The Best of 2017 – Mandy’s List

I didn’t get to do a great deal of reading in 2017, but here’s a quick run-down of my favorites from the books I did manage to read this year!

White Hot and Wildfire by Ilona Andrews

If I had to describe the Hidden Legacy series in one go, it would go something like this: crackling chemistry between leads, and super-crafted suspense plot. This is how Urban Fantasy should be written, no questions about it. The husband and wife team writing these books also know how to write some great secondary characters and give them enough backstory to turn them into real three dimensional characters, not just sidekicks. I waited a really long while for White Hot and Wildfire after Burn for Me – nearly three years. Both books came out in 2017 back-to-back, so that helped in relieving the book angst!

Nevada, the central character, comes across as snarky, curvy, loyal, warm and is slowly developing into superhero and powerful head of her own house. Mad Rogan comes across as brash, volatile, and super cunning – but his remote control is, of course, in Nevada’s hands. Enough said.

Buy Now: (White Hot) A/BN/iB/K

Buy Now: (Wildfire) A/BN/iB/K

The Queen and the Cure by Amy Harmon

My preferred genre is traditional fantasy romance, and in the recent years, it’s become a bit difficult to find books in this genre that are really worth their salt. The Queen and the Cure is one such book, however. It’s set in the same universe as Harmon’s earlier The Bird and the Sword, but can be read as a standalone. A slave girl with the seer’s touch has lost hold of her memories and history, and is then saved from certain death by a soldier with the healing gift. But this is just the first layer of the plot, as events transcend into more complexity, and soon the rise and fall of kingdoms is at stake. For me especially, the healer/ seer trope is like catnip, and this one thrilled me to the bone – I read this book in one go and cannot recommend it enough.

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A Lady’s Code of Misconduct by Meredith Duran

What Meredith Duran does best is writing about strong, flawed characters who somehow work best when paired together. The negatives of one character complements the negatives of the other, to make a positive whole, and what makes better reading than that? That’s what happens in A Lady’s Code of Misconduct too, when Jane (the orphaned desperate daughter of a once-great statesman) and a ruthless, ambitious politician lock horns – and then end up “married” to each other due to a myriad of circumstances too complicated to explain (also, plot spoilers!). This book is intense, superbly written, and was definitely my favorite historical fiction of the year.

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Temporary by Sarah Mayberry and Sarina Bowen

An office romance is risky business, and romancing the client even more so. That’s what Grace discovers while temping for an Australian company to catalogue the estate and inventory of a deceased corporate moghul. In walks Callan, the relative of the deceased – and also the son of Grace’s ultimate boss – who is hell-bent on making Grace’s job difficult. It’s a difficult line to toe, to depict a believable romance between two characters whose occupations are diametrically opposed to each other. But the duo of Sarah Mayberry and Sarina Bowen keeps things bright and right, and that’s the best part about this book. You have to admire Grace as she maintains her professionalism till the end, even if love does get in the way. Highly recommended for fans of contemporary romance.

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