Dangerous Lover (Dangerous, #1) in Alpha Heroes & Spitfire Heroines

May 09, 2008 Julianna rated it liked it

Shelves: read-2009, erotic-romance, romantic-suspense

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"3.5 stars" For the second time in a row, I have finished a book and been left waffling over how to rate it, which is very unusual for me. There were things that I liked about Dangerous Lover, but quite frankly, there were also things that I thought could have been greatly improved too. Lisa Marie Rice has a very languid writing style characterized by extended passages of descriptive or introspective prose punctuated by brief snippets of dialog. In my opinion, this gave t Reviewed for
"3.5 stars" For the second time in a row, I have finished a book and been left waffling over how to rate it, which is very unusual for me. There were things that I liked about Dangerous Lover, but quite frankly, there were also things that I thought could have been greatly improved too. Lisa Marie Rice has a very languid writing style characterized by extended passages of descriptive or introspective prose punctuated by brief snippets of dialog. In my opinion, this gave the story a rather slow and uneven pace, but I wouldn't really characterize it as dull or boring or say that I entirely disliked it. Since this is my first read by Ms. Rice, I can't say if this is her usual writing style or a peculiarity of this book, but my personal preference would have been that there be more dialog especially between the hero and heroine. In spite of being inside their heads almost constantly, I still felt like I was lacking a full and complete understanding of their feelings and motivations. Often I felt like the author was telling me things instead of showing me, and I think that at times it was a bit too wordy and simply didn't get to the point quickly enough for me to grasp it.

To say that Jack was the strong, silent type would probably be an understatement. Although I've already mentioned the general lack of dialog throughout the story, it seemed to me that Jack had the least of anyone. I suppose in some ways this added to the aura of mystery and danger surrounding him, but I still like my heroes to be a tad more talkative. Jack was a tortured hero and a hardened ex-military guy who was an ultra-protective alpha male. What I really liked about him though was that when it came to Caroline, he definitely discovered his softer side and always treated her very gently. However, what impressed me the most was his gentlemanly behavior towards her such as opening doors, pulling out chairs, etc. I may be in the minority, but I love it when a man does these sorts of things for a lady. Jack may have engaged in combat in some of the world's worst hellholes but around Caroline he was never uncouth, right down to watching his language, which I found to be a really neat dichotomy. I also found his frequent kissing of her hand to be a swoon-worthy gesture.

Caroline was an interesting heroine who is extremely kindhearted and trusting of others, but perhaps too much so. She was certainly a tortured heroine and an emotionally strong one to have lived through the deaths of her entire family, but I thought that having all her friends and neighbors basically ignore her because they were uncomfortable with the tragedy was a little overkill. I guess it added to her sense of isolation and vulnerability, but one would think that there would be a few people who would offer up some kind words or support during that difficult time. While I like a heroine who isn't afraid to let the hero take care of her, I also think that ideally she should have a little spunk as well. I thought that her previous on-again, off-again relationship with Sanders, especially when she didn't enjoy the sex and didn't really even seem to like him all that much, made her seem weak and indecisive. I also would have liked to see her defend herself a little better against his unwanted advances. Overall, Caroline was a nice, sweet heroine, but I would have preferred that she exhibit a bit more backbone.

While Dangerous Lover had quite a few romantic moments between Jack and Caroline that I enjoyed, there were also some things about the story that bothered me. I am not usually a fan of the instant 鈥渕eeting and mating,鈥� but I was able to overlook it to some degree in this book since I understood Caroline's loneliness, and she and Jack had a previous connection, even though she wasn't initially aware of it. Nevertheless, I do tend to be a proponent of safe sex especially in contemporary romance, and the lack of it in this book did bug me. Even though Jack was certainly a prepared, plan-ahead kind of guy, I maybe could have lived with neither of them having any condoms available in the middle of a snowstorm, and I probably could have accepted the flimsy reasons for Caroline fortuitously being on birth control. However, when she said, 鈥淵ou look healthy鈥� I couldn't help but roll my eyes and have a WTH moment, since careless assumptions like that in real life would likely end in an STD. Sometimes I can live with the condoms being left behind if there seems to be a decent reason for it, but in this case, I didn't really see any compelling rationale for the author to write it that way. The safe sex argument aside, I also found some of the violence a little off-putting. I'm generally not overly squeamish, but I found the descriptions of the atrocities being committed against the women and children in Sierra Leone to be somewhat disturbing. I think this was probably due to the realism of it and the fact that these things are actually happening on a daily basis rather than just being committed by some fictional, warped, psycho villain. Lastly, there were also quite a number of continuity errors as well as incorrect or incomplete word choices. While these errors weren't totally egregious, they were sometimes distracting and should have been caught by a good editor.

Out of all the reader complaints I've heard about Dangerous Lover so far, the most common one seems to be that many hated the ending. While I'll admit that it was pretty abrupt, I didn't find it to be absolutely terrible. This may have been due to my expectations being lower because of the complaints, so I can definitely see how those who didn't have prior knowledge of a potentially unsatisfying ending might be very disappointed or even upset by the way things wrapped up. It was happy, but certainly left a lot to the reader's imagination. For those who aren't aware, there is something of an epilogue to the story exclusively available online at , but it doesn't really add anything to the plot of the main novel. The epilogue also isn't written in a story format, but instead, has more of the feel of a timeline documenting all the major events in Jack and Caroline's lives from the end of Dangerous Lover until they both take their final breath on this mortal plane.

Dangerous Lover was marketed as an erotic romance, but the sexual content of the book did not include anything unusual or kinky. In my opinion, the love scenes were pretty vanilla and comparable to hot, steamy mainstream romances, but sensitive readers show know that they are more frequent and do contain explicit language. In a different vein, Dangerous Lover was not marketed as a Christmas romance, but the entire story takes place in four days over the Christmas holiday which might make it an appealing read for that time of the year. In spite of that, I would not necessarily call it a Christmas-themed romance, since none of the traditional trappings or celebrations of the holiday are present in the narrative. Dangerous Lover is the first book in the Dangerous series, followed by Dangerous Secrets and Dangerous Passion which is due to be released this summer. Lisa Marie Rice does not have a website and information on her books elsewhere is spotty, so I am not certain at this time what the character or plot connections between books might be. Even though there were a number of things about Dangerous Lover that I thought could have been better, I still found it to be a worthwhile read that also had a number of appealing elements too. I liked it well enough and have heard enough good things about Lisa Marie Rice that I will undoubtedly read the next book in the series and also try some of her other books, since I already have a few on my TBR pile. ...more

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Jan 09, 2009 Shawna rated it it was ok

Shelves: hero-cold-cruelbrute-dark-dangerous, romantic-suspense, erotic-romance-erotica-romantica, 2stars, 2009-reads, hero-stalk-me-baby-possessive, writing-style-didnt-work-for-me, blah-meh, hero-brooding-serious-grumpy-aloof, ending-abrupt-poor-epilogue-needed

2 stars - Romantic Suspense/Erotica

Dangerous Lover has a likable, sweet, mild alpha male hero who treats the heroine with tenderness and genuine affection. The romance is hot, but the intermittent bad guy pov regarding his pursuit of stolen blood diamonds distracts from the overall romantic progression and pace of the story. The ending is frustratingly abrupt and disappointing. The strong romantic aspect of the story isn't enough to counteract the choppy pace and bad ending. ...more

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Feb 10, 2008 Rhapsody rated it really liked it

Shelves: romance, fiction

Back when he was a homeless kid, Ben worshipped Caroline, the daughter of an affluent family. Twelve years later, now using the name Jack Prescott, he's just quit the military and is rich from selling his late father's company. He goes back to Caroline and starts living with her as her boarder without telling her who he really is. Caroline lost her parents years before and her younger brother was crippled in the accident; she's heavily in debt from the medical bills and her brother died just two ...more

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Jan 14, 2009 Stephanie rated it liked it

Shelves: steamy-hot-romance-comtemp, lisa-marie-rice

I really liked this book...until the end. It stunk!!! It was as if the author had something else to do and said "I'm done, next." I knew going in that the ending left a lot to be desired, but I had no idea just how much. I also knew that there was an epilog on her website and that is why I decided to go ahead and read the book. SO I downloaded it, waited to read it until I finished the book. Boy, it was a bigger disappointment. I don't think that the author even wrote it. It sounds as if it were ...more

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Jun 29, 2008 Jen rated it really liked it

I really do like her books but the endings are so abrupt. How about a little light and easy at the end or something??

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Nov 30, 2009 Kelly rated it liked it

This book could have been great but it just wasn't for me. My two issues

It just ended. I wanted one last scene beteween Jack and Caroline but never got it.

I found that the prose was lacking dialogue between the h/h.
I am a huge fan of more interaction between the characters. Of course they have plenty of sexual interaction.

I will give Lisa Marie Rice's books another shot.

...more

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Feb 07, 2008 Auntee rated it it was amazing

Shelves: erotic-romance, keepers, lisa-marie-rice

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Feb 09, 2008 Julie (jjmachshev) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2007-reads, erotica

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Apr 05, 2008 Marion rated it really liked it

Shelves: erotic-romance, 2008-read

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May 04, 2008 Mitzi marked it as wishlist

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May 08, 2008 鈾arlyn P鈾� rated it really liked it

Shelves: genre-contemporary, genre-suspense, genre-erotica, steam-sizzling

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May 18, 2008 Jen marked it as to-read

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Jul 11, 2008 MelissaB rated it really liked it

Shelves: military-men, contemporary-romance, kindle, romantica-erotica, lisa-marie-rice

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May 21, 2009 Danielle The Book Huntress marked it as to-read

Shelves: owned-copy, danielle-friendly-erotic-romance, mainstream-contemporary-romance, part-of-a-series

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Jul 03, 2009 Rissa rated it it was ok

Shelves: romance-suspense

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Sep 01, 2009 Kris H. rated it really liked it

Shelves: romantic-suspense-adventure

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Sep 10, 2009 Emmi rated it liked it

Shelves: favorites

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Sep 22, 2009 J rated it liked it

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Sep 27, 2009 jenjn79 rated it did not like it

Shelves: format-trade-pb, genre-romance-erotic, info-need, pbs-received, published-2007, stars-1, series-dangerous, condition-used, bought-other, 2013

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