Time for the most evil recommendation feature we have: READY, SET, GO!
Here are the rules:
We pick a specific sub-genre, trope, or type of romance, and we have to make ONE recommendation for that type.
ONE. YES, ONE.
And no more than two sentences as to why. It’s a challenge! Which one book do you pick to fill that rec?
This month we have a guest request from Susan T:
“Since I don’t have to get up quite so early to take the kids to school, I thought that right now might be a great time to have a list of recommendations of books that are likely to re-up one’s membership in the Bad Decisions Book Club.
Are there any books that you can recommend that are un-putdownable?
Thanks!”
Any genre, but just one rec.
Ready, set, GO!
Sarah: Lately I’ve been deep diving into the Murderbot Diaries, which I’m having a hard time putting down because there’s sarcasm AND action and I’m here for both. BUT, and I’m breaking my own rule here, if I had to put one book as the VIP Elite Access Pass to Bad Decisions Book Club, hmmm.
The Unleashing by Shelly Laurenston, with the caveat that for some readers, Laurenston’s writing can be like cilantro: it might make the dish superb or taste like soap. For me, more cilantro, please. There’s action, sexytimes, pining, snarky characters, ass kicking, and women being reborn into powerful, unlimited lives where they can do whatever they want and enjoy their desires and their incredible strengths. Might have to re-read this series next.
Sneezy: *vibrates on spot* *implodes*
All right, the pokeball I’m throwing this time is the Daevabad Trilogy by S.A. Chakraborty AND I KNOW I’M CHEATING BUT I DON’T CARE AND NEITHER WILL YOU ONCE YOU START READING!!!!! It has djinn and magic and myths takes an incredibly deep, honest look at racism, justice, and what it means to work an entire society out of the cycle of violence and revenge. This magical Islamic world is built on a solid foundation of research and respect, Nahri is my baby, I want to knock Ali and Dara’s heads together, and somehow, no matter the terrible decisions they make, I still love them.
The final book will be out later next month, which is a curse and a blessing because you WILL want to read ALL THREE BOOKS AT ONCE!!!!
…but fine, I guess I like the last one best, because it’s answering my QUESTIONS!!!!!!
Sarah: So The Empire of Gold, then, huh? 😀
Catherine: Oh God, I’m renewing my membership pretty much nightly at present, how on earth do I single out just one thing?
I am just going to go with the most recent book to completely delight me, which was Paladin’s Grace, by T. Kingfisher. Marvellous characters, plenty of humour, enough suspense to make it hard to put down, and a very endearing romance. And so many people who are working really hard at being good and kind to the people around them, even when it’s hard. There are a number of severed heads/rotting golems populating this book, which may pose a problem for some people – but I’m a complete wuss who can’t cope with violence in books or with horror anything and they didn’t bother me because there was so much other good stuff, so I don’t think one’s tolerance for horror has to be all that high. I loved this book.
Amanda: Should I go comforting re-reading or marathon re-reading?
Sarah: Oooh, tough question.
Amanda: I feel like we just did comfort books, so I’m tempted to do the latter.
The Ones Who Got Away by Roni Loren. The whole series (4 books) is wonderful and each one is definitely a ticket to the front of the line of BDBC. Emotional slow burns that will leave you a weepy mess.
Sarah: Oh, that sounds cathartic, too.
Amanda: Big warning of course that the central characters survived a school shooting, but the trauma is handled very well.
Shana: I vote for Alyssa Cole’s Off the Grid series. Romances with a touch of suspense (or suspenseful stories with a bit of luv) are the most likely kind of book to send me into the BDBC. I adored the characters in this mini-apocalyptic series, about an intertwined group of friends and family trying to stay safe, and figure out why the world’s electricity turned off. The family connections are so warm and comforting, and keep the storylines from feeling too stressful.
The first book is great, but my favorite is probably the second, Signal Boost. The m/m romance is epic. Although, warning for off-page sexual assault.
Aarya: I’m trying to think of a rec that I haven’t discussed on the site before… hmm, I’ll go with Carla de Guzman’s How She Likes It, a boss-secretary romance set in Manila and Shanghai. My romance roots began in Harlequin Presents billionaire angst, and I’m a sucker for certain tropes like boss/secretary (even though they can be very problematic!).
What I loved about this book is the trope role-reversal: the CEO is the heroine Isabel and her new assistant is single dad Adam. It gave me all the happy tropey feels (hence the “un-putdownable”) but it also navigated the trope’s questionable aspects very neatly. I am always interested in reading books that subvert familiar tropes in a new setting. It’s like saying hi to an old friend (one that is cooler now than they were in the past).
Lara: For your consideration: The Soldier’s Scoundrel by Cat Sebastian ( A | BN | K | G | AB ). I burnt through it in a delicious afternoon/evening/night, with not a regret in sight.
OK, your turn! What about you?
Give us your one (ONE) recommendation for the Romance You Could Not Put Down.
Ready, Set, Go!
Jeaniene Frost’s THE NIGHT PRINCE series.
Look, I am a life-long member of the BDBC*, I discovered Nalini Singh with one free daily deal didn’t stop until I’d caught up (A rough estimate? 22 books in one month. No such thing as free, zero regrets).
And yet, whenever I go read/check one line in any of the first three books of “The Night Prince”… I end up re-reading all three.
And all the love in the world to LOVE LETTERING. As a bunch of romance authors was “complaining” on Twitter: how dare Kate Clayborn write so beautifully?
*Ah! The Old Days when I had to bring the lamp under the covers so Mom wouldn’t catch me reading
My all-time go to that I have reread multiple times and don’t put down till done is Devil in Winter by Lisa Kleypas. It’s like a comfort blanket!
This is cheating because they aren’t romances, but Suzanne Palmer’s “Finder” and its sequel “Driving the Deep” are utterly unputdownable. The protagonist is lucky, creative, and resourceful as he careens around the galaxy solving problems and trying to do the right thing. I just bought them both in hardback with zero regrets and am hoping for more!
Very very hard for me to narrow down but i will try.
Authors: Lisa Kleypas, Sarah MacLean.
I had a very interesting unputdownable experience last summer. So where I work have a server hack and my department was one of the ones that had lost everything. So literally all I could do was read my Kindle and occasionally answer the phone. I was reading The Evil Queen by Gena Showalter (without realizing it was YA, but still loved it) and got so engrossed I would glare at my phone when it rung. It was a great read and an interesting take on the Snow White mythos.
I keep joining BDBC for the Gaslight Mysteries by Victoria Thompson. The romance is a hella stretched out will they or won’t they but it makes sense because of class differences. The heroine is a midwife who has largely rejected her Fifth Avenue upbringing and her crime solving partner is a the only uncorrupt cop in City Hall. The books offer a very gritty look into the lives of lower class and immigrant Americans in 1890s New York. I love them.
Oh my, so many recommendations to keep in my back pocket! Thanks, Bitchery!
The most un-put-downable title I can think of was All In by Simona Ahrnstedt, because that book is just bonkers layered on bonkers, frosted with bonkers, topped with whipped cream and a bonkers cherry.
Virtually anything by Kristen Ashley! Rock Chicks series or Dream Man….yummy!
To be honest, everything I’ve read by Rose Lerner has been unputdownable.
I just stayed up waaay too late last week to finish Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts, thinking while I did so, “wow, this is a bad decision.” and yet, it was the right decision. It is not *a romance* necessarily, but it has a romance in it (and a HEA), and is most easily compared to the Westing Game by Ellen Raskin (An excellently strange YA novel from my childhood). Plus it’s set not just in Boston but in Camberville! So I got
allmost of the in jokes!Wow! That’s lots of recommendations. There are quite a few that I’ve read, and agree with how un-putdownable they are, but I’ve got a giant list of new ones to look into. Thanks all!
My suggestion would be Kill the Queen by Jennifer Estep. I inhaled the first two but haven’t read the third yet. Fantasy romance with a strong female main character.