What a train wreck! I'm sure it was meant to be comical, but everything bordered on such extreme ridiculousness that after 70% I gave up. And I generally don't give up on books so easily. I just didn't feel like going back to this one again. Reminded me of some of those Lynsay Sands historicals I stopped reading for the exact same reason; everything ridiculously over the top, which makes the story absolutely not funny.

I can see I'm in the minority here (from the reviews on goodreads and on amazon) so read at your own risk.

3 stars. There'll be no full review... so here's what I thought in a nutshell:

I liked another one of this author's books so I decided to give Once a Gunslinger a go. I do love western historical romances, and an outlaw hero can be very appealing for sure. However, this one disappointed me. I didn't like the hero, and didn't care much for the heroine either.

The H and the h had a past of some sort when they were young, and there were consequences of their relationship. The H went to war (Civil war I believe) and fought for the enemy side, leaving the h behind and his own family in peril. He has been sort of an outlaw ever since. There were other things too, but I won't mention them.

H and h met again years later, and that is where the actual story begins. Unfortunately, he was an a$$ who decided he liked being a jerk to the heroine for what she did to save her reputation so long ago. He wanted to make her suffer because 'he was suffering as well'. His grudge, she married his now deceased brother and didn't wait for him. -_- However, if you read you will see that the fault wasn't hers at all. She had to do what she had to do, and she wasn't even a good wife to the brother who obviously cared for her because she still loved the H. The H even realizes that at one point but keeps on being a jerk until the last couple of pages of the book. The h, I wanted her to ditch this a$$ and look for a better man. But she was still so enamored of him that she continued being a doormat and took what he dished out almost without any argument at all. I could NOT understand exactly why? WHY?! :/

Their romance was not convincing to say the least. Believe me, I tried but I failed to see any HEA with such a hotheaded, impetuous a$$ for a hero. In the end, the argument that he was being a jerk cause he was afraid to acknowledge his feelings didn't float my boat either. Not my cup of tea, sorry. 3 stars because otherwise, the writing was very good and I thought this could've been better. Also, I really liked some of the secondary characters such as the heroine's brothers. I'd be more interested in their stories!

Note that this is a reissue of the author's earlier work, Savannah's Hero.

I just finished book 4, Truce and couldn't wait to read Elizabeth and Robert's "Honeymoon from Hell". True to the title, it was something pretty much straight out of hell! Though it started out fun (even with those first 30 pages of copy-paste from Truce), soon it turned into something... something.......... I don't even have exact words for that "honeymoon". :o

Aww those two.

Remember folks, over-the-top is the keyword here. Once again, so over the top it wasn't even funny. I just felt bad. :( I adore Elizabeth and Robert but this was horrible! They just wanted to enjoy a week free of kids and all the other responsibilities.................. *sigh* All I can say is that marrying a Bradford doesn't seem appealing to me at this point. :/

You can read my review of "Truce" here (spoiler alert applies!): http://punya.booklikes.com/post/1325614/truce

PS: the author needs to appoint a better editor for her books. The repetition and very convoluted sentences are also killing the fun of reading. At least for me.

"Annabel closed her eyes as dismay, regret and guilt rushed through her. She had beggared her husband and their people with that thoughtless move. Dear God, why did she have to be such a failure at everything?"

Umm, I don't know... maybe because you're dumber than a rock?! *SMH*


In my defense, I used to love Lynsay Sands' historical romances. Not sure what happened but this was over the top ridiculous. So much so that it wasn't even funny. The characters were either extremely dumb or extremely evil, no balance whatsoever. *sigh*

I'm also a glutton for punishment so I'm gonna give book 2 a try and see if this was a fluke and if the series gets better or not.

My review contains spoilers and they're mostly my thoughts as I went with the book...

Ok! I finished Secrets of a Scoundrel, book 7 of Inferno Club by Gaelen Foley after languishing for couple of months, mostly because I’m a sucker for punishment. I know I’ve exhausted this but this series was a disaster full of melodrama, annoying characters with over the top storyline, almost on the verge of being silly. If I say I was disappointed to the point that I’d be thinking twice before picking up her new stuff, it’d be an understatement. It took me 2 yrs. to pick up the series because book 5 blew my mind. It was that horrible. Book 7, unfortunately, had nothing better to offer.

To recap in a nutshell, the series revolves around a bunch of rakehells. The society knows them to be a part of a club called The Inferno Club. They give the illusion that Dante House, where they meet, is their ‘playground’; a den of debauchery. Well, Dante House is a mixture of debauchery and something far more secretive. What the others don’t know is that they’re spies for the Crown; a special breed of spies who were trained since early childhood, sort of ‘sacrificed’ by their families to become a part of an Order; the Order of the St. Michaels. They had an ancient nemesis the Promethean Council. We’re talking about thousands of years of enmity here, the Prometheans trying to unleash their evil on the world and rule it, while the heroes of the Order trying to save it from their clutches.