Illicit Passion — Sarah Stuart

Showbiz superstar, Lisette, flees a blackmailer threatening to reveal to the scandal-hungry media that she bore a child of incest. Michael, her father and ex-lover, initiates an audacious plan to set her free that leaves the whole family hovering on the brink of emotional and financial disaster. Their adult daughter, Harriet, learns the truth and vows vengeance on all who conspired to hide her birth by registering her as the twin of the man she loves. “The night will end in death.” The story, the scene set with a meeting between Lisette and her rejected, blackmailing, would-be lover in the prologue, goes on to show Harriet growing up and the sibling rivalries between Michael's, and his wife Lizzie's, five offspring. Lisette, knowing she is guilty of seducing her father, keeps the secret of blackmail, which has progressed from the extortion of money to a life of torture and perverted sex for sixteen years. She joins Michael for a European concert tour to promote the music of Kit Marsh, due to open at the Opéra Bastille in Paris. A scream in the night alerts Michael to Lisette's distress and guilt drives him to risk his career, and his liberty, to defeat his old enemy. The Book of Hours that belonged to Margaret, James IV of Scotland's queen, which she used as a diary and carries the secret royal command to her heiresses “find love where ye may” is given to Harriet. She plots to follow the dangerously immoral example of the queen's great-granddaughter, Lady Harriet Allanach, who falls in love with her own brother, until Harriet herself discovers that she is the child of incest and love for her whole family turns to hate. Readers who have enjoyed Jackie Collins' “Hollywood Wives”, Jacqueline Susann's “The Valley of the Dolls”, James Robert Waller's “The Bridges Of Madison County”, Nicholas Sparks' “The Notebook” and Jilly Cooper's “Rivals” will love the glitzy, glamour of this showbiz world where trial by paparazzi is very real and scandal threatens to bring down a family empire. The eBook version of Illicit Passion was awarded 5 stars by Readers' Favorite within weeks of publication.