Sandy M’s review of A Hellion in Her Bed (Hellions of Halstead Hall, Book 2) by Sabrina Jeffries
Historical Romance published by Pocket Star 1 Sep 10
I have a feeling a few of you — hell, maybe scores of you — are going to call me crazy after reading this review. I even had a thought or two like that roll around in my head as I read. I mean, we’re talking Sabrina Jeffries here. But the first half of this book is just so-so for me.
And I’m not totally sure why. I like the idea of a lady brewster in Annabel Lake’s day. She’s a smart cookie who does what she has to to get around in a man’s world to help her family out, help them survive. She loves working in the family brewery. She has secrets, of course, and that’s where she gets in trouble. Jarret Sharpe has spent the last nineteen years earning a living at gambling due to the fact his grandmother forced him out of their family brewery when he was much younger, made him go to school instead, which he hated immensely. Also losing his parents has shaped him into the wild and carefree wastrel he is today.
Annabel goes to Hester Plumtree to talk business about entering into a partnership that will be beneficial to both their breweries, but she runs into Jarret instead. He’s currently and reluctantly in charge of Plumtree Brewery while his grandmother recovers from her illness. Jarret, as well as his other siblings, are chafing at the ultimatum grandma has dished out to them — get married by the end of the year or you’re disinherited. He’s made a deal with her to run the brewery for that year and then he’s scot-free to back to his responsibility-free existence.
Jarret and Annabel make a wager over a game of cards — she wins Jarret will go along with her plan to save Lake Ale, he wins she spends a night in his bed. They are evenly matched at whist and it’s a draw up until the last hand when Jarret is distracted and eventually loses to Annabel. Now, of course, there’s other things that go on during this short synopsis, but up to this point the story is just…..slow for me. The idea of the breweries didn’t seem to flourish enough and the characters didn’t leap off the page as they usually do in a Sabrina Jeffries book, which surprises me because Jarret and Annabel banter and drive each other nuts.
Things pick up a bit when the scenery turns to Lake Ale. Jarret is there to look the place and its books over to make sure it has the wherewithal to sustain the plan Annabel has created for them. Slowly but surely Annabel’s fabrications about the state of her family, even herself, come undone. Jarret begins to put pieces together until the truth does come out.
And this is where the book comes alive for me. Jarret’s anger with Annabel scorches a fire between them fraught with guilt, betrayal, self-doubt, and self-realization, and that all leads to one intense and sexy as all get-out love scene. It’s raw and emotional. Annabel comes clean about her lies. Except one. The big one. And when it is revealed later, it’s unexpected reactions and emotions for both Annabel and the reader. Her revelations bring on an eventual look at the past in a different light and a relationship no one ever imagined.
If you haven’t read the first book in this series, The Truth about Lord Stoneville, but I truly don’t think you need to in order to read this one. Ms. Jeffries does a great job of giving us an overview of the family dynamics and what the series is based on, as well as a look into the mysterious deaths of the siblings’ parents. I’m definitely looking forward to Mnerva’s book, which is out next year. We’re given just enough to whet our curiosity as to what will happen.
I’m glad my audacity to give Sabrina Jeffries a C for this book has been nipped in the old proverbial bud. Jarret and Annabel make a stupendous comeback amid anger and terrific bed play, so my grade makes a comeback of its own.
Grade: B
Summary:
Mired in scandal after his parents’ mysterious deaths, notorious gambler Lord Jarret Sharpe agrees to tamely run the family’s brewery for a year if his Machiavellian grandmother rescinds her ultimatum that he marry. But the gambler in him can’t resist when beguiling Annabel Lake proposes a wager. If she wins their card game, he must help save her family’s foundering brewery. But if he wins, she must spend a night in his bed. The outcome sets off a chain of events that threatens to destroy all his plans…and unveils the secret Annabel has held for so long. When Jarret discovers the darker reason behind her wager, he forces her into another one—and this time he intends to win not just her body, but her heart.
Read an excerpt.
Other books in this series:
