This shit right here...reminds me why I have a love/hate relationship with SPAs.

This is like...a poorly written excuse for a Harlequin romance. It certainly has all the tropes of a Harlequin:

-Beautiful virgin
-ruthless rich Greek tycoon billionaire type who for some reason does no fact checking or research
-completely unrealistic situations that require lots of money


Now, don't get me wrong, I like Harlequins...I cut my romance teeth on Harlequins...but the writing and the characters killed me. How much time can an author spend in past tense? Well, I found out.

Diona Brown was a beautiful girl. While fairly small, only 5.3 she had a figure which had men turning wherever she went. Large blue intelligent eyes sat in her small round face, giving her an innocent look which many men found so appealing. Her soft red lips when they broke into a smile had the power to completely transform her lovely features, giving her a glow which was breathtaking and which people responded so warmly to, a great thing to have in her job as a nurse.
--Kindle Location 64

Seriously?? I almost stopped at this point. But then I thought...surely the writing has to get better.

But ummmm, nope!

Diona had held her breath as he had looked at her with a fire in his eyes which had made her whole body light up with desire, dropping her eyes to her food to hide the sudden matching fire in her own as she had concentrated on her meal.

As they had finished he had offered her a drink as they had moved into the living room. Accepting the offer, she had cleared her throat nervously.

"I was thinking that I would see if I could get a flight back home tomorrow" she had said her eyes flicking to his, seeing the way he had smiled knowingly.

"So, running away Diona?" he had said gently, as she had taken a drink from her glass before placing it on a nearby table.

"I think it would be for the best".

"What if I disagree?" he replied, seeing how she had looked up at him.

"Please Nikias, don't" she had said pleading gently with him, seeing how he had moved closer to her, so close that he was looking down on her.

"Why are you always trying to escape from me Diona? he whispered sensually against her hair feeling how she had shivered slightly.
-Kindle Location 1966

So. I had to force myself to finish the book. Mainly by skimming as much as possible and trying to ignore the word “had” that appears in almost every.freaking.sentence.*

The saddest part about this book is…that it really would make a pretty good fit for a Harlequin Presents. A shitload of editing would have to be done. And I do mean a shitload. Plus the author really needs to take some classes on how to clean up her writing. It’s…disconcerting to read a book that is almost 100% in past tense.

Not to say that the plot doesn’t have some issues (as well). The first part of the story arc: the kidnapping and mistaken identity are fine. The later arcs are a bit more troublesome. One arc - which focuses on Nikias’ belief that Diona was trying to get her sister and his brother to marry – just doesn’t really make sense as explained in the book. Why would Diona be so concerned with her sister’s possible wedding or not? The brother is younger than Nikias and has no money of his own. Nikias is the financial prize…so it didn’t make sense.

And the ending. Oh jeeze, the ending. Let’s just say it wasn’t satisfying and leave it at that.



Two One Badly Edited Star – for the trope alone.






*I did a search for the word “had” in this book. This book shows a final location of 2592. I stopped at location 1434 as the search was killing my processers. I found 1800 instances of the word “had” by location 1434.

I compared that to [b:How to Tell a Lie|8463038|How to Tell a Lie (Truth and Lies, #1)|Delphine Dryden|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1276628291s/8463038.jpg|13327411] by Delphine Dryden. How to Tell a Lie has a final location of 2721. I found 391 instances of the word “had” in the entire book!
( )

This shit right here...reminds me why I have a love/hate relationship with SPAs.

This is like...a poorly written excuse for a Harlequin romance. It certainly has all the tropes of a Harlequin:

-Beautiful virgin
-ruthless rich Greek tycoon billionaire type who for some reason does no fact checking or research
-completely unrealistic situations that require lots of money


Now, don't get me wrong, I like Harlequins...I cut my romance teeth on Harlequins...but the writing and the characters killed me. How much time can an author spend in past tense? Well, I found out.

Diona Brown was a beautiful girl. While fairly small, only 5.3 she had a figure which had men turning wherever she went. Large blue intelligent eyes sat in her small round face, giving her an innocent look which many men found so appealing. Her soft red lips when they broke into a smile had the power to completely transform her lovely features, giving her a glow which was breathtaking and which people responded so warmly to, a great thing to have in her job as a nurse.
--Kindle Location 64

Seriously?? I almost stopped at this point. But then I thought...surely the writing has to get better.

But ummmm, nope!

Diona had held her breath as he had looked at her with a fire in his eyes which had made her whole body light up with desire, dropping her eyes to her food to hide the sudden matching fire in her own as she had concentrated on her meal.

As they had finished he had offered her a drink as they had moved into the living room. Accepting the offer, she had cleared her throat nervously.

"I was thinking that I would see if I could get a flight back home tomorrow" she had said her eyes flicking to his, seeing the way he had smiled knowingly.

"So, running away Diona?" he had said gently, as she had taken a drink from her glass before placing it on a nearby table.

"I think it would be for the best".

"What if I disagree?" he replied, seeing how she had looked up at him.

"Please Nikias, don't" she had said pleading gently with him, seeing how he had moved closer to her, so close that he was looking down on her.

"Why are you always trying to escape from me Diona? he whispered sensually against her hair feeling how she had shivered slightly.
-Kindle Location 1966

So. I had to force myself to finish the book. Mainly by skimming as much as possible and trying to ignore the word “had” that appears in almost every.freaking.sentence.*

The saddest part about this book is…that it really would make a pretty good fit for a Harlequin Presents. A shitload of editing would have to be done. And I do mean a shitload. Plus the author really needs to take some classes on how to clean up her writing. It’s…disconcerting to read a book that is almost 100% in past tense.

Not to say that the plot doesn’t have some issues (as well). The first part of the story arc: the kidnapping and mistaken identity are fine. The later arcs are a bit more troublesome. One arc - which focuses on Nikias’ belief that Diona was trying to get her sister and his brother to marry – just doesn’t really make sense as explained in the book. Why would Diona be so concerned with her sister’s possible wedding or not? The brother is younger than Nikias and has no money of his own. Nikias is the financial prize…so it didn’t make sense.

And the ending. Oh jeeze, the ending. Let’s just say it wasn’t satisfying and leave it at that.



Two One Badly Edited Star – for the trope alone.






*I did a search for the word “had” in this book. This book shows a final location of 2592. I stopped at location 1434 as the search was killing my processers. I found 1800 instances of the word “had” by location 1434.

I compared that to [b:How to Tell a Lie|8463038|How to Tell a Lie (Truth and Lies, #1)|Delphine Dryden|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1276628291s/8463038.jpg|13327411] by Delphine Dryden. How to Tell a Lie has a final location of 2721. I found 391 instances of the word “had” in the entire book!
( )

It was Free! ( )