Aug 30 2007

Dear Author Recommends for September – Updated

By Jane • Letters of Opinion • • Tags: Recommended Reads

Usually we try to provide a recommendation list that has a little variety but this month, it’s all historicals. In my rush yesterday to post our recommendation list, I totally forgot two authors that I had read a long time ago and loved. I am an idiot.

I thought this one came out next month, but in double checking, I realized that the release date was late August. Eve Kenin breathes new life into the urban fantasy world with Driven whose post apocalyptic vision of the future (or alternative dimension) balances intricate world building with character development. Raina Bowen must win a race of truckers delivering cargo across a highway controlled by Duncan Bane. Duncan holds a weapon over Raina’s head and if she can win, she can remove that weapon and seek vengeance upon Bane. Wizard, a mercenary, appears to complicate and help Raina at the same time. She’s not quite sure his motivations but she doesn’t care so long as he doesn’t prevent her from gaining the ultimate prize. Together Wizard and Raina learn about humanity and what lengths they will go for the ones that they love.

First up is Nalini Singh’s Caressed By Ice . This is the third in the Psy/Changeling series and the first to feature a Psy hero. Judd Laurens was a Psy weapon who could kill a man with his mind. His family dropped out of the Psy network and lives with the SnowDancer clan. Judd is the perfect Psy, cold and unfeeling and completely unchanged despite months spent with the clan. Brenna Kincaid is suffering mentally for her abduction by a Changeling serial killer who was apprehended in the first Singh book, Slave to Sensation. Judd seems like the least likely man to attract a woman damaged like Brenna but it turns out that Judd’s coldness is no match for Brenna’s heat.

I also forgot to add that I thoroughly enjoyed romantic suspense novelist Karen Rose’s September release, Die for Me. Rose is particularly good at theming her books and this one is about families. The interrelationship of families, of how far one family member will go for another, drives the suspense and conflict in this story. Detective Vito Ciccotelli finds a number of graves, some empty and some filled and works with local archaelogist Sophie Johannsen to discover the secrets of the graves to prevent more bodies filling the ground. Rose writes strong romances in amongst the suspense and does it seemlessly.

Jayne and Jane both recommend The Serpent Prince. It’s a dark, emotional romance between a man bent on revenge and the woman in whose arms he finds succor. The reason for revenge is compelling but each act stamps a dark stain on Viscount Simon Iddesleigh’s soul and even Lucy’s love might not be enough to save him.

Jo Goodman never fails to deliver the reader a rich and nuanced story of love. Unlike The Serpent Prince, If His Kiss Is Wicked is a heroine in trouble story. The hero, Restell Gardner, a bit of a disreputable fellow, is known to help people in exchange for a favor. Emma Hathaway must place her trust in Restell in order to find peace in her life. Their future, however, is endangered by the envy and hate of others as well as the fear Emma harbors in secret. The relationship unfolds along with the mystery Emma brings to Restell, and the reader is rewarded along the way with wonderfully layered characters, intelligent dialogue, and detailed historical settings. This is definitely a book to savor.

Jayne reports that she inhaled Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade. Lord John's widowed mother is getting ready to remarry and he and Hal are meeting with the groom-to-be and his stepson. John realizes he's met the stepson and where he met him –" at a London male brothel. The stepson, Percy Wainwright, acknowledges John and the two begin, or try to begin, a flirtation. Percy is looking to join the Army and is persuaded to buy into John and Hal's regiment. John takes him under his wing and the two begin a love affair – one which must remain secret as homosexuality is a capital crime in 1750s England. The regiment is due to set out for Germany (the fighting is part of the global Seven Years War of which the American "French and Indian War–? is a part) where disaster strikes. John is injured and returns to England where he begins to wonder if a series of what he thought were random street attacks might have something to do with his father's long ago suicide. Or was it suicide? And if not, who were the men responsible? And did it have anything to do with the Uprising in 1745? And yes, Jamie shows up a few times. John must try to discover what happened so many years ago while keeping his true nature hidden from family, friends and his enemies.

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By Jane • Letters of Opinion • 12 • Tags: Recommended Reads