A compelling marriage-of-convenience story in a beloved series.
A ruined debutante finds herself back in society—as a mistress.
Leo Ramsgate, Lord Savage, has a reputation to match the name of his marquessate: He’s a serial monogamist, but he stays with no mistress for more than four months. To avoid misunderstandings, he even signs a contract with each woman before beginning their affair. He’s just bringing his current liaison to a close and looking for the next when a woman chases a dog in front of his carriage: Lady Prudence Thorogood, a woman who barely made her debut before she was ruined by an indiscretion. She’s only going back to London in order to recover a few items from her inheritance via, well, larceny, so when Lord Savage offers her the same deal he offers other women, she turns him down gracefully. But several weeks later, when her attempts at subterfuge have fallen short, she returns to his house to accept the contract. Having been ruined, Prue suspects her reputation can’t get much worse, and she already knows how to grit her teeth and get through sex. But as Leo is happy to show her, intimacy can be fun, and she has a lot to explore. When Leo discovers she is actually a virgin—or, rather, was a virgin until a lengthy and steamy scene between them—he marries her in a quiet ceremony, but they still expect to go their separate ways after the four-month contract is up. As the end date approaches, both find that they don’t want their time together to end but also that they don’t know how to tell each other as much. After an entire series inspired by Prudence's banishment from society, readers will be glad to finally meet her and to see her learn to take control of her life. Prue and Leo are well matched despite seeming like opposites at the start, and Lorret draws out their explorations of the carnal arts beautifully. Though this book is different from the earlier volumes of the Mating Habits of Scoundrels series, it will charm Lorret’s fans thoroughly, combining classic Regency tropes and storytelling with contemporary sensibilities.
A compelling marriage-of-convenience story in a beloved series.Pub Date: May 24, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-314301-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 15, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
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BOOK TO SCREEN
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