His Billion Dollar Dilemma by Alexia Adams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

His Billion Dollar Dilemma,received from NetGalley, was a good read with interesting characters. It centered on Helen, an extremely smart engineer who was roommates with her brother, also a genius, who is trying to save her company. Her boss is selling his company along with the patents she developed. He does not much care what happens to the 30 or so employees at the firm but Helen cares. She does what she has to so that she can save their jobs and in the course of trying to convince the corporate raider who is buying the firm to slice and dice it to sell off the parts for millions of dollars stumbles upon a very good-looking British millionaire that she refers to as a pirate. She gets to know him and sees more in him than how he even knows he is capable of feeling. Simon has had a steady diet of people that either were indifferent to him or betrayed him so Helen has her work cut out for her to convince him to care about the jobs of 30 people.

His Billion Dollar Dilemma tells a great story with some very quirky characters that have the reader laughing out loud at times. Helen's brother, David, is extremely colorful and does some things that make you want to cheer and also make you want to kick him in the leg a few times. But, his love for his sister and his protection of her allows you to not kick him too hard. Helen has a great set of friends and I got the feeling like I missed a few books in a series with the story of Liam and Mar

Tempted by Her Italian Surgeon by Louisa George
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Tempted by Her Italian Surgeon is a nice, clean read. There is a tiny bit of raciness but this story is more about the relationship developing between Matteo and Ivy. Ivy and Matteo meet when a racy picture of him hits the Internet and the name of the hospital he works as a top surgeon is visible in the shot. They start out as combatants and work their way towards more. Matteo spends most of his time completing renal surgeries on children and he is good at it. Ivy spends her time being a newly minted top attorney for the hospital. As these things go they are at cross-purposes which anyone else in information security like myself will tell you we try to secure things in a way that is the least disruptive to the end-users but sometimes it just does not work out that way. But, enforcement of these things usually takes up everyone's time and energy and no one knows this more than Matteo and he goes into this kicking and screaming and comes out of it with a new friend and possibly more.

There was one things that surprised me with this story. I have been reading these Harlequins quite a bit lately and started to see a formula for some of them. I thought this one would fall into the story line where both want to stay as far away from a relationship and love as possible and as the story progressed we would learn why. The end would have them both face their fears and eventually they would fall in love and move to Italy and I would get to do a bit of armchair travel in my favorite country outside of the U.S. We would see Matteo work through things with his family and we would meet everyone and see why he is the way he is and there would be a happily ever after. This story is not that kind of story and it is worth the read to see how the author takes things differently. If you are looking for a clean, modern romance this is the book.

The Shiro Project by David S. Khara
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Oh Shiro Project how much I loved you. For me, The Shiro Project was the continuation of a story that just gets better and better. I received an early release copy from Netgalley but was remiss in my duties to post my review at release because I was a bit burned out on serious material and had to read things outside of my normal favorite genres of Urban Fantasy and Thrillers. Unfortunately, this took more than a few weeks and it would have been unfair to read and review books when I was not in the mood for that type of book. I finished The Shiro Project last night and it held my attention just as The Bleiberg Project did. It was the continuation of Agent Morg's story but what was great was we were given more of Elena's history as well. There was a huge twist there and I keep hoping that there is a change with that because she is seriously kick-butt and now that we see more of her humanity it is great getting to know her. I was surprised at Elena's depth of hatred for her father and think that it was an over reaction but, she was a young girl and they do tend to have extreme feelings.

The Shiro Project, of course, did not disappoint when it came to action. David Khara writes great action sequences. He is also very adept at helping the reader get a great vision of how Morg is built and how he moves. It is amazing to read and picture his movements in hand-to-hand combat. David Khara does a wonderful job with imagery in describing these scenes. The portion of the story that gives the book its title was interesting. I wish there was more time spent there. There could have been a lot more time spent on that portion. The project was well described but meeting the person currently responsible for the terrorist activities in the story and the culmination of that part of the book could have been fleshed out more. It seemed to end a bit abruptly. It was interesting but felt a bit short.

But, the best part of this story for me, the part that had me go back and re-read it and bookmark the page was the description of how Eli and Etyan met and their relationship to each other. I was totally surprised, especially given my previous interpretation of the ages of both of them. Just great. This was the clincher for me and that scene made the book for me. Etyan is literally larger than life and he draws you in and makes the reader want to know what happens to him next. On to The Morgenstern Project!