A deliciously decadent beach read of temptation and the wages of sin.
Pastors Raven Jones Black and Porsha Harrington may co-minister the New Vision Christian Center but there’s no room for two at the top.
Fans of Roby’s (Copycat, 2017, etc.) bestselling Reverend Curtis Black series will rejoice at this new tale of women wrestling with temptation. After serving time for embezzling $100,000 from the Rev. Black himself, Raven married and divorced the reverend’s son, Dillon. She subsequently made an unexpected alliance with Porsha, Dillon’s former mistress, who fronted most of the money to start the women’s mega-church. No stranger to creative financing, Raven has never repaid Porsha’s seed money, nor has she repaid the money she stole years ago from a loan shark. Called to the pulpit by greed not God, both women are unlikely Christian role models, drawing hefty monthly salaries and indulging in steamy relationships outside the bonds of marriage. Tensions between Raven and Porsha escalate when Porsha announces that she will be delivering an inspirational message before Raven’s sermon. Raven smiles but seethes. Hoping to turn the spotlight back on herself, Raven spontaneously decides to share her story of being raped by a prominent pastor years ago on Facebook Live. The ploy works, but as Porsha suspects, the story is a lie, and Raven’s strong suggestion that the Rev. Black was her assailant sparks outrage from both Raven’s ex-husband and her current boyfriend. Coincidentally, the loan shark is back on her doorstep demanding payment with exorbitant interest. Financially desperate, Raven again turns to criminal behavior. Meanwhile, Porsha tries to turn back to God and clean up her behavior, but Steve, her married boyfriend, might not let her go, and Dillion is pushing her to reignite their love affair. Less burdened with back stories than other books in her series, Roby’s latest sizzles with scandal.
A deliciously decadent beach read of temptation and the wages of sin.Pub Date: June 20, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4555-6969-4
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2017
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an...
True love flares between two people, but they find that circumstances always impede it.
On a winter day in London, Laurie spots Jack from her bus home and he sparks a feeling in her so deep that she spends the next year searching for him. Her roommate and best friend, Sarah, is the perfect wing-woman but ultimately—and unknowingly—ends the search by finding Jack and falling for him herself. Laurie’s hasty decision not to tell Sarah is the second painful missed opportunity (after not getting off the bus), but Sarah’s happiness is so important to Laurie that she dedicates ample energy into retraining her heart not to love Jack. Laurie is misguided, but her effort and loyalty spring from a true heart, and she considers her project mostly successful. Perhaps she would have total success, but the fact of the matter is that Jack feels the same deep connection to Laurie. His reasons for not acting on them are less admirable: He likes Sarah and she’s the total package; why would he give that up just because every time he and Laurie have enough time together (and just enough alcohol) they nearly fall into each other’s arms? Laurie finally begins to move on, creating a mostly satisfying life for herself, whereas Jack’s inability to be genuine tortures him and turns him into an ever bigger jerk. Patriarchy—it hurts men, too! There’s no question where the book is going, but the pacing is just right, the tone warm, and the characters sympathetic, even when making dumb decisions.
Anyone who believes in true love or is simply willing to accept it as the premise of a winding tale will find this debut an emotional, satisfying read.Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-525-57468-2
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.
Another reboot of Jane Austen?!? Hadlow pulls it off in a smart, heartfelt novel devoted to bookish Mary, middle of the five sisters in Pride and Prejudice.
Part 1 recaps Pride and Prejudice through Mary’s eyes, climaxing with the humiliating moment when she sings poorly at a party and older sister Elizabeth goads their father to cut her off in front of everyone. The sisters’ friend Charlotte, who marries the unctuous Mr. Collins after Elizabeth rejects him, emerges as a pivotal character; her conversations with Mary are even tougher-minded here than those with Elizabeth depicted by Austen. In Part 2, two years later, Mary observes on a visit that Charlotte is deferential but remote with her husband; she forms an intellectual friendship with the neglected and surprisingly nice Mr. Collins that leads to Charlotte’s asking Mary to leave. In Part 3, Mary finds refuge in London with her kindly aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner. Mrs. Gardiner is the second motherly woman, after Longbourn housekeeper Mrs. Hill, to try to undo the psychic damage wrought by Mary’s actual mother, shallow, status-obsessed Mrs. Bennet, by building up her confidence and buying her some nice clothes (funded by guilt-ridden Lizzy). Sure enough, two suitors appear: Tom Hayward, a poetry-loving lawyer who relishes Mary’s intellect but urges her to also express her feelings; and William Ryder, charming but feckless inheritor of a large fortune, whom naturally Mrs. Bennet loudly favors. It takes some maneuvering to orchestrate the estrangement of Mary and Tom, so clearly right for each other, but debut novelist Hadlow manages it with aplomb in a bravura passage describing a walking tour of the Lake District rife with seething complications furthered by odious Caroline Bingley. Her comeuppance at Mary’s hands marks the welcome final step in our heroine’s transformation from a self-doubting wallflower to a vibrant, self-assured woman who deserves her happy ending. Hadlow traces that progression with sensitivity, emotional clarity, and a quiet edge of social criticism Austen would have relished.
Entertaining and thoroughly engrossing.Pub Date: March 31, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-12941-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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