The Perils of Pleasure by Julie Anne Long

Colin Eversea and Madeline Greenway's book



The Perils of Pleasure (Pennyroyal Green book 1)

by Julie Anne Long

Book Blurb:

          His life is in her hands...

She's willing to be fearless for a price...but what if the cost is her heart?

A rescued rogue...
Scandal has rocked the city of London. Colin Eversea, a handsome, reckless unapologetic rogue is sentenced to hang for murder and, inconveniently for him, the only witness to the crime disappears. Then again, throughout history, the Everseas have always managed to cheat fate in style: Colin is snatched from the gallows by a beautiful, clever mercenary

A captivating captor...
Cool-headed, daring Madeleine Greenway is immune to Colin's vaunted charm. Her mission is not to rescue Colin but to kidnap him, and to be paid handsomely for it. But when it becomes clear that whoever wants Colin alive wants Madeline dead, the two become uneasy allies in a deadly race for truth. Together, they'll face great danger—and a passion neither can resist.

The Perils of Pleasure was a really fun read.  I definitely feel encouraged to read on in the series. It is however such a shame that that the Kindle price is so darn expensive for this Pennyroyal Green series. That is the only reason I am not going straight to book 2. I did pick up What I Did For a Duke for a super deal on Amazon so I'm going to book 5 from this one. 

The best part of The Perils of Pleasure is the fun teasing sort of banter that Colin constantly delivers to Madeline. Colin has been down and out. He was accused of murder, sent to the gallows and was literally a minute from being hanged to his death, yet he is always joking and chipper. It is of course a defense mechanism but it totally works for him. It was so refreshing to read about an alpha type of hero that was not brooding the entire book. 

Madeline is a great hero. Yep you've got that right. A hero. She saves Colin's life a few times and she's super smart. She is as cool as a cucumber. I love how intelligent she is. She is much more serious than Colin but not in a stuffy stuck up way. I completely enjoyed how competent she was and how she reacted to Colin's teasing. He'd try so hard to get her to smile and then BAM! Madeline would have a funny comeback delivered with a smirk and a twinkle in her eyes. Awesome. 

The Perils of Pleasure has a bit of a mystery attached to the storyline. I did not connect the dots at all and I loved the direction the story took. 

What I did not like about The Perils of Pleasure was the amount of characters that was first introduced at the beginning of book. My head was spinning. I love a great prologue but I didn't care for this particular one. I was totally lost and after I read the book, I had to go back and re-read the prologue to understand. Once again, way too many characters and as it turned out, none of the prologue characters really had anything to do with the actual story. 
Jumping from the prologue right into the first chapter, I once again felt I was thrust into further character overload. I will admit to re-reading the first couple of chapters so I could get my bearings. 
However, once I got it, I was on my way to a great story. 

Teasers: the 5th solider - duck, quiet barn sex, family infidelity secrets, climbing a tree for love