Welcome to Whatcha Reading! It’s our first one of the month. Here’s what we’ve been reading and enjoying lately!
Elyse: I’m reading The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley. ( A | BN | K | AB ) I’m not very far in but I’m enjoying it so far
Sarah: I put The Body is Not an Apology by Sonia Renee Taylor ( A | BN | K | AB ) on hold at the library so long ago I completely forgot. My hold came in and WOW is this some radical mind blowing counter programming to what Taylor calls “the Body Shame Profit Complex.”
Maya: I’m listening to The Stars and the Blackness Between Them by Junauda Petrus. ( A | BN | K | AB ) It is read by the always amazing Bahni Turpin and the author! I’m also reading Pleasure Activism by Adrienne Maree Brown.
Shana: I’m in the middle of Finding Forever on Their Island Paradise by Therese Beharrie. The characters just have this bone deep kindness that I’m finding very soothing. However, it’s set in a penguin sanctuary based on Boulders Beach in Cape Town, and so far I haven’t seen any penguins. They better be coming soon…
AJ: You can’t set a book in a penguin sanctuary and then not write about penguins! It is Illegal.
I just finished The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden. ( A | BN | K | AB ) I don’t know what rock I’ve been under that I never picked this one up before!
Sneezy: Manta recently added a new webtoon, Her Peculiar Visitor. The main character is a celestial being that has been banished to the mortal realm for saving a human that was supposed to die. She leads a quiet life as a second hand bookstore owner and book restorer. There are tracks being laid for a slow-ish burn romance, excellent world building, and the supernatural elements are great!!! I’ll probably end up writing a review for it when it’s further along, just so I can list all the tropes. For now, know that we get treated to a cute, meddling grandpa arranging dates and making the couple to be sign a contract that they would go on at least three dates. Content warning for death though, including the grandpa’s.
So far there are 20 chapters and it’s updating every Thursday.
Kiki: Julie Garwood has a very tight grip on my entire brain/kindle right now. The only thing I want to consume are very long historicals. I do not want to pass go, I do not want to collect $200. I just want to give Julie Garwood my money so that I don’t have to wait for library holds to come in.
Sneezy: You should collect the $200 and double back though. To buy more Julie Garwood with.
Whatcha reading?! Let us know below!
Oh, how I love these post/comments! I recognize all that was wrong with The Love Hypothesis and liked it anyway. @HeatherS, thanks for writing about Randy Rainbow’s memoir. I read your comments aloud to my husband and son, who asked “where are you reading that?” “Smart Bitches, of course.”
Thanks to the wave of comments last week, I (like how many others??!) got a copy of The TYRANT ALPHA’S REJECTED MATE, which I’m reading on my phone while I read THE BEST OF ME by Sharon Sala on my Kindle and listen to THE NEXT THING YOU KNOW by Jessica Strawser – which I’m afraid may leave me a bit broken.
I also recently finished and very much enjoyed Denise Williams’s THE FASTEST WAY TO FALL. I don’t know the jargon (body affirming?) but I thought the plot and character development were top notch.
“City of Lies”(Victoria Thompson) was a fun, fast read, so now I’m on to the 2nd book in Counterfeit Lady series, “City of Secrets”. Can a confidence woman find happiness with a straight laced upstanding attorney?
Now I’m reading a trilogy set during the Congress of Vienna(the peace negotiations at the end of the Napoleonic Wars). The books are “Vienna Waltz”, “Vienna Woods” and “Vienna Dawn”, by Mary Lancaster. These are the kind of action romances I like, with spies, a jewel theft, multiple fake engagements, some politics, a mix of characters from high and low society, and cameo appearances by real historical characters.
I read “I’m Only Wicked With You”, which turned out to be a sweet romance, but not as good as the 1st 2 books in the Palace of Rogues series. I am looking forward to “After Dark With the Duke” next.
@cleo–I checked my Kindle and discovered I already own 2 of your recs-Power Play & Tigers and Devils. Always love shopping in my own kindle like that lol. Sadly I couldn’t find a Kindle version of Winging It on Amazon although I could swear I’d seen it there before. These all sound great thank you!!
@DDD I read the blurb for Thrown Off the Ice earlier this week and some the reviews and even though it sounds soo good I am definitely not in the mental and emotional space to read it right now. It’s one of those that I’ll have to save for some day when the world is not the dumpster it is now.
@Christie I have read and enjoyed to varying degrees m/m hockey romances by: Rachel Reid, Sarina Bowen both on her own, and with Elle Kennedy, Cait Nary, Ashlyn Kane, Avon Gale, maybe others, and at least one f/f series by Kelly Farmer but again I feel like I’m forgetting some. (And I am excited for your rec @DDD although you are far braver about feelings than I.)
I know of other queer sports romances than a couple of the ones @cleo mentions (and thank you I will look for the others!) although imo none as good. Oh, Samantha Kane has a fun m/m/f series, it’s American football, or similar.
Idk, it’s not as disproportionate as the sheer quantity of dukes in regency romance, but it’s a /lot/ of hockey, right?
Last time I finally had read T. Kingfisher’s Clockwork’s Boys, which has been sitting in my TBR pile for a couple of years. Like Tolkien’s Fellowship of the Ring – it is not a stand-alone book and it ends at a critical point in the story. So instead of reading another book from TBR pile, I bought the second book in the duology – The Wonder Engine – and read it. Clockwork Boys was short and mostly about setting up the story and getting the four main characters to the city of Anuket, the source of magical mechanized war machines (aka as clocktaurs or clockwork boys) that were destroying the Dowager’s kingdom. The Wonder Engine is about getting into Anuket and destroying whatever makes the clocktaurs. Lots of action, secrets, plots and counter-plots, magic and mayhem, and even a romance. For people who have read Kingfisher’s Paladin books, but not this duology – there are gnoles. Like most of Kingfisher’s other adult fantasy books, there are some grotesque scenes, tense and sad moments, but the overall story is lovely and hopeful.
Sonali Dev’s Incense and Sensibility – this is 3rd book in her Austen-inspired series. Each book follows the romantic relation of a member of the Raje family, a successful Indian-American family who live in San Francisco. Incense and Sensibility of course is a play on Sense and Sensibility and I liked a lot of what Dev did. The main plot line on the surface is quite different from S&S – ambitious gubernatorial candidate suffers panic attacks after an assassination attempt at a campaign rally and goes to see a stress coach (the heroine) to learn how to control the panic attacks – but the MCs of I&S echo the MCs of S&S in interesting ways. Like Edward Ferrars, Yash the hero, feels trapped and not in control of his own life. Like Elinor, India the heroine is calm and grounded, always trying to help those she loves, sometimes at the expense of her own needs and desires. There is also a nice redoing of the Marianne plot – China, India’s sister, has fallen hard for Song, a charming, but closeted, TV actress from Korean. In the background Yash’s new female bodyguard pines quietly for China and worries about what will happen when Song heads back to Korea. It’s not a perfect book – Dev crams a lot into this book and the pacing is uneven. She manages to tie up all the plotlines however, it’s not always done in a satisfactory way. Overall though, I think this is best of her 3 Austen-inspired romances.
Margaret Rogerson’s Vespertine: Rogerson wrote in the acknowledgments and on Good Reads that writing this book during Covid isolation was hard. Didn’t know this until I finished the book (and read the acknowledgments), but as I was reading this book, I kept thinking this is a book that is about our experiences with Covid even though it’s a fantasy YA book set in a medieval-like, French-like country where a young nun, learns to work with an extremely dangerous and powerful ghost or spirit (called a revenant) in order to prevent other ghosts from killing everyone and everything. Artemisia the heroine has suffered quite a bit before the story opens, and as a result has trouble relating to or trusting other people. She also has trouble relating to her own body – one of the interesting themes of the book is that it is the revenant, a bodiless spirit, whom Artemisia calls up from a holy relic and who “cohabits” her mind, who begins to teach Artemisia how to relate to her body. The working out of the relationship between Artemisia and the revenant is a strength of this book. By the end of the book, the main question of why so many revenants had arisen and how to stop them is solved, but the final chapter makes it clear that there will be at least one more book. This book is straight fantasy with no romance (although there is a very, very faint possibility of one developing later).
Rereads: Lady’s Choice by Jayne Ann Krentz (Harlequin Temptation 270) held up pretty well. The descriptions of the late 80s clothes and decorating schemes were a blast from past.
The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison – I’m another who really enjoyed this book and rereading just confirmed that again. When I’ve managed to read a few more out of the huge TBR pile, I’ll hunt down a copy of the next book, The Witness for the Dead.
On the fence about finishing: A Rake’s Midnight Kiss (Anna Campbell) it’s not a bad book, but I keep putting it down and wandering off to read something else.
As has often been the case in the last 2 years, I’ve fallen back into quiet romances where there is no great conflict or misunderstanding as my brain just can’t handle anything else right now. The recent No Bleak Moment Rec League was very helpful. With that in mind, the books I’ve enjoyed the most recently all fit into that category.
A Most Unusual Duke by Susanna Allen – this is a fun mash-up of Regency romance, arranged marriage, shapeshifters and fated mates. The main couple start out a bit resentful of each other, although still respectful, but then slowly start growing closer as they set his ruined estate to rights – well truthfully, he’s a bit of a pouty man child and she does most of the work LOL, but she loves the challenge and he totally admires her competence. Lots of found family and friends also along for the ride.
The Suite Spot by Trish Dollar – a quiet romance set on a small island on Lake Erie, between a single mom and a guy who left the rat race after making a lot of money to open a brewery/specialty hotel on the island. Again, competence porn, new friends and two people who are slowly healing and learning to move on.
In A New York Minute by Kate Spencer – this is releasing on Tuesday, 3/15 and opens with the heroine getting laid off, then catching her dress in the subway doors and ripping it from top to bottom, with the hero stepping in to lend her his (expensive) suit jacket. This features two very different people who never would have otherwise met, but once they do, they slowly figure out that they are perfect for each other.
My one exception to quiet romances was The Tyrant Alpha’s Rejected Mate by Cate C. Wells. Yes, yet another b*tch sucked in by @DDD’s excellent review LOL. I’m totally down with long term grovels by the hero so add me to the “loved It” group. I’m also now exploring the author’s backlist, even her MC books, a sub genre I usually stay far away from.
@kkw – yes, there is A LOT of hockey in mm romance. I’ve noticed it too. I’m not sure why – it doesn’t seem inherently gayer than other team sports.
@Christie – I read Winging It on Hoopla.
@Cleo & @kkw: at the risk of opening a can of worms, and with apologies to the many hockey-loving and hockey-knowledgeable readers out there, I think hockey is a popular choice for romance (both m/f and m/m) because it’s not an enormously popular sport in the U.S. and so it’s unlikely that any mistakes the author makes in terminology, techniques, play strategy, etc., will be identified and criticized. I think a lot of football and baseball romances are m/f (and almost “sports-adjacent”) because American readers are far more knowledgeable of those sports and would immediately spot obvious errors in how the game is presented in the book. Many m/m sports romances (regardless of which sport) have MCs who are both athletes and both play the sport—so there’s bound to be more time spent on the field/rink than in a m/f romance where much of the plot can place away from the field, so it makes sense to pick a less common sport as the setting. Of course, this is a broad generalization and I mean no disrespect to writers like Rachel Reid and Taylor Fitzpatrick who obviously know hockey inside and out (and Canadian readers who would most vociferously disagree with the contention that hockey is not a popular sport), but I do think the fact that hockey is not one of the “big three” favorite American sports makes it a prime candidate for choice as a setting for romance novels.
@Cleo & @kkw & @DDD – agree with all of this, and I suspect another reason we see so much m/m hockey is because there isn’t (to my knowledge) a single out NHL player to date – notwithstanding the wonderful and courageous Luke Prokop, an NHL prospect with the Edmonton Oil Kings. We’re working hard to dream our way into reality!
And the only reason I watch *any* Stanley Cup final game is because I’m wishing praying hoping to see a what the hell, blow the roof off the house kiss on the ice. One of these days, it’s gonna happen.
@Eliza: that’s the climax (pardon the pun) of Rachel Reid’s GAME CHANGER. As one of the MC’s team wins the Stanley Cup, no less.
@DDD: Yes I know that scene very well!
@Christie & @DDD & @Cleo and everyone else who loves hockey romance (a subgenre I have come to love myself thru SBTB fandom): I have to chime in with a rec for one of my favorites that I read last year, which is the graphic novel Check, Please! the sequel Sticks & Scones by Ngozi Ukazu. So lovely and comforting. It started out as a webcomic series (where I didn’t see it) – I got it as hard copy books from my public library. The story, characters and illustrations are top notch. I also appreciate a hard copy book where the paper and ink are high quality, and these two volumes met the mark for me. I also found the author’s backstory fascinating. Highly recommend.
I’m reading Side Effects by Tara Wyatt. It’s a series about the Prescott brothers and their cousins. The first is Stupid Love. If you like steamy reads which are quick easy reads these might be for you if you can ignore the fact that all of the heroes need intense therapy. Read them in order. Lucian is my favorite.
@DiscoDollyDeb – Thanks for the Heavy rec. I came across it recently and searched around to see if you’d mentioned it before. 🙂
After the discussion about The Goblin Emperor recently, I decided to re-listen and realized I’d borrowed it from the library originally so went to check it out again. There’s a six week wait. I’m guessing there are some Smart Bitches who also use the EBRP library.
Re, hockey romance: For whatever reason, my not-sporty brain thinks hockey is sexier than (other?) ballsports. Maybe because it’s rarer in the US? Maybe because all the sporting is done while wearing ice skates?
@RoseRead–it’s funny you mention Check Please because I’m convinced my current obsession with hockey romance started after reading CP (and discovering CP fanfiction) last year. CP and Murderbot have been my escape these last few years.
@DDD–regarding the idea of hockey as a setting for romance, I always kind of thought it comes from authors who are big hockey fans but maybe I’m wrong. I’ve loved hockey since I was a kid and that’s why I enjoy it so much. I’ve never found myself much interested in sports romances involving other sports.
I always mean to post in these. And then it’s two days past the first post. And then I decide let me wait for the next WAYR to come around. And then the cycle repeats itself! So, no more!
This is more of a dump since it’s been a few months since I last posted a WAYR. First, OMG—THOSE HONEY BADGERS!!! ADDICTIVE! Sarah’s relentless recommendation of the series made me capitulate. I loved them. I devored them more like it. One after the other, wanting nothing to do with things that needed to be done! I loved the world-building, the mystery, the relationships between the sisters, the family and friends they find, the fact that the elder sister (sorry forgot her name now!) is freaking unstoppable: oh how much did I love that she can fight anything, anywhere, unfazed and unrattled and that her sisters know this and trust this. It’s kind of like . . . my mom’s deep faith that THINGS ARE ALWAYS WORKING OUT FOR US NO MATTER WHAT. It’s something I can rely on when I start to wobble. So, yes, I loved that. The romance was, eh, ok, but frankly that was the last reason I read these books for.
Then: the innskeeper chronicles by Ilona Andrews. Oh how much I loved these and devored them too. Sean’s urinating to ‘mark his territoty’ was terribly off-putting but I persevered and that paid off. My favoritest, favoritest moment of the series so far is the way the central conflict is resolved in Book 3. Absolutely brilliant, and exactly what I think our world needs too.
Also read Kate Milford’s The Greenhouse Glass. Interesting and intelligent MG but didn’t inspire me to read further.
Men at Arms, Terry Pratchett. I love, love Pratchett and this second entry in the Guards sub-series is just brilliant.
Elizabeth Goudge’s The Dean’s Watch. For the longest time, I didn’t read this because I thought it would be too steeped in Christianity. But then I started the first chapter, and the description of a Victorian town that is dominated by its cathedral and the a whole chapter that talks about the origin of the cathedral to the present time simply sucked me in. That last isn’t as tedious as it sounds. Goudge paints her characters deftly. Even though they occupy only a page, they come out fully formed. the descriptions are evocative. And all the main characters wonderful. Yes, there is religious imagery but once I got past the vocabulary Goudge uses, I found her characters’ experiences to echo my own secular spiritual ones. I enjoyed the gentlness, and the joy of the book. I’m gonna look out for more of Goudge’s work.
Also re-read Tea with Black Dragon, and was sort of eh, and meh this time.
I don’t know why I keep assuming work might get *less* hectic, but once again, a little slower on the reading than I’d like.
Romance:
ONCE UPON A MARQUESS by Courtney Milan: as a Milan fan, I was delighted by this second-chance, sort-of-enemies-to-lovers historical that has some sprawling series plot lines being set up. Judith is my kind of prickly heroine—doing her best, but also very much stretched thin by her obligations. Christian had an intriguing arc—as expected, he’s trying to make it up to Judith after hurting her badly in the past, but that’s not enough by itself, and watching him work to a place for their shared future was satisfying. I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series thus-far sooner rather than later. Side bar, I’m always trying to figure out the right balance for reading the backlists of authors I like—I don’t want to burn through everything immediately, but it’s also no good to postpone reading books I’m very likely to enjoy!
BATTLE ROYAL by Lucy Parker: oh, I’m so glad I read this! Lovely sunshiney/grumpy with *rivals*-to-lovers, delicious food descriptions and some really beautiful scenes about grieving loved ones. I have liked but not loved some of Lucy Parker’s other works, and this is now easily my favorite of hers.
Non-romance:
Currently listening to KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON: THE OSAGE MURDERS AND THE BIRTH OF THE FBI by David Grann on audio. I kind of wish I were reading this on paper—there are many names that have come up and I don’t feel I retain things I hear as well—but it’s been interesting so far—lots of early efforts of modern criminology and discussions of murder and robbery but also “white collar crimes” like embezzlement, etc. I feel like Grann occasionally is dipping into some Noble Savage stereotypes, but maybe the audiobook production is at fault there. I’m hoping the audio format will help me not visualize the more gruesome details about the murders as much, though.
Up next:
HER EVERY WISH by Courtney Milan—looking forward to the next Worth Saga book!
FLAMECASTER by Cinda Williams Chima—recommended a while ago by a friend, looking forward to a new-to-me fantasy YA series!
Jeannie Lin and Jackie Lau have new books out at the end of the month, looking forward to those too!
I have been in a really weird place reading-wise this month, and can only seem to find comfort in rereading old favorites. It’s like my brain can’t handle ANY additional uncertainty at this point given all the ::gestures vaguely at the entire world:: so I need to read stories where I know exactly what will happen next. At the moment I’m rereading Samantha Young’s ON DUBLIN STREET series even though I’ve already read them all at least twice. I did take a break from my rereading marathon to read one new book this month, thanks to library holds and limited-time checkouts. A RIVER ENCHANTED by Rebecca Ross is a fantasy mystery of sorts, inspired by Scottish legends of faerie folk. The writing is beautiful and lyrical. The setup is potentially triggering–young girls are disappearing from their homes and the villagers assume it is the work of the faeries–but
you pretty much know that the girls are safe the entire time, so it’s somehow not that upsetting.
It is a duology, and the second book doesn’t come out until December so it’s a bit of a wait to find out what happens! Although I felt that the story moved a bit slowly overall, I will definitely be picking up the second book to see how it all wraps up.