Lynne Connolly’s review of Hot Shot Tycoon, Indecent Proposal by Heidi Rice
Contemporary romance released by Harlequin Presents 1 Sep 09

First thing’s first. The title. Le sigh. Le great big, huge sigh. Please stop it, Harlequin. 

As usual in Modern Heat romances, the hero is a little more – well – human, and less of the Object To Be Conquered. Connor still bears the marks of his unspeakable childhood, and the usual Harlequin wariness when it comes to women, but enough flexibility to know a good thing when he sees it.

Daisy is small and auburn, and for once, the heroine on the cover bears some resemblance to her. She walks away from Connor more than once, and the first time she does it, she nearly lost me, because her excuses just didn’t hold water.

However, this is a book I enjoyed, despite one or two improbabilities. I had no idea there were any run-down old Georgian houses left in the inner London area, least of all in the Notting Hill area, where most houses, however run-down can fetch a couple of million pounds, but I could live with it. “Notting Hill” is one of my favorite romcoms, so it was neat of Rice to use that, and Portobello Market for her setting.

Luckily, the loveable residents weren’t made too much of, and the story moved along at a nice clip.

Daisy meets Connor when she is sneaking into his garden to try to rescue a neighbor’s cat. Things progress very swiftly and the next morning, after a night in his bed, she sneaks back home. Connor needs a fake fiancée, and he persuades Daisy to be it, but despite using the familiar trope, Rice doesn’t make too much of it, and it doesn’t dominate the story. It’s almost ruefully acknowledged as a device to get the two protagonists together.

The end of the story was, for me, a bit of a disappointment as it uses another well-worn trope to get them back together, and it seemed a bit rushed compared to the rest of the book.

What shone in this book was the characters. Connor is sketched in enough to be believable, and Daisy was a delightful character, without being too whimsical. I like the lighter tone of the Modern Heat stories, and I think this was a welcome addition to the line.

Grade: B- (B+ for the characters, C for some aspects of the plot)

Blurb:

Tycoon Connor Brodie has just apprehended an intruder! One clad in lacy satin underwear.and not a trespasser at all, but his feisty neighbor Daisy Dean. The red-hot encounter leaves him aching for more – could the luscious Ms. Dean be the answer to his prayers in more ways than one? Connor needs to close a business deal, and he fully intends to finish what they’ve started. Unable to resist his lethal charm, Daisy finds herself agreeing to two hedonistic weeks in New York – as Connor’s fake fiancée!

Read an excerpt here (scroll down).