Thursday, December 30, 2010

After Dark with a Scoundrel-Alexandra Hawkins

After Dark with a Scoundrel
Alexandra Hawkins
St. Martin’s, Feb 1 2011, $7.99
ISBN: 9780312381264

In 1823 Lord Hugh “Dare” Mordare, the second son of a Duke, is a close friend of Frost Bishop. Through him he has known Frost’s sister Lady Regan for years, who is an honorary member of Nox’s Gentlemen’s Club. All changes when Dare and Regan kiss as both are stunned by their reaction; that is far from sibling-like.

She is shipped off to Miss Swann’s Academy for Young Ladies boarding school while he returns to being a rogue. Five years later Regan comes back to London with plans to drive Frost crazy and to seduce Dare. Frost is ready to pull his hair out with his sister’s antics while Dare remains resolute to keep Regan away from the Lords of Vice like he is. However, she proves a worthy adversary and soon they marry. As she learns of his dark secrets, she finds herself in the midst of madness.

The latest Lords of Vice (see Till Dawn with a Devil and All Night with a Rogue) is an engaging Regency gothic romantic suspense as the brave heroine finds herself in peril; perhaps from the man she loves. Fast-paced from the moment they kiss even before she is exiled, After Dark with a Scoundrel grips the reader as Alexandra Hawkins’ fans will think of Hitchcock’s Suspicion placed in an early nineteenth century milieu.

Harriet Klausner

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