drug dealer, Cash Braddock. She’s left her life of crime behind and invested in an art gallery. Seems like a dull transition from her days dodging competitors who wanted her gone and a short gig as a confidential informant so she could avoid jail time. When her ex-girlfriend Laurel shows up she discovers someone from her past is out for revenge.

This fourth and final addition to the series is a reunion of sorts. We see what has happened to the characters we’ve grown attached to throughout the series and discover through no fault of their own, everyone Cash has ever cared for is now at risk. It’s up to Cash and Laurel to find Henry before he finds them. Her former supplier was also a police officer so catching him will not be easy. Cue the (at times) juvenile behaviour on Cash’s part as she and Laurel try to avoid going to a safe house and letting Sacramento PD do their job. There is lots of action as well as some typical risky behaviour on Cash’s part giving the end of the series a thriller feel. We know Cash would never let anything terrible happen to the ones she loves but there are moments when you can’t be sure.

3.5 stars

ARC received with thanks from Bold Strokes Books via NetGalley for review.
Profile Image for Carrie.
404 reviews
February 5, 2021
Well... Thank you to Lex for introducing me to this series. It was a fun ride. I grew to really know and care about all of the characters. This was a solid final installment.

My only complaint with this series was that every single character had the same snarky humor. Everyone was born with the witty gene. At times, it was hard to really distinguish between the characters because they all sound the same. Thank god the humor was good most of the time. Or this really could have been a problem! :)
Profile Image for S.
201 reviews18 followers
December 31, 2020
Great ending to a great series. I read this whole series in week or so, so whilst this is a review of the final book, it’s also of the series as a whole (so there may be some spoilers prior instalments). I’m considering this a five star book due to it being the closing part and how I feel about the series, but from a writing point of view I preferred Cash and the Sorority Girl slightly.

There isn’t really anything else like this out there in queer fiction at the moment that I’m aware of and I love how much it stands out. It hit me whilst I was reading the third book in the series - Cash and the Sorority Girl - that one of the reasons I love this series so much is its inherent queerness. The discussions of the patriarchy and heteronormativity in an everyday manner and how it flows through the whole series are fantastic.

The narrative of this final part neatly closes up the issues Cash is facing due to her drug dealing past and her former supplier Henry who previously tried to kill her and her ex-girlfriend Laurel. The situation throws them both back together to work with law enforcement to both hide from and find Henry.


All of the characters are great, Cash and her sarcasm, knowledge, values and the way she lives her life are obviously the thing everything revolves around, but the other characters are well written and bring out all of the sides of Cash.

Laurel as an ex-cop has a lot to work through and convince Cash of in this book after she walked away to find herself. The romance between Laurel and Cash isn’t the most important part of the book to me, but it is a huge part of the narrative. The power dynamics, the second/third chance to make it work and both of their reluctance to address their own emotional feelings make for compelling exchanges and portrayal.

I really enjoy the roommate relationship that Cash has with Lane. Her being Laurel’s sister adds a dimension to it, but at its heart this relationship shows Cash at her best, just as her relationship with Andy as a teenager does too. Andy’s teenage moral beliefs are very black and white and I love how Cash responds to this and how Andy has grown throughout the series.


Of course, it would be remiss of me not to mention Nickels the cat, who has her own unique personality and provides some amusement.

I highly recommend this series - it stands out in wlw fiction, but it’s important to begin at the beginning with Cash Braddock. Despite the hard topics the whole series is easy to read, and all of the books are page turners. This was my 300th book this year and it was the perfect book to end the year on.

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Profile Image for Della B.
633 reviews139 followers
January 26, 2021
Intense, thrilling and addictive. Cash Braddock is such a intelligent, smart ass loveable character that it seems cruel to know this is the last book in the series.
Journey to Cash is everything you want in a series ender. There is so much happening yet it rolls out in an even pace to build the tension. Ashley Bartlett is a genius at pacing and balance in her writing. There is never too much or too little of anything in her stories. She keeps you on even keel although her characters are being assaulted by every means possible.
This is a must read series.
5⭐️
Profile Image for KarenC.
330 reviews
December 28, 2020
I adore the Cash Braddock series and have been anxiously awaiting this book all year. Cash is her typical self, railing on the "cishet patriarchy" as usual, and trying to get over being left by Laurel.

This installment really read like a mystery/intrigue, following a case that was so intricate I would've loved to see the giant white board that the author had to have used to keep everything straight. The early section of the book felt a little long to me but once you hit the halfway mark you'll know it was all necessary and made the conclusion that much more satisfying. There are a LOT of secondary characters introduced, all law enforcement agents helping solve the case, along with the neighbors and family members.

As much as I love Cash and her stories, I couldn't recommend this as a standalone. There's way too much background that's just essential in understanding what's going on here -- but I wholeheartedly recommend starting at the beginning of the series because it's THAT good. I'm secretly worried that this is the end though - it felt like everything was wrapped up. I hope not.
Profile Image for chaos.
122 reviews
April 4, 2022
Lots of action and not enough context for my taste, and the characters didn’t feel developed enough for me to feel connected to them as a reader. The story left me with a lot of questions that weren’t answered in this installment, but probably would have made more sense with the context of the earlier books.
Profile Image for Women Using Words.
405 reviews57 followers
April 2, 2021
Journey to Cash marks the final installment of the Cash series by Ashley Bartlett. After four fantastic books, fans must now say goodbye to Cash and crew. This series is tons of fun to read; it’s witty, well-written and completely entertaining. With every book readers get great characters, fantastic dialogue, and well-plotted stories.

Though the series has received high marks from reviewers, it hasn’t really been given a lot of hype, and that’s unfortunate. It’s probably one of the most engaging contemporary lesfic series to come along. This can be attributed to the main character; Cash is fantastic. One would describe her as complex, flawed and chuck full of contradictions. She’s an ex-drug dealer that lives by a strong code of conduct. She’s loyal, trustworthy and kind, yet some might say she’s a pain- in-the-ass. Either way, she’s extremely dynamic and completely captivating. Readers can’t help but find her appealing.

The storytelling in Journey to Cash is wonderfully executed and picks up where Cash and the Sorority Girl left off. Though this latest book has its own plot, an understanding of the previous books’ storylines is necessary to fully appreciate this well-scribed narrative. That being said, Journey to Cash’s story arc flows quite beautifully and paces particularly well. The conclusion is without criticism and completely satisfactory. Readers get their happy moment, as Bartlett ends things nicely for Cash and Laurel.

Final remarks…

This is a well-written book. The dialogue is spectacular. It is banter-filled and entertainingly snarky. The characters are wonderfully developed and completely engaging. Though Cash and Laurel’s romance is certainly part of the story, it isn’t the only thing driving it forward. This story gets an added push from mysterious and intriguing happenings, giving it an undeniably appealing full-bodied flavor. My recommendation is to cash in on this Cash Braddock novel; it’s an absolute winner!

Strengths…

Engaging characters
Intriguing plot
Well-written dialogue
Entertaining storytelling
Profile Image for Christian M..
102 reviews1 follower
Want to read
January 11, 2021
Journey To Cash is the final book in Ashley Bartlett’s Cash Braddock Series. I will miss the characters in this book - their witty banters, snarky remarks, and even their nonsense talking.
The flow of the story, as usual, was well written. There was no lull and I was hooked til the end. I’m so glad that Cash and Laurel got back together. And as always, their chemistry is still🔥🔥🔥 even though Cash kept on pushing Laurel away.
Although the issue regarding Cash’s mother was not emphasized, the interaction between them was enough for the readers to think that their new relationship is onto a good start.
It was a very good read and I enjoyed it a lot. Definitely recommending the book (and the whole series) to others.

I received an ARC from the publishers through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
373 reviews2 followers
January 6, 2021
So good. You need to have read the other books in this series to understand the background of the plot and who all the characters are and how they relate to each other. I have read the other books and I had to think hard to remember who everyone was. I recommend going back and re-reading the earlier Cash books before this one. They’re all brilliant so you’ll enjoy them. Cash is fantastic and the sort of drug dealer I would have liked to be in my younger days, not that I ever aspired to me a drug dealer; and neither should you, it’s bad for you and other people. She’s so cool though. She’s definitely read (and understood) Judith Butler. Meanwhile her girlfriend sounds hot and kickass. Her friends are great. So is the cat. I basically like everything in this book. Mega.
254 reviews2 followers
January 11, 2021
This is the first book I have read from this author. I can honestly say that it will not be my last. There were some really suspenseful and thrilling moments in this book as well as truly funny moments. Cash is a complex character with a few flaws and her chosen family is a mixture of old and young that I would love to hang out with too. The cat Nickel was a blast. Can't wait for the next installment of whatever journey Cash goes on.
Profile Image for Odd Bin.
277 reviews12 followers
January 25, 2021
I am so glad that I overcame my aversion to the "Cash Braddock - Drug Dealer" thing because I really, really enjoyed this series. Great ending to the series.
101 reviews
May 3, 2022
Cool

I wasn’t going to read this one, cause the last one felt short and left me hanging. Curiosity got the better of me, cool ending to ups and downs with my emotions. Well written.
247 reviews4 followers
February 12, 2021
Worth the wait

I couldn't wait for this final installment of the series. Book 3 left me on the metaphorical edge of my seat to see what would happen between Cash and Laurel. In this book Henry Brewer is back and wants to kill them both. Much action and drama ensues. Throughout you'll be treated with Cash's sarcastic humor. I'm sorry the series has come to an end.
1,149 reviews16 followers
January 25, 2021
Great.

I loved Journey to Cash. Yes, You need the first three books in the series before you read this one. But you’ll love them all. You will fall in love with Cash Braddock and her merry, gay, band of friends.
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