Whatcha Reading? May 2020 Edition, Part One

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1. Jadeigh says:

   May 9, 2020 at 4:20 am

   I just found out this site a few weeks ago. Someone from Dramabeans commented and shared about Smart Bitches, Trashy Books and now I’m here, sharing the news that I’ve fallen in love with the historical romance genre thanks to your reviews.

   I’ve finished reading Once Upon a Tower last month. It wasn’t my first brush with historical romance actually. I’ve read the first two chapters of Pride and Prejudice last year (or was it 2018? can’t remember tbh), but life happened (hint: I just got lazy ). Once I’m done with my cousin’s assignment today, I will go back to that book and treat myself with To Have and To Hoax (once again, thanks to your review!).
2. Mikaela says:

   May 9, 2020 at 4:39 am

   So I recently read Unreal Alchemy by Tansy Rayner Roberts. While I don’t normally read books set at universities, it was exactly what I needed. So good.
   I also just read and re-read a bunch of Vivian Arend books. *happy sigh*

   Otherwise, I seem to be restlessly jumping between books. I have started a bunch, and there is nothing wrong with the books, but I just can’t finish them. Which is very frustrating.
3. Kit says:

   May 9, 2020 at 5:47 am

   Week seven of lockdown and an well and truly fed up. Seems to be no end in sight of it in the UK, I feel Sunday’s lockdown easing plan by the government will be anticlimactic. I know that lots of people are in the same situation but it’s frustrating not being able to make plans and not knowing (especially having ASD) plus I’ve hit the point where my tolerance of preschooler TV has crashed.

   Anyway, rant over I’ve read Poison Study, which was brilliant (thanks for the rec) and will be reading the next books (We’ll at least until the series fatigue sets in, unfortunately a common problem for many book series). Apart from that, just the usual Alien romances, my brain isn’t up to much else at the moment even though I’m starting to tire of cardboard alien alpha heroes, stupid heroines and formulaic plots. Only so much “we have to bone to save the universe” plots I can tolerate in one go.
4. Jill Q. says:

   May 9, 2020 at 5:54 am

   I don’t feel like I’m tearing through books quite like I was last month, but I think I had a few meh books weighing me down and when I finally dnfed them and feel a bit lighter. This was a bit of mixed bag, genre wise this month and looks to continue that way for a while, we’ll see how it goes. I want to binge on rom com (YA and adult), but the ones I want have long wait lists at the library.
   So in order of enjoyment (since there is no other common theme this time)
   THE SPLENDID AND THE VILE by Erik Larson. Nonfiction about Winston Churchill and the Blitz, which I know has been done to death, but I really enjoyed it. I tend not to read a lot of historical nonfiction b/c I’m worried it will be dry, but the author used a lot of diaries and letters and personal accounts that made it very immersive. I got drawn in on a lot of the more minor characters’ lives and wondered how they ended up. I read the book in about 3 days I had to keep myself from going on wikipedia and looking up to find out what happened in everyone’s love lives (once a romance reader, always a romance reader).

   MEET ME AT MIDNIGHT by Jessica Pennington. YA rom-com. This was really cute, but fell apart and lost steam at about 75%. Two kids who stay at the same 2 cabins summer after summer, hate each other and play elaborate pranks on each other. But one of their pranks get out of control and they end up joining forces. Reallly cute if you want to read something summery and fun even with the drawn out conflict ending.

   INDISTRACTABLE by Nir Eydal. More self-help about focus, habits, etc. Better than ATOMIC HABITS by James Clear (last month’s read), but still doesn’t surpass this year’s favorite B.J. Fogg’s TINY HABITS. Both of them specifically mention B.J. Fogg as a mentor for what it’s worth and I think his book covers the same material the best (although Fogg’s is generally about habits, Eydal’s is about tech overuse, which I will always end up reading about!)

   KISSED A SAD GOODBYE by Deborah Crombie. Well, after really enjoying the last Kincaid/James book this one fell a bit flat. The mystery was still good and it still had the mystery in the past that connect to the present format that I love. I also really liked the peek into the Bitz (after the Erik Larson book) and a particular part of London I knew nothing about (The Isle of Dogs). But I felt like the some developments in the detectives’ personal life were handled very clumsily. Also, they had the the problem again of behaving pretty unprofessionally (without much motivation, unlike the last book). And yet, I will keep on, b/c mystery series tend to be my comfort read (familar world and characters) it’s hard to find one that hits that sweet spot of not super cutsey and not super grim, depressing.
5. Ren Benton says:

   May 9, 2020 at 6:04 am

   I’m past the halfway point of GIDEON THE NINTH by Tamsyn Muir and loving it. It’s essentially a manor murder mystery in space with necromancers. The Goth Smartass vibe is speaking my language.

   Since daily reading time is being cut shorter than I’d like by eyestrain (thanks, newly developed astigmatism!), I’ve been filling in the rest of my free time watching LEVERAGE, mostly while also playing mobile games because sitting still while media washes over me doesn’t work with my ADHD. Just started season 4, which included *drumroll* a manor murder mystery, so my entertainment is all wink-nod at each other.
6. Jane says:

   May 9, 2020 at 6:28 am

   I just finished “The Gift of Imperfections” – I really loved it! I’m reading “What if it’s us” (a little slow going), and Pat of Silver Bush (I’m finding out why she’s not as popular as Anne and Emily are!). Overall, I feel like my reading has been off but I’m pushing my way through the books and feeling better as I do.
7. Heather M says:

   May 9, 2020 at 6:28 am

   I finally finished Tempests and Slaughter by Tamora Pierce. Growing up, she was my favorite author, and the Immortals books were my favorite series (I read them literally to pieces, to the point that multiple copies were bought) so I was bummed at how much I didn’t like it. It was….fine. And I know it’s probably a problem of me not being the right audience anymore. Magic school stories bore me, and there was such a preoccupation on puberty (why did I have to keep reading about adolescent Numair’s boners for like the first full half of the book, it was so fucking uncomfortable). But I wanted that magic of being a young reader back and I just didn’t get it. Meh.

   That aside, the reading drought continues. I can’t find a single thing I search for in my library app, and buying ebooks is out of the question for the moment. Fanfic’s filling some of my time, and I will probably, inspired by this post, end up going back and reading KJ Charles’ backlist for the umpteenth time.
8. DiscoDollyDeb says:

   May 9, 2020 at 6:55 am

   As the Bitchery knows, I’m a Kati Wilde fan-girl and I’ve been waiting since 2016 for LOSING IT ALL, the next in her Hellfire Riders MC series. Well, it finally arrived and I loved it! And I promise I would feel the same way even if I wasn’t named on the dedication page—which I am! (My bragging and squeeing about that is on-going.) I had waited so long for LOSING IT ALL I was afraid it would suffer from “Brooklynaire Syndrome” and would fall short of my expectations. I needn’t have worried—LOSING IT ALL has all of Kati’s hallmarks: a thoughtful & intelligent heroine, an alpha hero whose kind-heart and self-awareness keep him securely outside alpha-hole territory, a propulsive plot that puts both h&h through the wringer—emotionally and physically, smoking-hot sexy-times, angsty misunderstandings, a joyful HEA, and a nice catch-up-with-everyone epilogue. However, I do want to mention a few things before I discuss the story. First, although LOSING IT ALL is technically a stand-alone, I strongly recommend reading BREAKING IT ALL first. The timeline in the first half of LOSING IT ALL runs roughly parallel to the entire timeline of BREAKING IT ALL and it helps to orient the action in one book if you know what is happening in the other. Second, even keeping in mind that this is an MC romance with the commensurate level of violence found in that genre, the tone of LOSING IT ALL is darker and sadder than the earlier books in the series; the story is suffused with loss and grief and and how we learn to live with them. Finally, there are some sexual situations that could be seen as involving dubious- or non-consent; while I think the context in which these scenes take place makes the situations understandable, Kati does provide a very clear and detailed Content Warning at the beginning of the book. LOSING IT ALL is the story of a woman who—in order to protect a loved one—lures a man to a desert compound where men are kept in captivity and forced into dark-web/underground fight-to-the-death cage matches while the dregs of humanity (wealthy & politically-connected sociopaths, drug cartel bosses, white supremacists, neo-Nazis, human traffickers) place enormous wagers on the outcome. The man she helps capture is a scarred Marine Corps veteran who is the enforcer for the Hellfire Riders MC (his sister and his best friend are the h&h of BREAKING IT ALL). Beneath his tough, alpha exterior, the hero has a caring heart and, like the heroine, everything he does is to protect his loved ones. When the hero is forced to kill a man in a cage match (this is no spoiler, it is revealed at the end of BREAKING IT ALL), his spirit is crushed and he is swamped by a relentless drive for retribution. Once they are freed, the h&h both want to do whatever they can to take down the syndicate that runs the cage fights—this means they remain together even though anger, resentment, and misunderstandings simmer between them. Under different circumstances, the couple might have been happy lovers, but they are both processing their losses, their grief, and the things that, under duress, they’ve been forced to do. This leads to some sex that might be described as angry-fucking, although a persistent undercurrent of concern and care about each other saves their encounters from becoming full-on hate-fucking. Their feelings do eventually evolve into something deeper, especially as secrets are revealed and misunderstands are explained. Angsty, emotional, hot, and, ultimately, tender, LOSING IT ALL pressed every button in my catnip center. Highly recommended—but read BREAKING IT ALL first.

   Caitlin Crews’s very good (and super hot!) TAKE ME (the second of her Filthy Rich Billionaires series from Dare) is almost as much a love-letter to the city of Sydney as it is the story of a man and a woman, close friends since their university days, falling in love when the woman leaves her icy, detached fiancé in England for a spontaneous trip to Australia where her friend (now a wealthy businessman) lives. The book includes such gorgeous descriptions of coastal Sydney and its associated beach communities that I was ready to book a post-quarantine trip! Friends-to-lovers is not a favorite trope of mine, but Crews makes it work here because there’s a pining element on the part of the hero, who has secretly loved the heroine for years even while knowing that she’s going to enter into an arranged marriage with a man deemed suitable by her aristocratic father. After the heroine arrives in Australia, she and the hero string out the sexual tension to astonishing levels before finally becoming lovers, at which point the sex scenes are incredibly hot (Crews does an excellent job at showing how a woman’s orgasm can be generated just as much from what’s going on in her head as from what’s being done to her clit) with a strong D/s component. But, as the hero tells the heroine, “sex does have a way of changing friendship,” and, when they discover they can’t find their way back to their previous platonic relationship, there’s angst & heartache ahead! I enjoyed TAKE ME very much: it’s the type of book that Dare has always promised right there in the tag line—“sexy romances featuring powerful alpha heroes and bold, fearless heroines exploring their deepest fantasies”—but has rarely delivered. Here’s hoping TAKE ME is not an anomaly but proof that Dare is finally living up to its promise. Highly recommended.

   While I thoroughly enjoyed Annika Martin’s first two Manhattan Billionaires books, MOST ELIGIBLE BILLIONAIRE and THE BILLIONAIRE’S WAKE-UP-CALL GIRL, I felt the enormous power imbalance in the third book, BREAKING THE BILLIONAIRE’S RULES, seemed unnecessarily cruel to the heroine and detracted from my enjoyment of the story. So I’m pleased to say that Martin’s latest, THE BILLIONAIRE’S FAKE FIANCÉE, brings back the tropey fun (along with serious undertones) of the first two books, without the almost cringingly-unequal dynamic of the third. FAKE FIANCÉE’s grumpy/growly/gruff self-made billionaire hero (“a power-broker with control issues,” as the heroine describes him) needs a fake fiancée to help cement an upcoming business deal. The woman who has been cutting and styling his hair for the past two years seems a good choice, even though everything about her—from her Hello Kitty tattoos to her blue-&-purple-streaked hair to her determinedly upbeat personality—seems to irritate his unsmiling, no-nonsense persona (apparently, he’s never heard of opposites-attract). Part of the business deal involves a vacation on a mega-yacht where the heroine (using her love of soap opera storylines as a guide) suspects their hostess’s nephew of nefarious doings—and she’s eventually able to convince her fake fiancé of same. The pair indulge in a little cloak-and-dagger while growing closer, physically and emotionally. But they’ve both experienced dysfunctional childhoods and they’ll have to let down their defense mechanisms to get their HEA. Martin brings her reliable blend of humor, heat, and heart to THE BILLIONAIRE’S FAKE FIANCÉE, and I give the book a strong recommendation—especially if you like grumpy heroes.

   Molly O’Keefe’s THE GAMBLER is the second in her Notorious series and is a revised and retitled version of a book she published through Harlequin’s Super Romance line in the mid-2000s. (I think Molly must have re-acquired the rights to a number of her earlier works because she’s doing a lot of revising/retitling/republishing these days. I haven’t read the original books, so I can’t say how extensive her revisions are, but in her forewords, Molly says she’s “sexed [the books] up.”) Although it can be read as a stand-alone, THE GAMBLER continues the story arc started in THE SINNER, so I would recommend reading that first. The hero of THE GAMBLER returns home for the first time in ten years, finding that the woman he once loved is now the town’s Chief of Police. Feelings still spark between them, but will the circumstances of the hero’s abrupt departure a decade ago, coupled with the unfortunate reappearance of his ne’er-do-well father, along with the search for some stolen gems that was a driving plot point of THE SINNER, disrupt their attempt to reconnect? Lots of angst and family dysfunction in this one.

   Is the myth of Persephone & Hades currently having a moment in Romancelandia? Earlier this year, Natasha Knight used it as the theme of her romance, DESCENT, which featured a heroine named Persephone, a hero named Hayden (nickname: Hades), an arranged marriage, and a lot of dark goings-on. This month, Jackie Ashenden’s latest HP, THE SPANIARD’S WEDDING REVENGE, also makes overt reference to the myth: “Like Persephone…she’d had a bite of the pomegranate and now she was trapped in the Underworld”—although the pomegranate in this case is the offer of a large sum of money in exchange for marrying a wealthy Spanish duke and the Underworld is his luxurious home. In this angsty story of revenge, a man recognizes a young homeless woman as the long-lost daughter of his bitterest enemy—a former friend who betrayed him—and offers her a job as part of his housekeeping staff. She accepts his offer, unaware that he knows who she is. Meanwhile, he plots a “revenge marriage” to the heroine to spite her father, but what to do when love enters the equation? Although I’m ambivalent about plots where a woman is used as a vehicle of revenge, THE SPANIARD’S WEDDING REVENGE is a good combination of a standard HP plot and Jackie Ashenden’s template of bad parenting, dysfunctional families, self-aware interior monologues, amazing eye colors, and passionate sexy-times (somewhat euphemized to fit HP’s guidelines). You know the drill: I enjoyed it; YMMV.

   Clare Connelly’s latest HP, THE SECRET KEPT FROM THE KING, wears its plot on its title: clearly, the hero is a royal personage of some sort (a sheikh of a small but wealthy kingdom) and—this being the HP universe—the “secret” is undoubtedly pregnancy/baby related. The most interesting thing about the book was that not only was the heroine NOT a virgin (something rather unusual for recent HPs), but she was also a divorcee whose ex-husband had conned her out of her savings and house. A actual real-world problem in an HP! But don’t worry—all the glamorous angst is still there. An unobjectionable example of a standard Harlequin Presents.

   Skye Warren’s WHO WILL SAVE YOUR SOUL? is a collection of four novellas, each of them featuring Warren’s dark plots about heroines who have seen too much, regardless of age or sexual experience. Based on their individual copyright dates, all the novellas appear to have been published earlier, but I had only read one of them previously. On the whole, I liked the collection, but there was a sloppiness about the editing that gave the book a rushed, unpolished feel. The title story is about a sheltered young woman who has been diagnosed as a pathological liar: “I can say words, but they don’t matter,” she says. “I can scream the truth at the top of my lungs and no one will believe me.” But will her family’s new gardener—who seems to be interested in more than mowing the lawn—believe her when she tells him about the stolen blood diamonds her father keeps hidden in the house? Symbolism from Sleeping Beauty winds its way through BEDTIME STORY: a young single mother, fleeing an abusive, mob-connected partner, is stopped for erratic driving (she’s not under the influence, just very sleepy). She needs help to escape, but she’s not sure if she can trust the cop who pulls her over and insists that she and her young son stop at the police station to rest. I suspect Warren originally wrote BEDTIME STORY in third-person and, at some point, decided to rewrite it in alternating first-person, but didn’t change all of the pronouns, leading to confusing sentences where the narrators appear to be referring to themselves in third-person. (On the other hand, if this mixing of narrative voices was a stylistic choice on Warren’s part, it’s not a particularly successful one.) The theme of MAFIA CINDERELLA is obvious in its title: two cruel sisters run a sweatshop where they keep the workers imprisoned. The youngest and prettiest of the workers is selected to play the part of receptionist when an influential businessman visits the factory. Later, she manages to find her way to an enormous fundraiser he is hosting, hoping to ask him to help the women in the factory—but she has to make a hasty escape, leaving only her shoes behind. Will he find her before the sisters have their revenge? (Another editing lapse: the heroine’s eyes described as brown in some passages, hazel in others. In a relatively short piece, it shouldn’t be hard to keep that straight.) HEAVY EQUIPMENT is the last story in the collection and one that I’d read when it was first available as a free download last year. The heroine is given to a man in exchange for repayment of her father’s business debts (how men use women as currency is a frequent theme of Warren’s work). The heroine is Chinese-American, but (other than her last name) her ethnicity plays no role in the story—and I found it odd that, in a book where one of the main characters is of Chinese ancestry, the recurring motif of the story is Japanese cherry blossoms. It’s hard to believe Warren would conflate the two nationalities, so the choice of motif really puzzled me.

   [CW/TW: discussion of suicide, death of a child, sexual abuse, non-consensual sex, sadism] If you plan on reading Keri Lake’s well-written, twisty, but chock-full-of-triggers MASTER OF SALT & BONES, it’s best not to think of it as a romance, but as a dark gothic-horror novel with some romantic elements. Despite having a hero, a heroine, some sexy-times, and an eventual, somewhat qualified HEA, the book plumbs the depths of so much misery and depravity that the traditional concept of a romance just isn’t applicable. However, by viewing the book through a gothic-horror lens, it’s an interesting read. Let’s address the triggers first (cw/tw): in addition to a suicide and the death of a child, this book contains a lot of abusive, non-consensual, distasteful, sadistic activity (most, but not all, of it sexual, and with the hero more often the victim than the perpetrator)—those passages are difficult to read, but I think this is intentional on Lake’s part: one of the book’s overarching themes is how wealthy people use money and power to indulge in their worst behaviors and avoid any accountability, and how, over time, this behavior becomes normalized, even passed down through generations. The story’s set-up is pure gothic: a young, working-class woman, intelligent but with a very dysfunctional upbringing and past trauma, takes a high-paying position as companion to the ailing mother of the town’s wealthiest citizen—a man who is damaged both physically and psychologically. The job requires the heroine to live in a huge, isolated house on the bluffs of a Massachusetts coastal island, and it doesn’t take long for the odd atmosphere in the house to raise many questions: What caused the hero’s scars? What happened to the hero’s late wife and young son? Why does the hero’s mother insist they are still alive? What causes the mother’s nightmares? What’s the deal with her massive, eerie doll collection? Why does the housekeeper tell the heroine to keep her door locked at night? Why are the other employees so secretive? And what is the purpose of the secret society of wealthy, prominent men run by the hero? I can recommend MASTER OF SALT & BONES as a genuinely creepy gothic story; I cannot, however, recommend it as a romance. Make your decision accordingly.
9. Joyce says:

   May 9, 2020 at 7:28 am

   Read 2 amazing books…highly recommend!
   1. Amy Harmon’s “Where The Lost Wander”…as marvelous as “What The Wind Knows”. Cannot stop thinking about the main characters.
   2. Amanda Quick’s “Close Up”…her books are so much FUN

   Read 2 romance books…not memorable, but diverting. Who doesn’t need a HEA right now?
   1. Julia Quinn’s “First Comes Scandal”
   2. Sophie Jordan’s “The Virgin and the Rogue”

   In the home stretch of the 500 page The Splendid and The Vile”…a MUST read if you like history and like me, you LOVE Eric Larson’s writing.
10. Frida says:

    May 9, 2020 at 7:52 am

    I’ve been reading mostly novellas and short stories. THE BEST FRIEND’S ANTHOLOGY by Stefanie Simpson was fun – four novellas with kink and found family.

    HEARTLAND was everything I always hope for in a Sarina Bowen book! I don’t even know how to explain why they work for me so well (and far from all of them do!) and especially this one has some aspects that I know will put a lot of readers off. Her sequel baiting is strong as always (the “Brooklynaire Syndrome” coined by DiscoDollyDeb refers to a Bowen book).
11. Laine says:

    May 9, 2020 at 8:11 am

    MURDERBOT! I just finished Network Effect last night. It was wonderful.

    Next is Swordheart by T. Kingfisher, which I actually started before getting
    Network Effect in my kindle but only got a chapter in before having to prioritize Murderbot.
12. TinaNoir says:

    May 9, 2020 at 8:48 am

    AFTER SUNDOWN – By Linda Howard/Linda Jones – I was rather ‘meh’ on this one.

    A STROKE OF MALICE – By Anna Lee Huber – the 8th book in her Lady Darby series. I enjoyed this installment a lot.

    SINISTER MAGIC & BATTLE BOND – By Lindsay Buroker – the first two books in an urban fantasy series with a humorous bent. I like them and they are fun.

    EXECUTION IN E – By Alexia Gordon – 5th book in a paranormal cozy mystery series about an African American violinist who becomes a music teacher in a small boys academy in an Irish village. She lives with a ghost who helps her out.
13. Jennifer Estep says:

    May 9, 2020 at 8:59 am

    I recently finished POLARIS RISING by Jessie Mihalik, which I really enjoyed. I’m looking forward to reading AURORA BLAZING and CHAOS REIGNING (which comes out next week).

    I also want to check out THE LIFE AND MEDIEVAL TIMES OF KIT SWEETLY by Jamie Pacton; BEACH READ by Emily Henry; and several other new books.

    @RenBenton — Did you hear that they are rebooting LEVERAGE with most of the original cast? That, the possibility of a WHITE COLLAR revival, and a new Robin Sparkles video totally made my week. 🙂
14. DonnaMarie says:

    May 9, 2020 at 9:55 am

    @Jennifer Estep, you just MADE MY DAY!! I am all in for more Elliot.

    The thing that made my week? THE GBPL OPENED THE DRIVE THROUGH!!!! So, I guess that answers SBSarah’s question. Yes, eventually they will want their books back. I raced over there with the dozen that I’ve been babysitting the last 8 weeks and got SIX NEW BOOKS. They are “quarantining” all returned materials for two weeks, so I’m reading slowly because I feel it’ll be awhile before I get a pick up notice.

    It’s not that I haven’t been enjoying the hell out of rereading Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand and Julie James’ It Happened One Wedding and Suddenly One Summer, because I have. It Happened One Wedding may actually be the perfect contemporary romance. We had that warm fuzzy reads post couple weeks ago, and it would fit right in. I find myself not just smiling, but out and out grinning through most of it. I was also reminded that Julie James and I have the same criteria for wedding bands.

    Now I’m happily reading Jordanna Max Brodsky’s Winter of the Gods the second book in the Olympus Bound trilogy? series? The Lady of Huonds and Protector of Virgins is still grumpy and badass (Christmas? she has thoughts) and still has her Classics professor love interest tagging along as she investigates the death of her uncle. Have her brothers broken their promise or has someone else realized that ancient gods walk among us?
15. Vivi12 says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:34 am

    @DiscoDollyDeb – I also read and really liked The Billionaire’s Fake Fiancé, it was another frothy enjoyable read. I skipped Breaking the Billionaire’s Rules based on reading the sample excerpt, and was thinking about trying it because the other ones are so fun, but it sounds like I should still give it a pass.
    I just finished Paladin’s Grace by T Kingfisher, and loved it. A perfumer and a broken knight, clashing religions in both a humorous and a dangerous way, a mystery, characters with pasts – so good! I’m excited to see T Kingfisher has substantial backlist.
    Otherwise mostly binging Schitz Creek.v
16. Big K says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:45 am

    Yippee! I love WAYR!
    Here we go:
    1. PALADIN’S GRACE by T. Kingfisher — A! Great book! Funny, heartfelt, paranormal fantasy romance. Love the world, agree with prior comments by the Bitchery, and a perfect pandemic read. Give it to yourself for Mother’s Day, regardless of whether you do any mothering! You deserve to sink into this funny, clever, emotionally rich book.
    2. CLOCKWORK BOYS, Wonder Engine, etc., by T. Kingfisher — B+ Finished first book, not done yet with second, but also enjoyable. I think there is enough sameness, and this is really three books that feel like one big book, so it needed some editing, so I’m not as wowed, because I jumped in as soon as I finished Paladine’s Grace. However, it’s also really good, same world, and I will definitely finish the second and third books, and I am looking forward to them. T. Kingfisher is prob. on autobuy for me now. 🙂
    3. THE NIGHT RAVEN and THE SIVER MARK by Sarah Painter — C+/B- The worldbuilding was good, but there was enough plot, and the characters were flat. I just read them, and I can’t remember them. Frustrating, because really interesting elements, but just not worth my time.
    4. Reading FATED (Alex Verus Book 1) — Doesn’t seem to be a romance. Moving slowly, and kind of boring, so I’ve taken a break. Will probably finish it, but am a little disappointed so far — started strong and now is meh.
    5. Reread Beard in Mind Penny Reid (favorite Winston Bros. book, along with Cletus’ — love cinnamon bun hero, neuro atypical, prickly, talented heroine trope) A
    6. Reread Talia Hibbert’s A GIRL LIKE HER (TH is hit or miss for me, but this was definitely one of my favorites — and another cinnamon bun hero, neuro atypical, prickly, talented heroine) A (again).
    7. Reread Ilona Andrews’ THE EDGE SERIES. My least favorite, but still excellent. Very dark, so I skimmed aggressively.

    Hope you are all safe, healthy, and taking care of yourselves! Thanks for all your recommendations!
17. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:58 am

    @ViVi12: I realize that in Billionaire romances there is always going to be an economic imbalance between h&h, but in all the other Manhattan Billionaires books, Martin has made the heroines spunky and assertive enough to overcome that obstacle. But in BREAKING THE BILLIONAIRE’S RULES, I thought the heroine internalized the enormous gulf between herself and the hero (he’s a business titan, she’s delivering his lunch while wearing a cat suit) in a way that just seemed too cruel for the light-hearted tone of the series. I’d say you could skip BTBR without missing anything in the other books.
18. oceanjasper says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:59 am

    Sally Malcolm’s The Last Kiss is the best romance I’ve read in ages. Post-WWI era, m/m romance between an aristocratic officer and his working class former batman. They forged a bond in the horrors of war, yet back in England they can’t even be friends, let along lovers. The sense of time and place is very strong and the romance is just lovely.
19. Gloriamarie Amalfitano says:

    May 9, 2020 at 12:29 pm

    I have been reading the entire Virgin River series in order, for a change. Started with the first one and am reading them one by one. When I first read them,I did it all out of order and managed to follow along

    But bow that I am reading them in order, I impressed by he intertwined they all are, how things about one couple continue into several books.

    It’s as if all the books combined make up one enormous novel.

    Really enjoying them.
20. Katie C. says:

    May 9, 2020 at 12:55 pm

    Not too many books finished in the last two weeks.

    Excellent:
    None

    Very Good:
    This Isn’t What I Expected: Overcoming Postpartum Depression by Karen Kleiman and Valerie Davis Raskin: Although I was not correctly diagnosed until I was 20 years old, I have had OCD my whole life. One of my top fears/concerns about having a baby was the effect on my mental health. Thankfully, while I have had some postpartum anxiety, my OCD has not flared too badly from the stress and hormones. I still found this book to be very helpful in describing the different feelings mothers have after the birth of a baby, guidance on self-help and self-care, and when to get more help. I would recommend this to any woman who is pregnant or has recently given birth who is either struggling with a perinatal or postpartum mood disorder (which includes perinatal/postpartum depression but also perinatal/postpartum anxiety, PTSD or OCD) OR any woman who is pregnant or a recent new mom who has had mental health issues in the past.

    Good:
    The Bishop’s Tale by Margaret Frazer: The fourth in the Medieval-England set Dame Frevisse series, this one is set at a sort of house “party” after a funeral. A suspicious death occurs during the funeral lunch and Dame Frevisse is set on the case. I have found that I prefer the two earliest books in the series that took place at the convent because the world was so different from my own – in time, place, and religious nature. This one is more of a traditional country house mystery and while I enjoyed it, it lacked that special setting I found in the first two.

    The Meh:
    Right Wrong Guy by Lia Riley: I liked the first book in this series, so I was looking forward to this one, but I found it really boring. The hero is a small town “man-whore” with a reputation and the heroine is a heiress and runaway bride (her fiancé was cheating on her) who hitches a ride with the hero from Las Vegas back to his small home town because her cousin lives there – the set up was so implausible to me – she saw no danger in hitching a ride with a guy she just met? Was that really the only way she could get there? Once over the set-up though, things didn’t improve. The hero falls in insta-love with the heroine and decides to become a better man to be worthy of her, BUT WHY? I don’t mind “not like other girls/guys” plot lines in general because I think we fall in love with people we find uniquely suited to us, but the book never made clear why the heroine was so special – the whole time she seemed really bland and generic. I liked the first in the series so much that I went ahead and added the third one to my TBR, but I consider this series on probation.

    The Bad:
    None
21. Darlynne says:

    May 9, 2020 at 1:23 pm

    I re-read GIDEON THE NINTH and all of MURDERBOT to get ready for more good book noise soon.

    Has anyone read Caimh McDonnell’s THE MAN WITH ONE OF THOSE FACES? A crime novel with a potential romance, but holy cow, it was funny, violent and so damn good. The book had been in my TBR forever and I’ve made a point lately of going through what I already have before buying more. Most of the characters start out not very likable, until you learn more and then you’re captured. Modern day Dublin, good and bad police, hapless protagonist, criminals and a metric ton of heart.
22. MaryK says:

    May 9, 2020 at 1:24 pm

    I’ve been having trouble finishing books lately. I’m kind of a magpie reader anyway, but lately it’s been out of control. I’ve lost track of the number of books I’m part way through. But, my preordered hard copy of Network Effect arrived Thursday and I finished it last night. It was great and now I have good book hangover. I’m going to bask in it for a while and then see if I’m in the mood for any of my unfinished books.
23. Kate K.F. says:

    May 9, 2020 at 1:40 pm

    I haven’t read that many books so far this month but I’ve been lucky that all of them have really worked.

    I stayed up all night reading Hither, Page by Cat Sebastian which is a small town mystery set after WWII with the main hero, the local doctor and the other an Intelligence agent who gave me definite Cassian Andor vibes. This book kept me up all night as it hit a lot of my favorite tropes in terms of the feel of older mysteries in terms of people who felt real but with more diversity.
    A book that surprised me how much I liked it was Children of the City, a nonfiction book that came out in the early 1980s about the lives of children in the early 1900s especially working children. I picked it up because it has on the cover, was the inspiration for Newsies. And since that’s one of my favorite movies, I grabbed it and really loved it. The book is full of interviews, great photographs and names I recognized from the movie.

    Last night I started The Goblin Emperor as my hold came in and wow, what a great book. Really hard to put it down and I want to keep reading, the world and character building is amazing.

    I also reread a favorite Diana Wynne Jones, Year of the Griffin and have the second Grishaverse book. I’m trying to read the original trilogy since I loved the Six of Crows duology and enjoyed King of Scars but didn’t have all the context. So far the Grishaverse books are much more YA and don’t grip me the same way. I think its because Alina and Mal aren’t as interesting as other characters, but the second one does have a set up that’s interesting.

    A number of my Libby holds came in too so I have lots of options to read next like Agnes and the Hitman and the Mary Balogh post has been wanting to reread and read ones I haven’t got to yet.
24. Margaret says:

    May 9, 2020 at 2:11 pm

    Echoing @Gloriamarie: The Virgin River books are a wonderful escape during these anxiety-ridden times. There are good guys and bad guys, but there’s a Karmic order to how things turn out, which seems totally absent in our here and now.

    I’ve recently discovered a relatively new author: Krista Sandor, and her Bergen Brothers series (Man Fast, Man Feast, and Man Find) are also a fun reprieve from the real world. I’ve just finished the last of the series, Man Find, and to my mind it was the best of the three. Millionaire brothers, scions to a winter sporting goods conglomerate, beautiful Colorado settings, and well-crafted relationships that are a bit fairy tale-ish, but still heart-warming.

    Julie Anne Long’s books have also provided delightful escape. I read The Perils of Pleasure and Like No Other Lover this month, and as Aarya said about Susanna Kearsley, I’m putting off reading the others too quickly (and Aarya, I’ve done the same with my collection of Kearsley’s books!) – kind of like making sure there’s always at least one unopened carton of Ben & Jerry’s in the freezer!

    Stay safe, everyone.
25. Susanna says:

    May 9, 2020 at 2:18 pm

    I’m reading science fiction just now – just finished the first Murderbot story, and am currently reading The Stars Now Unclaimed.
26. Sue says:

    May 9, 2020 at 3:33 pm

    I’m clawing my way out of a reading slump; nothing really feels right. It’s a weird time. Although I’m very fortunate to be able to work from home, things are just so OFF these days. Aarya, I had that exact reaction to my first Kearsley. I have also been very careful not to burn through her backlist! I think it’s time to pick up another.

    Thanks for all you do. It’s so lovely to hear/read likeminded folk.
27. Alexandra says:

    May 9, 2020 at 4:32 pm

    So far I haven’t reread ANYTHING in May! A big breakthrough considering previous months. I’ve been using the Reading Spreadsheet from here since January, but I added some columns to track rereads (just yes/no, so I’d know how often I was rereading bks), price spent on the books, and where I’d heard about each book and where I got each book from. I’m putting a link to the spreadsheet as my website if anyone is interested!

    Since last time I read Girl Gone Viral and loved it. I didn’t think the ending was too pat, mostly bc things that go viral do fade away pretty quickly. I want the next book in the trilogy now instead of waiting though!

    Also read The War Priest by Ann Aguirre. Five stars, perfect “Grumpy one is soft for the Sunshiny one” trope. I was a little nervous to start it as priests/religious figures and romance do not mix for me at all; but I think the fact that it was a fictional religion, the hero resigned from the religious order pre-sex, that he’d joined the order due to trauma and not devotion, AND that there were other factors in leaving the order besides just romance made it work for me. And he was so grumpy and she was so sunshiny and it was just amazing. I don’t think it’s a standalone, but I’ve enjoyed the whole series so far and am now eagerly awaiting the next!

    I also read ALL of the Kate Burkholder mystery books by Linda Castillo. They were obviously good enough that I read all of them in one weekend, but left a lot of lingering thoughts. They’re written in first person POV, narrator is a formerly Amish chief of police in a small town, and there is a love interest but I don’t think they really qualify as romances in any way. With 1st PPOV it’s hard to separate the author’s feelings from the narrators, and it felt like there was a lot of placing the Amish on a pedestal. There was a lot of talking about how Amish in general were more pure and innocent than the English (non-Amish) and Amish children were the most pure and innocent, moreso than English children. It felt kind of infantilizing and almost objectifying or fetishizing of the Amish. The narrator also kept these views despite multiple books where the perpetrator of a crime was Amish. So English children in general were not as pure or innocent, but despite Amish people doing horrible things Amish people as a whole were precious and didn’t understand how people could be awful. IDK, I wouldn’t recommend people not read the books, as they were well written and engaging, but on the whole I don’t think I’m going to recommend the books to family or friends bc there are other books with similar attributes that I like more.

    Also, had my first DNF of the year. I started Love on Beach Avenue by Jennifer Probst. The heroine is a wedding planner who co-owns a company with her sister, the hero is the older brother of a bride who is/was the heroine’s BFF in college. I made it 15% of the way in but had to stop bc the hero was SO CONDESCENDING and such an ass in both his thoughts and actions towards the heroine. The sister/BFF asks the heroine to plan her wedding with 3-4 months notice, with the wedding in August, so during the absolute busiest wedding time of the year. The heroine agrees despite being jam packed, and the hero is so clueless he doesn’t realize what a shitty thing that is to do. The hero decides the heroine is stupid, scatterbrained, irresponsible, and incapable at her job based on memories of what she was like when he met her in passing 10 years ago. He gets snippy with her bc she suggests a nice place for the wedding if the bride goes with a slightly smaller guest list than what she was estimating, he thinks she’s insincere and phony when she says nice stuff to the bride about their dead parents looking down on them and being happy for the bride, and in general he treats her like crap. I think an enemies-to-lovers vibe was happening, but I felt like there was too much condescension, disrespect, and sexism coming from the hero for me to believe in an HEA for the couple so I just put it away.

    But, to end on a high note, as soon as I put that down I started reading Office Hours by Katrina Jackson and it is amazing!!! Burnt out college professor heroine, cinnamon roll professor hero, both have had secret crushes and been pining for a year when the book starts. There are supportive friends and navigating concerns about how this will affect their professional lives in a realistic way and very realistic pacing (book takes place over an academic year). If you enjoyed Charish Reid’s Hearts on Hold, this is an absolute must read. One of my favorites of the year!
28. Kareni says:

    May 9, 2020 at 4:37 pm

    I so enjoy these posts! My reading ~

    — The Pride of Chanur by C.J. Cherryh. I’d heard good things about this book, found it a pleasant read, and may read further in the series at some time.
    — enjoyed Portrait of Death: Unforgotten by Isabel Wroth; curiously, I’ve previously read other books with a similar storyline. I’d classify this as romantic suspense with a paranormal element.
    — a short story Stormfront by M.C.A. Hogarth which happens to be currently free for Kindle readers. It had a twist.

    — The Curse of Chalion and Paladin of Souls (Chalion Book 2) by Lois McMaster Bujold, two fantasies which I quite enjoyed.
    — Road to the Sun (re-released as Ends of the Earth) by Keira Andrews; this was a pleasant male/male romance.
    — Plus a boatload of book samples.
29. HeatherS says:

    May 9, 2020 at 4:41 pm

    I read 3 books last weekend. “Something To Talk About” by Meryl Wilsner was lovely – age-gap romance, a heroine over 40 and Chinese-American, the other in her late 20s and Jewish. Lots of food in that book, too, so have snacks handy.

    At this point I am not interested in anything, really, except m/m romance. Currently re-reading “Faith & Fidelity” by Tere Michaels, a keeper shelf comfort read, and buying m/m romance books by the stacks online.

    I would like to read some m/m vampire paranormal romances, so if anybody can recommend some, I would appreciate it.
30. Nicolette says:

    May 9, 2020 at 4:48 pm

    Reading a non-fiction book. Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick.

    Here’s what I’m watching. It’s good, CallMeCarson is here. Share it with your whole family of youtube savvy teenagers. It’s good and goopy like Coffee cake with a little chocolate drizzling on it.
    https://youtu.be/3qDpf4vx850
31. K.N.O’Rear says:

    May 9, 2020 at 5:27 pm

    Now that I’m done with work I can add my comment to this wonderful thread.

    Read: THE WAKING LAND Callie Bates
    This book was quite slow to start, but once it hit the second half of Act Two it proved to be worth the read. Without going into spoilers here are some highlights of this awesome book: A runaway noble lady who occasionally dresses as a man, a charming rogue style love interest, female friendships, a somewhat unique world based on the 1700s, and a bad ass magic system based around earth magic that is wielded mostly by women. I highly, highly recommend this series if you can handle a slow start.

    BRIGHTLY BURNING by Alexa Donne
    This Jane Eyrie retelling was okay( I mostly read it because I follow the author on YouTube) . Unfortunately the weakest part was the relationship between the two leads. They just didn’t spend enough time with each other firstly and secondly the one-sides love triangle also weakened the main romance because “Jane” has more chemistry and spent more time with the guy who has a one-sided crush on her throughout the book than her main love interest. If you are just hankering for a Jane Eyrie retelling pick it up, but otherwise I really don’t recommend it.

    FIRST COMES MARRIAGE by Mary Balogh
    This is the first book in the Huxtable family series which is fun, but The Survivor’s Club series is better( I haven’t read any other series in Mary Balogh’s backlist. I really should ). This book is very “battle of the sexes” which is fun, but not great. This book in particular also contains a great deal of naval gazing on the philosophical components of love, marriage and happiness, but not a lot of plot to balance it out. It also took me quite sometime to like the hero and the heroine’s Pollyanna-ness can be a bit grating. However the discussions in this book are interesting enough that I picked up the second book in the series.

    This brings me to-Reading
    THEN COMES SEDUCTION by Mary Balogh.
    This book is definitely better than the first mostly because it’s a little more straight forward as far as the plot goes( so far anyways, I’m less than 100 pages in ). I also have to give it kudos points for actually subverting my expectations and surprising me. I’m gonna elaborate on that, but in case there’s someone reading this who hasn’t read the Huxtable family series yet there will be spoilers down below.

    I read the summery and the first few pages of this book and was almost certain it would follow the usual hero bets he can bed the heroine, but then changes his minds when he catches feelings story beats; Instead the hero realizes within the first three chapters that betting someone else’s virtue/ reputation is a rather nasty thing to do and almost immediately tells the heroine about the bet and she retaliates with a BRUTAL verbal beat-down. That subversion hooked me into story immediately and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
32. Emily B says:

    May 9, 2020 at 6:05 pm

    I finished IF I NEVER MET YOU by Mhairi McFarlane and really enjoyed it. There was a lot of misery over the heroine’s failed relationship, but I never felt it overwhelmed the story. The hero was also quite possibly by my favorite of McFarlane’s so far.

    CONFESSIONS OF A NAUGHTY NANNY by Piper Rayne, in their Bailey family series, didn’t work for me for more reasons than just the terrible title (although it is really terrible). The heroine of this one is the youngest sibling, who is now 22 or 23 but who we first met in the first book in the series when she was 17. She becomes the nanny for a decade older single dad who is also a successful music producer (and of course the heroine also wants to be a singer), and of course they fall in love. The whole thing just felt a bit icky, in part because I kept thinking about the heroine as a 17 year old, but it wasn’t helped by the thoughts/actions of the hero. I think a series can feature the story of a character we initially met when they were younger, but it has to be done carefully if all of a sudden we’re not getting fairly detailed sex scenes. I think Sarina Bowen did this well in HEARTLAND. That being said, I did still read the novella length OPERATION BAILEY BABIES, because I wanted to see Austin and Holly finally get their baby, and I’ll probably still read the next in the series, because the concept of a professional matchmaker only realizing she’s in love with her best friend after she’s matched him up with someone and he gets engaged is like Hallmark movie bait.

    I binged through the first three books in Kendall Ryan’s (not to be confused with the wonderful Kennedy Ryan) new-ish hockey series – PLAYING FOR KEEPS, ALL THE WAY, and TRYING TO SCORE. These are not great books, and I actually had issues with all 3, but they were strangely potato chip-like and each one took less than a day to breeze through, and they filled my hockey romance void while I wait for my next Helena Hunting and Sarina Bowen hockey romances to come out. I had a major issue with PLAYING FOR KEEPS, which is your basic heroine’s been in love with her older brother’s best friend forever trope, because the 24 year old heroine is a virgin for absolutely no reason that serves the story, and the manwhore hero gets all weird and “I shouldn’t have taken what I had no right to take” about it when he finds out after they’ve hooked up. ALL THE WAY was better, but the whole “heroine with sexual trauma in her past asks her manwhore friend to help her out sexually” was done better in Elle Kennedy’s THE DEAL. TRYING TO SCORE was a pretty good hookup to friends to lovers story with likable characters, but the drama hinges on the hero not deleting a past sex video even though he told the heroine that he did, which is really almost too scummy to forgive, and I don’t think this was treated with the proper amount of disgust in the book.

    A COWBOY TO REMEMBER by Rebekah Weatherspoon was, disappointingly, a bit of a slog. I’ve read some of Weatherspoon’s past more novella-length stories and enjoyed them (RAFE, about a hot ginger male nanny, is one of my favorites), but this one just didn’t really work for me. For starters, there was just a lot going on – famous tv chef heroine gets pushed down the stairs and has amnesia, goes to recover on the California ranch of her former surrogate family/childhood and teenage crush, a cowboy whose family also has Hollywood and professional sports ties (brother was a football player, grandmother is a famous actress). This may have benefitted from some simplification – we’re already dealing with amnesia here, we didn’t need all of those other details. The other thing that surprised me in this one was the lack of on the page detailed sex scenes – it’s not that I necessarily need this in a romance, but Weatherspoon’s other stories all have them, and in fact many of her stories delve into kink, so it was just surprising to only get a couple relatively tame sex scenes. This is the first in a new series Weatherspoon is kicking off, so just know it seems to be a bit of a departure for her from her previous style.

    SICK KIDS IN LOVE was a delightful YA about two teenagers living with chronic illness. The heroine has rheumatoid arthritis and has struggled ever since she developed symptoms with having her pain be taken seriously and whether or not she wants to label herself as sick. She meets a boy who also has a chronic illness and they bond not just over this but also over their shared cultural heritage and their common nerdy interests. It’s adorable and swooney and the perfect thing to read right now.

    YOU DESERVE EACH OTHER by Sarah Hogle was good, but also a challenge. The premise is basically “What if How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days was more How to Lose a Fiancee in 10 Days.” When we first meet the heroine, she’s engaged but miserable, but doesn’t want to be responsible for ending the relationship. It becomes seemingly clear that her fiancee feels the same way, and they engage in a war to get the other to end it – but of course find their way back to each other along the way. This one works for the most part, but there were definitely times at the beginning where I thought wow if you’re so miserable just stop putting yourself through this, and the mother in law character was a bit too cartoonishly awful. The way they fall back in love is lovely, but along the way both characters are so mean to each other that I wondered if they would be able to believably come back from it.

    Currently just started OF CURSES AND KISSES by Sandhya Menon, the first in a YA series about students at an elite international boarding school with a bit of a fairy tale vibe. I don’t think there’s any fantasy/actual magic involved, more just some cultural superstition/myths and fairy tale tropes. This one is a loose Beauty and the Beast retelling. It’s starting a bit slow, but I’m going to give it the benefit of the doubt as Menon needs to do some world building here and that takes time.
33. Kareni says:

    May 9, 2020 at 6:08 pm

    @HeatherS, here’s a list that might interest you ~

    https://eyesonbooks.com/2017/07/31/exciting-gay-vampire-books/
34. JenM says:

    May 9, 2020 at 6:29 pm

    I’m still not reading as much as usual and having trouble with anything other than light contemporary romance or UF/SF/Fantasy. I finished CRUSH THE KING by Jennifer Estep and loved it. I highly recommend the whole series, especially since it features a great heroine who trains as a gladiator and grows into her power but never loses her compassion.

    My bookclub is currently reading THE BOOK WOMAN OF TROUBLESOME CREEK by Kim Michele Richardson and it’s tough going with TW and CW for racism, poverty, abuse, etc. in Appalachia in the 1930’s. But I’ve been assured it gets less grim as it goes along, so I guess I’ll keep plugging away at it.
35. Rebecca says:

    May 9, 2020 at 7:08 pm

    So my library is reopening next week on the 15th, and my stash has served me well in getting me reading again, so well that I’ve once again been able to read e-books. I started the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by JR Ward via paperback, however I’m struggling with attention issues for book 2 – Im 70% now so the end is in sight (a worry… am I just too late for this series of alpha males?) I am enjoying the world building more than the romances. I squirrelled and read Dearest Rogue, #8 from Elizabeth Hoyt’s Maiden Lane series, which I loved! And after weeks of not being able to do audio, I’ve settled into Love Hacked by Penny Reid, the audio narration capturing my attention, lovely!
    I’m very keen to get back to some of my favourite series next: Nalini Singh’s Psi-Changeling’s Tangle of Need is up next for me, as is Cat Sebastian’s The Ruin of a Rake, the next Elizabeth Hoyt, Kerrigan Byrn’s The Duke… And continuing Nora Roberts Bed of Roses, a series I started late last month.
36. Scene Stealer says:

    May 9, 2020 at 7:11 pm

    I have been on a historical romance kick for a couple of weeks. Most of them were re-reads, but I did discover Grace Callaway. Some of her books were good.

    Anyway, I just finished Brad Meltzer’s new one, The Lincoln Conspiracy: The Secret Plot to Kill America’s 16th President–and Why It Failed. It was good, a walk through history that offered a story that I wasn’t taught in school.
37. Brigit says:

    May 9, 2020 at 7:13 pm

    This past week I’ve been reading a few books that have been on my wishlist for a while:

    Annika Martin, _Most Eligible Billionaire_

    Julie Particka, _ Adventures in Online Dating_

    Julie Hammerle, _Knocked-up Cinderella_

    I loved them all, but never would have even looked at them if they hadn’t been recommendations here at some point! I love this site and the input I get here.

    Thematically, they don’t have much in common aside from non-alphhole heroes, and professional heroines maybe?. If anyone happens to remember where they’ve all been mentioned, that would be great. I’ve searched the site, but didn’t find anything. And I’ve been wondering if I can find more fabulous reads in that thread that I missed.
38. Julia F says:

    May 9, 2020 at 9:58 pm

    @Ren Benton & @ Jennifer Estep – Yay more Leverage fans! I’ve been watching it on IMDB TV while WFH; I know the episodes so well that it’s great background for me. If you like fantasy, there’s a fantasy-esque Leverage series out there called The Rogues of the Republic (first book is The Palace Job) that’s really quite brilliant.

    I’m very happy for the reboot and glad to see John Rogers say it was because of the fans – we demanded it, and that made it happen! I know everyone’s back but Tim Hutton (of course because of the stuff that came out recently), and glad to have the gang back together. I wonder if they’ll get Mark Sheppard again??
39. Allison R-B says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:13 pm

    I’m eagerly awaiting K.J. Charles’ Slippery Creatures, too!

    R. Cooper’s Beings in Love backlist has become my Pandemic drug of choice. R. Cooper is the ruler of slow burn, low-to-medium-angst, cinnamon roll paranormal romance. A Beginner’s Guide to Wooing Your Mate is peak coziness. The last 2 re-releases in the series (His Mossy Boy & Sweet Clematis,) are coming out later this month.

    I’m loving Over & Over Again by Cole McCade, which I found thanks to a Corey’s Book Corner recommendation. https://coreysbookcorner.wordpress.com/2019/04/07/recs-for-a-spec-representation-in-contemporary-romance/ I was unable to resist this description: “This…snowed-in angsty holiday romance is the slowest of all slow burns. With baby goats.” Age gap romance is my catnip, so YMMV.

    Talia Hibbert’s Ravenswood books got released as an e-book bundle titled Hold Me Close, so I glommed that, and re-read. Next up, her new release, Guarding Temptation.

    Not-romance: The Book Club voted for War for the Oaks by Emma Bull, which is the Ur-text of the Urban Fantasy genre. I’ve meant to read forever. I started it yesterday, & it definitely deserves the hype.
40. Blackjack says:

    May 9, 2020 at 10:22 pm

    Just finished and loved Mhairi McFarlane’s If I Never Met You. Lovely romance with two wonderful main characters. I’m looking forward now to reading all of her books.

    I’m anxiously awaiting Emily Henry’s Beach Read later this month after reading so many rave reviews.

    @DiscoDollyDeb – Persephone/Hades retellings may possibly be a thing right now. I know that I’m absolutely hooked on Rachel Smythe’s serialized romance Lore Olympus published online on Webtoons. It’s a deconstruction of their infamous romance. Highly recommend for it’s utterly romantic retelling and for the lovely artwork. It’s free too and is soon to become an animated TV show.

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