The Perfect Fake

A Dark Romantic Suspense

By: Arabella Steedly

Narrated by: JaCee Voice

Length: 5 hrs and 12 mins

Publisher's summary

He's a successful billionaire with a secret. She's a skilled artist and will stop at nothing to save her father from dying in prison.

Caught between the mob and his conscience, he vows to break the grip they have on his family. He is desperate to find a painter to perfectly reproduce a priceless piece. But nothing is picture-perfect.

The mob is watching their every move.

Can he trust her? Can she trust him?

To convince the mafia that their relationship is real, they sign the paperwork and get married. For days, she paints, and he watches her create the perfect fake...until something changes between them. Now, he’s driven to protect her from the mob’s deadly grip.

Can they pull off conning the mafia? Is everything about their arrangement just fake, or is there something more?

The Perfect Fake is a romantic suspense with a guaranteed HEA. It is meant for mature audiences only. Listen to it now!

Trigger warning: This full-length novel has scenes that depict violence and death. Each book in the series can be listened to as a stand-alone, but for the best listening experience, they should be listened to in order.

©2019 Arabella Steedly (P)2019 Arabella Steedly

Ok story...

The narration made this hard to finish. Sometimes there were obvious dubs, and when the character was talking to themselves there would be this tinny far away version of the voice, and there was also some quiet background side effects. All of this together made for an unpleasant listen. I would suggest reading the book, I think I would have enjoyed it more.

The Perfect Fake

I recieved this book from the author for free and give my review voluntarily it's a nice story. It shows that while following you goals in life that sometimes you can find trust, friendship, and love in unexpected places.

Perfect

What a great find, this story is close to perfect it has the Mafia, a Billionaire, a damsel in distress and a dog. Plus romance, suspense and intrigue.

Annaliese and Harlan both have a love for the arts. One can create it, the other can sell it. Harlan wanting to get his family out of a mess that was created many generations before asked Anneliese for her assistance.

This story was well written and you will fall in love with all the characters. The narrator did an excellent job and I love the sound effects and volume variations that I have not heard before

Great Start to a Series!

I am fairly exclusively an avid audiobook reader, listening to hundreds of books a year, so I am critical of narrators since I have seen a bad narrator ruin great books. I prefer books with multiple narrators so there is less chance of character voice confusion and voices that are 'easy on the ears'. The narrator in this book did a great job and it was an easy listen.

Next is the story. I am not one to give a lot of specific story details since I feel you should read the story for that. This is book one in a sexy cowboy romance series. Need I say more? The characters were interesting and the story kepting me listening. I actually went very quickly through the entire series, so can definitely state that it is worth the listen.

I received a free review copy of this audiobook and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Great escape with this mafia romance!

Arabella Steedly takes us into the world of illegal art and weaves a tale of danger, deception and love. Harlan De Vries is an art dealer caught up in the mafia due to his family history. He wants to remove himself from the Camorra Mafia by giving them forgeries and commissions Annaliese, the daughter of a forger with promises only he can deliver. To make it all believable to the mafia and the FBI, these two get married, but is that enough to convince everyone this is a marriage in love? This is a great love story, full of suspense and danger. The chemistry is hot, the passion is high and I love the dynamic between Harlan and Annaliese. I found the story more romantic suspense than dark, but the story is amazing, and I am intrigued to see where it leads to next.

This is my first listen by JaCee Voice, and his voice is very good. He has a good pace and his voices are distinguishable between characters. I did think the inner voice changes were effective, letting us know when it was their thoughts. The editing of the narration was not clean, and evident when lines were inserted as corrections which I found very distracting. Overall it was a good performance.

amazing fake mafia romance

An amazing light mafia fake marriage romance.  This engaging storyline had me intrigued with suspense, some grit, crossing of enemies, romance, protection, insecurities and more. It's a clean very romantic perfect read that is vividly detailed and narrated beautifully.  The characters are realistic and interesting. An incredible job with both author and narrator. 

A Perfect Audible rendition!

This perfect audio file captured my attention and is better than just reading the novel, THE PERFECT FAKE! Since I absolutely loved this Arabella Steedly novel, when its Audible file was conferred, I jumped at the offer! JaCree's voice was the perfect gravelly personification of Kyre Petrovic and then changed into the exact sound of Harlan DeVries. JaCree’s ability to sound like the characters of author Steedly’s THE PERFECT FAKE is a phenomenal skill to breathe life into the characters of this amazing story. Even through “Annaliese’s voice” JaCree’s interpretation revealed her every emotion. This aural rendition of a nearly perfect novel is well worth the time and cost of listening. The romance leans to the dark side, typical of a Mafia romance, so only those 18 or older need apply. The writing is impeccable, the characters are realistic to the trope, and the romance is SWOON-WORTHY! I volunteered to listen to an early copy of this Audible file and fell in love with Arabella Steedly’s THE PERFECT FAKE all over again! Purchase your copy of this wonderful audio file, today! Happy listening! 😉

I am going to love this series

This is a great start to a series I can’t wait to listen to book two. I received a copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Great intro to a series

Audible (ebook is also available via KU). This is my first audiobook by this author and this narrator.

Let's start with narration. JaCee Voice was impeccable. He has an amazing range and did a wonderful job of giving each character their own unique sound. The decision to make phone calls as a separate and purposefully "tinny" recording added a depth usually only found in multi-cast productions. At first, I was thrown by the decision to use this technique for the characters' "inner monologues" as well ~ but I think it really helped differentiate the narrative for the listener. I initially felt that Voice sounded a little "old" but realized that was based on an assumption on the characters' ages. (the story never actually specifies) Once into the story ~ his gravely voice really worked for me. Even his register for Annaliese was pleasant to listen to.

Harlan De Vries is an art dealer trying to untangle his father's history of selling Nazi plundered works to the mob. In an effort to keep the Camorra Mafia from acquiring any more stolen pieces, Harlan hires Annaliese Hart to forge famous paintings. Harlan's family is being watched by the Camorras and Annaliese is being trailed by the FBI due to her father's conviction as a forger. Harlan suggests they marry temporarily to keep any suspicion off their activities. Steedly skillfully packs quite a bit of story into what turns out to be a short book (just over 5 hours). Yet, at no point did I feel like I was being shortchanged. I was actually amazed at how well I felt I knew Harlan and Annaliese even by the halfway point. It also didn't suffer from "insta love" which plagues many books this length. In addition to a solid relationship between the MCs ~ there was a nice addition of action & suspense as well.

My two main issues were:
1. I know that "Dark Romance" is an incredibly broad and poorly defined genre. However, I think it's a stretch to categorize this book as such. Yes, we're dealing with the mob ~ but the main characters are only committing a crime to defraud criminals. The sex is quite tame almost bordering on "fade to black". (no complaints, there's just nothing about that part to classify this as "dark") I'm good with anything from clean to erotica ~ but it's likely the author will miss readers who don't like "dark" and will disappoint those that do.

*** SPOILER-ISH ***
2. The whole point of this book is the fake marriage. For the mob & the FBI who are constantly monitoring them to believe that they are married. Then WHY does Annaliese continue to live in her own home for DAYS after they wed. It doesn't make any sense and was a big interruption to the believabilty of the plot.
*** END SPOILER-ISH ***

Overall, this was a solid 4 star listen that I happily finished on the same day I started it. The book has an HEA for the couple, but definitely leaves the De Vries family still entangled with the Camorra Mafia. Harlan has two younger brothers who were lightly introduced in the book and I'm looking forward to what I assume will be their stories as the series continues.

I received a free review copy of this book and am voluntarily leaving a review.