C Reviews

Game of Hearts by Kate Donovan

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Game of Hearts (Happily Ever After Company, #1)
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

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Worth the Scandal (Worth It, #1)
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.”

Let Me Be The One by Bella Andre

Posted on by Dirty Girl Anne

Let Me Be The One (The Sullivans, #6)
Grade-C
Hotness Level-Blaze
Kink Level-None
Series-The Sullivans #6
Reviewed by Kay

Ryan Sullivan and Vicki Bennett have been best friends since their sophomore year of high school.
Even with Vicki being a military brat and moving a lot they’ve kept in touch. Vicki is a sculptor and Ryan, a professional pitcher in the major leagues. So they are polar opposites and have been in love with each other for years. This story begins with a panicked message from Vicki to Ryan. When he gets to her she has a situation with a colleague who is making unwanted advancements. Normally, she’d just shut it down but he has a little power over her career so she has to tread lightly.

Ryan steps in and pretends to be her boyfriend in hopes this will scare the man off. This pretending kind of goes crazy and out of control. I thought the premise was cute and I liked the heroine. I also enjoyed reading about the other Sullivans. I didn’t care for Ryan’s character. He had moments where he was forceful but then he was very beta in his pursuit of her. So that was a big turn off for me. I love Bella Andre and the Sullivans. This book will not make me turn away from either of them but it wasn’t her best book in this series.