Review Date: 11/2/2010

This was a very quick read. I liked the May-Dec romance between the two main characters. This is last of a three part series call the Blackstones of Virginia, a story in which the Blackstone patriarch gets involved in a surprise romance with his new---and very pregnant--assistant. The only thing I did not like about the story was the intentional deception of the real father of assistant's child. I understood her reasons for not wanting the real father to know about the baby but I still feel it was wrong. However, it could lead into another series with this family if Ms. Alers choose to go that route.

The sultry secretary desperately needed athe job at Blackstone Farms. She could not afford to leave, but she didn't dare stary with widower Sheldon Blackstone, or deny the need that burned inside her whenever he was near.

One look at Renee and Sheldon knew he would make her his mistress. But would seduction be enough? Or was the deletable, fragile mother-to-be fostering a deeper desire in him. Already, her vulnerability and irresistible charm had begund to chip away at the icy shell that had encased his heart for so long....

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Review Date: 8/31/2010

Making A List
Thats what Kimberly Franklin is doing. Seems like her uncle Pierce had almost everything, including a successful software business and a luxury penthouse, But what he really needs is a special lady to call his own. The matchmaking teen has one in mind: Patricia Burke, the assistant principal at her prestigious private school. All Kimberly has to do is introduce them and let the magic happen.
Checking It Twice
Patricia just got caught under the mistletoe and she doesnt mind a bit. Getting wrapped up in Pierce strong arms is pure pleasure and his kisses set her soul on fire. The man is handsome, intelligent romantic and she cant resist him. Theyre together, its Christmas Eve and Patricias about to find out that true love is the best present of all.

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Review Date: 8/11/2012

Slow start but very good read. If you like basketball and love stories you will love this. This is the first of three in the current series featuring a lesser known basketball team called the Monarchs.

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Review Date: 1/7/2011

Helpful Score: 1

I liked this book, but I felt was more about the main character Courtneys mother and aunt then it was about her. Now dont get me wrong, their stories were very interesting compelling. Here you have two older women who had given thirty years of their lives to men who were truly not deserving of their love or loyalty. I would have liked to see more interaction between Courtney and Lake Masters. For me, their coming together was rather boring and easy. I would have liked to see Lake really have to work to get Courtney, more a dramatic buildup to their eventual coming together. Her mother and aunt had more drama in their relationships and former relationships then Courtney had in her dating of Lake.

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Review Date: 10/2/2011

This book was just ok for me. This is the first of a series of books about the Saber Football Team. For a book that was surpose to be about a football player it had very little to do with football. This was more about being a cook then a player and I guess I was expecting more about romance and having that kind of career. Also, if I couldn't get that then I would have like more surrounding his career ending injury. So for me it was just ok. I've read other work by this author so I know she can write, this just missed some of her usual flavor

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Review Date: 11/2/2010

This is the first in a three part series called the Blackstones of Virginia. This story is about a family of African-American horse racers. In the first story you meet Ryan Blackstone the eldest brother of the family and the resident veterinarian. Ryan is a divorcee with a young son who meets the new Pre-school teacher Kelly Andrews. Kelly is a widowed woman who has come to the farm to start her life over after the death of her husband. This is a simple love story, with a slow burn. The couples passion builds to a slow and steady fire. A very good opening book, I like it.

NEVER SAY NEVER TO PASSION
After his wife walked out on him and his son, veterinarian Ryan Blackstone swore never to love again. Hed tried to dislike beautiful Kelly Andrewsthe teacher hired to run Blackstone Farms Day Schoolon general principle, but failed. And it wasnt long before the sultry widow had ignited a firestorm of emotions that was burning a sensuous trailstraight to his heart!

Ryan had shattered Kellys visions of a lonely future since that first mind-bending, knee-weakening kiss. Before she knew it, he was oh-so-close to tearing down her defenses. Even as Kelly wonderedwas what Ryan felt for her love or just lust?

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Review Date: 5/7/2014

Very good book. This is the first of three books, starting with the middle sister. It is a thick book but a very quick read,it has just the right combination of suspense and romance with some history thrown in. The characters are mature and interesting. The female characters are strong but womanly. The male characters are manly but sensitive and warm without coming off weak.

Cal Hawkins just wants to be left alone and leave the past where it belongs. the bleak beauty of Dead Horse Creek is a perfect place to get away from the world...a place where nothing exists to remind him of everything he's lost. his isolation is complete--until Charity Sinclair arrives fresh from New York City. Stunningly beautiful and stubbornly independent, she's also shamefully ignorant of the untamed wilderness.. and the very real dangers she'll face if Call doesn't' teach her a thing or two.

But even with Call's grudging help, Charity's dream of life in the Yukon may have led her into something much more savage than the forest: A menace as endless as the long days that run together without darkness--and a killer who won't let anything come between him and perfect, deadly vengeance...

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Review Date: 10/9/2012

I liked this sequel to the book All Up in My Business, about a soul food resturant family business. I like that this story was a contemporary love story that focused more about the love life of mature adults(middle aged)and their adult children. In this sequel it takes up where the first left off and quickly gets you up to date with the family members you loved in the first while focusing on the other half of the family.

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Review Date: 9/1/2011

Helpful Score: 1

This was an OK book, but I was not really thrilled with it. I did not like how it left me with a cliffhanger at the end. It felt rushed near the end. Not that I'm complaining because it was starting to bore me anyway. Some parts of the book just dragged on, for no reason. For me, the last 4 chapters were redundant. They just kept doing the same thing over and over, just in a different location. The book starts off like the heroine was going to have some sort of lover's triangle but that quickly dies out, after that there was just no excitement or spark in the story. Yes, you are told of the couples life-long love, and yes, they are very affectionate with each other, but it's like so what. I could not feel their connection. There did not seem to me to have any conflict to overcome, so there was no build up and therefore no excitement. Usually there is boy meets girl, they find out about each other then have a make or break issue that they have to overcome, which then shows how much they mean to each other and then there's the reunion and everyone lives happily ever after. This was so even keel that it was boring. The one issue the couple had was very early in the story and resolved so quickly that the rest of the story was boring. Yes it had plenty of sex in it, but even that got old and tired by the time the story ended. For me, there just wasn't any sizzle.

The art of seduction....

Chastain Thibodaux is no longer the awkward, naive girl who had her heart smashed to pieces by Philippe Devereaux. Now the successful artist has included three oil paintings of Philippe in her prestigious gallery show---sensuous nudes painted entirely from her memory of their smoldering affaire. But then her subject turns up at her opening night, in the flesh---every hard-muscled, smooth-skinned, delicious inch of him---demanding to know why she's put him on display.

....the portrait of desire

Philippe hasn't been in love with Chastain since she dumped him to study art in Paris. Or so he's been telling himself. Bu this anger over her erotic portraits is mixed with the kind of desire that heats even the coldest New York night. And he vows that by New Year's Eve he'll have the answers to all his questions and have Chastain back where she belongs---in his arms....

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Review Date: 12/29/2010

I liked this book. It was not a real great love story more like a slow burn. Two kindred souls meet, one who was given up for adoption and never adopted and another who finds late in life that she was. You get both sides of that life and how it shaped each person. You find that not all birth parents want to relive that part of their lives and everything is not always a made for TV movie with a sweet happy ending. This was one of the more real life like stories that Ive read this year. The couples are more true to life and less fantasy. Their relationships while not always hot and heavy were more realistic then most romance novels. I say this not to mean that the couples did not express themselves physically but to say that this story is more along the lines of how real relationships and romances actually take place and the problems and solutions that couples work out really come out. I believe most people can relate to this story and this couple then most romance novels.

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Review Date: 11/25/2009

Helpful Score: 1

I liked it. This book is not for the young reader. It has some very explict sceens in it.

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Review Date: 2/21/2015

Very good book. It does end on a cliffhanger. This is an erotic novel so the sex is explicit and heavy in this book.

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Review Date: 5/1/2012

Yes. I enjoyed this book. It is in the same vein as the other books in this region that Ms. Gates as written. I suggest you read her other book series-The Throne of Judar and the Pride of Zohayd to fully appreicate this story.

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Review Date: 8/4/2009

I like this story. This is the finally story in the Mother Nature Matchmaker series. This series follows the lives of three friends during a hurricane and how they found love while it was going on. When you read the first in the series you learn about Terrence the ex-football jock turned DJ, in the second book you meet Stephen the sheriff, and finally in the third book you meet Lucas the real estate developer. This story it ended weird for me. This series was written strange. I know it involves three different authors and each author has their own style of writing but it was just weird how the stories intermingle together. Its almost is if you need to have all three books together and read them at the same time to follow the story completely. These books read as if you are watching a soap opera. I would definitely suggest you read the books either together or at the very least one after the other.

Stormy weatheror the shelter of love?

Giving her bosss fiancé the kiss-off isnt in Doreen Flemings job description. But when she meets the son-to-be ex, gorgeous real estate developer Lucas McCoy, Doreen knows shes headed for a storm tide of trouble.

Building his dream house isnt the same without someone to share it. Doreen may be just the messenger, but shes unleashing a tempest inside Lucas thats tempting him to risk his heart again.

Then a hurricane hits, stranding Lucas and Doreen in the house of both their dreams. As the winds howl outside, the passion rages inside---hotter than the sweltering summer nightand twice as explosive

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Review Date: 3/7/2012

I just finished reading Sweet Deception and I'm telling you I could hear Roberta Flack in the background, because she was definitely "Killing me Softly". I could really relate to her female lead, she is me in so many ways it was scary. What I liked about this story was that it wasn't your usual girl-boy meet, they date, have an issue or two and resolve that and live happily ever after, no this story encompassed everything. It wasn't just one-sided it fully engulfed the whole person; she included the lives of the minor characters and their issues and resolutions, as well as how that then played into the development of the major characters. Usually the stories I read they have a singleness to them. The minor characters have just that, supporting roles, they don't figure prominently into the main characters lives or truly have any real affect on the story. That was different here.
Having never been to Columbus, Ohio, I don't know how small it is, but she gave it a small town feel that I would have expected in some smaller southern town like where my mother is from (Houma,LA), everyone knows everyone's business (at least the church scenes felt that way).
As for the male lead in this story, he had real depth; I could feel his emotions and empathize with him on so many levels as well. I know how it feels to be the invisible child and feel like you have to fight for you place in the family.
I really like this story and could really get into it. Good job.

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Review Date: 9/13/2014

Very good book, but longer than it needed to be.

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Review Date: 11/23/2008

This is a hot book with three very good Christmas stories to keep you warm on those cold winter nights.

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Review Date: 12/28/2010

This was a very deep book, dealing with spousal and child abuse. This is the second in the Orphan series by Ms. St. John. In this story we find out Malik Williams history and how he came to be at the orphanage and meet up with his other friends Quentin, Sage, and Dante who are also orphans and bounded together to form a family. Mailks story in not unlike many other real life stories of kids that come from broken homes. On the surface it looks like hes beaten the odds, he as aged out of the system, goes on to college and grows up to be a successful Director of several community centers in New York, but when you dig a little deeper into his life you find that he has never really let go of his past. He has never really dealt with the psychological impact the child abuse did to him and therefore left him unable to fully grow and love as an adult; that is until he meets Peyton Sawyer. Peyton too, comes with her own scars. She is still working through the grief of losing her best friend, husband and only lover shes ever had and has come to New York to start her life over. Together they help each other to begin again.

What I liked about this story is it is written with realism that you dont find in most romance novels. You can really relate to the characters in this story. These people talk, act and react like real people you could actually see doing in real life. Their reactions to things happening in and around their lives is real, most romance novels have a certain amount of fantasy to them, you can get lost in the characters lives because they have the kind of dream life you wish was going on with yourself. But in this story you see it all, the good the bad and you can relate and understand if not agree with the decisions the characters make. This is not your typical romance story

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Review Date: 10/9/2011

I loved this book. This is the first of a three part series called the Pride of Zohayd. Anyone whose read Ms. Gates first Arab series The Throne of Judar will recognize some of the characters in this book and the intense favor of this set of books. This book reintroduces you to this Arab country and its tradition and culture. In this story you meet Shaheen Aal Shalaan, (those whove read the pervious series will remember as one the half-brothers of Aliyah, the new queen of Judar). Shaheen is the youngest of his full-blooded siblings. He has to make a marriage of state to one of the neighboring kingdoms to insure the peace. Unbeknown to him Johara, the sister of a former childhood friend, has been lusting after him for years. Johara having been told by her brother that the prince wanted nothing to with her or their family because of their station in life, is devastated when she learns of the princes impending marriage. She wants one last time to see and talk to the love of her life, never expecting that meeting to have far reaching and life long consequences. This story has everything a good royal romance should have. There is mystery, class conflict, beauty, tenderness, evil, innocents and very hot and steamy sex. A must read.

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Review Date: 10/9/2011

I like this story. It was the second in the Pride of Zohayd series. This story is about the second in line and Minister of interior, a living ninja raiding prince Harres Aal Shalaan. Harres thinks he's on to the man who may have the stolen jewels that dictate who rules the region. In his night raider clothes he and his choice men raid the camp where they hope to rescue the one person who will lead them to the jewels. Only problem, Harres thinks hes there to rescue a man named TJ, only to find out it is a very sexy and brave woman, who not only knows how to take care of herself she is a doctor and that comes in handy when he is shot in process of the rescue. Dr. Talia Jasmine TJ Burke blames the Aal Shalaans for her brothers illegal imprisonment and will do anything to take the family down. Their being shot down during her rescue and his wound make it necessary for them to find the closest oasis. It is during this time that all is revealed regarding her brother and another piece of the puzzle to where the stolen jewels are that will insure his family remains the ruling family in the region.
Very hot and sexy. It took too, long for them to get together for my taste but the background work was necessary and very interesting.

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