Monday, December 10, 2012

Review: The Price of Success

The advantage of belonging to a critique group as large as the Minxes, is that when life gets hectic and one of your CPs needs their manuscript read, there's always someone else able to stepin and you're not under pressure to do a critique.

Which is how I managed to read Maya's The Price of Success completely fresh, just as a reader, and without having to think of things like sentence structure or character inconsistencies.

As a reader, I loved this book. As I said in my previous post, it's set in the world of motor racing (my favourite sport), with a truly strong, feisty heroine (my favourite kind of heroine), and a hero I could easily fall in love with (and did).

This story has all the intensity and passion that is Maya's trademark, and she manages to keep the sensuality levels high and constant with surprisingly few actual love scenes. From cover to cover the chemistry sizzles.

As a writer, I'm very aware of saggy middles in a book, perhaps because it's the part I struggle most with. This book doesn't sag at all. The pace is unrelenting, the story and characters so gripping, that I kept turning the pages and never once felt an urge to put the book down. No wonder Maya's been getting such great reviews and made the Top 10 books of 2012 list on Harlequin Junkies.

But my biggest, number one reason for loving The Price of Success? The references to The Vampire Diaries. Read the book and see if you can spot them!

So what's next from Maya? Happily, there will be many more Maya Blake novels for you to enjoy.  Her next book, The Sinful Art of Revenge, will be available in both the UK and North America in April 2013. This is Damon and Reiko's story and features another unconventional heroine. I can't wait to get my hands on it!

The Price of Success should still be available in all brick-and-mortar stores that stock Harlequins, as well as on the Mills & Boon site, from Harlequin, Amazon and Amazon UK in both paperback and Kindle versions. However you plan to spend this holiday season, treat yourself with this read.

But don't take my word for it. Read this book and post your own review. Or leave us a comment letting us know how much you enjoyed Maya's debut novel.

6 comments:

Sally Clements said...

Great review, Romy! I must just add, that if you can't wait for more from Magical Maya - don't forget she has a story in the fabulous BLAZE anthology, available now! (plug plug)

Sri Pammi said...

I am nodding along to everything you said, Romy!!! I LOVED Marco and Sasha...the book just sizzles!!

I remember reading it before Maya sold and my heart just raced..I knew she had something fabulous!!!

Catherine Coles said...

Completely agree! I read this as a CP too but could not wait to read it as a paperbook too. Absolutely amazing and from the reviews I've seen everyone else who's read it agrees with us!!

You totally rock, Maya!

Suzanne Ross Jones said...

Terrific review for a terrific book.
xx

Maya Blake said...

Man, you ladies just kill me! You are, hands down, the best friends and CPs a gal could wish for! I absolutely adore all of you, and Romy, thank you so much for this review!

Christy McKellen said...

I love the sound of this one, can't wait to get my hands on it!