Classic MacLean: smoking hot, emotionally rich, thrilling, and unforgettable.
An ambitious, smart, and outspoken earl’s daughter faces off in business and pleasure against a gruff, protective, and sexy king of the London underworld who will stop at nothing to protect what is his.
Lady Henrietta “Hattie” Sedley wants to inherit the shipping business her father, an earl who won his title with bravery on the high seas, built into an empire. Instead, she is told to marry and have children while her foolish brother takes over. On the night of her 29th birthday, Hattie decides to render herself unmarriageable—while satisfying her keen sexual curiosity—by visiting a brothel, but the handsome brute of a man she finds tied up and unconscious in her carriage has other plans. Saviour Whittington is known as Beast in the slums where he and his siblings are feared and adored in equal measure. Benevolent protectors who rule with an iron fist, they run a smuggling operation to support their business enterprises in Covent Garden, “where darkness came like a promise, and brought with it all manner of malice.” Hattie attempts to make a deal with Beast when she discovers that her brother has done him wrong, but he has less chaste ideas. Hattie is a tall, curvy woman whose shape does not fit Regency-era beauty standards. Beast is all too happy to show her just how desirable she is in several very explicit sex scenes: “She was brilliant and bold and strong and beautiful, and when she came, she moved against a man like sin.” Beast’s own self-worth was diminished by an abusive father and a violent past he fears he will never overcome. Hattie and Beast come to see their own value through each other’s eyes, regardless of what society says about it. Strong female protagonists are the rule in genre romance, but Hattie stands out for the clarity of her goals and the intelligence with which she goes about achieving them.
Classic MacLean: smoking hot, emotionally rich, thrilling, and unforgettable.Pub Date: July 30, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-269207-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
A promising start to a series, provided Roberts can flesh out her derivative heroine.
A young woman in hiding from the Russian mob faces a difficult decision when she falls in love with a cop.
Abigail, 28, lives alone in the bucolic hamlet of Bickford, Ark., in an isolated house, fortified with firearms, a state-of-the-art alarm system and a vicious dog named Bert. When the town’s genial police chief, Brooks, suspects Abigail is packing while shopping for gourmet groceries, his curiosity soon morphs into courtship. Although she finds herself drawn to Brooks and to his welcoming, bohemian family, Abigail dares not reveal that her real name is Liz—which is not the only way in which she appears to be Roberts’ answer to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Gifted with an eidetic memory, an IQ over 200 and an affinity for cool, calculated mayhem, Liz/Abigail is a skilled hacker and a highly paid security consultant. In her spare time she investigates the Russian mob and the crooked federal agents who are responsible for her current predicament; whenever possible, she throws virtual monkey wrenches into the mob’s Internet scams. When she witnesses an altercation between Brooks and the wastrel son of a local magnate, she’s thrust back into the horror of the last time she witnessed a crime. At 16, rebelling against an unloving, controlling mother, Liz and a girlfriend, Julie, visited a Chicago nightclub run by the Russian Mafia, where Ilya, son of gang kingpin Sergei, and Alexi, a cousin, seduced them with Cosmos. Later, at Alexi’s lakeside home, Liz was an unseen witness to a hit on Alexi by Sergei’s enforcers, who also killed Julie. Managing to escape, Liz was forced to run again when two dirty FBI agents destroyed her safe house and murdered her guards. A person of interest to both the Feds and the mob, she’s been on the lam for 12 years. Before they can marry, Brooks must help Liz come in from the cold.
A promising start to a series, provided Roberts can flesh out her derivative heroine.Pub Date: April 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-399-15912-1
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of...
Hoover’s (November 9, 2015, etc.) latest tackles the difficult subject of domestic violence with romantic tenderness and emotional heft.
At first glance, the couple is edgy but cute: Lily Bloom runs a flower shop for people who hate flowers; Ryle Kincaid is a surgeon who says he never wants to get married or have kids. They meet on a rooftop in Boston on the night Ryle loses a patient and Lily attends her abusive father’s funeral. The provocative opening takes a dark turn when Lily receives a warning about Ryle’s intentions from his sister, who becomes Lily’s employee and close friend. Lily swears she’ll never end up in another abusive home, but when Ryle starts to show all the same warning signs that her mother ignored, Lily learns just how hard it is to say goodbye. When Ryle is not in the throes of a jealous rage, his redeeming qualities return, and Lily can justify his behavior: “I think we needed what happened on the stairwell to happen so that I would know his past and we’d be able to work on it together,” she tells herself. Lily marries Ryle hoping the good will outweigh the bad, and the mother-daughter dynamics evolve beautifully as Lily reflects on her childhood with fresh eyes. Diary entries fancifully addressed to TV host Ellen DeGeneres serve as flashbacks to Lily’s teenage years, when she met her first love, Atlas Corrigan, a homeless boy she found squatting in a neighbor’s house. When Atlas turns up in Boston, now a successful chef, he begs Lily to leave Ryle. Despite the better option right in front of her, an unexpected complication forces Lily to cut ties with Atlas, confront Ryle, and try to end the cycle of abuse before it’s too late. The relationships are portrayed with compassion and honesty, and the author’s note at the end that explains Hoover’s personal connection to the subject matter is a must-read.
Packed with riveting drama and painful truths, this book powerfully illustrates the devastation of abuse—and the strength of the survivors.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1036-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
