Shape of My Heart: The Irish Pride Series - Book 3 by Kemberlee Shortland

Shape of My Heart: The Irish Pride Series – Book 3.  Kemberlee Shortland. Tirgearr Publishing. April 2014. pp.  ISBN#: 9781910234044.

Grainne has a huge secret with some honest motives, all of which are going to get her into some very, very serious trouble!  She’s moved back to Dublin and is determined to earn enough money to go to college.  So she works in her brother Kieran’s bar and moonlights as an exotic dancer at the Klub, a seedy dump that draws both innocent and not so innocent men out for a wild night of fantasy and lustful, oh so lustful thoughts…and more!  Grainne earns her money and goes home and is quite happy with this routine, given her past troubled history!

Now one particular night, Grainne notices a leering man in the audience who captures her attention and just won’t let it go.  This is JD, John Desmond, who finally tracks down Grainne after work and actually follows her home.  While he’s phenomenally attracted, obsessed actually, with hot Grainne, he’s got a larger mission which is to catch criminal elements who are really the backbone behind the Klub!  In one sense, he actually forces Grainne to cooperate with his plans.  While his aggressiveness annoys her to no end, she is also electrified by his hot presence and for quite a war; these opposite elements are warring with each other in every scene when they are both together and apart! 

Obviously, passion and some very, very steamy, sexy scenes will follow but there’s also a good plot behind the lightning bolts.  Danger looms for both characters, life and death terrorizing scenes, with plenty of fights to fill the gaps until the final clash that will determine who is really the power and how that will shape the future!

Some lovely legends are interspersed throughout this novel that explains the origins of our protagonists’ names along with some Irish history and language sure to intrigue the reader.  Yes, characters in Dublin and some other minor towns are a force to be reckoned with and the reckoning is both sweet and fierce!

This reviewer has been following the writing of Kemberlee Shortland for years, and I’m delighted to say her creative skills in crafting this romance novel have substantially increased and promise the reader a grand read to enjoy and will compel the same to dive into the other books in this notable, recommended Irish Pride series!  Keep the stories coming, Kemberlee Shortland – nice job indeed!

Rhythm of My Heart (Irish Pride Series) by Kemberlee Shortland

Rhythm of My Heart (Irish Pride Series). Kemberlee Shortland. Tirgearr Publishing. July 2012. 279 pages. E-book sold at Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other major E-Book Sellers.

Kieran Vaughan's tolerance has struck bottom.  His dreams of playing the "blues" before a larger, more appreciative audience has been reduced to playing in seedy pubs where the customers are so drunk they haven't a clue to what they're hearing.  Add to that he's been cheated out the money he has rightly earned by his thief of a boss, but continuing to play in the filthy dump where he works is better than being, as his boss puts it, on "the Dole." (Irish name for welfare) He wonders if he'd be better off going to America where he understands people really understand and love the type of music he so passionately embraces and shares! But his huge debt makes even that a far distant dream!  Depressing enough?  Kieran's luck may be about to change in a totally unexpected way!

Eilis Kennedy is in a similar situation.  She's a gal who has an amazingly beautiful voice but she gave that up so that she could begin a hopefully more lucrative career as a a finder of new talent.  Find the greatest singers and offer them a record contract!  Sounds like a dream, right?  It's not so for Eilis as she's also had an unfortunate history with a lover and is besieged by Fergus, a man whose style alternates from brutally bossy to being a suave sexual harassment poster boy! Eilis is totally repulsed and frightened by him.  For reasons that emerge later in the story, however, Eilis has the ego of a flea and just can't seem to escape her own circumstances, believing she's totally untalented and would do worse in whatever place she would escape to!

Then one night, she travels to "The Little Man Pub" in Northside Dublin and is completely besotted by this gorgeous hunk of a guy who croons out the blues in a style Eilis knows could make him a star for sure.  Their contact is both frustrated by the tense sexual electricity stunning both of them and a bit of caustic banter coming from the cynical side of both who seek to protect their egos from  more battering!  However, the fire has been kindled and will not be put out! 

Onward this sexy, spark-laden story progresses.  Fergus becomes even more angry when he learns Eilis is attracted to Kieran in more than a professional manner and so becomes even more aggressive.  Kieran and Eilis begin to play a cat and mouse game leading them to an ultimately very passionate union eventually but with plenty of conflicts between each scene, ranging from fighting, threats, physical illness, violence and more!

Rhythm of My Heart is a romance story told in a tense, pumped-up, passionate way by someone who knows exactly how to balance the tension of characters falling desperately for each other but riddled with self-doubt and manipulation by other predatory creeps!  Very, very nicely done, Kemberlee Shortland!!!

Constant Craving: A Short Story by Kemberlee Shortland

Constant Craving: A Short Story by Kemberlee Shortland (Irish Pride Series). September 2010. Readers: Win one of 3 B&N Nook Readers - enter contest between August 2 and 29, 2010, at this website:
http://www.kemberlee.com/mybooks/constantcraving.htm

In a follow-up to the phenomenal novel, A Piece of My Heart, Mick and Kate are the proud parents of twins who are now six months old. They’ve become the proverbial harried parents. Kate is constantly exhausted from taking care of her two children plus a home, and Mick is constantly working on the “dream” home for his beloved wife, whom he adores. So why are they both so intensely cool with each other and yearning for a bed in which they only want to sleep?

“Constant Craving” reminds this reader a tad about “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry, a story also about miscommunication and placing one’s preoccupations in places and things that belie the purpose behind them. For Mick and Kate clearly are not communicating what they really feel and think. There is no lessening of love, but the old adage is forgotten that you are lovers and best friends first, and parenting, jobs, etc. need to be placed in their appropriate second place.

Fortunately, they begin, through the sage advice of wiser, older heads, to realize what has gone awry. Intending to fix things, Mick veers from his normal routine in a way that increases Kate’s suspicions and even starts her thinking that maybe, just maybe, there’s someone else. This is definitely a different and intriguing plot of true love challenged anew! The story has a hot, surprising and lovely end that promises a different future for this engaging couple whose love can endure through all those moments, as long as they remember what’s behind that flaming, delightful passion.

“Constant Craving” is a lovely addition to A Piece of My Heart, which in addition to being a huge success is definitely awaiting another novel or several stories, at the very least!!!

A Piece of My Heart by Kemberlee Shortland

A Piece of My Heart by Kemberlee Shortland. Highland Press Publication. 2009. ISBN #: 9780984249961


"The heart only breaks when love is denied." Mick and Kate haven't seen each other in years but are now thrown together in a manner neither are prepared to handle in a poised style. While Mick's been burying himself in work and in Dublin, Kate has remained in the Irish countryside where she's been working as a nurse and helping to care for Mick's dying parents. When both parents eventually pass away, Mike and Kate are called to Attorney Tighe's office to hear the reading of the will, a revelation absolutely shocking to both. It seems that Mick and Kate have been thrown together whether they like it or not. The question is how do they decide how much they can endure of this new unique situation when being in each other's presence produces instantaneous hormonal fireworks very hard to hide. Their new status tempts them to the limits of their willpower, upsetting the status quo scenarios each has created while also grieving past deep wounds.

Mick pulls back to figure it all out and inadvertently runs into a fellow, Flann Flannery, who seems an answer to Mick's problems. Mick wants to stay in Dublin but needs a manager for the farm he's inherited but can't sell without dire consequences. Flann seems just the right guy for the job and is hired. Only it turns out that Flann is an unsavory character who puts both the farm and Kate's well-being into serious jeopardy and Mick is almost too slow to come to the rescue!

Another twist enters the picture that is about to change Mick and Kate's lives forever. Mick's most recent romance before Kate arrives with a very upsetting announcement which eventually Mick handles with delightful panache that will make the reader roar with laughter. Ah, the tangled webs we weave! But will this web be the end of what seems to be the beginning of a renewed, passionate relationship between Mick and Kate?

Kemberlee Shortland is a pro at depicting numerous romantic moments in a stimulating, unique way that never gets boring or repetitive and evolves to a crescendo experience. The good guy/bad guy scenario unfolds in a credible manner that in turn creates a full-force reaction where one finds Flann or Damean (real name) a totally despicable character and roots for his demise, while eagerly anticipating how Mick and Kate will recover their obviously lost but not forgotten love! Ms. Shortland's style has definitely matured over the last few years, and A Piece of My Heart is terrific romantic/suspense fiction to savor and share with family and friends.