Ronda Thompson The Dark One

The Dark One

Ronda Thompson

St. Martin's, Nov 2005, $6.99, 352 pp.

ISBN: 0312935730

In 1821 London, Rosalind Rutherford sees her life falling apart due to the odious machinations of her cruel greedy stepbrother Franklin Chapman. She knows if she remains biddable he will peddle her to the highest bidder. She decides that causing a scandal to make her inappropriate marriage material is worth the price of giving up her place in society. She needs someone to ruin her so she selects THE DARK ONE Marquess Armond Wulf as the ideal toy.

Armond like his three brothers suffer from a beastly curse that has led to the quartet vowing to never marry. However, he finds himself in trouble from the moment he meets Rosalind who is a siren seducing his every sense to an intensity he has never felt before in his life. He wants her, but when she offers herself to him from the onset he is shocked especially when they dance; the beast within him wants to gain control as passion flows between them. However, recent murders point towards Armond as the killer, but Rosalind believes otherwise as she has seen his conscience and risks her life to prove it.

This opening of four tales is a terrific paranormal Regency romantic suspense that grips the audience from the moment Rosalind dares that first offer to the aptly named Wulf and never slows down until the exhilarating climatic conflict. Readers will believe in the existence of the werewolf especially the vivid transformation that lingers in the audience's mind as if we have seen a film while also wondering if beauty can tame the beast. Though the avaricious stepbrother is 200 proof stereotyped evil, sub-genre fans will fully treasure the first Wild Wulfs of London thriller.

Harriet Klausner