Stevie‘s review of Hidden Heat (Brothers of Mayhem, Book 1) by Carla Swafford
Contemporary Romance published by Loveswept 16 Feb 16
I love me a good motorcycle romance, although it’s becoming abundantly clear that what I want from the subgenre is wildly different from what most readers seem to enjoy and from the output of many authors. The biggest divergence from me and almost everyone else is that while I care about the heroine and the bikers, I don’t want a story that sets up one woman amongst the men and deprives her of any kind of meaningful interaction with female friends and relatives. I don’t mind if some of that interaction is prickly, or if she has problems relating to her mother or the mother-figure in her life, but I want to see the women working together either with, or separately from, the men. Something this book completely failed to deliver for me.
Cassidy and her brother have been brought up by their aunt and uncle since their biker father was jailed for killing their mother. Cassidy wants as little as possible to do with the Club they grew up in, but her brother is keen to become a part of it as soon as he turns 18. On a visit to the Club’s bar in search of her brother, Cassidy runs into the new bartender, Thorn, a member of the notorious Savalas family. He’s actually an undercover cop, playing on the reputation held by the rest of his family to infiltrate the club and bring down their criminal activities.
Cassidy and Thorn team up after a few awkward moments – she sees through his act quickly enough, though none of the men seem to – and she agrees to pretend to be his old lady to further his deception if he helps her get her brother out of the biker life and onto the straight and narrow. If Thorn’s not very convincing either undercover or as a cop at all, his superior officer is even worse. Come to think of it, why should his boss be a man? A female detective could have worked just as well, even if one plot point would have needed a bit of tweaking.
On top of my dissatisfaction with pretty much all the characters, and especially with the lack of women to back Cassidy up, this book featured the trope that annoys me more than almost any other – the hero and heroine who are so carried away in the heat of the moment that they both forget all about safe sex and then make no effort to visit any kind of healthcare professional afterwards to deal with both emergency contraception and STD screening. But then some people find unexpected babies romantic, I guess, and in Romancelandia the good guys never have the clap or anything worse, as far as I can make out.
Rant over, I really felt this book was lacking any solid grounding in plotting, characterisation, or research that went beyond watching Sons of Anarchy while missing most of the main themes in that saga (strong women and a love of Hamlet to name just two that I adore that series for). Another author I don’t have to read again, thankfully.
Grade: D
Summary:
Cassidy Ryder refuses to be intimidated by anyone, even the hell-raising, hard-drinking Brothers of Mayhem. The daughter of their former president, she’s not above smashing a few heads to keep her teenage brother safe. But when Cassidy’s big mouth gets her in trouble, the only thing that saves her is some quick thinking from the Brothers’ bartender. He’s commanding and strong, and as smooth as the whiskey he pours: the ultimate temptation for a girl who swore she’d never be a biker’s plaything.
But Thorn Savalas is no ordinary biker. He’s a cop, and he’s worked too hard earning the Brothers’ trust to blow his cover over a female—even one who rocks a pair of jeans like Cassidy. The only way to protect her is by claiming she’s his old lady. Trouble is, Thorn can’t just pretend. He wants Cassidy, and every scorching touch tells him she feels the same. But acting on their hottest fantasies could leave them both exposed . . . even if nothing else has ever felt so real.
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