Undeniable by Alison Kent

Grade-B
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-Low
Series-Dalton Gang #1
Reviewed by Kay

Arwen Poole is a bar owner in a smallish ranch town. She is also the daughter of the town drunk. She doesn't know that she's beautiful either. She is very content with her life. At least, she was until the Dalton Gang moved back home.

Dax Campbell has been kind of a drifter since he left town at eighteen years old. He left town to escape his dysfunctional family and their expectations of him. He spent his teen years at the Dalton ranch with the family he always wanted. He made the Daltons and his friends his family.

He and his friends come home after the death of the Daltons to take care of the ranch that was willed to the three of them. He sees Arwen and their relationship starts off with a bang. Literally.

I liked this novel a lot. Liked all the characters and what they are going through. Dax and Arwen struggle to put a label on their relationship because of their pasts. I loved the emotions I felt while reading and the sex...hot and frequent.

The Best Present I Ever Received

My husband has been known to be a bit hit and miss when it comes to buying me gifts.  Gifts aren't terribly important to me, but I like to receive something  on the appropriate holidays.  (I consider appropriate holidays to be my birthday, Christmas, and Mothers Day.) It has worked well for me to just tell Mr. Anne what I want for each holiday, either specifically or with some wiggle room.  That way I'm not disappointed and we're all good. I rarely get surprised, but I'm fine with that.  Christmas this year was a major exception though!  Mr. Anne got me the most thoughtful, shows-how-well-he-knows-me gift EVER!  He got me a romance novel personalized with our names!  SO cool!  I was laughing and crying at the same time when I opened it.  I think it will forever remain at the top of my favorite gifts list!

He ordered it from www.booksbyme.com.   The idea is pretty cool.  You can pick romance or regular fiction.  They even have children's and young adult books.  Within the romance there were even several genres to pick.  Once he picked romance and fantasy, he put in our names, physical characteristics, friends' names and more.   He chose a science fiction fantasy romance where he was a Water Mage and I was a self trained illegal Mage and we came together to, of course, save the world.  He chose a heat level that was "less than ménage but still hot" and that was fine with me.  (Note:  after I checked out the website myself, I asked him about this, because I didn't see any menage books.  He said he'd checked out a few different places, and it must have been another place that offered several more risque books you could put yourself into, including books where you already started as a couple, but then explored other interesting scenarios together.  The website he bought from, Books By Me offers books that range from no sex to a Blaze level.)

I have to tell you, though, that while it was an awesome gift, it was a weird read.  First of all, I was hyper aware of all the fill-in-the-blank spots.  I don't think they really stuck out much, but because it was about ME, I noticed when the heroine flips her straight brown hair, because it's MY straight brown hair.  And when the hero looked at MY "athletic" body, I had to break out of the story and appreciate that Mr. Anne had charitably described me as athletic!  (It made my day again!  See, best give EVER.)

Besides noticing the physical descriptions, I also was surprisingly squicked out to read the sex scene in the book!  I mean, I never skip sex scenes.  I'm not ashamed to say I look forward to them and really appreciate a hot sex scene.  The one in my book wasn't bad at all, but I really didn't enjoy seeing our names like I thought I would.  It was just...weird. 

The story itself was just ok, though it's hard for me to judge, since I was so wonderfully distracted by all the ME in the book.  It was a hoot and hands down a wonderful and thoughtful gift!

Escorted by Claire Kent

Grade-B-
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-None
Genre-contemporary
Reviewed by Kate

Okay, I admit to being intrigued by the premise right off the bat. You just don't run across too many male escort romances out there.

Lori, a successful romance author, is still a virgin at 26. She hires Anders, a male escort, to take care of that problem for her. Obviously, or it wouldn't be a romance, they both fall for each other.

This story is told from Lori's view point. You only hear Ander's thoughts if he shares them with Lori. I typically don't care for this style of narrative, but it worked here. I don't think I could have liked Ander as much as I did if the story included his other "engagements." There were two things that bothered me about the story:

1. The title. I kept thinking "oooh, you got escorted" in the same line of "you got served," and

2. the pen name Lori uses in the story is Claire Kent, the name of the author.
Small things, I know, but that's just me.

Married in Haste by Cathy Maxwell

Grade-B-
Hotness Level-Blaze
Kink Level-None
Series-Marriage #1
Genre-historical
Reviewed by Kate

Brenn, the new Earl of Merton, has come to London to find a bride...a rich bride...to help him rebuild his estate. The estate has been in tatters for 200 years and he is currently living in a small cottage.

Tess Hamlin has been the belle of the ball for a few seasons now. But an heiress can afford to be choosy, can't she? When she finds out her inheritance is gone, she must marry quickly before society finds out about her financial state.

Married within a week, neither Brenn nor Tess knows the other's secret.

I enjoyed this one quite a bit. I connected with both characters and couldn't help but root for them. But the typical "I love him but will be mad at him until he says those three magic words" part went on a bit long for me.

Game of Hearts by Kate Donovan

Grade-C+
Hotness Level-Blaze
Kink Level-None
Series-Happily Ever After Company #1
Genre-historical, mail order bride
Reviewed by Kate

Megan and Suzannah have been best friends since they were little girls. They promised each other that they would get married at the same time and live close enough to each other that their children would be able to play together.

They consult a matchmaker to arrange marriages for them. When they are unable to find two acceptable husbands that live close enough together, they decide Megan will accept a contract with Dennis Riordan. Suzannah will accompany Megan on her journey and then pick a husband at that point. I can't see anything going wrong, can you?

While on their journey, Megan meets and falls in love with Ben, but she feels unable to marry him due to her marriage contract. Ben follows them to their destination and is there when the girls discover that Dennis is really Aengus Yates.

Suzannah has been in love with Aengus Yates since she was a little girl. But he has broken her heart twice already. Once when, at age 11, she asked him to wait for her to be old enough to marry, but her married someone else instead. The second time, when he left his wife and two young sons and never came back.

Aengus can't marry Megan, despite their contract, once he sees how much she loves Ben. But can Suzannah marry Aengus after he has already broken her heart?

I think you can tell that the story is a bit involved. Definitely much easier to read than it is to summarize. What I've written about above is just the first half of the book. The scond half follows Suzannah as she adjusts to marriage and tries to help Aengus mend the broken relationship with his sons.

While I enjoyed the story, I don't think I'll be buying the other books in the series.

Worth the Scandal by Karen Erickson

Grade-C
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-None
Series-Worth It #1
Genre-contemporary
Reviewed by Kate

When Tessa started as CEO Alex Worth's assistant, she was instantly attracted to him. When he asks her to accompany him on a ten day business trip in Europe, she knows she will have to work hard to resist temptation. What she doesn't know is that Alex is attracted to her as well.

The story is pretty formulaic. They spend a few days trying to ignore their attraction to each other, they give in, he fires her when they get back to the office, she ends up pregnant and avoids him for a year, she gives in too easily when he finds her, they live happily ever after.

Because it reminded me a bit of the older Harlequins, I would rename it "The Tycoon's Ex-Assisstant's Secret Baby."

Comfort Reads

Grade-A
Hotness Level-Inferno
Kink Level-None
Series-Elite Ops #2
Reviewed by Kay

Micah Sloane has no family. He is an Elite Ops agent and a former Mossad agent. He was a former Mossad agent because he's no longer alive. By that, I mean that he was reported dead but he is actually still living. He is part of the group that Noah Blake is from. He has a chance to catch the killer that murdered his parents, but to do so he has to use Risa Clay as a way to lure out the killer.

Risa Clay has had the most horrific things happen to her. She was a victim of a kidnapping, she was drugged, she almost died, she was brutally raped while her father watched and she was wrongfully institutionalized to keep her quiet. She was raised by monsters who told her she was so ugly no one would ever want her and and she should never procreate and pass that ugliness on to a child.

She decides it's been long enough after her rape to embrace her sexuality. She's given the rest of her life six years to settle and now it's her sex life's turn. She meets Micah and from there her life will never be the same. As the situation is explained to her, she is resentful towards Micah, as she should be. But the part that hurt me was that she was accepting of the fact that there was a contract on her head. She was willing to go along with being the bait, she just didn't want Micah posing as her love interest.

I rank this book right up there with Lora Leigh's Wild Card. I even cried harder in this book. Every emotion is felt while reading it. You cheer for Risa because no one else ever has. Even at the height of betrayal for Risa she conducts herself with as much dignity as possible.  You have to read the entire Tempting SEALs series to fully understand what's going on but I encourage you to do it. This novel is worth that and so much more.