Demanding Mob Boss

Syndicate Rules, Book 3

By: Lucy Monroe

Narrated by: Denver Adams, Faith Clark

Length: 8 hrs and 50 mins

Publisher's summary

An exciting introduction to the Irish mob in USA Today bestselling author Lucy Monroe’s Syndicate Rules series.

Anna

The world is too loud, too bright, too everything. Until I meet him. His touch sends me to a place I’ve never been. I want more of him, bloodstained hands and all. What happens when the one person I need is the utterly ruthless boss of the Irish mob?

Cian

Some call me a psychopath. I don’t feel. Until I meet her. I need to know she is safe. Every minute of every day. I hire her to work for my legitimate business. I watch her. I crave her. I will never let her go. But I am a monster. What happens when the one person who makes me feel is pure, sweet innocence?

This is a stand alone steamy mafia romance with a guaranteed HEA. No cliffhangers. No cheating for either of the main characters.

CW: explicit intimacy, graphic violence, implied assault of secondary character, death of parents, foul language, stalking behavior.

For listeners who love morally grey heroes and devour mafia romance by authors like Cora Reilly, Michelle Heard and J.T. Geissinger.

©2023 Lucy Monroe (P)2024 Lucy Monroe

Hot!

Love the dual narration! Love this story! Two people whose differences from ‘normal people’, fit perfect with each other.

Brillant

This author has perfectly captured what life is like for someone with Autism Spectrum Disorder. Anna has ASD. She applies to work for The Doyles as a receptionist. She is hired for so much more. Cian Doyle head of the Doyle Mob is a sociopath. They somehow click. There are many twists and turns. Narrators Denver Adam's and Faith Clark are able to provide various accents, with one being Irish.

Demanding Mob Boss

This was fabulous. I listened to this back to back. I loved the characters. I have always enjoyed Lucy Monroe books and I am glad the are putting them on Audible

Such a spectacular story!

As a mother of sons with autism, the story about neurodivergent Anna and Cian was especially beautiful to me. Faith Clark narrates Anna and does a wonderful job with the hesitancy and the little rituals that are so true to someone with ASD that help them regulate.

As for the story, it sparkles with the energy and intensity of Mob life in Chicago. Cian makes and excellent - and terrifying Mafia boss and the constellation of characters that surround him and Anna ring true. This is a gorgeous story, full of heat, passion and intensity.

Interesting Mafia Romance

This was the second book of the Syndicate Rules, and since I was reading this out of order too, I was surprised that this was about Irish Mafia. So far we have Italian, Greek, and Irish both have very little connection to each other. But I enjoy this book nonetheless. Cian and Anna are such an unlikely couple, both of them have problems with connecting to other people. Anna is autistic, and Cian is an undiagnosed sociopath, but their attraction is undeniable.

It was pretty much an instalove, Cian was smitten at first sight and started stalking Anna. She, on the other hand, is very attracted to her boss too, but was oblivious that it was reciprocated. When she found out she was being stalked, she was over the moon instead of thinking that he was creepy, but I found it cute. Especially the scene when she calms him down with her boobs🫣 Overall, it was an adorable mafia story, not too dark and a little bit on the sweeter side with an interesting side character storyline. If you’re already a fan of Lucy Monroe, or new to mafia romance, this will be a great book for you.

🎧𝗔𝘂𝗱𝗶𝗼𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗲𝘄🎧
Both narrators are new to me, and this was the first dual-style narration audiobook for Lucy Monroe and I was lucky enough to be able to listen to this audio. I have to say Faith Clark did such a good job portraying Anna as a character with ASD, I feel like her voice was really spot on, just what I imagine Anna will sound like, blunt, a little bit awkward, and somewhat cute. The same goes for Denver Adams, I quite enjoy his voice and he did well on the Irish accent too. This was a high-quality audio and I enjoyed it immensely.

✿ 𝙸 𝚛𝚎𝚌𝚎𝚒𝚟𝚎𝚍 𝚊 𝚌𝚘𝚙𝚢 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 ALC 𝚏𝚛𝚘𝚖 The Author 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚊𝚖 𝚕𝚎𝚊𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚛𝚎𝚟𝚒𝚎𝚠 𝚟𝚘𝚕𝚞𝚗𝚝𝚊𝚛𝚒𝚕𝚢 ✿

Unique, Yummy, Steamy, Socially Important!

Lucy Monroe’s Syndicate Rules series introduced me to mafia romances, and now I can’t get enough of the genre. I’ve been waiting eagerly for this book in particular to be released as an audiobook. I read the book itself multiple times before listening to it, and it’s one of my all time favorites.

This is a sexy, heartfelt romance with actual mafia action and plot, rather than just a romance played out in a mafia setting. The chemistry was off the charts!!!

I fell in love with every single character. In a sea of mafia fiction and an ocean of mafia romance characters, the people in this book stood out from the beginning and remained memorable and unique months after I first read it.

The MMC is a super yummy possessive alpha mafia boss who develops a deep and endearing soft spot for the MFC. It’s instant attraction, but slow burn love. The relationship grows in such an organic, believable, beautiful way.

The MFC is, IMHO, the most important fictional character written in this century. She is undiagnosed ASD, living somewhere on the autism spectrum. Please listen to the author’s note about it at the beginning of the book. The MFC is strong, intelligent, loving, kind, insightful and loyal. Her brain is just wired differently than most people. Because of this, she’s been rejected and alienated for most of her life, The author does such a good job of bringing us into the MFC’s thought process and emotions. I fell in love with her and understood her from the start.

The MMC has an antisocial personality. He cares deeply for his family, and his loyalty is fierce. But he has difficulty feeling emotion. The first moment he sees the MFC he is intrigued, and he becomes obsessed with figuring out why she makes him feel things he’s never experienced before. From the very beginning, he feels fiercely protective of her. And even though he’s determined that she will be his forever (my ovaries were panting at his sexy possessiveness), he waits until she’s ready for a relationship with him before he acts on it. Even though he’s obsessed with her safety, he respects her privacy. As the work relationship develops, he goes out of his way to understand her specific way of processing the world and does everything he can to give her what she needs.

The MFC helps the MMC to feel and to tame his inner beast when his only way to express pain is rage. In return, he calms the chaotic overstimulation and resultant anxiety that the MFC copes with every day.

These characters and their story are absolutely precious, and they are such a breath of fresh air in a genre that is most often quite predictable.

The narrators did a good job. I notice they both seem new to audiobook performance, as both only have a few titles out. They each did a phenomenal job voicing their respective main character. Both narrators had difficulty coming up with different voices for all the secondary characters, though. But to be fair, the book does have quite a few of them, all super endearing and well developed. The female narrator, in particular, used a nasally intonation when voicing male characters, which wasn’t my favorite. Still… I give them both 5 stars in faith they will improve as they become more experienced. Despite my disappointment at not hearing well-established narrators like Teddy Hamilton or Allyson Voller, I loved this audiobook!

I hope you’ll give it a chance! You won’t regret it!

A great twist on a Mafia Boss/Employee romance

Anna starts working at Cian's legitimate business office and quickly learns that his presence has the ability to 'quiet' the parts of her world that cause her distress. Cian is a bit of a stalker, but we love him for it.

This book was really sweet. Anna had made herself a wonderful support system, despite her and her friends' circumstances. Cian only added to that, rather than restricting her. It's a nice change for the genre.

Also a nice change? The female protagonist not being put in or putting herself in danger. I quite liked that Cian worked so hard to keep Anna out of the mafia aspects of his life and that Anna actually listened to the people who know what is happening and keeping herself safe. And she did so while managing to rescue other characters from potential danger. Those scenes were so good.

Once again, the narration was wonderfully done. Denver Adams and Faith Clark really brought these characters to life.