Back Cover:
Raw, animal magnetism...

...is a big red flag to prim and proper office manager Jane Morgan. After a rough childhood with a mother who liked her men in prison-jumpsuit orange, Jane changed her name, her look and her taste for bad boys. So why is she lusting for William Chase with his tattoo-covered biceps and steel-toed boots? The man blows things up for a living!

She gives herself one explosive, fantasy-filled night with Chase. The next day it's back to plain Jane and safe men.

But when her beloved brother becomes a murder suspect, it's Chase who comes to her rescue. And Jane discovers that a man who's been around the block knows a thing or two about uncovering the truth…

Note from reviewer:
You all know I try to include memorable/funny/arousing quotes in all my reviews and you’ll also note that, except for one, they are missing in this review. That is because with LEAD ME ON Victoria Dahl managed to get me to writing another separate Quote Post while breaking the all time record for most quote markers in one book. I had stopped doing the Quote Posts as they are pretty time consuming but for this record breaking book I will make an exception and do one, once more. As I am seriously lacking time right now I promise to have the LEAD ME ON Quote Post up early in the first week of January 2010.



And now for my review:

Victoria Dahl has a sense of humor that strikes a cord with me. Every. Single. Time. Every. Single. Book! With LEAD ME ON the giggles started at page 10 and set the pace for the most of the book!

Quote:
But even his promising career couldn't make her forget the fact that he made love like a rabbit. (...) She'd tried to let it go. She really had. A man couldn't be judged on the depth of his thrusts alone.

Victoria Dahl had me laughing, panting, frowning and even tearing up right there in the end. All these feelings make for a great read and that is exactly what LEAD ME ON was for me. In this final installment of the Tumble Creek Trilogy Victoria Dahl puts it all out there for us to read, judge, challenge and enjoy.

Reading about Jane and how she wanted to separate her past from her present gave me the Superman vibe: Conservative business persona from the present by day, including the glasses and wild, wanton, dirty little sex pot by night, or let’s say with Chase! She has kept her good girl act up for 10 years but the right man, Chase, makes her want to drop her act, even if she has a really hard time actually doing that because she doesn't want to go back to being the girl she used to be and Chase makes her want to lose her self-imposed inhibitions. There was a moment I was a bit disappointed in Jane and though I understand why she did what she did in that scene and that it was part of her characterization but I still wanted to slap her silly.

Jane fits right in with Victoria Dahl's other heroines in the Tumble Creek Trilogy. I'll even go as far and say she's the boldest one of the three. Molly (heroine book 1) has nothing on Jane. I think people who didn't like Molly will like Jane even less, but since I loved Molly, I loved Jane too. Especially when she shed her "respectable" restrained persona and allowed the true Jane to surface and she finally embraced her past and stopped trying to hide the person she was and stopped trying to deny where she was from.

There will be readers out there who aren't going to like Jane because of some of her actions, her views on life and the things she sometimes does or says. I did like her, a lot. Fear, disappointment, and self-preservation drive her to overcome her crappy past. She is driven by ambition to leave a past she is not proud of behind her. Underneath that ambition she is vulnerable, caring and loyal. She may seem superficial, materialistic and snobbish and with her background, her high and mighty attitude seems wrong but Victoria Dahl pulled it off and made me like Jane as much as I liked her other heroines. Jane's fight with and ultimate surrender to love was beautifully written. Jane's groveling, which was totally justified and called for made me like her even more than I did before. And just when I thought I'd dodged the bullet on the emotional-make-me-cry stuff, the lovely and talented Ms. Dahl had me tearing up right at the end, with a smile plastered to my face.

As I am writing this review, I discovered that I didn't write down many notes on Chase. This doesn't mean Chase wasn't a very major factor in my liking this book. Chase is the man every woman dreams about, whether you're a good or a bad girl! What woman can resist that big, tattooed demolition man who gets excited when he blows things up and who knows how to make a woman feel like a woman? I sure couldn't and Chase has taken his rightful place next to Ben (hero book 1) on my favorite heroes list. Chase is a straight forward as they come. I love how Victoria Dahl switches the traditional roles in her books and puts the men in the position of wanting a decent, respectful relationship, whereas the women are only looking for a tumble in the bed. And without compromising femininity, masculinity and true romance she gives them all want they wanted and more!

In the secondary characters department Victoria Dahl scored once again too. I hated the ex, Greg, really he was the ass of all asses! But I loved Grandma Olive, Chase's dad, Jane's step dad Mac and of course Quinn and Lori. Even Molly, whom I really wasn't expecting to make an appearance, made it to this party, right at the very end and was her usual extravagant self.

As with the other books in this trilogy, there's a side plot next to the romance, this time it's the story thread of Jane's brother being arrested for something he didn't do. I liked that in all three books of the trilogy the sub plots are all different and tackle different subjects within law enforcement and suspense. A suspense writer Victoria Dahl is not but she does a great job in fusing the plot and the romance together. The balance is perfect for contemporary romance and since that is what she writes, no complaints or critique from me there.

This book had a bit of everything: humor, fun, emotional stuff, hot sexing and some soul searching. I really laughed out loud when the fry selection process came up. (OMG I eat my fries exactly like Jane does!). I got flustered at the scene on the biker bar parking lot and my heart ached for the stuff Jane went through as a child/teenager. I absolutely love the role that parents play in the formation of the characters in Victoria Dahl's Tumble Creek books. The parental influence, the way they were brought up, all contribute to the three-dimensional feel to the characters.

If you are tired of the fluffy and the PC you need a dose of Victoria Dahl’s Tumble Creek books. When you peel of the layers of humor and the hot sex you’ll find that each and everyone deals with real issues, real people and stuff we sometimes don’t want to deal with but have to. LEAD ME ON was the perfect example of this with serious emotional stuff seeping through next to the Victoria Dahl signature style of sharp, snappy and laugh-out-loud funny humor, proving that her writing is about more than naughty heroines, sex-on-a-stick heroes and salacious sex scenes.


Rating: 9.0 out of 10

Jacket Copy:

Lori Love is yearning for something more...


She’d always planned to get out of tiny Tumble Creek, Colorado, but when her late dad left her his beloved auto repair shop, Lori stayed. Now she needs some excitement in her life and, according to her best friend, some hot, no-strings-attached sex would be just the thing to get Lori’s engine purring.

Quinn Jennings has buildings on the brain—not love and romance. A serious architect, he’s delighted to discover that Lori is willing to skip dating protocol and head straight for the sheets. Using the Lori’s collection of steamy books as a guide, Quinn gets busy making all her wildest fantasies come true. Mind-blowing, meaningless sex is one thing, but then life in Tumble Creek takes a dangerous turn for Lori, and Quinn’s protective instincts kick in. Suddenly he cares. More than either of them ever expected…

Lori Love took over her father’s garage after his death and even though it messed up her professional ambitions and her dreams of traveling the world, she makes the best of it. She’s stubborn, independent and realistic. She is not a girly girl and is seen as one of the boys. In the small town of Tumble Creek she even has the rumored reputation of being a lesbian because nobody has ever seen her romantically involved with a man. When she’s looking for a man to have a sexual fling with, her best friend’s brother is the last one she’d think of, but he is available and when he volunteers very willingly she decides to go for it.

Quinn Jennings is the embodiment of perfection, at least in his parents’ eyes. He’s an accomplished architect who is a workaholic to say the least and scatter-brained is another description that fits him well. Nonetheless, he’s adorable and hot. Sometimes he’s the foot-in-mouth type of guy but his heart is definitely in the right place. When he finds out his sister’s best friend is looking for a volunteer to have a fling with, he doesn’t hesitate, he decides to take a chance and see where it leads them.

I loved Lori and Quinn and their story. They were lovely characters and their story was a very enjoyable read. There is a suspense plot intertwined through the romance again but it’s a very small plot and not the focus of the book. This is perfectly fine with me since it’s a contemporary and not a romantic suspense. However, the plot did present the perfect background for the emotional ending of the book and it also provided some insight in Lori’s character and motivations for the choices she has made in her life. What must be mentioned in this review is the resolution of the plot. As small as the plot was, the resolution was amazingly done. I was leaning towards the right person with my suspicions of who the “villain” would be but the motivation for this person’s actions was brilliantly found and totally took me by surprise.

START ME UP is a contemporary romance that was very much to my liking: not too complicated but with enough intensity to keep me captivated and even with the more staid Lori and Quinn (in comparison to Molly and Ben from TALK ME DOWN) the sexual tension leaped up from the pages. But it’s not only sex and fun. Both Quinn and Lori have emotional issues they have to deal with. For Quinn it’s his parents’ constant praise and approval of him while when at the same time they disapprove of his sister Molly because she chose her own way and doesn’t meet their expectations. For Lori it’s giving up her dreams, education, ambitions, and love life; in short giving up herself, in order to take care of her father and his needs and wishes when he becomes ill and later after his death.

I loved the amount of secondary characters, both the familiar and the new. Among the familiar of course Ben and Molly couldn’t be absent and I loved that they made a few appearances. The balance between romance, characters and hotness is perfectly done but I expected nothing less after TALK ME DOWN and THE WICKED WEST. Compared to other contemporary romance authors I’ve read, Victoria Dahl takes the love scenes quite towards the erotic side. Yes, they are explicit, but also tasteful and classy. Arousing yet never crossing the line to vulgarism. The use of the snippets from the erotica books Lori reads and Quinn’s “research” of the stories in order to find out what Lori liked, was another ingenious element in START ME UP and the verbal fights between Lori and Quinn, were delightful to read, not to mention the unbelievably hot make-up scenes they would have after them.

START ME UP is one of the books I read in July that I just flew through. From the moment I started reading I couldn’t stop. Between the numerous clever and laugh-out-loud one-liners and Lori and Quinn’s off the chart chemistry filled with sexual innuendo, there’s a story of dreams and independence. Sincere compassion and heartfelt and genuine love shine through the book. All brought to me by way of a writing style that is down to earth and delectable scenes that made me fly effortlessly through page after page until I reached the last one and felt crushed because there weren’t any left to enjoy.

Victoria Dahl’s writing is witty, hot and sensual. I haven’t sampled her historical writings yet but her contemporaries definitely are a hit with me and they are right up my alley: funny, sassy, fast-paced and excellently written. She is among the authors whom have made contemporary romance my favorite genre at the moment! START ME UP has become one of my favorite books and that’s not just because of the mention of Formula One and Amsterdam, or the snippets of Spanish or the fact that one of the walk-on secondary characters has my husband’s name.

I could go on and on with my praise of Victoria Dahl’s talent and maybe I’m starting to become repetitive with my worship but this is where it comes down to: Victoria Dahl is talented as hell and her Tumble Creek trilogy should be on every contemporary loving romance reader’s keeper shelf. Just don’t forget to keep a fan in arm’s reach. Oh and some tissues, because just when I thought I’d make it through a book with dry eyes and after all the hotness and fun, Victoria Dahl made me cry at the end with some beautiful, emotional scenes!

With START ME UP Victoria Dahl has written a contemporary romance novel as it is meant to be! Humorous, brazen, engaging and emotional yet uncomplicated.

Quotes:
Lori put her hands on the headboard.
The electric slide of his hand down the small of her back made her shiver. “Good girl.”
A jolt of lust swept through her belly, to her absolute mortification. You do not have daddy issues, she told her body in her best feminist voice. Her body responded by arching back in a blatant effort to please him. Hussy, the stern voice hissed, but hussy was no insult to her greedy body.

He stood there a moment longer, fantasizing once again of rescuing Lori Love. She’d turned out to be a damsel in distress after all, but not the innocent, helpless kind. No, she was a damsel of a different sort. The brave kind who fought and lied and did really dirty things to the knight in shining armor.

Jacket Copy:
What happens when the girl next door isn’t so innocent?
Molly Jennings might look like the girl next door, but she has one naughty little secret: her job. Molly is a very successful writer of erotic fiction. Until her inspiration runs dry—thanks to a creepy ex—and she decides it’s time to move back home to tiny Tumble Creek, Colorado.

Tumble Creek doesn’t have much going for it, but one look at luscious chief of police Ben Lawson, who starred in her girlhood dreams, and Molly is back in business. But while her fantasies are pouring out on paper, the town gossip is buzzing at her door and, worse yet, a stalker seems to be watching her every move. Thankfully, her very own lawman has taken to coming over, often. The only problem now is that Molly may have to let the cat out of the bag about her chosen profession, and straight-laced Ben will definitely not approve…

I start this review by apologizing to Ms. Dahl for not reading her work sooner. If TALK ME DOWN is an indication of her writing skills and talent, I am really looking forward to reading the historicals.

The story of TALK ME DOWN centers on Molly Jenkins, who inherits her aunt’s house in her small hometown, Tumble Creek. Molly left Tumble Creek a long time ago and has made a life for herself in Denver as an erotic romance novelist. A profession she keeps secret from everyone around her. The inheritance comes at an opportune moment since she's experiencing a case of writer's block and trying to find a way to get away from her obsessed ex-boyfriend. Besides, going back to Tumble Creek entails she can try to rekindle the feelings between her and Ben Lawson, the town's chief of police and the man who she had her very first crush on. Molly's return to the small town of Tumble Creek causes a lot of turmoil especially with Ben, who hasn't forgotten the inappropriate feelings he had for his best friend's little sister. The spark between Molly and Ben lights up immediately and Molly's secretiveness about her profession creates a challenge for Ben but when a stalker threatens Molly’s life and scary things begin to happen, keeping Molly safe and alive becomes Ben’s main goal.

I loved the characters, their interactions and dialogues. Molly is feisty, outspoken and has a sassy personality. There are moments where her self-consciousness and childhood insecurities come to the surface but she always bounces back from it. She's a product of her upbringing. She always had to compete with her smart and perfect brother to get noticed or appreciated by her parents for the individual she is. But her attempts mostly backfired and she has accepted that she will never be what they want her to be. This makes it hard for her to open up and reveal her secrets and feelings, even to Ben. And Ben...well there's nothing I didn't like about him. A rough diamond. He is practical, reserved, rugged and serious in an utterly sexy way. The way he went about to find out Molly's profession was fun to read. His contradictory feelings whether to pursue a relationship with Molly were endearing and his protective side made my heart melt.

I discovered Victoria Dahl when her debut historical novel TO TEMPT A SCOTSMAN was mentioned on the old ROOB-message board as a release in August 2007. At the time I was like a drug-addict in my book-buying habits: always looking for the next fix and I bought it immediately. As I bought like crazy then, the book arrived and disappeared to the bookshelves, unread. The next historical novel by Dahl followed the same path. Then I found out she was writing contemporary novels too and decided to buy TALK ME DOWN, still without having read a single letter by her hand. It's becoming repetitive now but TALK ME DOWN also didn't make the TBR-pile and went straight to the bookshelves. Until a few weeks ago. I had been reading some intense paranormal books and wanted something lighter to vary because variety is the spice of life! My eye caught the cover of TALK ME DOWN, I remembered some funny comment Victoria Dahl had made on Twitter and that sealed the deal.

Reading chapter 1 I knew I had made the right choice and by chapter 3, I was totally hooked on Victoria Dahl's refreshing and down-to-earth writing. With a little childhood scandal, a bit of stalker mystery and a lot of hotness this was a book straight up my alley. It was fast-paced, filled with delicious humor and great characters that had a nice chemistry going. It read smoothly and the mix of humor, sex and a little suspense made it a novel that really stands out in my collection of contemporary reads. Lovely sweet moments alternated with laugh-out-loud fun and sensually scorching moments.

For me the way Victoria Dahl combined witty fun with sultry passion and just the right amount of suspense made it a contemporary romance as it should be: sharp and witty. The unexpected explicitness made it a sizzling hot treat I find hard to say no to. I can't wait to read the erotic story Molly wrote during this book and I am looking forward to the second Tumble Creek book: START ME UP. It can't get here soon enough because I'm ready and willing to go back to the small town of Tumble Creek any time!

So if you're looking for a fun read with plenty of red-hot sensuality and a pinch of suspense? Pick Victoria Dahl’s TALK ME DOWN! It would be my first choice from the bookshelves if I ever need a pick-me-up read.

Quotes:
A sudden metallic screech interrupted, terrifying her into a scream. She sprang up, flinging the vibrator across the room. (...)"Oh.My.God." She thought she'd electrocuted herself with a defective sex toy. Her heart was still trying its best to escape from her chest, jumping ship at the first sign of danger.

His hair was slightly damp and it clung to his nape. Molly bit back a groan, trying to fight the urge to walk over and run her tongue down the back of his neck. She'd never even kissed the man, but right now she wanted to eat him up, swallow him whole, ditch Lori and this bar and drag him home with her for mindless, sweaty, dirty sex. He looked young and hot and delicious.