Beauty Bites (How beauty Saved Meiers Corners and Won the Hot Vampire)

I said I would come back with my review of the latest book in the delightful Biting Love series from Mary Hughes. I'm sure by now, everyone knows that I love Meiers Corners and all of the residents, mortal and vampire alike, and this one may just be the best so far. First, I'll whet your appetite for vampire hotness with the blurb from Beauty Bites, then I will post my review. So sit back, relax and suspend belief for a visit with the vampires and the women who love them.

Blurb for Beauty Bites

Beauty is skin deep…but the beast goes all the way.

When top Minneapolis ad man Ric Holiday is asked to design a campaign for a quaint little town, his first reaction is absolutely not. Meiers Corners is too near Chicago, home of the vampire who turned him as an orphaned boy. 

Then the city sends an angel-faced med student with a body made for sin to plead their case. Synnove Byornsson is the ray of sunshine Ric hasn’t felt since he was human.

Armed with determination and a micro miniskirt, Synnove is prepared to crash Holiday’s penthouse cocktail party—and to dislike him on sight. But Mr. All-Style-No-Substance turns out to have a deadly smile, a barely restrained, feral strength, and piercing blue eyes that look at her—not at her cleavage.

Unfortunately Synnove has competition in the form of a sly temptress with a counterproposal. For the first time in her life, Synnove must cash in her genetic lottery ticket and fire back with some sizzle of her own—or her beloved Meiers Corners could become the new Sin City.

Warning: Contains a doctor with a bod for sin, an ad exec with a chip on his shoulder, sarcasm, sex, and a cabin full of annoying friends. Secrets are revealed. One heart-stopping, horrific moment leads to the ultimate of happily-ever-afters.

They say Beauty is only skin deep, but if you are a medical student wanting to be taken seriously, beauty can be a pain in the...behind. Synnove Byornsson is sick of everyone focusing on her attributes instead of her intelligence. How can she be taken seriously, when she can't get a single male to focus on anything above her shoulders. So when her cousin Twyla asks her to cash in on Nature's gifts to convince ad-man Ric Holiday to build a campaign for their home town, Meiers Corners, she balks at first. When she finally agrees, she discovers there is competition, in the form of one slinky female determined to turn Meiers Corners into the next Las Vegas. And Synnove has begun to believe some of the citizens of her home town are something other than wholly human; more like vampires actually, but when she tries to ask her friends and relatives, they keep changing the subject. Can Synnove convince Ric to take on the cause, or will the town lose its innate charm to the glitz and decadence that the other side wants to bring in? And can Ric come to terms with the fact that this lovely woman is both smart and sexy, and his true One as well?

This is book six in the Biting Love series, and while it involves Meiers Corners, it doesn't actually take place there. As with all of Ms. Hughes' Biting Love books, there is a great deal of humor mixed in with the romance. I look forward to each of these as they arrive, knowing I am in for a treat, and this one may have been the best so far. The lead characters, Synnove and Ric, are both charismatic and likable, an I adore Synnove's quirky habit to med-speak when she is flustered or frustrated. And her ability to roll with the flow is delightful...she is determined to break through the 'wall of silence' about vampires that her friends and family have erected, and she does it, not with finesse, but with the help of a verbal sledgehammer.

I loved Ric, with his secrets and his determination to stay out of it, until the stakes (pardon the pun, please) are raised and he discovers a chicken, or rather a snake in his corporate hen-house. I love the nicknames Synnove comes up with for the bad guys, especially 'Chicken Little', the traitor in Ric's office who tries to undermine Synnove at every turn. Then there is Camille, Nosferatu's lieutenant, who wants to turn Meiers Corners into a midwest Sin City, with Ric's help, who Synnove prompty dubs Vampiretta. 

There are dangers to face, secrets to reveal, and under it all is the magnetic attraction between Ric and Synnove that refuses to be denied. I loved when Synnove just came right out and asked Twyla about vampires, or as she says, v-men. I spent much of this book clenching a tissue to stem the flow of tears from the laughter, and fanning myself from the heat raised by Synnove and Ric. This one is super hot, funny and delicious and I recommend it to all who like their romance Type O with a side of hot and sexy.