I didn’t receive a RITA® Reader Challenge 2015 review for this book, so I’m compiling quotes from reviews online and using the grade average from Goodreads as a substitute. This book has a 4.2 average, which I’m interpreting as an A. And here are the review quotes, linked to the original sources: Jonetta wrote: This story started off interesting and I nestled in for what I thought would be an intriguing case. It didn’t take … Continue reading Concealed in Death by J.D. Robb →
I wanted to love J Kenner’s Wanted, I really did. Here are the reasons why: It was my first foray into erotic fiction! It was nominated for a RITA award! It has 4 stars on Goodreads! I was reviewing it for SBTB and wanted to gush (!) about how glorious it was, leave CAPS lock on and using an excess of exclamation marks! Despite my good intentions, it was a struggle to get through the … Continue reading Wanted by J. Kenner →
Once upon a time, I was on Twitter and I was bubbly and slightly interesting and talked to all sorts of fantastic people. During that awesome time of Twitter joy, Katy Regnery and I bonded over the fact that the Toby Stephens of Jane Eyre is the BEST Jane Eyre movie version EVER. So, I was planning to really love her book, because clearly she has fantastic taste. Have I established firmly enough the fact … Continue reading The Vixen and the Vet by Katy Regnery →
I wanted to review Sweetest September because I’d read a couple of Liz Talley’s earlier works and enjoyed them. The novels I read were set in New Orleans and were both distinguished by a really strong sense of place. One of them, His Uptown Girl, also exhibited a level of risk-taking in the story-telling that I found both intriguing and original. Sweetest September turned out to be a totally different kettle of fish. That difference … Continue reading The Sweetest September by Liz Talley →
I love Jill Shalvis. I really do. She writes these funny, sexy, sweet stories featuring snappy, literally laugh out loud dialogue and heroines who are frequently goofy and make terrible decisions and are addicted to various forms of junk food, and her stories always leave me feeling warm and happy. It’s like anti-depressants in book form. It’s in His Kiss is no different. It’s one of the Lucky Harbor books, the first of the final … Continue reading It’s in His Kiss by Jill Shalvis →
I came close to DNFing this book many times, starting with the meet cute. Stephen shows up on Haley’s front porch. Haley, a firearms SAFETY INSTRUCTOR, pulls a gun on a non-threatening stranger. Stephen seems very understanding of her using a deadly weapon. Then he shows up to the gun-toting whacko’s house the next day, also unannounced. Negative points for being a numbskull on both sides. Still, I read on, because it can’t get any … Continue reading Somebody Like You by Beth Vogt →
I grabbed this book when the sign-ups came out because I’ve enjoyed Ms. Cullinan’s writing in the past—her story Let it Snow is something I’ve reread a couple of times, even though I don’t generally reread things. It’s a sweet, pretty low-angst Christmas story with interesting characters, and I really enjoyed the Minnesota backwoods setting. Fever Pitch didn’t work quite as well for me, but I still found it eminently readable and gobbled it up. … Continue reading Fever Pitch by Heidi Cullinan →
There isn’t a lot I didn’t like about this book. I’ve read a few of Liz Talley’s books before and her voice and style generally work well for me. Her characters seem human, she has an ear for dialogue and the issues facing the protagonists seem realistic and serious, but not too angsty or over the top. The Harlequin Superromance format and length also provides high enough word count to let the author really explore … Continue reading The Sweetest September by Liz Talley →
The Place I Belong is the third volume of Herkness’ Whisper Horse series (I can’t call it a trilogy as there is a novella winding up another character’s arc). This book involves many secrets and a few lies and I really enjoyed it. Although it is part of a series, it can easily be read as a stand-alone book. The thread running through the series is the idea of a Whisper Horse – that there … Continue reading The Place I Belong by Nancy Herkness →
Sanctuary, West Virginia, is one of those places I would love to visit if it were real town rather than the product of a writer’s imagination. It’s a small town where friends and acquaintances bring the new veterinarian in town chicken soup when she comes down with the flu. An internationally known chef is said to bribe locals with food from his acclaimed restaurant on the mountaintop, The Aerie. Most of the houses in town … Continue reading The Place I Belong by Nancy Herkness →
I must admit, after writing three reviews for novels in three genres that I don’t tend to seek out, I was pretty excited to see a novel come up that was not just a Regency-set historical, but one with smugglers and spies and a heroine who runs around in breeches. Sign me up! Alas, while The Smuggler Wore Silk wasn’t a bad book, it didn’t really thrill me. In fact, of all the books I’ve reviewed, … Continue reading The Smuggler Wore Silk by Alyssa Alexander →
