Dance with Deception

Scandalous Secrets, Book 1

By: Tracy Goodwin

Narrated by: Susan Duerden

Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's Summary

Haunted by his father's sins, Sebastian Montgomery, ninth Duke of Davenport vows never to fall in love or marry - until he encounters Gwendolyn MacAlistair and she consumes his thoughts. Sebastian wants her, and as he learned from his father, what a duke wants, a duke takes. Gwen's father has arranged for her to marry a man she despises, the very man who shattered her fragile family. As she struggles with a desperate choice - honor her dying father's final request or alienate him by choosing her true love - Sebastian is forced to make his own desperate decision: trick Gwen into marriage or lose her forever. Sebastian and Gwen must confront the consequences of their actions and secrets so scandalous that they threaten to destroy all they hold dear. In this dangerous dance with deception, who will die for love?

©2014 Tracy Goodwin (P)2016 Audible, Inc.

Critic Reviews

"Tracy Goodwin is a promising new voice in historical romance." (Barbara Dawson Smith, New York Times best-selling author)

Fabulous!

A true romance story. Sebastian is refreshing! The story is very entertaining and I didn't want to stop listening. I highly recommend this.
Susan Duerden is amazing!

Decent story, had some flaws but not bad.

I enjoyed this story. I particularly liked the heroine quite a bit, but more so in the beginning of the story. She seemed to get a bit wishy washy and melancholy after the wedding! Which was a bit annoying. I was surprised with her attitude on how Sebastian convinced her father to allow them to marry. I thought it was brilliant. LOL she did not, instead of thanking him and being grateful she acted like he was the biggest liar on earth. I was glad when she finally started getting back to her normal spunky self.
Sebastian was a good hero when he wasn't beating himself up over the lie he told. He was handsome, smart and rich.

They had some great chemistry together and a couple of very well written sex scenes.

The story line and plot was good. The secrets were good secrets not stupid misunderstandings so there is that. There was a lot of great dialogue through out the entire book.

As for the narration, I enjoy Susan Duerden she does a fantastic job on the men's voices, everyone gets their own distinct voice and she reads with emotion. She is a favorite of mine. (I do wish she would ease up on the sing song drawn out words, but she is still great).

I got the kindle version free with my KU subscription and the whispersync audible for 1.99, great deal for sure.

Frustrating Narrating Undeserving of Excellent Performance

After listening to many audiobooks as I take breaks from my now completed second college degree, I consider Susan Duerden to be by far, among the finest audio- performers today. Author Eloisa James, regardless of which narrative she weaves, always is the perfect match for Ms. Duerden's talent. Unfortunately, other authors such as Tracy Goodwin, in "Dance with Deception " truly is not worthy of Ms. Duerden's talent. The narrative was so frustrating as the female heroine constantly fluctuated in her ability to make a decision. Once we the audience are provided with the subplot to better understand her confusion, we expect the narrative to also affect her to a better understanding of her confusion. However, chapter after chapter the heroine continues to flip back-and-forth. I could not like her anymore and actually wanted the hero to walk away from her. I will never read a narrative by this author again. I only choose the book because of Susan Duerden.

It was MY dance with deception.

Don't let the title fool you. The deception referred to in the title is no real deception. Only one put there to deceive its readers in implying the revealing of an actual substantial deception. The story was doing well until the heroin got so mad at the hero for not telling her the truth about her father's agreement to their nuptials after his vehement disapproval. The reason for her sever reaction was so incredibly STUPID that I had to force myself to listen to the rest of the book hoping the madness of the Logic will catch up soon if only I continued. The stupidity of this "deception" the entire half of the book entirely relied upon was so ridiculously overemphasizes that the story was nothing short of painful to listen to. I can not recommend this book at all.

98% Awful.. DNF.

So, Sebastian and Gwen tell each other, in the chapel, that they love each other and then she tells him he wouldn’t be happy with just her, that he would go back to having other women, and he’s hurt and shocked that she didn’t think he’d be faithful. He’s dumbfounded and she runs off. She goes on to think of the “vicious” things she said to him and he’s thinking of going to find other women like she said he would. This is all the same night. Really?

OK, so I’m done with this stupid book. I can’t read that many pages of Gwen’s craziness. I can handle a little bit of crazy angst but this is too much. I guess she’d have rather married Keir than to have a lie told, so she could marry the man she loved.

The ONLY thing this book had going for it was the wonderful sexual attraction/tension between Sebastian and Gwen.

It should have been cut to about 300 pages and it would have been worth reading. I read some of the other 1 and 2 star reviews, AFTER I bought the book and audio, and I agree with a lot of them.

As to the narrator: I could listen to Susan Duerden in all my books. She reads with such emotion. But even she couldn't make this book good.

Even with it being free with KU and the audible only $1.99 it wasn't worth it.

Good story premise but…

Good Lord I suffered through the narration. Ms. Duerden’s voice was so syrupy, breathless and drug out it was difficult to pay attention. Her voice sounded as if all the characters were trying to seduce one another. I liked the characters but there was no chemistry between Sebastian and Gwen. Gwen whined too much about the lie Sebastian told to prevent her from marriage to her half brother. One would think she would have been a bit grateful. While the pace of the book(perhaps it was Duerden’s voice) was slow, events happened too quickly. No real build up. The entire book focused on Sebastian’s lie, how Gwen couldn’t forgive him (eye roll). And I just groaned when after making love with Sebastian Gwen was angry with him because they didn’t say they loved each other during the act. Please help me! Colin peaked my curiosity and would like to read his story but I’m afraid it will be much the same as this dissatisfying book. Not to mention the same person is narrating. This is my first read/listen by this author and certainly my last.

Not to bad

It was a bit slow and tedious in the beginning, but then got better. Still a cute story. This was my first book from this author. I look forward to the second book in this series. As always Susan Duerden was spectacular

Just don't!

Ugh! I hate stupid heroines and omg this one is one of the dumbest.

I couldn't continue listening after Gwendolyn gets mad at Sebastián for lying to her father. I mean seriously! What a complete ninny. She should have been on her knees thanking him for getting her out of the arranged marriage with her brother!

I only chose this book because it was narrated by Susan Duerden. I mean, hello, Susan Duerden! How could it not be great. Even Susan Deurdens excellent narrating skills could not make me finish this. It was so bad I actually started yelling at the heroine before I finally turned it off. That's 5 ish hours of my life I can't recover!

Needs New Narrator

Great story I kept listening because of the intrigue and secrets, I had to know. I like suspense that slowly unfurls. Yes I like naughty bits and this had just enough heat. The sex was great not too much but just right. The story was a 5. Now for the down part please do not use the reader. No her throaty voice left me cold. I skipped some parts just to finish faster. Whatever emotion she tried to display was overdone. The reader has one male voice. She had no voice range therefore I will avoid books with this reader. Overall 4. Performance 1 story 5

Good But Could Be Better

I started off liking this book a lot. There are interesting characters and the plot is very good. However, I am not one to give spoilers but Gwen gets so angry with Sebastian about something she shouldn't. There is a lot of narratives in this book, and the more I listened, it got on my nerves. It needed more dialogue. Also, after awhile SD is nerve racking because of a lot of whispering when there shouldn't be any.

Terrible book

This book is awful, the author wrote the part of the heroine as if she was 10 years old. The heroine Gwen is the worst kind of female possible with a petulant stupid personality, I don’t know what the author was thinking about writing the part. The other female in the book Victoria was also written as as a petulant 10 years old child. If this is how the author perceives women then god help us all.
On a good note the narrator Susan Duerden did another remarkable performance.

narrator was awful

narrator was awful. hated the way she did mens voices. Al oat put me off the book.