Darcy Burke „The Duke of Daring“ 4**** @darcyburke

*I got this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.”

We all know Darcy Burke if it comes to historical romance, don’t we? And we all love her? Well this story will make you love her.

Lucinda Parnell lives with her grandma in a small house in London. She already had a couple of unsuccessful seasons and kind of enjoyed being a wallflower because this way she wasn’t forced into marriage. Now their funds are gone, her dead lost most of them because of his gambling problem before he died, and her grandma wants her to marry, so she can retire to a small cottage near Bath. But Lucy has no plan to get married, on the contrary. She wants to stay with her grandma.

Andrew Wentworth, the Earl of Dartford, so short “Dart”, is the only surviving member of is family. He lost all of them to an illness. He feels empty and alone that’s why he decided to fly with ah hot-air balloon and he wants to parachute. On the other hand he loves to gamble and bet on things.

In desperate need of funds Lucy dresses up as a man and submerges into the hells of London to win what she needs. And her costume is good, nobody notices that there is a woman underneath – except for Dart. But he doesn’t blow her cover but helps her to win, introduces her to other bets, his friends … of course it gets dangerous.

Oh this was a nice story! I really enjoyed the details of Lucy’s costume and how she became a man, when he told her to act differently to be not that feminine -adorable. But in the end, I don’t know, things fell into place too smoothly. Even with the blackmailing and everything it wasn’t realistic enough for me but too Disney style – the happily ever after.

Nevertheless I really liked the book a lot!

4****

Jess Michaels „Tempted“ (Wicked Woodleys #3) @jessmichaelsbks

If you like Jess Michael’s novels, you’ll love „Tempted“. It’s the newest addition to the “Wicked Woodley’s” series. I read the book back in December but was too busy to finish my review just yet….

One of the reasons why I love it – while you read about the Woodley’s family you get in touch with characters from other series as the Flynn’s. I love that. You feel kind of connected with the old books.

This is the love story of Juliet Grey, the young woman who helped the Woodley mother to get healthy again with her knowledge of herbs, and Gabriel Woodley – the most logical man of the family. He is head over toes in science and has no idea how to work emotions respectively feel them – till Juliet crosses his way.

But there is so much more to this story. It’s also the love story of the Woodley mother and her youth love interest – Juliet’s father. And it’s also about Claire – the sister who “left” the family to live another life. Because of Claire’s disappearance Gabriel became the man he is. Everything has to be logical and explainable. But love isn’t.

Gabriel needs to realize that there is more to his life than looking for Claire. Juliet is changing everything.

It’s a very, very well told story- as always – and you love the characters. You cannot put Jess’ books away and that’s what I really love about them. You are pulled into this story and she doesn’t give you the option to put the book aside.

Thanks, Jess!

Rating: 5*****

I got this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Olivia Drake „Bella and the Beast“ (Cinderella Sisterhood #4) 4**** @OliviaDrake1

There are titles of books you read and know that you have to read it. So this one was also an ARC from Netgalley and I really, really enjoyed it.

Bella and her two siblings, the 14 year younger twins, arrive back in England after they lived abroad half their live in Bella’s case, the siblings never had touched English soil before. So their father left them the cottage and a little money, additionally he told Bella on his deathbed – he was an explorer/adventurer/archeologist – that she should find “Aylwin” because than she’d have half a pharaoh’s treasure. The problem is that Bella has no clue who Aylwin is.

So one of London’s matchmakers sees her chance in helping a source less virgin to fall in love and marry, and brings her a the magical slippers and they fit perfectly. She helps Bella to find a job as a curator in London but make her swear that she would never tell her “boss” – Aylwin – her name.

The Duke of Aylwin is a young man, a few years her senior, who spends all his day between Egyptians statues, vases and mummies. His whole house is filled with Egyptians artefacts. He doesn’t attend social gatherings and about to get married – to the joy of his cousin, the next duke in line.

In the beginning Bella has to impress Aylwin to give her a chance but slowly they start to develop a tender for each other – but on another basis. His father was murdered in Egypt, her father fled with his family (and Bella) in the same night and left the young boy behind, alone. She is searching his documents for the treasure map, he isn’t trusting her at all because he doesn’t trust people and slowly he notices that she is hiding things from him.

 

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I studied history but my master isn’t in Ancient history at all although my aunt is an archeologist so it was nice to read a story that deals with the grave robbers, archeology, curses and so on. I could picture pretty well sorting pieces of a broken vase because I watched my aunt sorting and drawing potsherds for years.

Bella is a really fascinating character and Aylwin isn’t the beast at all. He has reasons to hide behind the stoic mask of a historian and slowly she is able to get behind this.

I loved the scene when he came back from the bawdy house and she smelled the prostitute on him – I think this was one of my favorite scenes at all. It was so authentically. I mean how does a light skirt smell? In Austria there is a dialect word for it which isn’t very pretty but its “Hurendiesel” – a very cheap perfume.

While reading this one I asked myself why there are never unwanted pregnancies in those Regency Romance books. Yes, they pull out (sometimes) but everybody knows that you can also get pregnant when you do coitus interruptus. I’d think it would give some stories a really nice twist. Just my two scent.

Rating: 4****

Pepper Winters „First Debt“ (Indebted #2) – 5***** ( @PepperWinters )

To review a Pepper Winter’s book is really hard for me because her books are so different from what I usually read but I am addicted by her „Indebted“-Series. Her books are dark. It’s not about vanilla sex, oh no. The sex is dark, it is about domination and power. It’s also the reason why it took me a couple of weeks now to find the time to sit down and type it.

So “First Debt” is the second novel in this series and it’s a dark one but, in my opinion, not as dark as the first was – thankfully. It starts exactly where the first one left off – Nila is running. She’s running for her life because she doesn’t know what the debts, she was told about, are about.

Let’s say that he finds her but it is not that easy. If I say there are feelings involved I’d lie because it isn’t about feelings, in my opinion it is more about trust and about a secret – Jethro’s secret he isn’t telling yet. There is something he hides from his family and from Nila but she is about to find out – not in this book but soon.

So it is about the first debt and every debt has a long story – I’ll not tell now – but Jethro can decide if he will enjoy is and torture the Weaver in the process or if he only does it because he has to. Do I have to tell you on which side Jethro decides to stay?

And it’s about her cellphone, it’s about the messages she exchanges with a man since before her “kidnapping”.

It’s hard to tell the story without spoiling anything but let’s say – I loved it! I really had to stop myself at 2am to sleep (I usually get up at 6 and start work at 8) because I needed to know how the story goes on. And I really have to know more and more. I really cannot wait to read book number 3 which shall be out in a few days! *yay*

Rating: 5*****