PROMISE OF PLEASURE by Cheryl Holt

PUBLISHER: Berkley, 4/2010
GENRE: Historical romance
MY GRADE: D-

SYNOPSIS: No sooner does Mary Barnes, yet to be touched by a man, drink a secret elixir than a handsome and mysterious stranger walks into her life. But Mary wonders if the scoundrel's growing passion is the result of just a love tonic, or the real thing

MY THOUGHTS: I didn't like this story at all. The hero was a slut who was only marrying for money. He didn't care about Mary's feeling at all when she told him to not marry Felicity. He wanted to keep Mary as his mistress after he married her sister. When he found out Mary had been kicked out of the house, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, he's in love with her. I didn't buy that at all, nor did I buy the love Paxton and Cassandra had for each other after knowing each other for about a month. All the characters, except for Mary, were unlikeable. I didn't like that this story was really two stories in one. I didn't find either relationship believable. I don't understand how Lauretta was allowed to stay at Barnes Manor with two unmarried men. That was never explained.

I did like the hero and heroine meeting very early on, on page 6, to be exact. They didn't get along from the moment they met and they bickered constantly. Jordan was quite the instigator, always saying suggestive things to Mary, getting her riled up. But she soon gave in to his flirtatious ways and got kick out of the house because of it. But that's ok because she gets her happily-ever-after.

I received this from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

STILL MISSING by Chevy Stevens

You can read about this book at Amazon.com. It's Chevy Steven's first novel and was published by St. Martin's Press in July 2010.

MY THOUGHTS: 32 year old Annie, who's a Realtor, was abducted while alone at an open-house. The story is about being abducted by a stranger and how she suffered at his hands for a year. From the get-go I did not like Annie at all. She seems more like an angry, foul-mouthed, crude teenager than a woman in her 30s. I despise the word freak simply because I think it sounds stupid and she always referred to her abductor as The Freak  (real name Simon Rousseau) throughout the entire book. She also kept referring to the police station later in the book as the cop shop. That really annoyed me.


I didn't care for the abductor either and found him to be a bit unbelievable and unpredictable when it came to violence. I don't understand what the whole point of the baby plot was either. Include a baby just to kill it off a month later? I've read a lot of true crime and have watched a lot of true crime on television (and still do on a weekly basis) and I've never, ever heard of a kidnap victim getting away in the abductors own vehicle. That just seemed a bit silly to me.

I was very bored up until almost 2/3 of the way through when her abductor got what he deserved and Annie escaped. Too bad she couldn't have done the deed sooner so that the book could have ended sooner. Right after that incident, I was back to being bored and unhappy with the story. She went to the police station, in the abductors own van, and told them everything. She's back home, out jogging with her dog one day and is almost abducted again. I think before that happened, earlier after she first came home after the abduction, someone tried to break in her home while she was out. Can you say overkill?

Then it's revealed who's behind the kidnapping and it was just too much for a reader to stand. Just not plausible at all.

Needless to say, I did not care for this book at all. I didn't find it to be exciting or suspenseful at all. I won't be trying this author again.


This book was sent to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

LADY ISABELLA'S SCANDALOUS MARRIAGE by Jennifer Ashley

This book was published by Berkley in July 2010. It's the second in a planned set of four in the Highland Pleasure series. You can read the synopsis here. 

My thoughts: The story takes place in England in September 1881. The hero is 30 year old Mac Mackenzie. He has auburn hair and copper colored eyes. His estranged wife is Isabella. She's 24 and has red hair and green eyes. They've been married for 6 1/2 years and estranged/legally seperated for 3 1/2. The story spans about a little over a year, including the epilogue. 

I liked this book more than I thought I would. I was not a fan of the previous one in this series, The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie, which came out last year. This was a pretty basic story of an estranged couple who ended up working out everything and getting back together after admitting they still loved each other. Despite Isabella declaring her love for Mac several times, I never believed it. She seemed a bit cold to me and too young. What I did like most is the bit of mystery and suspense that the author threw in right from the get-go with Mac's imposter. I thought this book would be more like romantic suspense but there wasn't quite enough suspense in it for me. 

I didn't like that the hero and heroine from the previous book in the series was throughout the whole story. I think a cameo appearance would have been plenty. Mac's other two brothers, Hart and Cameron, were throughout the book too and in fact Cameron is to have his own book, The Many Sins of Lord Cameron, next year. I do want to read about his single brothers. 

* This book was sent to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Author Meagan McKinney and Her Fraudulent Activities- Crime Doesn't Pay

Author Meagan McKinney, who's real name is Ruth Goodman, born in 1961, published her first historical romance novel, No Choice But Surrender, in 1987. In recent years she's been up to no good. Have a look at this article and you'll see what I'm talking about. Shame on her. She clearly has problems since this is far from the first time she's tried to get money that she wasn't entitled to. And here's an older article that talks about her claiming two diamond bracelets were stolen.