Review: Tempting by Susan Mallery

Posted July 10, 2007 by Holly in Reviews | 8 Comments

Review: Tempting by Susan MalleryReviewer: Holly
Tempting by Susan Mallery
Series: Buchanans #4
Publisher: Harlequin
Publication Date: June 15th 2012
Genres: Fiction
Pages: 384
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four-stars
Series Rating: four-stars

After three romantic flame-outs in a year and a restaurant career going nowhere, Dani Buchanan needs a fresh start. She goes looking for her biological father, but never expects to find a senator running for president. As his long-lost "love child," Dani could seriously derail the election—something his handsome campaign manager Alex Canfield isn't going to let happen.

Dani isn't about to let Alex run her life, no matter how tempting she finds him—and Alex isn't going to allow Dani to melt his cynicism, no matter how close he has to get. The last thing either of them wants is love, especially with scandals brewing and family trouble on the way. But Dani and Alex are forced to trust each other, and when trust turns to passion, the potential for disaster is only a tabloid scandal away.

This is the fourth book in the Buchanan Series and Dani Buchanan’s much awaited story. For a recap of Dani’s previous escapades and the rest of the Buchanan clan, go check out Mollie’s review at Biblioharlot’s Bookshelf.

Dani is the youngest of the Buchanan siblings and the only girl. She’s had a pretty bad run of luck throughout the series, but the most devastating blow -even worse than her husband divorcing her after she nursed him back to health, or her first lover after the divorce turning out to be married – was the fact that she wasn’t truly a Buchanan. Her spiteful grandmother informed her that Dani’s mother had had an affair and Dani was the result.

Dani learns her biological father is a State Senator, Mark Canfield, who’s thinking of running for president. To get to him she must go through his eldest adopted son, Alex. If finding her real father isn’t bad enough, dealing with an attraction to Alex is just the icing on the cake.

Alex is skeptical of Dani’s claim that she’s Mark’s daughter and takes it upon himself to watch her like a hawk. He has her investigated and insists on a DNA test, even though Mark is convinced Dani is his daughter.

I really liked this book. Dani was a good heroine, even if she did start to annoy me toward the end of the book with her obsession to commit the “ultimate sacrifice” for the “greater good”.

You see, The Senator and his wife, Katherine, have adopted 8 special needs children over the years. Alex is the oldest and a beautiful little girl with HIV is the youngest at 5. As Dani gets to know Katherine and her children, she falls completely in love with them. She adores Bailey, the 15-yr-old with Down Syndrome and finds herself falling in a different kind of love with Alex. But more than anyone else, she wants the approval of Katherine. Having lost her mother at a very young age, she sees Katherine as a sort of surrogate mother. Naturally Katherine is upset by Dani’s appearance, because it makes her question her husbands feelings for her and it reminds her of her own inability to conceive children. She doesn’t put any of the blame on Dani, and she’s always gracious, but Dani realizes she’s struggling and wants to do the right thing.

In this case, according to Dani, the right thing is walking away from all of them. The Buchanans and the Canfields. I seriously hate the “ultimate sacrifice” storyline. These characters are all adults (for the most part) and are more than able to make their own decisions. For one person to decide she knows what’s best for EVERY DAMN BODY pisses me off. She almost, almost, crossed the line into Too Stupid To Live-ville. Luckily she stopped running and realized what a stupid ass she was being -with the help of her brothers and her father’s family – so she was partially redeemed. Still, that kind of left a bad taste in my mouth.

I also had a slight issue with her grandmother’s transformation. I didn’t read the first two books in this series, but from what I understand Gloria was a complete and total waste of a human being. We saw her transformation in Sizzling -Reid’s book- with the help of Lori, Gloria’s nurse. But from some of the things Gloria said and did to Dani, I was surprised at how easily Dani let her back into her life. I’m on the fence with that whole element.

Overall the story was good, though. Despite the issues I had, I was drawn to the characters and really enjoyed the storyline.

I’m going to give this one a 4 out of 5.

The series:

Delicious (February 2006) – Cal’s book
Irresistible (July 2006) – Walker’s book
Sizzling (January 2007) – Reid’s book
Tempting (July 2007) – Dani’s book

PS. I’m being a rebel. I wrote most of this review about 5 days ago and haven’t re-read it since. Forgive any grammatical errors, please. And if the review doesn’t make sense, well…

four-stars


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8 responses to “Review: Tempting by Susan Mallery

  1. You’re right about her being annoying near the end. Thankfully the other characters stop her before she did something that would really piss us off!

  2. It is, Dev, despite the sacrifice thing. It’s just a light read.

    you know, I apologize to all, but as Nath pointed out yesterday, I didn’t really mention the hero. He was abandoned as a child – his mother was a prostitute and he saw her murdered – and that was his big issue. He didn’t have a handicap or whatever. He was a good guy and I liked that once he committed himself to Dani, that was it for him. No going back, no waffling, no doubts. He just jumped in.

  3. What did her dad think about her? I think I read Irresistible, but now you’ve got me thinking about hitting the used book store for the other three. It never hurts to have a few books for when I’m not in the mood for paranormal or suspense.

  4. You know, I didn’t mention her dad much in my review on purpose. I have no idea how I ended up feeling about him and his feelings for her. At first he seemed excited about her and then just emotionally cut off. I’m still not sure how I ended up feeling about him.

    I think he truly loved his family, but at times his career seemed to come first. And sometimes he treated Dani like a “situation” that had to be dealt with. I think you’d have to read it to understand.

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