The third book in Julie Anne Long’s critically acclaimed, Rita-nominated, Best of 2016 Hellcat Canyon series is here—and the reviews are extraordinary:
from Romantic Times…
A RARE Five-Star GOLD review (a book is in a class by itself):
“Just when you think you can’t fall deeper in love with Hellcat Canyon, along comes Avalon and Mac. Hilarious and touching…flawlessly executed, DIRTY DANCING AT DEVIL’S LEAP is easily the most romantic read of the summer.”
from Publishers Weekly…
A STARRED review:
“…the best of the series so far…sparkling banter, adorable children and animals, and moments of charming hilarity will gratify both new and returning readers.”
from All About Romance…
A rare “A” Grade and DESERT ISLE Keeper status:
“I started after dinner one evening, expecting to read a few chapters before getting ready for bed. The book gods laughed at that one, y’all, because the next thing I knew it was midnight and I was nearly hugging my Kindle for love of this book.”
THE STORY…
She was a naive country girl. He was a billionaire’s spoiled son. He was her first crush, her first heartbreak…and now her sworn enemy.
As Avalon Harwood’s fortunes soared, Maximilian “Mac” Coltrane’s plummeted, and he had to fight his way back to where they both began: Hellcat Canyon. Now Mac and Avalon will play dirty—in more ways than one–to get what they each want: the glorious old abandoned Coltrane mansion. But when Avalon snaps the house up at auction, she discovers there’s something awfully familiar about the extremely hot caretaker…
Mac might have a heart of stone, and the abs to match, but Avalon—the dazzling girl whose heart was always too big and too reckless for her own good—was always his Kryptonite. And just like that, the stakes change: suddenly they’re fighting not just for a house, but for a magic they tasted only once before and never since—long ago, with each other, at Devil’s Leap.
Excerpt:
Avalon Harwood nudged the wheel of her BMW with her forefinger and it did exactly what she wanted it to do. Which officially made it unlike everything else in her life.
The speedometer quivered on up to fifty as she eased it into the first “S” turn.
She’d passed a “40 MPH” sign a while back.
But she knew this network of back roads that laced through Hellcat Canyon, California as instinctively, say, as she knew how get to the bathroom in her apartment in the pitch dark when clothes and shoes and books and were strewn in her path. Which was all to the good, because or the past three hours she’d been preoccupied by the images crashing crashed and pinging inside her skull like a handful of change circulating in a hot dryer.
For some reason, she kept coming back to the sparkly orange toenails.
This time she imagined the gas pedal was her boyfriend Corbin’s windpipe.
The speedometer quivered up to 55.
Threaded through all those ghastly images were important philosophical questions. Such as: What would her life be like if she didn’t always wonder things?
Like that time when she was nine years old when she’d wondered whether her big toe would fit up inside the faucet of the bathtub.
And as it turned out, it could.
It just wouldn’t come back out again.
She’d panicked and shrieked and her brother Jude had called the paramedics mostly because he’d always wanted a reason to call the paramedics, and when they arrived something like five minutes later Jude had run out the door to greet them screaming “get the paddles!” because he’d seen it on a TV show. (To this day, “Get the paddles!” was family shorthand for any emergency.)
And then there was: What would her life be like if she’d didn’t always feel as though she had something to prove?
Like the time when she was twelve and she’d built a ramp and proceeded to jump her bike over the narrowest part of Whiskey Creek. Because back then she would have done anything to impress Mac Coltrane, and when she was twelve, jumping Whiskey Creek on a bike seemed the logical way to do it.
That jump, however, had been worth it for two reasons:
For those three glorious seconds during which she was fully airborne.
And for those three seconds after she came to: Flat on the ground, dazed but unbroken, half in the creek, half out, bike half on her, half off—Mac Coltrane kneeling next to her, saying her name.
And she knew that even if her heart had stopped for good, the expression in his hazel eyes would have jolted it back into pounding, joyous life again.
Sometimes she thought had never quite beat the same way again.
Visit Julie Anne Long on Social Media to find out more about DIRTY DANCING AT DEVIL’S LEAP and the Hellcat Canyon series!
Website: http://www.julieannelong.com
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