The Song That Seduced Paris by Cindy Irish ♥ Review, Book Tour & GIVEAWAY ♥ (Contemporary Romance)

He seduced millions with his beautiful voice. She seduced him with her beautiful soul…When ordinary, every-day music teacher Annie gets the chance to help create an international singing group, she jumps at the chance, but meeting sexy French superstar Gabriel turns her ordinary life into a rich, beautiful song she can’t seem to ignore. THE SONG THAT SEDUCED PARIS is a sensual story of finding love, and dimming the bright lights of stardom to see the shining beauty in even the most ordinary.

Join Cindy Irish and the Killion Group as we celebrate the release of The Song That Seduced Paris with this 18 stop Book Tour from January 8th to 19th. Included in this book tour is exclusive content, guest posts from Cindy, a spotlight of the book, and a giveaway. One GRAND PRIZE WINNER will receive a $100 Amazon Gift Card!

Opera gets sexy! American music mogul Teddy Wilson combines the beauty of opera with the marketability of pop and creates the pop-opera multinational singing group called “Bel Homme.” French for “Beautiful Man,” the four performers he chooses are much more than that.

Gabriel Grenier is already a huge celebrity in his native France, but even at the height of his career, he’s bored and lonely and still wants more, so he accepts Teddy’s offer, hoping it will become his redemption.

American music teacher Annie Morgan is brought into this venture by her Aunt Harriet, who’s Teddy’s executive assistant. Annie becomes Teddy’s special emissary in this new undertaking—but she’s not prepared for her instant attraction to the charismatic Gabriel. And he’s blindsided by the life-altering effect of Annie’s very first smile.

It doesn’t matter, anyway, because Teddy wants nothing personal mucking up this gig, and he forbids the two to get involved. Gabriel has never had to answer to anyone, and he’s not sure he wants to start now. Annie is still mourning her deceased husband’s memory, and she’s not sure of anything.

What happens when beautiful music meets predestined love? Seduction always wins.

Gabriel’s and Annie’s love story is the first book in this romantic, sexy Bel Homme Quartet. Don’t miss being there from the very beginning. Vive la France!

C'est parfait!

It's a steamy, feel-good contemporary romance that I will be reading again and again! This book absolutely deserves a standing ovation. Each and every character was fantastic, and this book set up the whole series quite nicely!

I was intrigued from the beginning! Even the first page is...well...ahem...let's just say I have never seen a book begin quite that way :) It was absolutely not what I expected this book to include, but again, I was VERY interested to see where the story went from there!

And it doesn't stop there! Not only is the love built up between Annie and Gabriel (and a certain other couple that shall remain nameless and you'll have to read to find out), but the love scenes are ON FIRE!!! Cindy includes that element of true love that makes these exchanges between Annie and Gabriel so endearing.

Annie might just be my favorite heroine of all time. She is no-nonsense, smart, VERY funny and yet sometimes, as with the rest of us, forgets to turn on her filter. Some of the things that come out of her mouth are absolutely priceless!

Gabriel is, bar none, THE most romantic hero I have ever read. Ladies, I think you will GLADLY ditch your current book-boyfriend for Gabriel! (I know I did!)

An element is included in this story (twice) that I usually don't like reading about; the deceased spouse. Cindy included and handled this aspect beautifully with such humility and respect that, and I felt, really added to the story. It also added to Gabriel's character with regard to the way he handled it.

I absolutely LOVED every single character in this book. I even found it hard to hate the "villain"! (The conflict was pretty low-stress, which fit in well with the tone of the story)

I am THRILLED that book 2 is out, and I can't wait to read Jamie's story!!!

Cloaked in darkness, Gabriel thought he was dreaming when she floated past him like a sweet phantom: filaments of timorous light. He didn’t make a sound because he didn’t want to lose this, whatever it was. Stopping at the keyboard, she played seven notes that made him smile: Mary Had A Little Lamb. Why, it was Little Bo Peep, he thought, charmed right out of his trance.

His parents had been very progressive people. They’d wanted him to learn many different cultures and languages, so he’d been tutored in English since he’d been quite young. Childhood memories bombarded him as he remembered one of his favorite nannies, an American woman who used to sing this song to him.

Something awakened inside him then. It felt like happiness.

When she moved toward the window, moonlight caught her just so, and Gabriel lusted. He stopped his groan before it hit the air, but his groin had a mind of its own. He hardened, the urge to thrust nearly overpowering as she crawled up onto the pillowed seat. She opened a locket hanging around her neck and sighed. Then she closed it and let it drop back to her chest, wrapped her arms around her knees, and sighed again.

He started at the sound of her voice.

“What lovely music I heard coming from up here tonight—but it made me cry in my sleep. The music was crying, too.”

Dieu, he wondered, was she talking to him?

“A beautiful man whose melodies weep. How can someone like him be lonely? But I felt his pain all the way to my bed, and I wanted to take him inside me and kiss him until it went away.” She covered her face with her hands. “I can’t believe it’s you I’m telling this to.”

Gabriel asked himself again. Who in the world was she talking to?

She knelt and placed her hand on the window. “I was so lucky to be married to you, Stephen, but I need you to help me say my real last goodbye. Do it for me from your side of Heaven. Push me away, because I’m too weak to do it alone. Please let me go.”  

       

♥ Click on the cover to learn more ♥

Author Cindy Irish writes Contemporary, Paranormal, and Speculative romance fiction. She's a member of Romance Writers of America, as well as the Mid-Michigan and Greater Detroit chapters. Cindy lives in Michigan with her family. For more information about her work, visit her website at http://www.cindyirish.com

As you can see, I was a happy, carefree child.

Obviously, I had a fabulous fashion sense

that touted the stunning charms

of short-sleeved patterned shirts

with earthy grime around the neckline. 

I completed my farm-girl assemble

with the practical flair of bib overalls.

It made for frustrating tinkle breaks,

I’m sure, but then it never bound me at the

waist, either. 

You’d think for that reason alone I could have at least unfurrowed my

brows and cracked a smile, wouldn’t you? 

Maybe it was that hideous hair.

My kinky hairstyle was totally fabricated by the application

of a very bad perm, as I have naturally straight locks.

The overall sweaty look of it was created by the hot and humid

temperatures of a sultry Michigan summer. My mother could

never trim my bangs in a straight line, and as a result,

to this day no one but me cuts my hair in front. 

Trust once betrayed leaves deep repercussions.

I don’t remember what happened to that bunny in my arms,

but I wouldn’t be surprised if my older devil-brother

buried him alive years ago.

Actually, I don’t remember being as testy

as I look up there, either, but the camera doesn’t lie. 

Nonetheless, this is my favorite photograph of myself

because it never fails to make me laugh—and I love to laugh.

There’s nothing more entertaining than human beings, is there? 

Not even puppies. 

Well, okay, except maybe puppies.

I love puppies, especially Old English Sheepdogs.

This is our dearly-missed Sam,

or Lady Samantha Amber as she was formally titled.

I like Golden Retrievers, too.

I love cats—and, it seems, the mangier the better.

I’ve always adopted strays someone else has abandoned.

My childhood consisted of playing cars in the sand

and making up stories starring my paper dolls.

Even then, I was a Romance Writer-in-Training.  

Before I turned five and posed for this equally giddy-looking

picture here, I’d sit at a table—any table—and play it

like a piano, so it was decided to get me a real one

(a piano, not my very own table) and see what I could do. 

I took piano lessons from Mrs. Draveling for many, many years.

She was a strict instructor who insisted I learn the classical composers only.

No Broadway show tunes for Cindy. 

For that I’m extremely grateful because today I love classical music.

In my pre-teens, I took organ lessons from Professor Romeo Fracalanza

whose home always smelled like garlic bread and Chianti. In retrospect,

I think that must have been when I fell in love with everything Italian.

I remember looking out his beautiful beveled glass windows as I played.

He was born in Piombino Bese, Italy, and his teacher was the organist

at St. Peter’s Cathedral in Rome. How cool is that? I was a lucky little girl

to have him as my teacher, and I was blessed to have known him. 

My first job was in fourth grade when I became a church organist. 

I wanted to become a nun, but I hate being told what to do, 

so I scratched that idea pretty fast.

(Don’t act so surprised. Look at those two pictures

above again. Is that the face of a peaceful, pious person?)

Anyway, music has always been a big part of my life. 

I sang and wrote music. I wrote poetry. 

I read all the time—the library was one of my favorite places.

Now, I write all the time. 

I honed a lot of my skills as a copywriter creating radio commercials. You think it’s easy coercing the public in sixty seconds or less to buy a product?

Think again, unaware consumers. 

That kind of writing sharpens the brain cells and focuses the mind to turn emotion

and need into a blur of mass shopping ejaculation. 

(Using snappy double entrendres is a given with romance writers.)  

Then in my late teens,
I picked up an astrology book,
and that’s all it took.
In a flash,  I was well and truly hooked.

I sound like a metaphysical Dr. Seuss…

But this is sincerely true: I’m very serious about the subject of the stars and the planets, and how their magnetic energies affect and correlate with everything on our earth.

I’ve studied with the best astrologers in the business, and I’ve taught adult education astrology classes and had my own astrological radio program. I’m one of only a handful of astrologers who uses the INCARN program to calculatenatal charts. (This fact should tell you that the rest of them look on INCARNwith a mixture of patient humor, subtle skepticism, and thinly-veiled disdain.)

The theory of soul-based natal charts, rather than birthtime charts, is mentioned in some of Edgar Cayce’s readings,and the computer program toimplement them was created by my mentor, the late John Willner. The ancient algorithm itself can be traced back to a British woman who used it to formulate spiritual-birth charts at the turn of the 20th century, but beyond that, I have no further knowledge of its true origin. I only know that THIS is the astrology of the future.

So the music and the metaphysics in my background explain the subject matter in my writing today. My romantic heart, I attribute to being a water sign with a very heavy emphasis on Pisces.

For years, it never occurred to me to try writing romance.

Now it seems impossible not to.

Whether my setting is contemporary or paranormal, the tales are super sexy, witty, sentimental, and uplifting. I want you to smile and sigh when you finish the last page.

Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to have you read and enjoy the stories I’ve been privileged and honored to have come through me. See, although I reached up through the frail barrier of the collective imagination and claimed them as my own, they’re not really mine. 

But knowing that doesn’t keep me from joyfully passing them on to you… 

   

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