Title: A Reckless Note
Author: Lisa Renee Jones
Publisher/Year: Julie Patra Publishing 6/23/20
Length: 280 Pages
Series: Brilliance Trilogy #1
Overview
It all started with a note, just a simple note hand written by a woman I didn’t know, never even met. But in that note is perhaps every answer to every question I’ve ever had in my life. And because of that note, I look for her, but find him. I’m drawn to his passion, his talent, a darkness in him that somehow becomes my light, my life. Kace August is rich, powerful, a rockstar of violins, a man who is all tattoos, leather, good looks and talent. He has a wickedly sweet ability to play the violin, seducing audiences worldwide. Now, he’s seducing me. I know he has secrets. I don’t care. Because you see, I have secrets, too.
I’m not Aria Alard, as he believes. I’m Aria Stradivari, daughter to Alessandro Stradivari, a musician born from the same blood as the man who created the famous Stradivarius violin. I am as rare as the mere 650 instruments my ancestors created. Instruments worth millions. 650 masterpieces, the brilliance unmatched. 650 reasons to kill. 650 reasons to hide. One reason not to: him.
My Thoughts
I love just about anything that Lisa Renee Jones writes and when we’re pulled back into the world of Riptide with a bit of Walker Security mixed in, there’s all sorts of warm fuzzies coming our way. As the summary teases, there’s a lot of mystery and history here tied all nicely together with some intense passion.
Aria is a woman who’s been forced into her life because of the mystery surrounding her father’s disappearance. Because of that, her mother took her and her brother Gio from Italy to New York and they’ve reinvented themselves with new names and everything. As the summary also tells us, it’s their family history that causes problems, this time in the form of her brother Gio who’s gone ‘missing’ – presumably hunting for his family’s dynasty in the form of the recipe of how to make the sacred and coveted violin.
As Sara did with the diaries at Riptide, Aria does with the Violin and she enters a world that’s outside her comfort zone in the hopes to find answers. She doesn’t find those answers, not yet at least, but what she does find is friendship, a world that’s risky and exciting and a man that she’s likely to fall in love with if she’s not careful.
Kace is that man. He’s the worlds most gifted bad boy violinist and he’s tight with the Riptide circle. He’s close with Chris from the Chris and Sara sagas and he’s friends with Mark – the owner of Riptide. He has a past that’s obviously made up of complicated things, and when he meets Aria, he knows that he’s not good for her, yet they are drawn to each other based on a shared passion for music, violins and chemistry.
We spend this first installment on a whirlwind with these two. Aria is infatuated with him as he is her and they have a combustable energy that crackles when they are in a room together. There’s so much between them that he starts to open up about his past and it prompts her to share more about who she really is even though it’s not safe.
Kace takes the liberty of bringing Aria into his world, showering her with luxuries that she’s been without for so long, and even offers to help her track down her brother, whom she’s certain is now in danger. It’s only until Kace trusts her a bit too much that we find a twist in the story, and that’s where we are left at the end.
All the fixings that we get in LRJ books are in this intro to the new series. There’s tension and angst, family mystery and pasts that are perhaps better kept in the past. But at the same time there’s so much passion and sexual tension that you’re really kept on the edge of your seat reading, afraid to put the book down. So, now i’ve found myself at the point where i’ve run through this book so quickly and now i’m onto book 2 without hesitation. Enjoy!