On the whole I liked this read. The characterizations were interesting and different. The hero was damaged by his upbringing and interestingly, when he became the regent for his country, the people could not stand him. That's different. The heroine was also damaged by her upbringing. I felt her reactions were realistic in relation to her trauma. And I loved how she came to the realization that she could not walk off and leave her nephew. I found that very realistic and moving. She was however a very clear homage to "The Big Bang Theory." In fact, I'm not sure that any additional research into theoretical physics was done at all. I recognized every facet of her actions from the show. I'm not against having a character be a scientist of this type but it seemed somewhat under utilized. It didn't actually have anything to do with the story other than "hey! she's a scientist!"

The book was mostly dialog and introspection. There was not a lot of concreteness. In other words it lacked description. They were in a desert kingdom and you knew next to nothing about it. It really lacked a sense of place. Back in the 1970s and 80s, HPs were overloaded with massive amounts of description and that was too much but what I've seen in the latest HPs I've read has been a serious and annoying lack of description. What's the point of having it set in a desert kingdom if I don't get to read about any local/exotic color? The story also lacked what I call "time words." Things like "later that day.." or "Two weeks passed before..."

Another thing that made the pacing feel odd to me is that every scene that ever happened between the characters was shown. On the basis of the actual interaction between them, the feelings that they developed for each other were suspect. That is where an author would help herself out a bit by adding some bridges to the effect that they met for dinner every night that week or some such. That way the reader can fill in that they were getting to know each other and their eventual tumble into love is more believable.

The love scenes were very well done and emotional so no complaints there.

I received this book free as an ARC from netGalley for review. ( )

I was in a funk, and the lovely Ms. Yates offered to send me an ARC of this book. I am *SO GLAD* she did.

Yeah, he's a bit alpha - which I like if done right - but he has weaknesses.

Both the H & h suffered trauma due to violence while young. Very differently experienced, yet enough the same to have empathy for each other.

They both opened up to each other, and allowed the other in - offered to share each others' burdens.

There was a true give-and-take. It wasn't just the "I'm the man, do as I say," thing. He tried, and sometimes it upset Chloe, but she persevered, and broke down his walls.

In the end, they stand together stronger. There's an epilogue that finishes the story arc in the future, and I really liked how it tied things up in a lovely bow. ( )

Check out my review and a teaser on February 19th 2013 and later - http://frommetoyouvideophoto.blogspot.com/2013/02/made-grade-secret-heirs-of-pow... ( )

A quick beach read. Not my favorite but easy reading. See my full review at puretextuality.com ( )

Could come close to 3 stars.
I was so happy to receive this advanced copy from NetGalley and Harlequin.
I read the premise: Arab prince, American scientist, a baby, a nation on the cusp of monarchy crisis, somewhat elicit romance… and no. I got some very dry facts that resemble the premise, but it wasn’t at all what I thought it would be.

Chloe is a physics graduate student who acted as surrogate to her half sister and the Sheik of Attar. Her sister and brother in law die in a car accident on their way to the hospital to meet their son.
The Sheik’s brother, Sayid, finds out about the surrogacy and that his nephew is in fact, alive, and hasn’t died in the accident. He sets to retrieve his future king, and is pretty much stuck with Chloe, as well, since she won’t part from the baby.
Sayid’s cold demeanor, having been trained to be a ruthless warrior, having been in torture filled captivity for a year and having to face being a regent to his people, is not prepared to have Chloe crawl under his skin.

I was missing passion and a little tenderness in the writing. Some parts were fantastic and very emotional and some were very to-the-point, almost very business-like. There were no smooth segues to the developments in their relationship. Sayid’s behavior felt choppy, his character switching with a blink of an eye from cold and closed, to cold and angry, to so consumed with Chloe, without showing the growth they both made. I’d have loved to see more character development, a more flowing plot.

I was close to really enjoying the story at about 3/4 into reading, but then it just flipped on me.

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