Devil in Disguise

Portland Devils

By: Rosalind James

Narrated by: Emma Wilder

Length: 15 hrs and 43 mins

Publisher's summary

The devil doesn’t come with pointy horns and a tail. He comes as everything you’ve ever wished for.

When discipline is your life, structure’s a good thing, and Owen Johnson’s got plenty of both. An All-Pro NFL center who’s also a cattle rancher? Yeah, that’s structure. His marriage didn’t work out, but then, he picked the wrong woman. A Wyoming ranch doesn’t look nearly as romantic up close. Not to a model, anyway. Next time, he’ll choose better.

Not, for example, a 19-year-old ball of fire like Dyma Cardello, who’s just starting on her own journey. To become an astronautical engineer. After about five years of schooling. Which she’s focused on like, well, a rocket.

Did he mention that he owns a cattle ranch, and she’s a vegetarian? That he’s on the road half the time, and the other half, he’s in Wyoming? That she’s in no way interested in becoming a Good NFL Girlfriend? That it’s getting harder and harder to tell her no? Oh - and that his teammate and closest friend is marrying her mother?

Wait until the press gets hold of that one.

©2021 Rosalind James (P)2021 Rosalind James

When a Man Loves a Woman

A wonderful, romantic, and sometimes brow-raising, story that explorers the gentle courtship of Owen, a 20-something NFL player, for Dyma, a 19-year old college-bound spitfire. Rosalind skillfully and tastefully crafts a story about a man that understands that loving a woman means encouraging her to go off to college, chase her dreams, explore who she is and what she wants out of life - hoping he's part of that future.

Rosalind's stories and characters repeatedly capture my heart with their liberal mix of fantasy and reality. Her characters are well developed and the flow of the story is natural and humorous. Owen and Dyma's story is one that I would recommend.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not compensated for my review, and I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.

Lots of laughs and emotions

I was happy to see Rosalind James write Dyma and Owen's story. As always Ms. James describes her characters so well and the location they are at or situation so thoroughly you feel as though you are right there. I felt like I was back in my freshman year of college. She also covered the football games very well.

I loved following Dyma and Owen through their daily life's and struggling to keep their relationship strong. I love how strong Owen is and he's always there for anyone who needs him, friend or family. Dyma is a spunky breathe of fresh air. Emma Wilder does an amazing job narrating Ms. James book as always she reads with emotion, switches characters voices with ease and is just an overall pleasure to listen to. This will be a repeat on my audio books.

"I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not compensated for my review, and I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.”

Enjoyed as always

I've read and listened to them all . The reader is awesome as always. I enjoyed listening and some parts were so excellent but I think the end was too long and wordy but the characters won me over as usual.

Owen and Dyma are wonderful together

I love Emma Wilder narrating for Rosalind James!

Dyma and Owen. We knew how different they were after meeting them in Shame the Devil. Though they kind of “fit” each other, despite the differences in life experience. Owen is steady and unshakeable, it’s hard to throw him off balance. Dyma manages it, she is such a pistol that there isn’t really any predicting her.

Dyma has to gain some experience in the world and boy does she. The start of her college experience throws her for a loop, she learns that she won’t always be the smartest person in the room and her current way of doing things won’t always cut it, so she has to grow and mature. Owen learns that sometimes the person you need the most is not the person you have always believed them to be.

Owen and Dyma love each other fiercely and work to overcome their differences throughout the entire book. It really tugs are your heart strings and you get more invested. I love that we got to see more of Jennifer, Harlan, and Annabelle in this book, it really pulls you more into their little family.

I think my favorite party is just how steady Owen is. He really is there for everyone and he cares so much.

Rosalind has another hit with this one!

"I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not compensated for my review, and I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.”

A great entry in this series...

I love Rosalind's books. Her characters are intelligent, fun, loving and interesting people. It's probably not necessary to listen/read these books in order but it makes them better if you do. This story gets its start in Shame the Devil when Owen and Dyma first meet. I wondered how it was going to work out as Dyma is just graduating from high school and Owen is 25 and playing in the NFL. She is a mixture of maturity and immaturity as many kids are at that age. She's on a mission, to complete college and work in her desired field. She has tunnel vision and it's hard for her to see other ways to do what she wants and to allow new desires in her life. She's also very proud and determined to not lean on anyone else any more than she absolutely has to. She's mouthy and sometimes a little too impressed with her own intelligence, but she does learn and it's fun to watch her learn and grow.
Owen has the patience of a saint and knows what he wants to do with his life. He is divorced and that did a bit of a number on him, plus his big brother is jealous of his success which causes some issues for them to resolve. So there are things for both of them to learn - how they do that makes a great story.
Emma Wilder does a good job with the reading, her phrasing is good and so are her voices, she does make them different for each character. The male voices aren't deep but they do sound male so that's what matters for me!

Harder story to buy.

There’s obviously a lot of fantasy that goes along with a Rosalind James, or any romance story but this one was harder for me to get into than any of her previous books, and I have listened to them all! I found the female lead character (still not sure if it's Dyma or Dyna-annoying) to be a little harder to like than most of her other characters. She just doesn’t seem to be as fully developed of a character. She seems to whine about the same things throughout the book and doesn't go through much evolution herself I found myself feeling sorry for the male character from time to time that this was the female he’d ended up with which is a strange way to feel. I skipped an entire chapter (tv interview) and missed nothing. The epilogue did wrap up and resolve some of this for me, but it still was not my favorite. Do I regret the credit? No, however, I do hope Rosalind James returns to some less-outlandish themes in future books.

Great author, great book

I love Rosalind James’ books and this one delivers on all of the feels! Also one of my favorite narrators. I started with the New Zealand rugby books and have all her other now too.

Better in Audio Than in Print for Me

I normally like everything that Rosalind James writes but not this one. This one just seemed like she wrote it to tie up some loose ends from her previous book. I am also not a fan of American football and this has influenced my opinion of this book.

I liked this book but have struggled with writing my review of it for some reason. I liked the characters but there are some issues with them. The storyline was good but not an over the top one. The characters are familiar since they were introduced in "Shame the Devil."

The character of Owen has lived quite a bit of life for someone so young. He is an old soul and just too perfect of a man. Something is off with this character. He is too honorable. Yes, there are too honorable men out there but even they have faults. Owen seems to have no faults. I like him but something about him that bothers me.

Dyma is a wonderful character and she claims to be wise beyond her years. But she is still a young woman who has always lived in a small town and having her first experiences with the much larger outside world. She makes several very common errors among young people experiencing the larger world. She is likable but the experiences gap between her and Owen is large. Huge actually.

This is a good read if you want something to escape into on a hot summer weekend. It is enjoyable. And it can be read without reading the other books in the series. But you do encounter characters from earlier books in this series. And it is nice to have an actual novel to read instead of the novellas that many authors are publishing right now as well.

I much preferred the audio version of this book compared to the printed version. I still had the same issues with the storyline but it was much easier this time around. I guess it could be because audio versions allow me to do other things like weave or knit while listening.

I did receive a copy of this audiobook from the author in exchange for a fair and unbiased review. Although I do normally purchase Ms. James' novels as soon as they come out for pre-order.

Not Your Average Love Story

As you can read in other reviews, this story is about Dyma a 19-year-old college freshman, and Owen a 25-year-old NFL player. Other reviewers have given you a sense of the story and characters.

This is book four in the series Portland Devils. Many of the characters were introduced in book three. I highly recommend you read that book first (actually, start with book one- you will enjoy the series and each book so much more if you read them in order!).

I love Rosalind's stories and her characters are very well developed. I always feel like I truly know them.

Emma's narration is so good. She voices the characters as I imagine they would sound. Her voice is soothing when called for and is filled with emotion when that is called for. When I read Rosalind's books, I hear Emma's voice. I love that.

I did not give this book five stars because I couldn't get past the fact that Dyma is 19- still a teenager (a child in many ways) while Owen is 25. The sexy scenes sometimes made me uncomfortable.

The book is well written and the Audible version is great to listen to. I do recommend it.

I received a free copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review. I was not compensated for my review and I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.

not your average college romance

Once again Rosalind James has proven how well she develops her characters. I generally do not like college-age romance. I cannot relate to them. However, while at face-value I cannot relate her, there are aspects to Dyma that I found completely relatable. The romance was a fairly mature one considering the age of the characters. There is nothing I find more annoying than petty fights and breakups because of immaturity.... which is why I avoid the genre. Thankfully that was not the case here! I can't forget to mention the great imagery of the locations. You can actually picture the place in you mind. Always one of my favorite parts of Rosalind James's writing.

Emma Wilder is fantastic... and I am very picky when it comes to narrators. She differentiates the voices of the characters so well. I can tell who is speaking before she says.

 I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. I was not compensated for my review, and I was not required to write a positive review. The opinion expressed here is my own.