Books On Sale

A Solved HaBO, Sarah MacLean, & More

  • Passion on Park Avenue

    Passion on Park Avenue by Lauren Layne

    Passion on Park Avenue by Lauren Layne is $1.99! This is the first book in the Central Park Pact series and was released earlier this year. I’m a fan of Layne’s other series and found they balance great banter and sexy chemistry. However, some readers feel this straddles the line between chick lit and contemporary romance. Do you have any thoughts?

    From the author of the New York Times bestselling Stiletto and Oxford series, the first in a sizzling new series following the unlikely friendship of three Upper East Side women as they struggle to achieve their dreams and find true love and happiness in the city that never sleeps. 

    For as long as she can remember, Bronx-born Naomi Powell has had one goal: to prove her worth among the Upper East Side elite—the same people for which her mom worked as a housekeeper. Now, as the strongminded, sassy CEO of one of the biggest jewelry empires in the country, Naomi finally has exactly what she wants—but it’s going to take more than just the right address to make Manhattan’s upper class stop treating her like an outsider.

    The worst offender is her new neighbor, Oliver Cunningham—the grown son of the very family Naomi’s mother used to work for. Oliver used to torment Naomi when they were children, and as a ridiculously attractive adult, he’s tormenting her in entirely different ways. Now they find themselves engaged in a battle-of-wills that will either consume or destroy them…

    Filled with charm and heart and plenty of sex and snark, this entertaining series will hook you from the very first page.

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  • Empire of Sand

    Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri

    Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri is $2.99! This is an adult fantasy novel with some romantic elements. Though this is marketed as adult fantasy, some readers it felt like it was more YA. Empire of Sand has been on my TBR pile for a while; have you read this one? Aarya highly recommends it.

    A nobleman’s daughter with magic in her blood. An empire built on the dreams of enslaved gods. Empire of Sand is Tasha Suri’s captivating, Mughal India-inspired debut fantasy.

    The Amrithi are outcasts; nomads descended of desert spirits, they are coveted and persecuted throughout the Empire for the power in their blood. Mehr is the illegitimate daughter of an imperial governor and an exiled Amrithi mother she can barely remember, but whose face and magic she has inherited.

    When Mehr’s power comes to the attention of the Emperor’s most feared mystics, she must use every ounce of will, subtlety, and power she possesses to resist their cruel agenda.

    Should she fail, the gods themselves may awaken seeking vengeance…

    Empire of Sand is a lush, dazzling fantasy novel perfect for readers of City of Brass and The Wrath & the Dawn.

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  • The Day of the Duchess

    The Day of the Duchess by Sarah MacLean

    The Day of the Duchess by Sarah MacLean is $1.99! This is the third book in the Scandal & Scoundrel series. Elyse read this one and ultimately gave it C+, mainly because she couldn’t forgive the hero for his actions:

    If you really like a good grovel, this book might be your catnip. As much as I loved Sera and her sisters, I just couldn’t buy the reconciliation

    The one woman he will never forget…
    Malcolm Bevingstoke, Duke of Haven, has lived the last three years in self-imposed solitude, paying the price for a mistake he can never reverse and a love he lost forever. The dukedom does not wait, however, and Haven requires an heir, which means he must find himself a wife by summer’s end. There is only one problem—he already has one.

    The one man she will never forgive…
    After years in exile, Seraphina, Duchess of Haven, returns to London with a single goal—to reclaim the life she left and find happiness, unencumbered by the man who broke her heart. Haven offers her a deal; Sera can have her freedom, just as soon as she finds her replacement…which requires her to spend the summer in close quarters with the husband she does not want, but somehow cannot resist.

    A love that neither can deny…
    The duke has a single summer to woo his wife and convince her that, despite their broken past, he can give her forever, making every day The Day of the Duchess.

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    This book is on sale at:
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  • The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic

    The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Barker

    The Thinking Woman’s Guide to Real Magic by Emily Croy Barker is $1.99! This book was the subject of a solved HaBO. I highly recommend checking out the HaBO because the request is totally bananas. So bananas that you just might have to read it.

    An imaginative story of a woman caught in an alternate world—where she will need to learn the skills of magic to survive

    Nora Fischer’s dissertation is stalled and her boyfriend is about to marry another woman.  During a miserable weekend at a friend’s wedding, Nora wanders off and walks through a portal into a different world where she’s transformed from a drab grad student into a stunning beauty.  Before long, she has a set of glamorous new friends and her romance with gorgeous, masterful Raclin is heating up. It’s almost too good to be true.

    Then the elegant veneer shatters. Nora’s new fantasy world turns darker, a fairy tale gone incredibly wrong. Making it here will take skills Nora never learned in graduate school. Her only real ally—and a reluctant one at that—is the magician Aruendiel, a grim, reclusive figure with a biting tongue and a shrouded past. And it will take her becoming Aruendiel’s student—and learning magic herself—to survive. When a passage home finally opens, Nora must weigh her “real life” against the dangerous power of love and magic.

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Comments are Closed

  1. Michelle says:

    One reason I refuse to read Day of the Duchess is that the heroine is trapped in her marriage. She legally CAN’T get away and there would be no book if she could, because she’d be gone.

    This is a problem I have with historical romance in general. I can’t get over the power imbalance. Also, too often a heroine lacks even the benefit of family and money, making a questionable consent situation even worse.

  2. Lara says:

    Spoilery comment for Day of the Duchess Below, and TW for any of my fellow readers dealing with infertility…

    I also had a hard time forgiving Malcolm, but what made me slam the book shut in frustration was the end. After having one of Sera’s main traits be that she’s still grieving the child she lost and how that loss made her infertile (which is surely another reason why Malcolm will never want her back), suddenly in the epilogue she’s had four babies? Including a set of twins? With no trouble at all, and only a casual line about how the doctor who originally told her she wouldn’t be able to have any more kids must have been mistaken?

    Some of us wish it were that easy.

  3. Ren Benton says:

    I read EMPIRE OF SAND a couple of months ago and liked it well enough to read further adventures of Mehr and Amun, but the sequel is about Mehr’s sister, so I’m left with an unfinished feeling about Mehr. Maybe those going into it knowing it’s one-and-done can avoid that sense of incompletion.

    On the bright side, although Mehr is forced into marriage, her husband isn’t the forcer and is unwilling himself, and he’s really good about sexual consent even though they don’t have a lot of freedom in other areas. If you’re into guys who are convinced they’re monsters even while being demonstrably good, you’ll probably like Amun.

  4. Leigh Kramer says:

    I loved Empire Of Sand so much! I cannot wait to see what happens with Mehr’s sister in book 2.

  5. Malin says:

    As someone who struggled through about six years and many emotionally and physically painful failed assisted fertility attempts before I finally got pregnant, the resolution to MacLean’s Day of the Duchess felt extra insulting, yes. Not just your normal frequently grating pregnancy epilogue, but a veritable feast of fertility! I think Day of the Duchess may be MacLean’s weakest novel (can’t really forgive the hero for his actions, despite his late stage grovelling), with the possible exception of her very first one, The Season.

  6. FashionablyEvil says:

    My other problem with Day of the Duchess is that Malcom didn’t just have an affair out of spite, but that he then also attempted to FINANCIALLY RUIN SERA’S ENTIRE FAMILY. I felt like that detail was totally glossed over and inadequately reconciled. He owed the whole family an abject groveling (in addition to Sera).

    And yeah, I was also hoping for a Regency couple who were childless and happy. I remember reading something an author wrote (maybe Kristin Cashore?) about how insulting it is to have a character with some sort of trait that is magically waved away at the end. (In this case, the issue was a blind character who was magically able to see.) People want a range of representation and having a character that people identify with and then whisking away that point of identification is shitty.

  7. Deianira says:

    Short comments:

    “Passion on Park Avenue” – I enjoyed it, but it’s not up to the Stiletto/Oxford novels; chick lit is a pretty good description. FYI, book 2 in the series is out, but the Kindle price is a prohibitive $11.99.

    “Day of the Duchess” – My least favorite of the Scandal & Scoundrels novels, not least because of the obligatory baby epilogue.

    @Michelle: I’m with you on the power imbalance thing. “Duchess” addresses it, but the one that drove me craziest was “Never Judge a Lady by Her Cover”, I think because she was such a powerful person in her own right for so long. And kudos to MacLean for at least highlighting the issue, with two very different characters in two very different books.

  8. Lisa F says:

    One of my least favorite romance tropes is “infertility gets handwaved because babies ever after.” This is, not coincidentally, my least favorite McLean.

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