Whatcha Reading? October 2020 Edition, Part Two

Cup of coffee and yarn for knitting on plaid with books close-upIt’s that time again! Our second and last Whatcha Reading of October is where we chat about the books we’ve picked up in the last couple weeks.

So far, the general consensus is that it’s been hard to stick with anything.

Shana: I’m still reading Comet’s First Christmas by Delilah Night. ( A ) It’s an intensely Christmassy f/f reindeer shifter romance where all of Santa’s reindeers are queer. It’s low heat, but also low-tension, which I’m enjoying. I just finished Alyssa Cole’s When No One Is Watching. I’m pretty sure it’s the best book about gentrification that I’ve ever read. It was a wild ride.

Kiki: I moved a few weeks ago and hadn’t had time to do much reading pre and post move so now I’m making up for it by trying to read all of the books at once. But what I’m most excited about The Widow of Rose House by Diana Biller because I kept having to return the ebook loan because I was so busy but I finally have time for it now and am LOVING it.

The Arctic Fury
A | BN | K | AB
Sarah: Happy new home, Kiki!

Elyse: I just started A Stitch in Time by Kelley Armstrong.

I’ve been in quite a slump this month, I think because I don’t have the emotional bandwidth for creepier stuff but a lot of lighter books just aren’t sticking with me

Carrie: In War and Peace, things got super boring, then super exciting, then super boring again, which I gather is just how war is. I’m in Part 11, there are 15 parts, I’m losing my motivation! Will I make it? Pierre tried going to war and did not like it.

Tara: You can do it, Carrie!

Carrie: Other than that by coincidence I have two books that reference the Donnor Party back to back – I just finished The Arctic Fury which was a book I have many thoughts about, and now I’m about to finish Answer Creek by Sacramento author Ashley E. Sweeny ( A | BN | K | AB ).

The moral to both, in the words of Virginia Reed, “Don’t take any shortcuts and hurry along as fast as you can.”

A Duke, a Lady, and a Baby
A | K | AB
Claudia: I’m making my way through Vanessa Riley’s A Duke, the Lady, and a Baby.

Catherine: I’ve begun and abandoned so many books recently – nothing seems to stick. But we read Troilus and Cressida with the Skypespeare group on Saturday, and while it is a pretty bad play, it did remind me that I haven’t read The Unknown Ajax ( A | BN | K | AB ) in well over a decade, so I’m giving that a shot (and hoping that it hasn’t been visited by the Racism Fairy since I last read it).

(The classism fairy definitely inhabits this book, but then, she always did!)

EllenM: I recently finished Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas ( A | BN | K | AB ) and it was amazing—definitely recommend if you are looking for good queer rep fantasy with a happy ending 🥰 although readers be warned that there’s a lot of transphobia committed by the MCs family in the opening chapters of the book.

I also finally read Harrow the Ninth ( A | BN | K | AB ) and even though it was really different from Gideon I loved it!!! cannot wait to hopefully get ALL THE ANSWERS I CRAVE in book 3

Queen of the Conquered
A | BN | K | AB
Amanda: I’ve been loving all the Harrow fanart.

Maya: A friend of mine told me to read Queen of the Conquered by Kacen Callender, so I just got that from my library and I’m listening to the audiobook of Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse. ( A | BN | K | AB ) The narrator is Tanis Parenteau, who also did Trail of Lightning and Storm of Locusts, and she is SO GOOD.

Amanda: The book blew my damn mind (Queen of the Conquered) and I still don’t know how to feel about it.

Maya: My friend asked me to read it because she needed someone to talk to about it, so I’m guessing samesies in short order!!

Amanda: Very curious to hear what you think!

Sneezy: I’ve been having the same problem with not being able to sink into a book, so largely I’m still lolling in Beverly Jenkin’s backlist. I’m on Something Like Love ( A | BN | K | AB ) right now. I’m also going to try reading Scattered Minds by Gabor Mate again. ( A ) I’m a (theoretical) adult, dammit, and I need to figure out my brain!!!!

Tara : Bouncing between books continues to be a thing for me too. But in good news, my hold finally came through for I’m Still Here by Austin Channing Brown ( A | BN | K | AB ) and it’s excellent.

What have you been reading? Let us know in the comments!

Comments are Closed

  1. Sydneysider says:

    I’m reading Death in Paris by Emilia Bernhard. It started slowly, but it’s getting interesting and I am into it now.

    In non-romance books, I read No Man’s Land by Kevin Sullivan, which is about a near-disaster with airline automation. It’s good, but I’m glad I won’t be flying for a while! I also read Empire of Wild by Cherie Dimaline – it was very engaging and I read it in a day. It is classified as horror, but it’s not particularly gory, which is good.

    In romance, I read The Landowner’s Secret by Sonya Heaney. It was OK and I liked the colonial Australian setting. I don’t think I’ll continue in the series though, as the characters weren’t all that engaging. I read Night Owl, a Rachel Grant prequel, and it was a nice quick read. Black Lace by Beverly Jenkins was good as well and I liked the Detroit setting.

  2. FashionablyEvil says:

    Starting with a content note for the second part of my post: child abuse, animal abuse.

    More misses than hits for me of late, although I did enjoy Nicola Davidson’s FALLEN trilogy of novellas (can it be a trilogy if they’re novellas…?) They’re not the most historically accurate, but they’re fun. THE DEVIL’S SUBMISSION (a dom/sub with a female domme) was my favorite of the three.

    On the topic of misses: Lauren Dane’s OPENING UP and Elizabeth Hoyt’s DUKE OF SIN (part of the Maiden Lane series). I totally accept that part of the signature of the romance genre is that everyone deserves an HEA. But I really have trouble with books where one of the MCs has a really horrific back story and doesn’t get any sort of help or therapy and the reader is expected to believe the character is capable of sustaining a healthy romantic relationship. For context, and this is where the CN applies: in the Hoyt, the hero’s father repeatedly killed his pets as part of an abusive childhood (until the hero kills his own cat so his dad won’t) among many other awful things, and in the Dane the hero was physically and emotionally abused by his grandparents for the first seven years because of his life because they thought he were the physical manifestation of his mother’s sins (who gave birth at 15.)

    I just really have a hard time with the idea of the women in those relationships doing so much emotional labor and what should be the work of a very skilled therapist. I also don’t know how to screen for these types of books—does this trope (and I hesitate to even call it a trope because that doesn’t sound serious enough) have a name?

  3. Jill Q. says:

    Wow, this month is flying by. Which I guess is s good thing given world circumstances and circumstances here in the US currently. Still, October is my favorite time of year.
    I finally finished MY BRILLIANT FRIEND by Elena Ferrante. I read it in Italian, not English and it’s definitely the longest, most complicated thing I’ve ever read in that language, so it’s hard to separate how I felt about it from the sense of triumph and the love of the language itself. I would say it’s good, but sad and I’m definitely going to read the whole series spaced out to give my brain and emotions a rest.
    BREAKING THE RULES by Barbara Samuel, a 1994 Silhouette Intimate Moments with a woman-in-jeopardy plot. I found it a bit of misfire, but honestly I think I should stop snapping up old releases cheap on Kindle and expect to find a diamond in the rough. Tastes and times change. The descriptions of the mountains were beautiful, the hero was kind of an ass to the heroine, and he didn’t buy condoms b/c he didn’t “want to be tempted” and then they had sex anyway. With the hero thinking “wow, I really thought she would be the sensible one and stop me.” B/c clearly she’s a “nice girl” (He tells her that a million times and I wanted her to hit him for it.) That was enough to tip it over from “meh” to “do not like.”
    I’m also done with THE DUKE WHO DIDN’T by Courtney Milan and although there are some silly secrets and misunderstandings, I’m enjoying its light and fluffy plot after the last book I read by hers dragged me through the ringer.
    I decided this Tuesday that I absolutely have to stop reading the news until after the election (maybe well after depending on how counting the votes goes). I will make myself crazy with polls and projections. So I anticipate my reading concentration will go up (there’s always a correlation between too much news and squirrel brain for me). But I am reading “how to stop a coup” reading material (fun times, fun times).

  4. Arijo says:

    @FashionablyEvil: I so get you! That’s why I stopped Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Dark-Hunter series – the guys’ backstories where too often relentlessly horrific, I couldn’t stand it. I tend to stay clear of the child abuse CW because. To show it’s about a MC backstory… I’ll leave it to cleverer minds to come up with something, all that comes to me is stuff like Child Abuse, Therapy Required = CATReq (!)

    I had more luck with my reading. I started off well with MIKOTO AND THE REAVER VILLAGE by Forthright. 4th book in the Amaranthine Saga. After Tamiko and the Two Janitors‘s detour (to introduce the twin trees) we’re back on the main arc. I’d try to give a bit of description, but it would be useless because you’d need to have read Kimiko and the Accidental Proposal (and also Tsumiko and the Enslaved Fox) to follow – and if you read those then you’re already addicted to Forthright’s soothing writing, and compassionate protagonists. In short, we meet up with old friends, some new are added (or grown; it’s set 11 years after the end of Tsumiko). As with the other 3, I finished it feeling very zen. Forthright’s books are so appeasing, reading one is like meditating. I would’ve liked more romance though, I’m a bit disappointed on that front.

    I also followed up on the names I picked up from the Pets in Space 4 collection. First, THE KEY by Pauline Baird Jones about a US military female space pilot rescued by an alien after crashing on a deserted planet. The writing was fun and engaging so it took me a while to wake up to how bad the world building was… The hero and heroine were sweet together, but they were insta-love and didn’t evolve for the half of the book I read. They couldn’t counterbalance the gaping plot holes. DNF. I like the author’s style, but will keep to her short stories in the future.

    I had more luck with the second author, Alexis Glynn Latner. BRIARLEY is an unconventional retelling of Beauty & the Beast, set in WWII. It’s an m/m story – here, the father doesn’t exchange his daughter for his own well-being. It’s a slow build between a gentle middle-aged man and a childish and anguished young man. The writing had a fairytale-like rythm, it fit very well with this toughtful story. The clash between the enchanted house from 1840 and ‘modern’ 1940 is also well done and made the WWII era come alive for me. I only wish the ending had been less abrupt. Alexis Glynn Latner is a name that has come up a couple of times in WAYR and rec league, for good reasons. I’ll pick up more.

    I tried another anthology, DARK FAIRY TALES. DiscoDollyDeb did a good run down of it in the past, and also recommended Skye Warren somewhere. Warren’s story was good and I plan on reading more of her stuff; another author that pinged my radar was Celia Aaron. In her short story ‘Rumpelstiskin’, the hero has a business meeting with a man, and asks him why he’s selling them a profitable business. The guy’s answer? His wife doesn’t like its carbon imprint and the impact on rainforests so he’s getting rid of it. As the hardened, criminal businessmen goggle at him, he shrugs and adds: ‘Camille is everything I’m not.’ He smiles with the only warmth I’ve seen him offer. ‘The only woman I’ve ever preferred all in one piece.’ Whoa… I had to check it out, to see if it was what I feared, but mostly because I liked what I’d seen of Celia Aaron’s writing. So I searched for, and found, THE BAD GUY.

    I’ve read my share of dark romances in the past, DNF lots before I learned how to sift through goodreads reviews to finally find authors whose main characters’ dynamic within that theme I could enjoy. THE BAD GUY synopsis reads like the typical obsessive stalker kidnapping dark romance, so I thought I knew what I’d get. Not so. First off, it’s okay, Sebastian’s not a serial killer cutting up women like I feared. He’s not a career criminal with a mafia entourage either, he’s a privileged kid with a loving father. Since he’s a psychopath (ok, I don’t know if it’s credible that a kid would get this diagnostic… I just suspended my disbelief a bit higher and read on), his loving father’s job was to explain things to him and give him tricks ‘to pass’. We are shown some of these lessons in flashback, full of the dad’s love and fears, seen through Sebastien’s limited attachment. It gave an additional dimension I’m not used to seeing in this type of book. Also, in a story about obsession and kidnapping, there was a surprising amount of banter. Dark-edged banter, sure, usually about the hero’s disturbing habits (he’s very frank about what he is, what he did and what he wants, and doesn’t mind getting snark about it), but funny. At least, it was funny banter to me and I managed to enjoy the story all the way to the end (despite too many pages dedicated to the boyfriend). We even get a happy happy joy joy epilogue that so many dislike, but that I can enjoy, personally.

    I also kept up with reading Halloween themed books: MY BEST FRIEND’S EXORCISM by Grady Hendrix, the one with the very cool cover disguised as an 80s VHS movie (right down to the ‘Be kind, Please rewind’ sticker). The title tells the story and I won’t spend too long on it because there wasn’t a speck of romance. Just, it captured the 80s atmosphere so well (as the decade that grew out of Poltergeist and The Omen); I was reminded how urban legends back then were obsessed with satanism and they SCARED ME SO BAD when I was little. Enough so that I actually felt uneasy reading this, heh. (It also ended up being a very touching story about friendship – I cried at the end.)

    After that, I needed some uncomplicated smexy loving and went with TOUCH NOT THE CAT by Cathryn Cade. Being a Mary Stewart fan, the title was what attracted me, but I did dig the wizard turning into a cat and the antagonistic neighbors set up. I knew going in the hero would be a dick, but dicky heros can be fun when they’re paired with the right heroine. So yeah he was a dick but no, they weren’t well paired. The power balance was completely skewed in his favor and he kept abusing it, until they became a couple and he finally toned it down. I wasn’t impressed. (As I was reading over what I’d written, I realized how inconsistent it looked. Reading about Sebastian’s secret cameras in The Bad Guy gave me thrills, but a wizard looking through his neighbor’s window skeeved me out…? Well, here the wizard spy for a cheap sexual thrill on a woman he doesn’t like and feels superior to, while making bad puns about peeping toms and pussies /shudders/)

    I finished HOLLOW KINGDOM by Kira Jane Buxton. As far as zombies apocalypses go, this one was well depicted. As was the sheer relief of the fauna and flora to (finally!) be rid of the humans, even if the Mother Earth philosphy became rather heavy handed. But I couldn’t stand the MC name, Shit Thurd. I kept picturing a big… log… everytime his name (even in initials) was mentionned. On top of the zombies’ horribly dislocated necks, purulent fluids and rotting world, just seeing ‘S.T.’ at the top of his pov chapter made me go Urgh, especially with all the Cheetos meals mixed in. I gave up at p.124 and won’t be able to enjoy Cheetos for a while.

    Right now I’m reading UNCANNY magazine, the sept-oct edition (there’s a story by T. Kingfisher in it!). I came accross a passage in the first essay, Imagining Place: Worldbuilding As by Elsa Sjunneson. She writes: ‘We stop asking when things go back to normal. We start to imagine how things could begin to feel normal once again, but with adjustments for this new world of ours. I’ll give you an example—it’s small, but it helped me. I invested in masks that would coordinate with my favorite clothes. […] In a present where we all must wear masks all of the time… that’s a small slice of normalcy. My cloth masks match my clothes. Especially since no one can possibly see my lipstick’. It made me realize I do wear matching masks, and I do like how it makes me feel! This realization adds a new feel-good-in-the-moment to my day, when I put on a coordinated mask. And the thrill of finding a mask that fit!!! *happy sigh* Thanks Ms. Sjunneson.

  5. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    I early-voted this week (stood in line an hour-and-a-half, which is small potatoes compared to the times some people are experiencing waiting to cast their ballots). Now all I can do is pray…and watch the World Series. Go Dodgers!

    Ruth Cardello dedicated her latest book, THE SECRET ONE, to “all the men who understand there’s more than one way to be ‘alpha.’ Sometimes the strongest man in the room is the one who is quietly supporting those around him.” I wouldn’t describe the hero of THE SECRET ONE as a “cinnamon roll” exactly, but his patient, empathetic way of relating to people and his quiet confidence in himself make him a little different from the standard kick-ass-and-impose-his-will-through-knowing-what’s-best-for-everyone alpha hero. In a switch on the standard m/f romance roles, the hero meets the heroine (a mechanic who runs a race car test track) when his car overheats and she stops to help him. It’s only after some FaceTime phone calls that they realize they met briefly seven years before when they were both at low ebbs and that their one conversation then gave them both the courage to move on. Although the romance in THE SECRET ONE is self-contained in the book—it’s a nice slow burn with found family and fake relationship elements—there is also a secondary story that has threaded its way through the two previous books (THE BROKEN ONE and THE WILD ONE) about the efforts (not all of them friendly) of a long-lost relative to meet the hero’s extended family, and that is why I strongly recommend reading the series in order to get the full arc of that backstory. Cardello reminds me of writers like Melanie Harlow and Julianna Stone: consistently producing reliably good books with plenty of heat and heart but never quite breaking through to the top tier. Perhaps THE SECRET ONE will finally open her work to a wider audience—I certainly hope so.

    I’m relatively new to Lauren Blakely—so new that I haven’t even attempted her backlist and am just trying to keep up with her current releases. I’ve read some complaints from her long-time readers that Blakely’s more recent books seem to be written for the audiobook market, with heavy emphasis on dialogue and little of the details, descriptions, and character development that were features of her earlier books. I can’t really address that, but I read (as opposed to listened to) Blakely’s ONE EXQUISITE TOUCH and enjoyed the antagonists-to-lovers erotic romance (with menage elements) between the rival owners of two of the biggest hotel-casinos in Las Vegas. Yes, there is a lot of dialogue—both of the expositional and the sexy kind—but I thought it worked well for the tone of the book: a woman—still hurt by the infidelity of her cheating ex-fiancé—meets two men at a masquerade ball in Vegas, unaware that they are business partners who own a hotel that is giving hers a lot of competition. The heroine has an anonymous (m/f/m) menage with the men (who, in fairness, don’t know who she is either). Even after identities are revealed, the throuple continues, although the heroine feels more emotionally connected to one of the men than to the other. But can they make romantic relationship work when their business considerations require them to essentially be adversaries? I thought ONE EXQUISITE TOUCH was interesting in that it starts with a menage but eventually resolves itself into a more standard m/f relationship (don’t worry—the third-wheel business partner will have his own romance in the future). Perhaps if I were more familiar with Blakely’s prior work, I would have a different opinion, but as it is I enjoyed ONE EXQUISITE TOUCH and recommend it as a hot & emotional erotic romance.

    The genial, all’s-well-that-ends-well tone of Rebel Carter’s older-heroine romance, NEW GIRL IN TOWN, is so at odds with the heroine’s backstory that it almost gave me whiplash. The 37-year-old heroine has just divorced her abusive, controlling husband and moved to Colorado to start over. She soon meets and feels attracted to the super of her apartment building—a feeling that is mutual on his part. But when the heroine discovers this man is ten years her junior, she puts the brakes on their burgeoning relationship and decides to date other men too, even as she and the younger man keep drifting closer together. There are a couple of “surprises” in the book (one about the hero, one about the heroine’s ex), both of which are obvious to the reader because Carter drops anvil-like hints about them, but the supposedly smart heroine is still shocked when they are uncovered. These situations cause some hiccups, but eventually all is resolved and true love triumphs. That’s the romance in a nutshell: it’s very sweet, almost fluffy, which is a jarring juxtaposition against the backdrop of the heroine’s abusive marriage and her ex-husband’s continued attempts to contact and intimidate her. And I also kept asking myself, would any woman, the ink barely dry on her divorce papers, really jump back into the dating game so quickly? NEW GIRL IN TOWN is not a terrible book (although there is no discussion of health status, birth control, or condom use before the couple have sex—so points off for that), but the tone felt wrong, as if the romance were far too light for the overall story.

    Clare Connelly’s latest HP, THEIR IMPOSSIBLE DESERT MATCH, is a Romeo & Juliet-esque romance about the forbidden love between a sheikh and a princess from rival kingdoms that have been at war for generations. The plot was so-so, but I liked the hero and heroine—each of them has been profoundly affected by the on-going conflict (especially the hero who lost both of his parents to an attack from the neighboring country) and each of them are in their own ways baffled by their attraction to each other; the push-pull of this attraction and its consequences play out over the course of the book. It takes the hero longer to accept the situation than the heroine, but I’m glad to say she doesn’t just wait around, pining, but instead returns to New York where she runs a children’s literacy program. Another element I liked: the heroine was not a virgin—and there was no unplanned pregnancy in the story. A serviceable example of the HP template with some interesting authorial choices thrown into the mix.

    Cora Reilly’s SWEET TEMPTATION is a mafia romance involving an arranged marriage between a young woman just turned 18 and the 14-years-her-senior widowed “underboss” of Philadelphia. The book begins with the hero standing over the body of his late first wife: we don’t immediately know what happened to her, but the story is gradually teased out over the course of the book. A few months later, the teenaged heroine enters into a marriage where she is suddenly responsible for the hero’s two children (one still a baby, the other a toddler clearly traumatized by his mother’s death). Will this young woman, just out of high school, be able to heal the family, fall in love with her much older husband, and keep peace amongst the warring crime factions of “La Famiglia”? Reilly is one of my favorite mafia romance writers: in her books, we find a hermetically-sealed universe of capos, underbosses, captains, made men, and women whose function it is to enter into arranged marriages with these men to strengthen the bonds between the various branches of La Famiglia and to produce its next generation (there are actually some interesting parallels to the Omegaverse in Reilly’s world—a place where everyone has a role from birth and is required to play it). Every character is raised “in the life” and prepares for an arranged marriage with no expectation of the union being particularly happy, certainly not a love match; so, when love does arrive, it’s not always immediately recognized or welcomed. I know Reilly’s books aren’t for everyone—they feature a lot of virginity fetishism and also require cw/tw for all manner of violence—but I enjoy their angsty style: as if, rather than kings, princes, or billionaire tycoons, the heroes of Harlequin Presents were all mob bosses. Perhaps Harlequin should take note—if they’re looking for a theme for a new line!

  6. I just started A PRINCESS FOR CHRISTMAS by Jenny Holiday. I also want to check out some other holiday books, including CHRISTMAS AT THE ISLAND HOTEL by Jenny Colgan.

    I’m also hoping to read ISLAND AFFAIR by Priscilla Oliveras; INK AND BONE by Rachel Caine; and THE GUINEVERE DECEPTION by Kiersten White.

    I’m also excited because the new Hallmark Christmas movies start tonight. The way this year has gone, I just want to look at pretty people and decorations and drink some hot chocolate. 🙂

  7. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    @Arijo: Aster Glenn Gray wrote BRIARLEY (and also another one of my favorite reads this year, THE THREE-FOLD TIE). I don’t think she’s the same writer as Alexis Glynn Latner who seems to be a SFF writer.

    I also agree about wanting to learn more about the man who makes a brief appearance in Celia Aaron’s RUMPELSTILKSKIN. I ended up downloading a couple of her freebies, but not THE BAD GUY (which wasn’t free, but is now on my never-ending tbr list).

  8. Rebecca says:

    It was slow going earlier this month but hit a few winners lately.

    OUT ON THE ICE was just the queer hockey romance I needed, I loved that the main characters were in their 30s and a little more established in themselves (even if there was still a lot of personal growth!). Loved to read about women getting ogled for their muscles.

    IN A HOLIDAZE was a pleasurable holiday read (I’m always here for a Groundhog Day trope) but I had a hard time putting together the characters’ theoretical back stories with who they were around their families (which is, perhaps, how people are sometimes)

    Still trying to decide whether I’m going to DNF Janet Dailey’s HOLDING OUT FOR CHRISTMAS, at this point I’m reading it just to rant about the totally bizarre depiction of ranchers and weather (no rancher who is actually capable of running a ranch has a house empty of nothing but a dozen doughnuts during blizzard season (or ever!), the notion that the last snow of the season would be mid December when literally everywhere in the Northern hemisphere is colder in January than mid December is bizarre, neither of these are critical to the story, just hanging out being wrong.)

    69 MILLION THINGS I HATE ABOUT YOU was a blast, very silly and I loved that the heroine was both really competent at her job and got to get her revenge for the petty crap the hero pulled. Don’t know that I really needed them to get together at the end, the revenge part was the most fun.

    In perfection, my hold on YOU HAD ME AT HOLA came in and I loved it, the big noisy family and the breadth of the Latinx representation and just the fun that the characters had- it wasn’t fluffy but it was fun and it was exactly what I was looking for. Looking forward to working through her backlist.

  9. Carrie G says:

    I’ve listened to two more books in Lucinda Brant’s Roxton series, THE AUTUMN DUCHESS and DAIR DEVIL. Both books are narrated by Alex Wyndham. I enjoyed them both, and DAIR DEVIL is perhaps my favorite of the series so far.

    I Also listened to two Julia Quinn Bridgerton books, THE VISCOUNT WHO LOVED ME, and TO SIR PHILIP, WITH LOVE. Again, I enjoyed both books. Quinn handled mental illness pretty well overall in TO SIR PHILIP, but in the end the feeling was that those with mental illness were a huge burden on those around them and life is better when they are not there.

    I tried two audiobook linked to Sarina Bowne/Elle Kennedy’s great HIM series, but they were both DNF for me. In GOOD BOY and STAY, the women were both super anxious characters I didn’t enjoy reading about. I was sad that the authors didn’t write more equal relationships like in the m/m HIM series. Great narrators on all of these.

    I also listened to TEMPORARY by Sarina Bown and Sarah Mayberry, which was fun. BRITISH BEDMATE by Vi Keenland and Penelope Ward was fine, great narrators, but I didn’t like part of the story. The SEXY ONE by Lauren Blakely was short, cute, and pretty stress-free. Not really much of a storyline. Again, great narration.

    In print I read:
    ORIENTATION by Gregory Ashe. Edge of your seat story and very well-written. I was tired when I finished. Ashe is a really talented writer.

    THE IDEAL BRIDE by Nonnie St. George. Light, fluffy, and a little slapstick. A good before-bed relaxing read.

    Two Annette Marie urban fantasy books–DAMNED SOUL AND SANGRIA, the final book of her Guild Codex: Spellbound series, and DELIVERING EVIL FOR EXPERTS the final book in her related Guild Codex: Demonica series. Both of these series have been so much fun and so many feels! Great world building, and wonderful friends, loyalty and found family stories. There are some romantic element woven through the stories, but mostly they are great urban fantasy. I recommend going to Annette Marie’s website for best reading order (the series are intertwined) if you are interested.

    Now I am reading SINGLE MALT (Agents Irish and Whiskey #1) by Layla Reyneand enjoying it so far. I’m listening to MIDSUMMER MOON by Laura Kinsale and narrated by the fabulous Nicholas Boulton. Sometimes Kinsale gets too angsty for me,so I’m crossing my fingers on this one.

  10. Heather C says:

    I switched over to the horror/creepy genre the last couple of weeks.

    Non Romance:
    The Butterfly Garden: I won’t describe because its disturbing, but I spent a lot of time imagining and mapping out the setting. And this is the first in a series and I can’t imagine how the following books would be connected but I’ll eventually give them a shot

    The Winter People: I got this off a ‘best of’ list but it didn’t click with me. Secluded house with creepy local legends about a secret to raise loved ones from the dead.

    And then in the Romance:

    The Engineer by C.S. Poe (m/m steampunk) Magic agent Gillian is sent to Old West Arizona to arrest bad guy Tinkerer and has to team up with outlaw Gunner to take the bad guy down. This was book 1 of a new series and I totally misunderstood and thought book 2 was out already, but its not!! Argh!!

    And then I read the first 2 in Gillian Keveran’s Read by Candlelight. They are short, gothic m/m romances.
    The Secretary and the Ghost: Pip goes to work for Lord Cross to pay off his father’s debts
    The Mystery of Brankenwell Hall: Stephen is an invalid, trying to recover at his grandfather’s home. He discovers a section of the home built around a spring/bath. And a random stranger who hangs out there

    This weekend I’m reading The Year of the Witching ( Alexis Henderson). Hopefully. Because I saw an advertisement for N.R. Walkers new release Lacuna and the cover is so pretty (and tempting)!

  11. Heather C says:

    @ DiscoDollyDeb “all the men who understand there’s more than one way to be ‘alpha.’ Sometimes the strongest man in the room is the one who is quietly supporting those around him.” YES! Those are the kinds of ‘alpha’ stories I love reading,

    @Arijo BRIARLEY is on my TBR.

  12. DonnaMarie says:

    Where did we leave off? Oh, that’s right picking a vacation read. I went with Whiteout by Andrea Anders. Easily packed paperback, easy to put down when activities called or it was time for light out. Easy to pick back up and a pretty enjoyable bit of romantic suspense 0 even if the rescue was a bit of a stretch.

    Then it was back home to finish Robert Galbraith’s Troubled Blood,. There was no way I was lugging that boulder to NC and back. While I over all enjoyed the mystery, I don’t care how much money the woman has made for your publishing house, she needs someone to slap some editing into her. I think the main reason I didn’t guess the who-done-it was because it had probably been 300 pages since we’d seen the character. Also, one secondary story is sufficient unto the needs of the day. PICK ONE! It was a 400 page mystery in a 933 page book.

    I’m currently in the middle of Heaven’s Queen the third book in Rachel Bach’s Paradox series. Devi & Rupert have just landed on the space station where their shipmate Nova grew up to see if her father can help with Devi’s infection. Can the eyes, the lelgas and the phantoms be far behind?

    Next up is Hench. I’m up for a little super villainy/revenge story.

  13. Escapeologist says:

    Been looking forward to Whatcha Reading as it helps my tired brain process those back-burner deep thoughts that get rudely interrupted by work and family responsibilities.

    “Hard to stick with anything” is sooo accurate.

    Books: all DNFs, here are the highlights:

    Hot Island Nights by Sarah Mayberry – this was recommended in the last whatcha reading comments. Australian setting, very sexy and emotionally resonant, great characters, funny moments. Too much angst for me at this time, hoping to come back to it.

    Soulless and Changeless by Gail Carriger – tried to get into this series years ago but didn’t care for the heroine. Since it’s spooky season, picked it up again in search of something paranormal but not too scary. Good worldbuilding, snarky humor, still don’t much like the heroine… she’s funny and refreshing but ultimately I don’t care enough what happens to her.

    Book-adjacent content:

    Miranda’s Daily Dose of Such Fun by Miranda Hart – it’s a book but in a page-a-day calendar format. Recommended if your day to day routine could use jollying up.

    Kate Allen @TheLatestKate daily social media posts and email newsletter – Adorable animals and positive affirmations. I also have them in book form but it’s hard to remember to open the book most days.

    Alyssa Cole’s Girls with Glasses newsletter

    SmartBitches posts and comments, of course!

    tor.com discussions about books I read decades ago

    tv/streaming:

    Avatar the Last Airbender on Netflix – watching with my preteen kid who has already binged it all and insists on educating me. Beautiful animation, great worldbuilding, characters get satisfying arcs.

    Big Fat Quiz old episodes on YouTube – it’s basically a pub trivia game with teams of mostly British comedians, had me belly laughing.

    Happy reading to you all, take good care of yourselves now

  14. Heather M says:

    I think I missed the last WAYR. Since I was last here, I finished Just Like That by Cole McCade. It was ok, but not exactly my thing. I wasn’t as bothered by the fact that they were a former student and his teacher, but more by the fact that they were current colleagues. And the fact that they had sex in public areas of a *school campus where they both teach* really threw me out of the story into an anxiety spiral. I kept thinking “where’s the CCTV?” So, uh…not for me, in the end.

    I also read The Duke Who Didn’t, which, as many people are saying, was wonderful. I’ve missed Milan and glad to see her back (it feels like quite a while since she’s had a new book out, or is that just me?)

    I also finished reading The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation for the second time this year because fuck, it’s 2020, there are no rules anymore. For an unofficial translation, I’m consistently impressed with how *good* it is (since I can’t read Chinese, I obviously have no idea what the original is like.) Like, there’s this one line about a character who “looked like he’d been pricked by a needle made of sugar.” It’s been in my head for a week. Anyway, I love that story. I’ve started one of the author’s other novel’s, but I haven’t made it very far yet.

    And, I made some progress in The Tale of Gengi, but I’m still not even halfway through. I may still be on track to finish it by the end of the year, but I had to take a break again, so who knows.

  15. Big K says:

    WAYR! YIPPEE! Like all of you, I am tired. So tired. For lots of reasons. So this is a little ray of sunshine I really needed.
    Got a lot more books read – my 13 year old issued a reading challenge to me, and she is going down! Actually, she is tearing through the Georgette Heyer, so I might be in trouble. Thank you for all of the recommendations – I think she is on her fourth book. She told me yesterday that she IS Frederica, so I feel that we, as a community, are guiding our youth well. Also, now I have a bunch of hard copies Georgette Heyer in the house so that’s an upside for me. Old Skool for the win during the pandemic!
    What I read:
    THE FRANGIPANI TREE MYSTERY Ovidia Yu – Really interesting exploration of gender, disability, race, and class wrapped up in a mystery. The setting, 1930’s Singapore, seemed well-researched and vivid, and I liked the fact that the author worked hard to tell the story from the viewpoint and values of a forward thinking 1930’s Chinese woman. So she challenged a lot, but there was a lot she accepted that we would/should not today. There was a lot of telling, not showing, but it worked because I personally would not have understood or noticed the cultural nuances without explanation. The mystery was a little plodding and obvious, but overall I enjoyed it. I think it would make a great book club book, if you are looking for one. Has anyone read the next ones in the series?
    MAGIC OUTSIDE THE BOX Honor Raconteur – Paranormal on a different world with a detective transplanted there from this world, roughly Victorian society. Magic, other races, inventions fueled by magic but based on our tech, investigations of crimes, but nothing is really explored or expanded upon. This series is not evolving as I’d hoped. Should I continue? I just feel unsatisfied, honestly. This was the third one, and we’ve learned nothing about the characters or world we didn’t know in the first book. Where are we going?
    SUCKS TO BE ME Kristen Painter – Terrible, terrible book. Mob boss’s widow is TSTL (seriously, you didn’t know the mob was going to turn on you?), obsessed with her appearance and material things, and shallow. Unwillingly becoming a vampire does not improve upon her. As someone who is the same age as the heroine, her obsession with looking younger after she became a vampire felt really gross. Sometimes a book presents a fantasy that you can enjoy vicariously. Sometimes, a book makes you feel like you won’t live that fantasy, so the author is saying your life is terrible. This book did the latter. In the real world, most people really don’t care if we look older. Most of us aren’t ever models, mob wives, or movie stars. And hopefully you have friends and family, a home, a career you love, all the life you’ve built, that you didn’t have when you were young. So f*ck you very much, lady vampire. I wouldn’t give all of that up to become a size 4 (which most of us never were or should be, so f*ck you very much again). Aside from that, the book went nowhere and the writing was poor. I would not have finished it if I didn’t have to beat my 13 year old in this reading challenge.
    WOOD: A TRUE LOVER’S STORY A.E. Via Not very good. Neither main character felt real to me, and the emotional arc was a little unbelievable. I was intrigued by the exploration of what it might feel like to get out of prison after 17 years, though it didn’t really deliver.
    FIRE’S MATE C.W. Gray Not very good. One of the main characters had been an “elemental” and his brain still worked like he was a happy flame. His simplicity and childlike attitude annoyed me. Also, this may be because I read them out of order, but the world building felt like I was in Candyland, the game. So, not bothering with the rest of the series.
    MY HUSBAND MY STALKER and THE HITMAN’S ANGEL Jessa Kane – Whenever I am in the mood for something naughty and twisted, I look to @DiscoDollyDeb’s recommendations. That’s how I found these two books. Are these great literature? Probably not. Did I enjoy them? Yes. Do we want women in the real world to make the choices made in these books? No, but they are very hot ‘n heavy, if that is what you are looking for, which I was. Thanks, Triple D! The Bitchery can count on you! 
    Stay safe and healthy and vote, everyone! Looking forward to diving into all your recommendations!

  16. Arijo says:

    @DiscoDollyDeb. OMG! I feel so bad mixing up Alexis Glynn Latner & Aster Glenn Gray… When helping my son with his homework, I’m always telling him to go slow and to make sure he has all the details right… He has ADHD, didn’t get it from the neighbor! Mom should follow her own advice.

    There was also The Time-Travelling Popocorn Ball I was pretty excited to read soon, now which of the two wrote it? *Checks* Aster Glenn Gray! Okay. Now I’ve got to check out some Alexis Glynn Latner books then.

  17. Trix says:

    I read Angela Chen’s ACE, and my feelings are…complicated. It is impressively researched and very thoughtful, and I’m sure many people on the purely ace, sex-neutral, or sex-averse side of things will feel acknowledged for the first time. The handling of grey-ace sexuality is a lot more problematic, and I don’t know if that’s because of Chen’s own orientation or because it would complicate explanations too much. She has said that she wasn’t intending to write the definitive statement on asexuality (the length alone bears this out), but as a demisexual who had just assumed I was a broken allo, I didn’t feel better. Demisexuality gets a few brief paragraphs about a third of the way in, and I headdesked (since facepalming is no longer allowed in the time of Covid-19) when Chen opined that a lot of allos behave in a way that could be considered demisexual. When even Dan Savage is saying demis don’t exist, and we have to constantly tell people “it’s attraction, not behavior by choice,” this seems like carte blanche for people to keep saying “you’re just picky/a snowflake/a prude/think you’re morally superior for wanting to wait,” because now they can point to a passage in a book written by a certified ace person (albeit one who spends a lot of time explaining the nuances of her own romantic and sexual relationships). Sigh. It’s good to open up dialogue, but you may not want to read this if you’re seeking reassurance. I also read some manga and related things, but will get into that later….

  18. JenM says:

    Even though I have this weird nagging sense that the holidays are still far in the future (not true since Xmas is only eight weeks away!), I’ve been sucked into the holiday romance whirlwind. I think my favorite so far is THE TWELVE DOGS OF CHRISTMAS by Lizzie Shane. An NYC fashion photographer goes to her grandparents’ upstate NY town to help them out with their rescue shelter, only to learn that the town is going to pull their funding in order to rebuild the town’s damaged community center. She has just a couple of weeks to find homes for the 12 somewhat challenging dogs currently in the shelter and is helped by the outwardly grumpy (but inwardly people pleasing) town council member who cast the deciding vote to pull the funding and feels pretty guilty about it. Hijinks, small town holiday celebrations, and lots of cute dog scenes ensue.

  19. Janine says:

    Haven’t been reading as much romance lately, but am loving Roger Zelazny’s “A Night in the Lonesome October.” It concerns a Mysterious Event which is in the process of developing over the month of October–there is one chapter for each day of the month. The story is told from the point of view of the familiars to the people involved in the Event. I am loving it as Halloween reading…it’s spooky and borrows a lot of horror tropes, but thus far is not scary or gory. The one downside is it’s a bit hard to get…I don’t think it’s available as an e-book and used copies are relatively expensive for a book from the 1990s.

  20. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    @Big K: I live to serve the Bitchery!

  21. Pear says:

    This week was busy/hectic at work and I think next week will not be much better. (After I finish writing this, I need to do some work now to make next week less frantic.) I’ve been on a good romance novel streak lately!

    Romance:

    UNCLAIMED by Courtney Milan was wonderful, I liked the subversion of the seduction-as-bet trope (first of all, minor subversion that the woman was taking money to seduce the man, as I usually see the reverse, and secondly, what she does with the seduction-as-bet is a delight). I’m looking forward to reading Smite’s book, probably in November as I need to line up some comfort reading for the time after Election Day (which is probably not going to have a decisive answer). B+/A-

    IT TAKES TWO by Jenny Holiday was fun. I think this series does a great job of lovingly mocking the modern wedding-industrial complex, and how even brides who think their weddings will be ~chill~ end up succumbing to the cultural pressures to do MORE. I liked Wendy and Noah together; not super into the best friend’s brother trope in general, but I felt like the conflict here was less “what will the sister think?” and more “wow we have baggage from over a decade of being in denial about our feelings,” so that worked fairly well for me. Reflecting FashionablyEvil’s comment above though, I felt like their backstories (not SUPER dark but lots of feelings that have not been processed) made me want to send them both to therapy. Maybe we need a tier system for the “please get therapy and then seek happily ever after” label. Overall, a B.

    HER BIG CITY NEIGHBOR by Jackie Lau worked surprisingly well for me. I was a little uncertain after the first chapter, but I’m a sucker for grumpy one & sunshiney one, and I’m coming to trust Lau when she has grief in a character’s backstory. Amy and Victor both have to work some things out on-page, but it felt like they’ve at least started the process of facing their emotions in such a way that neither has to do the heavy lifting for the other. I also think this was a great book to read during the pandemic as I reflect on how my world is smaller right now, as Amy and Victor are both dealing with the ways in which they have allowed their lives to shrink down. Also, so many good food descriptions, I miss going places and eating things. B+ at least, and I’ve preordered the next ones in the series.

    HEARTS ON HOLD by Charish Reid was a delight and so autumnally appropriate. I picked this up after it got recommended as a double feature with MR. IMPOSSIBLE by Loretta Chase, which is one of my all-time favorite romance novels. Definitely very similar vibes with uptight, academic heroine + laidback hero who loves her for her personality. The academia setting was really great, and as I suspect is the case for many on this site, I love a librarian. There were a few minor plot points that felt unresolved to me at the end (and I wanted the bad boss to get his comeuppance!), but overall I really enjoyed it. B+ here as well!

    Non-Romance:

    THE UNREALITY OF MEMORY: AND OTHER ESSAYS by Elisa Gabbert was as good as I’d been hoping. It’s a collection covering myriad topics (global warming, pandemics (written before 2020!), disasters, the nature of memory, pain, compassion, the media, reality) that left me with a lot to think about, and I anticipate returning to various essays soon.

    UTOPIA FOR REALISTS: HOW WE CAN BUILD THE IDEAL WORLD by Rutger Bregman had some great chapters discussing Universal Basic Income and the idea of the 15-hour work week. I’m less optimistic than he is on the use of AI to improve life for everyone (because I don’t trust the people in Silicon Valley to be concerned with inequality when AI use becomes pervasive), and I need to ponder the open borders concept more (as global warming will drive more climate refugees). Definitely worth picking up for the UBI chapters and the reduced work week, if you would like to learn more about that. Very accessible language.

    Currently working through BRING THE WAR HOME: THE WHITE POWER MOVEMENT AND PARAMILITARY AMERICA by Kathleen Belew. It’s been on my list for a while and seems relevant for right now. Definitely very academic in tone, but I’ve learned a lot about the rise of a more unified white power movement following the Vietnam War and how they organized & committed acts of violence in such a way that the authorities and media tended to credit people as “lone wolves” rather than members of a deliberately constructed movement using small cells to limit government action. Also, learned that the white power people have been organizing on the internet since it arrived.

    On deck:
    BLITZED and SNAPPED by Alexa Martin (FUMBLED has been my favorite in this series, which reminds me of the Chicago Stars by SEP but with an insider’s view and more modern racial politics) are both in from the library, I guess football books feel very fall-appropriate too. I also just got WITCH HAT ATELIER vols 5 + 6 in, and I look forward to starting those soon.

  22. LML says:

    I re-read the first (In Milady’s Chamber, no charge from Amazon) and then blasted through Sheri Cobb South’s John Pickett mysteries, bouncing between titles purchased from Amazon and titles available on Scribd. The mysteries were good, but the arc of John’s relationship with his ‘my lady’ was exceptional. Unlike many historical novels where people from different economic and social levels meet, marry and never give those differences another thought, adjustments are an indelible part of this couple’s relationship. It has been a long time since I’ve felt that frantic urge to read the next and the next and the next…

    Yesterday, adjusting having to do without John Pickett and friends, I read Dangerous by Minerva Spencer. Perfect change of pace. In Books on Sale, Amanda introduced Dangerous with “old skool vibes” and “harkens back to early romance novels”, all true. But. As I read I considered that old skool needs a descriptive update (along the lines of post-modern or neoclassical), for books like this which retain a plot of rescued victim, new relationship, return to the scene of captivity to rescue someone else, all without the belittling aspects of old skool romance.

  23. Darlynne says:

    Surprisingly, these last two weeks (days, hours, who knows/cares any more?) have been amazing, reading-wise. I loved every one of these for different reasons:

    HOW RORY THORNE DESTROYED THE MULTIVERSE by K. Eason
    A DEADLY EDUCATION by Naomi Novik
    RING SHOUT by P. Djeli Clark
    HENCH by Natalie Zina Walschots

    The last three are quite dark, the characters not always likable, the plots frequently violent, but I will remember/treasure all of them for a long time. Highly recommended.

    Next up: THE VAPORS by David Hill. Organized crime, cons, family in Hot Springs, AR.

  24. Katie says:

    I’ve had a hard time concentrating on reading this month. I’ve finished what I started, I’m just going about half as fast as usual and pausing frequently to re-read my favorite parts of other random books. Liked the stuff I picked up, this is me and not the books.

    THE DEADLY HOURS: anthology by Susanna Kearsley, Anna Lee Huber, Christine Trent, and C.S. Harris. It’s four novellas set in different time periods from the 1700s through to WWII. The stories are connected by a cursed pocket watch that shows up in each one. I really enjoyed this. I’ve been thinking of reading Susanna Kearsley for a while but never went for it because I’m not wild about split time-line stories (if the story involves the past I prefer to stay there unless there is time travel), so a novella was a good place to start. It was good enough that I’m probably going to read the novel that introduced these characters. The Huber story features the characters from her Lady Darby series. The Trent story also seems to feature series characters, but I have never read her work before. Her detective is a female Victorian undertaker, which was really interesting and gave me a vague urge to read about Victorian mourning that I might follow through on when I can focus better. The Harris story is set in WWII; it seems to be the only one here not connected to the author’s already-published books. Really liked that one. She brought up things like the treatment of immigrants from the Axis countries in Britain during the war, which was deeply depressing but also important to think about.

    The library finally got MURDER AT QUEEN’S LANDING by Andrea Penrose, so I read that. I liked it. Moved the romantic subplot along and involved a lot of the supporting characters that have been introduced in the previous books. The science and technology stuff from the 19th century she incorporates in this series is always interesting, too.

  25. Vivi12 says:

    I’m so stress averse that I almost couldn’t make myself of read through the dark moment of RETURN BILLIONAIRE TO SENDER by Annika Martin, and if you’ve read any of those you know how fluffy they are! I had to remind myself that I knew how it would end…So it was fun, still not as good as The Billionaire’s Wake-Up-Call-Girl, but diverting. if
    In a similarly light vein I really liked Charis Michael’s THE EARL NEXT DOOR, I loved the plot from the moment the heroine accidentally walks into the hero’s music room through a hidden passage way. All characters that are first represented as terrible people: the judgemental Lady Frinfrock and the dissipated heroe, Trevor, an earl, are actually good, and there’s really no effort to hide this fact, so we don’t have to waste any time learning that first impressions were incorrect. I loved it so much I picked up the Virgin and the Viscount, but had to dnf. Exploitation of young girls in brothels as part of the plot seems precariously close to real life.
    A DANGEROUS DECEIT by Alissa Johnson follows A Talent for Trickery and A Gift for Guile. Gabriel, the hero, is a famous private investigator who has been hired to find something in the belongings of the heroine’s deceased brother sent back from Russia. Jane, the heroine, has been living in seclusion for 17 years . They end up on a rough road trip, traveling mostly by horse. There’s subterfuge, sudden exits from trains, bad guys being led and appearing when least expected, near misses and quick rescues. Jane manages to hide a hearing problem from Gabriel for several days, afraid it will change how he sees her. Gabriel believes he’s has been too deceitful for too long to even know who he is, much less deserve love. Characters from the first two books in the series appear, and I really recommend them as well, A TALENT FOR TRICKERY, and A GIFT FOR GUile.
    I haven’t seen anyone recommend Naughty Brits, a collection of novellas unified by a gala party at a museum and by unusually well endowed heroes, by authors Sierra Simone, Sarah McClean, Sophie Jordon, Louisa Edwards and Tessa Grafton. I likes all the stories except Better With You, I disliked being with the petty self involved heroine. Tessa Grafton is a new author to me, and I loved her story of an American hero in Wales to buy a pub for his multinational company and the current owner. He’s a war vet with PTSD a survivor’s guilt, she’s an aspiring opera singer who came home to run the family bar when her father died. The scenery was beautiful and made me want to visit Wales and hear some of the long Welsh names out loud. This is a really sexy one! The overall rating is ~3.5.

  26. Sujata R says:

    It’s been a busy couple of months reading for me! On the romance side, I loved Mary Balogh’s newest in the Westcott series “Someone to Romance”. Is it my imagination or is the series getting better?! In the mystery/romance side, I dug deep into the Lady Darby series by Anna Lee Huber. I enjoyed the first couple of books but now the modern language/mannerisms are making me crazy – Georgette Heyer and Mary Balogh are the best Regency authors IMO and so it’s hard when you see little mistakes in other books.On the “romance-light”side, I enjoyed Marjan Kamali’s Together Tea and The Stationery Shop. Other books that I really enjoyed are Philip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart series (The Ruby in the Smoke is the first) and then the latest in The Dark Materials world – The Secret Commonwealth. I just love how he is able to capture key aspects of a strong, smart young woman who is also vulnerable in that she is young and learning as she goes along (no superpowers per se even in a fantasy world). I’m also listening to Happiness by Aminatta Forna which is wonderful! On my TBR pile, I have The Frangipani Tree Mystery by Ovidia Yu and Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy. I need to find some fun, light reading to get through the elections especially now that I’ve stopped watching the news. In the meantime, please go vote everyone!

  27. FashionablyEvil says:

    @Vivi12–ooh, had not seen that anthology yet—looks like fun!

  28. Hot in AZ says:

    I have been finding it hard to find books that really catch me. I start hopeful and then about 1/3 of the way in, either call it quits or start another book. There was a bad part earlier this month I think I had 4 or 5 books started. So what I really liked:

    A LADY IN RED by Kelly Bowen. I just finished this one, it is a novella about a woman painter and how she masquerades as a man to get a painting commission. It was sweet and I loved how she and the hero relate to one another, both when he thought she was another man and once he learned she was a woman.

    Get Well Soon by Jennifer Wright: This is a non-fiction accounting of the worst plagues in history and the heroes who fought them. It was recommended in WYR months ago. It is snarky and not as medical as a I would like (4 years of veterinary school makes you want to know ALL the details of the pathogenesis of a disease). However I am enjoying reading it. The chapter on Syphilis is alarming and may affect how I read historical romances… I have thought, even before this, that all those rakes likely had STDs especially with all the courtesans and brothels etc. My husband was not amused when I tell him anecdotes from the book though (he is non-medical) and apparently hearing about smearing feces in your plague buboes is disturbing, who knew?

    THE OTHER SIDE OF MIDNIGHT by Simone St James: I oddly enough have been reading her books in order, which was completely unintentional. I did not care too much for the previous book to this one SILENCE FOR THE DEAD, but MIDNIGHT was much better and more what I had experienced from her before. If you are looking for a ghost story that is light on romance, but has a HEA this is a fun read.

    MARRIAGE OF MERCY by Carla Kelly: After having a bad run with Ms Kelly this book was delightful. I liked the heroine and the hero and it was just delightful with enough drama to keep things interesting, but not enough to be too upsetting.

    I did tap out finally of the Psy Changeling books by Nalini Singh. I really hated HEART OF OBSIDIAN, and I just did not care enough about what was happening in that world anymore. Kaleb was just awful and Sahara insipid and the sex scenes boring, I actually was only skimming and got about 2 pages in and realized oh they’re having sex, huh.

    Keep going on the recommendations ladies and gents!

    Also any online book club recommendations? I know some people have zoom or other meetings and I am looking for more interaction with people!

  29. Kareni says:

    — an enjoyable contemporary romance; this book had me laughing aloud several times: 40-Love by Olivia Dade
    — @Karin and @Deborah, A Death in Sheffield by Anne Cleeland. I’m a fan of the author’s Acton and Doyle series, but this is the first of her historical romances that I’ve read. It was interesting to note parallels between this book and the series.

    1. In series and book, the hero is a peer; the heroine is decidedly not.

    2. There is an age difference between hero and heroine. (She’s a very wise 17 in this book.)

    3. In the series, the heroine can detect lies; in this book, the heroine is talented at gauging character.

    4. Both book and series use a term I’d never previously encountered — “to grass” which means to inform on someone.

    I enjoyed the book and would read more of the author’s historical romances.
    — The Nickel Boys: A Novel by Colson Whitehead for my book group. It was a sad read which likely means that the author did a good job writing it. (I think my book group needs to start reading some uplifting books rather than tales of war and misery month after month.)
    — I have at least a dozen brand new library books here awaiting my attention, thus I chose to re-read a book I own. Go figure! Sometimes you just want a guaranteed good read. Parker’s Sanctuary: A Guardsmen Novel. I also read the FREE prequel …Rescued: A “Parker’s Sanctuary” Story. Both are by Cooper West.
    — Nowhere Man: Another John Pickett Novella by Sheri Cobb South.This is a take on It’s a Wonderful Life; it was a nice read but would make no sense without having read the prior books in the series.

    — Little Fires Everywhere: A Novel by Celeste Ng. It was an interesting read which presented some thought provoking scenarios. The book group that I left 18 years ago when I moved invited me back since they are now Zooming; it was a fun meeting and a nice silver lining in these strange times.
    — the Australian set contemporary mystery romance Tallowwood by N.R. Walker which I quite enjoyed.
    — enjoyed yet another reread of Linesman and Alliance (Linesman Novels Book 1 and 2) by SK Dunstall.

  30. Kate K.F. says:

    The best thing I’ve read recently is Seanan McGuire as A Deborah Baker’s Over the Woodward Wall, very much in the vein of her Wayward Children books and lovely and heartfelt.

    The next one I really enjoyed was Piranesi by Susanna Clarke, which is a complicated and evocative book, it kind of made me think of Wylding Hall, not as creepy but some of the same sense of place. I love how she writes books that really put you into somewhere else.

    Ones that were not as strong for me were the newest badger book by Shelley Laurenston, Badger to the Bone. All these books are definite potato chip books for me as I stayed up far too late reading it. But this one I think was the weakest in terms of romance and I was more aware of all the other plots. I enjoyed the various interlocking families but didn’t like how the hero didn’t have as much of one. It was a good ending for the three sisters and I’d rec it more for seeing the next step in the plot than the romance.

    I also finally finished Whispers Underground, the third Peter Grant book. This is one of those series where there are parts I like but it doesn’t catch me the way other authors do. A dear friend who’s judgement I trust loves them so I’m trying again. For this one I was either having a hard time putting it down or had to force myself through, the momentum is weird.

    I read two of the new comic anthologies that are continuations of Henson’s Storyteller series, great art cut a mixed bag.

    At the moment, I’m reading a P.G. Wodehouse novel: A Pelican at Blandings, that’s light fun. And starting a collection of Henry James’ scary/suspense stories as I liked Haunting of Bly Manor and was curious.

    I’ve also been rereading a lot of Pratchett, mainly the Guards’ books.

  31. wingednike says:

    “All thesese worlds are yours, except Europa.” *snicker

    My last batch of audiobooks have been great. The above was quoted in Opening Up by Lauren Dane.

    The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai was also good but I had a difficult time with the heroine. She had a lot of characteristics that I find annoying in any character. I understand her perspective, though, which is still a good thing to encounter in books.

    I’m currently listening to S***, Actually by Lindy West. The snark is awesome.

    I finished reading Skip Beat #44. When will this series end? I now want a sheep sleep pillow.

    I just found out that a 20th anniversary special manga has been released for Revolutionary Girl Utena. After the Revolution:Return to Ohtori Academy will soon be mine. Muwahaha

  32. Candace says:

    I just finished BREATHE THE SKY by Michelle Hazen (very capably read by Brittany Pressley). Can definitely recommend from the competence porn angle, among many others. If any of you are familiar with Anne Calhoun’s ability to bring psychological complexity with characters that had griefs and baggage and then distill the most potent kind of yearning and sweetness from that, you have a sense of what goes on in this one from Michelle Hazen.

    (Does anyone know if we have heard the last from Anne Calhoun, btw???)

    And had big love for BEACH READ by Emily Henry. Characters with psychological depth plus witty dialog…

    May we all be finding the right books for these next couple of weeks!

  33. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    @Candace: Calhoun’s last book was TURN ME LOOSE in mid-2017. It was very good and seemed to be setting up at least one other couple for a future book, and then…nothing. Within a year, she had shut down all her social media accounts and, as far as I’m aware, has not made any public comments on what happened or whether she plans to publish again one day. I would love to see another book from her, but more than that, I would just like to know that she’s in a good place and doing well. There are several other writers who have stopped publishing (Cara McKenna, Ruthie Knox, Eve Dangerfield, among others), but at least all of them made public statements about their decisions to move on from writing (or, in Dangerfield’s case, to move on from writing romances). I never saw anything of that nature from Calhoun. She was such a good and prolific writer. How I miss her.

  34. Crystal says:

    Greetings, spooky bitches. It’s the week before Halloween, we’re all spooky bitches.

    Let’s see, I left off on being about to start Spoiler Alert by Olivia Dade, which I absolutely loved. I loved how much the heroine loved herself and put herself out there with her body and her fandom, and Marcus, my God, what a cinnamon roll. That sweetheart needed protected at all costs, often from himself. And the very sharp jabs at Game of Thrones were a gift to us all (and I count myself as a fan of GoT, which means I am still happy to point out where that show failed). I then tried to put a suspense into my brain, and it just was not where my head was at. So I went with The Duke With the Dragon Tattoo by Kerrigan Byrne, which I had checked out of the library. I had never read Byrne before, but the synopsis intrigued me. It was like a compendium of crazysauce, we had the fact that the heroine was the sister of an abusive brother, she was big into rescuing and rehabbing injured animals, the Duke in question was a man with amnesia, there was a lost treasure map, pirates, kittens, pirates with kittens, it was like one of Stefon’s clubs. But it WORKED. It stayed centrally coherent, bad people got theirs in satisfactorily gory fashion if you have a bloodthirsty streak (I do), the love story was frankly pretty hot, and again, kittens. I ended up reccing it to a friend of mine, and she thanked me for the fact that it apparently helped her with a book slump. It was social issue week for my Info Needs class, so I read The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein. Hoo boy, if you were needing a detailed account of the depth and breadth of how much the US Government has screwed over African-Americans when it comes to things like housing, and how much that screwing over continues into the present day, this is your book. It’s appalling. So much service has been paid into integrating neighborhoods over, and yet we are arguably more segregated now than we’ve ever been. Then it seemed like a good time to break the proverbial glass on None Shall Sleep by Ellie Marney. This had some serious shades of Silence of the Lambs and Mindhunter, in that it involves two teenagers that are recruited to work for the FBI interviewing teenage serial killers, and they get caught up in a current case of a serial killer that is targeting teenagers and has been in contact with one of their subjects. Very fun, definitely liked the mind games between Simon, the teenage serial killer that they are trying to profile, and Emma, the survivor of a man that kidnapped and killed girls. Again, very Hannibal/Clarice (pre-Hannibal, that book was TRASH with what it turned Clarice into, convo for another day). And now we’re here and I’m reading Aru Shah and the End of Time by Roshani Chokshi. It is one of the books from Rick Riordan’s OwnVoices mythology imprint (Rick Riordan Presents) and deals with Hindu mythology. I’m not overly familiar with Hindu mythology, other than having heard of the Bhagavad Gita and the Mahabharata in passing in high school history (which was A WHILE AGO). I am really enjoying how adventurous and funny it is. The scene where Aru and her Pandava “sister” Mini trick the Seasons into making the weapons and armor they need is very clever. It’s SFF week for my class, so this seemed like a good offering (fun fact, I’m presenting this week, my presentation is on female SFF writers, because they’re my faves). Until next time, let us all own our spooky bitchiness. And also, VOTEY VOTE VOTE.

  35. MaryK says:

    @Arijo – “After Tamiko and the Two Janitors‘s detour (to introduce the twin trees) we’re back on the main arc.” That’s good to hear! I was really disappointed when book 3 abandoned the original story line and went off on a tangent. I’ll have to give it a try. Here’s hoping it doesn’t have 5+ POVs.

    @Big K – I don’t think the Davenforth series is meant to progress. It’s basically a cozy mystery series where you read for the protagonists solving puzzles.

    FYI, this post and comments were a real struggle to read because of the ads that pop up to make a box around the screen.

  36. Empress of Blandings says:

    Kelly Hunter’s WITH THIS FLING – an archaeologist creates a fictional fiancee to comfort a dying relative, then conveniently kills him off when he’s no longer needed. Then a box of belongings marked with fictional fiancé’s name arrives in her office, followed shortly by its owner, followed by a short fling followed by an accidental pregnancy. Everybody is relatively three-dimensional, and there is an ex-girlfriend who is beloved by the hero’s parents, but they’re mostly more awkward than evil and people do the right thing when it comes down to it. Also it’s the heroine who has the money in this one.

    I mentioned a few WR’s ago that I liked quieter romances with a dry humour, and then I read FROM ENEMY’S DAUGHTER TO EXPECTANT BRIDE by Olivia Gates which was just… bananas. Unlikely characters (H is one of a brotherhood who escaped from some eeeevil organisation and is about seven feet tall, h is 25-ish, has undergraduate degree, MBA & postgrad degree in child development and volunteers in an orphanage and probably has a halo tucked somewhere). Nobody talks like any human being has ever talked (sample dialogue where he’s kissed her after they’ve eaten spicy food, ‘“Having binged on the same pungent bomb, all I taste is your sweetness”….She suddenly yelped, pulling back once again. “You always scorch me, but now you literally do. Those deadly malagueta peppers you gobbled are still lacing your lips and tongue.”’ And I just went along for the ride and had a lot of fun.

    A bunch of Abby Green books which were pretty good, although when I binge on the same pungent bo… uh, the same author, I start to notice similarities. So I went through a good half-dozen stories about revenge-driven, emotionally stunted tycoons and the misunderstood and persecuted virginal or virgin-adjacent women who reluctantly love them. Moderately angsty. Maybe Maisey Yates/Clare Connolly levels? The H usually does a good grovel at the end though. It always annoys me when the H, having been a terrible person, turns up at the end shuffling his feet while delivering a half-arsed apology and says actually he loves her. And the heroine says ‘it’s fine that you were terrible because I love you too and everything gets wrapped up in two pages. I like him to suffer a bit and Green does deliver on that.

    DEEP by Skye Warren, one of the authors @DiscoDollyDeb recommended. This was a very good read. It also made me think about why some books with dubious consent, or dark themes work for me, and some just do not. I had a mini rant a while ago about a paranormal where the ‘hero’ psychically makes the heroine want to have sex with him, and I think I was meant to swoon over his masterfulness. But he completely disregards her feelings and autonomy throughout the book so it was just another instance of him acting like a controlling arsehole. However, Warren digs into the feelings and backgrounds of her H & h in a much more in-depth way. The H is powerful and attractive but it’s clear that in many ways he’s not admirable, and that a lot of his actions towards the h are driven by fear. The h worries about her confused feelings for him E.g, when her H doesn’t use a condom despite the h’s protests, she’s repelled by him, and knows that it’s wrong and messed up despite the pleasure she feels. However, he also does respect her in some measure even when he’s challenging or even being downright awful to her.

    @Arijo – I missed that bit in the Dark Fairy Tales book – I like the sound of that book!

    Non-fiction – I’ve started SMOKE GETS IN YOUR EYES by Caitlin Doughty. This is the account of a woman who worked at a crematorium. She doesn’t euphemise the processes that a body undergoes there, but she’s sharp and funny with it.

    And I did find boots that are comfortable AND look nice, which, while not particularly book related, is still something to celebrate (wide-footed woman here)

  37. FashionablyEvil says:

    @wingednike—I wanted to like that scene in Opening Up, but she only has to say that line about Europa because he just assumes anal is on the table and ignores her first two cues that she’s not into it. That was a definite contributing factor to my DNF.

  38. DiscoDollyDeb says:

    @Empress of Blandings: I think one of the key reasons that Skye Warren’s brand of “dark” works when that of so many other writers doesn’t is because Warren shows that sometimes people are so damaged that only another equally damaged person can understand and relate to them—and that a relationship between two damaged people will result in that damage playing out in the bedroom and other places. Yes, were we to meet people like them in real life, we’d strongly recommend therapy, but in the fictional world, they make for some riveting reading.

  39. wingednike says:

    @fashionablyevil Totally get it. That scene actually threw me off a bit because it seemed out of character for him not to notice her signals. I think her speaking up bluntly, which is in character for her, made the scene okay for me.

  40. KatiM says:

    I’m still in my slump. I did re-read my favorite parts of The Queen of Attolia and The King of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner. I love the subtleness of the romance and of course Eugenides is one of the greatest characters in all of fantasy.

    Started Her Alpha Viking by Sheryl Nantus last night. About 10% of the way in and while I think I’ll finish it, I’m not sure I will care enough to read anything else in this series. The hero has major PTSD and spends his time cage fighting. The heroine is a Valkyrie who was supposed to take him to Valhalla after an IED went off. She kissed him instead. The whole set up seemed WTF.

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