FORTUNE’S SON

 By Emery Lee

http://www.authoremerylee.com/

ISBN-10: 1402256442

ISBN-13: 978-1402256448

 

From the back cover:

Love is the ultimate gamble…

Seasoned gambler Philip Drake knows every trick and uses most of them. After years of infamy, he’s ready to accept the mantle of respectability with his earldom– until a devastating racing loss and the threat of debtors’ prison force Philip right back into his gaming ways…

Susannah, Lady Messingham, is a woman with a past who refuses to belong to any man again. But Philip’s skill catches her eye and she persuades him to teach her how to win at the tables. Their new partnership turns into an exhilarating high-stakes game that entangles them in terrifying risk and unimaginable rewards…

Immerse yourself in the risky side of Georgian England with a pair of lovers who aren’t afraid to risk it all on a toss of the dice…

Emery Lee brings Georgian England to life in her recent release Fortune’s Son. With its cast of colorful characters and a love story rife with twists and turns, this meticulously researched book is a captivating from start to finish. Not your typical beach read, it accompanied me everywhere I went on a recent cruise vacation: poolside, afternoon tea, even to the beach in Cozumel. I simply couldn’t put it down.  It’s that good.

After you finish this one, you will want to go back and read Emery’s debut novel, The Highest Stakes, for more background on some of the characters.  I can hardly wait to find out where this gifted author will take us next!

Duty and Desire

A Novel of Modern India

By Anju Gattani

http://www.anjugattani.com/

Greenbrier Book Company, LLC

ISBN: 978-1-937573-01-0

Duty and Desire is the debut novel in Anju Gattani’s Winds of Fire series. To paraphrase the back cover blurb: Sheetal Prasad has it all: youth, beauty, wealth and education. But when this modern Indian woman surrenders love for honor and marries into India’s most glamorous and powerful “royal family,” the Dhanrajs, she is exposed to a web of lies, infidelity, greed and secrets. As Sheetal experiences a loss of freedom, she struggles to control her fate.

The Prologue was intriguing. “It was the wedding of the decade. Everyone present had been holding his or her breath in anticipation of the five hundred-million-rupee bash. Everyone but the bride.”

First, let me say that I am a friend of Anju’s, therefore I would be predisposed to like any book she wrote. But I wasn’t prepared to love it like I did. Of course, it didn’t hurt that she thanked me in the Acknowledgments section. That was a thrill. But, back to the book. The pacing and the plot, the characterization and the conflict, the storytelling and the setting and sexual tension she created, were impeccable. I didn’t want to put it down. It’s the story of a woman’s journey from maidenhood to marriage and a story of how she adapts to her new family, bound as she is by the rigid traditions and confines of her culture. 

Her hero, Sanjeet, is a very complex, charming and compelling man with many layers. On the surface, he is intolerable and the way he ignores and abuses his new wife, despicable. Sheetal is sympathetic as she fights her desire for her husband, while at the same time harboring growing feelings of powerlessness,  frustration and rage towards him. The secondary characters, Sheetal’s mother-in-law and sisters-in-law are evil, fascinating and entertaining in their own ways, each trapped by their own past. 

I love books about foreign cultures and Duty and Desire is no exception. Anju knows what she writes about. She was born in India and grew up in Hong Kong. Reading her book introduced me to the exotic and glittering world of modern India. The glossary alone is worth the price of the book. I really learned a lot. And the cover is exquisite. I highly recommend this book.

THE STAND-IN BRIDEGROOM                                      

A Short Story by Marilyn Baron

http://petitfoursandhottamales.com/author/marilyn-baron/

Publisher:  TWB Press (Copyright 2011)

ISBN 978-1-936991-25-9

Genre: Paranormal Romance

Publisher’s blurb:

A bride has planned a storybook wedding in Las Vegas. Unfortunately, her groom is late and isn’t answering his phone. Should she cancel the wedding, disappoint her guests, and devastate her mother? Not when the groom’s twin brother agrees to stand in as the bridegroom.

- – - – -

And that is when things start to get really get exciting.  Marilyn Baron has a wonderful voice and an imagination that works overtime.  This is her third in her popular angel stories published by TWB Press.  I highly recommend this to anyone that loves a good romance thrown in the middle of a little paranormal activity.

This, and Baron’s other short stories can be purchased at TWB Press.

Body Movers Series:  2 BODIES for the PRICE of 1       

                      

by Stephanie Bond

http://www.stephaniebond.com/

Publisher:  MIRA Books (Copyright 2008)

ISBN-13: 987-0-7783-2606-9

ISBN-10:         0-7783-2606-3

Buy it here

“A Sexy Romance”

With fugitive parents, a brother dodging loan sharks, a hunky cop who’s made her outlaw family his business, a buff body mover looking to make a move on her and her ex-fiancé back in the picture, Carlotta Wren thought her life couldn’t get any more complicated.  And then . . .

A couldn’t-put-it-down-until-I-finished book.  Stephanie Bond writes a fast-paced story with great dialogue and a great story line.  The cliffhanger ending has me searching for the third in this Body Movers series.

 

The Prodigal’s Return

 

By Anna DeStefano

 

http://annawrites.com/

 

Harlequin Super Romance

ISBN: 13 9780373713585

 

Does going home mean living with the past-or living down the past?

 

The death of teenager Bobby Compton shocked the community of Rivermist, Georgia. It also destroyed the lives of Neal Cain and Jennifer Gardner. Neal was sent to prison, and Jennifer’s life spiraled out of control until the birth of her daughter forced her to grow up.

 

Now, eight years later, Neal has come home to help his ailing father. Jennifer, a single mother, is also back, trying to make a go of things. Neal and Jennifer were in love when they were teenagers, and those feelings haven’t gone away. But they’re different people, shaped by everything that’s happened. They can’t change the past. Can they still have a future?

 

This is an emotion filled book. Despite the mistakes and decisions of the characters you still like them. Warning: Have a hanky nearby.

 

The Hundred-Foot Journey

Author: Richard C. Morais

 

Author site: http://www.richardcmorais.com/

ISBN: 978-1-4391-6564-5

ISBN 978-1-4391-6566-9 (ebook)

Format: Hardcover*

Publisher: Scribner, A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Release Date: July 2010; Paperback release/Summer of 2011

*The international bestseller is also in active film development.

 

Although a love story is woven into the plot, love of family is the focus of this charming debut novel, The Hundred-Foot Journey, by Richard C. Morais. Hassan Haji, a Muslim of Indian descent, now a middle-aged celebrated chef and proprietor of a French haute cuisine establishment in Paris, flashes back to Bombay where he grew up working in his family’s modest restaurant.

Following a family tragedy, Hassan’s colorful, extended family moves to London. After traveling around Europe, they eventually open an inexpensive Indian restaurant, Maison Mumbai, across the street from a traditional French relais run by the famous chef Madame Mallory in the fictional village of Lumière in the French Alps.

Madame Mallory recognizes something in Hassan, that mysterious “it,” that rare innate talent that comes along in a chef once a generation. The fact that Hassan, in the person of a “skinny Indian teenager,” is a “great artist,” infuriates her. After a clash of cultures, strikes and counterstrikes, and a horrific accident, Madame Mallory takes Hassan under her wing and ultimately guides his destiny from behind the scenes.

The Hundred-Foot Journey is a beautiful fable, a gem, like a fine meal, to be savored. The author’s description of the culinary world, his characters and his sense of place are authentic.

I had the pleasure of meeting Richard C. Morais at a reading and book signing in Atlanta earlier this month and he had some advice to share with other writers.

A U.S. citizen who has lived abroad for most of his life, Morais says the reason he writes is that “he’s desperately trying to find out what he has in common with other people.” At the same time, he says he gets to “pretend to be someone different from my background. It’s a great joy and hard to put a monetary value on.”

Morais writes in layers. “You start with yourself and your essence, do research to get the voice, which stimulates your imagination, then you add the layers.”

Morais compares writers with magpies. “They gather real details and in their writing process, at the precise moment they need them, the details surface from their unconscious.

“Don’t mimic anybody,” advises Morais. “Every route is different. You’ve got to find your own path.”

Ultimately, Morais counsels authors to “Write the book you’d want to read.”

In this case, he wrote the book I wanted to read.   

 

His Valentine Surprise

Tanya Michaels

http://www.eharlequin.com/author.html?authorid=986

Publisher:  Harlequin

ISBN-10: 0373753470

Genre:  Romance

 

Mark Hathaway gets called into the principal’s office when his six-year-old daughter, Vicki, sends an e-mail to everyone on the PTA mailing list asking for a new mommy.  Fortunately for him, the principal, Shay Morgan, is just the valentine he needs.  Now, he has to convince her that going out with him won’t keep her from getting the principal job she’s always wanted while revitalizing sales at his outdoor equipment store and, oh yeah, spending more time with his daughter.  Can he convince Principal Morgan to be his valentine?

I thoroughly enjoyed this book.  I cooked supper with it, read it in car pool, and sometimes even sneaked a peek at red lights.  I laughed and I sniffed while reading this small town story, but I found some worthy antagonists as well.  I can promise you that you, too, will fall in love with Mark Hathaway, as he burns pork ribs but sets up an incredible chocolate fondue spread.  Just like Shay, you won’t be able to resist Vicki’s sweet persistence, either.  If you’re looking for a well-crafted story with three dimensional characters, then look no further.  His Valentine Surprise would make a great Valentine’s Day present to yourself, and, hey, it’s fat free.