A raucous, entertaining, New Age erotic yarn, by turns funny and soulful.
Massage therapists tangle in a physically and spiritually gnarly love triangle in this steamy romance.
Lilienthal’s debut novel follows Vera West, a single mom and massage therapist living in San Francisco. Vera enters into a business partnership and an affair with her massage therapy instructor, Ernesto Archer. That Ernesto is married causes Vera twinges of guilt, but her misgivings are swept away by world-shaking orgasms and shared erotic dreams that confirm that they were lovers in a past life in ancient Mongolia. Complicating things further are other women whom Ernesto has been involved with and who continue orbiting him, including rival masseuse Star Child. Almost blinded by Ernesto’s sexy charisma and praise for her empathic power to “transmute” feelings, Vera starts seeing cracks in his facade when his drinking escalates and he commits a professional betrayal. Almost everyone, especially her 14-year-old daughter, India, tells her to dump him. One woman who doesn’t is Ernesto’s wife, Jean, a shaman who remains outwardly cordial and plies Vera with essential oils. As Vera’s entanglement with Ernesto grows more fraught and annoying health problems erupt, she starts to suspect Jean’s potential for witchy malevolence. Lilienthal’s story is a finely observed portrait of the wellness industry in affluent Northern California, where virtually everyone has a retinue of massage therapists, astrologers, and doctors “of energetic medicine” to minister to their psyches. She winks at the excesses of this culture but takes seriously its metaphysical premises and healing aspirations, adding whispers of the occult to Vera’s experiences. The author’s sex scenes are lavish, but she keeps the novel grounded in comically tawdry concerns that play out in smart, zippy prose, whether Vera is mulling an assignation—“Am I really wearing black silk stay-ups, a very pretty, transparent black lace bra, and the skimpiest thong known to mankind in order to bring this married boss of mine a still-warm plate of chocolate chip cookies?”—or spoiling for a catfight. (“Instead of turning and skedaddling her big butt back down my pathway, she comes on in and closes the door behind her, thrusting her fake boobs out like a couple of headlights.”) Vera is a vibrant hoot of a hero as she wanders down the road to wisdom.
A raucous, entertaining, New Age erotic yarn, by turns funny and soulful.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-64742-383-4
Page Count: 216
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.
Childhood friends, almost-sweethearts, a misunderstanding, and a funeral.
Blair Lang and Declan Renshaw were best friends who went on one date before a disagreement and an accident sent them in different directions after high school. Now Blair is back from college to be with her great-aunt Lottie, who’s dying, and to support her single mother in small-town Seabrook, California. Finding a job at a coffee shop puts her in the path of her former boyfriend, since he turns out to be its owner. Can the two get past their mistakes? The novel uses the popular second-chance romance trope, but Pham fails to energize it through interesting characters. Blair’s grief over her great-aunt’s death and her plan to help her mother are overshadowed by internal monologues about her feelings, the way her friends aren’t paying attention to her, and the novel she plans to write. Declan’s distinguishing characteristic, besides being a former high school quarterback, is his skill at building birdhouses. Unsurprisingly, the couple doesn’t have much chemistry; when they embrace, their “bodies meld like…memory foam.” The wooden characters, unusual word choices (“conglomerate of pedestrians,” “litany of plants”), and odd turns of phrase (“tension melting from his eyebrows like butter melting in a warm pan”) are almost enough to obscure the lack of plot development. What passes for stakes is easily defused when Blair comes into an inheritance that saves her from working as a consultant at Ernst & Young in New York—so she can write a romance novel.
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781668095188
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.
A heartbroken man lusts after his therapist while seeking revenge on a drug kingpin and his enforcer.
Mitch Haskell’s wife, Angela, died two years ago of an apparent suicide, but Mitch has always believed the scene was staged. Certainly, she would never have willingly left their young son, Andrew, behind. Consumed with a thirst for vengeance, Mitch—a former Marine and undercover agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration and currently a police detective—is struggling with alcohol dependency and uncontrolled rage. Andrew is living with his in-laws, who are making not-so-subtle suggestions that they might apply for permanent guardianship if Mitch can’t get it together. So his boss and best friend, John Bowie, mandates that he go into therapy, which puts him in the path of sexy Dr. Dylan Reede. Within a few days, Mitch makes a connection between two new murders and the death of his former partner; finds a big clue that points to the truth about Angela’s death; goes undercover as a homeless man; takes on a vicious drug cartel; and obnoxiously bullies Dylan with a charm offensive that leads them inevitably to bed. While Mitch seems to lean into the stereotype of the ex-soldier/cop with deeply buried trauma who believes that the ends justify the means—at least in law enforcement—Dylan offers the strength and sweetness to help him start breaking down his walls, allowing herself to be vulnerable in turn. Is passionate sex enough to ground a relationship and a family for the long term? For these characters, and the breakneck speed of this thriller, it’s as good a foundation as any.
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.Pub Date: March 17, 2026
ISBN: 9781538743027
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 11, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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