Customer Reviews

Dark Seduction

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(18)

 

 

I absolutely love Brenda Joyce. Some of the first romance novels that I ever read were hers and I've always considered her one of my top five favorite authors. I've never liked her contemporaries, though, and when I heard that Ms. Joyce had decided to take her turn writing paranormals, I was rather worried that they would be just as bad. I really wish it wasn't true, but Dark Seduction is, if possible, even worse than her contemporaries. Before you read further, however, you should be warned that I have not finished Dark Seduction, not even close. And I probably never will. I disliked it that much. I'm still a fan of Ms. Joyce, but I won't be spending any more money on her paranormals and I hope she seriously reconsiders writing anymore in this series.

Not long after Dark Seduction begins, we quickly learn that Claire, our heroine, was traumatized by her mother's murder when she was ten years old. She later found out that her mother was actually a victim of a pleasure crime. Years after that, her cousin, while at college, was murdered the same way, another victim of a pleasure crime. Apparently victims of pleasure crimes have very, uh, pleasurable sex before their hearts stop beating, from exhaustion maybe, and they die. Of course a woman with no marks on her, no drugs, no forcible rape and no signs of a struggle must have been murdered, right? And of course when Claire finds out her hero has sexed someone to death, she's quick to suggest that it was a weak heart or an accident. The entire pleasure crime murder thing read like a BAD idea, as if Ms. Joyce really really wanted the supernatural aspect of her book to center around sex and the fear of our two main characters having sex, and nothing else, not logic, not common sense, not even her editor, was going to stop her. The other result of this bad idea? It made the heroine, apparently a very intelligent and well read bookseller, come across as really stupid.

Claire was definitely far too annoying and too stupid to live for my tastes. She spends most of her life living in fear of being the victim of a pleasure crime just like her mom and cousin. She does what she can to prevent that from ever happening: runs, lifts weights, learns self defense, target shoots with her beretta, keeps mace AND pepperspray AND a taser handy in case the gun isn't enough. Despite all this preparation, the moment a threatening person, a woman named Sibylla, breaks into her store late at night, she allows Sibylla to take the gun right out of her hand and knock her unconscious. When Claire wakes, she hears a man in her house, but allows him to sneak up on her as well. And despite her fear of being murdered, inspite of her fear of being a victim, she has sex with our too stupid to live, controlling, annoying hero within twenty PAGES of meeting him. She's pressed up against him, he's obviously aroused, and it's all she can do not to rip his clothes off. But she's smarter than that, she wouldn't allow herself to lose control with a strange psychotic man, right? Of course, she wouldn't. Instead, she waits an entire page or two until he forces her painfully back in to time with him before going at it like there's no tomorrow.

And what about Malcolm? Could there be a more stereotypical Scottish warrior hero man? Could he be more condescending, controlling, patronizing or sexist? And how many times did Malcolm need to say "Ye" or "Ye be?" What woman wouldn't fall for (20 pages after meeting): "I be wantin' ye, lass"? I was tired of him after about five pages.

Malcolm walks into Claire's life looking for the Page, which he believes she has in her possession. He definitely recognizes her, but is impatient when she doesn't seem to believe him or understand what he's talking about. Either he knew who she was and knew that she would't know him at that point in time or he doesn't know her, but it just felt like Ms. Joyce hadn't clearly thought out the timeline. Malcom is the arrogant type, he knows what's best for Claire- taking her back in time and not returning her despite her desperate pleas and then demands to go home - because of course taking her back in time is more logical than hiding her or keeping her safe in her own time. Again it just seemed like a BAD idea, a too easy solution, to write something Ms. Joyce appeared determined to write about- a historical.

Unfortunately, Dark Seduction was just disappointment after disappointment. Both characters were so annoying that I quickly reached the point where I couldn't read any more about them. I tried briefly skimming the rest of the book, but it never got any better. None of the usual romantic and sexual build up and tension, usually so well written in Ms. Joyce's other novels, was present here. It was just forced idea after forced idea and none of it seemed well thought out. I just hope Ms. Joyce reconsiders writing paranormal romances and returns to the historicals that she does so well.

I read a lot of romance books (one or two books a day) in both paranormal and historical genres as well as books that combine both. I have read Ms. Joyce's historical books in the past and really enjoyed them which is why I gave this a try. I found this book confusing and uninspired. I read the first four chapters but couldn't finish. If a big fan of time travel romance I would recommend Janet Chapman or Karen Marie Moning instead...

This is my first review, but this book was so awful I couldn't help myself. I don't know why I finished it. I guess I hoped it would eventually improve, but no such luck.

I think I disliked Claire more than any of the other characters. First, for a heroine that is so strong and brave, Claire sure does spend a lot of time crying and getting sick. When she finds out there are demons in the world, she just can't handle it, and at first refuses to believe it. The idea even makes here pass out. How can a woman who says she Christian refuse to believe in demons? Claire also seems to really like hurting horses, since she does it multiple times throughout the book. As far as the sex scenes go, if I were Claire and any part of my body was distended enough to mention it multiple times, I would find a doctor. Maybe she can just research the problem on the internet, since her laptop can pick it up in the fifteenth century.

There are also the "pleasure crimes" and multiple inconsistencies to consider, but I won't go any further, since others have done a good job reviewing them. If you're not sure about paranormal romances, please don't let this book ruin them for you. Try J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood series. The only thing I dislike about these books is that it's a new series and I have to wait for new books to come out.

This was my first introduction to a Brenda Joyce novel and for ms. Joyce this was her first published book into paranormal romance. I thought it was a great first book into the genre. I loved the world she brought us into. if you love time travel, historicals and the highlands, not to mention the warriors, good vs evil as well as the characters she introduced us to Claire a New York City book seller and an almost 500 year old Malcolm of Dunrock - with powers, then this book is for you!All the paranomal romance lover's out there should give it a try. In my opinion some of the reviews of this book may have been poor because the fans of Brenda Joyce loved the way she had written her historicals ,and, might not be fans of the paranormal, but, because they are fans they gave it a try. The genre isn't for everyone. Well, done Ms. Joyce.

Brenda Joyce is another well known author who has bit the dust and gone the route of the trendy paranormal genre; unfortunately it is not a good endeavor on her part. She should have stuck to Historical Romances. I haven't read any of her novels since the early 90s, but I was frankly surprised at how bad the book was. I ended up skimming the book and returning the book to the store. I wish I had just skimmed it in the store rather than buying it.

It's difficult to express how bad the book is because there was a combination of things: convoluted plotting, horrible premise, annoying heroine, and demon versus Immortal culture.

The gist of the world setting is that there are a big hunky group of men called the Masters of Time; that are horny most of the time, feed off sexual energy to the point that they can kill during the pleasure act, try to protect some Innocent or another, and battle demons on occasion.

The basic plot revolved around someone has stolen a page of Healing from one of the 3 books that are protected by the Masters. Word is that Claire has the page in her antique book store in contemporary times. After several intruders ransack her place and get it, Malcolm, a Master, comes and tries the same w/ no success. He ends up taking Claire back to his time in the 1400s. Let's not forget that Claire's mother & cousin were previously victims of demons. Because she's an Amazon who is learned and martial arts moves, she wants to help Malcolm. Malcolm is afraid of her despite the attraction because he's already killed one woman accidentally he doesn't want to add another Innocent murder to his record which would mark him as a demon.

Claire was so amazingly annoying that I was wishing she would be taken down a notch. She never listened to anyone, was always crying foul after she gave in to her attractions, staring at all the hunky men, making groundless assumptions, and arguing in the silliest way because she kept claiming that she was independent woman of the contemporary times. Weird part is that she seemed to adjust to the time period instantly, whatever...

Malcolm, the hero, is pretty cookie cutter mold, except he was giving just as many mixed signals as Claire. He wanted her, but didn't want to risk killing her, but basically he was always rubbing himself on her or tempting her but not following through.

I couldn't decide where Brenda Joyce was going w/ this book, since the sensuality level was there in fit and starts. Every couple of pages described the attraction between Claire & Malcolm but the follow through was strange and oddly not hot. The slam bam thank you method wasn't very attractive. If Joyce was striving for a more sensual story like Emma Holly, Angela Knight, or Lora Leigh, she definitely failed in that department. The dialogue and the action scenes didn't work cohesively with the romance as well.

I would never recommend this book to anyone. Horrible time travel premise, badly written, irritating heroine, an entire cast I really didn't care about, villains that are evil just because, and a bad overall plot. If this is any indication of how Brenda Joyce has transitioned from her old historical romance novels these days in the 90s, I will never ever buy another Brenday Joyce novel.

I have never read anything by Brenda Joyce prior to this book. I snapped it up in the store after seeing it was Highlanders and time travel - two of my favorites. I wish I would have read a page or two here and there before I bought it. It was so annoying to have the exclamation "she cried" in every fourth sentence. Claire was annoying enough without it. I had a very hard time picturing her as a strong independent woman because all she did was whine. At one point Malcolm calls her arrogant and I think that is an understatement. She talks down to Malcolm and plots to get her way instead of listening to what he has to say. Claire was not very believable or likeable. I did like Malcolm. He's your typical gorgeous laird, with fears and torments who is supposed to find a good woman and save him from himself. Instead he gets Claire. I think the author was trying way too hard in this book. The plot is jangled and a little on the bizare side. I know it is supposed to be a fantasy but even in a fantasy point a is supposed to lead to point b not some convoluted path in between. The whole pleasure crime bit is not realistic. I gave it two stars because of Malcolm. If you are want to read this one borrow it. I am going to give this series another chance but I will borrow it before I buy it to see if the kinks get worked out in the second installment. Royce and Aidan also were bright spots in this book so possibly the next one will be better.

I love Brenda Joyce, but this book is a huge dissapointment. I mean, the way Malcom talked just aggravated me, 'didna ken', 'I be wantin ye lass', and Claire came off as a stupid ninny...Don't waste your money on this book. It was a huge disappointment, I hope Brenda Joyce doesn't stick with this series. Who ever died from pleasure anyway, where did she come up with that? I wouldn't even rate this with one star...

I have never reviewed before but this book has so many negative reviews I had to. I really enjoyed this story. I admit I did get the audio book version and the narrartor did a great job. I know everyone has different tastes but if you do like to read about time travel and ancient highlanders you will probably like this book. It just had a very good story that kept me listening and staying up late to get some more. I hope there is a follow up in the future.

I love Brenda Joyce. Her historical novels are rich in character development, plot, and overall story. With that said, I did not like Dark Seduction. I was excited after reading the excerpt, as it sounded much like Karen Moning's Highlander series which I also love.
It didn't take long for me to lose interest as I think I actually scoffed after reading about how people were dying from "pleasure crimes." After hoping that it was going to improve, I was greatly disappointed when it failed to just get up off the ground. I found the characters uninteresting and honestly, quite unremarkable. I had such high hopes for this series because Karen Moning's work, Dark Fever, was such a colossal disappointment that I was thinking that this series of Brenda Joyce's would be so much better. It wasn't. That's okay though because she has another DeWarrene novel coming out soon which I'm sure will be back to her normal outstanding work.

I don't want to sound repetitive but I too, found this book an utter disappointment. I have read all previous Brenda Joyce novels and loved pretty much all of them. If I didn't know she wrote this book, I NEVER would have guessed it was the same author as the Deadly series (which I adore) or, really, ANY of her previous work. I can't believe I made it to the end, which I did two full weeks after buying it- normally I would finish one of Ms. Joyce's books in a matter of hours. The characters were unlikable and had no chemistry and the plot was weak at best. If you love Brenda Joyce, stay away from this book!