Showing posts with label Jane Godman. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jane Godman. Show all posts

Thursday, July 10, 2014

Echoes in the Darkness Review

Echoes in the Darkness by Jane Godmn (ARC Review)
Published July 7, 2014 by Harlequin E
5 CREEPY CHILLS!

"Some Legacies are so dark that not the strongest of loves can revert them."

Synopsis -

Not betrothed, but beguiled.

In artistic circles she is the Divine Dita, Paris’ most sought-after nude model. But now she’s not so much posing as playing a role: fiancĂ©e to the next Earl of Athal. The charade is a favor to Dita’s friend, Eddie Jago, a dissolute painter…and the aforementioned heir. As deceptions go, it is innocent compared with what will come.

On the grim Cornish coast, from the ashes of a ruined castle rises the Jagos’ sumptuous new manor house. The fresh-hewn stone, however, cannot absorb the blood of centuries or quiet the echoes of past crimes. Dita struggles to decipher the family: the infirm Earl and his inscrutable wife; resentful Eddie; sheltered sister Eleanor. And Cad: the handsome second son whose reputation is spotless in business—scandalous everywhere else.

Drawn by friendship, ensnared by lust, Dita uncovers a sordid tangle of murder, desire and madness. It will lay her bare as no portraitist has done before.  (Goodreads)

Review -

Godman has truly mastered the art of Gothic Romance.  Every aspect needed to create the scene for a truly epic dark romance is within these pages; dark and deadly atmosphere, chills running up and down your spine, forbidden and dangerous love, question in the back of the readers mind if the lover is truly the killer and will he/she murder the one they love.

Many readers may have questioned the how wise of a choice it was for Lucy and Tynan to have children knowing the ghastly legacy they were passing on.  Especially when they ended up having three children, two sons and a daughter, in essence recreating the doomed trio of Uther, Demelza and Tynan's father.  If anyone were to know just how real the Jago Legacy was, it would be them.  Maybe the two fated lovers believed their love was so great that with the right upbringing of their children, they could overcome the curse of the name Jago.  Sadly, they couldn't have been more wrong.  Especially when they bring the family back to the Athal estate, rebuilding and renaming the castle to Tenebris, as though that would cleanse the old blood within its very soil.  Lucy and Tynan's mistake will cause countless others their lives.

Arwen Jago has been born again to the Jago line, the question readers will be questioning is to which brother?  The quiet Eddie, reluctant heir who despises the Jago name and the very walls Tenebris feel as though they are closing in on him, and ripping away his sanity.  Or is it Cad, the wild, scandalous Jago, who is the spitting image of Arwen and Uther, from the hair to the eyes, to the sinister smile.  And has Demelza been born again in the youngest Jago, Elizabeth?  And is Elizabeth even the youngest Jago?

Dita Vargo is the new lead in this dark tale, one with a sordid past of her own.  On the run from a man who has sworn to get her back at any cost, she is forced to remove her clothes for money, as a nude model.  Her only rule, no artists is to ever paint her face, for fear that her not so secret admirer will learn of her whereabouts.  So when she is warned by a friend that he is close, and Eddie her dear friend, asks her to accompany him to Cornwall, it seems the perfect escape.  Little does she know that she will be stepping into more danger, not less.

Echoes in the Darkness is a beautiful and epic Gothic Romance, keeping readers guessing until the very end, and leave goosebumps on every inch of the skin.  This incarnation of Arwen Jago will give Jack the Ripper a run for his money and have Norman Bates looking like a saint.


Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Legacy of Darkness Review

Legacy of Darkness by Jane Godman (ARC Review)
Published April 14, 2014
5 Dark Stars

"A deliciously dark tale that will definitely make you shiver and send more than a chill or two down your spine."

Synopsis - 

1837 Cornwall, England

Orphaned, penniless and reduced to the role of lady's companion, Lucy Alleyne is relieved when a distant relation spirits her away to Castle Athal. But gratitude soon gives way to fear--and unlooked-for pleasure.

The ancient Cornish castle is a dark monument to family, fortune and blood. Within its walls, the Jago family keeps its wards close...and its secrets closer. Lucy is drawn to Tynan, Earl of Athal. The young heir is handsome and caring, yet tortured in his mind like his father before him. Tynan is utterly different from his uncle Uther--a commanding, seductive presence whose leonine power radiates from his every word and gesture.-

These two Jago men have innocent Lucy enthralled--mind, soul and body. But if she remains within the poisonous castle keep, with its history of ill-starred passion and madness, a mere broken heart will seem a mercy.  (Goodreads)

Review - 

This is the first non-vampire novel that I have read in a very long time in which I can say I didn't even miss the fangs.  A tale that is truly dark and sinister that any fan of Gothic Romance would be sure to love, and crave for more.  Godman takes readers into a dark world in centuries past, where one families castle that has a history that may be as deadly as Count Vlad's, and even more sordid.

When Lucy is taken in by very distant relatives she at once feels like less than a squaller when she enters the beautiful and dark Gothic Manor, and takes in all the riches that belong to the family name.  But she soon learns that the grass isn't always greener.  For within the walls of the castle lie the secrets of long dead ancestors, one in particular that had no compunction in making a pact with the Devil.  And while people would have her to believe the sounds she's been hearing to be nothing more than that of the atmosphere that is making her imagination run wild, the truth is far more horrifying, and possibly deadly.  She will also learn every woman should, never trust a man willing to give you every pleasure imaginable, without expecting anything in return, even release.  Uther Jago is determined beyond reason to produce a Jago heir, and not just to keep the family name alive.  

Walk into the halls of the Jago Castle where nothing and no-one is as they seem, not even relationships.  Where trusting your instincts may very well be the only thing that could keep you alive.   Where reincarnation has never been more deadly.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...