King of Pride

King of Pride
by Ana Huang

Book: Kings of Sin #2
Publisher: Bloom Books
Pub Date: April 27, 2024
Genre: Adult, Romance, Contemporary 
Format: Print
Source: Bought
Book Links: Goodreads  Amazon

She's his opposite in every way...and the greatest temptation he's ever known.

Reserved, controlled, and proper to a fault, Kai Young has neither the time nor inclination for chaos—and Isabella, with her purple hair and inappropriate jokes, is chaos personified.

With a crucial CEO vote looming and a media empire at stake, the billionaire heir can’t afford the distraction she brings.

Isabella is everything he shouldn’t want, but with every look and every touch, he’s tempted to break all his rules…and claim her as his own.

***

Bold, impulsive, and full of life, Isabella Valencia has never met a party she doesn’t like or a man she couldn’t charm...except for Kai Young.

It shouldn’t matter. He’s not her type—the man translates classics into Latin for fun, and his membership at the exclusive club where she bartends means he’s strictly off limits.

But she can’t deny that, beneath his cool exterior, is a man who could make her melt with just a touch.

No matter how hard they try, they can’t resist giving into their forbidden desires.

Even if it costs them everything.

King of Pride is a steamy opposite attract, forbidden billionaire romance. It's book two in the Kings of Sin series but can be read as a standalone.

Contains explicit content and profanity. Recommended for mature readers only.

My Review: I have to admit, I almost gave up on this one...but stick it out, trust me.  

I loved the first book and couldn't wait for the rest of the series. However, the first 15 chapters were pretty slow which made it feel boring for me. 

Isabella is lovely. She is always herself, has all kinds of stories to tell (especially at work), great friends and just written really well. Now if, only she could get that books of hers done already.  

Kai is the opposite. He is quiet, more reserved and well kina boring. He is good at pretty much everything, on his way to become CEO much sooner than he planned. Has weekly scheduled lunches with the guys and so on. Very no nonsense business guy.  

A night out lead to a kiss and then cue the questions and thinking while weeks go by and Kai hasn't shown back up at the club... 

Until Thanksgiving where Kai gives Isa a chance to meet him upstairs and finally they cave. And that's when everything changes and the pace picks up. Kai's jealous at moments makes him sweet, protective and possessive all at once. Isa loves to play on that and drive Kai crazy. These two are wonderful together.  

From Birthdays to Christmas to dates. These two are sweet and certainly know how to be spicy. Everything is go perfectly well....until photos emerged and things took a quick change. 

From job loss to spontaneous getaways. Isa and Kai are made for each other. In the end they'll take the next step in their forever.  

I love this series so far and its certainly one you should have on your TBR. 

 

My Rating:

✪✪✪✪

The Last Letter

The Last Letter
by Rebecca Yarros 

Book: Stand Alone
Publisher: Entangled: Amara
Pub Date: February 26, 2019
Genre: Adult, Contemporary, Romance, Military
Format: Print
Source: Bought
Book Links: Goodreads  Amazon 

Beckett,
If you’re reading this, well, you know the last-letter drill. You made it. I didn’t. Get off the guilt train, because I know if there was any chance you could have saved me, you would have.

I need one thing from you: get out of the army and get to Telluride.
My little sister Ella’s raising the twins alone. She’s too independent and won’t accept help easily, but she has lost our grandmother, our parents, and now me. It’s too much for anyone to endure. It’s not fair.
And here’s the kicker: there’s something else you don’t know that’s tearing her family apart. She’s going to need help.

So if I’m gone, that means I can’t be there for Ella. I can’t help them through this. But you can. So I’m begging you, as my best friend, go take care of my sister, my family.

Please don’t make her go through it alone.

Ryan

 
My Review:  Love this book, but really I've loved everything Rebecca has written. 

Beckett (Chaos) is someone who is so deserving of love but feels anything but. When his best friend convinced his sister to be his penpal while away on a mission, its like something changes in him. He feels less alone and gets to know Ella, her life and home back in CO. 

Ella is amazing and so loving. At a young age she got pregnant with twins. She raised them with so much love and doing it while running a business. Then an article about the business just makes everything even more worthwhile. 

It's not long when tragedy hits all over again. Her little girl is seriously ill. Her brother died in action and the letters from Chaos stopped. Ella's world is turned upside down and a guy named Beckett randomly showing up for a 7 month stay is going to change things even more.

Beckett shows up in Telluride. Following his best friends wishes, he goes to help Ella. His world changes when he finally saw Ella for the first time. Then her kids and how much they melted his heart. Not only does he have to tell her he's there because of Ella's brother but reveal he is Chaos. 

About halfway things start to develop. Beckett is there for Ella in any way he can be. From dropping off a binder to helping with soccer. 

A simple soccer game made them feel like a family and Beckett is so amazing with these kids. After the game, while grabbing dinner is when you see how quickly Beckett will go to protect Ella and the kids. Even Havoc wasn't having with this couple trying to get a close look at the kids. They should just stay gone and it was made clear.

From there it just continue to get better.

It's such a beautiful story. It's real, raw, emotional, and heartbreaking. It's everything you want and more in a romance. 

My Rating:

✪✪✪✪✪

Wayward Son

Wayward Son
by Jay Crownover

Book: The Forever Marked #4
Publisher: Author
Pub Date: January 18, 2024
Genre: Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Format: eARC
Source: Author
Book Links: Goodreads  Amazon

She’s the only girl he’s ever loved.

Zowen Archer has been in love with Aston Wheeler for as long as he can remember.
She’s perfect, except for the glaring fact that she fell in love with his best friend instead of him. For years, he loved her from afar with zero expectation. He told himself that as long as Aston was happy, his feelings for her didn’t matter.

However, Aston isn’t nearly as happy as she seems. And by the time Zowen figures things out, his life takes a drastic turn for the worse.

Now that Aston is single and laser-focused on making up for the lost time between the two of them, Zowen is doing everything in his power to avoid her. He’s convinced that if she never wanted him when he was at his very best, there is no chance in hell she could care about him now that he’s at his absolute worst.

He’s the only boy she’s willing to wait for.

Time has never been on Aston Wheeler’s side.

She spent too long pretending to be someone she was not. She lost herself in a first love that everyone, except her, thought was perfect. She wasted a lot of time trying to convince herself that she should be happy when she was anything but. She watched for years as the one person who made her feel like her true self drifted further and further away.

Finally, when she’s ready to reach out and grab the one-of-a-kind love that Zowen Archer has always silently promised her, it’s too late. Zowen is taken away, and when he reappears in her life, he makes it clear there’s no going back to whatever they might have been.

Good thing for Zowen that Aston is patient and doesn’t mind waiting for him to have a change of heart. It’s the least she can do after all the time he spent waiting for her.

 
My Review: This is a world that I couldn't untangle myself from the second I read Rule. From that world to this spinoff of their kids, its been nothing but amazing and I am sad this is the last book in this spinoff.  

Zowen is a free man now. He could finally go home and see his parents again and check on his dad since his big health scare. Only problem is that this legal battle isn't over yet.  Then the next problem (okay so maybe two problems) is Aston. The woman he didn't let visit him.... 

Aston has the guest house in back all setup for Zowen to stay in. She wants to help him while also wanting to reconnect. Selfish? Maybe, she did play with his feelings for a long time before realizing. But regardless you can see how much she really does want to just help Zowen.  

Everything between them changes soon. From a drunken night to Zowen going to meet his niece and Aston coming back from her own family stuff. Things start to mellow out and a connection builds, plus they are basically dog parents now.  

Aston wakes in her room and walks out to see Zowen making breakfast, everything needed for the puppy is now there and he'll take care of things while she takes time to deal with everything going on.

From then on this book truly develops into what I've come to expect from Jay. Zowen and Aston are wonderful characters. They truly deserved to finally have that happy ending after everything they've been through. 

 

My Rating:

✪✪✪✪

Weekly Spotlight - Rebel

    

Lyric

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Molly McAdams delivers the first captivating, stand-alone novel in her REDEMPTION series spin-off—the REBEL series . . .  

I’m not the kind of girl you forget. 

I wish I was. 

I wish I was normal. 

That I could blend into a crowd. Have a future with the man I’ve loved my entire life…  

Maxon James understands me in a way others can’t. 

For as long as I can remember, he’s vowed that one day he would claim my wild, rebel heart. God knows I wanted him to try. I wanted the life he promised me in his lyrics. 

But his assurances couldn’t change the past, and the infamous mafia blood in my veins guarantees my heart can’t be claimed.  

Somewhere along the way, I slipped. I let myself believe we could have it all. Now a dark, menacing shadow hovers between us, mocking us for daring to hope for a normal future.  

And it’s come to collect on a blood oath.  

My name’s Elizabeth Borello—Libby for short. Don’t worry about forgetting it … He hasn’t. 

My Review 

 

 

Lock

I’ve waited for him for over a decade.

Loyalties kept us apart. A death set us free.
Our passion unleashed, nothing could stop us.

Until my world was rocked—my greatest failure leaving me with my greatest heartbreak.

Now Maverick is baring his soul to me, begging me to let him in. God knows I want to, but I love him, and that means I’ll do anything to keep him from the pain haunting me. Even if it destroys us both.

Someone has been waiting for this perfect moment to strike.
Watching me.
Studying me.
Waiting for me to be too consumed with hurt to notice he was there.
Someone who knows me.

I’m Einstein . . . like the genius, only smarter and with better hair.
There’s nothing I can’t hack into, crack open, or figure out. Well, almost nothing.

And if I can’t beat his sinister game, it won’t just be my heart that stops beating.  

My Review

 

 

Limit

The final breathtaking installment in New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Molly McAdams’s REBEL series.

Protecting people isn’t simply my job—it’s engrained in me.
It doesn’t atone for my countless sins.
There’s no washing the blood off my hands after a lifetime in the mob.

I just want to save those who can’t save themselves.

Then Sutton Larson came at me with diamond-encrusted heels.
She’s judgmental and guarded and the most infuriating woman I’ve ever met.

Gaining her trust is nearly impossible. Protecting her is anything but easy. When she becomes more than a job, our passion builds like a brutal storm—beautiful and consuming.

But we have an expiration date made of lies and betrayals and lethal games.

One we thought we could outlive.
And it’s taunting us for thinking we could.

My name’s Conor Kennedy. I’ve lost enough people in my life . . . I refuse to lose her.

My Review

 

Weekly Spotlight - Kylie Scott Stand Alones

“She makes me want to keep living. She makes me want to write songs and get up in the morning and go out and actually have a fucking life. I cannot overstate her importance to me.”

― Kylie Scott, Famous in a Small Town

 

End of Story

New York Times bestselling sensation Kylie Scott’s sexy, smart and unconventional opposites-attract love story looks at what happens when fate refuses to give up on what’s meant to be…

When Susie Bowen inherits a charming fixer-upper from her aunt, she’s excited to start living her best HGTV life. But when she opens the door to find that her contractor is none other than her ex’s best friend, Lars—the same man who witnessed their humiliating public breakup six months ago—she isn’t exactly eager to have anyone around whose alliance is with the enemy. But beggars can’t be choosers, and the sooner the repairs are done, the sooner she can get back to embracing singledom.

Things go from awkward to unbelievable when Lars discovers a divorce certificate hidden in a wall and dated ten years in the future—with both their names on it. It couldn’t possibly be real…could it? As Susie and Lars work to unravel the document’s origins, the impossibility of a spark between them suddenly doesn’t seem so far-fetched. But would a relationship between them be doomed before it’s even begun?

“Sweet and spicy—the unique setup, top-notch banter and charming enigma had me hooked.” —Anna E. Collins, author of Love at First Spite

My Review

Famous in a Small Town

What chance does a small-town girl have with a world-famous rock star?

Two years after his wife’s death, rock star Garrett Hayes hasn’t moved on. But he has moved out of L.A. Where better to escape his past than a small town in the Northern California mountains? If only he could get the townsfolk of Wildwood to leave him the hell alone.

Ani Bennet returned to her hometown for some much-needed serenity. The last thing she needs is a grumpy, too hot for his own good, rich and famous rock star living next door—and rent-free in her brain.

She set her fangirl tendencies aside and deleted his photo off her cell when they became neighbors. But when Garrett asks for help, she can’t say no. The problem is, spending time together is making those fangirl feelings resurface—and bringing them to a whole new level.

What chance does a small-town girl have with world-famous rock star? It’s time for Ani to set her fears aside and find out.

My Review

 

Lies

Betty Dawsey knows that breaking things off with Thom Lange is for the best. He’s nice, but boring, and their relationship has lost its spark. But steady and predictable Thom, suddenly doesn’t seem so steady and predictable when their condo explodes and she’s kidnapped by a couple of crazies claiming that Thom isn’t who he says he is.

Thom is having a hellish week. Not only is he hunting a double agent, but his fiancé dumped him, and thanks to his undercover life, she’s been kidnapped.

Turns out Thom is Operative Thom and he’s got more than a few secrets to share with Betty if he’s going to keep her alive. With both their lives on the line, their lackluster connection is suddenly replaced by an intense one. But in his line of work, feelings aren’t wanted or desired. Because feelings can be a lethal distraction.

My Review

 

Wonderland

Wonderland 

by Alta Hensley

Book: Wonderland #1-3

Publisher: Dangerous Press

Pub Date: July 18, 2023

Genre: Adult, Romance, Contemporary, Dark, Retelling

Format: eARC

Source: Publisher

Book Links: Goodreads Amazon

I fall into an underground world of luxury and sin. There are threats everywhere. The only man who can save me is the most dangerous of all. WONDERLAND contains the complete trilogy including King of Spades, Queen of Hearts, and Ace of Diamonds. Step through the looking glass to the other side. 

 

My Review: I love a good retelling. Alice in Wonderland is one of my favorites, plus throw in a more adult aspect and I'm in.  

Although, I will say it’s more inspired rather than a retelling, there are some references that show the Alice in Wonderland theming.   

 

Lyriope is the outcast, the family's black sheep. She even has to sneak into family parties otherwise she would be thrown out in a heartbeat. 

 

But then, Nick walks in. Even he didn’t decline an invitation to the party, even if he preferred to be home. But Nick, being who he is, makes an appearance just to save face basically.  

 

Nick goes off to a room where he can be alone and away from the party. The same room that Lyriope finds herself in while hiding from someone at the party and looking for a way out. Surprised to see Nick there. But perhaps a bit more surprised at Nick’s POV and how he seems to know Lyriope just as much as she does about him.  

 

They strike a deal together, which in turn ends up being worth it. As you really get into the series they develop together, feelings blossom even more, and they just thrive together.  

 

If you have to just know how their story goes, have no worries as this book contains the entire series. So, you’ll easily get their whole story in one sitting. The characters and the story were very well done. It has all the spice you could want and then some. Quite possibly one of my favorite series of the year.  

My Rating:

✪✪✪✪✪