Welcome back! It’s time for y’all to talk about what you’ve been reading. Let’s go!
Sarah: I am reading Crowbones, ( A | BN | K | AB ) and it is creeping me out just enough that I don’t want to read it before bedtime..
Tara: I’m reading You Sexy Thing by Cat Rambo. I was sold on the premise of GBBO + Farscape and I’m having fun with it.
Elyse: I just finished Birds of California ( A | BN | K | AB ) which is a celebrity romance coming out this summer. It was much darker than I was anticipating. Review incoming.
Shana: I’m in the middle of Her Scottish Rogue by Dahlia Rose. Pirate romances aren’t my fave, but this one is fun so far. The heroine is a Black lady pirate who runs an island of escaped slaves…and rescues the not-quite-as-competent pirate hero.
Susan: I’m reading Boyish², which is an f/f manga anthology (!) specifically of butch/butch pairings (!!), and I’m so happy. (Ed. note: This looks like it was a Kickstarter and doesn’t appear to be for purchase anywhere yet.)
Claudia: I’ve just started The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes by Cat Sebastian. ( A | BN | K | AB ) I’ve very much enjoyed the previous book in the series and this one is looking promising. Blackmailer main character, but if anyone can pull that off Sebastian can.
What are you reading? Tell us below!
@KatieC @DDD: since the 2nd & 3rd books in the FIVE PACKS series after THE TYRANT are THE HEIR APPARENT’S REJECTED MATE & THE LONE ALPHA’S REJECTED MATE, I’m sensing that the trope of ‘H rejects h & then has to get her back’ is the theme of the whole series, so maybe keep an eye out for those.
THE MADNESS OF LORD IAN MACKENZIE is an old favorite that I have revisited n several tjmes, but I had never tried the other books in the series. Now I picked up THE DUKE’S PERFECT WIFE, the story of Ian’s oldest brother, Hart, who isn’t at all likable in Ian’s book. That continues in his own book, he remains at a distance from those he loves, and consumed with ambition in for most of it. The resolution was interesting, if dramatic after a lifetime of acting in a certain way, but I still liked it, enough that I’m about halfway through Cameron MacKenzie’s book. Both have elements of second chance, and the heroes and heroines are all fully adult, no 18 hear olds. Yay! Jennifer Ashley’s writing is really good.
@KatieC@Karin Count me among those who still reads JAK even though though her current books feel very similar and the romances are underdeveloped. She still works as a comfort read, even if she is no longer an auto buy. I still have a handful of her category romances stash away and Karin is right, several use the trope – hero screws up and discounts the heroine in some way, realizes that he has screwed up and tries to get back into her good graces. A couple that I think would still hold up from Krentz’s category days are Lady’s Choice (Harlequin Temptation 270) and Too Wild to Wed (Harlequin Temptation 341).
Lady’s Choice – opens with the H/h in bed together for the first time (really, really racy for even a Temptation in 1989). Juliana, the heroine, assumes that this is all leading to marriage, much to the surprise of the hero Travis. Juliana, recognizing that Travis is indeed interested, but has some reason for not committing, kicks him out her bed and tells him he has one month to straighten up and fly right. She doesn’t kick him totally out of her life as he is her business consultant, and she needs his help managing the expansion of her successful small business, a high end coffee shop. A big part of the book is that most people find Juliana too much and too confident, but that is exactly what Travis likes about her, even though as her business consultant he wishes she would listen to his advice to grow her coffee business, while she insists on expanding into fancy teas.
Too Wild to Wed – Letty the heroine is a quiet, shy medieval history professor at small liberal arts college. She is engaged to Xavier, a highly successful business man. She’s still a bit surprised at her good fortune at attracting such a successful, confident man and also worried because although they are engaged, they have never slept together. But then she finds out that the whole reason Xavier is interested in her is because she has led an entirely blameless, pristine life (in fact he has had her investigated to make sure). Angry and hurt Letty fights with Xavier, who of course makes things worse, by being a patronizing ass. So Letty decides that she will no longer be dull and respectable, and as first step in her new more wild life decides to attend a rather bizarre medieval reenactors convention (sorta of cross between a frat house and the Society for Creative Anachronism). Xavier follows her to the convention determined to win her back. High jinks ensue.
Both books are fun, light-hearted reads.
I seem to be rereading the Maiden Lane series – finally got around to Silence & Mickey’s story, third time’s the charm, and I guess I’ll read the final one. I left off it because both mains didn’t have any connection to prior stories. I have the two Greycourt books and I’m trying to get into them, I think I’m just tired right now so reexamining characters to see if I still like them or if I can like them this time is just more enjoyable. I just wish they were longer T_T If anyone knows a really good Romance or character-centered book or series that follows the same characters and has a lot of love and adventure, please hit me up. It takes me ~5-8 hours to read a standard length 350 page novel and it just isn’t long enough right now, plus I always love multi-part relationship stories, like how KJ Charles’s Magpie Lord was the same relationship over 3 books (but they were too short!!).
Oops I meant to write “really long Romance or…” xD
I think I missed the last Whatcha Reading but after a strong reading start in 2022, things have slowed down for me a bit. I did finish Katherine Arden’s Winternight trilogy with WINTER OF THE WITCH and it was freaking glorious. I was so unsure how she was going to end this and how I even wanted it to end–as a romance reader I am fully “HEA or GTFO” but these particular characters felt like they both had Things To Do and just riding off into the sunset together would have been so out of place with the rest of the story. The author wound things up neatly and, I thought, perfectly. I was also fascinated by how she tied it in with actual history. I needed some lighter fare after that so I read MAKE IT SWEET by Kristen Callihan. She is a go-to author for me and I have really enjoyed both her contemporary and paranormal series. This one lacked a little of the “oomph” of her other books and I thought both MC’s made choices at the end of the book that seemed super out of sync with how they had been portrayed so far, but overall it was a sweet (ha) story. I followed that with two mostly forgettable Harlequin Presents, ONE SNOWBOUND NEW YEAR’S NIGHT by Dani Collins, which was interesting in that it did not follow the traditional HP format and instead was a “marriage in trouble” story, if not a super compelling one, and THE ITALIAN’S BARGAIN FOR HIS BRIDE by Chantelle Shaw, in which I feel like the author used all her plot in the first four chapters and didn’t know what to do with the rest. I skimmed the last half. And then my anxiety made a raging appearance due to personal factors as well as the world losing its everloving mind, so although I cleared library holds for a book I’m excited to read (A RIVER ENCHANTED by Rebecca Ross) I am instead comfort rereading old favorites and returning to my early pandemic coping mechanism of playing video games while under my weighted blanket. Take care of yourselves, Smart B’s!
This weekend I read A SPINDLE SPLINTERED by Alix E. Harrow and it was just ok. Way too many pop culture references and it read a bit like fanfic.
Also just finished listening to HOOKED: HOW CRAFTING SAVED MY LIFE by Sutton Foster. It’s pretty good, but I had no idea about some of the challenges she has faced, including an agoraphobic, emotionally distant mother, anxiety and infertility.
@Quinn Wilde Yes, I love The Gentle Art of Fortune Hunting too!