Bad Bishop By L.J. Shen
Bad Bishop by L.J. Shen - Book 1 in the Society of Villains Series
Tropes: Dark Romance, Mafia Romance, Age Gap, Arranged Marriage, Enemies to Lovers, Irish Mafia, Secret Baby, Morally Grey MMC, Touch Her and You Die, Series Opener
Summary:
Bad Bishop is the first book in L.J. Shen's dark and decadent new Society of Villains series, and it is a dark age gap mafia romance in every sense of that phrase. This one is genuinely twisted, so please read the trigger warnings before you start.
BOOK REVIEW
L.J. Shen can write a complicated person better than most people in this genre. Lila is eighteen, pregnant, and traded away by her own father to buy an alliance, and she refuses to make herself small about any of it. Tiernan is a psychopath in a beautifully cut suit whose fixation on her is total from very early on. The chess motif threaded through the whole book, the pawn and the bishop and who protects whom, is clever and it pays off properly by the end. It's dark, it's messy, it's dramatic, and I could not put it down.
I think it reaches for shock in a couple of places where it could have gone deeper instead, and I think your mileage will depend almost entirely on whether you can hold a hero fully accountable and keep reading anyway. If you can, you'll tear through it exactly like I did.
“Protecting you is a compulsion at this point. I'd stop the night from falling if darkness scares you, Lila.”
If you want mafia romance with real bite and a heroine who is far more dangerous than anyone gives her credit for, Bad Bishop is a brilliant place to start. Tiernan is a psychopath in a very good suit, Lila refuses to stay a pawn, and the chess motif running through the whole thing is delicious. Dark, decadent, and a very strong opener for the Society of Villains, with Fallen Rook continuing the series this September.
