Look, 9 times out of 10 when an author decides to rewrite their book from the male love interest's perspective, it's not interesting and feels wholly unnecessary. LOVER is that 1 book out of 10 that really adds something to the story, and it's also basically a masterclass in how to write a gentlemanly simp who is respectfully obsessive. HAWT.
Do NOT read this book if you haven't already read THE CRUEL DARK because it contains major spoilers for the book. Before I dive into my review, I will say that these two books are set during the roaring twenties, and are a lushly written gothic saga about a girl with a tragic past coming to help a hot and tormented professor with his research, only to discover that the house that they're working in harbors dark secrets that inextricably twine with both of their own sordid histories.
Callum is such a great hero. He had some of the best lines in this book ever, and the spicy scenes were both elegant and hot. A Michelin starred dish of spice, if you will. I also loved seeing Millie through his eyes. I loved her a lot in her own book, and getting to see the hero falling in love with her, being in love with her, was a real treat.
Does this book do much for the plot? No. But it advances the story emotionally and is actually a very thoughtful and complex piece of fan service that goes beyond a mere smuttening, so I am happy.
That might be one of the easiest five star ratings I've ever given out, which is funny because I didn't think femdom was even my kink. Apparently it is. Look at me, learning something new about myself today. God, I LOVE THE INTERNET.
Kate works at a tech company owned by Russian billionaire Mikhail Volkov. One day, he tries to take a paper off her desk while she's on the phone. Not realizing who he is, she slaps his hand away and snaps at him. Then, she has one of the biggest "oh shit" moments of her life. When he calls her into his office, she thinks he's going to fire her. Instead, he tells her flat-out that he's a submissive who wants her to Dom him and that he really likes her style. Likes it about a $5000 a week amount, actually.
Sure, it's basically against all HR policies, but a girl's got bills to pay.
I loved PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT so much. I'm actually surprised how many people seemed to hate Kate (lmfao, jk, no I'm not) because she was the perfect inversion of the alpha with issues who has a heart of gold stereotype. Her upbringing and insecurity around money made her reluctance and attraction to this relationship totally understandable, and I liked how she took care never to push her hot Russian paypig too far (also the fact that she made him donate to charities to punish him? HILARIOUS).
Chemistry was off the charts, Mikhail was super hot, and it has one of the best grovel scenes ever. Covers everything from aftercare to discussions about expectations and feelings, and Kate was a super likable and lovable character with very relatable problems. What's not to like? I might have to buy this in physical because I adored it so much I want to have a copy with me always.
This was an impulse download because I kept seeing it being suggested to me every time I went on Amazon. On a whim, I downloaded THE CRUEL DARK and ended up completely obsessed. It's kind of like a threeway cross between Gothikana, Jane Eyre, and RoseRed, but set in the 1920s with a headstrong heroine who has come to a remote and supposedly haunted mansion named Willowfield to help a hot and standoffish professor with his research, only to realize that nothing about the house-- or the man-- is truly as it seems.
The lush writing and rich setting are good enough for those who read their gothics for the vibes, but the characterizations and SPICE are also top tier. Spice does nothing for me if there's no emotional element to it, so I was delighted that the chemistry between Callum and Millie basically set the pages on fire. They're so good together, and the dangerous edge to Callum's character makes it even better.
I was thinking this was going to be a four star read for a while because there were a few niggling things that weren't my fave, but then that TWIST flew out of nowhere and everything suddenly flew neatly into place, and I was like holy shitteth, there is no way that anything that made me gasp out loud like that is getting anything less than the full five stars. I don't make the rules. (JK, I do.)
If you're a fan of Keri Lake, you need to read this book.
Loved how this managed to capture the vibe of an old skool HP in the vein of Charlotte Lamb, but with a modern feminist twist and way more smut. RETURN TO MONTE CARLO also made me enjoy several tropes I hate, including secret baby and marriage in crisis. PLEASE let this be a series she's planning, I beg of you. I love the retro vibe without the stranglehold of dated sexism.
I'm honestly surprised at how many people were hating on Diane as the heroine (JK, no I'm not). People were saying she was immature but she was young. She's twenty. I was a hot mess when I was twenty. She's married and mostly has her shit together. She's basically a beautiful rube who got lucky and married way above her head to an older man with weird kinks she doesn't quite understand but (mostly) get her off. So in this case, the marriage in crisis element works because they literally come from two very different worlds.
Marco, her husband, is an Italian business tycoon. Lately, he's been neglecting her and Diane is afraid he's cheating. He's a hard man to read, the pinnacle of the strong and silent type with BDE Daddy energy. When their anniversary dinner goes to shit and results in a broken heirloom and a telenovela-style slap, Diane is disgraced and ends up leaving Marco and his family to return back to her hometown in Oklahoma.
I don't want to spoil too much but I thought the misunderstandings between them were really well done. I loved the dual POV, loved both narrators, and thought it was great to see Marco fall in love with his wife all over again: this time, not as a pretty doll he placed on a pedestal, but as the real flesh and blood article behind the painted face. We also STAN a grovel that has the man on his knees in front of his entire family begging her not to leave (YAS). Speaking of the family, they were interesting too. Even the villains of this story had interesting little twists to their characters, and I loved Rosanella.
Cate C. Wells was a new to me author who made me love mafia (another genre I usually don't like). At this point, I think I'm probably going to read everything she writes, regardless of whether it's a trope I enjoy or not. She is so fucking talented and I just love her characters and her worlds.
I'm kind of surprised this doesn't have way more reviews because it's so good. This is like the dark romance version of B.G. Harlen's BREAK HER, in the sense that it takes a Hannibal/Clarice dynamic and turns it into erotica, but whereas BREAK HER is just erotica (which borders on horror and torture porn), IN SESSION is more of a very dark and taboo erotic romance that examines its characters in psychological depth.
Avery is a psychiatrist who sometimes handles court-ordered patients. Her newest one is a man named Nash Wyatt, a convinced serial killer. He immediately starts pushing boundaries and trying to get into her head and Avery is a little alarmed at how she responds to him-- with disgust, yes, but also in ways that go beyond clinical fascination.
Even though this is a novella, it feels like slow-burn because not much happens until the end. It's so worth it, though. From the very beginning I was fascinated with these characters and had to know how the story would end. Some of the dirty talk wasn't my cup of tea (like when he tells princess to make her asshole "wink" lol), but 99% of it, I was toooootally on board with. If you're into books with CNC, this is right up there with WILLING VICTIM and ASKING FOR IT. I'd read anything else this author writes.
Update: Bumping up to a full five stars because I can't stop thinking about this book.
This book was absolutely insane, like FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC meets Midsommar. I wasn't expecting to enjoy it as much as I did, because this is some of the most depraved shit I've read in a while. Without going into spoilers, THE ECLIPSE RITUAL is the story of Obedience and Ronan, and a society that oppresses women and forces them to be brides against their will if they are chosen.
I liked Obedience's gradual questioning of her faith. I thought it was really well done and appropriately terrifying. Any book where one of the bad guys gets a piece of his dick nailed to a wall is going to be pretty fucked up. I also liked that all of the characters were 18+ and that as psychotic as the hero was, he had his own internal logic that he was following to try to prove his twisted love to the heroine.
WILLING PREY was the primal kink book I've book looking for all my life. Shane, a socially awkward lawyer, pays Claire, a schoolteacher divorcee, $30,000 to hunt her for 30 days. The catch is that she has to make it difficult by putting up a fight. He doesn't like easy hunts.
I liked this book a lot. The sex scenes were great and I loved how sweet Shane was (when he wasn't hunting lol). Where do I find a hot lawyer to make cardio fun? Even though there isn't much in the way of conflict, I thought the X-rated games of tag and hide and seek really added a lot of suspense. I did expect more of a third act conflict than what I got, though. Since Claire is a school teacher and the U.S. is such a dick when it comes to morality clauses, I was expecting someone (maybe her douche ex?) to blackmail her, or something like that that would force them to unite as a couple against a common enemy.
But overall, WILLING PREY was great. I thought it was interesting that the author decided to make Shane a switch. At first I wasn't sure how I felt about that, but since "hunting" was so new to him and he was questioning his sexuality in such an open and thoughtful way, I guess it made sense to his character, after all. And Claire seemed super into it, so I loved that for her.
Definitely can't wait to read more from this author.
I got this from Stuff Your Kindle day because the title sounded deliciously gothic and I think it's my favorite selection so far. THE LOST LORD OF CASTLE BLACK has everything I love in a historical romance: a sexy and dangerous hero, hidden identity, childhood friends to lovers, gothic vibes, murder subplots, and a headstrong and likable heroine.
Agatha and Nicholas were a wealthy married couple on business in Europe when Agatha cheated on her husband with a potential spy. On their way home, in disgrace, their ship suffered catastrophic damage and they were separated from their young son, Graham.
Now, years later, Graham has returned to Castle Black to take what is his. Only his mother has survived all these years, and his cousin, Edmund, has taken over the estate, acting as regent for his half-brother, Christopher. Also living at the estate is Beatrice, Nicholas's ward, who grew up with Edmund, Christopher, and Nicholas. Once, the four of them were close, but life at the castle under its new corrupt ownership has inextricably tainted them all.
This was so good, OMG. There was steam, there were scary villains, there was ROMANCE. I wouldn't exactly call this a gothic romance but man, it sure was gothic-infused. The danger gave the budding relationship between Graham and Beatrice some much-needed stakes, and even though it verged a little on insta-love, I thought it was pretty clever to make them childhood friends as a way of explaining some of that instantaneous trust and fondness. Graham was such a dreamboat too. When he told her she was HIS? And that nobody else could touch her? Swoon City: population me.
LUST FOR TOMORROW almost feels like a nostalgic read because it's so reminiscent of the military sci-fi classics of the 70s and 80s, like STARSHIP TROOPERS or ENDER'S GAME. I remember trying so hard to get into books like that in my early twenties and walking away feeling so disillusioned, because the worlds those books described were entirely men's worlds, and seemed to deliberately exclude women from being a part of the fantasy (at least, on their own terms).
This book feels like a direct response to the sexist male gazey sci-fi canon, both in homage and also as a critique. The heroine, Nina, is a foot soldier in a futuristic post-apocalyptic dystopian hellscape where zombies have ravaged the cities, forcing people to a life of scavenging or, if they're "lucky," military service. In the Stronghold, which used to be a fancy hotel and now serves as barracks, Nina lives on the outskirts of a sort of gated community, where she alternates between performing various duties in the Stronghold and going on raids led by Helmets.
Helmets are the commanders who lead the raids. Some of them take the helmets off after the battle is over, but some of them really have a hard-on for the helmets and wear them all the time like it's some kind of kink. (YAAAASS.) The people in the stronghold refer to these individuals as "helmet heads," pejoratively. But Nina, who is forced to hide so much of who she used to be to function in what remains of society, is fascinated by these people who seem to glory in hiding themselves so completely. Especially when a new Helmet joins the Stronghold and she finds herself utterly hypnotized by his voice. Most people don't like him and call him Alpha, but Nina wants to fuck him.
This is because Nina is smart.
I was really impressed by this book. For a debut, it is nearly perfect. I really liked the world building, which surprised me, because post-apoc is not a genre I gravitate to at all (I think the last one I read was, like, two years ago and I believe I gave it a two). The mask kink is hot and very on-trend. Why is nobody talking about the Reylo to mask kink dark romance pipeline? If you watched The Force Awakens and thought to yourself, "I want to fuck Kylo Ren," this book is for you. Especially if it was qualified by "But only when he's nice to me while domming the complete and utter shit out of me."
The sex in this book was great. It manages to convey a pretty compelling BDSM relationship with a Dom who does active care and fucks up sometimes but admits it. There were a couple scenes that weren't to my personal taste, but 90% of them were exactly my thing and all of them were well-written and contributed to the emotional development of the characters. I also liked that the heroine initiated the relationship between them and that the consent was mostly implied. I feel like too often, erotica writers are so conscious of making sure there's consent that they sometimes end up sounding like afterschool specials for How to Sex Without Being Rapey 101 and it ends up feeling artificial. This did not.
I personally cannot fully get on board with a romance unless there's an emotional connection and all the little moments between Tom/Alpha and Nina really made such a difference. There's people on TikTok who do videos about toxic couples where they make jokes about how they'd break up or divorce after the fact, but these two feel like a couple you could really root for. Which is why it kind of surprised me when, after Nina sees Tom's face for the first time, it feels almost anticlimactic. His face is never really described much at all. Maybe this was intentional, because his face was never what she was attracted to, but given the mutual simpage, I thought she'd wax a little more over (in Tom's own words) his "handsome face."
I only had a handful of qualms for this book. There's a jump where Nina and Alpha go from sleeping together to her waking up injured and I had to reread that scene several times because I didn't realize that there was a battle scene that happened off page. I think it's supposed to convey amnesia, like an actual blank space (kind of like those empty pages in Stephenie Meyer's New Moon), but it was really confusing to me. I was also a little confused about how the zombie outbreak happened in the first place (unless I was really dumb and I missed the explanation), and also about what Threshers were. There's also a really sinister undertone to the Stronghold which is only really hinted at here (and I'm sure will be explored in more detail in later books) but I really wanted to know more about what it is like post-apocalypse, and what these super sus military people are actually hiding (LOTS, probably).
Apparently the next book is going to be about the himbo of the Stronghold, Demetri. I really liked his character, and I'm excited to read more in this series. It's been a while since I picked up a sci-fi romance I really liked, and hats off to the author for writing a world that is sinister but not stomach-wrenchingly bleak. My poor little wuss soul wouldn't be able to take it. :)
WOW. This is everything I want out of a dark gothic romance: strong heroine, tortured hero, vibes for days, moral ambiguity, just the tiniest bit of dub-con and a little bit of kink, and a little bit of the paranormal. I'm honestly shocked Grace Callaway wrote this, to be honest, because her newer stuff seems like it's for the fluffies, but this was DARK. Also, it's a Jane Eyre retelling?
I loved it.
Abigail Jones works as a maid in the Earl of Huxton's house. She's bookish and quiet and keeps to herself, but beneath the prudish exterior lies a dark secret: her mother was a prostitute who died in an asylum having fucked-up visions, and Abigail fears she'll end up exactly the same. She has nightmares constantly, and sometimes, during the day, she sees things that terrify her... and excite her.
After an encounter with the Earl in the library (ahem), he promotes her to the role of secretary, entrusting her as his confidant. But the closer she gets to him, the less she really knows. What's the deal with the painting of the creepy but beautiful woman in his library? What about the mysterious death of his late wife and his older brother? Where does he go all day and why does he sleep with so many women? The questions keep piling up, and the more there are, the less sure Abby is that she wants to know the answer. This doesn't even really scrape at the surface of what the book is REALLY about but I don't want to spoil things.
No, seriously. That WTF pivot in the middle is priceless.
I just loved this book so much, okay? It showed up on a list of JANE EYRE retellings and since this was one of the few that seemed to be taking the tried and true gothic route, I was immediately intrigued. The way that the author wove the foundational bits into her story while still making it absolutely her own was ingenious. This is one of those books where after I finished it, I walked away thinking, "I wish I'd thought of that." Even when things got kind of weird, I was still into it... because it was my brand of weird. The atmosphere was just as good as the romance, and the writing was simply luscious.
I'm surprised this book has such low ratings but I think part of the problem is how it was probably marketed. The contemporary historical romance crowd tends to prefer lighter fare, so if this was marketed with them in mind as an audience, I think many of them would be disgusted or put off. In terms of theme, I feel like this would actually be a better match for most dark romance readers: the gore, depravity, and morally gray antihero just fit in really neatly with what they tend to want.
Anyone who enjoys historical romances on the darker side will love this book.
MORBIDLY YOURS is a profoundly romantic book that manages to tackle friends-to-lovers (one of the hardest tropes to do well, in my opinion), grief, death anxiety, enrichment of life, self-advocacy, and interesting and nuanced relationships, all with equal mastery.
Callum is a mortician who is going to lose his funeral home if he doesn't get married because of a stipulation in his grandfather's will. Lark, on the other hand, is a grieving widow who has come to Ireland to work as an animation director in Galway. When they meet, it's a clash of personalities at first, but they quickly end up getting to know each other better than they expected because they're neighbors.
This book was pure perfection. I'm going to overlook the cruelty of Ms. Fairbanks making me fall in love with a man who doesn't exist. I loved the way that the OW and OM ended up being delightful people who furthered the story in interesting and unexpected way. I liked how Callum wasn't traditionally masculine, and that he had a stutter. He's also demisexual and I thought that rep was handled beautifully.
I am absolutely seething with jealousy that this was a debut effort. It is so good, and I will absolutely read whatever this author puts out there next. There aren't a lot of romances that feel so real, that you can just totally lose yourself in the story because they feel like your friends, but this is one of them.
If you heard an outraged pterodactyl-sounding screech of rage, that was me when I got to the cliffhanger at the end of this book. I probably shouldn't be surprised, though. Having read other series by this author, I can definitely confirm that this is 100% her thing.
I'll try not to be mad.
Keyword: try.
I'm actually really impressed with how polished this book is compared to some of this author's other works. In PRIVATE PROPERTY, she has really honed her writing style into something dark and richly atmospheric, with slow-burn sexual attraction and, of course, lots of smut. I think going into this book expecting it to be a carbon copy of JANE EYRE is a mistake, since that's obviously not what the author is trying to do. This is one of those books that feels more like an homage than a straightforward retelling-- even if there's a wicked cliffhanger.
Jane Mendoza is a biracial nanny who is moving from Texas to Maine to take care of a girl named Paige, the niece of the tortured and very imposing Beau Rochester. I think the author did a good job capturing what a manipulative dick Rochester was, and how he basically did it for his own amusement, and because he knew he could get away with it. Some of the stand-offs between Jane and Beau felt very much in keeping with the source material and more than a couple of them made me smile.
Even though this is smut, it is Smut with Plot(TM) which makes a world of difference because it allows for an emotional connection between the two leads that fuels all their scenes together. I liked how Jane talked about how when her Latinx father died, she felt as if her connection to her culture was severed. The way that grief was approached in this book was also really well done. The author shows, rather than tells, us how disillusioned Beau has become with the wealthy set he used to party with, and Jane's abusive and grief-stricken past allow her to forge a connection with his defiant and grieving niece, who is about to flunk out of the first grade because she is refusing to do her school work.
I will say that the second half is a bit weaker than the first half, just because it felt like the author stopped caring as much about the atmosphere and tension once Jane and Beau started hooking up, but I devoured this so eagerly that I really can't give it less than five stars. It's one of my favorite Jane Eyre retellings that I've read, and now I'm feeling the urge to binge-read some more, all thanks to this book.
This book broke my heart and then put it back together about fifty times over the course of my reading this book. LORD OF THE BEASTS is the sequel to THE FOREST LORD, and the hero of this book, Donal, is the son of the hero of the previous book. That doesn't always work, but here it's done magnificently. Donal is half-fae and has the ability to speak to animals. He's kind of like a faerie Dr. Dolittle, and indeed, tells people that he's a veterinarian.
When he meets the heroine, he saves her and her cousin from a rampaging elephant that's escaped from the zoo. Then she goes to his estate, which is basically a farm filled with animals, and realizes that he's also the guardian of the girl who almost robbed her loathsome fiance-to-be, Viscount Inglesham. And seeing his prowess with animals, she ends up having him come to her estate to examine the desolate animals in her menagerie, all of which have been rescued from poachers, in addition to offering a permanent home for his ward, Ivy.
I liked the first book in this series a lot, but it had some notable flaws: uneven pacing, an unbelievable villain, a wishy-washy hero, and a climax that felt a little too, well, pile-on. This book, by contrast, was EVERYTHING I wanted. Donal actually reminded me a lot of Julian Sinclair from DUKE OF SHADOWS: he's noble but so, so lonely, and feels like an outcast from society because of his mixed heritage. He's soft-spoken and soft-hearted, but man, you do not want to fuck with this man or anyone he cares about, because he will END you. That's the stuff of dreams, srsly.
And the heroine in this book, Cordelia Hardcastle, was wonderful. A lot of authors write heroines who are strong and independent, but I liked how Cordelia wouldn't let anyone in and was afraid to let herself feel dependent on anyone. She had such a sad backstory and I loved her so much. I also liked how some of her kindness was selfish, even though it was coming from a good place, and how the author talked about how sometimes we think we're doing good, even though we're really serving ourselves best. There was just so much nuance to her character and she was absolutely perfect for Donal.
There's so much I want to say about this book. Like, how Donal had a teenage ward who was crushing on him and it wasn't creepy at all (seriously the bar is on the floor at this point, but everything about their relationship was handled so deftly). Or how the love for animals in this book was just so wholesome and believable (although there are some animal deaths in here, and talks about animal cruelty). In terms of the environmental messages, there's an almost Ferngully feel to this book at times, but it's done so well that it doesn't feel heavy-handed at all. And sometimes secondary characters take up too much page-time but I loved Ivy and Tod's stories just as much as Donal's and Cordelia's.
Oh, and the VILLAINS. The villains in this book were so good. Especially since the author made them just human enough that you can sort of see where they're coming from (terrifying).
I could ramble on and on but I won't. Just know that this is now a Susan Krinard fan account and I'm probably going to be reading a whole bunch of her other books in the very near future.
Karina Halle can be a hit-or-miss author for me. I've quite enjoyed some of her books and others I have disliked immensely. But I've never picked up one of her books and thought, "OH. <3" Until now. So thank god I'm so stingy with my five-star ratings, because otherwise, how else to showcase how this stands out from all the rest? (Cut to me: defending being a picky bitch.)
But seriously, THE ROYALS NEXT DOOR is a wonderful book and to be honest, I don't think the summary does it justice; it makes it seem like this book is going to be sickly saccharine sweet, when nothing could be farther from the truth. This is not just a romance novel, it's also about right to privacy, mental health, dealing with trauma, and loving romance. In some ways, it feels like a nostalgic throwback to some of my favorite aughts chicklit authors, like Sophie Kinsella and Meg Cabot, where romance novels and chick-lit were often interchangeable and focused on the development of the heroine's personal journey as much as the romance.
Piper is an elementary school teacher who lives on a Canadian island. It's scenic and picturesque and private, so obviously it makes sense that the legally-distinct-from-Meghan-and-Harry English duchess and duke would make it their own private getaway. It also makes sense that they would have a super hot bodyguard who is grumpy and secretly loves baking who kind of dislikes Piper on sight. But only for a little while. And he's never, like, mean about it. Which I think is the best way to do a grumpy sunshine romance. There's a difference between gruff and mean.
I don't want to say too much, but there was so much about this book I enjoyed. I liked the emotional connection between Harrison, the bodyguard, and Piper. I liked that they went on relatable dates (Costco and a lake?). I liked that the author shows the incredible pressure teachers are under to be moral paragons of virtue, to the extent where sometimes even having a hobby can threaten their jobs. I liked the mental health representation and how it ran the gamut from anxiety to PTSD to borderline personality disorder. I also really liked the writing.
With some of Halle's books, I have felt that the pacing could be uneven and the heroine went on really long asides that took away from the story and ended up being really distracting. That was not the case with this book at all. It ended up feeling really clean and polished and perfectly paced, from start to finish, and cinematic and vivid as any film or movie. I don't know if that's due to her personal growth as a writer or a particularly good editing team, but either way it was impressive and added to my enjoyment.
If you love bodyguard romances and are a fan of Meghan and Harry, you will love this book. The ending is perfect, too.
Whenever a book gets this popular, I'm always kind of leery of starting it because I feel like it almost gets to a point where the book will never live up to the standards I've set for it in my mind. My toxic reader trait is that I build things up in my mind until they reach a point where nothing short of god can match them. But after weeks and weeks and weeks of being bombarded with it on Goodreads, TikTok, and Instagram, I finally decided to bite the bullet. I told everyone around me how much I wanted to read the book, and someone picked up the hint and got it for me for my birthday present.
I read it in literally two days.
This book is god.
God of keeping me up at night and forcing me to read about hot shadow men and dragons.
I chose not to perceive most of the reviews for this book because I didn't want to be spoiled, but I did glance at a few spoiler-free ones that were both positive and negative before asking for this book. FOURTH WING is a fantasy book but it's a fantasy book written by a romance author, and in an interview I saw with her on TikTok, she said she wanted to write a book for people who had trouble getting into fantasy. In that regard, I think it succeeds wildly. It was very, very easy to get into this book. Case in point: me finishing it in two days, on very little sleep.
FOURTH WING is basically a cross between Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern, Mercedes Lackey's Joust, DIVERGENT, HUNGER GAMES, and VAMPIRE ACADEMY. Because of this, it feels almost nostalgic, even though it's contemporaneous. The language of the book is very modern so it isn't like a lot of high fantasy books, which tend to use very ornate and convoluted language. It is very easy to read and is written kind of like a young adult book, almost (although I'd put the target age demographic as probably new adult). Which means that it's accessible for young readers, but because the characters are older and the content is actually pretty sexual, older readers can enjoy it too without feeling weird.
I don't want to spoil too much because it's better going in cold, but I actually really loved this book. It's compulsively readable, and even though the heroine is a bit of a Mary Sue (seriously, two-toned hair and, like, super special powers? she's basically the posterchild), I liked that the author gave her real struggles in the form of chronic pain/long-term disability and a very real sense of being out of her element and having to struggle to achieve physical feats when all of her strength lies in book-learning. This rounded her out as a character. It's also a very feminist story. Sometimes the heroine does break the fourth wall (fourth wing, fourth wall, get it?), and it can come off as cheesy, but her perspective serves as a nice counterpoint for the borderline villainous hero, who despite being a couple years older than her, is often put in his place by her, so the relationship doesn't come across as being unequal.
FOURTH WING also subverts a lot of other tired tropes. The heroine isn't a virgin and says several times that she enjoys sex. Her best friend is queer and has an on-page relationship and the author doesn't bury her gays. It's very casual and the heroine teases her about her relationship the same way she teases the straight characters. Also, even though this is a military academy where the students are basically supposed to Hunger Games each other to get control of dragons, none of the violence that Violet faces from her attackers is ever sexual. I don't personally mind that in a story about bullying where it's obviously toxic, but I know it bothers a lot of people, and it's notably absent here.
But the biggest selling point for me? DRAGONS. I am still a ten-year-old girl at heart, okay? If a book has dragons OR unicorns in it, I will come running. As soon as I found out that this was a romantic fantasy book about a girl who bonds with dragons and has an enemies-to-lovers relationship with a morally grey hero, I basically fell over myself adding it to my to-read pile.
On a closing note, I feel like in the book community, there can be an almost hipster mentality where a popular book is seen as "selling out" or "too commercial," and reviewers feel a lot of pressure to hate on it for clout, lest their intellectualism and credibility be called into question. I am not saying that all one-star reviewers all clout-chasers (and I have definitely been the odd one out when it comes to very popular books more times than I can count), but I do definitely see people who seem like they hate on these books precisely because they sell well and maybe aren't as safely literary as other tried-and-true choices in the book blogger canon. I think it's wrong to punish a book for being easy to read though, and I think it's even more wrong to mock or deride reviewers who actually enjoy these books. Is this Tolkien? No. But that's why I like it. Tolkien, to me, is like a chore. Reading books like that feels like an unpleasant mental exercise. This book is like eating an entire bag of potato chips. Addictive. Fun.
So if you have had trouble getting into the fantasy genre and you really enjoy romance novels, this might be the gateway drug that ends up sucking you in for good. I honestly felt so giddy after reading this, the way I did after reading THE HUNGER GAMES for the first time. It was so much fun to post status updates for this book and fangirl over it with other readers who also enjoy it, and to be a part of the hype for a popular book while it's popular, and be excited over the release of the sequel. (WHICH I TOTALLY ALREADY PREORDERED BY THE WAY.) I hope, if you pick this book up, that you feel the same way. Although if you don't like it, I'll also totally understand. (Sort of.)
Whoa. Was this the best thing I've ever read? No. But the story it told in under two hundred pages was *chef's kiss* brilliant. Finally, a contemporary enemies-to-lovers that actually sells the enmity and isn't just two petty under-caffeinated bitches whining about something trivial. Lexi gave testimony eleven years ago that sent the hero, Atlas, to jail. Now, freshly exonerated, he has come back to her and her family to seek his revenge. Which revolves, in a roundabout way, marriage. To her.
The sexual tension was great. The build-up was A+. The sex scenes were surprisingly kinky (I mean, for a Harlequin). I first got hooked on this author through her historical viking romance that had a master/slave relationship with semi-consensual sadomasochism and it was spicy. So you can imagine my surprise and delight when I found out that many of her other Harlequin offerings are rather loosely laced and feature about one or two more chili peppers than you can usually expect from this line.
What really made this book, though, was the back and forth between the h and the H. They both felt so betrayed and had tragic backstories that made them loath to trust one another. I thought that Lexi's worshipful childhood crush on the hero really shaped their relationship (in a good way), and I liked how even though the hero desperately wanted revenge, it didn't make him too cruel (I hate it when heroes are too mean to their ladies).
The only thing I would have changed is that the ending felt a little too anticlimactic. I was expecting a bigger showdown between the h/H and the villain. If he could have saved her, I felt like that would have really cemented himself as being the hero that Lexi always saw him as, as well as, you know, providing a redemption arc for his cruelty. But that didn't happen, and I was sad. Because this is a Harlequin and they do tend to be more bite-sized snacky than full course meal. Man, if this had been a full-length novel and just a little darker, it would have been a solid five-star. But this came really close.
Amelia Wilde is a new author to me. I think I came across BLACKMAIL when it was cheap or free in the Kindle store. I remember reading the sample (which I ALWAYS do, now) and thinking, "Oh my God, this sounds hot." Also, it was nice to actually see some emotional depth and a quasi-realistic office environment from the get-go. So many office romances feel like they were written by someone who saw one episode of The Apprentice and thinks all CEOs go around telling people they're fired in rooms that look like mausoleums designed by Liberace.
ANYWAY, this book was great. I loved the hero and the heroine. Bristol is the daughter of a con artist and working at a temp agency to support her younger siblings, but when her dad screws over the wrong guy and needs 50k fast, she decides to embezzle it from her boss: Will. Will is a corporate hardass who is cold and a little cruel, the sort of guy who sends people running the other way when they encounter him in the hallway. But he appreciates Bristol's attention to detail and likes her cheap TJ Maxx suits a little too much... until the theft.
Then he decides to make her pay. With her body.
Dun dun dun.
This was almost a perfect five star read for me. The pacing was great and it did a good job balancing emotional development with the relationship. Will has a pretty tragic backstory and so does Bristol, and I liked how both of their pasts provided opportunities to connect and provide for each other in ways that went beyond the bedroom. That said, I felt like the author kind of foreshadowed Will to be way kinkier than he actually was. If you keep hinting that a guy is a sadist and then just have him do a bit of light biting and humiliation, well, ma'am, you have not served up what was promised on the menu. Also, I do not like the name "corporate whore." I was going to let it slide but it kept happening. Apparently the author liked calling the heroine that as much as Will did. I, however, did not find it hot. At all.
For those who plan on reading the series, it does end on a cliffhanger and there is no HEA/HFN in this book. That said, I found it a pleasant surprise and I think this author is going to be a new favorite of mine. I can't wait to read Emerson's book. It's so rare to find an author who can write a tortured hero so well.
So I was at my therapy session the other day and was like, "You know the problem with being a content creator with a larger platform is that everyone expects you to have an extremely radical opinion on whatever the latest hot take is, and it gets to the point where you start to second-guess your own opinions because you begin to ask yourself, 'is this really what I think or am I just doing this for the clicks?'" And then my therapist was like, "Ma'am, this is just a drive-thru Starbucks, please take your coffee so we can help the next person in line," and I was like, "Well, SOMEONE'S getting a one-star review on Zocdoc."*
*Just kidding, although if you don't think of coffee as therapy, you've obviously never had a double shot blonde espresso oat milk latte.**
**Seriously, just kidding. Coffee is not a substitute for therapy.
I was leery about picking up VICIOUS because literally everyone and their horny granny was hyping it up, and contrary to popular belief, I don't actually sit around here looking for popular books to hate on. I also really didn't like the last L.J. Shen book I read. It was one of her mafia ones and reading it made me angry, and I was like "NEVER AGAIN." So it kind of seemed like me and Ms. Shen just weren't destined to be. And I was fine with that. Really. Things were fine.
But then one of my friends wrote a review saying that this was basically THE CRUEL PRINCE but with a human cast. And it was like one of those children's TV show buzzers went off, where they're like, "Uh oh! You said today's WORD OF THE DAY!!!!!" Because if there was one thing she could have said that would have made me pick up the book, it was that. I fucking love THE CRUEL PRINCE. Enemies to lovers served up hot on a plate. There's seriously no better rush.
Here's the thing about VICIOUS. It's very much like Hana Yori Dango/Meteor Garden in terms of vibes. Except they call themselves the HotHoles, which is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Also the hero's name is Vicious, which I guess he calls himself because he hates being named Baron. But as stupid as the name Baron is, I think his nickname might actually be worse. Also he calls the heroine "Help." Because she's part of the help. It takes a LOT of mental gymnastics to get over the nicknames, but after reading five books of Zodiac Academy and enduring things like "Faebook," my literary suspension of disbelief has stretched like taffy and I find myself willing to tolerate all kinds of ridic as long as it's for the sake of a good story. Maybe you can't get over the name thing. Maybe it's like sandpaper on your brain. But if you can get over the name thing, the story is so worth it.
Look, I get that it's toxic. I don't care. If you come at me with a story that serves up old skool Asian drama vibes, the feminism is going on the shelf for a while. I'm a sucker for the "I hate everyone but you" trope, especially when it's liberally salted with the "touch her and die" trope and the "I've loved you for years" trope. Yes, I know this buys into toxic masculinity and the idea that men only treat women like shit because they like them, and in real life, I would definitely give that a hard no, but in a story, where the characters are obviously meant for each other and you know that everything is guaranteed to turn out all right in the end because this is a redemptive romance and love is the invisible fairy godmother who makes everything all right with a kiss and a magic wand, I SHIP THE FUCK OUT OF IT. The end.
And this was a really great story. I actually really liked Emilia a lot. I liked that she had the agency and witty rejoinders of an old skool Charlotte Lamb heroine. I liked Vicious (ugh) and how he had such a sardonic and cynical outlook on life that was a result of not wanting to be hurt. I thought his backstory was super sad and I thought the revenge story was compelling and added a nice touch of darkness to what could have otherwise been a really saccharine storyline. I liked both timelines, the side characters, and the pacing of the story. When Emilia and Vicious go on their Christmas-in-New-York date I swooned. Actually, this might be the only Christmas romance I've read that didn't feel like it was trying to convert me to the Hallmark channel. It was just so good.
VICIOUS is a really great story. I'm not giving it a full five stars because the pacing was a little bumpy and I didn't particularly like the epilogue (and also the names, omg). But this was so, so close to being a perfect read. I might actually like L.J. Shen after all, oh my God. I can't wait to talk to my "therapist" about this tomorrow when I pick up my latte. (Starbucks staff: NOOOOOOOO***)
THE SHADOWED HEART is an underrated historical classic set in Venice in the 1700s. It's also almost everything I want out of a romance, with echos of tension and danger that at times make it feel like a dark romance. The two main characters are Chiara, a half-Romani girl with noble lineage, and Luca, a noble son from a patrician family.
Chiara wants to kill Luca because she thinks he's the man who assaulted her sister at their camp in Padua. But the man who did that had an aura of evil (btw, the heroine is psychic) and was also a coward (the author makes a point of telling us that he screamed girlishly when she tried to stab him lol). This man reminds her of a predatory Lucifer and as much as she hates him, she's strangely attracted to him too, and that, I think we can all agree, is the absolute best kind of hate in a romance novel.
I loved the Venetian setting and how in-depth the author went into all the history and politics for such a short novel. There was also tons of intrigue and action, and even though I'm not usually into psychic characters in books, like, at all, the author made me not mind it. Although I did personally think it was cheesy and made a lot of things way too neat that otherwise would have been difficult to resolve or explain.
This book fell a little short with me with regards to the ending. I felt like Luca fell into TSTL territory, and since we were let to believe he was actually quite calculating and scheming, this felt extremely out of character for him. So did his huge blindspot regarding his psychopath brother who he knew was a psychopath because he personally had him jailed for SA-ing and murdering the woman he loved. I also liked his character more as the suave and dangerous playboy, and felt like he had become too nice by the end of the book (and I love a nice hero, and all, but that's not the Luca I married in my head!).
Overall, though, THE SHADOWED HEART was absolutely wonderful and I will be reading other books from this author for sure because I am in love with her ability to weave a metaphor.
So many of Charlotte Lamb's old books are out of print now, so I had to make an effort to hunt this one down, but it was SO worth it. Sophie has an administrative position at a business office, working for a creep boss. One day, she almost gets run down in the street by a fancy car: surprise, surprise, it's the Greek mother of the CEO, Madame Lefka. Madame is charmed by Sophie's straightforward nature and dry humor, and offers Sophie a new role-- as her secretary-- which Sophie accepts.
One of Sophie's duties is keeping the son, Alex, out of his mother's affairs. Alex is a control freak in all things and is constantly trying to horn in on his mother's finances. The last two secretaries apparently fell prey to his charms and Madame is sick of it. So is Sophie, and the best part of the book is seeing her act as a professional obstruction to Alex, and seeing him clearly not know how to deal with her. When he tries to make her jealous with another woman, she's just like thank you, next. Sophie is honestly one of the best Harlequin heroines I've ever encountered, past or present, and I seriously adored this woman.
This would have been a five star read except for a few things. I was fine with the dub-con but I didn't like that the hero slapped the heroine afterwards. I was also fine with the heroine being in love with another man, but I hated the grooming element of it-- something which the hero, surprisingly, points out. The heroine was eighteen when the OM made a move on her-- and he was MARRIED! To her cousin! Also, the cousin, Elaine, is AWFUL. She said and did the most horrible things and I kept waiting for something awful to happen to her, but nothing did. Usually these Harlequins feel like a perfect bit-sized tidbit of story but with this one, I found myself wishing it was a little longer just so it could tie up some of these loose ends. I also didn't like that the heroine loses her fire towards the end and kind of just becomes a sad, beaten down shadow of her former self. He needed to grovel, bad.
Apart from that, I really enjoyed this book. The banter in the beginning, the development of the side characters, the personality of Madame, and Sophie's quick wit and no-nonsense personality were all great, and I could even see the appeal of Alex (except for the slap and murder threats). SAVAGE SURRENDER is definitely one of the better old skool Harlequins I've read and I loved the Greek setting and the way the heroine was given agency and allowed to stick up for herself. Even though it wasn't perfect, it's a keeper. I think I might have to read more Charlotte Lamb now!
Nenia ✨ I yeet my books back and forth ✨
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