The Marriage Bargain by Jennifer Probst
Series:
Release Date: February 14, 2012
Publisher: Entangled Publishing
Page Count: 185
Source: Provided by publisher
Buy the book at: Amazon
A marriage in name only…
To save her family home, impulsive bookstore owner, Alexa Maria McKenzie, casts a love spell. But she never planned on conjuring up her best friend’s older brother—the powerful man who once shattered her heart.
Billionaire Nicholas Ryan doesn’t believe in marriage, but in order to inherit his father’s corporation, he needs a wife and needs one fast. When he discovers his sister’s childhood friend is in dire financial straits, he’s offers Alexa a bold proposition.
A marriage in name only with certain rules: Avoid entanglement. Keep things all business. Do not fall in love. The arrangement is only for a year so the rules shouldn’t be that hard to follow, right?
Except fate has a way of upsetting the best-laid plans…
Alexa needs to save her family’s home, so she tries to cast a love spell to capture a man who has a lot of money but also meets the other qualities she looks for in a man. If she’s going to use a spell to help out her family, she might as well get what she wants to. Enter best friend Maggie with her own suggestion: marry her brother Nick, who needs a wife in order to retain controlling interest in his family’s architecture firm.
Of course, neither of them is what the other imagines in the spouse they need, but they agree to a one year arrangement anyway. But things get a little messy when childhood feelings and lustful stirrings get in the way.
I enjoyed this story, especially since the arranged marriage storyline didn’t include complete strangers but instead two people who knew each other as children and one of them harbored feelings for the other. It gave this a whole new emotional twist, which I really enjoyed.
As expected, there were jealous feelings, miscommunications, accusations and finally heartfelt apologies, but the story was engaging and both Alexa and Nick were wonderful characters that had you hoping they could make it work.
Shannon
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I thought it was well written. Funny with some tension. I really enjoyed Nick and Alexa’s story. The plot has been rehashed in several reviews so won’t bother with that. I can understand why Nick didn’t think he could do long term, having parents like his would do that to ya. It was nice seeing him come out of his dad’s shadow and realize the type of man he can be.
I know this plot has been done already, but with so many romance books out there how many plots can you come up with that might be original? I thought it was a fun quick read. I have it on my ebook and go back and read through it every now and then. Looking forward to the next one in this series.