Hero: Donovan O’Shea
Heroine: Riley Powell
Grade: 3 out of 5
He was cursed with a “Gift”
Born with the clairvoyance known to the Irish as “The Sight” Donovan O’Shea fled to America to escape his visions. On a return trip to Ireland to see his ailing father, staggering family secrets threaten to turn his world upside down. And then beautiful, sensual Rylie Power shows up, claiming to be his half-sister.
She’s just looking for the family she never knew…
After her mother’s death, Rylie finds tantalizing clues that send her off to Ireland to find the man listed on her birth certificate as her father. She needs the truth–but how can she and Donovan be brother and sister when the chemistry between them is nearly irresistible?
Uncovering the past leads them dangerously close to madness…
Donovan’s visions lead them into mystery and murder, and only by going deep into the fends can they defeat an ancient enemy and bring the truth to light…but will they ever be able to get out?
I started this book with an excitement that I always get when reading a Sourcebooks book because I haven’t read a book from Sourcebooks that I haven’t liked and as much as I enjoyed the storytelling of Loucinda McGary, the first part of the book really bothered me. Now, what’s funny is that the very thing that made me interested in reading this book is the one thing that I didn’t like about this book.
This story is about Donovan O’Shea and Riley Powell. We meet Powell as she’s traveling to Ireland to find her biological father, Dermot O’Shea. So she gets to Ireland and she runs into the hero of the story, Donovan. Donovan O’Shea is the son of Dermot O’Shea. He’s hot stuff and Riley notices, not so bad since she’s just met him but what I could not stand was that she acted on her attraction to Donovan. Donovan, who she thinks is her half brother. What really bothered me was that Riley was always fighting her attraction to Donovan. He knew she wasn’t his sister and so I guess it wasn’t all that worrisome for him but for her, she went into her little attraction knowing (in her mind anyway) that this guy was her brother. She knew that Dermot O’Shea was her father and she hired PI’s to find him and she flew all the way out there to meet him and she lets her “brother” kiss the hell out of her and even worst is she kisses him back and then, afterward has the nerve to be grossed out because HE’S HER BROTHER!
Ugh.
So she takes a DNA test to find out the truth for herself. She gets a sample from Dermot, she gives her own sample and just for the heck of it, Donovan gives a sample to help out a case for the person who’s doing the test. Alright, so after Dermot gives his sample, he writes a note for Riley and tells her that he’s not her father but his cousin is.
So what does Riley do with this information? She gives Donovan the green light to take her to bed.
WTF?
Mind you, she hasn’t gotten the DNA test results yet and she’s only going on Dermot’s word. She doesn’t know Dermot all the well but I found her readiness to jump in between the sheets with a guy that hours before, she thought was her brother just grossed me out. It grossed me out because 1) she didn’t get the results back yet and 2) Dermot told her he wasn’t her father but he did tell her that he was her uncle so that would make Donovan still….a relative, right?
Yucko.
What’s funny about this is that even though I didn’t like that part of the story, it didn’t make me put the book down. Mrs. McGary did a great job of hooking me into this story. She told the story extremely well and made it easy to read (even if it wasn’t easy to swallow) because though I was WTFing through that part of the book, I still wanted to know what happened with Donovan’s mother, I wanted to know if Dermot was anybody’s father and then I wanted to know what would happen with Sybil and everything.
This book was good, I don’t think I’ll be rereading this book but I did enjoy the overall story being told. I enjoyed the characters and even though Donovan and Riley ended up not being related at all, it still grossed me out when they hooked up the first time because Riley THOUGHT she was related and did it anyway. That was really the only downer in the book for me. I thought it was a good book, I enjoyed the characters and the end surprised me, I didn’t see it coming but then again, I’m not good at guessing what’s going to happen at the end of the book but overall, I enjoyed this story but could have done with the whole maybe brother/sister part of the story.
Should you read it? Sure, if you enjoyed Shades of Twilight by Linda Howard then I’m sure you’ll enjoy this one. =P
This book is available from Sourcebooks. You can buy it here.
Ok, so maybe I’ll pass. Cause just the thought you might be related… no.
Eeeeew – Howard’s Shades Of Twilight grossed me out – and the mere ‘thought’ of this one grosses me out too!
I think I’ll pass . . . eew!
heh- I didn’t mind Shades of Twilight and I have this one to read too- now you’ve made me curious!!