Review: The Awakening of Ivy Leavold

The Awakening of Ivy Leavold by Sierra Simone
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is my first Sierra Simone book. I have read the books she has done with Laurelin Paige, but this was the first of hers alone. She had me from there very beginning. I will admit that I didn’t read the blurb about it, I just one-clicked it and went to reading so the story was a complete surprise.

This story was sent in the 1800’s. Ivy was left an orphan (which sounds odd when speaking of an adult). Parents died, brother gambled away all of the money, then he died. So times being what they were, ivy needed to move with some other family whether that was with someone else in her family, or she moved on to another family to be a governess. She really didn’t like that idea. She only had one living relative, her cousin Violet. So a letter was sent to her, who had recently married, to see about them taking on Ivy in their home.

Julian Markham was the recipient of that letter. He was the widower of Violet. He seemed to be a cursed man. He had been married twice and both wives had died very early into their marriage. He was a very enigmatic man, so of course Ivy was bound to fall for him. We soon find out that Julian has a very erotic side. He decides to have a party for friends to come and play. He says that he doesn’t want to corrupt Ivy, but then why have those people around and claim that it is so that she will not feel alone in that house? Didn’t make sense to me, but then again men can be annoyingly stubborn.

Without spoiling much more of the story I will say that they do finally get together despite his stubbornness. He finally begins to see that she might just been what he has been looking for all along. Perhaps she will want to be involved with his alternative lifestyle. This book does end with a cliffhanger (which I usually hate!), but since the series has already been written you won’t have to wait for the next book to come out before you can read more about Julian and Ivy!

View all my reviews