Review: Temptation and Surrender by Stephanie Laurens.

Posted February 25, 2009 by Rowena in Reviews | 1 Comment

Publisher: Avon, Harper Collins


Hero: Jonas Tallant
Heroine: Emily Beauregard
Grade: 3 out of 5

Danger, desire, and adventure collide in this newest tale featuring the bold and daring Cynster family… The passionate and daring Cynster clan returns to delight readers, as Jonas Tallant, Lucifer Cynster’s brother in law, happily leaves the ballrooms of London and returns to Devon to manager his family estate. There, his life becomes intertwined with that of beautiful, headstrong, Emily Beauregard. Orphaned and near penniless, Emily is determined to find her family’s lost treasure that will ensure her and her sibling’s futures. But as she draws closer to finding it, the greater the danger grows to her, her family, and to the treasure that she’s discovered in Jonas’ arms.

I haven’t read a Cynster novel since Scandal’s story and I never really thought I’d ever be interested in reading another Cynster novel until I read a few pages of this book. The beginning of this story started out interesting. I enjoyed the first glimpse of the relationship that was to come between Jonas and Em. I loved how she just bombarded him in her interview for the position of Innkeeper and I immediately knew that these two were going to be cute and for the most part, I was right.

I enjoyed reading the chemistry sizzling between these two but for a good chunk of the book, I kept wanting something to happen between these two. I wanted Jonas to demand the truth from Em or I wanted Em to get the hell on with her search for the family treasure. It seemed to me that I kept waiting for something to happen and the more pages I turned and still had those few stolen kisses and Jonas staring at Em from across the now crowded Inn, waiting her out made me want to shake them both and scream at them, “GET ON WITH IT ALREADY!”

You see, the story goes like this: Jonas Tallant is Lucifer’s brother-in-law. Lucifer is the Cynster and that’s the connection to the Cynster family. Jonas has become tired of the London fast life and he wants to come home and run the family estate in Devon. So he’s back at home in the country and he running things and the chore that he needs to fix is the chore of finding a new Innkeeper to breathe some life back into his family’s Inn.

Enter the heroine. Emily Beauregard, who is the oldest in her family with four siblings. After their parents died, their family got shipped off to an uncle that abused them (emotionally) and used them as his servants (free of charge of course) and when Em was finally of age to legally take custody of her siblings, they steal off in the middle of the night on a family adventure to find the family treasure. They need to go back to the place where their family is from, Colyton and they need to figure out where the treasure is exactly.

The story revolves around the treasure, Em and her family and then Em and Jonas’s budding relationship.

Jonas was a good hero. He was one of those sexy, I want to jump your bones kind of historical heroes that I like and I loved watching him fall in love with Emily. I loved the little scenes between these two, where we see them bickering and everything. It was cute. There were times in the story where I wanted to throttle both Jonas and Em but for the most part, I enjoyed their pairing. I enjoyed them two together and Jonas away from Em was pretty hot damn sexy and I really enjoyed getting to know him.

Em was a great heroine as well. The way that she took care of her brother and sisters was commendable and it was a huge part of the reason why I liked her. She was one of those heroines that got the job done, she did what she had to do and she took more things on her shoulder than she should have but she did it all in the name of love. I was glad when Jonas finally stepped in and started helping her because she needed some damn help.

The other characters in this story like Lucifer and Phyllida, Issy, Henry and the twins were all great additions to a great cast of characters and my only complaint with this book was the dragging in the middle of the story and in the beginning of Jonas and Em’s relationship. That waiting for something to happen and then still waiting 50 pages later slowed my enjoyment of this book and had me sifting through the pages a time or two but I’m glad that I stuck with this story because it ended up being a pretty decent read.

This book is available from Avon. You can buy it here or here in e-format.


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One response to “Review: Temptation and Surrender by Stephanie Laurens.

  1. Thank you Rowena. Temping, tempting. Hmmm, I haven’t picked up a Cynster book for a while. I’ve read a few but…what I really (secretly) want is Stephanie Laurens to write a medieval Cynster book… 🙂

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