Showing posts with label Alisha Rai. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alisha Rai. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 27, 2018

Blog Tour Review, Excerpt & Giveaway: Hurts to Love You (Forbidden Hearts #3) by Alisha Rai


Hurts to Love You by Alisha Rai
Series Forbidden Hearts #3
Genre Adult Contemporary Romance
Publisher Avon Books
Publication Date March 27, 2018
BOOK SYNOPSIS
Being bad never felt so good, in the third novel in Alisha Rai’s sexy Forbidden Hearts series!

Well-behaved women don’t lust after men who love to misbehave.

Heiress Evangeline Chandler knows how to keep a secret . . . like her life-long crush on the tattooed hottie who just happens to be her big brother’s friend. She’s a Chandler, after all, and Chandlers don’t hook up with the help. Then again, they also don’t disobey their fathers and quit their respectable jobs, so good-girl rules may no longer apply.

Gabriel Hunter hides the pain of his past behind a smile, but he can’t hide his sudden attraction to his friend’s sheltered little sister. Eve is far too sweet to accept anything less than forever and there’s no chance of a future between the son of a housekeeper and the town’s resident princess.

When a wedding party forces Eve and Gabe into tight quarters, keeping their hands off each other will be as hard as keeping their clothes on. The need that draws them together is stronger than the forces that should shove them apart . . . but their sparks may not survive the explosion when long-buried secrets are finally unearthed.





EXCERPT

“No one knows .”
His tone was bleak, the words tripping over each other.
“No one will,” she whispered, though that wasn’t her place to promise. “I’ll keep it a secret.” His laugh was a harsh bark. “What am I supposed to do? Just trust you?”
Yes.” The adrenaline in her blood spiked, and she leaned in closer, driven to comfort and consume him. “I’m very good at secrets.”
He shook his head. “You don’t— ”
She had no idea what he was going to say, because she settled her lips over his. It was a ridiculous urge, born of panic and desperation and a deep-seated drive to calm him. Their lips fit together perfectly, and she moved them over his, tasting the faint hint of mint in his mouth.
Finally. Finally. Now she knew what kissing would feel like.
Like perfection.
He froze for a second, but then a growl came from deep in his chest. He tightened his hold on her, crushed her close, and kissed her back.

What I thought about Hurts to Love You

In this last installment of the Chandler/Kane saga, Evangaline Chandler, younger sister of Nicholas Chandler is crushing on Gabriel Hunter, tattoo artist and son of the Kane family housekeeper. There's a significant age difference between them, and since Gabe is also Nicholas' best friend, there's all the best-friend's-little-sister taboo thing going on. It isn't until they are forced to be together that the sparks have a chance to ignite.

Eve and Gabe's story takes place during Livvy and Nicholas's wedding week, a setting which provides for lots of family drama and revelations as one might expect, considering weddings typically bring out the best and worst in families! It was a good way to bring in the previous characters in the series, and I always enjoy that in a family based series. While Eve and Gabe have a few things to work first, their journey to happiness runs a gamut of emotions. 

Hurts to Love You was true to it's title in that it was a very emotional story that demonstrates just how love can hurt too.  Overall, this is a terrific series, with complex diverse characters and Hurts to Love You provides a nice wrap-up for the series.  While you can read as a standalone, I would recommend reading in order to get the full impact of the family dynamics. 
An ARC was provided for review. 


Tour Wide Giveaway

To celebrate the release of HURTS TO LOVE YOU, we're giving away a paperback copy of HATE TO WANT YOU by Alisha Rai!


GIVEAWAY TERMS & CONDITIONS:  Open to US shipping addresses only. Five winners will each receive a paperback copy of Hate to Want You by Alisha Rai.  This giveaway is administered by Pure Textuality PR on behalf of Avon Romance.  Giveaway ends 4/9/2018 @ 11:59pm EST. Avon Romance will send the winning copies out to the winner directly. Limit one entry per reader and mailing address.  Duplicates will be deleted.  CLICK HERE TO ENTER!

About Alisha Rai

Alisha Rai pens award-winning sexy contemporary romances and is the first author to have an indie-published book appear on The Washington Post's annual Best Books list. She spends most of her time dreaming up sexy heroes and heroines, traveling, and tweeting. To find out more about her books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit www.alisharai.com

Author Links

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Friday, December 8, 2017

Blog Tour Review, Excerpt & Giveaway:Wrong to Need You (Forbidden Hearts #2) by Alisha Rai


 Alisha Rai returns with the second novel in her sizzling Forbidden Hearts series!
Wrong To Need You
by Alisha Rai
Series
Forbidden Hearts #2
Genre
Adult Contemporary Romance
Publisher
Avon Books
Publication Date
November 28, 2017

He wasn’t supposed to fall in love with his brother’s widow…

Accused of a crime he didn’t commit, Jackson Kane fled his home, his name, and his family. Ten years later, he’s come back to town: older, wiser, richer, tougher—and still helpless to turn away the one woman he could never stop loving, even after she married his brother.


Sadia Ahmed can’t deal with the feelings her mysterious former brother-in-law stirs, but she also can’t turn down his offer of help with the cafe she’s inherited. While he heats up her kitchen, she slowly discovers that the boy she adored has grown into a man she’s simply unable to resist.

An affair is unthinkable, but their desire is undeniable. As secrets and lies are stripped away, Sadia and Jackson must decide if they’re strong enough to face the past…and step into a future together.

Buy Links

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Excerpt

Chapter 1

Some women were seduced by a voice or a touch or a look. For Sadia Ahmed, it was hands.
Or, at least . . . His hands.
They were big, the perfect size to grasp her ass and grip her tight. Or to wrap around her neck while his thumbs settled into the hollow at the base of her throat. Or to cup her breast and lift it to his mouth.
Sadia picked up a glass and started drying it, her actions precise and unhurried. She was certain her face didn’t give away the fact she was fantasizing about sex with a patron sitting in the dive bar. Her libido might be hot, but her facade was stone- cold. She was a mother, a widow. To a lot of people, she’d discovered, those two titles took precedence over being a woman.
She didn’t mind letting people keep their illusions. It made her life easier and she wasn’t a disruptive person by nature. Someone else could shock the world, so long as she could dream about what she pleased.
Out of the corner of her eye, she contemplated what she could see of the anonymous man’s hands. He wore a baseball cap pulled low, and the bar was dark, so his body was all she had to moon over. His body was enough.
His fingers were long and elegant. They were big enough to fill her up with one, but she’d demand two. Hidden under the soft cotton of her shirt, her stomach clenched. He could play her like a violin, which was appropriate. He had the hands of an artist. Attached to a body that belonged to a fighter. Her gaze drifted over what she could see of the rest of him.  Wide chest, broad shoulders, thighs like tree trunks, biceps like whoa.
Unf.
Sadia carefully replaced the dry glass and picked up another one. Over the past week, she’d gotten really good at surreptitiously peeking at her mystery man during each of her shifts. On Monday she’d noticed him for the first time, sitting in a darkened booth in a far corner. On Wednesday he’d chosen a seat which was better lit, enough for her to grow obsessed with thoughts of his fingers on her and in her.
Though it had been busy earlier tonight, she’d consciously kept an eye out for him. Once the Thursday crowd had thinned out, her gaze had been drawn to him like a magnet to a metal. An- other dark booth, another dark cap pulled low to hide his face. Alone, nursing the ginger ale he’d ordered. His quiet stillness set him apart from the rowdy people who usually filled this bar.
“Hey, Sadia.”
Sadia started. She regrouped quickly and gave her boss a cheerful grin which hopefully masked the filthy thoughts in her head. “Hey, what’s up?” Michael had owned O’Killian’s for at least as long as she’d been working here, off and on since her twenty-first birthday.
“I wanted to thank you again for picking up so many shifts this week.”
She tossed her towel over her shoulder. “No problem. You know I’ll take the hours.” The tips were good. With a young son, she could always use extra money. She wanted to keep her bartending skills sharp.
Those were all the reasons she told people when they asked her why she was still tending bar when she had her hands full with the cafĂ© she’d inherited from her husband. They weren’t false.
They weren’t completely true either, but the whole truth would cause more than a few raised eyebrows.
My husband had debts he didn’t tell me about. The tips give me grocery money.
I’m terrified the cafe will go bankrupt on my watch. I need a fallback career.
And there was one other good reason, but she really couldn’t share that one with anyone. That reason was her secret.
 
  
What I thought about Wrong to Need You

Sadia has her nose to the grindstone, trying to deal with the loss of her husband and all the bills he's left her with. She's doing a good job of it too, as long as nothing disrupts her schedule. When Jackson returns to town, that's a huge disruption that brings good and bad.

Jackson has stayed away from home for his own emotional protection, not returning home even when his best friend Sadia emails him that his brother Paul has passed away. Sadia still isn't over that or the emails that Jackson never returned.
 

Sadia's really trying hard to make it on her own, and I really liked that about her. I adored her sisters and her relationship with her family and the fact that she didn't ignore her sex life just because she was a widow.
 

Jackson's return to town throws her into some turmoil. She wants him, but knows how much trouble it will cause all of them. There's a lot of family turmoil going on, and Alisha Rai has crafted a very interesting world here. Reading Wrong to Need You made me want to go back and read Hate To Want You, the first book in the series again.
 

There are plenty of hurdles for Jackson and Sadia to jump before they can claim their HEA, but it's all worth the ride. The characters are interesting, the dialogue is crisp and true, and I just adore this world that Alisha Rai has created.
Wrong to Need You works as a standalone, but you'll get more out of it if you read Hate To Want You first.
 

Oh, and did you see these covers? Hottest covers of 2017!
 

So if you are looking for a romance with a nice level of heat, interesting and diverse characters, good story, and intriguing world, you might like this series. I do.
 

An ARC was provided for review. 

Get the first book in the series!

Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Amazon | iBooks

GIVEAWAY

Giveaway LINK: https://goo.gl/p2ZUc6

GIVEAWAY TERMS & CONDITIONS:  Open to US shipping addresses only. One winner will receive a paperback copy of Hate to Want You by Alisha Rai.  This giveaway is administered by Pure Textuality PR on behalf of Avon Romance.  Giveaway ends 12/8/2017 @ 11:59pm EST. Avon Romance will send the winning copies out to the winner directly. Limit one entry per reader and mailing address.  Duplicates will be deleted.

 

About Alisha Rai

Alisha Rai pens award-winning sexy contemporary romances and is the first author to have an indie-published book appear on The Washington Post’s annual Best Books list. She spends most of her time dreaming up sexy heroes and heroines, traveling, and tweeting. To find out more about her books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit http://www.alisharai.com

Author Links

website facebook twitter goodreads Amazon icon






Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Review, Excerpt & Giveaway: Hate to Want You (Forbidden Hearts #1) by Alisha Rai


One night. No one will know.


HATE TO WANT YOU
Forbidden Hearts #1
Alisha Rai
Releasing July 25, 2017
Avon Books


Alisha Rai, one of contemporary romance’s brightest stars, makes her Avon Books debut with the first novel in the sexy Forbidden Hearts series!

One night. No one will know.

That was the deal. Every year, Livvy Kane and Nicholas Chandler would share one perfect night of illicit pleasure. The forbidden hours let them forget the tragedy that haunted their pasts—and the last names that made them enemies.

Until the night she didn’t show up.

Now Nicholas has an empire to run. He doesn’t have time for distractions and Livvy’s sudden reappearance in town is a major distraction. She’s the one woman he shouldn’t want . . . so why can’t he forget how right she feels in his bed?

Livvy didn’t come home for Nicholas, but fate seems determined to remind her of his presence—and their past. Although the passion between them might have once run hot and deep, not even love can overcome the scandal that divided their families.

Being together might be against all the rules . . . but being apart is impossible.



Excerpt (Rated R)
Despite her ridiculous schoolgirl outfit, she wasn’t the girl she’d been when she left town. Her hair, her clothes, even her attitude was subtly different. He’d watched every change happen over the past decade in a time-lapse video. There was nothing he didn’t like about the differences in her now.
Dangerous.
Right. Right. This was about sex. Nothing else.
She headed down the walkway, the flickering streetlamp in the parking lot burnishing her hair with red and black. She didn’t wobble a bit on her pencil-thin heels, reassuring him that though she’d been in a bar, she wasn’t anywhere near intoxicated.
He got out of the car, taking care to pull his collar up and lower his head, feeling ridiculous as he did so. He was a grown man. Who cared if he had sex with another consenting adult?
Lots of people, starting with his father, but he wasn’t going to think about them right now.
His strides were longer than hers. Her heels and skirt made it difficult for her to do more than mince. He made it to the door a second after she got it open, and followed her in, kicking the door shut behind him. She stripped off her light fall jacket and tossed it on the floor. “Liv—” was all he had a chance to say before she was in his arms, shoving him back.
It was dark, the only light coming in from the crack between the dingy curtains. Her lips pressed against his, and he inhaled the scent of her, each drugging kiss making his head spin. She crawled up him like he was a pole, her arms and legs clutching for balance.
It took him only a second. One second of having those red lips devouring his hungrily, one second of that hot sinner’s body pressing against his own, and all semblance of rational thought flew out of his brain.
Who cared about tomorrow? He was too enflamed to wonder about anything but the here and now. Too excited to even consider this a bad idea. He kissed her back as if he would die if he didn’t get her mouth, licking and sucking and memorizing the very taste of her. He slid his hands over her ass, gripped her luscious cheeks tight, and spun her around, pushing her up against the door.
He ripped his lips away, holding her from him when she might have forced her way back. “How do you want it?” he growled. He had an inkling, from the signals she was broadcasting, but it had been a while since he’d had to read those signals.
“Hard . . .” She scraped her nails over the back of his neck. “Use me. Make me feel it tomorrow.”
The wild look in her eyes was sharper than he’d ever seen it, and it ramped up his own lust. He dragged his hand over her ass, rubbing the fabric against her bottom. “This outfit is indecent.”
Her lids dropped to half-mast, and she arched her back. “You don’t like my clothes? I’m heartbroken.”
“You look like a schoolgirl.”
She tightened her legs around his waist, rubbing up on him. Her heat and wetness was obvious, even through the twin barriers of her underwear and his pants. “A naughty one? Who needs to be punished?”
He should feel ridiculous, but instead his body hardened more, blood engorging his dick. “So naughty.” His hand slipped up her leg to her hip and the strip of fabric there. He used his other hand to arch her back farther, feathering his fingers up her spine. “I could see your ass while you were walking outside.” He traced his hand around the waistband at her back and clenched the fabric in his wrist, pulling the bikini and her tights taut, digging into the folds of her pussy. Her eyes widened.
He tightened his grip. “Were you purposefully strutting around in this skirt, your ass hanging out of it?”
“N-no.”
“You’re lying. Do you know what I do to liars?”
Her nails dug into his skin. “Tell me you spank them.”
A red haze swam in front of his eyes, and he pushed her legs down so she was standing. Then he grabbed her by the waist and spun her around to face the door.
He grasped her by the hips and pulled her to stand with her back in an arch, then flipped up that ridiculous plaid skirt. It took him a second to lower her tights to her thighs. Her red panties barely covered the curves of her ass, making him growl. He didn’t know what bar she’d been in, but he imagined her seated in some dingy smoke-filled dive, anonymous bastards salivating over her tight body. Fuck, all it would have taken was one shimmy, and everyone could have gotten a free show, these tempting round globes exposed but for the silly scraps of fabric she’d put over them.
You have no right to be jealous.
He palmed her cheeks, rubbing his thumbs over the plump flesh. “Do you know how badly I wanted to pull you onto my lap and flip this skirt up the second I saw you?”
“To fuck me or to spank me?”
“Both.”
She arched her back more, her ass wriggling. He didn’t think, merely lifted his hand and smacked one full cheek, his rational, caring side standing far apart and watching in horror. He’d never spanked a woman before. As scrappy as Livvy was, he hadn’t thought she’d like this.
Her moan suggested otherwise.
He got it. He got the appeal of this, with Livvy bent over in front of him, legs spread, skirt lifted, red panties exposed, and the hot flesh of her ass filling his hand. He slapped her other cheek, and she moaned again, louder. Hell. He could see the appeal of literally doing anything with Livvy, to be honest.
“Was that okay?” he had the semblance of mind to ask her.
Her hands had braced against the door, and her fingers curled in. She nodded, her red-streaked hair rippling over her back.
His next tap was harder. “You’ve been so bad, Livvy. Tempting all those men tonight. Tempting me.” He smacked her again. “You’ve never stopped tempting me.”
She whimpered. “I’ll stop.”
“We both know that’s impossible.” He squeezed her left cheek, dropping to his knees behind her. With his teeth, he carefully lowered the panties over her ass to meet the rolled-up waistband of her tights. He stayed there, luxuriating in her body as he pressed soft kisses over each cheek, punctuating each tender touch with a slap of his hand.
When she was rocking back against his mouth, he pulled away. He came to his feet. Unable to take his gaze off her tight body, he walked backward until his knees hit the cheap bed. Nicholas slid down to sit on the floor, his back supported by the bed. The sliver of streetlight illuminating the room highlighted her sweet, reddened buttocks. He tore at his jeans, growling when his hand met his throbbing cock. He needed to jerk off or get in her pussy. Something. Anything. Literally whatever would relieve this ache as soon as possible.
She peeked under her arm and straightened, skirt dropping down to cover her bottom.
A crime, covering that butt.
Livvy stripped off her tights and panties and then turned to face him. “Nicholas?”
He ran his hand down his cock once, then twice when he noted the hunger in her gaze as she watched him fondle himself. He grazed the tip, and his body jerked. “Take off your clothes. Shirt first.”
“Do I have to?” Her breathless question was pseudo-innocent.
“Unless you want to be punished.” How he’d punish her, he wasn’t sure. More spanking? Licking her until she wept with the need to orgasm? Fucking her until she screamed?
These didn’t sound like terrible punishments for either of them.
Her fingers fumbled with the buttons of her shirt, and she undid them one by one, so slowly he knew it was a tease. He tightened his hand on his cock, because he knew if he didn’t, he’d demand she come over here so he could rip the offending material right off her.
She stripped it off her shoulders, leaving her in her bra, her toned belly inviting his lips.
“Now the bra.”
She unsnapped the front snap and drew both cups of red lace away from her breasts. They were perky and lifted on their own, the small handfuls the perfect fit for his palm. Her brown nipples were tight and pointed, giving away her excitement. Her breasts rose and fell, her gaze locked on his hand. He made his pulls slower and more explicit, both to give her a show and to make sure he didn’t blow too quickly.
Her hand dropped to the waistband of her skirt, shoving it down, leaving her completely naked. She licked her lips, making the remnants of her lipstick shiny and vibrant. He imagined those lips wrapped tight around his cock, him whispering, Suck me, while guiding her head over his lap.
He shook his head, trying to shake the filthy image from his brain, and released his cock. “Come here.”
She walked over. Her hand unselfconsciously slid over her belly and pussy. She was wet and hot and plump, nearly hairless, save for a small landing strip. The pot of gold tattooed at her hip was a dark shadow. “Closer.”



What I thought about Hate to Want you

Livvy Kane and Nick Chandler were childhood sweethearts torn apart by tragedy.  Even though they have loved each other since childhood, their feuding families keep them apart except for one night a year when they enjoy one illicit and steamy night together.  It's sort of a Romeo and Juliet love affair that goes on, for one night only. 

I really liked Livvy.  She's not afraid to acknowledge and feel her emotions, even when she is dealing with some fairly serious mental health issue by way of depression.  This aspect of Livvy's life is handled with sensitivity and compassion and it fit so well into the story.  Nick has a harder edge, but these two complement each other very well, and that's what makes them work in spite of their families differences.

There was more to this story than I thought there would be. This is my first book by Alisha Rai, and I'd heard some buzz in my twitter timeline about her writing, so I wanted to see what it was all about.  Hate to Want You is a nicely done romance that doesn't skip on the steam or the story and I really liked that about this contemporary romance.

The heat level can be pretty steamy with this romance, and pushes the edges of bdsm play. It worked well for me because there were so many emotions swirling around during these scenes that made it exciting and interesting and had these characters connecting in a way that made sense for them.

There's a lot of pent up anger, frustration and tension in this story, between the drama that goes on between the two families and the forbidden love between Livvy and Nick.  As I said earlier, there's a lot of emotions and they are drawn beautifully by the author.

So overall, an engaging and sexy story.  Looking forward to more from this world. 

An ARC was provided for review. 





Alisha Rai pens award-winning, sexy, contemporary romances and is the first author to have an indie-published book appear on The Washington Post’s annual Best Books list. She spends most of her time dreaming up sexy heroes and heroines, traveling, and tweeting. To find out more about her books or to sign up for her newsletter, visit her Website.

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