A Stormy Greek Marriage by Lynne Graham (The Drakos Baby, Book 2)
Books like this are the reason I stopped reading category romance in my mid-20s. I hope I don’t come across too many more of them in the near future. DNF.
I have five more titles in my Lynne Graham glom pile, but I’m not sure I can bear to go on. On one hand, I knew getting into this book that Graham writes domineering heroes of the 80s alpha kind. I thought I could cope with it, but this book is such a trainwreck I gave up halfway through.
Surprisingly for a category romance, this is part two of a series. (Perhaps Graham should have just written a full length book, did anyone think of that?) The back story is explained well enough to get the gist—I’m fairly sure I wouldn’t be prepared to slog through an entire book to basically learn that Alexei finally slept with his personal assistant, Billie, taking her virginity. She’s pined for him in secret but felt she was no match for the dazzling beauties that naturally flock to her rich, handsome boss.
Unfortunately, Alexei tripped and hit his head and managed to conveniently forget the two nights they were together. More unfortunately for Billie, the oblivious Alexei tried to rekindle a childhood romance as Billie coped with the consequences of their nights together—yes, the old secret baby.
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Ruthless Magnate, Convenient Wife by Lynne Graham (Pregnant Brides, Book 2)
There’s nothing earth-shattering about this story. I didn’t hate the hero or the heroine, but that might be damning with faint praise.
Back in my 20s, I would have loved this book. This may be spoilery to some readers—although if you regularly read in this Mills & Boon line it would amaze me if any of this surprises you—but Ruthless Magnate, Convenient Wife features a tycoon hero who borders on misogyny, a contract marriage, a virgin heroine, an accidental pregnancy and a Small Misunderstanding.
But as far as these things go, Lynne Graham does a decent enough job with the plot. Sergei Antonovich was saved from a troubled childhood by his grandmother, and as she gets older he wants to give her what he knows would make her happy—a grandchild.
As you do when you’re insanely rich but scarred by a money-grubbing first wife and young hotties forever flashing their cleavage in exchange for your wad (of cash, people!), Sergei sets up a business arrangement to acquire a wife and child.
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With This Fling... by Kelly Hunter
This book proves that finely tuned character development and emotional honesty can turn even the most maligned clichés in romance fiction not just into an enjoyable read, but a story worth savouring.
The more I read Kelly Hunter’s work, the more I admire how well she’s able to make each couple and each story fresh, interesting and fun.
With This Fling… features what seems to be Hunter’s favourite type of heroine—a rich one. Charlotte Greenstone invents a fiancé to reassure her dying godmother that she won’t be alone. When said fiancé fails to turn up at the funeral, Charlotte concocts a story in which he’s killed in the wilds of Papua New Guinea.
But in series of spectacular coincidences, she finds herself in possession of Grey Tyler’s, well, office. Her fictional fiancé is not only not dead, he’s back from PNG, he’s hot and it seems he may just have need of a fictional girlfriend of his own.
If you’re looking for an elaborate external plot, you’re in for disappointment. With This Fling… is romance distilled.
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Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison (Elder Races, Book 1)
The Elder Races series has become my BDB replacement. It’s totally cracktastic.
After reading Wandergurl’s review and at the urging of Decadence and Kate, I finally picked up the first book in Thea Harrison’s Elder Races series.
I’m hooked.
Pia Giovanni is blackmailed into stealing from Dragos, Wyr (shapeshifter) leader and one of the most powerful creatures in the world. She’s on the run, but he’s determined to find out who stole his…penny.
Dragon Bound gets off to a snappy start, with Dragos’s pursuit of Pia and her attempts to elude him. Dragos’s enemies are determined to bring him down, and Pia is inadvertently swept up in their conflict. Her life has been based on the need to protect herself, but with Dragos refusing to let her go, it seems her secrets may put her in even greater danger than either of them could have anticipated.
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Chasing Fire by Nora Roberts
A satisfying romantic suspense with a capable heroine. The romance lacks intensity, but a decent mystery plot keeps the pages turning.
The thing about Nora Roberts is that I almost always enjoy her books—just never enough to want to buy her next one and let’s not even contemplate her backlist. Chasing Fire is no exception.
Rowan Tripp is an experienced firefighter with the US equivalent of the rural fire service, but it’s a little different this time. She lost a jump partner in a freak accident the previous season, and it seems someone has put the blame squarely at her feet.
There are a pool potential suspects, even though Rowan isn’t comfortable thinking that any of them could be capable of sabotage and murder. Aside from staff at the base station, there’s her fellow fire fighters, who rely on each other’s trust for survival. There’s also the newest batch of smoke-jumping recruits—firefighters who get flown into a middle of a bush fire.
One of these recruits is Gull Curry—perhaps one of the least romantic names I’ve seen in the genre—who is immediately attracted to Tripp’s ‘package’ and ‘attitude’. Curry’s a nice guy…and remains so throughout the entire book. The romance develops gradually, but it’s not quite central to the story. It’s nice to have, but not essential.
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Red-Hot Renegade by Kelly Hunter (The Bennetts, Book 5)
This RITA-nominated book is sexy, angsty and deeply moving—everything we love about modern category romance. Oh, and the heroine? She’s the tycoon. This one’s a keeper.
You may have noticed that I’m in the middle of a Kelly Hunter glom. How I missed this awesome Aussie author boggles my mind, but Red-Hot Renegade (published in the US as Her Singapore Fling) is the book that made me first try Hunter’s work. Nominated for this year’s RITA awards, the book also features an Asian heroine with an Australia hero.
The back story for this novel is set up in the previous books of the series, which features the romances of Jacob Bennett’s siblings. Jacob’s estranged wife Jianne is being stalked and, having run out of options, she reluctantly comes to him for help.
Jacob is a martial arts champion who runs his dojo in Singapore. For reasons neither he nor Jianne want to acknowledge, they’re still officially married even though Jianne walked out on the marriage twelve years ago. What makes this reunion story different is that neither of them blame the other—instead, they remind each other of the guilt they feel about not having fought hard enough to save their relationship.
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Last weekend, I lost my Sony Pocket Reader. I keep my ebook library synced with Calibre, so I didn’t lose any books, but I did lose my annotations and review notes.
Yesterday I went shopping for…something not an ebook reader.
And I came home with this:
What can I say? I fell in lust. (And yes, it levitates. So awesome.)
Source: Nicola Marsh
A big congratulations to Melbourne-based author Nicola Marsh, who is celebrating the release of her latest novel, Busted in Bollywood, today! You might know her best as a USA Today bestselling author, writing category romances for Harlequin Mills and Boon. Her new book is published by Entangled Publishing and is available in print and in digital format.
BOOK GIVEAWAY: For a chance to win one of Nicola’s books, tell us which actor you’d like to be mistaken for and why.
Some rules: Post your answer as a comment to this post. Multiple entries are fine. By entering, you give us permission to quote your entry in future blog posts and articles. You also give us permission to send your email address to the author, who will be organising delivery of the book. Open to anyone as long as Book Depository offers free shipping to your address. The giveaway ends midnight on Sunday, December 11 AEST. Wandergurl, Decadence, Envyious and I will pick our favourite answer. The winner must provide a delivery address and pick a book in stock at Book Depository within one week after we announce the result on the blog.
Website: www.nicolamarsh.com
Social networks: Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Goodreads
Genre: Contemporary romance
Latest release: Busted in Bollywood
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The Man She Loves To Hate by Kelly Hunter
Mills & Boon conventions aside—yes, he’s a tycoon, she’s totally hot and they don’t use a condom—the heroine and hero of this book are rarely predictable. I only wish it could have been longer.
I don’t know why I didn’t discover Australian author Kelly Hunter sooner because she writes bloody good books.
Jolie Tanner has just removed all of her mother’s possessions from her mother’s recently deceased lover’s hideaway, when she’s caught in an avalanche with the dead lover’s son, Cole. Cole and Jolie used to be friends, but when news of his father’s dalliance with her mother became public ten years ago, Jolie was shunned and she’s borne the stigma of being a mistress’s daughter ever since.
As you do in a blizzard, Jolie and Cole share quite a bit of body heat, and what’s supposed to be a we’re-half-asleep-and-aroused-so-let’s-just-take-the-edge-off kiss ends up in unprotected sex that’s only partially mitigated by the fact that Cole isn’t a shirker and Jolie isn’t stupid enough to have sex without any form of birth control.
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Photo: Blood by xTrish (via Flickr)
Warning: Not for the squeamish. (And I haven’t had this much fun with euphemisms ever.)
I love a good vampire romance as much as the next Twilight fan, and I love it when authors force their ethical vampire heroes to fall in lust with human heroines. It’s a heady thrill to read about the excruciating dilemma of a vegetarian vampire, a conscientious objector when it comes to live blood sport, whose instincts throb in the presence of his One True Love and her pulsating arteries.
It’s why we let Edward get away with stalking bloody Bella. Because he’s conflicted! And hungry! And noble! And sparkly!
Wait, what?
But seriously. There’s a question that has never been addressed to my satisfaction by any paranormal romance or urban fantasy book I’ve read:
What happens every month when Aunt Flo is visiting, when all is not quiet on the waterfront, when the heroine is trolling for vampires?
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