RECOMMENDED: Firelight by Kristen Callihan is still $1.99 digitally right now. This is the first book in the Darkest London series- a very popular paranormal historical/steampunk series. Celia reviewed it for the 2013 RITA® Reader Challenge, and gave it an A, saying:
“Let’s just get it right out there: I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I couldn’t and wouldn’t stop reading it. When I had to put it down to say, go to sleep, I’d think about it until it drove me crazy and the next thing I knew, the light was back on and I was reading again. It had all the elements I love; a bad ass heroine, a moody, sensitive yet bad ass hero, and sexual tension so thick you’d have to use a machete to cut through it.”
Miranda Ellis is a woman tormented. Plagued since birth by a strange and powerful gift, she has spent her entire life struggling to control her exceptional abilities. Yet one innocent but irreversible mistake has left her family's fortune decimated and forced her to wed London's most nefarious nobleman. They will burn for eternity . . .
Lord Benjamin Archer is no ordinary man. Doomed to hide his disfigured face behind masks, Archer knows it's selfish to take Miranda as his bride. Yet he can't help being drawn to the flame-haired beauty whose touch sparks a passion he hasn't felt in a lifetime. When Archer is accused of a series of gruesome murders, he gives in to the beastly nature he has fought so hard to hide from the world. But the curse that haunts him cannot be denied.
Now, to save his soul, Miranda will enter a world of dark magic and darker intrigue. For only she can see the man hiding behind the mask.
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June is Audiobook Something Month, and as a result, Tantor is having a 50% site-wide sale. WOO!
That's all formats – CD or MP3 – site wide. Got travel coming up?
This sale is all month, so make a list! What are you buying?
Lavinia by Ursula K. Le Guin is $2.99 digitally right now. Le Guin is a revered writer, and this book is an award-winning historical retelling of the mythology of Aeneas, focusing on Aeneas' second wife, Lavinia. This book has a 3.7 star average on GR, and many readers say they love the thoughtfulness and the detail of the worldbuilding, and the character of Lavinia herself. Have you read this book? Do you recommend it?
In a richly imagined, beautiful new novel, an acclaimed writer gives an epic heroine her voice
In The Aeneid, Vergil’s hero fights to claim the king’s daughter, Lavinia, with whom he is destined to found an empire. Lavinia herself never speaks a word. Now, Ursula K. Le Guin gives Lavinia a voice in a novel that takes us to the half-wild world of ancient Italy, when Rome was a muddy village near seven hills.
Lavinia grows up knowing nothing but peace and freedom, until suitors come. Her mother wants her to marry handsome, ambitious Turnus. But omens and prophecies spoken by the sacred springs say she must marry a foreigner—that she will be the cause of a bitter war—and that her husband will not live long. When a fleet of Trojan ships sails up the Tiber, Lavinia decides to take her destiny into her own hands. And so she tells us what Vergil did not: the story of her life, and of the love of her life.
Lavinia is a book of passion and war, generous and austerely beautiful, from a writer working at the height of her powers.
An Arranged Marriage by Jo Beverley is .99c right now. This book was originally published in 1991, and has been released digitally. This book has mixed reviews, but those who adore it love the supreme angst and the over-the-top plot devices. Is this one of your favorites? What do you love about it?
Eleanor Chivenham didn't put much past her vile brother, but even she had not anticipated his greedy scheme to dupe a rich earl into mistaking her for a lightskirt With her reputation in shreds and her future ruined, a defeated Eleanor was forced to agree to a hasty wedding.
But marriage to the mysterious Nicholas Delaney was more than she'd bargained for. He doubtless thought the worst of her, but when society gossip soon told her all about his beautiful French mistress, Eleanor tried to act with the cool dignity required in a marriage of convenience. But how long could she hold out against his undeniable charm — or the secret desires of her heart?
For the sake of family honor, Nicolas Delaney agreed to wed a wronged lady. In truth, such chivalry ran counter to his carefully wrought image of a carousing, dissolute rogue — the guise so vital to his secret political mission.
He hoped to keep his new wife in the background until a spy was trapped, but Eleanor's beauty and fighting wit were impossible to ignore. In fact, she presented quite a challenge to his prowess with women — and a test of his formidable will.
I highly, highly recommend Lavinia. It’s just simply beautiful. And you don’t need to be familiar with the Aeneid to appreciate it.
I can recommend An Arranged Marriage – I think it’s the first of the Company of Rogues books – Nicholas Delaney is referred to as “King Rogue”. But I’ll read pretty much anything Jo Beverley writes.
I bought the Beverly book last time it was on sale and whoa Nelly! I spent to first half of the book in a constant WTF state, the next quarter thinking “why am I reading this??” And the last quarter, well, there was no last quarter to me. I found the book to be a scary take on the aftermath of rape. I mean, who doesn’t agree to marry her rapist? And feel surprisingly upbeat after doing so?
I can recommend Firelight. The series is pretty good. Moonglow, the second book, was my favorite of the series. The author blends the paranormal/steampunk pretty well. Sometimes I feel like she should have just gone straight paranormal and leave out the steampunk as it gets a little cluttered when trying to worldbuild.
FYI: Tantor has audiobooks for the entire Shelly Laurenston Pride series. MP-3 CDs are about $15 each with this sale.
Oh wow, I picked up Nalini Singh’s Angel’s Blood from Tantor during their last sale and listened to it this week—the narrator is wonderful, and it looks like she does the entire series. I noticed so many different things listening vs reading, I absolutely need to get the rest!
To be fair, in Beverley’s “An Arranged Marriage,” Eleanor doesn’t actually marry her rapist. She marries her rapist’s brother (the hero Nicholas)—although I think she does believe that Nicholas is the rapist until the wedding night when the Truth Is Revealed. The book was originally published in 1991, which I suppose makes it borderline Old Skool?—so should probably be read with your Old Skool glasses on. It’s angsty, not fluffy, with (imho) kind of squicky sexual ethics all around, and it does require some robust suspension of disbelief. At its heart it’s a “marriage of convenience” story which is my catnip, the writing is good, and I can’t help but admire Eleanor’s resilience in the midst of the crazy. Although frankly the Rogues just don’t grab my imagination like the Malloren series (the “classic” ones, “My Lady Notorious” through “Devilish”).