Sunday, August 16, 2009

Review: Dangerous Passion by Lisa Marie Rice

No comments  
Title: Dangerous Passion
Series: Dangerous
Author: Lisa Marie Rice
Read copy: eBook
Published: August 4, 2009
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0061898376
ISBN-13: 9780061898372

Feelings kill faster than bullets.

That is Drake's creed. A legend, a renegade, a ruthless, powerful enigma understood by no one and feared by all, Viktor "Drake" Drakovich heads up a billion-dollar empire—and shows no mercy to the many enemies who would stop at nothing to destroy him. He is a man with no love and no weakness, until...

Grace Larsen takes Drake's breath away the first time he sees her—and quickly becomes his obsession. Never before has he burned for someone the way he desires this hauntingly beautiful artist who is plagued by troubling dreams. He aches to possess her, to protect her, to carry her to new heights of sensuous arousal and rapturous release.

But entering Drake's world means becoming a target—for relentless, bloodthirsty foes have been eagerly waiting for him to expose his weak spot. And the price of their passion may be their lives.

My rating:

Oh. My. God. Three words that, IMO, perfectly sum up this book.

While the first two stories in this series were severely hampered by their heroines, this book was sheer perfection compared to the previous two.

Grace was still a soft, gentle woman, but - perhaps because the violence touched her early in the story - she didn't come off as unaware, blind or naive. She knew straight on what was going on and though she could wail, cry, and throw tantrums, she did none of those things. She gathered her courage, thrust her chin in the air, and trudged forward. I couldn't imagine a more suitable and perfect counterpart for Drake, our beloved arms dealer.

Yeah, it's a humongous feat turning someone who is essentially a bad guy into the leading man, but Victor "Drake" Drakovich had that little extra oomph that made this possible. The prologue in itself showed us, how utterly different he is from other heroes in Romancelandia - not a towering hunk over six-foot-two, but of average height, hands and feet heavily callused from martial arts (though most heroes are callused, I've never read of someone like Drake), and what we discovered through Grace's eyes throughout the story only confirmed the theory...Also, despite operating on the other side of the law, he still had his principles, his own set of rules, which is what started the whole story.

These two completely different people, one soft, the other hard, found themselves thrust together, mostly thanks to Drake and his little obsession, and then had to make the best of the situation. It was lovely seeing their slow, but steady transformation, especially Drake's. He was the one that, despite retaining all his traits that helped him survive through the years and helped him keep Grace safe, was the most changed by this relationship.
She taught a man that never smiled, the importance of it, she taught him gentleness, she brought softness and peace into his life. But most of all, it was so sweet watching him see his bleak world overfill with colors through her eyes.

This was truly an amazing story, with just the right amount of suspense to spice up Drake and Grace's love story. And what a love story this was, with three memorable scenes that put this one firmly on my keepers shelf: the scene at the window overlooking the Manhattan night skyline—H-O-T, the scene on the terrace in Rome—sweet, and the final few paragraphs of the epilogue—bring on the tissues!

An amazingly bitter-sweet and highly recommended read.

, , , , , , ,

0 comments:

Post a Comment