It’s that time again! The time where we all talk about the things we’ve been reading and try not to blow our book budget in one sitting. Some months are tougher than others. Here’s hoping this one isn’t too strenuous on your wallet!
Sarah: Currently I’m still listening to Devil’s Bride by Stephanie Laurens ( A | BN | K | G | AB | Au ), which I’ve read a few thousand times but the audiobook, as I have told many people, is making me very happy.
But alas, in terms of reading and not listening, I’m between books at the moment, so I’m curious what you are all reading.
Redheadedgirl: I am reading The Odyssey, in a new translation by Emily Wilson ( A | BN | K | AB ). It’s the first full translation into English done by a woman and it is FASCINATING.She talks into the introduction about how the translator will change how a work reads – there’s not really any such thing as a “faithful translation,” especially when it comes to concepts from thousands of years ago. And the challenges of making something that was conceived as an oral piece into a written piece.
And at NECRWA I made a point of looking for authors at the book signing that were new to me, so I picked up a copy of Elizabeth Cole’s A Heartless Design, which is the first book in her Regency spy series.
Carrie: I am madly binging on comic books to get ready for BayCon. Catching up on trades of Ms. Marvel ( A ), Moon Girl and Dinosaur ( A ), and Sex Criminals.
Elyse: I just got new yarn so I’m listening to more audio. I’ve been listening to Pretend You’re Safe by Alexandra Ivy which is delightfully creepy ( A | BN | K | G | AB ).Amanda: We discussed this at RT and at SBTB HQ about what our brains want and my brain wants more Anne Bishop, so I’m continuing with my read of The Others series. I’m on Vision in Silver ( A | BN | K | G | AB ), so no spoilers!
I’m in such fantasy/scifi kick lately and I’m going to continue with The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang. I’ve heard the second half of the book is very graphic; just a warning for those interested.
Did you read anything great this month? Or are there any reading experiences you just need to get off your chest? Tell us all about it!
By request, since we can’t link to every book you mention in the comments, here are bookstore links that help support the site with your purchases. If you use them, we greatly appreciate it, and if you’d prefer not to, no worries. Thanks for being a part of SBTB and hopefully, you’ve found some great books to read!
Did anyone else watch the new Little Women adaptation on PBS? I loved it, my favorite Marmee and Meg, ever!
Faves
– AMBERLOUGH / ARMISTICE by Lara Elena Donnelly – I adore this series. And Book 2? We’ve got film stars and airplanes and gun runners and mansions and lying government officials and mystery and OMG, GIVE ME BOOK 3!!! (Also, read this series if you enjoyed Netflix’s BABYLON BERLIN & vice versa)
– DREAD NATION by Justina Ireland (audiobook) – AMAZING! Zombies in post-Civil War America. Loved the heroine, the worldbuilding was excellent, just amazing
– CIRCE BY Madeline Miller -ughhhh, this is so good! And it, shockingly, *is* a page turner! Greek myth, a witch, sea monsters, annoying gods, read it!
– THE IDEA OF YOU by Robinne Lee – picked up because of Sarah’s podcast interview with Julia Whelan, this surprised me. In it, a single mom falls for a member of her daughter’s favorite boy band! I cried at the end! Warning: it ends on a cliff hanger and does not have a HEA.
– THE ILIAD by Homer (audiobook) – picked up because of CIRCE and because I want to reread SONG OF ACHILLES. I was crying by the end. Crying.
– SKY IN THE DEEP by Adrienne Young – Viking-esque historical fantasy with a kick-ass heroine!
– TIME WAS by Ian McDonald – this is not a romance, though it’s blurbed that way. It’s a hunt for two men missing in time. It’s intricate and slow, but I loved it
– HOW TO MARRY A WEREWOLF by Gail Carriger – so charming! And cute! And funny! Classic Carriger!
– MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL by John Berendt – a classic and for good reason, but I hated everyone except for Chablis
Good
– LIFE’S WORK: A MORAL ARGUMENT FOR CHOICE by Dr. Willie Parker – memoir by a black doctor who gives up his successful OBGYN job in Hawaii to become an abortion doctor in Mississippi and around the South. Important story, but the writing is weak
– MOONSHINE by Jasmine Gower – light, diverse urban fantasy about a Chicago in the 20’s-like city where a drink that grants imbibers magic powers flows and magicians are on the run
– THE HOUSE BETWEEN TIDES by Sarah Maine – dual timeline story, woman inherits house on Scottish island, unfortunately there’s a dead body! I especially loved the descriptions of nature on the island
– THE HENCHMEN OF ZENDA by KJ Charles – I loved the style, didn’t love the heroes much. I know they’re henchmen, but I just wanted to be more invested in their relationship
– THE SISTERS MEDEROS by Patrice Sarath – Two sisters go on a quest for revenge for the sake of their family name. Loved the adventure, the worldbuilding was a little under done
– LEIA: PRINCESS OF ALDERAAN by Claudia Gray (audiobook) – I continue to love the Star War audiobooks and this was really fun, cause I love Leia, this just came across very YA
– BLACK SWANS: STORIES by Eve Babitz – I love Babitz’s whole thing, but these were just okay
Meh
– BET ME by Jennifer Crusie – I’M SORRY! It just felt like a parade of conversations in casinos about betting on romance and, like, weight loss
– THE HOUSE OF SHATTERED WINGS by Aliette de Bodard – an uneven mix of urban fantasy and epic fantasy about angel murder
– HEDY’S FOLLY: THE LIFE AND BREAKTHROUGH INVENTIONS OF HEDY LAMARR, THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN IN THE WORLD by Richard Rhodes – focuses mostly on Lamarr’s beauty and male inventing partner
– SPARK by Catherine Friend – a time traveling f/f Tudor romance that just falls flat. Friend has a habit of making the soon to be ex-gf of her heroines just, like, the worst people. It makes me question the heroine as a lead
Currently Reading
– WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED IN THE CASTLE by Shirley Jackson (audiobook) – immediately creepy, just, right off the bat
– ARMED IN HER FASHION by Kate Heartfield – The leader of Hell rises and brings an army with her to take over 11th century Europe, with the help of the King of France…because, naturally!
@RedheadedGirl – THE ILIAD translation I listened to was the 2015 version by Caroline Alexander! It’s very good!
Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson: He’s finding his humor a lot here, and it flowed very well.
Force of Nature by Jane Harper: Sequel to The Dry and an equally good mystery.
English Wife by Lauren Willig: I haven’t been impressed with her some of her standalones, but this one was good. It starts with the discovery of a body, and then you spend the rest of the book alternating between the investigation and a few years back to determine how we all ended up there.
My ongoing devotion to Harlequin Presents sent me in two different directions this month. The first was trying out several new-to-me authors with mixed success. (Predictably, if the first book I read appealed to me, I would immediately devour the author’s entire available backlist…even if every other book in the backlist proved to be a disappointment. Which happened often enough to indicate that part of the initial appeal was just the fresh voice, but I still get the secondary enjoyment of encapsulating prolific authors’ go-to tropes and characterizations. I know it’s easy to dismiss HPs as mental candyfloss, but when I’m dealing with this much data, my mind is more engaged, not less.) The second direction sent me to Open Library to check out older titles that are not otherwise available in ebook format. I don’t recall my first encounter with ebooks (either the date or format), but I suspect it was very like the Open Library scanned book experience, which explains why it took me so long to get on board with ereaders. I’m seriously grateful to the Open Library for preserving access to these otherwise lost books, but it can be an uneven-to-unpleasant reading experience.
In not-HP reading:
THE OTHER LADY VANISHES by Amanda Quick – The lethal vigilante justice in Quick’s Burning Cove series continues to repel me. With only two books out, this series is so far doing an excellent job of leveraging the 1930s film-industry-adjacent setting, a middling job of serializing the characters (never a Krentz strength), and a mediocre job on the romance (which I assume is because this is romantic suspense and I have to stop evaluating her romantic relationships by romance novel standards…but I never will.)
FAMILY MAN by Jayne Ann Krentz (audiobook narrated by Amy McFadden) – First, this audiobook was available via Hoopla on the release date, so libraries for the win, people!
Second, audiobooks can ruthlessly highlight the limitations of an author’s range. Amy McFadden’s female protagonist voice is essentially the same for Krentz’s Hidden Talents, Silver Linings, and Family Man. (Hey, I like plucky, optimistic heroines who know how to cope. It’s half the reason I read pre-2K JAK.) Her male protagonist voice is the same in Hidden Talents and Family Man. I’m not putting this down to a limitation on McFadden’s part, because given the opportunity to use a different voice for Hugh Abbott (the neanderthal hero of Silver Linings), she does so. It’s just that a lot of Krentz heroes in this era are tightly-wound white men who come from an affluent background and are currently enjoying hard-won professional success.
Third: I love this book, I have always loved this book, and it is causing me a great deal of agita. I love that every action and interaction is in some way about the developing relationship between Luke and Katy. I love that the extent of the romantic conflict is they’re supposedly not each other’s type. I love that Luke is the kind of competent and protective alpha who’ll take care of your orgasms, your oil change, and your blackmailer because taking care of things is what he does. I love that Luke is Krentz’s only conventionally handsome hero (time to break out the hot Italian model gifs). And I love that the background story is about reuniting an extended family in a non-sentimental way. So what’s my problem? I love this book and I can’t freely recommend it because it is hopelessly rooted in outdated gender stereotypes. I love this book and I can’t freely recommend it because it includes workplace sexual harassment. I love this heroine and I can’t freely recommend the book because her superpower is influence and she never fixes a problem or accomplishes a goal without the intervention of her employer, her boyfriend, or her boyfriend’s dog.
Oh, and I love the dog.
The Flowers of Vashnoi, an Ekaterin Vorkosigan novella by Lois McMaster Bujold.
After re-reading Robin McKinley’s ‘Beauty’ last month, I re-read ‘Sunshine’ – I’d read it a long time ago but there was so much I didn’t recall. I loved it. It’s such an interesting world and the characters are all so memorable and distinctive. The ending worked for me in the context of the story, but I am firmly in the camp that would like a sequel – not because I feel like McKinley owes me more as a reader, but just because I enjoyed the characters and the world so much. (Now ‘Pegasus’ – I’m owed a sequel for that one, surely…)
‘I Knew You Were Trouble’ – Lauren Layne – cute and mostly angst-free entry in her Oxford/Stiletto series. Not the best – ‘I Wish You Were Mine’ was higher on angst and emotion so was much more satisfying. Cast of characters so un-diverse for NYC though #nycsowhite
After reading ‘The Gamble’ by Kristen Ashley last month I went back and re-read ‘Mystery Man’, which sent me down the wormhole of the Dream Man and Colorado Mountain series. I really liked ‘Law Man’, mostly due to the main characters, but both ‘Wild Man’ and ‘Motorcycle Man’ missed the mark with me. I discovered I don’t like motorcycle club settings – it’s just not a world that appeals to me. I get that the hero of ‘Motorcycle Man’ was supposed to be a good guy but it just didn’t work for me. ‘Wild Man’ and ‘Sweet Dreams’ were very similar (I felt like you could’ve interchanged the characters and there wouldn’t have been much difference in the story) and I wasn’t crazy about either – a distinct whiff of ‘not like the other girls’ about both. I really liked ‘Lady Luck’ though – maybe because the characters were a bit different. I may officially be all Kristen Ashley-ed out now though. Her voice is very distinctive and quirky but because of that there is a sameness about her books.
I’d ordered a bunch of Suzanne Brockmann Troubleshooters books from my library after reading ‘Out of Control’ and re-reading ‘The Unsung Hero’, and I ended up bingeing on those when they arrived. A number of Bad Decision ™ were made. I really enjoy her characters – lots of competence porn here.
Of the books I’ve read so far, I loved ‘Hot Target’ (I thought Cosmo was perfect and I really liked Jane); I thought the subplots in ‘Into the Night’ were masterful, more interesting than the main couple; and I thought ‘Gone Too Far’ – Sam & Alyssa’s book – was perfection. I missed having a WWII storyline in ‘Flashpoint’. I’m in the middle of ‘Breaking Point’ right now and I’m struggling with how emotionally constipated the hero is – he can’t talk about anything or express any emotions.
I’m also in the middle of the audiobook of ‘Over the Edge’ – my library system didn’t have it in any other format. It’s my first audiobook ever. I find I’m noticing the humor and the swearing a lot more, and I’m pulled out of the story every time the narrators pronounce a word or name differently to how I do (Starrett pronounced Stare-it rather than Star-et). And OMG it is so much more time-consuming than just reading! I’m only a few chapters in so I’m still more focused on experiencing the format and not sucked in to the story yet.
Overall I’m really enjoying the diversity of characters – not just ethnicity/race/class/sexuality but also size/shape/age – especially in the heroes.
I also re-read Cara McKenna’s ‘Unbound’ (after re-reading ‘After Hours’ last month) and she is just such an exquisite writer. Her characters feel so real. The setting in this book is totally integral to how the two characters relate to each other. And, it’s a really interesting exploration of kink. I did feel a little short-changed at the end – I would’ve liked more wrap up or epilogue!
I took advantage of a sale and read ‘Dance With Me’ by Alexis Daria, the sequel to ‘Take the Lead’ which I had really enjoyed. I liked this one too, and thought that once again Daria created a convincing conflict, both internal and external, which can be challenging in a contemporary, and I really liked both main characters. I look forward to reading more by this author.
Finally, just this morning I finished up ‘Luck is No Lady’ by Amy Sandas – I was sucked in by the sale price and the cover. I liked it – would give it a B+ – interesting characters, but gee am I sick of gambling clubs in the Regency. I did purchase the sequel, ‘The Untouchable Earl’, because of the excerpt at the end of this book.
For this upcoming month I expect I’ll finish the Troubleshooters series and maybe I will finally get through some of my TBR pile!
A cross-country move at the beginning of the month = Audio books! I listened to:
Not Becoming my Mother (Ruth Reichl) – I love her writing, and this one was special because it was read by the author herself.
The Beautiful Mystery (Louise Penny) – because nothing makes a long drive pass quickly like a good mystery!
How Not to Let Go (Emily Foster) – I read the first book a while back (maybe a year ago?) – I definitely didn’t enjoy the sequel as much as I found it much slower paced and like the author was trying to cram too much plot in, but I did enjoy seeing the characters becoming and acting like adults together.
A Mixture of Failties (Robertson Davies) – I was caving a re-read of one of my favourite books, so I decided to listen to it instead!
I also read a couple of books:
Kulti (Mariana Zapata) – this was a DNF for me last month, but I did finish it. I strongly disliked the hero (and that was why I had stopped reading a month ago – for something he had done). By the end of the book, I still disliked the hero, but I had come to dislike the heroine too, so I guess I’m OK with them being together?
Wrong to Need You (Alisha Rai) – Loved it. Maybe not quite as much as The first book in the series, but I will definitely keep reading her books.
I’m 3/4 of the way through A Queen from the North now – my thoughts on that one next month!
Okay, after a truly crummy reading month last month, I buckled down and read a *lot* this month. Not a lot was great, but not a lot was terrible. Mostly I’m just glad I have my reading groove back.
So, briefly.
The best of the month –
“Saga Volume 8” by Brian K Vaughan. Love, love this series
“The Duchess War” by Courtney Milan. I enjoyed this a lot, although now I’m blanking out on some of the plot. Honestly, I’m just anxiously awaiting more Cyclone series and Worth Saga (from the library).
“A Perilous Undertaking” by Deanna Raybourn – Reading these as fast as I can get them from the library. Amelia Peabody vibes.
“Memento Mori” by Ruth Downie. Love this mystery series for the characters.
The decent
“Hot in Hellcat Canyon” and “Wild in Whiskey Creek” by Julie Anne Long. Honestly, I don’t read a lot of small town contemporary. ( I have *issues* about small towns), but I like the way Julie Ann Long does her worldbuilding and she’s what I think of as a “smooth” writer. I don’t necessarily get blown away, but she writes in a nice non showy way and keeps the story moving. One pet peeve? The characters don’t talk about contraception and they don’t use condoms. I just have to mentally tell myself they did.
“The Match of Century” by Cathy Maxwell. This was another “smooth” book. I didn’t care about the suspense subplot, but I was intrigued by . . . possible spoiler alert . . . . . . the next hero in the series is a virgin duke. Hello, catnip!
“Alex, Approximately” by Jenn Bennett. This didn’t have quite the “You’ve Got Mail” vibe I was looking for, but it was still cute. A little more explicit than some YA, but nothing outrageous.
The “Meh”
“I Believe in a Thing Called Love” by Maureen Goo. This started out cute and made me want to watch K dramas, but there was just too much lying on top of lying.
“A Date with Death” by Julia Chapman. This was okay and not too cutesy (which is the kiss of death for me and cozy mysteries), but it did not scratch my Cormoran Strike itch. Boo.
“Death in White Tie” by Ngaio Marsh. I pretty much read her books to go back in time and because I can read them out on public with my kids and not worry about anyone judging my reading habits. 😉 Definitely some casual racism, snobbery that is typical for the era etc. But since I’ve read every Agatha Christie and see above about how I feel about contemporary cozies.
“Mother Tongue” by Bill Bryson. This was cute but dated both in some of the theories about language and speaking of casual racism, some language used. “Oriental” used to describe people? (Eyebrow raise.) It was also repetitive because I suspect it was published essays grouped together.
For audio
“Death Masks” by Jim Dresden. I’m going to have to think long and hard about if I’m going to listen to another Harry Dresden book. I clearly like glomming onto a series (see above :-)) and these are well produced and all available at our library, but Harry has said a few passing creepy comments about teenage girls that give me pause. This is why I don’t read a lot of male authors. (Shrug).
“A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet” by Becky Chambers. This was cute. It was like “Farscape” fan fiction and I mean that as a huge compliment. Fun space opera.
“Waking Gods” by Sylvain Neuvel. This was enjoyable, but I don’t like it quite as much as the YA series The Illuminae Files with a similar format.
Read:
THE SUMMER WIVES by Beatriz Williams
I don’t want to go too much into detail about this one since I won and ARC of it and the novel doesn’t come out until July , but I will say that I enjoyed it . It makes some interesting points about gender roles and racism in the 1950s( but not in the way you’d think) . However it also reads a lot like a soap opera , along the lines of DALLAS from the 80s,so if that’s not your thing I’d skip it.
MY ONCE and FUTURE DUKE by Caroline Linden
This book honestly takes a lot of suspension of disbelief . The story is a Regency about a woman who strives for independence through gambling cause her parents died and her grandpa was a jerk who dropped her off at a boarding school because he didn’t approve who his son married( the heroine’s mother ) and she has no other way to make a living except marriage and gambling. Later on she starts playing a game with the younger brother of the hero, said younger brother has a gambling problem. One night the hero comes in and stops his brother from gambling to save his life. Hero does this by running into the gambling hall and making a scene that ends with him betting 5000 pounds against a week of the heroine’s time. He wins of course and practically slings the heroine over his shoulder and heads to carriage. He intends to just take her home but Rain happens followed by forced proximity and love.
Like I said there’s a lot of suspension of belief involved here, but surprisingly the hero is not an unforgivable jerk and I actually believed they fell in love thanks to Linden’s writing talent . All in all it’s a fun Regency with catnip like the heroine pretending to be someone else for independence, a grumpy hero and plenty of sequel bait.
Reading:
A SCANDALOUS DEAL by Joanna Shupe
More likely than not, this book is eventually going to become a DNF because I’m not a huge fan of this book and have a lot of books to read, but I haven’t given up on this book yet so we’ll see. My biggest problem is that it has a lot of potential that it just hasn’t lived up to. For instance the setting is America’s gilded age, which could be a potentially interesting setting, but Shupe takes a “wallpaper historical” approach and doesn’t do the setting justice. The main character is also a woman in a man’s job which could also be interesting, but Shupe approaches it in a shallow manner along the lines of the movies Bright and Crash . Lastly the hero is inconsistent, being a charming, progressive gentleman one minute and a Misogynist jerk who creates problematic power dynamics since he is her boss. Still, I haven’t been able to stop yet so we’ll see .
DNF:
STEELHEART by Brandon Sanderson
This book isn’t bad per say , the world building is great and the female characters are plenty badass, but I’m not the audience. However if you enjoy superheroes or Brandon Sanderson and just haven’t read this one yet I’d give it a try, heck I might go back to it for the world building alone.
I read ROYALS by Rachel Hawkins, which was a fun, YA take on a royal romance.
Right now, I’m reading THE LATE SHOW by Michael Connelly. I like the BOSCH show based on Connelly’s books, and I’ve been wanting to try his books. This one is about a female detective investigating several crimes. It’s interesting to read about the inner workings and internal politics of the police department, but I’m not sure how I feel about some of the things that happen to the heroine.
After hearing about the capture of the Golden Gate killer, I read the Michelle McNamara book, I’ll Be Gone In the Dark. Fascinating both for the look at the frustrating, meticulous work (and luck) required in tracking down a cold case, but also for the look at the unique flavor of obessiveness required to do so.
I then thought I’d try another true crime and borrowed The Onion Field, but realized that what I find so compelling is the hunt for the killer. In The Onion Field, there is never any doubt who did the killing and the book includes a lot from the perspective of the killers.
I read some Lisa Jewell eons ago so borrowed her new one, Then She Was Gone. I blew through this one — story of a teenage girl that goes missing and becomes very twisty and sinister.
Now I’m reading Take The Lead — loving it so far.
@Another Kate – How is the audio version of A Mixture of Frailties? I adore Robertson Davies, but I saw a live reading done by him once and I can only hear his voice when I reread his books.
I spent the last several months on a reread of most of my favourites for rather morbid reasons, due to waiting for test results (so far, so good), but I’d gotten myself into the mindset of “I might not have much longer so I’m going to spend it with old friends.”
Most recent new reads ranged from meh! to I enjoyed it but…
A Queen from the North by Erin McRae and Racheline Maltese – I applaud the authors for adding something new to the girl meets prince story, but couldn’t really get on board overall.
The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo by Zen Cho – This was a lot of fun. I really enjoyed the slightly snarky tone.
Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff – Interesting story, but I guess I’m a Philistine. I kept feeling like I should be admiring the author’s writing style rather than immersing myself in the book.
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid – I didn’t hate it, but let’s just say I’m glad I got it on sale.
The Last Mrs Parrish by Liv Constantin – Rich people behaving badly and scheming villainesses are among my guilty pleasures, but the eventual comeuppance was too hard to believe.
@KateB – I, too, watched Little Women, having very recently reread it (see above). I enjoyed the second part more – probably because the actors were closer to ages of the characters by then. I wish Meg would get more love and I would like to see an adaptation that covers the chapter where she blows a hole in the budget by spending fifty dollars on a silk dress. She always just gets married and fades away on screen, whereas the book did devote a couple of chapters to the trials of marriage and reality vs expectation. I likes Jo calling her father out over the fact that he’s been futzing around with his book for twenty years while others pay the bills (a reality in the Alcott household) and Angela Lansbury stole every scene she was in.
I read a lot this month, but much of it was forgettable or mediocre. Two books stood out, one of which was Sarina Bowen’s Bittersweet. She’s a fairly new author for me, but I love what I’ve read so far. I’m slowly collecting her True North books, which my library doesn’t have. I only know about her because of comments here, so thank you all!
Right now I’m in the middle of Faith Hunter’s first Soulwood book, and I’m loving it so much I raced to the library shortly before closing time yesterday to get the next two in the series. I have not yet read her Jane Yellowrock books (although I really want to), but happily this spinoff has been easy to follow without the background knowledge that I’m clearly missing.
Francesca: I’m so glad your tests results are okay so far; all good wishes and thoughts and everything crossed for the rest of them! I saw your name when I was scrolling down, and I remember a comment from a while ago when you said what you’ve been going through.
Jill Q, I am obsessed with K dramas right now. One of the things that led to this is that book. That and a massive slump. But it has been fun watching them and discovering the active community surrounding them.
I just reread The Collector and The Obsession by Nora Roberts and I know I liked them the first time I read them, but I LOVED them this time around. I love how competent and capable all the heroines Roberts writes are. She has a new one coming out Tuesday and I’m super ready for it.
New Reads this month
Rogues Rush In by Tessa Dare and Christi Caldwell- Both the novellas in this book were good, but I felt like the angst to length ratio was a little off. Overall I really enjoyed both stories and will definitely reread them, but mostly they just made me want to read full length books by the same authors.
Aftermath by Kelley Armstrong – A YA romantic suspense – This was very good, but I think for a lot of people the subject is going to turn them off completely and I think that’s okay. If reading about a school shooting will upset you, don’t read this one. The sister of a boy killed by police because he was holding a gun during a school shooting has moved back to her hometown in her junior year of high school, having left immediately after the shooting for 3 years. The book is very well written, I loved the characters, but Armstrong herself said this book was written in early 2016 but the publishing schedule made the timing unfortunate. I’d give the book an A, with the caveat that the book isn’t for everyone.
Grumpy Fake Boyfriend by Jacki Lau- I liked this book! Probably not going down as a favorite book, but I can see myself rereading it. One thing that does have a little leery of the sequel; in GFB the heroine’s sister, heroine of the next book, mentions having major depressive episodes that hit every 5 years in the fall, like clockwork, and maybe I’m wrong but that seems really off to me. I’m hoping reading the book will show a more accurate picture of depression, but I’m probably going to be fairly nit-picky about that aspect of it because with all the information out there it’s not okay to have poor representation of a specific character trait that affects so many people.
I also read a couple Jennifer Clare books, specifically Beauty and the Billionaire, The Wrong Billionaire’s Bed, Once Upon a Billionaire, and Dirty Scoundrel. A consistent theme in her books seems to be heroes crossing boundaries and doing creepy things but thinking that since they know it’s creepy it’s okay. I could have forgiven that in one book, maybe, but not in several. I enjoyed Beauty and the Billionaire but Once Upon a Billionaire completely ruined it for me as the heroine of Beauty and the Billionaire behaved abominably in the latter book. In Once Upon a Billionaire a member of the royal family of some small made-up country has to go home for a royal wedding and his assistant gets sick and can’t go. The heroine of Beauty and the Billionaire recommends one of her husband’s assistants to get back at the royal hero, thinking the assistant is a hick and doesn’t understand how the upper crest works and it will be hilarious to see how much it bugs the royal hero. The assistant and the royal guy fall in love but first he’s a major ass to her, just as the heroine from BatB predicted and it’s pretty awful to read. It made me furious and I abandoned the series after that. I tried Dirty Scoundrel and it also sucked. The hero was another billionaire, but “rough” in the sense that he worked hard on the oil rigs that built his fortune (good) but also was an entitled ass who demanded respect from people while giving them absolutely none. He showed up at a country club to talk to someone and they wouldn’t let him in because he wasn’t following the dress code or a member and he hadn’t been cleared by a member and he refused to calmly discuss anything just threw a little tantrum that they wouldn’t break rules for him even though he’s rich. He went in anyway, causing an upset, then later bought the place and burnt it down. Because they were rude to him. He saw the heroine’s picture in a real estate ad, decided he wanted her, then used his fortune as a lure to get her to spend time with him while he supposedly looked for a house but plainly admitted he had hired as his real estate agent so he could hit on her. For some reason that worked on her, but he got super mad when he found out she wasn’t as wealthy as her clothes indicated as though he’s never experienced people assuming the wrong things based on how he’s dressed. Hated the book. I can see a glimmer of promise from Jennifer Clare, but I can’t get over how overbearing and awful the heroes in her books are.
And to end on a high note! The Summer Children by Dot Hutchison was amazing. Third book in a series on KU, the books aren’t romances, but they are so well written and just fantastic. Someone is killing parents and leaving the kids on an FBI agent’s doorstep. She can’t officially be on the case, but is still part of the investigation and there are a lot of appearances from past characters. There’s child sexual abuse in the book, so not for everyone, but I’ve loved this series so far. A+++ author if you like dark mysteries.
THE HENCHMEN OF ZENDA by KJ Charles: This was my least favorite KJ Charles book so far. But still 3 stars
A Delicate Affair (Decades: A Journey of African American Romance Book 1) by Evans, Lindsay: 3 stars. I want to continue the series
Unmasked by the Marquess (Regency Imposters, #1) by Sebastian, Cat: 4 stars
Wheels Up (Out of Uniform #4) by Annabeth Albert: 4 stars
Robby Riverton: Mail Order Bride by Eli Easton: 3 stars ( I just need to accept that I don’t click with this authors writing. )
@KateB: someone else in my life asked if I had read HOW TO MARRY A WEREWOLF. Now that I know its good I’ll give it a shot
I’m in a huge slump, but did pick up a book this morning when I couldn’t sleep.
I feel like my slump may be ending.
Anyway the book is one I’ve wanted to read for awhile and I’m enjoying it so far.
Raw Blue by Kirsty Eagar.
@KateB & @Francesca, I watched and found myself…. disappointed? I’m pulling my copy off the shelf for a reread because I kept thinking, What about? and Didn’t? Loved Angela Lansbury. She was the perfect Aunt March. Great point about Meg, Francesca.
Reading? It’s been a pretty good month. Had some nice angsty reads with Hurts to Love You. Sigh, so good. Not surprised by the resolution of the “mystery” surrounding the parental deaths, but that twist? That was nicely done. Then on to The Ones Who Got Away, which definitely lived up to the hype from the Bitchery, so thanks. I’d tried Roni Loren before, and she didn’t work for me, so I would never have tried this without all the recs.
Like @Deborah, I glommed the new Amanda Quick, and what she said. Although I stopped looking for the strong romance in her books awhile ago. She’s got a sort of shorthand about it that I’ve come to recognize over the last 30 odd years. Oh, and @Deborah, I agree, Family Man is one of her best. I adore it as well. NO APOLOGIES!
I’m now about half way through High Risk, Simona Ahrnstedt’s latest effort in doing for Swedish romance what Stieg Larsson did for Swedish suspense. That’s actually, kind of a good analogy. The Larsson books all had a trope they worked with: the first a murder mystery, the second a cat and mouse game and the third a courtroom drama. Ahrnstedt’s first book All In was a secret baby tropgasm. The second, Falling was the billionaire bad boy/socially conscious woman, with a little action/adventure thrown in. This one is the wounded warrior/wounded woman. Really wounded warrior, as Tom was “dead” at the end of the last book. Still no explanation for that. I guess he, like many an X-Men “got better”… Lots of missed signals and PTSD. Also, MALE friendships and, just to give you some catnip you didn’t know you needed, Tom and his buddy are hatching a plan to wreck some havoc on online trolls. The kind who send vulgar and violent messages to women. Soooooo, I’ll be going now, cause I really want to read about trolls getting IRL what they anonymously put out in the world.
@KateB I’m glad you liked Dread Nation. I’ve had the ebook for six weeks from my library (one renewal) and I now have a day to finish so that’s what I’m doing today. I can always do the whole airplane mode thing if I can’t get it done.
I’ve had a bad reading month between a combination of hitting a reading slump, tackling major projects around the house, and starting a new job I’ve only read one book in the last two weeks. Here’s a few of the books I did read and want to highlight.
The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang- I was lucky enough to read an arc of this and really enjoyed it. It features a heroine on the autism spectrum (the author is also on the spectrum) and a half-Swedish/half-Korean hero who is described as looking like David Henney and happens to be an escort. The heroine hires the hero to help her improve at sex, which she’s never enjoyed, and dating. Their relationship was so sweet (don’t worry the sex scenes are hot) and I really enjoyed getting to know them.
A Girl Like Her by Talia Hibbert- This also happens to have a heroine who is on the autism spectrum (I believe Hibbert is as well) and just a super good guy hero. I love the way the hero respects the heroine and loves her exactly as she is. Hibbert is just so great about depicting mutual respect and consent in her books which is just so refreshing and very sexy. I’ve now read all of Hibbert’s books except her latest (it was up next, but due to my slump now I have to finish several library books and arcs first) and I’m a total fangirl. I recommend her to everyone.
Hot Asset by Lauren Layne- I got an arc of this one as well and it was the last one I read before the slump really hit, but I think it was starting when I read this one. It was good with the type of snappy dialogue and fast-paced story I expect from Layne, but I never quite felt as connected to the characters or story as I would have liked. I did like the characters which was good considering I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about a Wall Street hero, but never quite got drawn into their relationship.
Force of Nature by Jane Harper- I enjoyed this one, but not quite as much as The Dry. That might be due to the slump and being so busy it took me ten days to read.
All of my plans for this weekend got cancelled! I can read all three days! I’m so excited. After Dread Nation, I have Noir by Christopher Moore due soon and an arc of Ocean Light by Nalini Singh to get to. I’m pretty sure I can get that done this weekend if my slump’s over and I put off doing any housework.
I’m a third through THE NINTH RAIN by Jen Williams, fantasy about, well, I can’t even summarize. Three disparate and uneasy traveling companions from groups that have sought to destroy or conquer the other are looking for evidence of the invaders who are destroying everything else.
That’s not even close. Violent as well as unexpectedly humorous in parts, and really really good. I am looking forward to a lot more of Jen Williams’ books.
Also, Elyse, I loved THE BROKEN GIRLS by Simone St. James. Thank you (I think it was you) for reassuring me that the girls’ relationships were everything.
@KateB, thanks for the recommendation of “The Idea of You.” I just finished it. I loved it. The characters are complex and the plot was plausible despite being improbable.
Some books by new-to-me writers and some books by writers who were recently new-to-me formed a large portion of my reading this month.
I loved, loved, loved Audra North’s GIVING IT UP, a beautifully-written story about two lonely people—both crushed by the weight of family obligations/expectations—who fumble their way toward love and acceptance through a dominance and submission relationship. (Coincidentally, I read this book only a couple of weeks before the Rec League asked for books with domme heroines.) The hero is a cop, a member of the SWAT team, who is responsible for his aging parents, his single-mother sister, and his teenage nephew. The heroine is a photographer who was raised in an ultra-conservative religious home (North has some very sharp observations about what it’s like for females in that environment) and was ostracized when she chose to attend a college her parents didn’t approve of. The hero just wants a little time where he doesn’t have to be responsible for, well, everything, where he can cede control to someone else and simply obey commands. The heroine is trying to find her own voice, she wants to escape the past that has made her too willing to be compliant; she wants to be the one who issues commands and is obeyed. What North does so well is show that, even though neither the hero nor the heroine have any experience with the D/s dynamic and even though their initial encounters do not always go smoothly, they both give something to the other that helps both of them gain the inner strength to confront their current situations and make necessary changes. I can’t recommend this book enough—one of my favorite reads of 2018 so far.
I then read North’s TWO TIMING—and liked it almost as much as GIVING IT UP. It’s set in the same world as the earlier book (the heroes of both books are cops who work in the same precinct). The plot involves twins and mistaken identity—usually the kind of thing that has me rolling my eyes, but North moves the story so smoothly that the initial mistake and the subsequent reasons for concealing the truth seem completely plausible. Both the hero and the heroine have siblings who have (or have had) major problems with drug addiction—and the book is forthright about the terrible toll addiction takes on the families of addicts. The love between hero and heroine develops at a believable pace and the anger the heroine feels when she learns the truth of the identity ruse is realistic. And, although her ethnicity does not play a major role in the book, the heroine is of Korean and Italian ancestry and I liked how North refused to make her seem “exotic” or “other”. The normalcy was refreshing and reminded me of how Alisha Rai presents her multi-cultural cast of characters.
North’s REMEMBERING YOU is the prequel to the previous two books. As in the other books, the hero here is also cop; the heroine is a journalist who has returned to her hometown to care for her ailing father. Although well-written with a sweet love story, nothing really grabbed me about the book. The conflict (the heroine does not want to worry about the hero’s safety the way she always worried about her military father’s life) seemed a little contrived. An unobjectionable book, but nothing that made it stand out either.
Despite some over-the-top caricatures of gold-digging Manhattanites, I really enjoyed Lucy Score’s THE WORST BEST MAN, a fun enemies-to-lovers read with a hero and heroine on the older side (he’s 40, she’s 34). The maid of honor and the best man at a destination wedding in Barbados try to put aside their mutual animosity for the sake of the bride and groom (their respective best friends). When the couple have to join forces to save the wedding from disaster, their feelings toward each other morph into respect and attraction. Back in New York (and Brooklyn), they continue seeing each other and many complications (some external, some self-created) ensue. I loved the book’s strong, independent heroine and the fact that she refused to allow the extremely wealthy hero to “rescue” her financially (often a trope in billionaire romances). For a story that’s manages to stay on the lighter side, there’s a lot of depth in the book as issues of wealth and the power imbalance it creates, family entanglements & dysfunction, classism, tabloid gossip, retribution, and forgiveness get full airings. (There are even some elements that touch on the #MeToo movement and non-disclosure agreements.) Highly recommended.
After loving Callie Hart’s MISTER NORTH last month, I absolutely inhaled her latest book, DIRTY. I read it in an evening—and it was Bad Decisions Book Club all the way (it’s also a strong nominee for the sexiest cover of the year, imho). The book has an incredibly propulsive plot: a tough woman (terribly abused as a child, but now a strong, determined adult) gets caught in a snowstorm while driving to her sister’s wedding. She has to share the one available room in an overbooked hotel with a smoking-hot stranger. You think you know where this story is going and, in part, you’re right…at first. Yeah, the heroine does have wild-crazy-enforced-proximity-in-a-snowbound-hotel-room-sex with the guy (and, baby, is it hot!), but what happens the next day comes completely out of left field—in a good way. I love it when a book confounds my expectations and surprises me like that. So I was absolutely tearing up the pages, noticing how close I was to the end of the book and wondering how the heck Hart was going to tie everything up when I suddenly got to the last page and realized…aarrgghh—cliffhanger ending! Noooooooo!! Now I have to wait for the next book.
So, while waiting for Hart’s sequel to DIRTY, I read her BLOOD & ROSES series, which consists of six novellas (DEVIANT, FRACTURE, BURN, FALLEN, TWISTED, and COLLATERAL); but, because you have to read the novellas in order and because none of them can be read as a stand-alone, it’s best to think of BLOOD & ROSES as one very long novel rather than six interconnected shorter ones. The heroine is a doctor who has been searching for her abducted sister for several years (the sister is, in turn, the heroine of another Hart series, DEAD MAN’S INK). In the course of her search, the heroine meets and begins a relationship with the hero—a man who has a LOT of issues and who works for an underworld crime boss. The plot is very twisty—no one is ever who they seem—and just when you think you know where the story is going, it surprises you. There is frequent, bloody violence and frequent, very rough sex (often bordering on non-consensual). The story is dark and angsty—which is not a problem for me; however, there were two issues that did bother me: first, the hero & heroine indulge in “breath play”—he chokes her out several times—in ways that don’t seem completely consensual to me. Secondly, the hero’s nickname for the heroine is “Angry Girl”, which made me, well, angry. We all know how the male power structure uses women’s understandable (and completely justified) anger against them and how the “angry woman” is such a cultural caricature—it just seemed all kinds of wrong for the heroine—a woman doing her best in circumstances way beyond her experience and control—to be given this nickname. But, all things considered, I found my objections did not override my enjoyment of this rapid-paced and twisty story, but YMMV.
Then I read Hart’s stand-alone ROOKE, an older-woman-younger-man story with a heroine who is still recovering from a devastating loss several years before. She begins to emerge from her fog of grief and despair with the help of her friends in a romance book club and the decade-younger hero who comes from a wealthy family but has a history of stealing cars. I found the hero to be a little too cocky (wait—can I still use that word?) for my liking, but I loved the heroine—a woman who has experienced the worst loss imaginable and returns to life and love in slow, believable degrees.
After reading the first two books in Carolyn Crane’s Undercover Associates series last month, I read the third, INTO THE SHADOWS, which I liked very much. There’s a reformed party girl, a good guy infiltrating the gang of a very bad guy, human trafficking, intense violence, and the search for a long-lost mother all wrapped around a secret-baby/second-chance-romance plot. Also, some really hot “society-princess & low-life-crime-thug” quasi-role-play hate-fucking… although, is it ever really about the hate?
And then I read Crane’s fourth Undercover Associates book, BEHIND THE MASK, which features an older hero and heroine (both are close to 40) who have each been terribly damaged—physically and emotionally—by their own choices and the choices of others. Most of the story takes place in a mountainous area of South America and pits local farmers against the narco syndicate. Crane’s descriptions of the terrain and the rare local flowers are beautiful and the love story of two very distrustful people trying to learn how to trust again is written with tenderness and passion. Like all the Undercover Associates books, there’s a high degree of violence, but if you can tolerate that, the book is very good.
Has there been some sort of royal nuptials in the news these past few weeks? I’m not sure, but there certainly have been a lot of royal romances showing up in my “Recommended” list—and one of them was THE KING’S HORRIBLE BRIDE by one of my favorites, Kati Wilde. Although marketed as a piece-of-fluff-royal-wedding-tie-in (with, frankly, a rather tacky cover), the book features some of Wilde’s trademark characteristics: a thoughtful heroine, an unintentionally thoughtless hero, emotional pain, wildly passionate sex, and a contrition/redemption arc for the hero. In this case, the heroine has been secretly betrothed to the king for 12 years; during which time, he has essentially ignored her—a fact he only begins to understand once their engagement is announced. Key quote: “Carelessness is a passive, inactive thing, but it can still harm. Caring means making the effort.” I also liked, “Even the best intentions are worth shit when a choice is taken away.”
Alexa Riley’s THE KING’S INNOCENT BRIDE is another book in the same series as Kati Wilde’s book. It’s very much what I think of as an Alexa Riley book: sweet, virginal heroine, beyond-alpha hero, insta-love/lust, lots of sex, and the element of breeding fetishism where impregnating a woman is essentially a male’s claiming ritual.
Natasha Knight has become a bit of a guilty pleasure for me. Her books are extremely dark, angsty, and violent; and they pretty much follow the same basic plot: a morally-compromised hero seeks revenge/retribution against some sort of criminal enterprise (often one with which the hero himself is associated). The heroine—who is generally quite young and often a virgin—is only tangentially involved in the criminal activity (either by being related to someone involved or because of the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time), but she inadvertently becomes a target for the hero and for some other very bad people. The hero rescues/abducts the heroine; captivity and/or enforced proximity ensue, along with a lot of frequently-violent and barely-consensual sexual activity. However, Knight makes this plot work for her. UNHINGED (and its free download prequel, BETRAYED) follows Knight’s standard setup: a Lebanese-American woman is tracked down by a former soldier who thinks she assisted in a betrayal that led to the deaths of some of his men and to his own severe injuries. They return to Beirut to try to determine who was really responsible. There’s an element “angry punishment” sex, so you’ve been warned.
Knight’s CAPTIVE BEAUTY has some of her standard plot points (a woman becomes a man’s plaything in order to save her brother from punishment in a drug deal gone wrong), but includes an interesting subplot about the different ways people process childhood abuse. As children, both the hero and the heroine, along with their respective siblings, experienced abuse (descriptions of which, although not overly detailed, could be triggering); how each of them, as adults, handle those traumatic experiences forms a major component of the book.
Knight’s CAPTIVE, MINE is an extremely dark story about the daughter of a major drug supplier; she is about to enter the witness protection program when the hero kidnaps her. The sexual activity in this book is extremely rough and violent—and much of it cannot be viewed as consensual, even when it appears that the captive heroine consents. The hero is terribly conflicted and his behavior is sometimes completely out of control—making the sex scenes more scary than sexy. As with Skye Warren & Annika Martin’s PRISONER or A. Zavarelli’s BEAST, I think CAPTIVE, MINE should be read as a suspense/thriller rather than a romance because so much of the “romance” is rendered moot by what is undoubtedly Stockholm Syndrome. Also, I found Knight’s narrative choices for this book rather baffling: the chapters from the heroine’s point of view are written in first person, while the chapters from the hero’s point of view are written in third person. It was rather disconcerting. I wish she’d chosen one voice and stuck with it!
And what would a month of reading be for me without at least one visit with Lexi Blake’s Masters & Mercenaries books? Last month, someone commented that, after the first five books in the series, subsequent M&M books focus less on the bdsm lifestyle and more on the individual couple negotiating their own power exchange (all the while dodging bullets and hunting double agents). A VIEW TO A THRILL appears to be a transitional book in the series. There are still references to the lifestyle and the bdsm club everyone frequents, but the central relationship develops with bdsm as almost an afterthought. The heroine is a prickly 27-year-old coder/hacker with a severely-damaged leg, the result of an episode of horrific child abuse. She’s also a virgin. The hero is British and a former member of MI6. One element of the book I really liked was how the hero includes physical care for the heroine (such as PT for her leg, along with yoga and nourishing food for her overall health) in their “contact.” The emphasis here is on emotional growth much more than using clamps or floggers.
@Alexandra wrote: “…used his fortune as a lure to get her to spend time with him while he supposedly looked for a house but plainly admitted he had hired as his real estate agent so he could hit on her. For some reason that worked on her, but he got super mad when he found out she wasn’t as wealthy as her clothes indicated…”
I assume she wasn’t murderously angry that he sabotaged time she could have spent EARNING A LIVING BY SERVING REAL CLIENTS only because she was, in fact, looking to land a rich douchebag.
I knew that book was going to be problematic. I’m so glad I heeded my instincts. At this point, any book that uses wealth as a selling feature is an automatic no from me because rich people are the WORST even in fiction. Bleh.
I read “The Officer and the Southerner” by Rose Gordon. Mail order bride trope. With the exception of the heroine’s illness (which was lingered over to the point of boredom), the whole story felt rushed. H/h both seemed to stomp off in a huff and expect the other to be a mindreader in lieu of, I dunno, actually communicating with each other; the heroine was the bigger offender here, but both were guilty. The ending was even more rushed, if that’s possible. The idea was good, but the execution all around was lacking, due to speed or not enough character development.
I just started “Chaos Station”, an m/m Firefly-esque space adventure series, by Kelly Jensen and Jenn Burke. It’s already clear that Felix and Zander have a pile of baggage they need to sort through.
Reading ahoy! I finished a lot of books this month and am on track to surpass my goal of 100 by year’s end – woot woot!
Excellent:
The Unofficial Guide to Las Vegas 2018 by Bob Sehlinger: i haven’t been to Vegas in about seven years and found this to be a good guide to the next trip there that my husband and I hope to take in the next year or two.
Very Good:
The Martian by Andy Weir: I finally got around to reading this because my husband read it and saw the movie when it came out and wanted me to read it too. I thought the plot and the science were great, but the characters were pretty flat and some of the writing was clunky.
Your Best Health Care: Get Doctor Discounts, Save with Better Health Insurance, Find Affordable Prescriptions by Frank Lalli: A good guide on how to navigate the health care system from a financial perspective.
Peak by Roland Smith: This is a YA about a teen boy who gets in trouble in New York and is sent to live with his father who owns and runs a climbing/expedition company. His dad wants him to summit Everest and become the youngest person to do so. There is a lot of great stuff going on here – the setting is amazingly well described, there are complex family dynamics, there are some great twists. My only complaint is some of the decisions made by some of the characters were not as well explained as I would have liked them to be.
Good:
Some Clouds by Paco Ignacio Taibo II: This is noir crime fiction set in Mexico City. It is very short so the characters aren’t fully fleshed out, but the crime and corruption in the story were well plotted and explained. I read this for my mystery bookclub.
Cheater by Rachel Van Dyken: There is a lot going on here – the hero was engaged at one point to the heroine’s sister and the night before the wedding was caught in bed with the heroine’s other sister. I think this is a no-go for a lot of people – the hero is labeled a man-whore, there is the cheating thing (which is somewhat explained), and the heroine’s sister was once engaged to the hero – so be warned. However, for the most part, the author made it work for me. I don’t think I will read the second in the series, but haven’t totally ruled it out.
Self-Made Man: One Woman’s Journey Into Manhood and Back Again by Norah Vincent: A woman decided to dress and pass herself off as a man to see what it felt like to be perceived as male – she joined an all male bowling league, took a retreat with monks, tried to date women, and visited a lot of strip clubs. While it was interesting, it felt incomplete and limited. TW for talk of mental illness and suicide.
The Talisman Ring by Georgette Heyer: I know this is heresy, but this read to me more like historical fiction than a romance. And while it was well-written and funny, it didn’t give me the romance feels if that makes any sense.
The Most Dangerous Duke in London by Madeline Hunter: I loved the writing and the verbal sparring between the hero and heroine in this one, but the ending felt off – the conflict was very convoluted and lacked an emotionally satisfying conclusion.
Buttercream Bump Off by Jenn McKinlay: Look, I know the mystery and writing on this weren’t the strongest, BUT I love the friendship between the three main characters AND how the cupcake baking (and eating) process is so lovingly described. This is the second in the series and I plan to read the third.
Meh:
Good Time Girl by Candace Schuler: Wealthy socialite decides to have a fun summer with a rodeo cowboy.
The Duke’s Guide to Correct Behavior by Megan Frampton: duke/governess trope.
At Your Command by Julie Miller: Special forces hero and lawyer heroine married on impulse – after a deployment, the hero is back and they have to figure out if they can make the marriage work. TW for PTSD.
Fail by Rick Skwiot: a standalone police procedural set in contemporary St. Louis.
The Bad:
The Three Weismanns of Westport by Cathleen Schine: A modern day retelling of Sense and Sensibility without any of the heart, humor, sly wit, or charm of the original. A very dreary take on the story.
@Alexandra: Regarding the heroine’s sister from GFB, she may have seasonal depression. I have depression in general and take anti-depressants for it, but I always find it gets a little bit harder to battle around fall and winter. I live in New England and there are times when the sun starts going down at 4pm. I really should get a SAD lamp for it.
@Kristen – have you read Brockmann’s Tall Dark & Dangerous series? I freaking love Prince Joe (the first book) – working class hero SEAL meets aristocratic assistant to a prince – so, so, so good. Also in that series I love Forever Blue, Frisco’s Kid, and Night Watch. On a twist too, The Admiral’s Bride focuses on an older widower hero and younger heroine – which is different than the standard Brockmann.
I had two long train trips this past month, so I got quite a bit of reading done. I bought the first book in J.R. Ward’s Black Dagger Brotherhood when it was on sale recently. I know I’m late to this series, but it was an enjoyable way to pass a train trip. I’ve read several more in the series. I also had bought two of Julie Ann Long’s Hellcat Canyon series when they were on sale months ago. Then I forgot about them. The third was on sale, I discovered that I already had the first two and bought the third. I am not always a fan of contemporary – because it is easier for me to suspend disbelief about plot lines in historicals — but I enjoyed all three very much and am looking forward to the 4th.
I read Two to Love by Lexie Blake, which is a series that I think is going to intersect with her Masters and Mercenaries series. @DiscoDollyDeb – I also like the Lexie Blake books that are set at Top (Sean Taggart’s restaurant) that feature injured vets (both male and female).
I just finished Beneath the Scars by Cherise Sinclair, which is another book in her Shadowlands series.
I’m trying to decide whether to read Alexis Daria’s books or the next Black Dagger Brotherhood books.
Like @Francesca, I am curious about the quality of the Robertson Davies audiobooks. I heard him speak at a graduation in 1983 (the year before mine) and fell in love with his voice and then his work. I think that I’ve read everything he’s written, but if the audiobooks are good, I might add them to my collection. Hopefully, @AnotherKate will see these questions and be able to answer after she is done unpacking from her move.
@Amanda and @Alexandra — It’s the “every five years” part of that description that raised my eyebrow. I also have depression in general plus SAD, but it hits every summer, not every X summers, and I don’t understand how the “every X seasons like clockwork” would work. Like, maybe it’s only particularly bad-weathered falls? but weather isn’t on a five-year cycle like that.
@KateB : you and I have uncannily similar book tastes. Can I stalk you of Goodreads or do you have a blog?
I’m loving Armistace. I’m also reading An Uncommon Woman about the Emperess Frederick but it is difficult going because damn her life was a long hard slog. (It is wonderful but so sad that this brilllant woman gave birth to a narcissistic idiot, Kaiser Wilhelm).
I’ve decided the Weimar republic-esque and Gaslamp America/Fin de Siecle are my catnip.
I’ve fallen into the Holley Trent Afótama Legacy hole. I’m sort of binging. I’m breaking up the binging with the shiny, new releases.
BENEATH THE SCARS by Cherise Sinclair – This was a wonderful addition to the Shadowlands series.
J. Kenner’s Man of the Month series. I’m enjoying the lightness of these books and how she folds in the calendar contest to the storyline without it being repetitious.
CASHMERE & CAMO by Erin Nicholas – This was the third in the Billionaires in Blue Jeans trilogy. It’s a light, fun contemporary. It’s always nice to see characters improve without it being necessitated by the other half of the couple.
I got my royal wedding fix by reading THE PRINCESS TRAP by Talia Hibbert. This was a pretty fabulous read and I’m planning on reading more of her stuff.
I got my monthly dose of Lani Lynn Vale with her MAYBE DON’T WANNA. I expected something different based on the previous month’s book and was pleasantly surprised. I’m really not sure why I enjoy her books so much. I just blame it on book crack and enjoy it.
THE OTHER LADY VANISHES by Amanda Quick – I love the setting. This seems to be light on romance vs. mystery/suspense formula that she has going on with these books. I’m okay with that. She has varying levels of romance throughout her books, so I’m used to it. Either way, she writes an entertaining story.
FIGHTING FOR EVERYTHING by Laura Kaye – This was amazeballs. Noah is worth all the swoon. It’s really a fabulous tale of a returning soldier dealing with his injuries, PTSD, and reacclimating to civilian life. Ms. Kaye spun an amazing story.
THE GREATEST RISK by Kristen Ashley – This one was a good addition to the Honey series. I originally wasn’t sure where she was going to go with this one, but I liked how she laid it out. Though, I don’t think that BDSM is her strong suit.
REBEL HEART by Vi Keeland & Penelope Ward – I’m just starting this one and I expect things will get rougher before it gets better, since the previous book ended on a cliffhanger.
A busy month of reading for me, but few greats in there.
Favourite of the Month:
Sherwood Smith’s CROWN DUEL/COURT DUEL. This is a cosy fantasy novel on the borderline between adult and YA. The protagonist is an impoverished young countess who wages war against the cruel king with her brother. It’s very character-driven and the major plot elements are rushed through, but I loved the romance elements and the worldbuilding. I wouldn’t read the appendix of stories from the hero’s POV, which took away from my experience a bit.
Good:
AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION, Alyssa Cole. Civil War romance with a wonderful heroine, important things to say about white privilege, and a very meh hero.
STRANGE PRACTICE, Vivian Shaw. Urban fantasy with a few pacing problems and a really fun pastiche of vampire fiction. Sweet romance subplot.
Meh:
OATHS, Lindsay Buroker. This was a welcome return to Ridge and Sardelle of the DRAGON BLOOD series, but not very memorable.
LICENSE TO ENSORCELL, Katherine Kerr. Choppy urban fantasy with inconsistent characterisation, but a quick read with some fun scenes.
CAN YOU KEEP A SECRET?, Sophie Kinsella. Started well but lost steam in the second half and the hero was pretty insufferable.
THE UNDOMESTIC GODDESS, Sophie Kinsella. Same issue as the other Kinsella, though the hero was better and I enjoyed it more. I don’t think Kinsella is for me.
THE HATING GAME, Sally Thorne. Another contemporary romance (workplace and enemies to lovers). Hero and heroine both seemed much younger than their ages and I didn’t warm to either of them.
WRATH OF EMPIRE, Brian McClellan. Epic flintlock fantasy. Still struggling to warm to one of the POV characters, which makes this new trilogy a bit of a slog in places, but I’ll be keen on the next book.
STOLEN SONGBIRD, Danielle Jensen. YA fantasy romance with arranged marriage trope. Went from hatred to undying love too rapidly for my taste, which was a pity because I liked the worldbuilding a lot. It felt very ‘Goblin Market’.
Did not like:
THE GUERNSEY LITERARY AND POTATO PEEL PIE SOCIETY, Mary Ann Shaffer. Recommended by a friend, but so saccharine and full of flat characters. The book also makes next to nothing of the epistolary format.
Did not finish:
DIVISION OF THE MARKED series, March McCarron. Fantasy with some intriguing ideas, but the villain is a serial sexual abuser and almost every character suffers some sort of sexual abuse during the book and a half I read. Not for me.
EVERY LAST MINUTE, Ellen Smith. Loved the characters in this sci-fi novel about a couple affected by a school shooting, but it’s really about a decision leading up to potentially changing the timeline rather than time travel itself. If you’re the sort of reader who loves to think through the mechanics of sci-fi/fantasy elements, you’ll love this, but I am not and I did not.
CHARMING, Elliott James. Urban fantasy. I was kind of sad about this one because it has lots of recommendations, but heroes posturing over women they’ve just met is one of my least favourite tropes and there are just too many books!
Finally sitting down with Jo Goodman’s Dennehy sisters series. I’m beyond halfway through the third book, and finding the hero a bit off-putting. The first and second books had plenty of crazysauce, vintage Goodman plotting. This one has a completely bizarre first encounter between the H/H, and it’s made the entire story off kilter for me. That being said, I’ll be on to the fourth book soon.
Was someone here keeping track of books where the hero and heroine get trapped in a closet together? Because I’ve got one, “Wicked in His Arms” by Stacy Reid. It’s sexy and a page-turner, but fair warning the closet sex is totally ridiculous and OTT. I liked it enough to look at the author’s other books, and I found a novella, “The Viscount and I”, which had a trope I can’t resist, which is when the hero is lusting/pining for the heroine from afar since forever, and then through luck or accident, she just falls in his lap. So definitely worth the $1.99, for me anyway, plus the Regency wallpaper is thrown in for free.
I picked up “A Pregnant Courtesan for the Rake” because I couldn’t believe they had slapped that HP title onto a historical! But it’s by Diane Gaston, so I’m sure it’ll be good.
Now on to the really good stuff: I am currently wallowing in “A Scandal in the Night” by Elizabeth Essex, and I love, love, love it. It’s her 3rd Reckless Brides series book, and I highly recommend all of them. This one is actually distracting my mind from horrible current events. Essex has her own unique and beautiful writing style, but if you like Meredith Duran, Hoyt, or Joanna Bourne, you should love her books. No wallpaper here, but real three dimensional historical world building.
Read in May ~
— Andy Weir’s The Martian seemed like the perfect comfort read early in the month when I was sick. This was probably my fifth re-read and I enjoyed it yet again.
— The Thought Readers by Dima Zales which is currently free to Kindle readers. The premise was interesting, but I didn’t care overmuch for the lead character.
— First Touch: A Paranormal Suspense Story by Teyla Branton which is currently free to Kindle readers. I enjoyed it and would read on.
— Driven to Temptation: A Romantic Comedy by Melia Alexander; this was a fun read.
— The Omega’s Bodyguard by Dessa Lux. This had lots of adult content and too little story; I’d have preferred the reverse.
— the graphic novel Mercy Thompson: Hopcross Jilly by Patricia Briggs and Rik Hoskin. I’m not sorry to have read this, but it’s not what I’d call an uplifting story.
— the contemporary romance The Ones Who Got Away by Roni Loren which is the first book in a series that takes place twelve years after a high school shooting. I’ve read comments that critique the shooting scenario, but this did not seem in poor taste. I’ll happily read on in the series.
— the historical romance Summer Campaign by Carla Kelly.
– the portal fantasy Namesake by Kate Stradling; I suspect I’ll re-read this at some point.
– M.L. Buchman’s currently free Daniel’s Christmas (The Night Stalkers Book 3).
– quite enjoyed Keira Andrew’s historical male/male romance Semper Fi; I’ll definitely be revisiting this book.
– enjoyed the slightly futuristic male/male romance Evolved by N.R. Walker
– re-read with pleasure Cut & Run by Madeleine Urban and Abigail Roux; this is a male/male mystery romance and the first of a series.
— For my book group, The Alienist by Caleb Carr. The book was lengthy, interesting, and dismal since it dealt with a serial killer. It came across as incredibly well researched. It’s not a book that I see myself re-reading.
— Betsy James’ fantasy Roadsouls which was very different from the book above. This came to me via inter-library loan. I have absolutely no idea why I requested it, but I’m glad I did.
— a graphic novel that had me chuckling at times: Big Mushy Happy Lump: A Sarah’s Scribbles Collection by Sarah Andersen
— Elizabeth Moon’s Once A Hero which I quite enjoyed. According to Amazon, this falls into the category of military science fiction.
— Katharine Ashe’s historical romance The Prince: A Devil’s Duke Novel; this featured a prince in hiding and a young woman, in disguise, studying to be a surgeon. Both characters had issues (he was missing part of his leg, she had what I think we’d now describe as anxiety and OCD). It was an enjoyable read.
— re-read Lyn Gala’s Prelude to Claimings, Tails, and Other Alien Artifacts; Claimings, Tails, and Other Alien Artifacts; Assimilation, Love, and Other Human Oddities; and Affiliations, Aliens, and Other Profitable Pursuits. These are male/male romances that feature an alien as one of the main characters. They are favorites.
— also re-read Cooper West’s The Protector; Rescued: A “Parker’s Sanctuary” Story (this is currently free to Kindle readers); Parker’s Sanctuary; and Second Chances (a short).
I haven’t commented in months, but I did want to stop in to say that I’m working on a reread of the Harry Potter Series, and I find it enjoyable as an adult. I’m catching different things I don’t think I would have as a teen.
May has been an interesting month. I started it by being demoted to part time because business wasn’t good, which threw me into a bit of a tailspin. I lost all interest in ejat I had been reading (the new Courtney Milan, which I had been enjoying up until that point) and decided to re-read my go-to comfort read, Three Fates by Nora Roberts. This took me until this past Monday to finish because I was going on interviews as well as preparing all the marketing for my chorus’s spring concert, which was last Sunday (so much fun!).
After finishing Three Fates, I started rereading The Thing About Love by Julie James (for the third time). That book is so much fun and I am really excited for the tv show if it gets picked up.
I’ve got the next week off (I’m starting a new job on the 4th and wanted to decompress first), so hopefully I’ll get a lot of reading time in while I am home.
I’m currently struggling through Midnight Promise by Hebby Roman. It’s an uneven historical romance for me because the heroine gets shit done while the hero is like, “Here are all my problems. You take care of them for me.”
I love the audiobook of Devil’s Bride and think Simon Prebble did a great job with the characters. My library used to carry the first dozen or so Cynster books on audio and I glommed through them all when I worked at a data entry job. But they eventually weeded down the collection and got rid of almost all of them. When I saw the Devil’s Bride audiobook on BRIDGES last year I was so happy. It brought back memories of when I first listened to it almost 20 years ago. I painted my mom’s kitchen while listening to that book. When I have a big paint project, I still try to find a Simon Prebble/Stephanie Laurens book to help pass the time.
I’ve picked up a ton of books at the library but haven’t been able to make myself read any of them. Instead, I reread The Bride by Julie Garwood and started rereading The Wedding. I’m hoping they will help jump start my desire to dive into a good book again. I’m really far behind on my Goodreads challenge.
And now that it’s gardening season, I’ve grabbed a few audiobooks to enjoy. I love having something to do with my hands when I listen to books. Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly and The Shape of Water by Guillermo Del Toro are checked out from the library. And I have Circe by Madeline Miller and A Madness So Discreet by Mindy McGinnis on hold.