Elizabeth Lapthorne

Board Resolution

I read this story when it first came out in 2005. I had already read several of Joey’s stories by this time and I was hooked. This is also when Ellora's Cave was only publishing a few books a week and I was devouring them like a starving person. Sadly, I haven’t read it again until this week. I love Joey W. Hill’s writing and look forward to each book she puts out. Her stories pull you in and draw forth emotions that you might not want to expose. For someone that was new to BDSM stories this was an eye opener. I had read Joey’s HOLDING THE CARDS before this but that story is very different from this one. I am not going to be able to say much about what goes on in the story because I don’t want to give anything away. This is the first and for a number of years the only book in the Knights of the Boardroom series.

This story involves convincing a woman that has lived her entire life according to father’s rules that it is okay to love and be loved. Savannah Tennyson has stayed behind a suit or armor all her life. She has never shown weakness and has torn apart those that would try to take advantage of her. Secretly she longs for someone to comfort her but there is only one person that she trusts to do that any she is afraid to make a commitment and lose the man and his respect. Matthew “Matt” Kensington is a man that goes after what he wants and he wants Savannah. Matt is a Master and he knows that Savannah is a submissive and he sets out to prove to her that submission isn't an admission of weakness. It will take all the five men of the management team of Kensington and Associates to show Savannah the power she has when it comes to them.

This is an emotional roller coaster ride as Savannah finds that it is okay to love and laugh and be human. It takes all Matt’s restraint to allow his team to pull Savannah from her armor and show her that there is more to life than her job. I love all these men and Matt especially. Each man is an alpha in his own right and Matt is the leader of this dynamic pack of wolves. There are some very molten hot sex scenes in this book and there are lots of toys used for Savannah’s enjoyment. Be warned that there is bondage used to perfection as well as a spanking. I can never say enough about Joey’s books and I always recommended them to those that love the BDSM romance genre.… (mer)

I really don't know what to say about this one. It really should have worked well. But it didn't. It shouldn't have felt like a first book - the author has written quite a few books, some that I've read - but it did.

I don't know...maybe I've read too many vampire romances? Maybe I expect too much? Maybe I need to take a break from romances and dive headfirst into a door-stopper fantasy of epic proportions? The mind boggles and the reader chafes.

Back to this book.

It started well. The set up was ok. The author seemed to want to avoid the "fated mates" trope but she wanted the singular instant connection that the fated mates trope gives. So she created the awkwardly phrased "Vampire Soul's Circle." It seems to work quite similar to the fated mates trope without using the terms "fate" or "mate." It was only slightly less annoying than a fated mate.

What bothered me was that there were a lot of awkward phrasing and wording throughout the book. Almost as if it was unevenly edited. The book would be moving along at decent pace and suddenly Awkward Word would jump out and shock me out of the story again. And considering I started reading this as light brain fluff while trying to avoid the vice-presidential debate, that really annoyed me.

Another thing that dropped this book down to two stars (when it should have been higher) is all the freaking talking they do during sex! Yap, yap, yap. Chat, chat, chat. Give me a break! The sex was not hot at all. Not at all. It was chock full of baby dreams and conversations and sweet gentle nothings. Oh man, seriously? I love kids and all but the last thing that I want to think (and talk!) about when having hot monkey bondage(lite) sex is having a baby.

So, all the random conversations and thoughts during the (single!) sex scene, the insta-baby and the awkward phrasing/wording killed me.… (mer)

I bought this to complete my Joey Hill collection. It's a complicated romance of hers, because it requires such suspension of disbelief. That such a group of men could exist in today's world, that they would build such a weird office, that they would seduce a woman in that way. For me, it would have been easier to believe in an alien setting, because maybe they can do that there, but in today's corporate world? It kept bugging me. And those bugs wouldn't let me relax into the story as much as I would have liked. It may grow on me in rereads, and I am keeping it (Joey Hill is a real love of mine) but it wasn't effortless...… (mer)