I have really enjoyed Angelina M. Lopez’s spectacularly soapy Filthy Rich series. The series has the melodrama and glamour of a 1980’s nighttime soap, but with a lot less misogyny. Lopez centers the stories around strong women who fight to be on top in their chosen profession. The stories sprawl across time and continents, but (mostly) stay focused on the romance. Serving Sin tightens up some of the excesses of Hate Crush.
One of the joys of a romance series is knowing that interesting side characters are likely to get their own stories. In the first book of the series, Roman was the enigmatic, possibly nefarious, recently revealed bastard son of the King of Monte del Vino Real. Spoiler for Lush Money, Roman was enigmatic, but not nefarious. Roman has hovered on the outskirts of his recently discovered family, being interesting and mysterious. In Serving Sin, he’s still interesting, but we finally get to know him.
Thirteen years earlier, Roman had rescued Cenobia from kidnappers. Now Cen is the acting CEO of her family’s car company and about to revolutionize the Mexican car market. Cen is a great character – strong and dynamic enough to make Roman upend everything he has ever thought about himself. Sophia and Cen both have to battle against men entrenched in their power who don’t want change, and certainly not change led by a woman. She is magically always well dressed, even while on the run for her life. I loved it.
The only thing I wanted less of was calling Roman a warrior prince. That’s very much a personal taste issue.
I’m putting one content warning behind a spoiler tag because it is something that will be triggering for some people. Spoiler: When she was being held hostage, she was raped by one of her kidnappers, became pregnant, and had a son who has been raised as her brother. End Spoiler. Content warnings: violence, past kidnapping, past sexual assault, misogyny.
I received this as an advance reader copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.