A young naive man, who falls for the most beautiful courtesan in Paris, has to contend with his father's interference, her more sophisticated lovers, and her eventual death by consumption.
Victorian Romance Boxset from Shayla Black. Strictly Seduction and Strictly Forbidden together in one bundle. Start your historical romance adventure today! Strictly Seduction: It can’t be love if it’s Strictly Seduction… As an innocent girl, Madeline Sedgewick learned that nothing comes without a price—even desire. Five years later, now widowed and deeply in debt, she’s certain that the stranger who bought her last husband’s notes of credit will demand swift, steep repayment. But she never imagines her creditor will be Brock Taylor, her baseborn former stable-hand turned newly wealthy entrepreneur—the man who stole her virginity and her heart. She’s even more stunned when he says that he’ll forgive her debts only if she becomes his wife. Brock’s memories of their parting are no less bitter than Maddie’s, and his plans for their future are hardly a rekindling of their blissful first love. But seeing Maddie again—just as spirited, strong, and beautiful as ever—reawakens a desire he thought long dead. When she refuses his proposal, they strike a dangerous wager, with Brock’s self-made fortune and Maddie’s treasured independence at stake. It’s a wager only one of them can win—as long as they resist the other’s passionate seduction…and falling in love again. Strictly Forbidden: A passion this tempting must be Strictly Forbidden… Miss Kira Melbourne is anything but a proper English rose. Her exotic beauty, courtesy of her foreign mother, has marked her as an outsider, and her ghastly reputation as a woman of loose virtue has only added to that status. The victim of a devious viscount's horrible lies, Kira has the chance to redeem herself and become a member of polite society as the fiancée of a respected country clergyman. She'll finally have a place to belong…even if it's in the tepid arms of a man she doesn't love. Gavin Daggett, Duke of Cropthorne, isn't about to let his naive country cousin marry a scandalous woman like Kira Melbourne. The solution is a simple one: Gavin will seduce the vixen and prove her unworthiness, thereby releasing his cousin from any obligation. But spending time with Kira is like awakening to a world of color and beauty, and it stirs the fiery desires Gavin has fought to suppress his entire life. Caught in his own dangerous game, sharing forbidden pleasure with Kira, Gavin knows that the price of loving her is high—and yet it is one that he will willingly pay…with every beat of his heart.
She should have kissed her... The Lady Kings and their singer, Lana Lynch, have been out of the limelight since Lana's partner's sudden death ten years ago. They’re ready for an epic comeback tour, but have to take a young and hip support band with them. Cleo Palmer and The Other Women are over the moon when they get booked to support their lifelong idols and share the stage with the iconic Lady Kings—especially queer legend Lana Lynch. But when Lana invites her to sing a sensual duet together every night, Cleo gets way more than she bargained for. Lana and Cleo's on-stage chemistry is off the charts, but the differences in their age and life experience, not to mention some dramatic band politics, prove difficult to overcome. Can Lana and Cleo find their way to each other once the spotlights are switched off? Best-selling lesbian fiction author Harper Bliss brings you an age-gap rock star romance about what happens when the passion of a performance turns into something real...
Scholarly work on the impact of an active audience on theatrical and dance performance is a relatively new phenomenon, one that until now has manifested itself largely in the form of scattered dialogue on the subject. Audience Participation: Essays on Inclusion in Performance serves as a corrective to this. While the passive audience has long been acknowledged in works on response theory and audience studies for its contribution to the performance event, performance styles that use the audience as an active contributing creative force have been appended to the studies as merely variations on a theme. This anthology brings together essays on direct audience participation in the work of fourteen widely varied theatrical and dance artists, covering performance genres of the past and present, popular entertainment and high art. Its comprehensiveness and uniqueness make it an important contribution to the literature on theater and its many forms and facets.
A crazy ex. A wedding on a yacht. And one fake fiancée. I love my sister and will do anything for her. But when I arrive to board her wedding cruise and she tells me my ex is going to be there, I know I need to take drastic action. I can’t spend three days alone on a boat with that psychotic, traitorous woman. But a red-haired, oval-eyed beauty boarding the ship catches my eye. Perfection. Just what I need. I make her an offer she can’t refuse. She accepts my proposal and my money. Three days should have been the end of it. But I don’t want our relationship to be fake. Not after getting to know her and the connection we share. It started out because of my crazy ex, but now, I need her in my life permanently. I want to make my fake fiancée the real thing.
Jennifer Strayer needed an attitude adjustment. She'd managed to get fired from nearly every job she'd ever had thanks to running her mouth. When a chance meeting lands her in Jack Kemble's office, she's offered the opportunity of a lifetime. Working for Jack Kemble's company is a dream come true. It comes with decent pay, good benefits, and a ridiculously sexy boss to ogle. But there's more to the job than meets the eyes, and Jennifer's presented with lines she doesn't want to cross. Will she be able to keep her job strictly professional, or will the billionaire playboy get his way? keywords: boss romance, bad boy romance, alpha male romance, bdsm romance, steamy romance, workplace romance, work place romance, new adult romance
Autocratic male impresarios increasingly dominated the American stage between 1865 and 1914. Many rose from poor immigrant roots and built their own careers by making huge stars out of “undiscovered,” Anglo-identified actresses. Reflecting the antics of self-made industrial empire-builders and independent, challenging New Women, these theatrical potentates and their protégées gained a level of wealth and celebrity comparable to that of Hollywood stars today. In her engaging and provocative Strange Duets, Kim Marra spotlights three passionate impresario-actress relationships of exceptional duration that encapsulated the social tensions of the day and strongly influenced the theatre of the twentieth century. Augustin Daly and Ada Rehan, Charles Frohman and Maude Adams, and David Belasco and Mrs. Leslie Carter reigned over “legitimate” Broadway theatre, the venue of greatest social cachet for the monied classes. Unlike impresarios and actresses in vaudeville and burlesque, they produced full-length spoken drama that involved special rigors of training and rehearsal to sustain a character’s emotional “truth” as well as a high level of physical athleticism and endurance. Their efforts compelled fascination at a time when most people believed women’s emotions were seated primarily in the reproductive organs and thus were fundamentally embodied and sexual in nature. While the impresario ostensibly exercised full control over his leading lady, showing fashionable audiences that the exciting but unruly New Woman could be both tamed and enjoyed, she acquired a power of her own that could bring him to his knees.Kim Marra combines methods of cultural, gender, and sexuality studies with theatre history to explore the vexed mutual dependency between these status-seeking Svengalis and their alternately willing and resistant leading ladies. She illuminates how their on- and off-stage performances, highly charged in this Darwinian era with “racial” as well as gender, sexual, and class dynamics, tapped into the contradictory fantasies and aspirations of their audiences. Played out against a backdrop of enormous cultural and institutional transformation, the volatile romance of Daly and Rehan, closeted homosexuality of Frohman and Adams, and carnal expiations of Belasco and Carter produced strange duets indeed.
An arranged marriage? Who does that anymore? Apparently, my parents think it's okay to sell me off if it will benefit their company. It can't be that bad. Jack Kemble, the man they're marrying me to, is one of the hottest bachelors on the market. He's also an arrogant prick. I try to play the part of his dutiful fiancée until he tells me I'll need to go to a special school to learn how to meet his needs. This is way out of my comfort zone. Should I do my best to mold myself into his perfect wife? This marriage is important to my family, but my heart may already belong to another. Heat level: Smokin' Hot This is a stand-alone novella and was previously published under a different title. keywords: new adult romance, coming of age romance, billionaire romance, bad boy romance, childhood romance, bdsm romance, steamy romance, love triangle