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annathepiperI'm not sure whether it's a function of authors I've previously known and adored in the fantasy realm, of the Bombshell line of romances being generally way more about the suspense and less about the romance, or both, but ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rachelcaine's Devil's Bargain has joined mizkit's Cate Dermody novels in demonstrating to me that there are in fact category romances that I can read and enjoy. It is therefore a damn shame that the Bombshell line is now defunct.
Devil's Bargain has the same crackling action and pacing familiar to me from the Weather Warden series, and much the same general level of badassery on the part of the two central characters, Jazz Callender and Lucia Garza. They are approached by a mysterious organization and offered $100,000 to found a private investigation agency--as long as they give any cases that come to them in red envelopes top priority. It doesn't take long at all for the two women to discover that they've been pulled into a shadowy game with stakes of worldwide consequence, and that refusing to join in is not an option.
Overall it wasn't what quite what I expected, given the title of this book and its sequel, Devil's Due; I'd gone into this expecting a paranormal romance, with a probable main theme of demons. That I got a suspenseful shadow-game instead is not at all a problem. I quite enjoyed the chemistry between POV character Jazz and her love interest, James Borden; extra points, too, for James being atypical in my romance-reading experience, which is to say, not a macho action-man. Instead, he's a lawyer, fit enough and rather on the pretty/gorgeous side, yet not at all a wimp. (Though I'll have to admit that I was vaguely disappointed that the paranoid ex-FBI guy, one of the more interesting side characters, did not actually turn out to be the love interest. Nor, as near as I can tell, is he queued up to be the featured love interest in the sequel. Drat!)
Anyway, a fluffy read and easy to blow through quickly, but enjoyable all around, with exactly the right mix of action and romance for my tastes. Four stars.
rachelcaine's Devil's Bargain has joined mizkit's Cate Dermody novels in demonstrating to me that there are in fact category romances that I can read and enjoy. It is therefore a damn shame that the Bombshell line is now defunct.Devil's Bargain has the same crackling action and pacing familiar to me from the Weather Warden series, and much the same general level of badassery on the part of the two central characters, Jazz Callender and Lucia Garza. They are approached by a mysterious organization and offered $100,000 to found a private investigation agency--as long as they give any cases that come to them in red envelopes top priority. It doesn't take long at all for the two women to discover that they've been pulled into a shadowy game with stakes of worldwide consequence, and that refusing to join in is not an option.
Overall it wasn't what quite what I expected, given the title of this book and its sequel, Devil's Due; I'd gone into this expecting a paranormal romance, with a probable main theme of demons. That I got a suspenseful shadow-game instead is not at all a problem. I quite enjoyed the chemistry between POV character Jazz and her love interest, James Borden; extra points, too, for James being atypical in my romance-reading experience, which is to say, not a macho action-man. Instead, he's a lawyer, fit enough and rather on the pretty/gorgeous side, yet not at all a wimp. (Though I'll have to admit that I was vaguely disappointed that the paranoid ex-FBI guy, one of the more interesting side characters, did not actually turn out to be the love interest. Nor, as near as I can tell, is he queued up to be the featured love interest in the sequel. Drat!)
Anyway, a fluffy read and easy to blow through quickly, but enjoyable all around, with exactly the right mix of action and romance for my tastes. Four stars.