A raucous, entertaining, New Age erotic yarn, by turns funny and soulful.
Massage therapists tangle in a physically and spiritually gnarly love triangle in this steamy romance.
Lilienthal’s debut novel follows Vera West, a single mom and massage therapist living in San Francisco. Vera enters into a business partnership and an affair with her massage therapy instructor, Ernesto Archer. That Ernesto is married causes Vera twinges of guilt, but her misgivings are swept away by world-shaking orgasms and shared erotic dreams that confirm that they were lovers in a past life in ancient Mongolia. Complicating things further are other women whom Ernesto has been involved with and who continue orbiting him, including rival masseuse Star Child. Almost blinded by Ernesto’s sexy charisma and praise for her empathic power to “transmute” feelings, Vera starts seeing cracks in his facade when his drinking escalates and he commits a professional betrayal. Almost everyone, especially her 14-year-old daughter, India, tells her to dump him. One woman who doesn’t is Ernesto’s wife, Jean, a shaman who remains outwardly cordial and plies Vera with essential oils. As Vera’s entanglement with Ernesto grows more fraught and annoying health problems erupt, she starts to suspect Jean’s potential for witchy malevolence. Lilienthal’s story is a finely observed portrait of the wellness industry in affluent Northern California, where virtually everyone has a retinue of massage therapists, astrologers, and doctors “of energetic medicine” to minister to their psyches. She winks at the excesses of this culture but takes seriously its metaphysical premises and healing aspirations, adding whispers of the occult to Vera’s experiences. The author’s sex scenes are lavish, but she keeps the novel grounded in comically tawdry concerns that play out in smart, zippy prose, whether Vera is mulling an assignation—“Am I really wearing black silk stay-ups, a very pretty, transparent black lace bra, and the skimpiest thong known to mankind in order to bring this married boss of mine a still-warm plate of chocolate chip cookies?”—or spoiling for a catfight. (“Instead of turning and skedaddling her big butt back down my pathway, she comes on in and closes the door behind her, thrusting her fake boobs out like a couple of headlights.”) Vera is a vibrant hoot of a hero as she wanders down the road to wisdom.
A raucous, entertaining, New Age erotic yarn, by turns funny and soulful.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-1-64742-383-4
Page Count: 216
Publisher: She Writes Press
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Sink your teeth into this delightful paranormal romance with a modern twist.
A vampire and an Alpha werewolf enter into a marriage of convenience in order to ease tensions between their species.
As the only daughter of a prominent Vampyre councilman, Misery Lark has grown accustomed to playing the role that’s demanded of her—and now, her father is ordering her to be part of yet another truce agreement. In an effort to maintain goodwill between the Vampyres and their longtime nemeses the Weres, Misery must wed their Alpha, Lowe Moreland. But it turns out that Misery has her own motivations for agreeing to this political marriage, including finding answers about what happened to her best friend, who went missing after setting up a meeting in Were territory. Isolated from her kind and surrounded on all sides by the enemy after the wedding, Misery refuses to let herself forget about her real mission. It doesn’t matter that Lowe is one of the most confounding and intense people she’s ever met, or that the connection building between them doesn’t feel like one born entirely of convenience. There’s also the possibility that Lowe may already have a Were mate of his own, but in spite of their biological differences, they may turn out to be the missing piece in each other’s lives. While this is Hazelwood’s first paranormal romance, and the book does lean on some hallmark tropes of the genre, the contemporary setting lends itself to the author’s trademark humor and makes the political plot more easily digestible. Misery and Lowe’s slow-burn romance is appealing enough that readers will readily devour every moment between them and hunger to return to them whenever the story diverts from their scenes together.
Sink your teeth into this delightful paranormal romance with a modern twist.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9780593550403
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
PERSPECTIVES
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