Those who have waited 11 years for Kinsale's return will lap up this romance, but others will be turned off by its length and its controlling, sometimes cruel, alpha male hero. Elegant yet violent, breathtakingly handsome yet brutal, the assassin Allegreto has returned in this long-awaited sequel to Laura Kinsales. Kinsale's characters speak in stilted phrases resembling Middle English, and she loads the book with historical detail, making it both realistic and ponderous. As Allegreto and Elena journey to Italy to face Franco Pietro, Elena's former fiancé and a rival of Allegreto's family, lust and affection spring between the two (in that order), but Elena's disdain for Allegreto's ability to murder without remorse gives rise to an abundance of romantic tension and some intense love scenes. See all books authored by Laura Kinsale, including Flowers From the Storm, and For My Lady's Heart, and more on.

It’s a very dark, intense story a book with Allegreto at the center could have been nothing else. It’s Allegreto’s story, the young Italian assassin from my first medieval, For My Lady’s Heart. Set in the reign of Richard II, this is a sequel to Kinsales historical romance For My. I have a new book, Shadowheart, scheduled for April 2004. To this end, he captures Elena, the princess of Monteverde, and makes her his wife in a particularly violent sex scene ('She met him with a fierce reply, opening her mouth against his shoulder, a willing she-cat to his leopard, biting him as viciously as if she could draw blood'). Written by Laura Kinsale Review by Rosemary Edghill. (1993), takes place in 14th-century Europe, where Allegreto-assassin, pirate, brute and bastard son of the Navona family-attempts to reclaim his birthright in the Italian principality of Monteverde.

This long-awaited follow-up to Kinsale's last book, For My Lady's Heart

Shadowheart by laura kinsale