Wealthy society woman Sara is a writer known for deeply researching her novels about the underbelly of London. While preparing her latest book, she makes an undercover visit to Derek Craven's high end gambling den. Sara finds herself shaken by Derek's magnetism, perhaps even enough to leave her much more socially acceptable suitor back home.

Okay, who's ready for a hot take on a book from 1994?! DREAMING OF YOU was so promising. I loved the premise and the chemistry between Sara and Derek was great - it's a fantastic forbidden love story. The gambling hall was a rich setting, and all the supporting characters were snappy and interesting.

However, this really fell apart for me in the last quarter or so of the book, after Sara and Derek got together because he turned into an outright abuser. Virtually all he says to her is some variation of "you're never allowed to leave me now," often while painfully gripping her arm. Every time they have sex, she is nervous or scared about some aspect of it and tells him "no" and "stop" and he ignores her and does what he wants anyway. So that's a no from me.

As a side note, I looked at the negative reviews on Goodreads to see if other readers flagged this, but every bad review is about how Derek slept with someone else when Sara went back home and how they can't possibly abide a cheating hero. (Not to be all "they were on a break" but they weren't even together at that point? I don't know, that's another discussion entirely.)