His Wicked Charm

His Wicked Charm (The Mad Morelands)- Candace Camp
HQN Books
Release Date: March 27, 2018

Rating:
📚📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: Lilah Holcutt dislikes Constantine Moreland from the moment she meets him. He may be handsome, but he’s frivolous, rash, impulsive and, worst of all, a flirt. Now that Con’s twin brother has married Lilah’s best friend, she’s seeing way more of Con than she’d like. And when Con’s sisters are inexplicably kidnapped, Lilah’s own curiosity and stubbornness get the better of her, and she finds herself swept into Con’s investigation. 

Con knows that Lilah hates him—he just wishes she weren’t so devastatingly beautiful, that he weren’t so attracted to her. Especially since they’re working closely together to solve the kidnapping, an adventure that leads them to Lilah’s peculiar childhood home, Barrow House, which sits atop an ancient fen and features an eerie maze on its grounds.

The more Con and Lilah uncover, the more they’re convinced that the answers lie buried deep within Barrow House—answers to a mystery darker than either of them could ever have realized.

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You knew from the first time Lilah and Con met in His Sinful Touch that they were meant to be together.  They bickered nonstop and went out of their way to avoid being alone together.  But since Con's twin Alex has just married Lilah's best friend Sabrina, they are sure to be thrown together often.  Con is impulsive, flirtatious, and more than willing to embrace the hint of mystic that clings to most of his family- his one complaint being that their mysterious gifts seem to have passed over him!  Lilah, with her stiff attitude, adherence to society's rules, and seeming lack of humor, constantly rubs him the wrong way.  But when Lilah doesn't hesitate to jump into a search for Con's family when they are kidnapped, he begins to think there may be more to Lilah than meets the eye.  The reader sees Lilah's layers mostly at the same time that Con does, knowing that there is plenty beneath her proper surface and getting hints but waiting along with Con until she reveals them to us.  Lilah is a wonderfully multifaceted character who tries hard to be the prim model of society her aunt has raised her to be, but finds herself chafing at the restrictions placed on her.  

When she and Con go to her childhood home, Barrow House, and we meet her eccentric Aunt Vesta, things get really complicated.  The Moreland family kidnapping seems to have less to do with the Morelands than with Sabrina and Lilah and their families.  All of Camp's Mad Morelands series touch on the supernatural or paranormal, some more than others, and His Wicked Charm twines modern Victorian ideas with a heavy does of the appeal of the paranormal that was popular during Con and Lilah's parents and grandparents time.  Past and present are inseparable though, because the puzzle they are trying to solve may have its origins two generations ago, but is very much alive in the present.  

Like the rest of the Mad Morelands series, this book can be read as a stand alone, although there are enough references to events in His Sinful Touch that readers may want to start with that book first.  His Wicked Charm is a fast-paced, brilliantly written thriller from start to finish.  Con and Lilah have smoldering chemistry that, when they finally allow themselves to give in to it, becomes a beautiful and passionate relationship that was one of the best I've read in a long time.  A perfect blend of logic and mystic, normal and paranormal, Lilah and Con balance each other and turn into a perfect team.  The mystery's twist at the end was shocking- and completely perfect. His Wicked Charm may be my new favorite Candace Camp book!   

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review