Search - Lord of Fire (Knight Miscellany, Bk 2)

Outstanding emotionally rich book with one of the sexiest "tortured" heroes ever. On the outside Lucien is bad boy "Lucifer" Knight. On the inside he's just a lonely, hurting little boy who feels inferior to his twin brother and wants to be loved. He runs a spy listening post disguised as the meeting ground for an underground society that has regular orgies and he's tired of all the lies and deception. When Alice Montague, a complete innocent, arrives to collect her slutty sister-in-law Caro, Lucien is completley captivated by Alice's beauty and innocence and keeps her captive because he's lonely and wants a friend (he also wants to seduce her of course). They develop a wonderful friendship that blossoms into love and things get hot, hot, hot. Alice is enchanted by Lucien and can't resist his charms despite thinking that he's dangerous and she's taking a big risk getting involved with him. Lucien is disarmingly charming and at his captivating best when he's with Alice. He's also completley devoted to Alice. There's an interesting spy subplot that puts Alice, Carol and Alice's nephew in danger. Definitely staying on my "keeper" shelf. The others in the Knight miscellany series are also very good but this is undoubtedly the best. Galen has outdone herself. In fact, I liked it **almost** as much as "Outlander." This is a huge compliment.

Having read Lord of Ice a few months ago, I was glad to read Lucien’s story. Foley’s writing has now made her one of my favorite historical authors. Having become bored with typical historicals this one is uniquely different.

Alice Montague has left her home to bring back her slut of a sister-in-law, Caro. Caro has left town leaving Alice to take care of her nephew whom is now sick with the chicken pox. Caro is now the mistress of Lord Lucifer (Lucien) Knight. While looking for Caro, Alice arrives in the “Grotto” where a massive orgy is taking place. Lucien is in the guise of “Draco” and shows up in the middle of the orgy with young new initates crawling all over him. What a different way to start a story.

Everything is not as it seems as Lucien immediately falls for the innocence of Alice and hatches a plan to trap her at his estate. Alice is not some doormat, but proceeds to show Lucien he is try worthy of love.

This book kept me reading late into the night. Not your typical lord/lady story.

No one in London suspects that Lord Lucien Knight is England's most cunning spy, an officer who has sacrificed his soul for his country. Now an unexpected intruder has invaded his fortress of sin, jeopardizing his carefully laid plans--igniting his deepest desires.

Beautiful innocent, Alice Montague finds herseelf at the mercy of scandalous Lord Lucien. But as he begins his slow seduction to corrupt her virtue, Alice glimpses a man tormented by his own choices, a man who promised her nothing except undeniable passion...

Off to a bit of a slow start, Lord of Fire turned into an emotionally rich tale of a man who perceives himself as unlovable and alone and a lonely virgin who gives herself to him completely. Lucien carries emotional wounds from his childhood, he believes his identical twin no longer cares for him, and he carries unseen scars from torture at the hands of the enemy. His work isolates him from ordinary society and keeps any opportunity for a real relationship at bay. His heartbreaking story endears him almost instantly and makes his sweet romance with Alice believable and tender.

Initially I found the forays into the side story of the spy activity a bit distracting, but eventually realized that it really demonstrated how lonely and isolated his work really was. It painted a clearer picture of him and why he was so deserving of someone who would love him unconditionally.

Unfortunately, I thought the book kind of fell apart at the end. I think the idea was to have a very chaotic scene with a lot of intensity and so Foley consolidated a lot of the denouement into a short number of pages. However there were too many issues to be resolved all at once and it started to become almost hilarious every time Alice would scream for Lucian to solve a new crisis. I was also a little disappointed in the epilogue, which I think could have given us more.

Overall, I would recommend, despite complaints about the last 50 pages or so. It was a good romantic story.

3.5 stars