A Touch Wicked

I was able to receive an electronic copy from the publisher but here are my thoughts and review:

Loved the strong FMC. She pulled up her boot straps and did what she needed to do in order to find her missing family. Such strong determination!

Not only was the FMC strong willed, all the other main female characters were strong, rebellious and overall fun characters to read/get to know.

I love the banter between Emma and James. The back and forth and witty comments were perfect. I wish I was that quick-witted in real life.

Loved the employer-employee relationship troupe…so scandalous.

The spice was just right! The masquerade… sneaky and seductive.

I was truly terrified Emma was going to end up following the footsteps of the book she recommended for James. However- so glad she got her happy end.

Such a great regency read. Very much enjoyed.

Fast paced, Victorian-era romance with spice, intrigue, and lots of great banter. Emma Dumont's sister is wrapped up in something bad, and Emma leverages a connection to English aristocracy to gain employment the Earl of Kent's household while she searches for her sister. The story moves quickly and has a fair amount of action for a romance novel. The author is super descriptive without overdoing it.

Also, I loved that some of the events from this book are happening concurrently with events in the next installment of the series- it was a fun peek at Anne and Richard's story from the next book!

This was my first book by Katrina Kendrick and it will not be my last!

I was looking for a historical romance with some heat. Nothing makes me happier than members of the"ton" falling in love in the most scandalous of ways. A Touch Wicked filled that need and more.

This beautifully written story was a quick, short read (the only drawback) but filled with masquerades, a brooding Earl, a devilishly quirky sister, the bad boy second son and a love story filled with heat, secrecy and serious seduction. The love interest, a not so mild-mannered maid named Emma with her life of secrets. I was excited to see that he love interest wasn't some timid maid who had never been touched by a man or had her head buried in the sand. She could give as good as she got and she didn't back down from asking for it...but only during the masquerade.

I encourage you to read the book and play along with the Jame and Emma as they dance around their growing feelings. I know I can't wait to read Alex and Richard's story now!

Thank you NetGalley for providing the book for an honest review.

📚A Touch Wicked by Katrina Kendrick📚

4⭐️ out of 5
2.5🌶️ out of 5

✨Tropes✨
💋Dual POV
💋Hidden identities
💋He falls first
💋Forbidden romance

✨Summary✨

Emma Dumont’s sister, Isabel, is gone. Vanished. Leaving nothing but a note, their deceased mother’s journal, and a mysterious admission card to a debaucherous masquerade club in London. Desperate to find her sister and answers, Emma travels from her home in Paris to London.

James, Earl of Kent, has decided he needs to marry. If only to keep his beloved, yet unruly, sister, Alexandria, in line as well as the rest of his household. It’s not that he particularly wishes to wed, it’s more for practicality sake than anything else. And also the fact that he’s nearing 30 years old. However, James is not a romantic. He concedes that he only needs a wife who knows her duty and who will be authoritative, especially with his sister. That is until he meets, and gets to know, his new employee, Emma Clark.

Emma must hide her true name under the disguise of ‘Emma Clark.’ Sheryl also poses as a lady’s maid for the sister of the Earl of Kent in order to maintain a place in London, where she believes her sister is hiding. Going off of the only clue Isabel left behind, Emma visits the masquerade club every Thursday with the hope of seeing her sister. Instead, she sees her employer, the Earl of Kent, who she has been having sexually charged moments with at the house. Emma is in full disguise, therefore James does not recognize her, though he cannot shake the feeling that he knows this beautiful and mysterious woman.

Will Emma find her sister or will she find more than she ever bargained for?

✨Critiques✨

How does James not recognize Emma when they encounter each other in the house? He hears her voice and laugh, sees her smile, and sees her eyes. How does he not even acknowledge that they’re the at least similar to the masked woman he’s meeting with at the masquerade club? He realizes there’s something familiar about her but nothing else. Yet he can’t stop thinking about the woman he sees on a weekly basis. It doesn’t make sense.

✨Elements I Loved✨

The writing and imagery is lush and beautiful. The author’s descriptions, narrative, and banter are all excellent.

👩🏻My Recommendation👩🏻

If you’re looking for a quick, fun, well written, spicy romance novel, this is it. It’s full of romance, mystery, and even a little espionage.

Thank you to Netgalley, Bloomsbury USA, and the author for providing the ARC.

⭐️⭐️⭐️
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

Emma travels overseas in search of her lost sister, and finds herself employed as a maid to the Earl of Kent. In an effort to escape his responsibilities and his thoughts of his new mysterious maid, James attends the Masquerade, the secret illicit club for aristocrats, and lusts over a woman who also has secrets she won’t let go of.

This was a quick, spicy, insta-lust historical romance filled with angst, secrets, conspiracy, and crazy siblings. I thought the pacing of the story was a bit chaotic where at times part of the story just came out of left field when there was room to gradually build up to it. Also, I love me some spice, but I think there was a little too much of the story focused on the deed and their banter that didn’t really give substance to the story. So I didn’t fall in love with the MCs but enjoyed the side characters/siblings! I thought the sibs were more multi layered and interesting, so I think their stories would be more exciting to read. All in all, I thought it was a good, sweet story, but was hoping for just a little more.

Thank you netgalley for the eARC and the opportunity to read and review!

I really enjoyed this book. The romance was amazing and the banter was very entertaining. I really enjoyed the writing.

Thank you Bloomsbury USA & NetGalley for a chance to read this ARC!

First order of business - hot.

Okay onto the next!

(here be spoilers!!!)

I think some people are able to set their real-life principles aside when they're reading, but I am simply ✨not one of those people✨ James is into Emma from the onset, so him going to the Masquerade to "blow off some steam" (so to speak) is a little icky to me. Then he proposes marriage to Tempest.... then about 14.5 minutes later proclaims his love for Emma?? What?? I wanted to beat him up a little bit (still love him though). I couldn't really gel with this, so it was a little tough for me to fully enjoy the romance in this book

I was also liiiittle confused with Isabel's story, but have to assume that will be explained further in another book. (I'm only just now realizing this is a prequel to His Scandalous Lessons - AMAZING!)

Overall, I still had a lot of fun reading this book & would definitely seek out Katrina Kendrick books in the future!

Very early on, we find that Emma’s sister Isabel who is a criminal left her a goodbye letter. Emma having to fend for themselves after their father abandoned her and her sister and their mother, feels she must find Isabel. The clue left is an invitation to a masquerade. In order to find her sister, she falsely becomes a lady’s companion to Alexandra who is the sister of James the Earl of Kent. James being uptight and also taking care of his siblings, his brother Richard gets him an invitation to the masquerade. Well both have masks and meet but neither know who each other are. The story flowed very well and has a bit of mystery and a lot of spice. I also love the siblings conversations! This was a first read for me by this author and I plan on checking out the others.

I received this book at my request and have voluntarily left this unbiased review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

This was a cozy, quick and easy read! I wasn’t aware this was apart of a series when I received the arc; and am definitely going to check out the other books.

What I liked:
- The story was intriguing; pulls you in right away with a mystery and throughout the book you want to keep reading due to the angst of waiting for the main characters to really come together
- The banter was witty and I definitely caught myself smiling several times
- The spicy scenes were well done (personally, I get the “ick” when specific words get used to describe body parts or the redundant use of adjectives) I felt the heat 🔥🔥
- the overall writing style was captivating and easy to follow


What I didn’t like:
- The “this can’t work” trope that the FMC repeats (we get it, thank you very much)
- Not knowing more about Isabel (although, now that I know it is a series hopefully there will be more of her…)
- I understand the time period but the brothers need to manage his sister to the extreme of marrying just to keep her in check… that was overkill, but didn’t distract from the story

I also want to thann NetGalley and Bloomsbury USA for this ARC!!

Katrina Kendrick's historical romance series is really fun, and this one is a fun side story.

Emma is searching for her missing sister, who appears to be in serious trouble. Emma heads to London, takes a job as a lady's maid under false pretenses, and tries to find out about a sex club that may have some connection to her sister.

James, the Earl of Kent, is the responsible one in his family and he's decided it's time to get married. Too bad he can't seem to fight his attraction to his sister's new maid, Emma. Surely, a visit to a sex club is the perfect solution.

This is definitely a sexy book, which is what you'd expect when a big part of the plot centers around a sex club for artistocrats. Emma keeps going to the club hoping to find her sister. James keeps going hoping to see the masked woman he's falling for.

This was originally a novella and it's been revised and expanded. It's a little lighter on plot than the other books in the series, but that gives plenty of space for the romance and I really enjoyed it. There are secrets and class differences between the hero and heroine, but love may be enough to overcome all.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bloomsbury USA for this ARC! All opinions are my own.

I first picked up Katrina Kendrick's historical romance series after their cover re-brand popped up on my Libby app - and they've all been solid historical romances with high steam, exactly what I wanted. A Touch Wicked is no exception, and because of the masquerade ball, we devolve into the steaminess right from the get-go, which is something I've always loved about this series.

I'll be honest and say James wasn't the story I was most intrigued by as I was reading the rest of the novels (the other Gray brother, Richard, was my first and stellar start to this series) since it was mostly giving Cinderella, and I thought it would be reminiscent of Benedict Bridgerton's book in his series, which I found relatively lackluster. While this wasn't my favorite of the series, I did think it served to introduce us to an intriguing character in her own right, Isabel, and hopefully that future love story. This was initially a novella, to my understanding, and I think probably could've stayed as such -- it was mostly just a lot of sexy back-and-forth with added pining from our Earl, with nothing particularly memorable that had it stand out from the rest. I will say, I was incredibly disappointed when I realized these books were published years ago, and I wouldn't be getting more characters...especially when I so, so desperately wanted the Duchess of Hastings's story. I've since found out via Goodreads that there will be one coming, to be published Jan 2025 and I CANNOT wait to get my hands on it!! I've given the rest of the series 4 stars, and so it only feels fair to give this one a 3 or 3.5, given its relative comparisons, but I do hope more readers get to discover this series and all of the other novels in it, and that Katrina Kendrick gets the chance to republish/write more of the characters in the world with the revamp of interest in historical romance!

This was an interesting story that worked well for a novella (though could have worked for a full-fledged book). We have class mismatch, a secret identity, and a larger story about a character in hiding after angering a criminal syndicate. The male main character encounters his sister's lady's maid at a sex club, but doesn't recognize her for weeks because of a mask. That requires a little suspension of disbelief, but it's fun to watch their relationship outside the club grow. The female main character's search for her sister was the aspect I would have loved to get more space in here. Still, it was a fun read!

Such a good read. Steamy, engaging, with excellent side characters and a touch of mystery, this book is definitely worth a read. Love both Emma and James and enjoyed watching their relationship go from clandestine sex to something more.

4.5 stars rounded to 5. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a complimentary ARC of this book. The opinions herein are my own.

Genre: historical romance
London, 1872

Emma Dumont is desperate to find and save her sister. She infiltrates the house of James Gray, Earl of Kent, posing as a lady’s maid to his sister Alexandra, who sheds maids like coats because of her wild temperament and brazen bluestocking writings. James is relieved to have someone like Emma who seems to be able to take Alex in hand. James know he needs to ignore his attraction to Emma, as her employer it’s highly inappropriate, so at his brother’s urging, he goes to a masked sex club. Unbeknownst to him, Emma is there too, looking for her sister. She knows it’s him, but he doesn’t know it’s her, and the anonymity gives them a chance to explore their attraction.

This was originally a prequel novella for the Private Arrangements series, newly republished as an expanded novel. It’s well edited, because it never drags the ways an expanded novella sometimes might. I actually read it fourth - after His Scandalous Lessons, Tempting the Scoundrel, and A Bride by Morning - and I liked having read it after Alex’s book Tempting the Scoundrel, because I already knew her HEA, and James and Emma’s relationship is hinted at in the other books, so I was primed. But I also think you could start here. It’s truly never a bad thing to start a series with the sex-in-a-mask hidden identity trope!

I love the sizzling chemistry that Katrina Kendrick creates between her main characters. I can never get enough of them on page, and I devoured this series one book after the other as quickly as I could. From a plot perspective, there’s enough intrigue to keep the story moving, but the book’s real movement comes from the desire for the characters to f— and also to discover who they really are. I truly had a blast.

This was a really well done novel, it had everything that I was looking for from this type of book. The concept worked with the historical setting going on and that the characters were everything that I was looking for. I enjoyed the overall concept and thought the romance element worked together with the characters. I enjoyed the way Katrina Kendrick wrote this and left me wanting more.

What a pleasant surprise this novella is!

I loved the characters, the setting & the spice scenes were hot!!

A steamy read that historical romance lovers are gonna devour.