Reviewed by Maria
LET ME BE YOUR HERO is the debut novel from Elise Hart. But Elise has been writing books for several years now and is one of my favourite authors. She writes cosy crime and sweet romance (well, sweet but you could say sexy as well) as Sally Quilford. Sally's a bit like Julie Andrews in her THE SOUND OF MUSIC days - wholesome and family orientated. I can share Sally's books with my children. Elise? Well, now, that's a horse of a different colour. Elise is more Shirley MacLaine in SWEET CHARITY (think 'Hey, Big Spender' and you'll get the idea). To tell you the truth, I enjoy both Julie Andrews and Shirley MacLaine. It just depends on mood. Elise's stories are a bit naughtier than Sally's. To get to the point, Elise writes erotic romance.
It's erotic romance, but it's still romance, right? So there's a hero, a heroine and love scenes. And, hopefully, a happy ever after ending. But we have to go through a lot of difficult stuff before the HEA and it's the writer's job to convince us that the HEA is absolutely the right (write?) thing.
Well, all the right ingredients are there. There's a hero, Aden, a heroine, Georgia and a problem. Problem? Yes. Georgia is a compulsive liar. She tells outrageous, far fetched lies. Yet, for some reason, even when Aden catches her out, he's still intrigued by her. Call it curiosity, or his enquiring, medical mind, but Aden can't turn his back on this enigmatic girl. Her care and concern when a passenger on the train she's travelling on has a fatal heart attack touches Aden's heart and he gets involved. He knows she's a caring, loving girl who got a bad break in life when her father died and her mother remarried.
In many ways, this is a very dark story for a romance. Georgia's problems are very serious indeed. As the story progresses, we learn more about her. But, eternal optimist that I am, I have faith in the healing power of love. Aden's love is something that can rescue Georgia from her life of hell. But does he have enough faith in her? Does he love her enough to go down into the dark with her and still have faith in her? Or is she just a passing fancy, like others who have gone before?
Now as to the sex scenes. They are really not much stronger than in some of the contemporary romances going around, labelled as 'spicy'. The difference is in the language used. It's very strong. But in fairness, it's a mere substitution of words. The love scenes are straight, nothing kinky or deviant. Moroever, it is very definitely sex for the sake of love, not sex for the sake of sex. This is a love story. For sure. The ending is satisfying, but there's no way of predicting it unless you read it through to the end. Elise/Sally is an able writer and always delivers.
It has all the qualities of a Sally Quilford novel. The intriguing storyline, the flowing quality of the language, the excellent use of words and phrases and the attractive characters. For a piece of erotica, it's a story dominated work, not a sex dominated one. Yes, the sex is an intrinsic part of it, but then human life is like that, isn't it? If anything, the sexual explicitness of the story made the characters more realistic.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this novel. It lived up to everything I could expect from a book by Sally Quilford. I look forward to reading more work from Elise Hart in the future. I don't see it in terms of the amount of sex that appears on the pages, I see it as a literary work in which all human life is there.
This book is published by Siren Publishing.
You can get your copy of this book here. Or if you are in the UK, here.
