The Misadventures Of Super Librarian

Passion & Prose, Non-Bookstores, Heroic Librarians & Fatty McFattins

2012-01-27T08:34:00.000-08:00

So, I haven't posted jack on this blog since Monday. I also haven't read a single word in any book since last weekend. Not good considering I'm knee-deep in stuff I really need, and want!, to read. I need to stop getting distracted by The Shiny. In the meantime, while I look around for my
misplaced mojo, here are some linky highlights I've culled off the Interwebs the last few days.

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For romance junkies that live in Southern California, there is the Passion and Prose event in Long Beach on February 25. The event is a wee bit on the pricey side - but there is a fantastic mix of authors on board, plus keynote speakers like Meg Cabot, Christina Dodd and Gail Carriger. This certainly looks like it could be a nice alternative if ponying up for the entire RWA conference in Anaheim this summer isn't an option. I'm planning on attending, hopefully I'll see some of you there!

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I've been kicking around this blog post in my head about publishers and libraries, but Amber takes care of the task for me with this lovely, succinct post When Is A Bookstore Not A Bookstore? Seems Amber decided to visit the Barnes & Noble where she used to work and was none too pleased with what she encountered. Can't say I blame her.

Publishers, you know besides Borders going belly-up, this would be another good reason why you shouldn't be jerking libraries around. Frankly? You need us. A lot. Because if this is the future of brick and mortar bookstores? Y'all are screwed.

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Speaking of libraries being awesome-sauce, there is this list of 20 heroic librarians who save the world. See publishers, librarians can even save the world! I'm quite pleased to see that my alter ego made the list, although to have her sitting behind Noah Wyle? I mean, really?!

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And finally, in baseball news. Yes, the Detroit Tigers have lost their damn minds and given a bloated, fat contract to....well, Prince Fielder. Yes folks, this is the fine athletic specimen we've got for the next 9 years at over $200 million dollars.

For the record, I'm the only Tigers fan on the planet who hates this deal. Oh sure, there will be a lovely honeymoon period of about three years, and then after that I foresee Jabba The Hutt wearing the Old English D. Also, moving Miguel Cabrera to third base? Whatever drugs they're doing in Detroit, someone pass some this way because it's obviously something potent. I now have the slowest, fattest infield in the history of the world. Oh sure, they'll mash some taters, but defense? You know, the other half of the game? Just sayin'.

The Month That Was December 2011

2012-01-23T07:00:00.000-08:00

Lemon Drop: OMG, seriously Auntie Wendy? Seriously?! You finally show up just when I'm getting ready to conquer a mountain? Has anybody ever told you your timing stinks?

Me: Well you're not the first to say so young lady, nor do I doubt you'll be the last. What can I say? I was busy. Plus I had to recap the whole reading year of 2011 first....

Lemon Drop: Yeah, and don't think I didn't notice I was mentioned, like, nowhere in those posts ::pout::

Me: Sweetie, you shouldn't pout. Smart girls looking pretty in pink shouldn't pout.

Lemon Drop: ::mollified:: Well, I might be able to spare a few moments before Mommy takes me sledding.....

Title links will take you to full reviews

All Fall Down by Megan Hart, Contemporary general fiction, Mira, 2011, Grade = B+

Thought-provoking fiction from Hart featuring a young woman, with three babies, who escapes a religious cult on the eve of them committing mass suicide. I love how Hart takes ordinary people and puts them in extraordinary circumstances. Excellent choice for book clubs.

Maggie's Wish by Sharon Ihle, Historical western romance, Zebra, 1996, Grade = DNF

My aborted TBR Challenge read. I was looking for angst in a story about a woman who hires the hero to track down her scumbag ex so their little girl won't be disappointed again at Christmas. Instead, the "heartbroken" little girl is a mischievous imp who gets up in everybody's business and the author shoots for farcical humor by having the hero try to man-up the scumbag ex into being a suitable husband and father. Yeah, so not what I wanted.

Another Chance by Portia Da Costa, Erotic romance digital short story, Spice Briefs, 2011, Grade = B+

Vintage Da Costa, with a lovely playfulness to the erotic shenanigans. Also, a heroine in her 40s. Sign me up!

A Seduction at Christmas by Cathy Maxwell, Historical romance, Avon, 2008, Grade = C

Super thin historical back-drop not aided by an equally thin suspense subplot. I'm telling you though, there's something about Maxwell's writing that reels me in. It's like drinking liquid candy.

Craving the Highlander's Touch by Michelle Willingham, Historical romance digital short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2011, Grade = B

A short story with surprising depth and a whole lot of plot. Connected to a series, but stands alone well. Says me.

The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt by Caroline Preston, Historical fiction, Ecco, 2011, Grade = B+

A picture book for grown-ups (scrapbook), that tells the story of a young woman in the early 1920s. Great stuff for social history nuts and crafty types.

One Night as a Courtesan by Ann Lethbridge, Historical romance digital short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2010, Grade = B-

A sexy story with a nice historical feel about a rakish Duke and a gently-born heroine down on a her luck. Had my issues, but really appreciated the slow, sensual feel to the love scenes.

One Wicked Christmas by Amanda McCabe, Historical romance digital short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2011, Grade = D+

This one breaks my heart because I normally like McCabe's Undones. Hero pining for his BFF's widow comes off as distasteful in this short format.

The Queen's Consort by Leia Rice, Erotica digital short story, Spice Briefs, 2011, Grade = B-

Uber-lusty heroine paired with a hero who could set a world record in stamina. Yeah, it's pretty much all about the sex here. But you know what? That's not always a bad thing.

Me: And that was that. Lots of short stories this month because I was trying to delude my way into hitting 100 books read in 2011. It didn't happen, and instead I hit 95.

Lemon Drop: Yeah, yeah, yeah - that's nice Auntie Wendy. Now, where's Mommy with my sled?

Me: I'm lucky she stood still this long....

Digital Review: Romancing The Toe Bone

2012-01-20T15:25:00.000-08:00

It shouldn't take anyone who likes to read short stories very long to generate a list of go-to authors who work well within a shorter format. Barbara Monajem is one of those authors for me. Her work for Harlequin Historical Undone tends to feature a nice historical flavor, interesting characters, and "different" plot-lines to keep me from feeling like I'm reading a retread. In the case of The Unrepentant Rake, the "different" was what held me back.

Readers first met Simon Caling in another Undone short story, The Wanton Governess. A younger son, he's a bit of a cad. A charming, sexy cad - but a cad nonetheless. One of his acquaintances is hopelessly in love with a young lady, but he's too damn tongue-tied to offer for her. He's hoping Simon can help him out. Simon, with nothing more amusing to do, agrees - only to find himself captivated by the girl's governess, Beatrix March.

Beatrix will soon my leaving her employer, but she cannot do that until she finds her missing relic. Her family has had possession of a toe bone of St. Davnet for generations. She believes the relic is what has been responsible for family harmony all these years. And now her foolish young charge has swiped it from her thinking it will help with her love life! Bah! To make matters worse, Simon Caling, a rake of the first order, is visiting and he's sniffing around. The lady of the house is completely unconcerned, which means it is up to Beatrix to protect the girls. Little does she know Simon only has eyes for her.

As much as I enjoyed the previous short story, this latest entry didn't really cook for me. While I enjoy Monajem's light touches of humor, and she continues to write excellent banter, the whole sub plot revolving around the missing toe bone (seriously?) was just a bit too farcical for my blood. It was just....silly. And unfortunately, since I found it silly, the heroine, who deeply believes in the powers of said toe bone, comes off as silly.

Simon is what carries this story for me. He's charming, he's rakish without being slimy, and it's a wonder that all the females in this story manage to keep their clothes on around him (well, Beatrix doesn't succeed - but then she's the heroine). But I couldn't help but think Simon would have been better matched with a more mature heroine. Someone who has been around the block. Someone who didn't believe in magical, saintly toe bones.

So where does that leave us? Well, with personal preference. If you can swing with a little bit of farce, enjoy sexy banter, and don't mind heroines who participate in a bit of "magical thinking" - you will likely enjoy this story more than I did. I still enjoyed the author's writing, and she continues to work well in this tough shorter format. It's just this particular story wasn't really my cup of tea. Someone pass the Earl Grey....

Final Grade = C+

TBR Challenge 2012: Family At Stake

2012-01-18T07:00:00.000-08:00

The Book: Family at Stake by Molly O'Keefe

The Particulars: Contemporary romance, Harlequin SuperRomance #1365, 2006, First book in duet (book two = His Best Friend's Baby), Out of Print, Available In Digital

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: Well, I can tell you I bought it at a local used bookstore that has since closed up shop - so my guess is I read a description somewhere and it sounded good. This particular book did win Best Category Romance in AAR's annual reader's poll in 2007 - so that might be the reason too.

The Review: After falling totally in love with a Molly O'Keefe Super last year, I immediately pulled out the giant Rubbermaid tote I have wedged in a storage closet where I house my print collection of category romance. The mission? See if I have any other books by this author collecting dust in the mountain range. And sure enough, I did - including this one which happens to be the first story she wrote for SuperRomance.

Rachel Filmore and Mac Edwards were BFFs in high school. Before you can say This Isn't Going To End Well, the two succumb to their teenage hormones and have sex the night of their graduation. Mac has been hopelessly in love with Rachel forever, but she has one mission - and that's to get the hell out of her tiny hometown and as far away from her father, who beats on her, and her mother, who enables Daddy's drinking. Having sex with Mac doesn't change that mission, although he foolishly hopes that it might.

Fast forward many years later, and Rachel is a social worker who hasn't strayed far from her hometown (a scant 30-odd miles away in fact). There's been a retirement higher up the food chain, which means cases are getting shuffled among existing staff. That's when Rachel sees Mac Edwards' name on a folder with a scary red flag on it. Seems Mac is having issues with his 12-year-old daughter, Amanda. Serious enough issues that the guy who just retired? Yeah, made a notation that maybe it was time for Amanda to be removed from the home. Rachel cannot reconcile this Mac in the file with the Mac she grew up with - so she volunteers to take the case, without telling her new superior that there just might be a teensy conflict of interest.

Mac is floored to see Rachel standing on his doorstep. Her leaving broke his heart. When he learns she's their new case worker? He doesn't know what to think. This new Rachel - this Rachel who is aloof, cold, and acts like they have no history really depresses him. However, he loves his daughter, and he's desperate to find out what has been troubling her. She seemed to handle her mother's death fairly OK (considering), so why now, many months after the fact, is she falling apart?

I generally look to Supers to get my emotional angsty fix, and this story is pretty much textbook. Mac and Rachel have a lot of baggage, mostly because as 18-year-old kids they were too stupid to talk to each other. Also, it's easy to understand Rachel's desire to get the heck out of Dodge given how craptastic her family life was. She couldn't be bothered to think about the people around her (Mac, her brother) who would be effected by her leaving. All she knew was that 1) this is a bad place and 2) anyplace else has to be better.

I found myself enjoying this book, but for all the other reasons besides the romance - which honestly was incidental for me. I was intrigued by Amanda. What was she hiding? What was slowly eating away at her? I also found myself terribly interested in Rachel's past. Was she going to stop running from it? Was she finally going to take the steps to address the toxic sludge in her life that she was pushing to the side?

The romance is rather heavy, given the past that Mac and Rachel share. They have a tendency to say things to each other that are rather hurtful. I did find Mac's response to Rachel rather Pavlovian after they finally hit the sheets (when we first had sex she left ergo now that we've had sex a second time she'll leave again) - and I also found myself feeling really sorry for Mac's dead wife. She was a pretty, popular girl who wanted Mac but found herself competing with the fact that he was in love with Rachel. Naturally this eventually wears on her, and while I won't necessarily say the author demonizes her for it - I can see how some readers would feel that she does.

So where does that leave us? Well, this was a strong read with many enjoyable elements to it. I also really appreciated that the author addressed the ethical issues concerning Rachel's job and her history with Mac - when in many other romances one would see an issue like this swept under the rug entirely. While I didn't love it and want to have babies with it - if it had been my first introduction to O'Keefe's writing? Yeah, she would have landed on my Check Out Her Next Release list. As it is, I've now gone back and ordered her backlist titles that I didn't already have buried in the TBR. So much for this challenge being about making progress with my hording....

Final Grade = B-

Reminder: TBR Challenge For January 2012

2012-01-13T07:00:00.000-08:00

For those of you participating in the 2012 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, January 18.

The theme this month is Category Romance. You know, one of those cute little books with the dippy titles.

Remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. If you're not much for category romance, or heck - you just don't feel like reading one this month, that's totally cool! The themes aren't nearly as "important" as digging some long neglected book out of your TBR pile.

And hey, and it's only January! It's not too late to sign-up for the challenge and join in on the fun. If you're interested, or just want to be a snoop, please check out the TBR Challenge 2012 information page.

Unusual Historical Spotlight: Retro Rippin', Cowboys, Egypt, Gladiators, Ottoman Empire, and Vikings

2012-01-11T15:00:00.000-08:00

Love and War by Patricia Hagan

What You Need To Know: Publication date December 13, 2011; Digital Release; originally published in 1978 by Avon; first book in series

Description:

A tale of sizzling passion in a world consumed by the Civil War.

Beautiful and spirited Southerner Kitty Wright is torn between Rebel Nathan Collins and Yankee Travis Coltrane, the dashing Cavalry officer who can melt her heart with desire while sending fury coursing through her veins.

As war erupts, Kitty is abducted and ravished by a war-crazed Rebel. Rescued by Yankees, she is held captive and thrust into the battlefields to help tend the wounded. But from the first moment Travis Coltrane ignites—and satiates—the wild, raw desire in her that she never knew existed, she realizes her heart is imprisoned as well as her body.

Hating Travis for his Yankee loyalty, while loving him despite their different worlds, Kitty struggles with her guilt over Nathan, the Rebel to whom she is promised…all while struggling to survive as the world explodes around them all.

This title was originally published by Avon Books in 1978.

Product Warnings
This sweeping Civil War saga features accurate and graphic descriptions of battlefield wounds, nursing, and the brutality of war.

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, a Civil War saga! Plus it sounds like just the ticket for those of you who are yearning for some Old School Bodice-Rippin' Action (see review at Get Yer Bodices Ripped Here)

Susanna's Choice by Sara Luck

What You Need To Know: Publication date December 27, 2011; debut

Description:

A Chance Encounter
Soon after stepping off the train, Rab rescues a beautiful woman from an oncoming wagon, and they are consumed by the strength and seduction of their embrace. Susanna is an aspiring writer and agrees to interview a stranger, who she is shocked to discover is none other than Rab Trudeau, the man that everyone is talking about and the man that saved her life.

A Life Changing Choice
Promised in marriage to another, Susanna fights her overwhelming desire for Rab, but as the scandal surrounding his company heats up, Susanna must make an impossible choice—one that could bind her to Rab forever or destroy any hope of their future happiness.

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, a debut western!

Priestess of the Nile by Veronica Scott

What You Need To Know: Publication date January 23, 2012; Digital Release, short story

Description:

Egypt, 1500 BC

Drawn to his abandoned temple on the banks of the Nile by an enchanting song, Sobek the Crocodile God is even more captivated by the sight of the singer herself. Appearing to her as a man, he learns she is Merys, a descendant of his last priestess. Though filled with lust, Sobek believes Merys deserves to be more than just his mistress. But the rules that govern the Egyptian pantheon forbid anything beyond a physical joining of a Great One and a human.

Merys is attracted to the handsome stranger, who arouses passions in her that no man ever has. But with no dowry and no hope of ever leaving her village, she dares not dream of the future—or love.
Sobek takes every opportunity to visit Merys, taxing his resolve to leave her pure. When he saves her life, their mutual desire must be sated. But can a love between a human and an immortal survive the ultimate test of the gods?
21,000 words

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, ancient Egypt!

Mask of the Gladiator by Georgie Lee

What You Need To Know: Publication date January 30, 2012; Digital Release, short story

Description:

Rome, 41 AD
Livia Duronius is driven to seek out a gladiator after watching him triumph in the Colosseum. His touch arouses a sense of hope she hasn't felt since Rome fell under the tyrannical rule of Caligula—and her late husband betrayed her. Though in danger of losing more than her heart, she vows to see him again, even after she learns her uncle has arranged her marriage to a senator.

Senator Titus Marius cannot resist indulging in a passionate encounter with the veiled woman who waits for him after the games, though he faces execution if his true identity is discovered. Bound by honor to wed another, and embroiled in a plot to free Rome from madness, he never expects to see the mystery woman again.

When the fates reunite them in the marriage bed, Titus vows to protect Livia at all costs—even from the lecherous eyes of the emperor...
17,000 words

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, ancient Rome!

A Secret in Her Kiss by Anna Randol

What You Need To Know: Publication date January 31, 2012; debut

Description:

She would gladly relinquish her life of intrigue…

A rare beauty, raised in the exotic heart of the Ottoman Empire, Mari Sinclair knows it’s time to end her career as a British spy when she narrowly avoids a brush with death. Unfortunately her employers think otherwise—and they are not above using blackmail to keep Mari in the Game.

Saddled with a handsome, duty-obsessed “minder” to ensure that she completes—and survives—one last mission, Mari is incensed…for her guardian, Major Bennett Prestwood, is simply too dedicated, too unbending, and too disarmingly attractive. But in the face of dark secrets and deadly treacheries, as the true peril to Mari is slowly revealed, loyal soldier Bennett realizes that, to save and win this extraordinary woman, he will have to do the unthinkable and break the rules—rules that passion and desire have suddenly, irrevocably changed.

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, a debut novel published by Avon (all England, all the bloody time) set in the Ottoman Empire.

The Viking's Touch by Joanna Fulford

What You Need To Know: Publication date February 21, 2012; sequel to The Viking's Defiant Bride

Description:

Wulfgar and his band of warriors are on their way to join Rollo when their ship is damaged in a storm, and puts into a small bay off the Anglian coast. They need to carry out urgent repairs and this looks like a perfect haven. However, it turns out to be anything but. For a start there is Lord Ingvar’s war band who make it clear that the newcomers are not welcome. Then there is Anwyn, the beautiful and wealthy widow, on whom Ingvar has designs. Having escaped one forced marriage she is not about to embark on another. Striving to maintain her independence and protect her young son, she feels increasing isolated and under threat. When she agrees to help Wulfgar he is grateful and, on learning of her predicament, even sympathetic. Unfortunately, he won’t be around long enough to become involved, and anyway it’s none of his business. However, Anwyn, soon realises that he is the one person who could help her.

What Makes It Unusual: Dude, Vikings!

This is just a small sampling of upcoming and recently released titles. Have you read any promising unusual historicals of late? (Seriously, the last time I did a UH post was back in September! In other words, let the recommendations fly!)

The Year That Was 2011: The Best Of Everything Else

2012-01-10T07:00:00.000-08:00

Now that I've corralled the best reading I did in category romance last year, it's time to talk about everything else. This also marks my last post on the subject of rehashing 2011. It's time to look forward, and kick my reading butt in gear if I have any hopes of cracking 100 books read in 2012. So, what were some of the gems that I read last year that weren't category romance? Here they are!

Madame Tussaud by Michelle Moran (historical fiction, Crown, 2011)

My other A read of the year. Compelling, riveting, historical fiction detailing the life of Madame Tussaud (of wax museum fame) before she was a madame and living in Paris on the eve of the French Revolution. Loved it!

You Killed Wesley Payne by Sean Beaudoin (YA crime, Little Brown, 2011)

Pulpy crime noir set in a suburban high school. Not a book for everybody (Lil' Sis DNF'ed it!), but if you love crime noir, and can deal with a mother-lode of slang, this is a really clever read.

Fourth and Goal by Jami Davenport (digital erotic romance, LooseID, 2011)

An erotic romance with some lovely character depth. Also, a sports-themed romance (professional American football) that didn't make me want to drive my fist through a wall. Can't wait for the next book in the series.

Portrait of Seduction by Carrie Lofty (digital historical romance, Carina, 2011)

A fantastic star-crossed lovers story with a happy ending! Beautiful period detail, compelling conflict, and achingly romantic.

Flawless by Carrie Lofty (historical romance, Pocket, 2011)

A wastrel hero who grows up and a heroine who learns to stop running scared. All while set against the back-drop of Victorian South Africa. Seriously, someone needs to lock Lofty in an attic and tell her to keep churning out historical romances. They're really magical.

Fall From Grace by Wayne Arthurson (mystery/suspense, Forge, 2011)

Thought-provoking suspense with a seriously eff'ed up hero and a great sense of place (Canada!). The ending warped my fragile little mind, but I couldn't stop thinking about it for days afterward. A winning debut.

The Silent Girl by Tess Gerritsen (mystery/suspense, Ballantine, 2011)

Gerritsen has been on a roll for me with her last several Rizzoli/Isles books. This one has a great mystery set in Boston's Chinatown and it's a "Jane book." Yippee!

The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt by Caroline Preston (historical fiction, Ecco, 2011)

A picture book for grown-ups. Tells the story of Frances "Frankie" Pratt through her scrapbook. Yeah, it's a gimmick - but it's a clever gimmick. If you're a social history junkie, look no further.

All Fall Down by Megan Hart (general fiction, Mira, 2011)

I love the way Hart takes "ordinary people" and puts them in extraordinary circumstances. Heroine wakes up one morning to discover her husband had a child by his first wife. A child who is now 20, with three kids of her own, and oh - just escaped from a cult that committed mass suicide.

Princess Forever by Meg Cabot (YA, HarperTeen, 2009)

The final chapter in the author's popular Princess Diaries series. I'm putting this one on the list mostly because it's a series that ended - and it ended beautifully. The author gives her fans what they want, and wraps it up in such a way to make me believe that an 18-year-old girl is going to live happily-ever-after.

This is probably the most variety I've ever had in a Best Of list before. Part of this is thanks to work. Two of these, including the lone A read? Yeah, I picked up to prepare for a "book talk" I did at a local senior center.

I hope you enjoyed looking back with me on my reading year in 2011. It's always fun for me to go back and reminisce on some of the great stuff I read over the course of the year. And hopefully you were able to cull a couple of suggestions from this trip down memory lane.

The Year That Was 2011: Best Category Romance

2012-01-08T08:00:00.000-08:00

My reading psychology has two very distinct personalities: 1) Category Romance and 2) Everything Else. For the sake of looking back at my best reads of 2011, I've decided to take these split personalities and give them each their own blog posts. First up, a look back at some of the really great category romance I read last year.

Title links will take you to full reviews.

His Wife For One Night by Molly O'Keefe (Harlequin SuperRomance 2011)

One of my two A reads for this year and a book so good I wanted to have babies with it. Friends-to-lovers, marriage-in-trouble, and a spitfire heroine who is tired of taking the self-absorbed hero's crap. Seriously, so good I had to remove this book from my desk and put it in a storage tub because I kept picking it back up to skim large chunks of it. Have I mentioned how much I loved this book? Squee-worthy, danger danger Wendy's getting more obnoxious than usual.....

Mommy Said Goodbye and Revelations by Janice Kay Johnson (Harlequin SuperRomance 2004)

Johnson's strength as a writer, in my opinion, is in her conflict. She writes such fantastic conflict that I really think Harlequin is missing a cash cow by not packaging her in trade paperback to snag the Book Club Crowd. This is a connected duet. Mommy Said Goodbye didn't really work for me as a romance, but the story was so frackin' good that I didn't care. Revelations featured my very favorite sort of heroine, and was stronger on the romance front.

The Big Guns by HelenKay Dimon (Harlequin Intrigue 2011)

This is actually the last book in Dimon's Mystery Men series and, while it was my favorite, I'm also putting it on the list to represent the whole series. Great plotting, page-turning action, with steamy romances. Granted I'm not widely read in the Intrigue line, but Dimon is the one author that I pick up without even reading the back cover copy.

A Man of His Word by Sarah M. Anderson (Harlequin Desire 2011)

A debut Desire that reminded me so much of why I used to love this line - well, it made me a little bereft. A real hero-worthy hero, a haunted heroine, and so much story....it's really accomplished. I met Anderson briefly at RWA, which is the sole reason why I picked up this book - and oh man, so glad I did. A one-sitter kind of a read.

Honeymoon with the Ranger by Donna Alward (Harlequin Romance 2011)

I read several books by Alward this year, all of which I enjoyed, but this was the stand-out. A lovely setting (Argentina!) and a heroine who has to find herself again after a relationship goes bust.

Molly Cooper's Dream Date by Barbara Hannay (Harlequin Romance 2011)

A total throw-back kind of read, the kind of book I would equally love to share with a grandmother or a teenage girl. Couple agrees to a home-swap vacation and end up falling for each other through their e-mail exchange. A little old-fashioned, a whole lot sweet - it was just downright lovely.

Mr. Right There All Along by Jackie Braun (Harlequin Romance 2011)

A charming friends-to-lovers story featuring a young woman who is still haunted by high school and a hero with abandonment issues. Just flat-out nice characters, and a nicely drawn New York setting.

The Army Ranger's Return by Soraya Lane (Harlequin Romance 2011)

Lane had three books out this year, and this - her second release - was my favorite. Hero and heroine meet through a pen-pal program for military personnel. When he returns home thanks to an injury, he meets the heroine in the flesh - which is scarred by her fight with breast cancer.

Heart of a Hero by Barbara Wallace (Harlequin Romance 2011)

An opposites attract kind of story. Hero is surly ex-military and moved to a tiny island to escape people. Instead he gets stuck next door to the heroine, who needs a handyman (he's the only one on the island!) and has an obnoxious dog that won't stay in its own frackin' yard. Loved the way the author handled the issue of the hero's PTSD. No pat solutions and no miracle recovery once he falls in lurve.

And those are the highlights in category romance. It really was a strong year and it was fun to go back over my spreadsheet to revisit them. Of course now I want to reread them all. Next up? The best of everything else that wasn't category.....

The Year That Was 2011: The Numbers

2012-01-04T15:39:00.000-08:00

Of all my annual Year In Review posts, this one is likely to bore the majority of Bat Cave followers. But, what can I say? I like looking at the numbers. I like seeing how many books I read, what the grades were, and the various "labels" I slapped on them. I use a pretty stripped down spreadsheet in Google Docs to keep track of my reading. It's simple, it's easy, and it works for me. I'm a if it ain't broke don't fix it kind of gal - and as tempting as GoodReads is at times, I just can't pull the trigger (I have my reasons). Anyway, here's how 2011 stacked up for me:

My goal for 2011 was to crack 100 books read, and I fell short at 95. I'm a little disappointed in myself, but considering I read 94 in 2010 and 95 in 2009, it's hard to berate myself over....consistency.

My grades this year were also fairly consistent when compared to 2010.

A = 2 (4 in 2010)
B = 54 (59 in 2010)
C = 23 (24 in 2010)
D = 11 (4 in 2010)
DNF = 5 (5 in 2010)

My reputation for being stingy with A grades holds. The defining element for me has always been do I want to drop my entire life and immediately reread the book. People, my TBR is so legendary, and the guilt that comes with such hording, that rereading is a rarity for me. So if the story passes the Must Reread Someday test, it's an A.

A word about DNF grades - I pretty much stopped giving F grades when I left TRR. My personal policy is life is too short to keep reading a book I absolutely loathe, and TGTBTU has the same policy. So yeah, Wendy no longer gives F grades. It's probably not fair to count books I didn't finish in my final numbers (OK, it isn't), but I tend to only count books that I invested a significant amount of time in. And since we're talking genre fiction, the bulk of which is somewhere around 300-400 pages? I'm looking at 50+ pages, with a decent chunk of skimming ahead.

I did pretty good with my variety of publishers this year, even considering I only review category romance for TGTBTU. Instead of giving you the numbers, let's just go with a list:

Aphrodisia, Avon, Ballantine, Brava, Carina, Cleis, Crown, Ecco, Forge, Hard Case Crime, Harpercollins, Harlequin Historical, Harlequin Historical Undone, Harlequin Blaze, Spice Briefs, Love Inspired Historical, Mira, Kimani, Harlequin Desire, Harlequin Intrigue, Harlequin Presents, Harlequin Romance, Harlequin Special Edition, Harlequin Superromance, Hyperion, Kensington, Samhain, Little Brown, St. Martin's, LooseID, Warner, Minotaur, Zebra, Pocket, Signet.

Publication dates were a lovely mix this year, even if my reviewing means that the 2011 are significantly higher.

1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 2001 (2), 2003 (2), 2004 (3), 2005 (2), 2007 (2), 2008, 2009 (2), 2010 (9), 2011 (68)

Now that's all interesting (OK, maybe just to me), but what exactly did I read this year? Well, let's take a look at my tagging. Now these won't add up to 95 because I tend to slap multiple tags on the books I read. For example, a Harlequin Romance is going to be tagged C, S for "Contemporary" and "Series."

Anthology = 4
Contemporary = 31
Inspirational = 2
Romantic/Suspense = 8
Women's Fiction = 4
Series = 26
Erotic Romance = 6
Short Stories = 17
Erotica = 7
Historical = 33
England = 2
Medieval = 4
Regency = 12
Victorian = 2
Western = 7
Historical Fiction (not romance) = 2
Mystery/Suspense = 9
Non-Fiction = 1
Paranormal = 1
Science Fiction Romance = 1
Young Adult = 2

Every year I tell myself I'm going to get more consistent with my tagging, and every year I can't seem to get it together. So I'm not sure how helpful these numbers are, but they are interesting, if for no other reason than to see the variety (or lack thereof) that I read.

One other thing I found interesting is that of the 95 books I read this year? Yeah, I reviewed all of them (either on this blog or TGTBTU) except for 6. Of those 6 I didn't do full-fledged reviews for? 3 were C reads, 3 were DNFs, and all 6 were books I didn't "promise" anyone I'd write a review for.

Discipline, I haz it.

Just goes to show that one reason I started blogging (to talk about the books I was reading) still holds true today as it did back in the stone ages of 2003.

The Year That Was 2011: TBR Challenge Books

2012-01-03T07:00:00.000-08:00

Hello 2012, goodbye ~~thank you sweet baby Jesus~~ 2011! Which means it must be time, once again, for the bonanza that is my Year In Reading Review posts here at the Bat Cave. I like to drag these reflections out over the course of several blog posts, mostly because it flips some secret librarian switch I have in my brain, and also because I like looking back. My wee lil' geeky heart likes looking at numbers, and I also like thinking back to all the great books I read over the last 12 months. The not-so-great ones? Yeah, let's let sleeping dogs lie.

I thought a good way to kick off my recaps would be to start with what I read for the 2011 TBR Challenge. I was able to complete the challenge every month, which means a total of 12 books read and reviewed out of my ginormous TBR Mountain Range. Here's how the numbers break down:

Grades:
A = 0
B = 4
C = 5
D = 3

Blah. I had the impression that my reading this year for the challenge was pretty sucky, and these numbers kinda back me up. Hey, 4 B reads are great, but C books always leave me feeling uninspired and....3 D reads?! Ugh.

Genres Read:
Category Romance = 3
Romantic Suspense = 1
Historical Romance = 5
Mystery/Suspense = 2
Young Adult = 1

I'm pretty happy with the variety I read, and even more pleased with the mix of publication dates!

Publication Dates:
1993
1995
1997
2003
2004 (2)
2005
2007 (2)
2008
2009 (2)

So what were all those books I read for the challenge? Here they are, a trip down memory lane (title links will take you to full reviews).

The B Reads:

Mommy Said Goodbye by Janice Kay Johnson - Didn't really work for me as a romance, but amazing conflict and a humdinger of a mystery. Loved it!

Land of Dreams by Cheryl St. John - Vintage St. John that delivered exactly what I expect out of one of her books - pure comfort read.

Montana Wife by Jillian Hart - Like St. John, Hart is another author I tend to slap the "comfort" label on. Oodles of angsty conflict and a nice historical back-drop.

Princess Forever by Meg Cabot - Last book in the Princess Diaries series. A bit padded, but a very good book to end a very good series.

The C Reads:

The Last Cheerleader by Meg O'Brien - Amateur sleuth suspense that suffered from unbelievable character behavior and a secondary character who annoyed the crap out of me.

Wife for a Week by Kelly Hunter - Loved the sexy bantering couple, but the silly slapped on "suspense" sub plot was beyond tedious.

With This Ring by Carla Kelly - Loved the historical back-drop and the heroine, the hero and, at times, farcical storyline? Not so much.

A Seduction at Christmas by Cathy Maxwell - Thin historical detail with a suspense sub plot to match. But Maxwell continues to reel me in with her brain-candy writing style.

Beyond Desire by Thea Devine - Another cracktastic soap opera from Devine. Has it's moments, but pretty low on the cracky-goodness scale I tend to rate her books by.

The D Reads:

Billion Dollar Baby Bargain by Tessa Radley - What can go wrong when you're someone who impulse reads category romance. The Cult of Biology strikes again!

Dead Shot by Annie Solomon - Major issues with the heroine and a big ol' plot hole a convoy can drive through. Yummy damaged hero though.

Officer Down by Theresa Schwegel - Well-written, page-turning suspense featuring a dumb, dumb, dumb heroine.

And there they are. All the books I read to complete the 2011 TBR Challenge. My "goal" for the 2012 TBR Challenge? Well, I'm hoping I find myself at least one yummy A read buried somewhere in the depths of my ~~hording~~ collection (come out, come out where ever you are!).

Speaking of the 2012 TBR Challenge? Maybe it's time for you to sign-up! It really is a lot of fun, and a great way to make progress on your own ~~hording~~ collection. Check out the information page for all the details.

Lemon Drop: Book Reviewer-In-Training

2012-01-01T16:15:00.000-08:00

Lemon Drop: Thanks for the Christmas presents Auntie Wendy! Even if you and Auntie Big Sis need to work on your communication skills a bit....

Me: How was I supposed to know that we were both going to buy you the same T-shirt? Oh well, it's a good thing I bought you two gifts - otherwise I might have gotten thrown out on my ear.

Lemon Drop: I was tempted, but Mommy wouldn't let me. Besides, all is forgiven since you got me this awesome book!

Me: So, how did you like The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss? It's a classic you know.

Lemon Drop: Oh, it's very good Auntie Wendy. You'll have to thank Bat Cave Reader, Jami, for recommending it. I was riveted by this book!

Me: Tell me all about it cupcake....

Lemon Drop: Well, it's about a little boy who plants a carrot seed, and everybody tells him it won't grow. His parents, his brother, everybody! But the little boy believes, takes care of the seed, waters it, tends to it and one day.....

It grows and grows and grows! The boy gets a big giant ginormous carrot to grow!

Me: Wow, that does sound exciting. What do you think the message of this story is?

Lemon Drop: Well, it's obvious isn't it Auntie Wendy? Never listen to grown-ups, they have no idea what they're talking about.

Me: Uhhh.....

Lemon Drop: Seriously, what did that little boy's parents really know? He didn't listen to them and look what happened! He grew a giant carrot that could feed an entire third world country! Yep, adults and older brothers have like, no clue.

Me: Uhhh.....

Lemon Drop: Why do you look so worried all of the sudden Auntie Wendy....

Me: Oh man, your Mama is going to kill me.

Lemon Drop: Dude, Uncle My Man was right. You are easy to mess with. Geez, I know that's not what the story is really about Auntie Wendy! It's about believing in yourself. That if you believe and work hard, anything is possible. Man, you are gullible. Are you sure you were really Librarian of the Year?

Me: Whew! Dodged a bullet with that one.....

The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt

2011-12-29T07:00:00.000-08:00

When I tell people what I do for a living they immediately think I sit in an office all day and read books. Uh, no. What I do is read a mother-lode of book reviews. Then once I do that, I go to places where your average non-librarian citizen hears about books. Let's face it - they aren't pouring over Publisher's Weekly every week. They just aren't. They're watching the Today Show, reading People magazine, and trolling around on Entertainment Weekly's web site. That's how they hear about books - and that's how I heard about The Scrapbook of Frankie Pratt - by reading Oprah's (::shudder::) magazine.

Once I tweeted (yeah, I did) the publisher to confirm that Caroline Preston's scrapbook-style novel didn't have any dreaded pull out ephemera (no little letters tucked in envelopes for example), I happily forked over library funds to buy several copies. Because, you know, our customers read Oprah. It generated a modest waiting list, and when I noticed a copy sitting on the New Books shelves before I left work for the holiday weekend, I thought "What the heck?" Ladies and gentleman, I present to you the book I zipped through in a couple of hours on Christmas Eve.

The best way I can describe this novel is that it's a picture book for grown-ups. Or better yet, like going to a cocktail party and poking around in your host's medicine cabinet. We meet Frances "Frankie" Pratt when she graduates high school in 1920. She's a young lady with big dreams stuck in a tiny New England town. Over the course of reading her scrapbook, we follow her from Connecticut, to Vassar, to New York City, to Paris, back to Connecticut. It's a bit like uncovering an old photo album while playing in Grandma's attic and discovering the old lady had a really cool life before shackling herself to Grandpa.

It is a charming little book, with a wonderful "hook" and a nice attention to historical detail. It also makes me weep bitter, copious tears that this era tends to be flat-out ignored in romance genre circles (yeah, yeah World War I and the Great Depression are major downers, but it's such an interesting time for women!). That being said, readers shouldn't go into this book expecting serious amounts of depth. It's a story told in scrapbook form, so we're not talking oodles of text here. We also really only get Frankie's point of view, so if you're a reader not wild about first-person? This one isn't likely to change your mind.

But it is an enjoyable little read that has a lot to recommend it to the right person. I can totally see scrapbooking crafty-types going ga-ga over this. Also, if you're a bit of a social history nut, like I am, this is a real treasure trove. I suspect some romance readers will find Frankie's romantic entanglements less than fulfilling, but I found them remarkably refreshing in a "true to life" sort of way. There are boys, then men, and all of this leads to Frankie being the woman she is by the final chapter.

Like I said, it's a bit like finding out that Grandma was pretty kick ass before she settled down, had babies, and baked cookies for the grandkids. It is what it is - that is to say somewhat of a novelty. But it's a charming, breathtaking novelty that I didn't want to put down.

Final Grade = B+

All Fall Down

2011-12-27T07:00:00.000-08:00

Megan Hart is one author I don't like to slap labels on. I even hate to label her erotic novels as "erotic" - because frankly anyone who reads Megan Hart solely for "the sex" is missing the point (sorry, you are). However, for the sake of discussing All Fall Down, her latest release, I'll go so far as to say it's "not a romance" and that it's Hart's "book club book." Because that's what it is. Highly readable general fiction that sucks you in with a ripped-from-the-headlines style plot and characters who feel like they could be real people.

Sunshine has spent her entire life growing up in a cult, the Family of Superior Bliss. It's late at night, and the alarms are blaring again. She thinks it's merely another drill - but her mother bundles her up, along with Sunshine's three small children, and ushers them off the compound. Sunshine is confused, doesn't want to leave, and can't understand what her mother is doing. However, she listens to her, takes a scrap of paper, and urges the girl to find her father. Her biological father that Sunshine has never known.

Liesel Albright is Chris's second wife, and desperately wants a baby. But month after month, her period arrives to mock her. It's another month, another such morning, and then the door bell rings. There stands Sunshine and her three children. Chris had a daughter by his first wife, a woman who up and left him to join a cult 20 years ago. Liesel may have wanted a family, but she's not quite prepared for inheriting one. Sunshine might be 20 with three children of her own, but living her entire life sheltered in a cult means she is just as much a child herself. While Chris retreats, it's up to Liesel to learn to cope, and Sunshine to find her way. Which becomes increasingly hard for her when news that the cult committed mass-suicide hits the news. Sunshine wasn't just forced out of the compound by her mother, she was left behind.

Hart's strength as a writer has never been, in my opinion, her plotting. She's a very deliberate writer with very deliberately paced plots - which means none of her books are what I would call "page-turners" in the high-paced thriller sense of the expression. This book is no different. It unfolds slowly, page-by-page, sucking the reader in with the daily existence of the characters. It's the kind of book that could go on forever and as the reader you wouldn't mind - because you get so invested in the characters that it's almost like reading a soap opera, but with no over-the-top behavior and bed-hopping shenanigans.

The first half of this book is mostly spent on Liesel - a woman who should be careful what she wishes for. She admirably begins to pick up the pieces, but having four lost souls fall in your lap isn't exactly smooth sailing. How she copes, what she learns about herself, and how it effects her marriage make for riveting reading.

The second half of the book is much more strongly focused on Sunshine, and how a girl who has spent her whole life living under the shadow of a cult can become acclimated to "the real world." I'll admit that while I thought Liesel and Chris were interesting to read about, that I really felt this was Sunshine's story. It reminded me a lot of one of my all time favorite books, Flowers For Algernon, also about a character going through a rapid ascent through adolescence and trying to live in a world he's not prepared for, nor understands.

As deliberately paced as the book is, and as much as I wanted it to just go on forever, it does have to end eventually. In that respect, I found that after the slow unfolding of the story, that the ending does feel a bit rushed. I also suspect that as general fiction, some genre readers might be less than enthralled. However, it ends the way I think Hart has to end it. And there is still a silver lining, albeit cute little puppies aren't exactly frolicking under a rainbow while gumdrops rain down.

The only real quibble I have is that the most interesting character is largely left unexplored, and that's Sunshine's mother. I'm not entirely sure what the author could have done to remedy this though without entirely changing her story. Unless flashbacks were employed, and that way is fraught with dozens of mine-fields. I found myself fascinated by this woman, what made her marry Chris, and then leave him for a cult? What was she looking for? Why did she choose the way she chose? And exactly how is she able to look on while her daughter has three babies by the time she's 20? Sadly, those questions are never really answered, although the author does give us a few teasing glimpses.

This isn't what I consider a sexy book. It's not easy to categorize, it's not filled with car chases, wall-to-wall sex, battle scenes, or a nail-biting cliffhanger. It's a story about people who find themselves in extraordinary circumstances and how they learn to cope with each other, care for each other, and live their "new lives." It's a lovely piece of work by an author whose work I tend to enjoy immensely, and it's the kind of book that sticks with me long after I've finished it. No, it's not a romance - but I was perfectly fine with that.

Final Grade = B+

2012 TBR Challenge, Historical Romance Wiki, and Library Poultry

2011-12-23T09:37:00.000-08:00

Now that the 2011 TBR Challenge has come to a close, why not consider signing up for 2012? I'm hosting again next year, and I can tell you - not only is it a lot of fun, but it's also a great way to force your hand into digging some long-ignored book out of the mountainous hordes that can accumulate. Why not take a gander at the information page to see the schedule, really broad monthly themes, and who has signed up already?

+++++

Every time I think I'm settling in fairly well at The New Modified ~~Holy Crap I Have A Ton To Do~~ Job, my optimism usually comes back to haunt me. One of the things I've been neglecting lately is my Upcoming Historical Romances wiki. However, I did get a little sprucing up done yesterday, and I have a healthy list of titles I hope to add soon (Today? Maybe? Hopefully?)

I'll admit that I debated for a while to deep-six this wiki. To keep it manageable I don't include inspirational, digital-first, digital-only, self-published, or vanity press-published titles. Which kind of made me wonder "Does anyone find this list remotely useful when my scope is only The Big Six, Harlequin, Sourcebooks and Kensington?" That's the librarian part of my brain talking. At the end of the day, I'm going to keep trying to keep it up. Honestly, I like cover art. I also like seeing what's in the pipeline. I still don't have the time or inclination to broaden my scope for this wiki, but maybe it will one day spur someone else on to undertake those areas of publishing I'm currently "neglecting" because I'm only one person.

+++++

If you've been reading this blog for a long time (~~why?!~~), you may recall that back in The Dark Ages I used to occasionally post wacky library stories. Just some of the odd-ball I Can't Believe That Just Happened stuff that can crop up when you do this type of work. Then I moved to an administration building where nothing wacky ever seemed to happen. Hence, no more stories. Well, until now. Sort of. My blog has got to be one of the worst kept secrets among some of my colleagues, so I need to pick my stories carefully. This is one I've been sitting on until I got a picture opportunity, so here it is.

We have poultry. Yes, Library Poultry.

The library where I was transferred sits right next to a park. This park is apparently a fertile dumping ground for various animals that people no longer want to take care of. Hence, we've now got poultry. A couple of roosters with faulty internal clocks that like to crow all day long, and even some hens.

Apparently this Rogue Band Of Bibliophile Birds has been here for a while, and I don't see them leaving anytime soon. For one thing, I don't see coyotes coming this far into the interior (without help from a major disaster of some sort) and the animal folks are surprisingly hesitant to pick up any strays that they have to actually, you know, catch themselves. Unless someone is really hungry and wants one for their soup pot? The library has poultry.

(I wonder if we could sell their eggs as a fundraiser? I mean, have you seen how much free-range organic eggs cost? Yikes.)

I'm half-tempted to name them, but I don't actually know how many of them are out there. There are at least two roosters, but I was clueless about the hens until this morning. Maybe if I ever get a final head count we can have a Name The Library Poultry Contest?

TBR Challenge 2011: Apartment Living

2011-12-21T07:00:00.000-08:00

The Book: A Seduction at Christmas by Cathy Maxwell

The Particulars: Historical romance, Avon, 2008, In Print, First book in the Scandals and Seduction series.

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: There was an eBay auction for a romance author (and I'm ashamed to say, I can't remember who now) to help her with some medical bills. Maxwell was offering up this really cute Dr. Seuss-themed charm bracelet that I ultimately won. Along with the bracelet, she sent this book - which was her latest release at the time.

The Review: Fiona Lachlan came to London thinking it surely had to be better than Scotland. Gently born and schooled by her mother to one day marry well, the tide changes quickly when her magistrate father attempts to do the right thing (which those in power think is the very wrong thing) and her brother gets mixed up in rebel causes. She was employed as a seamstress, although she is now out of work and getting a little desperate. So desperate that when her neighbor falls in love (for the umpteenth time) and elopes, she agrees to take over an errand the girl was going to run for a notorious courtesan.

The courtesan in question wants Fiona to meet her former lover, who has since unceremoniously dumped her. Fiona is to feign like she's there for seduction, but instead slip a potion in the man's drink so he'll become violently ill. That will surely teach him to not trifle with the affections of his spurned mistress! However, when Fiona shows up on the scene? It's not the man who spurned the courtesan, but the notorious Duke of Holburn who is waiting for her. He's there thinking he's finally going to meet the man who stole his family signet ring years before - but instead he gets the delectable Fiona. Then hired goons show up waving around guns and things get really sticky.

I know some authors who get their backs up when the term "wallpaper" is thrown around, so let us just say this book has absolutely no sense of place. It's a bit like living in an apartment. The walls are white and the carpet is beige. Think of it like going to see some experimental theater "production" off-off-off Broadway, where the actors perform the play on an empty stage with no sets. After a while I started to fancifully imagine these characters in any half-cocked location I could think of, because honestly - they would have fit just about anywhere with minimal changes needing to be made to the story. On a pirate ship? Sure. At a Texas cattle ranch? Why not! On a space ship voyage to Mars? OK, that's a little weird - but it could work!

The characters are likable enough, aren't prone to silly misunderstandings and do communicate with each other fairly well. The Duke has Dead Daddy and Shrewish Mommy Issues, while the heroine is "haunted" by a gang rape she suffered at the hands of soldiers back in Scotland. I don't mean to belittle gang rape, but this aspect of the heroine's back-story runs hot or cold - cropping up only when the author needs a convenient plot device. It's not employed on a consistent basis, and I'll admit the feminist in me got annoyed that something as serious as a gang-rape was reduced to "convenient plot device" - on the same level as a impish child character who interrupts a potential love scene. Bother.

The driving conflict of the story is really, mostly, external. Someone wants the Duke dead, but who? This "mystery" (and I use the term loosely) is thin and obvious, even though the author does toss in a red herring. However, it does succeed in keeping the story moving along. There is also a little slice of woo-woo, in the form of Greek mythology (the Oracle at Delphi plays a small role in the story). As someone who is totally over paranormal, I can assuredly say that this aspect of the story is really light, although it did run a little silly for my personal taste (A prophecy? Really?)

So we've got white walls and a thin mystery. Where does that leave us? With this weird sort of magic Maxwell's writing style seems to have over me. It's like drinking liquid candy - which is ultimately how I came to think of this book - as "brain candy." Sure there's no sense of place and I knew where the plot was going before it got there, but this is the sort of book I just needed at this moment in time. When my head is all over the place, I'm strung a little too tight, and I'm overwhelmed. I could pick up this book, turn off my brain, flip the pages, and just lose myself several chapters at a time. No, it's not high art but I kept reading and never thought about DNF'ing it. And even though I told myself I wasn't interested? I looked up the other books in this series to make sure some of the secondary characters I met in this book eventually got a romance (I probably won't read those books - but I still had to make sure!).

So at the end of the day? I'm left with the ultimate "C read." It wasn't terrible, it wasn't great, it was easy reading, but ask me in a week what this book was about and you'll probably get "Uhhhhh....."

Final Grade = C

The Month That Was November 2011

2011-12-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

Lemon Drop: Auntie Wendy! You're finally here, blogging, and not sitting in the corner rocking back and forth.... By the way, Mommy says that's rather unbecoming.

Me: Now see here Little Miss Cutie Britches, Auntie Wendy and Uncle My Man got the plague. And I'm still swamped at work, and not reading, and having a general all-around meltdown...

Lemon Drop: Blah, blah, blah - have you thought about me Auntie Wendy? And my adoring public? You need to get it together, because this keeping us waiting until the end of the month thing is just not kosher. Besides, I'm cute!

Me: Well, there is no denying your cuteness. While we all try to get over the sugar shock, why don't I tell you about what I read last month? It wasn't all that great. A couple of goodies mixed in with a couple of ho-hummers washed down with a DNF. Six books in all.

Title links will take you to full reviews.

Snowflakes and Stetsons by Jillian Hart, Carol Finch & Cheryl St. John, Historical romance anthology, Harlequin Historical, 2011, Grade = B

Holiday-themed anthology featuring three western stories. Totally solid all the way around, with particularly strong showings by Hart and St. John.

Officer Down by Theresa Schwegel, Suspense, St. Martin's, 2005, Grade = D+

My epic dud of a TBR Challenge read. Well-written so I kept flipping the pages, a compelling mystery that kept me hooked, but a dumber than a sack full of door knobs heroine. Blah.

Baby, Let It Snow by Beverly Jenkins & Elaine Overton, Contemporary romance anthology, Kimani Romance, 2011, Grade = C

Two holiday short stories featuring characters done wrong, Thanksgiving, family and snow storms. Easy reading, a nice way to spend an afternoon, but neither story lit a fire under me.

Rodeo Daddy by Soraya Lane, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = C+

Kind of a letdown considering how much I enjoyed Lane's first two books for HR. Cowboy hero and single dad moves to New Zealand and falls for a local girl running from her past. The heroine's Big Secret smacked me as "punishment." It got under my skin, and not in a good way.

A Man of His Word by Sarah M. Anderson, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Desire, 2011, Grade = B+

A real gem of a read that I downloaded and plowed through in one afternoon. Hero shows up in South Dakota to help out his not-so-dear uncle, only to fall for the thorn in the man's side - the lawyer heroine. Compelling conflict, interesting characters, a solid three-dimensional read that reminded me of how much I used to love the Desire line.

The Playboy's Gift by Teresa Carpenter, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = DNF

Got halfway through the book and had to stop reading because I was no longer rational. Heroine's brother and sister-in-law die months apart from each other and the hero thinks he's the little girls' Daddy just because he was the frackin' sperm donor. I got to the point where reading was making me angry, so I stopped. Writing style gelled for me, so will likely try this local (for me) author again so long as Biology Above All Else is off the table.

Lemon Drop: Wow, you have issues Auntie Wendy.

Me: That would be what we call stating the obvious my dear. Here's hoping for better things during the final weeks of December.

Lemon Drop: Like Christmas! And presents! And Santa Claus! And presents! You are getting me presents aren't you.....

Me: I love how you automatically made that plural. Yes, I'm getting you presents. And yes, I even had a little help from the Bat Cave community in picking them out. That's how much of a rock star you are.

Lemon Drop: Like there was ever any doubt?

Reminder: TBR Challenge For December

2011-12-16T07:00:00.000-08:00

For those of you participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, December 21.

This month's theme is Holidays. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Valentine's Day - any ol' holiday will fit the bill.

Anywho....remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. The themes aren't as important as digging something (anything!) out of your TBR Pile.

This also marks the end (::sob::) of the 2011 TBR Challenge. I had a great time hosting, and I hope you all had a great time participating and/or following along. But never fear! I'm hosting again in 2012! If you are interested in joining the 2012 TBR Challenge, please check out the information page.

Wanted: Contemporary and Paranormal Fairy Tales

2011-12-14T13:54:00.000-08:00

Yes, yes - it's been a Dead Zone around here for the past week. Chalk it up to Real Life with a healthy dose of Head Cold From Hell mixed in for good measure (and just to keep things lively, Typhoid Wendy gave the plague to My Man).

Obviously taking pity on my lack of blog-fodder, JamiSings (a fairly regular commenter 'round here) sent me an e-mail desperately looking for some book recommendations. She gave me permission to post her query on the blog - so here it is! Here's what she's looking for (and coincidentally, what she's not looking for).

So this all started with a thread on All About Romance - this one actually

It's all discussions of fairy tales we love. Well, it's got me craving some serious fairy tale themed romances. Especially if the fae actually appear in it. Thing is, you know how you're burnt out on Paranormals? Well, right now I'm burnt out on historicals. My recent forays trying to find "plain Jane" and Older Man/Younger Woman romances gave me a lot of historicals. I REALLY want some contemporaries. (Yes, I've read ALL of Karen Marie Monings books, BTW.)

Jami is open to all sorts of fairy tales, but she's sooooo over Cinderella (seriously, girlfriend has exhausted the fairy tale collection at the library - she was telling me about some that I've never even heard of!) By contemporary she's willing to go pretty much anything 20th century and after. She'll make an exception for steampunk, but otherwise she wants to stay the hell away from the 19th century and earlier.

She's looking for books with Sexy Times, but buttsecks is a deal-breaker for her. She's totally cool with Hot Vanilla.

She's open to reading "older" romances (she works at a library, so ILL is always an option for her) - but she doesn't like Rapetastic Bodice Rippers. Also, no YA recommendations (Google's been spitting out lots of YA recs to her.....)

She really wants to read some human/fae books - but given that she's exhausted Karen Marie Moning, she's willing to go with "just fairy tale-ish."

So Bat Cave Dwellers, what have you got? I've been on Paranormal Burn-Out for a while now, and my contemporary reading tends to be stuck in Category Romance Land. Any awesome-sauce single titles out there? Any smokin' fun paranormals? Hit us up in the comment section!

Come One, Come All: The 2012 TBR Challenge!

2011-12-07T14:00:00.000-08:00

Yes folks, it's that time! I had such fun hosting in 2011, that I've decided y'all will half to pry the 2012 TBR Challenge out of my cold dead hands.

Things are going to run the same way they were in 2011. The idea is that once a month you will pull some neglected book out of your To-Be-Read pile, read it, and post your commentary for that book on the 3rd Wednesday of the month. This commentary can be as involved as you want to make it, and can happen anywhere online - including Twitter, Facebook, a message board, GoodReads, your blog etc. We are also, once again, going to have themes for each month. These themes are totally voluntary, and this year I've gone with boarder suggestions, some of which were provided by 2011 participants (thanks guys!).

If you are interested in signing up, please take a look at the 2012 TBR Challenge Information Page (which you can find on my sidebar), and either e-mail me from there, or simply leave me a comment on this post. What I need from you is your first name, and a link to where your commentary will appear. I will then add your home link to the information page so interested people can follow along with the various challengers.

C'mon, you know you want to sign-up! It's fun, it's low-stress, there's no pressure (hey, Real Life happens!), and it's a great way to delude yourself into thinking you're making progress on your book hording "issues."

Not that I would know anything about that last bit....

Random Natterings: Holidays, TV, Adele and Apps

2011-12-02T14:00:00.000-08:00

My #1 piece of advice for newbie bloggers has always been "be consistent." I don't subscribe to the school of thought that says Blog Every Day, instead saying that one should find their own natural rhythm. Mine? On average, around 3 posts a week. But honestly, this "reorg" at work is kicking my ass. Still. Just when I think I've settled in to some normalcy, I slide back a few steps. It's also been hell on my mojo. I've got nothing people. Like, nothing. I'm half-tempted to declare a hiatus because the one and only time I did that? Yeah, blogging inspiration all over the darn place. But yeah - I'm not going to do that. Instead, I'm going to suck it up - which means yep, y'all are getting a random as hell post from me about stuff that I've been thinking about.

Wendy's brain = yes, really this pathetic.

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The older I get the more overwhelmed I feel by the holidays. Honestly, I think that might be attributing to my current lack of blogging inspiration. However, I am making progress! The Christmas tree went up over Thanksgiving weekend, and today I finally sat down in front of the computer and ordered most of the gifts I needed to get.

The last sticking point? Ugh, cards. I haven't done cards the last two years because I suck (oh, and I'm lazy). But this year? I really feel like I should. So I am. Cards have been bought, but do you think I've started on them yet? Ha! It is to laugh.

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Oh happy day, TV has been pure gold for me. First, Beavis and Butthead are back - which means I can start watching MTV again for the first time in like, 15 years. Yes, I know they're juvenile. Yes, I know I have precious few brain cells as is - but I don't care. Epic! It's been epic I tells ya!

Then I found out last week that Justified is coming back on January 17. People, my life is just better with a blue-jean-boot-cowboy-hat-wearin' Timothy Olypant in it. Heck, I think that makes all our lives better.

Dare I say it, could cowboy eye-candy be the meaning of life? OK, maybe just my life....

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I don't get Adele.

At all.

There, I said it.

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I finally broke down and got a real cell phone. No more pay-as-you-go for Wendy! Yep, an actual honest-to-goodness smartphone. With apps! One app I downloaded right away was, well of course, Kindle. I'll be blunt, I'm cheap and in it for the freebies.

So any advice out there from Kindle junkies? Any searching tips for finding those killer deals? Along those lines, any blogs or newsletters that I should think about signing up for?

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In general housekeeping news, I need to get moving on getting the information for the 2012 TBR Challenge posted. Scroll back to the top of this blog post and reread. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it. Hopefully next week. Start wrapping your mind around how much you want to sign on!

Awesome Sauce Harlequin Historical Giveaway!

2011-11-28T07:00:00.000-08:00

I loved this contest/giveaway last year, and I think I love it even more this year!

Once again a handful of authors from the Harlequin Historical family are getting together to sponsor an Advent Calender! From November 29 through December 22, every day a different author will sponsor a giveaway and there will be daily prizes! But the best part? The most awesomest part? At the end of the calender, one lucky entrant on a randomly selected day will win....

A Kindle Fire!

And since we don't know what day that random day will be? The more authors you visit, the more chances you have to win!

Contest calender and details can be found here.

Also, the contest is open to some residents outside of the U.S. (It boils down to if you can get a Kindle shipped to your country!) Further details about eligibility and the nitty-gritty can be found here.

Hello? Is It Me You're Looking For?

2011-11-23T09:53:00.000-08:00

I got the best e-mail from one of my colleagues this morning. She's a big time reader of inspirational historical romance, and has just wrapped up Deeanne Gist's latest, Love On The Line. Some of you might recall I featured this book, about a rural switchboard operator and a Texas Ranger working undercover, in my last Unusual Historicals spotlight.

Guess who else is a character in Love On The Line? Oh, none other than the town librarian. A town librarian who is named after....

Yours truly.

Gist even makes her a "Mrs." - so it's nice to know that my name isn't attached to an Old Maid Spinster Librarian Who Is Two Steps Away From Being A Crazy Cat Lady.

The fictional Queen Librarian Of The Universe is apparently only mentioned a few times in the story, and not a terribly prominent character, but still? Squee!

I was going to read a library copy of this, but damn - now I have to buy the book. Well, actually two copies - since I'm sure My Man's mother is going to want to read it as well.

MVP

2011-11-21T11:12:00.000-08:00

Go on with your bad self JV!

When Being A Romance Reader Gets In The Way

2011-11-20T14:03:00.000-08:00

Nothing gets my goat more than when a book is criticized for not being what it never intended to be in the first place. For example, when I see a mention of a suspense novel where the reader (or reviewer or whomever) says: "The mystery was good, but the hero and his wife are getting a divorce!!!!"

OK, here's the thing cupcake: It's a suspense novel. The author has one job, one requirement they have to meet - and that is solve the suspense thread. Period. End of story. Personal relationships can be left twisting in the breeze. Authors can even kill off beloved secondary characters (readers probably won't like it - but the author can still "do it" without breaking The Genre Code). What the author cannot do? Is not solve the suspense. They have to give readers the whodunit.

The romance genre is a bit different. Yes, you have to have the happy ending - but fans of the genre also despise loose ends, as a general rule. So while mystery/suspense authors can get away with leaving personal character relationships "messy" - romance authors? It's a short leash.

I was a mystery/suspense reader long before I was a romance reader, so I'm pretty good and flipping the genre switches in my brain. When I sit down to read a suspense novel, I expect certain things. When I sit down to read a romance novel, I expect other things. I've always had pride in the fact that I can keep my preferred reading hats in separate boxes in my reading closet.

That is until I read Choke Hold by Christa Faust.

I thought I had bound, gagged the romance reader in me, and locked her in the attic - but apparently not. That sneaky witch somehow managed to slip her bonds, remove her gag and start screaming to beat the band.

Choke Hold is the second crime novel in Faust's series about ex-porn-star, turned vigilante on the run, Angel Dare. Obviously when I read her books I expect 1) dark 2) characters with dubious reputations and 3) lots o' violence and dead bodies. I'm not expecting Sunshine Happy Land. I have to acknowledge the fact that none of the secondary characters are sacred. Angel, being the main character, is probably safe from death - but the others? Yeah, not so much.

However the author makes some choices in this novel that drove my inner romance reader batty. First, there's an unprotected sex scene. This sex scene happens after a break in the action where our fair heroine literally escapes with her life. Adrenaline is surging towards the OMG, We're Still Alive! Let's Celebrate With Hot Sweaty Sexy Times! spectrum. I get that. But the romance reader in me? She sees "unprotected sex" and immediately thinks, "That bitch is going to end up pregnant, I just know it."

Granted the chances of Angel ending up with a bun in the oven strain considerably - but stranger things have happened. All I'm saying is if there's another book in this series down the road, and she's either 1) knocked up or 2) has a baby in tow.....

Wendy Mad, Wendy Smash!

However, that wasn't what bothered me the most. No, in this novel it was the feeling I had that Angel was being exploited.

Yes, yes - I know she's a former porn star. I know me worrying about her being "exploited" sounds ludicrous. I also understand that she makes the choices she makes in this book when her back is literally up against a wall. She doesn't see any other way out.

However, it didn't stop me from feeling like Angel was more reactive than proactive in this book. Hence, exploited.

I have no idea if Faust is going to keep going on with the Angel Dare saga, but even with my misgivings with this book, I still appreciated the fact that we had a gutsy, gory, pulpy crime novel with a female lead. That lead might not have always "behaved" the way I wanted her to - but she was still the star of the show. That is something, especially in a fictional universe where testosterone has always been king.

Now it's your turn - Have you ever read a book that wasn't a romance, wasn't marketed as a romance - but you still couldn't silence your inner screaming romance fangirl?

TBR Challenge 2011: Stupid Girl

2011-11-16T07:00:00.000-08:00

The Book: Officer Down by Theresa Schwegel

The Particulars: Mystery/Suspense, St. Martin's Minotaur, 2005, Out of print but available digitally.

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: First released in hard cover, Officer Down won Schwegel the Edgar Award for Best First Novel. So when it was slated to come out in mass market, her publisher printed up more ARCs for it - which is how I got one when the St. Martin's library rep paid a visit to my office.

The Review: You know why some think women are stupid? Because it turns out, many of us are. No really, we are. That's the formula for this novel, which features a female cop who somehow has not managed to shoot herself with her own gun....yet. Seriously, a duffel bag full of rocks shows more brain power than Samantha "Smack" Mack.

Sam wasn't even supposed to work that night. She was at home, waiting for her married lover to return her phone call. Instead she ends up going into work when the resident hypochondriac cop calls in sick. She's riding around with her ex-partner Fred, when they get a tip from a snitch that a Very Bad Man they've been looking for has resurfaced. They storm into the building, only to walk into a trap. Fred ends up dead, Sam ends up concussed, and those investigating the crime scene chalk it up to "friendly fire." A tragic accident since it was Sam's gun that delivered the fatal bullet.

This is one of those books where the author literally drops you in the middle of everything with very little lead time. It's also a very plot-driven story, and the character development, such as it is, is fed to the reader in drips and drabs. Sort of like quenching your thirst from a leaky faucet. It makes for a very detached reading experience for the majority of the story, which is a neat trick since the thing is written in first person. Feeling "detached" while reading first person takes some doing folks.

But the story is told well, and I kept flipping the pages to find out what happened to Fred, even though Sam is the sort of character I want to throw heavy objects at. I tend to adore self-destructive characters in crime fiction. The more screwed up they are, the more I tend to like them. But Sam isn't just screwed up, no she's also an idiot. Which just makes it hard to give a flying crap about the fact that she's obviously being framed. She runs around like a loose cannon. She won't talk to a shrink. She won't talk to Internal Affairs.

However, she will talk to, and trust, her married lover. Seriously?!?! This girl is so dumb she makes Jessica Simpson look like a Rhodes scholar.

That's ultimately my problem with this book. Sam is just too much of an idiot for me to care about what happens to her. I don't care that someone is framing her, because she's too stupid to see the obvious smacking her in the face. But, like I said, it's a well-told story. It's well-written, I kept flipping the pages, and I had to find out how it was all going to turn out in the end. Even with a heroine that was a few fries short of a Happy Meal.

Final Grade = D+

Delicious Despair, Gone Reading And Epic Caffeine Consumption

2011-11-14T10:35:00.000-08:00

Another day, and another post from yours truly over at Heroes & Heartbreakers. It's another round of Delicious Despair, and ::shock:: it's another historical romance!

This go-around I'm talking about one of my favorites (OK, it IS my favorite) by an author with a backlist a mile long. Here are some hints: 1) It's the final book in a trilogy 2) The entire trilogy opens up in Chicago and 3) This author wrote a boat-load of historicals before jumping ship to the contemporary romance/women's fiction waters.

Head on over to learn the identity of our Mystery Date.

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In other news, I am currently in denial over the holidays. I'm not sure what happened, but I woke up one morning and found out it was the middle of November. Do you think I've done any shopping yet? Do you think I have any frickin' clue what I'm going to buy people? Ha ha! It is to laugh.

But, never fear! If you're in the same boat I am, and have some hardcore readers on your shopping list? Why not check out Gone Reading? There are all sorts of goodies ranging from mugs to t-shirts, all with a bookish theme. Also, in an added bit of coolness, proceeds from items purchased go towards funding/building libraries in under-developed countries.

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As far as my work misadventures, things are starting to settle in. Although it hit me last week, after a meeting with my new supervisor, that he expects me to...well...act like someone who is "in charge." Why? Oh, might have something to do with the fact that I do have a supervisory classification. Hand to God. Color me crazy, but this sort of smacks of the lunatic running the asylum. My previous stint as a library branch manager not withstanding.

So while I think I've managed to uncover a new workflow, at least as far as my collection management duties, now I'm back to fumbling around in the dark like an over-excited teenager. This is going to require a lot more caffeine, I just know it.

Reminder: TBR Challenge For November

2011-11-11T07:23:00.000-08:00

For those of you participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, November 16.

This month's theme is Other Genre Besides Romance. Or as I like to call it, Because Wendy Has Plenty Of Mystery/Suspense In Her Giant TBR Mountain Range That Can Be Seen From Space.

Anywho....remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. If the idea of not reading romance fills your heart with dread, never fear! The themes aren't as important as digging something (anything!) out of your TBR Pile.

It's also never too early to think about joining the TBR Challenge in 2012! More information will be coming in December. In the meantime, if you're new to the challenge and curious on how it works, please see the 2011 information page.

Delicious Despair

2011-11-10T07:26:00.000-08:00

Oh look! Wendy, not being lazy! That's right kids, I have a new post up at Heroes & Heartbreakers. This post is in a series that is run semi-every-so-often over there called Delicious Despair. What is DD?

"Those moments in romance novels where you feel as though your heart is being ripped from your chest. Come suffer the anguish with us!"

Yeah, that's DD. Those moments in a romance novel where even a hard-ass like Wendy will tear up a bit, if not fall into an outright swoon.

Why not head on over and find out what book gets Wendy's DD stamp of approval? Here's are some hints: 1) It won RWA's Golden Heart 2) It's a medieval and 3) The author had a new book out this year, with a different publisher.....

The Month That Was October 2011

2011-11-06T13:20:00.000-08:00

Lemon Drop: Hey there I'm Little Red Riding Hood; I sure am lookin' good; I'm everything a Big Bad Wolf could want....

Not that I want him....

Me: Hmmm, have you met the Big Bad Wolf?

Lemon Drop: Sigh. Yes. His name is Alex. My Mommy is friends with his Mommy. He's sorta kinda maybe cute, but boys are gross Auntie Wendy. Except for Daddy. Oh, and Papaw. But yeah, gross.

Me: A girl after my own heart. I thought boys were pretty gross too, until puberty. Then it sadly went downhill from there.

Lemon Drop: Puberty? What's puberty?

Me: Oh look! It's time to talk about what I read last month! I started off mired in the Reading Slump From Hell, but was able to pull myself together to finish somewhat strongly. The final tally ended up being 6 books.

Flawless by Carrie Lofty - Historical romance, Pocket, Book one in series, 2011, Grade = B+

Heroine and her no-good husband travel to South Africa after she inherits a failing diamond brokerage house from her father. True to form for Lofty - great attention to detail, lots of angst, and a hero who actually grows up over the course of the story.

Dead Shot by Annie Solomon - Romantic suspense, Warner Book, 2007, Grade = D-

My duddy TBR Challenge read for October. Liked the hero quite a bit, but never gelled with the heroine, and was majorly annoyed by the fact that a key part of the suspense (you know, the one the author harped on for the whole blessed book) was left entirely unresolved at the end.

Fast Girls edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel - Erotica anthology, Cleis Press, 2010, Grade = B

Erotica anthology featuring stories about "fast" women. What missed really missed for me, but there were plenty of hits to even it out in the end.

Season for Temptation by Theresa Romain - Historical romance, Zebra, Book one in series, 2011, Grade = C+

A fluffy, cotton-candy of a read perfect for the craziness that is the holiday season. Hero engaged to one sister, finds himself entranced by the other (our heroine). It's not nearly as unsavory as it sounds, trust me.

Blue Angel by Logan Belle - Erotic romance, Kensington, Book one in series, 2011, Grade = C+

Aspiring lawyer heroine burnt out on the law finds her calling when her boyfriend takes her to a local burlesque club. Great world-building and soapy plot, even though I wasn't terrible wild about the characters.

Fallen Angel by Logan Belle - Erotic romance, Kensington, Book two in series, 2011, Grade = C+

Heroine working as paralegal and moonlighting as burlesque performer finds herself reevaluating when she falls under the spell of her hunky lawyer boss. Again, great world-building and soapy plot, mixed in this time with a dominatrix villainess. Unfortunately, I still had issues with the heroine.

Me: Well sweetie, I'm sorry you think Alex is gross - but maybe you could just be friends with him? Boys can make pretty awesome friends.

Lemon Drop: Yeah, not interested. Mommy keeps trying to make me ride in the wagon with him and that's just not going to happen. I'm a star Auntie Wendy! I should have my own wagon!

Me: That sounds kinda lonely though....

Lemon Drop: Hey, wait a second....as a star I do need a chauffeur! Alex can be my chauffeur!

Me: ::headdesk::

Lemon Drop: Baby he can drive my car. Yes I'm gonna be a star....

Me: At least you're singing the Beatles. Sigh.

Here, There, Everywhere

2011-11-04T09:21:00.000-07:00

So, I think it's time we sat down and had The Talk. The one where Wendy discloses why her blogging has been all over the frackin' place the past several weeks. But first....

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I wanted to make sure to point any aspiring writers here at the Bat Cave towards Harlequin's online So You Think You Can Write conference. If you're interested in writing for Harlequin (and, more importantly, keeping Wendy in category romance), this is a great opportunity to hob-nob with editors, get feedback and advice.

The conference runs from November 7 - 11. Be sure to check it out.

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I just got back from a trip home to Michigan. I spent time with the folks, had a fabu dinner out with Big Sis, saw my niece and nephew....neither of whom are Lemon Drop, but still cute as the dickens all the same.

This trip also explains why y'all got a bunch of reviews in the past week or so. I hit a major slump in October, which means Wendy Got Back Logged. Well, being held captive on an airplane where the film was Mr. Popper's Penguins (::shudder::) - pretty much meant Wendy did nothing but read. I had two books finished before I even landed in Michigan, and finished a third while I was home. 3 books, in 5 days. That's not a personal best for me, but pretty dang close.

Still, I need to get some reviews to Sybil soon or she's going to take out my knee-caps. My category romance back-log on the Sony Reader has hit Epic OMG! levels.

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So why the slump and why the spotty blogging? Well, for those of you who have been following my work-related misadventures, the "reorg" is in full swing. I was transferred to one of our larger branch libraries on October 22. I worked three whole days and then took a week off for my Michigan trip. Which means I'm still trying to find my groove.

I'm the type of person who pretty much kicks ass in a rut. Oh, how I lurve me a rut. Right now, my rut has been back-filled and I've been given a teaspoon to dig a New Rut. Which is a trick, because I still have my responsibilities from My Old Job (you know, the kick ass Wendy Helps Maintain Adult Fiction For 30-Some Libraries one) plus new responsibilities for The Modified Job (public service at the branch - which entails reference work, programming, collection management, the general business of running said branch etc.).

In a nutshell, I'm two people now.

On the bright side, everybody has been really great - and patient with me while I flail about like a half-dead fish. I'm at a library with a great staff, it's a community I'm familiar with, I just haven't quite figured out My New Normal yet. I do need to get my stuff together though, because much more of this and I suspect people will begin to lose patience with me.

But it's tough for me, because I feel like I'm half-assing just about everything right now, which naturally spills over into my blogging and reading. Sigh, I'll figure it out. Eventually. I mean, I always do. In the meantime though, it's going to be bumpy around here....

Wants It All Mama's Fallen Angel

2011-10-31T09:30:00.000-07:00

Fallen Angel by Logan Belle is the second book in her Club Burlesque series that follows the exploits of former aspiring lawyer, turned burlesque performer, Mallory Dale. The issues I had with the first book, Blue Angel, are the exact same issues I had with this book. Which tells me two things: 1) the author is consistent and 2) I am a hopeless sucker for a soap opera.

As much as Mallory Dale loves performing at the burlesque club, Blue Angel, it doesn't pay the bills. Especially in New York City. So she lands herself a day job as a paralegal, working for a divorce lawyer. Besides being inappropriately attracted to her boss, she has other problems on the home front. Her boyfriend, Alec, loves pushing sexual boundaries with her, and Mallory gets the feeling that he wants them to hook up with the newest performer at the club, Violet Offender. Violet is a dominatrix, is more into stripping than burlesque, has major ambition - oh, and she wants Mallory. Like, bad. Really bad. Naturally complications abound.

What follows is Mallory and Alec hitting the skids, Violet manipulating things behind the scenes to get what she wants, Bette Noir rolling back into town, and Mallory exploring her attraction with her sexy boss. It's soapy, it's sudsy, and it's compulsively readable for it's "OMG, what is going to happen next?!" factor.

My issue is basically with Mallory. She's one of those females that obviously hasn't heard the expression "What's good for the goose is good for the gander." She gets insanely jealous and angry with Alec if he so much as looks at another woman - but it's apparently OK for her to have some hot girl-on-girl action. I mean, golly - why is he so upset with her?

Oh, I don't know - could it be the whole you're an unfaithful hypocritical slut thing?

Just a guess.

Sigh.

Now in her defense, she did display this behavior in the last book - so I shouldn't have been surprised. And I really wasn't. The bigger sin here is that she's the sort of female who is easily manipulated. She went through all of the last book debating on what she wanted, what she wanted to do - and she ended up dumping the idea of being a lawyer and went burlesque. But in this book? When her hunky boss suggests that she'd be a "good lawyer" - she makes moves to dump burlesque and head back to law. I mean, seriously?! Make a choice and stick with it cupcake. Be who you are and own it. If the man doesn't like that? Well, maybe the door won't smack him too hard in the butt on his way out.

Now, all that being said, Belle continues to excel at delivering on her world-building. Yeah, I'm hooked now. She's created the club, created the culture, and populated it with secondary characters who keep the whole thing chugging along. She also delivers us a villain in the form of Violet, who sure as shootin' is going to play a sizable role in the next book, Naked Angel.

So I'm pretty much left at the same bus stop I was at when I finished the last book. I still can't really wrap my loving arms around Mallory, but like Shakespeare said, the play's the thing. Er, or the burlesque stage. Er, or more like it, the plot. Belle's got me sucked in with her plot. So yeah, I might want to smack Mallory upside the head - but that doesn't mean I don't care. I do.

Now, what happens next? And what do you mean I have to wait until the end of March 2012 to find out? Ugh.

Final Grade = C+

Show Me How You Burlesque

2011-10-28T12:00:00.000-07:00

When I was at RWA this summer, living it up as Librarian of the Year (maybe you heard about that?) one of the publisher signings I went to was for Kensington. Logan Belle was there signing copies of Blue Angel. I hadn't heard of this book, didn't know a darn thing about it in fact, but I took one look at that cover and had to have it. Never underestimate the power of a good book cover.

Mallory Dale burns the candle at both ends working for a prestigious law firm in Manhattan. It's what she's always wanted, and with two lawyer parents, she figured it was her destiny to practice law. Unfortunately, her first round with the bar exam has left her down for the count. She's still working insane hours, she's still stung by the fact that she failed the bar first go-around, and now her journalist boyfriend is dragging her into a burlesque club for her 25th birthday. She is not amused, but decides to suck it up to please Alec. What she gets is a sexual awakening and identity shift for herself.

It's while she's at the club that night that she meets the headliner, Bette Noir. Bette is a girl with big ambitions, and when she sees Alec with his boss (a trust fund baby who runs a men's magazine), she sees it as her way to the top. And to get what she wants? She's going to sink her claws into Mallory, who may look like a mousy little thing, but is up for some adventures, in and out of the bedroom.

This is a book that starts out in one direction, and then takes a sharp U-turn. Alec comes off as a major dill-hole in the early chapters. Besides dragging Mallory around to further his career, he's pressuring her to have a three-some, which she is extremely hesitant about. When Bette enters into the picture, it sends things topsy-turvy. Bette is fame-hungry and will do just about anything to become a "somebody." So she starts to manipulate Mallory to further her own ambitions.

But then, something happens - the story shifts. Mallory starts hanging out with Bette, blowing off her job, getting entranced by burlesque, and not being remotely truthful with Alec. Gosh, she just doesn't understand why he's so upset. I mean, she's only doing a complete 180, and then when they have a fight she runs over to Bette's for a sympathetic ear that quickly turns into something else. Even though I started out really disliking him, for the bulk of the second half, I kinda thought Alec had a point, and Mallory comes off like a hypocritical rhymes with witch.

What we have here is a good old-fashioned sudsy soap opera plot with some naughty times tossed in the mix. The downside to that is that I really didn't care about the characters. Mallory is a hypocrite, Alec is a jerk, and Bette's greatest ambition in life is to be a Kardashian sister (::shudder::). Now that said, soap opera plots work because they're....soapy. You keep reading just to see what will happen next. Oh, and to get to the steaminess, which is well-done here. The author doesn't make the mistake of skimping on plot, keeps it moving forward, and doesn't get derailed by padding her story with sexual encounters (although have no fear pervs, there's still plenty to go around).

What this book has is good world-building, which no should never just be limited to science fiction, fantasy and paranormal. The author creates this whole world inside the Blue Angel club. She populates it with secondary characters that operate on the fringe of the story, and ultimately work to push Mallory towards her awakening. It's good stuff.

What I'm left with is an enjoyable "world," a soap opera plot that makes my Melrose Place lovin' heart go squee!, but characters that I had a hard time wrapping my arms around. However it is a page-turner, and I've already started the second book in the Mallory Dale saga, Fallen Angel.

Final Grade = C+

It's So Fluffy!

2011-10-27T08:55:00.000-07:00

I think it's fairly well documented how much I loathe love triangles. It's the sort of plot trope where none of the characters come out looking good, which is why I generally avoid it like the plague. So why exactly did I sign up to review Season For Temptation, Theresa Romain's debut Regency about a hero torn between two sisters? She asked, and caught me with an open mind. I have to say, while I had issues, this might be one of my quickest reads on record. And given that I've been mired in a reading slump for over a month? Yeah, that's kinda a big deal.

Julia Herrington is very close to her stepsister, Louisa, so she is very excited when Louisa returns from her first London Season engaged! To a Viscount no less! For a country-raised girl this is quite a coup. Now the Viscount is coming for a visit, the house is in a tizzy, and Julia manages to step in it rather promptly. With a habit of running off at the mouth, and running after her younger half-siblings, Julia manages to stumble in on James, that is Viscount Matheson, who has arrived early. And is standing in their drawing room. And drat it all, but he's the most captivating man she's ever laid eyes on. Uh, and he's engaged to her sister.

James feels like he's been hit by a whirlwind when he meets his future sister-in-law, Julia. She's so bubbly, and full of life, and probably the most interesting woman he's ever met. She's forthright, refreshing, and his fiance's sister. What was her name again? Oh yeah, Louisa. Dear, sensible, intelligent, poised Louisa. A wee bit of a step down in his social standing, but just the ticket to gloss over a rather nasty scandal his older sister unwittingly became embroiled in when her useless husband died. Yes, yes - Louisa. So why can't he stop thinking about Julia?

As unsavory as this probably sounds (and it did to me), the author writes the story in such a bubbly, frothy way that even hard-line love-triangle haters will be charmed. It helps that the author goes the sensible route with Louisa. Yes, she's engaged to the Viscount, but one gets the impression very, very early on in the story that there are doubts there. It's not like she's upstairs in her bedroom scribbling Louisa, Viscountess Matheson over and over again in her Trapper Keeper. Also while there are immediate sparks between Julia and James, there is quite a bit of tap-dancing going on. In other words, he's not debauching her in the broom closet in Chapter 3.

This is the sort of cotton-candy concoction that's perfect for the holiday season. Julia's family is full of eccentric personalities. James isn't easily overwhelmed. There's lots of banter flying around. It's not exactly a deep read, the conflict being a bit thin in spots, but it is the sort of book where I easily flipped the pages and lost myself for a few hours.

Unfortunately, it did lose some traction for me towards the end. Namely, when Julia and James consummate their relationship. After all the fluffiness, the sex just seemed jarring. Also, the fall-out of said naughty times really strains the seams considerably. Julia's mother's reaction to the deflowering is jar-dropping, and is the sort of anachronism that would send several historical romance readers I know into a swoon. (Plus, Mommy Dearest tells Julia a story where the lesson seems to be "It's OK to trap men into marriage to get what you want" O_o) That said, it does push the romance forward, and the resolution to the love triangle is wrapped up well.

In the end, this was a quick read for me that found me at the right time. After spending all of October in the Reading Slump From Hell, I inhaled this book in one sitting. It was sweetness and light just when I needed it most. It's not the sort of book that I clutched to my chest and sighed over after I finished the last page, but it kept me engrossed and entertained during the time we spent together. Imagine what a better world this would be if we could all say that about our exes?

Final Grade = C+

Faster Pussycat

2011-10-25T13:38:00.000-07:00

The folks at Cleis Press were pleased enough with my review for their anthology Obsessed: Erotic Romance for Women that they asked if I wanted to review any of their other offerings. One title that jumped out at me was Fast Girls: Erotic Stories by Women, once again edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel. One of the appeals of erotica, for me, is that when it's written by and for women, the heroines are in charge of their own sexual identities. Even in this day and age, the idea that a woman can be in control of her sexuality, derive pleasure from it, no matter what her personal kinks may be, is rather subversive. So an anthology about "fast girls" going after what they want? Yeah, sign me up.

With 20 stories and the collection only clocking in at 192 pages, all of these are rather brief reads - some of which hit the spot, and others that left me feeling decidedly uncomfortable, and not really in a good way.

Temptation by Kayla Perrin is about a recently-divorced heroine who gets her groove back with the studly young college student who does her lawn work. Yeah, do I need to say anything more? Not complex by any means, but it sizzles all the same. Grade = B

Waxing Eloquent by Donna George Storey finds the heroine house-sitting in L.A. for her brother when she spies on the sexy actor neighbor next door. Wanting an "L.A. experience," the heroine then hits the local salon to get....uh, waxed. Guess what happens next? A heroine breaking away and a hero willing to show her a good time. Grade = B

Five-Minute Porn Star by Jacqueline Applebee is a seriously fun story. A broken leg has made hubby surly and an argument erupts with his wife, our heroine. To teach him a lesson, she decides to vamp it up for him, cheesy soft-core porn star style. I love it when erotica is playful and fun - because life is too short to take sex all that seriously. Loved this one. Grade = B+

Winter, Summer by Tristan Taormino was a story that confused me. The heroine is in Provincetown looking for a little hot girl on girl action. And naturally, she finds it. Granted I don't read a ton of f/f erotica, but the way the author writes this, right down to the inclusion of a certain bodily fluid functions just confused me. Did our heroine hook up with a chick? Transgender, post-op or otherwise? A dude? What? Color me dense, but I don't get it. Also, the more of BDSM I read the more I realize it's not my bag baby. Grade = D

Playing the Market by Angela Capterton is a story that made me uncomfortable. The heroine has just lost her shirt on Wall Street and needs rent money. So why not pick up a guy at a bar and uh, exchange services? I'm an Erotica As Fantasy girl, so "no condoms" usually don't bother me - but whoa doggie, it bothered me here. A lot. Especially given the threesome and the way the story ends. Bonus points for the ending, which was clever, but I hope the heroine stocks up at the local drugstore from now on. Grade = B-

Panther by Suzanne V. Slate I just found silly. The heroine checks out a local art exhibit where she gets turned on my sculpture of a panther. Boyfriend shows up, shenanigans ensue. Seriously, she gets turned on by looking at a panther? Of course I don't like shapeshifter books either, so there you go. Grade = D

Communal by Saskia Walker excels at writing sexy shorts, and this story is more proof of that. College student overhears two dorm mates getting nasty in the communal shower. Uh, which turns her on. So she starts enjoying some "alone time" in said shower, only to have someone overhear her, and join the party. Again, playful and fun - I'm sold. Grade = B+

Fireworks by Lolita Lopez finds two newlyweds sneaking away from a July 4th party to make some fireworks of their own. A married couple enjoying themselves? The hubby is a cowboy? Sign me up. Grade = B

Flash! by Andrea Dale finds our paparazzi heroine taking a break from a location shoot with a fellow photographer. Naturally, cameras are involved. Normally cameras in erotica make me squeamish (thank you Internet), but somehow having two photographers in the mix made it OK for me. Go figure. Grade = B

Waiting for Beethoven by Susie Hara is another cougar story. Older heroine who writes erotica gets her groove thang on with younger coworker, a piano player. This one was OK. Mostly I had issues with the "tell-y" style in the early goings and then I wasn't entirely sure these two people were really "comfortable" with each other. Grade = C

Confessions of a Kinky Shopaholic by Jennifer Peters finds our heroine visiting a newly opened sex toy shop, and running her purchases past a guy she meets on the bus. Again, no condom makes me squirky - but again, a clever ending. Grade = B-

Let's Dance by D.L. King should be filed under "Wow, totally not my thing," but it certainly fits the bill of "fast girls." Heroine picks up college boy at bar, takes him back to her place where they get into some kinky suspension play. Again, clever ending - even if it relies heavily on coincidence. Grade = B

That Girl by Cherry Bomb is a confessional piece, with the heroine detailing some of what she has done and why. It's certainly different, and a bit out of the box. I liked it because it was really quick, and felt like an intermission. Grade = B-

Oz by Isabelle Gray is another story that I just didn't quite "get" - although I sorta see what the author was shooting for. Another confessional style piece, the author evokes the Wizard Of Oz (Home, Wicked, Yellow Brick Road etc.) for the heroine spew forth various fantasies. Meh. Grade = C

Married Life by Charlotte Stein features another married couple, this time an unsatisfied wife who stumbles across her restrained hubby's dirty little secret. Naturally, shenanigans ensue. I'm a sucker for dominant heroines, and that's partly what we have here. Mostly though we have a heroine who is so dang frustrated she's just not going to take matters lying down anymore. Preach it sister! Grade = B

Princess by Elizabeth Coldwell finds our heroine getting a nice surprise on her birthday from her coworkers - the kind of surprise where you get blind-folded and taken for a ride. This is a story where the reader needs to let go and roll with the fantasy, because in Real Life? Yeah, sexual harassment lawsuit waiting to happen. Grade = B

Chasing Danger by Kristina Wright is another Roll With The Fantasy-style story. Cop heroine and her hunky partner find themselves chasing after a car thief - uh, a car thief that the heroine had a fling with during her younger, more reckless days. If you're a stickler for how law enforcement is portrayed in fiction? Yeah, just skip this story altogether. Your blood pressure will thank me. But if you're shallow (like me) and just in it for the hotness + uniform? Yeah. I mean, in Real Life this chick would get her butt fired (or sued) so fast her head would spin, but again - fantasy. Grade = B-

Whore Complex by Rachel Kramer Bussel is a story that didn't work for me on any level. The heroine plays whore for her man, when he escalates the game by literally passing her off to other partners. Certainly the whore fantasy has played itself out in other stories in this anthology, but here I didn't feel like the heroine was in control at all. More like she was under the thumb of the "hero" and had an extremely unhealthy attachment to him. It really, really didn't work for me, and made me want to take her to the nearest therapist. Grade = D-

Lessons, Slow and Painful by Tess Danesi is a story that starts off well enough, but then takes me to a place I just didn't want to go. Heroine invites boyfriend over for dinner. When he shows up he discovers her hastily sharpening a knife. Shenanigans ensue. OK, there is a knife in this story and there is blood involved. Yeah, no thanks. Grade = D

Speed Bump by Tenille Brown is a story that started a little rocky, but picked up steam for me. Heroine who likes fast motorcycles, a fast life, and has no desire to be tied down, finds her bartender boyfriend going soft after a heart attack has him reevaluating his lifestyle. A 40+ year old heroine (not something you see every day) who I felt lacked sympathy for the guy she'd been banging for 8 years. But, naturally, she comes around in the end. Slowing down doesn't necessarily mean Death To Fun. Grade = B-

Even though I had a strong negative reaction to four of these stories, there were definitely more hits than misses for me. Also, while all fiction certainly relies somewhat on "personal taste," that's nowhere more prevalent than in erotica. What flips one reader's switch may leave someone else cold. One thing that I know readers feel strongly about is condom usage. I can normally roll without The Condom Moment, but the lack of safe sex in a couple of these stories really bothered me, and if you're a reader that needs that condom mention? Yeah, safe sex is spotty at best in this collection. I would also mention that while most of these stories do end on an upbeat note, outside of the stories featuring married couples, it would strain to classify any of these as strict "erotic romance."

At the end of the day, this was a really strong collection, and great fun to read. Certainly I didn't care for everything offered at the buffet, but it was a pleasurably dining experience nonetheless.

Overall Grade = B

The Month That Was September 2011

2011-10-20T11:00:00.000-07:00

Me: Hey, hey there's Lemon Drop! Wow, that's some dress kiddo.

Lemon Drop: Do you like it Auntie Wendy? Mommy says I look positively "retro" - whatever the heck that means....

Me: Yeah, they made sofas with that print 40 years ago.

Lemon Drop: Don't hate the player, hate the game Auntie Wendy. Mommy says it looks like something Auntie Big Sis wore back when she was a wee lil' wiener. A magical, mythical time known as.....1970s.

Me: ::shudder:: Well now that we've gone back in time through fashion history, how about I tell you about what I read last month? I did alright, with 8 books read.

Title links will take you to full reviews.

Locked And Loaded by HelenKay Dimon - Romantic suspense, Harlequin Intrigue, 2011, Grade = B

Book 4 in the Mystery Men series. A harder-edged heroine partnered with a sexy computer geek hero. Swoon. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Geek Hero, Heroine On The Run, Returning Happy Couples From Previous Books

The Big Guns by HelenKay Dimon - Romantic suspense, Harlequin Intrigue, 2011, Grade = B+

Final book in the Mystery Men series. I love the strong, silent, brooding Alpha-style heroes, and we get one here. A heroine who is slow to trust, but who isn't brain-dead about it. Also, really enjoyed the way the author wrapped up the overarching suspense that carried through all five books in the series. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Personal Assistant Heroine, Brooding Hero, Returning Happy Couples From Previous Books

Unlacing the Lady In Waiting by Amanda McCabe - Digital historical romance short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2011, Grade = C

Hero and heroine reunited years later after their betrothal is broken. The heavy emphasis on Insta-Lurve really kept me from buying into the romance. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Arranged Marriage, Broken Engagement!, One Politically Minded Papa, Hero With Revenge In His Heart

How a Cowboy Stole Her Heart by Donna Alward - Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B-

Breast cancer survivor heroine returns home to family ranch and must confront her feelings for their neighbor - her brother's BFF and her childhood crush. Emotionally draining read with plenty of angst. Stubborn as mud characters though, so readers have to be patient and ride them out. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Unrequited Crush, Friends To Lovers, Hero Haunted By His Past, Cancer Survivor Heroine

The Dragon and the Pearl by Jeannie Lin - Historical romance, Harlequin Historical, 2011, Grade = C+

Feared warlord with epic reputation arrives on the heroine's doorstep, a former consort to the dead Emperor, after he learns from an anonymous tip that she's in mortal danger. Excellent use of 8th century China back-drop, but that also manifests itself in slow-to-trust characters. Also, while there is a happy ending, reader is left with feeling that it won't be all sunshine and rainbows. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Political Unrest, Big Secret, Warrior Hero, Heroine With A Past

Girl in the Beaded Mask by Amanda McCabe - Digital historical romance short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2011, Grade = B-

Adventurous heroine attends masquerade party to put the moves on her dead brother's BFF, just returned from World War I. Great use of 1920s setting, although I wanted "more" about the heroine's family. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Free Spirit Heroine, Wounded Hero, Unrequited Crush, One Dead Brother, Masquerade!

The Earl Takes a Lover by Georgia E. Jones - Digital historical erotica short story, Spice Briefs, 2011, Grade = D

Heroine with scandalous past has affair with rake hero. Plenty of sexy sizzle, but didn't buy in to heroine's back-story and there is zero resolution to the conflict at hand. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Heroine With A Past, Rake Hero, Wrong Side Of The Tracks

Princess Forever by Meg Cabot - Young Adult, HarperTeen, 2009, Grade = B+

My TBR Challenge read for the month. Final book in the author's Princess Diaries series. Mia finds herself fretting about high school graduation, the prom, what college she should go to, and the fact that her ex-boyfriend is back in town. A bit padded, but a good read and an excellent way to end the series.

Lemon Drop: So you're not a big fan of the 70s Auntie Wendy? How about if Mommy dressed me in fashions from the 1980s?

Me: Oh yeah, just what we need to revisit. Neon, day-glo color, jelly shoes, and leg warmers. I can't believe I'm saying this - but stick with the 70s.

Lemon Drop: You forgot about leather jackets with fringe on them.

Me: ::shudder:: Oh yes, thanks for reminding me dear.

TBR Challenge 2011: Men Like The Hot Head Cases

2011-10-19T06:00:00.000-07:00

The Book: Dead Shot by Annie Solomon

The Particulars: Romantic suspense, Warner Books, 2007, Out of Print but available digitally

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR: I read a previous book by Solomon and enjoyed it. The description of this one intrigued, so I picked it up. Pretty sure I bought it new at Borders (RIP), but who can remember for sure now?

Danger, danger, thar be spoilers ahoy!

The Review: Romantic suspense is a sub genre I really want to love, but I'll admit I'm a harsh critic. A big reason for this is that I cut my reading teeth on mystery/suspense. I'm one of those rare romance readers who gets annoyed when the romance gets in the way of the suspense. With Dead Shot the suspense was interesting, the romance was somewhat promising, but standing in the way? The heroine. Oh, and the ending. But more on that in a bit.

Poor little rich girl Gillian Gray came home one day to find her supermodel mother dead on their kitchen floor. Brutally raped and murdered. School-age Gillian eventually went to live with her cold-fish grandparents, got shipped off to boarding school, and ultimately turned to photography as an outlet for her rage. She specializes in self-portraits. Ones where she concocts crime scenes and then dolls herself up as a murder victim. Her mission is not only to provoke the establishment, but also her mother's killer - who was never caught. She's telling the guy "come and get me." However seems their wires got crossed, because the bad guy isn't coming after her. Oh no. He's killing innocent women and using their corpses to recreate Gillian's photographs.

Ray Pearce is an ex-cop who now works for a security company. He has plans to shake off the dust of Nashville for parts unknown, but his personal baggage keeps holding him back. His boss is hired to work security at the art gallery where Gillian's photos are on display and after there is an "incident" - her grandfather hires him to look after Gillian personally. To keep her safe. The problem being that Gillian has a death wish.

What we have is one of those books where I spent the whole time thinking, "Yeah, but what does he see in her?" Ray's an interesting guy - with an ex-wife, an ex-brother-in-law who is still a cop, and an ex-father-in-law, also a ex-cop, who is suffering from dementia. He's a guy with believable baggage. A nice guy. A guy who wants to do the right thing. Will you marry me Ray?

The problem here is Gillian. Now, technically speaking, just because some whack-a-do is using her photographs in his killing spree doesn't make it "her fault." However, the fact that these poor dead innocent bystanders barely register a blip on her radar is. Also, I can deal with her being reckless and stupid - but when her reckless stupidness starts putting innocents in danger? Yeah, it's hard to feel sorry for the poor little rich girl, even if her Mommy was murdered, and even if she resorted to cutting herself before she discovered photography as a healthy outlet. Sorry, not buying.

However, I was rolling with it. Solomon can write, the pages flipped easily, and since I'm currently slogging my way out of a reading slump, that cannot be overstated. Then I get to the ending.

Uh, what ending?

We never find out who murdered Gillian's Mommy. And since the author makes this out to be a big, honkin' hairy deal for the entire blessed book? Yeah, no resolution to this = bad. Now, I know what you're thinking: "But Wendy....real life is often very messy. We don't always get resolution. We don't always have the answers." To which I say? "This is genre fiction, not real life." You know why people read genre fiction? We like resolution. We like answers. We like things being neat and tidy at the end. And since Gillian's every waking moment is haunted by Mommy's murder? To not get a resolution to that is well....crap. The author does some tap-dancing, hoping to show the reader that Gillian has now confronted "her own demons" and that justice is done by the fresh murder victims - but yeah, not for Mommy. You can't make a big deal out of this and then not give me any resolution to it. It makes me cranky.

So we have one hot mess of a romance featuring a nice guy getting sucked into the orbit of a head case, and a vital chunk of what passes for the suspense in this story not being resolved. At all. Gee, and now I'm at the end of the review and I didn't even mention the strong emphasis on Gillian's waifish petiteness, Ray's annoying pet name for her ("Short Stack" ::shudder::), and the heavy handed use of the Rescue Fantasy trope (never a huge favorite of mine). Yeah, none of this worked for me. At all. But it was readable - hence not DNF'ing it. And if nothing else? It's out of the TBR now.

Final Grade = D-

Sidenote: If you're wondering about the title of this blog post - I was chatting with My Man about this book and he asked, "Is she hot?" To which I said, "It's romance novel, of course the heroine is hot." His reply: "Some men can't say no to hot head cases." No truer words have ever been spoken. Oh Ray. Why Ray? Why?! Why her?!

Looking Ahead: TBR Challenge 2012

2011-10-18T09:41:00.000-07:00

It dawned on me recently that it's almost the last week of October. And since the last thing I want to think about right now are the holidays (I'll keep my head in the sand, thankyouverymuch) - I thought now would be a good time to look ahead to the TBR Challenge 2012.

Yes, I'm going to host again. Mostly because it keeps me honest and forces me to scale the mountain range at least once a month. I like to delude myself that I'm actually making progress climbing that mountain by reading at least 12 books a year off of it. Ha!

One thing I'm contemplating are the monthly themes. I know some of you love them, and others of you find them too restricting - even though I always say they are totally optional. ~~So, on that score, I've set up a poll at the top of my left hand sidebar (feed readers, if you want to vote, you're going to have to physically click on over to my blog!).~~

ETA: Well, forget the poll. Looks like only people with Blogger accounts could use it, and even then it wasn't working correctly for me. So please vote yea or nay on themes in the comments section of this post.

Also, while we're at it - in the event that y'all want me to hang on to the themes, I'm now open for suggestions on some potential ones you'd like to see for 2012. Just drop your ideas in the comments section of this post. I'll consider each and every one of them - picking my favorites to add to the rotation.

Even if you didn't participate in this year's challenge, I still encourage you to vote. It really is lots of fun, and at least for me, I get that little zing of accomplishment every month. Please consider signing up for the challenge in 2012. Gory details and a chance to sign on will happen sometime mid-December-ish.

Reminder: TBR Challenge For October

2011-10-14T08:24:00.000-07:00

For those of you participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, October 19.

This month's theme is Paranormal or Romantic Suspense. Because, you know, it's October. Like Halloween and all. Hey, I never said I had imagination. Anywho....remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. If you don't wanna go with woo-woo or romantic suspense, or there's nothing lying around in your TBR that fits, please go off the beaten path. The themes aren't as important as digging something (anything!) out of your TBR Pile.

It's also never too late to sign-up. If you are interested in doing so, or just want to learn more about the challenge, please see the information page.

Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend

2011-10-12T17:00:00.000-07:00

It's a joy and wonder when, as the reader, you hit upon a historical romance that not only utilizes history, but does so for the betterment of the romance. Carrie Lofty has been able to excel at this, in particular with her last several books which have all been set during the 19th century. With Flawless, the first book in the Christie series, the author mixes a delicious cocktail of emotional payback, colonial South Africa, the grit of the diamond trade, and a marriage in trouble like no other.

Lady Vivienne Bancroft is the adopted daughter of Sir William Christie, a tycoon who has finally met his maker. She and her three siblings have gathered for the reading of their father's will, only to get a very rude surprise. Seems the old man had one final trick up his sleeve, leaving a failing business to each of his children. The task? They have one year to turn the business around. If they do? A million dollars is their reward. If they do not? They get nothing. Vivienne inherits a failing diamond brokerage house in South Africa. She needs the reward, not only for security reasons, but to fix up her lovely brownstone in New York City. She did not plan on her useless excuse of a husband to muck up the works.

Miles Durham, Viscount Bancroft, married Vivienne for a reason that's as old as time. He's got a title but is broke. Her family has buckets of money and wants a title. However, neither Viv nor Miles planned on the attraction that sizzled between them. But Viv ultimately could not deal with his reprobate ways, and left him. They're literally separated by the expanse of the Atlantic ocean. Miles' pride takes a serious hit, but when he hears the terms of the old man's will? Yeah, all bets are off.

There's really no way to sugar-coat this, so I'll just come out and say it: Miles is an asshole. Having been born into a life of privilege, he finds the confines stifling. His answer? Be as useless as humanly possible. Gamble, drink, debauch etc. His marriage to Vivienne doesn't change his behavior. Oh sure, he loves seducing his wife. Getting her to throw aside all her proper decorum and give into the passion, but he's still going to gamble, drink, debauch etc. It's only after she leaves that he realizes he must have her again, to teach her a lesson. The lesson being that while she might want to hide behind proper, there's no denying what her true nature is - that of a passionate woman.

For her part, Viv craves respectability. She demands it. It means security. It means safety. She's tackles London society like a military operation. However being with Miles, with his reprobate ways, scares the hell out of her. With one glance, with one twitch of his finger, he can undo it all. Everything that she craves. Everything she yearns for. Safety. And safety is something that she desires so much, that she'll run away to another continent. Staying with Miles would mean going down with a ship destined to sink.

What I adore about Lofty's historicals is that she works with the history, not against it. Her heroines have worries and concerns that feel legitimate to what women may have wanted, in real life, during these time periods. She also takes the restrictions women faced and weaves it into the story. Once Miles and Viv strike up their bargain, they know that to turn the brokerage house around they'll have to work together. As a mere woman, she needs Miles. He can go places, say things, she cannot. And Miles needs Viv, because frankly, she's smart. She's a head for business.

For a good chunk of this book, I found the act of reading it exhausting. Naturally, given the back-story, our couple does have a bit of an adversarial relationship in the early going. Couple that with a heavy dose of mental lusting, and it takes readers for quite the roller coaster ride. What ultimately worked for me was watching these two people come to terms with each other. Miles, for lack of a better expression, finds a purpose. A reason for being. Honestly, he grows up. And Vivienne learns that she can trust her husband. That he is capable of being the man that she needs him to be. In the end, these two deserve each other, and in a good way.

When talking personal opinion, I think Lofty has written better stories - but that's me splitting hairs. She does so much right with her historicals. It's like she has a portal that will take her back to whatever time and space she wants to spin stories from. Certainly the history of South Africa isn't entirely romantic (some would argue not at all) - but here she strikes the right balance. She gives us the grim, but infuses it with the possibilities that any good romance should have. It's a very good start to what promises to be a very intriguing series.

Final Grade = B+

Disclosure, Transparency, and Blogger Jealousy

2011-10-11T13:24:00.000-07:00

Largely stay off the Internet for the weekend, and look what happens? Kerfuffles break out! Now, my usual policy on kerfuffles is that just because they happen, doesn't mean you have to comment on every single one. Honestly, I've been around long enough to know that 99.9% of these dust-ups are all things I've seen before (ad nauseum) with only the targets changing. But every once in a while something comes along that Auntie Wendy wants to comment on, and I think that my almost 9-years of blogging (yes, 9!) on top of my 12 years of reviewing romance novels online gives me a certain perspective.

While I was offline, some drama erupted over Smart Bitch Sarah being affiliated with a consulting company. Said consulting company represents a number of OMG BIG NAME authors and when this relationship came to light, Sarah's objectivity was called into question. I'll direct you over to her blog to get the general run-down.

Looking at the history of the online romance community, you have to understand the place where we used to be. Back in the Dark Ages, unless you were Harriet Klausner, you were the enemy. One thing I love about attending the annual RWA conference is catching up with the ladies that now run All About Romance. When I see those gals it's like a bunch of old veterans sitting around telling war stories. Back in those early days, The Romance Reader and AAR were "the enemy." Many authors did not like these sites. At all. We were accused of being unqualified hacks (to this day I'm not sure what makes a "qualified" book reviewer) or frustrated wannabe writers who were jealous of someone else's success.

All this sounds vaguely familiar doesn't it?

Over time, the longer both TRR and AAR hung around, opinions softened. One part of this was that many "new writers" were getting published who had "grown up" with both TRR and AAR. Both sites had become part of the fabric of the romance genre landscape. Also, and this can't be discounted, was that there were new targets to attack - bloggers. TRR and AAR were no longer "the devil." Dear Author and Smart Bitches were "the new devil."

For a long time, bloggers were sort of operating out in the Wild West, doing our own thing. Honestly, that's ultimately why I stopped reviewing for TRR and began focusing all my energy on my own blog. I love those ladies at TRR like chocolate cake, but I wanted to do my own thing. So, I did. Other bloggers started doing their own thing, and publishing took notice.

Now, part of the reason publishing took notice is because it's a tough business to be in. Bloggers were (and still are IMHO) seen as a "word of mouth" resource. Authors began to see that the "At The Back Fence" mentality that AAR had cultivated so many years before, was spilling out into the blogosphere. With the advent of social media? That's a lot publicity potential - you can't fault publishers and authors wanting to tap into that. You also can't fault many bloggers for this - I mean, we love books. We're whores for books. If we weren't whores for books, we wouldn't be blogging about books.

Of course this has all meant the waters have gotten murky. Where did Sarah go wrong? Why did this kerfuffle break out? My rule? Disclose early and disclose often. I don't think there's anything "wrong" with Sarah having a stake in this consulting company. I also don't think it's wrong for her to write books, promote the genre, her blog, and herself. She's putting in the work, so I say good for her. I don't have insight into Sarah's day-to-day existence, but I have a hard time believing she's had the success she's had simply handed to her on a silver platter while she's doing nothing more than eating bon-bons, rockin' a feather boa, while reclining on a chaise lounge.

Listen, I'm not sure anybody noticed - but I know that I'm an adult. If I think Sarah is disingenious, has a conflict of interest, or whatever, guess what? I'm not going to "listen" to her. I might even make the choice to ::gasp:: not read her blog. Just because it's "out there" doesn't mean anyone is holding a gun to my head to make me "do" anything. Otherwise? I'd be reading all those paranormal romances some of you love so much even though I'm burnt out on them like crazy-sauce. The blogger's job, first and foremost, is to give the review reader enough information so that they can make their own decision. If you aren't giving me that, I'm not going to waste my time on you. If I do get that, and yet I discover that the path the you're consistently steering me torwards is one I'm not wild about? Yeah, maybe we should "just be friends."

Does her not disclosing this relationship immediately alter my opinion of Sarah in any way? Not really. Look, I'm not sure if you've all noticed - but the relationship between readers, authors, bloggers and publishing is changing rapidly. Sometimes on a daily basis. And because it's changing rapidly, I think we, as bloggers, need to acknowledge something that is rarely spoken about.

Yes, I'm talking jealousy.

Any blogger who claims it doesn't exist is walking around with their pants on fire. Just as authors can get jealous of other authors - so can bloggers be jealous of other bloggers.

Let's use me as an example. I have been blogging since 2003. Which makes me positively ancient. And yet when you think of "major romance novel blogs" - do I immediately come to mind? Uh, that would be no. Most people are going to immediatley say "Dear Author" and/or "Smart Bitches." Does this irritate me? That my almost 9 years of not having a life and blogging does not immediately leap into every online romance reader's consciousness when they're asked about "major blogs."

No.

And I'll tell you why: the people behind Dear Author and Smart Bitches have worked really hard. I sorta, kinda do some work around the Bat Cave - but nothing like those ladies do. And you know what? I don't want to work that hard. I just don't. I want my blog to be what I want it to be. Which it is. Some of you like that, and some of you don't. Which is cool. Blogging is a lot like books. There is literally something out there for every reader. And if there isn't? Hey, why not start your own blog? Why not add your own voice to the mix?

So yeah, at the end of the day my take on this is be a grown-up and make-up your own mind. I've met Sarah in person, I know she adores the genre, but I'll be honest - Sarah ain't going to tell me what to think or what to do. Ever. I know it's easy to forget sometimes, what with the fact that trolls exist, but you know what? We're grown-ups people. Really, truly - we are. And we all have our own minds. Own yours. Be yourself. Like free will, it's pretty damn sexy.

Sorry All You Non-Baseball Fans....

2011-10-07T07:48:00.000-07:00

I'm not done talking baseball yet for this season.

Justin Verlander and Don Kelly - basking in the bromance.

Apparently the Tigers feel it's their duty, their right, their lot in life even, to keep shaving years off my life. Thanks boys.

Next stop....Texas!

Baseball, State of Health, Hunky Librarians, and Mojo

2011-10-05T10:23:00.000-07:00

I have lots of little stuff floating around in my wee lil' Super Librarian brain at the moment, and none of it is really suited for me to drag out into a full-length blog post. You know what that means, right? We're going to kick it round-up style! And away we go.....

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I'm finding that watching my Tigers in the post-season is a nerve-wracking experience, and probably isn't doing too much for my current state of health. Last night's beat-down by the Yankees would have had me running towards the closest bottle, except I suspect drinking alcohol right now would not aid my cause of "feeling better" and I would have spent the next 24 hours in the fetal position. Cooler heads prevailed. Game 5 is on Thursday, which means if you're sick of hearing me talk about baseball - well it could all be over soon. At least until Spring Training at any rate.

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For those following my various whinings about "not feeling good" - I went to the doctor this week and had some blood work drawn. If that comes back normal, then I find myself dealing with a "stress" and "food" related issue. Which means Wendy needs to behave herself. And in my experience, behaving ones self is highly overrated. The good news is that my doctor did give me a prescription for something that should help (I took said drug in college - which was the last time my symptoms were of this nature), and then I did the mature, responsible thing that any self-aware, confident 30-something woman should always do.

I called my Mommy.

And wouldn't you know it? Mom made me feel better.

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One thing you hardly ever see on this blog is the blatant objectifying of men. Well, unless they're cowboys. Then all bets are off. And even then I tend to go with men wearing clothes - what with this being a safe to sneak a peak at work or in front of your kidlets blog. One thing that's hardly ever done? I mean, like ever?

The blatant objectifying of male librarians. Why should actors, models, athletes and cowboys have all the fun?

Answering the call, 12 male librarians have posed for the Men Of The Stacks 2012 calender! There's even some nekkidity, with strategically covered naughty bits, of course! So girls, let your inner geek flag fly (If you're a male librarian and take offense to that - suck it up cupcake. All librarians are geeks. Own it. Revel in it.).

All proceeds from the calender are going to the It Gets Better Project.

Oh, and laughing man is Mr. February. I picked him because 1) he has his clothes on and 2) I love guys with a sense of humor.

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In blog related news - Amazon and California have called a truce (at least for the time being) and I am once again an Amazon Associate. I link accordingly to items on Amazon not only on this blog, but also on my Upcoming Historicals wiki. See the Bat Cave Disclaimer page for more than you probably ever wanted to know about the inner workings of this blog and my other dealings in Cyber-Romancelandia.

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Finally, I have lost my reading mojo. I seem to have misplaced it somewhere. Should you run across it, I appreciate it if you would return it. I'm still considering if I'll offer a reward.....

Sex, Gossip And Rock & Roll

2011-10-04T07:00:00.000-07:00

As much as I love category romance, I have historically had a terrible time navigating the Harlequin Presents waters. I can roll with dippy titles (this line featured some doozies for the longest time), it was the over-the-top back cover blurbs that tended to keep me away. And when I'm not talking auto-buy authors? I pick all my category romance reads based off of back cover copy.

These days I normally choose my HP reads from reviews I read, but in this case, I snapped up Sex, Gossip And Rock & Roll because I've enjoyed books that Nicola Marsh has written for the Harlequin Romance line. This story had it's moments, but it didn't work as well for me as those previous HR books.

Charli Chambers works for big time Australian music producer, Hector Landry. Her current mission is to re-launch the career of aging rocker, Storm Varth. The plan is to take him out on tour to smaller venues, build up some buzz, cap it off with a big show in Melbourne, and hopefully get his butt back in the studio. However, this is proving to be complicated. Storm wants to bring his young son along with him - which means Charli needs to come up with some kid-friendly diversions to entertain the lad. Then there's the small matter of Luca Petrelli. He is Hector's bastard grandson, and the boss has declared that Luca will be overseeing money matters on the tour. With his notorious playboy reputation, plus the fact that Luca and Hector are not close - Charli smells a rat. She's sure she's going to get stuck with some lazy Lothario who is only along for the ride to take advantage of her kindly boss. Naturally, her less-than-stellar opinion of him is confirmed when she goes to pick him up, and he answers his door wearing nothing but a towel and a smile.

The set-up and early chapters of this story are vintage HP. You have immediate Insta-Lust between hero and heroine - both of whom are thinking of burning up the sheets together even if they can barely tolerate each other. You have a hero who is charming and slick on the surface, but underneath is vulnerable and a bit wounded. Then you've got a heroine who is trying to navigate the choppy waters left in his wake, while trying to keep her panties firmly in place (yeah, good luck with that cupcake).

This was a second-half read for me. The first few chapters were a bit rocky, with some lumpy writing, and the repetitive use of some words (seriously, if I never read "fortnight" again....). But once the set-up is out of the way, and our motley band of characters are on the road, things begin to pick up steam.

What I initially really liked about this particular book is that the heroine is just as commitment-phobic as the hero. She's no Little Miss Innocent trying to protect her virtue from the Big Bad Virile Alpha Stud. That said, when you have two characters, both of whom have leftover childhood baggage? It can make for a tricky read. It's really easy to slip over that edge where the reader stops being sympathetic and starts screaming, "Oh get over it already!" And some of that happens here. Namely because both Luca and Charlie are fairly self-aware people. They both acknowledge the fact that their screwed up childhoods have rendered them gun-shy. But for two people who are so seemingly self-aware, they both show a surprising lack of motivation to "get past it," "move on," and "get over it." Smart on one hand, dense on the other. It made for a frustrating read because on one hand they "owned" their foibles, but on the other they chose to not do a damn thing about them.

Still, there were some pleasant moments in this story, and I read through it rather quickly. I liked that on one hand Storm Varth is just the sort of aging rock star you would expect, but on the other he adores his son, and is a pretty decent father. I liked that Charli had a little bit of a harder edge, and I liked that there was a lot of sexy banter flying around. It wasn't perfect, but there were moments nonetheless. Enough moments that the author is still on my HP radar.

Final Grade = C+

No More Drama

2011-10-03T07:00:00.000-07:00

Never has the old adage that you can't choose your family been more apt than it is in Gwynne Forster's Breaking The Ties That Bind, her latest women's fiction novel.

Kendra Richards is in her early-30s, working a dead-end job as a coat check girl in a swanky restaurant, trying to save enough money to get back to Howard University and finish her degree. However just as she starts to get her head above water, and squirrel away a little money in the bank, her useless mother turns up looking for a handout. Ginny is a narcissistic barracuda with worse morals than an alley cat. Kendra has finally reached her limit, and very early on in the book begins to sever ties with her.

Enter into the picture Sam Hughes, a professor at George Washington University. He was a regular customer at the restaurant where Kendra worked, and she always admired him from afar, but it's not until she gets a job at a local radio station that they meet in person. Sparks, immediately, fly. But Sam has been burned before, and Kendra is just now getting her life together. Adding in Ginny's continued shenanigans, and do these two have any hope of building a solid, drama-free, life together?

One thing I think librarians lose sight of sometimes is that there is a market, and a reader, for just about everything in the adult fiction universe. And trust me, there's a market for this book. It has a lot of the earmarks that have made other books, and authors, quite successful over the years. Here you have a young woman, Kendra, from a humble background, pulling herself up by her boot-straps, and making something of her life. Standing in her way is her mother, Ginny, who keeps coming around to create problems, even after Kendra stops enabling her. Readers like it (heck, I like it!) when the downtrodden character is able to break-free from the baggage holding them back and "win" in the end.

However, while Forster is a good storyteller, that's actually the problem with this tale. There's too much "telling." We never really get to dig deep inside the characters. I felt like I was only getting a surface look at them. As much as I did sympathize with Kendra's predicament, I never truly bled for her. I never ached for her. I never felt that urge to cheer when she succeeded in something. I was also hindered by some of the dialogue which, in some instances, sounded stilted and forced. Like the characters were reciting a passage instead of speaking naturally.

While not, technically, marketed as a romance, the arrival of Sam on the scene does provide one. This never registered above "OK" for me - mostly because the attraction is very immediate, and has an almost "love at first sight" kind of vibe to it. It was something I could roll with here, until towards the end when I wanted to smack Sam so hard that he'd swallow his teeth. On one hand, you do have Ginny mucking up the works, but on the other, you have Kendra who is so polar-opposite from her mama that Sam should have caught a clue.

So where does that leave us? Stuck in the middle. There's a decent story here, and I turned the pages easily. However, I gotta be honest, a big reason I kept flipping those pages was to keep reading The Ginny Train Wreck. I actually looked forward to the moments when she appeared on page. The other characters? Yeah, not so much. They never seemed entirely natural to me, and there was a hint of preachiness to some of them that grated. So I'm left with villainous Ginny, who I found oddly hypnotic, and the appeal of the theme at large - of breaking free, letting go, and finding your own self. It was one of those pick and choose kind of reads....

Final Grade = C-

The Greek Tycoon's Librarian

2011-09-29T08:34:00.000-07:00

Setting the stage, I haven't been feeling well since we got back from New York. In fact, I came home from work early yesterday and called in sick today. I am not a fun sick person to be around. Yes, I'm one of those. A whiny patient.

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Late at night, My Man lounging in bed, Wendy the Super Librarian doing her nightly ablutions in between praying for death (seriously, do not feel good....)

My Man: You can't make me go back (talking about work).

Me: Well, you can't make me go back (Did I mention that I act like a 2-year-old when I don't feel well?)

My Man: You have to go back. You "chose."

(OK, yeah, I chose to go to college to become a librarian - but seriously, I feel like crap right now).

Me: I should have chosen a Greek tycoon.

My Man: Yeah, what were you thinking? Going for broke and Irish. But do you really think a man like that (a workaholic tycoon) would be capable of giving you a loving relationship?

Me: Love is highly overrated.

My Man: Oh really? Please. You'd be an emotional wreck if you were in a relationship like that.

Me: I'd just keep you on the side. Mikos could support us both!

My Man: Mikos?! Where the hell do you come up with this stuff?

::pause::

What are you reading right now?

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For the record, I am not reading a Harlequin Presents right now. Also, in the harsh light of a new day I realize that I really don't want a Greek tycoon named Mikos. If Harlequin has taught me anything, it's that if you're with a Greek tycoon it's usually because he's 1) blackmailing you to get revenge on your family 2) you're his secretary and after years of ignoring your mousy looks he's finally got the hots for you now that your BFF has given you a make-over 3) you had a hot one-night-stand with him, ended up pregnant, and even though you want to give birth to a bouncing secret baby, he finds out the bun in the oven has his name all over it or 4) you tell him about the baby, he doesn't believe you, and accuses you of being a money-grubbing whore - but he keeps you around "just in case." Great guy that he is.

Or, let's be honest here, it could be a variation on all four of those. In which case, oy vei!

My life is already too full and rich to add that kind of drama to it. Plus, even at 100% healthy I'm not sure I'm capable of handling all that. Seriously, those romance heroines are made of some stern stuff.

Unusual Historical Spotlight: Diamonds, Telephones, The Terror, A Bounty Hunter, and Gambling

2011-09-26T16:00:00.000-07:00

Flawless by Carrie Lofty

What You Need To Know: Publication date September 27, 2011; First book in series

Description:

A passion this seductive is more precious than diamonds. . . .

Sir William Christie, ruthless tycoon and notorious ladies' man, is dead. Now his four grown children have gathered for the reading of his will. What lies in store for half-siblings Vivienne, Alexander, and twins Gareth and Gwyneth? Stunning challenges that will test their fortitude across a royal empire...and lead them to the marvelously passionate adventures of their lives.

Lady Vivienne Bancroft fled England for New York, hoping to shed the confines of her arranged marriage to unrepentant rogue Miles Durham, Viscount Bancroft--though she never forgot the fiery desire he unleashed with his slightest touch. And when the gambling man arrives on her doorstep for a little sensual revenge for her desertion, he is met with Vivienne's dilemma: she must earn her father's inheritance by profitably running a diamond business worth millions in colonial South Africa.

Swept together in an exotic undertaking filled with heated passion and hungry temptation, will Vivienne and Miles discover that the marriage vows they once made are the greatest snare--or the most treasured reward?

What Makes It Unusual: South Africa baby!

Love on the Line by Deeanne Gist

What You Need To Know: Publication date October 1, 2011; Inspirational (my past experience with this author is that she doesn't beat readers over the head with "the God stick" - but I can't speak for this particular title yet).

Description:

Rural switchboard operator Georgie Gail is proud of her independence in a man's world ... which makes it twice as vexing when the telephone company sends a man to look over her shoulder.

Dashing Luke Palmer is more than he appears though. He's a Texas Ranger working undercover to infiltrate a notorious gang of train robbers. Repairing telephones and tangling with this tempestuous woman is the last thing he wants to do. But when his stakeout puts Georgie in peril, he realizes more than his job is on the line.

What Makes It Unusual: ZOMG - a Texas Ranger undercover and a switchboard-workin' heroine!

Love's Charade by Jane Feather

What You Need To Know: Publication date October 4, 2011; Reprint

Description:

A LADY REVEALED
The Earl of Linton had never been prone to sentiment. Only boredom could have led him to rescue Danny, a filthy street urchin, from the clutches of a drunken brawler. Once rescued, however, the spirited ragamuffin proved a handful even for the usually unflappable nobleman. Not only did a simple bath require force, but the squirming brat imprisoned in his arms turned out to be a winsome young lady--and a strangely familiar one at that...

A HEART DISGUISED

Danielle was grateful for the Earl's timely intervention, but not for his arrogance and bruising strength. She had fended for herself quite well until now, against dangers more far-reaching than anyone imagined. That she had won the Earl's considerable protection only made it more vital that she keep her wits about her--and never give in to the quickening of her heartbeat every time his deceptively lazy eyes bore into hers...

What Makes It Unusual: Set in Paris on the eve of the French Revolution.

Night Hawk by Beverly Jenkins

What You Need To Know: Publication date October 25, 2011

Description:

Outlaw. Preacher. Night Hawk. He’s had many names, but he can’t escape the past.

Since Ian Vance’s beloved wife was murdered years ago, the hardened bounty hunter knows he’ll never feel love or tenderness again, so he’s made it his mission to ensure others get their justice. But when he’s charged with delivering a sharp-eyed beauty to the law, Ian can’t help but feel he may still have something left to lose.

Orphaned at twelve, Maggie Freeman has always found her way out of trouble. But now there’s a vigilante mob at her back who would like nothing more than to see her hang for a crime she didn’t commit. Maggie may have to accept help for the first time in her life . . . even if it’s from the one man standing between her and freedom.

As the past closes in, the sassy prisoner and toughened lawman may just find a passion between them that could bring blinding happiness . . . if they’ll let it.

What Makes It Unusual: Western baby! Western! YeeHaw!

Fortune's Son by Emery Lee

What You Need To Know: Publication date November 1, 2011

Description:

Love is the ultimate gamble…

Seasoned gambler Philip Drake knows every trick and uses most of them. After years of infamy, he’s ready to accept the mantle of respectability with his earldom— until a devastating racing loss and the threat of debtors’ prison force Philip right back into his gaming ways…

Susannah, Lady Messingham, is a woman with a past who refuses to belong to any man again. But Philip’s skill catches her eye and she persuades him to teach her how to win at the tables. Their new partnership turns into an exhilarating high-stakes game that entangles them in terrifying risk and unimaginable rewards....

What Makes It Unusual: Georgian-era England (oh, and the gambling thing....)

This is just a small sampling of upcoming and recently released titles. Have you read any promising unusual historicals of late?

The Month That Was August 2011

2011-09-23T11:06:00.000-07:00

Lemon Drop: Auntie Wendy, you're finally here! I was beginning to think you forgot all about me this month.

Me: I know sweetie. Your Auntie Wendy has had kind of a crazy month. We had to fly across the country for Uncle My Man's sister's wedding, and then there's work, and then there's getting caught up.....::sigh::

Lemon Drop: Ooooh, a wedding! Rubber chicken, cheesey line dancing, but cake! Pretty dresses! And champagne! Which I hear is pretty tasty even if Mommy says I'm not allowed to try it until I'm 45.

Me: Yeah, that about covers it. Although honestly, the food was quite tasty. Anywho, how about we catch you up on what I read last month? There's a little something for every romance reader on this list - everything from very naughty to very nice.

Title links will take you to full reviews.

Obsessed: Erotic Romance For Women edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel - Erotic anthology, Cleis Press, 2011, Grade = B

A super quick anthology of erotic short stories. The "romance" label is kind of a stretch in some cases, but all stories do end on a positive note. Solid stuff, with only one real dud in the bunch for me.

Marrying Miss Marshal by Lacey Williams - Inspirational historical western romance, Love Inspired Historical, 2011, Grade = B

A really solid debut novel about a widowed heroine who finds herself being named town marshal in late 19th century Wyoming. A well-told story featuring interesting characters against a well-done western back-drop. Also, very light on The God Stuff. Worth a look for inspirational and western fans alike. Says me. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Private Detective Hero, Widowed Heroine, One Murdered Ex, One Dead Woman Who Still Haunts Hero

Beyond Desire by Thea Devine - Historical romance, Zebra, 1993, Grade = C

I went for Guilty Pleasure for last month's TBR Challenge. Vintage Devine, right down to the writing quirks, Sexy Times, Jerkface Hero and a sneaky heroine who knows a thing or two about keeping secrets.

Pampered To Death by Laura Levine - Cozy mystery, Kensington, 2011, Grade = C (sorry, no full review)

Latest entry in one of my favorite cozy mystery series. Jaine Austen (no relation) gets gifted with a visit to a "posh" local spa, only to find herself in Fat Camp Hell. Sadly, this one fell flat for me. All of the humor revolved around Jaine's deprivation from junk food and the spa's terrible healthy menu. After a while enough was enough and I'm beginning to suspect that Jaine has an eating disorder. This makes me sad, because I really love this series. Oh well, better luck next time.

How to Lasso A Cowboy by Christine Wenger - Contemporary romance, Harlequin Special Edition, 2011, Grade = D-

A major dud of a read that features some of my favorite tropes. A heroine with Split Personality Disorder, along with a hero and secondary character who are card-carrying morons. Blah. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Friends To Lovers, Rodeo Star Hero, One Protective Older Brother, One Kidlet

The Heart Of A Hero by Barbara Wallace - Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B+

Heroine moves into run-down family summer home to lick her wounds after divorce. Her neighbor, our hero, is the PTSD-suffering war veteran who just wants to be left alone, but finds himself sucked into her orbit when she hires him as a handyman. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Wounded Military Hero, Heroine Done Wrong, One Slimy Ex, One Cute Doggy

Taking Her Boss by Alegra Verde - Contemporary erotic digital short story, Spice Briefs, 2011, Grade = B-

Personal assistant heroine enters into affair with her boss who likes to be dominated. Intriguing story with some dicey elements. I'm hoping it's the first entry in an on-going saga.... Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Domme Heroine, Submissive Hero, Office Shenanigans

To Touch The Knight by Lindsey Townsend - Medieval historical romance, Zebra, 2011, Grade = C

Masquerading heroine finds her past coming back to haunt her when she runs up against the knight hero competing in a local tournament. A slower paced story featuring characters with truth-telling and trust issues.

Breaking the Ties That Bind by Gwynne Forster - Contemporary women's fiction, Kensington, 2011, Grade = C- (review is forthcoming)

Story of a young woman with big dreams who is constantly held back by her demanding, screw-up of a mother. I found a lot of the main characters a bit too goody-goody, but got sucked in by The Mean Mama. Whoa doggie, is that woman ever a serious piece of work.

Gunning For Trouble by HelenKay Dimon - Romantic suspense, Harlequin Intrigue, Part of series, 2011, Grade = B-

Medical guy for a supah-secret quasi-government organization finds himself face-to-face with the heroine, his former lover and boss. Uh, the boss who fired him from his last job. And did I mention there are hired goons trying to kill her? Solid story, action-packed, but lots o' bickering. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Hero Done Wrong, Heroine In Peril, Conspiracy!, Series-Baitin' Hotties

Lemon Drop: Wow, that's some serious reading Auntie Wendy. No wonder you've been neglecting me. Mind you, not that you're totally off the hook yet. You can't keep me waiting this long. And for that matter, you can't keep The Lemon Drop Fan Club waiting until the end of the month. It's cruel. Truly.

Me: I suppose I'm to change the name of this blog to The Misadventures of Lemon Drop's Press Secretary?

Lemon Drop: Hey, now you're talking!

Me: ::headdesk::

TBR Challenge 2011: Princess Forever

2011-09-21T07:30:00.000-07:00

The Book: Princess Forever by Meg Cabot

The Particulars: Contemporary Young Adult, final book in series (#10), 2009, in print

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: I read very little YA (good Lord, not enough hours in the day!) but I have been hooked on this series from the beginning (for the record: nothing like the Disney movies). When Lil' Sis moved to California....oh 2 years ago - she bought a copy of this to read on the plane and promptly gave it to me to read. Uh, which I've done. Finally. Two years later. Seriously, I suck.

The Review: So for those of you who know nothing about this series, it follows seemingly average New York City teenager, Mia Thermopolis, who one day, during her freshman year of high school, finds out her dad is a prince to a tiny (fictional) European country. Thereby, making her a princess. This 10th, and final book, in the series takes place on the cusp of Mia's high school graduation. She's worried about finals, the extravagant 18th birthday party her grandmother is planning for her, oh, and the fact that her boyfriend of two-years, J.P.Reynolds-Abernathy IV, hasn't asked her to prom yet.

On top of all this, her Dad is having problems back in Genovia (uh, which are sort of Mia's doing) and her ex-boyfriend, Michael Moscovitz, is back in New York after two years in Japan, where he has been working on a robotic surgical arm that has now made him a gazillionaire. The problem? Mia is still hung-up on Michael, even as she's trying to convince herself that she HAS a boyfriend. A boyfriend who loves her. He does, doesn't he?

When I first heard that this was going to be the last book in the series, I was a little bereft. There have been highs (the first four books) and lows (the less said about Party Princess the better), but it's been a lovely, charming series that has featured many laugh-out-loud moments. However after reading this book, I've realized that Meg Cabot is way smarter than I am. She made the right choice ending this series now. She really has. Part of the reason is that what made Mia charming as a teenager (she's what I call Teenage Dense, but in a sweet way), could get annoying in anyone over the age of 18. So best to wrap up the series now, give Mia her happy ending, and let those fond memories carry readers off into the sunset.

Speaking of happy endings, I also think this was Cabot's way of writing a love letter to the romance genre. It's actually very sweet. For her senior project, Mia has been telling everyone that she's writing a thesis on Genovian olive oil presses. In actuality? She wrote a 400 page romance novel (which Cabot got published, Ransom of My Heart). She's hidden this fact from everyone, even her BFF, Tina Hakim-Baba, who is obsessed with all things romance. Seriously, I love Tina. LOVE HER! Anywho, this book also details Mia's attempts to get her book published, and the reaction of people around her when they found out she ::gasp:: wrote a romance novel.

While I did feel at times that this book was a bit padded (it clocks in at almost 400 pages), it's a lovely send off to a series that I've really enjoyed. It ends the way I (and I suspect many fans) want it to end. It leaves me with the feeling that even if she is only 18, that Mia is going to be alright. She's gotten her happy ending, and even if she will always be a little clueless, she'll always continue to make the right decisions and choices in the end.

Final Grade = B+

The Dragon And The Pearl

2011-09-20T06:00:00.000-07:00

OK, so I never have gotten around to reading Jeannie Lin's debut novel, Butterfly Swords. Despite the fact that I was really excited about it. Despite the fact that I have the darn thing loaded on my e-reader as I type this. I tend to suck like that.

However, this bit of slacking on my part (story of my life!), did not deter me from reading her second book, The Dragon And The Pearl - a follow-up to Butterfly Swords. The good news is that this book stands alone very well. The bad news? I really wanted to love it, and that didn't quite happen.

Ling Suyin is the former Emperor's consort. Her beauty is legendary, with her name being known far and wide - however that notoriety offers little protection. When the Emperor dies, she flees to a small home by the river, which is where the feared warlord, Li Tao, finds her. She thinks he's her executioner. While Li Tao does show up on her doorstep with abduction in mind, it is with the goal of protecting her. He's gotten word that she is in danger, and that it would be in his best interests to make sure no harm comes to her.

This story is set in 8th century China, a time period that I would wager more than a few romance readers aren't terribly familiar with. The author excels at painting her back-drop, and evoking a setting that even the most unfamiliar of readers will feel "at home" in. This is a very uncertain time period in Chinese history, with civil unrest looming, and the threat of war on the horizon. Li Tao wants to keep the peace, but his way of doing so is seen as treasonous by the Emperor. These uncertain times lead to characters who aren't immediately transparent to each other. Frankly, secrets were a means of staying alive, as well as getting yourself killed. Naturally both hero and heroine have their secrets, and trust is not an easy commodity to come by. Trusting the wrong person could very well get you killed.

For this reason, this story works better for me as "historical fiction" more so than "historical romance." I understood why these characters kept secrets from each other. I understood why they weren't totally honest and open with each other for a long stretch of time - but that said, I still have that niggle in the back of my brain. That niggle that says, "Will they ever totally trust each other?" That's how uncertain the historical back-drop of the story left me, and how well the author paints the obstacles that these two people will have to overcome. Those niggling doubts over the trust issue ultimately left me wondering, "Yeah, but do they truly love each other?" Sure there's passion and the sex is hot - but is that enough?

The story hums along at a leisurely clip until the ending, which seemed rather rushed to me. The author literally has a lot to wrap up, and some of the developments later on in the story made my head swim. There's also the small matter that I'm not sure how "resolved" the conflict truly is. For readers who like everything neat, tidy, puppy dogs and rainbows at the end? You're not going to get that with this book. You just aren't. The time period is too unsettled. So unless the author were to completely throw out the historical baby with the historical bath water? This couple isn't skipping off into the bamboo forest together holding hands while happy pandas dance around them. Does it end "happily?" Yes. Our couple is together. But will there continue to be obstacles on the horizon? Most assuredly.

This all being said, this is a well-written and well-told story. I fell right into it. Even with being as unfamiliar as I am with this era of Chinese history, the author does an excellent job of evoking the setting, while avoiding spoon-feeding or info-dumping. The love scenes are well-done, and the author (thank the good Lord!) avoids the laughable purple prose that I've seen crop up in other books featuring Asian characters (in other words, no "jade stalk"). I liked that Ling was, in some respects, a jaded personality - given as she spent much of her young life surviving palace intrigue. I also liked how Li Tao was this mix of villain and hero - stuck with navigating a political nightmare while keeping those around him safe. Falling in love with Ling brings more complications, even if he doesn't want to admit, at first, that what he feels for her is love.

I'm torn when it comes to grading this book. I'm going to slap it with a C, given my reservations about the romance and the rushed ending. But if I'm honest, which I usually am, this wasn't an average C read for me. It's better than that, but not enough for me to entirely overlook those issues I did have. Certainly it's always up to the review reader to decide, but my gut tells me that if you're looking for a "different" historical? This one isn't a bad way to go.

Final Grade = C+

Sidenote: Kudos to the Harlequin art department. A cover that actually "fits" the story, right down to the tattoo.

Impeccable Timing As Always

2011-09-17T16:07:00.000-07:00

Preach it Papa Grande, preach it!

Yes, the hiatus is over. The reason for said hiatus is because My Man's baby sister got married last weekend, and we spent the entire week in New York. Whenever I mention that we're visiting the in-laws in "New York," I generally clarify it with "not New York City." People who don't "know" New York seem to think it's all "the City." Um, no. I was in the country. Farm country. And when I wasn't looking at a corn field, I was hiding out in the woods. To give you some idea of the rustic nature of this trip - My Man's parents don't have cable TV. Not because they don't want it - because literally cable TV isn't available for them. They haven't run cable up to their "neighborhood."

Yes, these places apparently do still exist on Earth.

Needless to say, that also meant no Internet. Hey, no problem. Sure I got the shakes by Monday, but I also got quite a bit of reading done (reviews forthcoming). My Sony Reader is jammed, I've over-extended myself (again) - surely I can live without the Internet and cable TV for a few measly days. Right? Right?

Now since this is generally a romance novel related blog - I'm sure you're all wondering about the wedding. Yes, it was lovely. Yes, My Man's sister looked beautiful and she married a really nice guy. Yes, when she shared a dance with her big brother (My Man), I was a total sap and cried. There, I said it.

Blah, blah, blah.

But lest we think Wendy has totally run off the rails, let us remember that I blog because It's All About Me. And what happened while I was away - with no Internet binky and no cable TV? Yeah....

My Detroit Tigers went on a 12-game winning streak!

None of the games were televised (I was in Yankee country, although a small rogue band of Blue Jays fans lurks in the area), no highlights on the Internet or even ESPN. None. All I had were box scores in the local paper! ARGHHHHH! Seriously, it was like being thrust back to....the 1970s. ::shudder:: Before cable TV. Before ESPN. Before the Internet. ARGHHHHHH!

Now this might not seem like a big deal to...oh, normal people. But the last time my Tigers won 12 games in a row? Yeah, 1934. And what has my team done during the second half over the last several years? Yeah, swoon. They've sucked so bad in the second half that in 2006 they coughed up the AL Central Division title and went to the playoffs as the wild card. And I can't even think about 2009 when we had to play a flippin' tie-breaker game only to lose to the Twins in extra innings.

On the bright side, they're playing in Oakland this weekend, which means - late games. Which means, once our plane landed and we ran the gauntlet of Friday evening rush hour traffic, I got to watch them clinch the AL Central Division (Playoffs baby! Playoffs!). I also got to watch my curmudgeonly old goat of a manager cry on TV. Which is about when I stopped watching the celebration. Seriously, grown men crying. Harder for me to take than watching My Man dance with his baby sister at her wedding.....

Reminder: TBR Challenge For September 2011

2011-09-16T07:00:00.000-07:00

For those of you participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, September 21.

This month's theme is Series Catch-up. In other words, a book that is part of a series that you are "behind on." This should be an easy one, since every flippin' book is part of a series these days. That being said, remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. If you've hit series overload, or there's nothing lying around in your TBR that fits (ha!), please go off the beaten path. The themes aren't as important as digging something (anything!) out of your TBR Pile.

It's also not too late to sign-up. If you are interested in doing so, or just want to learn more about the challenge, please see the information page.

Temporary Hiatus Time

2011-09-08T11:05:00.000-07:00

I know this blog hasn't exactly been a hotbed of scintillating fodder of late, mostly because I seem to have misplaced my blogging mojo. Hey, it's alright. It'll come back. One thing I've learned in the past 8 years of blogging (besides the fact that I have no life), is that if you hang on by your fingernails, sooner or later the mojo shall return!

Normally a hiatus would not be a welcome thing for me, but the timing seems halfway decent for once. Maybe once I get done dealing with The Terror, Ye Olde Mojo will have returned with a vengeance?

What is this Terror of which I speak? Two words that will surely strike fear in even the most pure of souls. Two words that leave mild-mannered librarians longing for sanctuary, and superhero alter-egos quaking in their thigh-high boots. Two words that haunt little children in their sleep and have burly football linemen crying uncle.

I am, of course, talking about a.....

Family wedding.

Am I the only one who thinks elopements are highly underrated? Just sayin'.

But anywho, with all the various goo-ga going on - I'll be unplugging for the week. We'll resume with, hopefully, our regular mojo-rific activities next Friday....with a TBR Challenge Reminder post. Consider yourselves warned.

The Heart Of A Hero

2011-09-06T07:00:00.000-07:00

Not every book I read is a winner, but sometimes there's enough on the page to entice me to add an author to my "try again" list. Earlier this year I reviewed Beauty And The Brooding Boss by Barbara Wallace over at The Good, The Bad And The Unread. I had a mixed reaction. I had my issues with it, but it wasn't an outright stinker. So when I was approached about reviewing the author's next book, The Heart of a Hero - I jumped all over it. I'm glad I did.

Zoe Hamilton has moved into her family's rundown island cottage off the coast of Massachusetts to get over a nasty divorce. She learned the hard way that her wannabe golf pro ex was only interested in her money. A syndicated advice columnist, to say Zoe's doubting her judgment is an understatement. The tiny island community holds fond childhood memories for her, so escaping there seems the perfect solution. Well, until she meets her surly next door neighbor at any rate.

Jake Meyers is ex-military and has hidden himself away on the island out of guilt. Suffering from combat trauma and PTSD, living in a cottage next to a rental property was the ideal situation for him. Vacationers tend to offer a wave and a smile, and then leave you the heck alone. So having Zoe and her obnoxious dachshund next door (why won't that dog stay in his own freakin' yard?), is not welcome at all. But dang it all if she doesn't worm her way under his skin. Especially when she comes sniffing around looking for a handyman, and wouldn't you know he's the only one (literally) on the island?

There were so many elements to this story that really worked for me. Admittedly, I'm a sucker for a wounded hero, and Jake's trauma leapt off the page for me. I know PTSD ex-military heroes aren't exactly rare in Romance Novel Land, but what I really liked here is that the author doesn't give the reader pat solutions to Jake's issues. In other words, the love of a good woman does not miraculously "cure" him. Meeting Zoe, and later developing a relationship with her, does not stop his nightmares. His flashbacks don't suddenly evaporate into thin air.

I liked that Zoe was unsure of herself after her divorce, but also that she was tenacious. Her main stumbling block is that she loves to be "needed." And because of this, she married a man who took advantage of her, who was only interested in what she could do for him. Jake is a puzzle she's intrigued by, and dang if she doesn't want to solve him. Is she pushy? Yes. Is that exactly what Jake needs? Yes. I loved that she didn't tap-dance around him. I loved that she didn't let him wallow. I loved that she confronted him. Oh man, does she ever confront him!

The author does a very lovely job with the setting and even offers up a secondary character in the form of Zoe's canine companion Reynaldo. I would have liked more of a mention of Jake's family, and even with this being the "just kisses" Harlequin Romance line - I think I would have liked a love scene here, even a PG-rated one, to illustrate Jake being ready to take that plunge into emotional investment. But still, it's a lovely read, with some lovely, quiet moments punctuated with emotional intensity.

Final Grade = B+

You Had Your Time, Now Go Away

2011-09-02T08:45:00.000-07:00

On a certain level, I totally get why publishers and authors push connected books. It allows the author to tinker around, create an entire world, revisit themes and characters. There's also the added bonus that if a series "hits" with the reading public that it's a bit like picking the right numbers on a lottery ticket. If you can suck readers in with a series, a good many of us will ride with you until the wheels fall off. A lot of us try to deny it, but really - a lot of us are creatures of habit.

However, I think I may have hit a wall when it comes to romance series. At least a temporary one.

Now, it's entirely possible that my mind isn't "right" at the moment (no comment from the peanut gallery). Real Life has been....uh colorful of late. I've been whining. I've been depressed. I've been bothered by the fact that I was put in a situation where I didn't know what was going on or how it would directly effect me. I knew it would effect me - but how? Yeah, Wendy doesn't do well with "not knowing." I don't like it. Again, I'm a major creature of habit - so when you disrupt my rut, and then don't give me new marching orders in a timely fashion?

Wendy meet wall. Wall meet Wendy.

Even though I try to not let things like this effect my reading, it inevitably does. Now the good news is that I generally know when I'm being irrational. In other words - I know it's "me" and not "you." I still have the ability to register when a theme/concept is done "not so good" in one book by one author, and "wow, that was kinda fun!" in another book by another author.

Which is where I'm coming in with connected series books (you just have to give me enough time, I got back to it!). One problem that series have in the Romance World is that the required "happy ending" limits you to a certain extent. Readers like the couple to ride off into the sunset together. Now intellectually readers know that no relationship is perfect. Couples can be madly in love with each other and fight. They can have arguments about money, the kids, the fact that the hero leaves his dirty socks on the floor. Here's the thing though:

Most of us don't want to read about it.

So authors let their characters ride off into the sunset, and with following books they pair up new couples in the same world. However, readers and authors cannot seem to help themselves. They need to bring back those past couples in future books. Typically, some readers like seeing them again.

Me? Yeah, not so much.

Here's the thing, I've moved on. Dear Hero A and Heroine B, you have had your moment in the sun. You have had your time in the spotlight. Now go away. Sincerely, Wendy.

Now it used to be that I didn't mind past couples showing up, especially if them being "on page" was somehow important to the new story at hand. They had to play an important role to the new romance. Then it was OK. If they just showed up on page to pose, posture, and act sickeningly sweet lovey-dovey - yeah, get the heck off the page. You're wasting my time and giving me a toothache. And don't get me started on characters who show up just to sequel-bait. Hi, I'm Sexy Interchangeable Navy SEAL #49. I'm going to get my own book in December 2029. You shall read me. You shall love me. Here, look at my massive, manly pecs.

Blah.

The reason I suspect I may have hit a wall with romance series is that even now past couples who are playing an important roll in the story at hand are starting to crawl under my skin a little bit. I haven't hit the loathing their existence point yet, but they're starting to irritate. Sort of like a mosquito bite that you just can't leave alone. You. Must. Scratch. It.

But the good news is that I suspect I'm being unreasonable. And I'm a big enough person to admit that. I think Real Life has bled into my reading too much. So yeah, it's me - not you. The good news is that Wendy got those new marching orders recently, so I can start digging the beginnings of a new rut.

What about you? Have you hit a wall on connected books?

Finding The Happy

2011-08-30T10:30:00.000-07:00

For those of who know me, or have met me live and in the flesh, you'll know I'm not a Happy Sunshine Pollyanna person. But I'm also not a miserable human being who walks with a cloud over her head all the time. I'm pretty much an even-keel kind of gal. There are two types of people I cannot tolerate - those who create drama for the sake of drama and those who endlessly gripe for the sake of griping. Look, I can whine with the best of 'em, but sooner or later you need to stop whining, pull up your big girl panties, and take your medicine. Life isn't always pleasant. It has a way of rearing it's ugly head when you least expect it. I usually give myself a few days to wallow, and then I need to "move on." Because frankly, not only does My Man dislike being around Wallowing Wendy, I dislike being around Wallowing Wendy.

I hit a wall last week. I feel a little guilty about this since it meant I spent my weekend in a foul mood. My Man works hard, this is a busy time of year for him at his job, and the last thing he needs is a cranky girlfriend on the weekend. It's not fair to him, and honestly? I don't like being cranky girl. So by Monday morning, I had resolved to "get over it." But dang, that's proving to be hard. Just when I think I'm ready to take my medicine, be the big girl, someone ends up smacking me upside the head. Or in kindergarten terms, taking my ice cream cone and dumping it in the sand box. I keep telling myself that not everybody is a Big Ol' Meanie Jerkface - and that the universe really isn't out to get me. No really, it's not. But seriously, ::sigh::.

Which got me thinking, while I was in Full Blown Irrational Cranky Mode, on what makes me "happy." Lots of things actually make me happy. My family makes me happy. Babies laughing makes me happy. Kittens make me happy. Good European chocolate topped off with a bottle of wine makes me very happy. But you know what really, really makes me happy?

Books.

And I don't think this is just a "librarian thing" - more like a "reader thing" in general. You know what flips my switch really hard? Shiny, hard cover books, with pristine dust jackets, that haven't been cracked open yet. Brand new mass market paperbacks, lined up in a row on the shelf, not a beat-up spine in the bunch.

My fetish isn't even reserved for "new" books. I love The Hunt. I haven't done it in ages, what with store-fronts closing at record speed - but there is nothing quite like a good old-fashioned Used Bookstore Hop. I used to do this all the time when I lived in Michigan. I'd drive around town, and hit anywhere from 3 to 4 used bookstores. I would spend the whole day "hunting." Sometimes I cleaned up, sometimes I found nothing, but it was just the act of pawing through piles of books, like an archaeologist looking for buried treasure, that seemed to get my mind right.

Sure I could buy lots of old historical romances on eBay, but trust me - it's not the same.

As far as actual reading goes - when I'm in full-blown Wallowing Wendy mode, it's hard for me to start reading. It's hard for me to sit down, pick up the book, and start. Once I "make myself" start - I can usually keep going for a while. But sometimes not any ol' story will do when I'm cranky girl. Usually my blood-thirsty nature comes out. For example? Right now I'm working through the last of HelenKay Dimon's Mystery Men series for Harlequin Intrigue. I thought, why not? Stories about people who carry guns and shoot at bad guys. If I wasn't so back-logged right now, I'd probably be more than half-tempted to root around in my keeper stash and reread something. But I am back-logged, so gun-totin' hottie heroes it is.

So, in an effort to kick-start my flagging blogging mojo - I want to hear from all of you. When you're in a cranky mood, do you turn to books? And if so, what do you like to read when you're in Cranky Mode? Hey, I even want to hear examples (with book titles!) if you have them.

Librarians Helping Librarians: eReader Program Help

2011-08-26T09:23:00.000-07:00

One of the awesome-sauce things about blogging is that you "meet" a variety of people. And even with my total lack of blogging about "library stuff" - yes there are even other librarians who read this blog. Shock of all shocks. Macaire is one of those librarians, and she's looking for some advice. Her library is looking into starting an eReader lending program for their patrons, and would love some insight from other libraries who already have a program like this in place.

Hey, we librarians are firm believers in not reinventing the wheel.

So if you work for a library who has a program like this, or helped implement a program like this - Macaire would certainly appreciate your insights. See her direct plea below:

I am an Adult Services Librarian in a small public library. We would like to begin loaning pre-loaded e-readers to our patrons, and are attempting to put together a proposal for purchase and all policies related to lending. I have been charged with gathering information from other libraries that already have an e-reader lending program in place. I would love to hear from librarians who would be willing either to take the time to answer a few questions via email or to chat with one of our staff members by phone. If you would like to help us out, please just send me an email with your contact information and preferred method of contact.

Stephanie Plum, Ho Bag

2011-08-24T08:40:00.000-07:00

Genre fiction (any genre, pick a genre), is unique from most other types of fiction because, by it's nature, readers are deeply invested. The book doesn't even have to be part of a series for this to happen. As genre readers, there are just certain conventions that readers hold dear. That we hold up as truth. When a genre author is doing their job well, the characters should leap off the page and feel "real" - even when we know as competent adults that they aren't. They're "characters." It's this feeling of "real" that keeps readers coming back for more. Says me.

So what happens when a character in a genre book goes off the rails? Well, it depends. What one reader is willing to forgive in a character can, and sometimes does, vastly differ from what the reader standing next to them will.

Which brings me to Smokin' Seventeen by Janet Evanovich, the 17th (well duh) entry in the Stephanie Plum, inept Jersey bounty hunter series. When I first joined online Romancelandia way back a trillion years ago, a new Stephanie Plum book was anticipated, dissected, and ravenously devoured. Think about the hysteria over the early J.R. Ward novels and you'll have a decent comparison. But as the series has droned on, and as the author has essentially given readers the same book over and over and over and over and over and.....ahem - again. Well, a lot of people have moved on. I, however, have not. Oh don't get me wrong. I'm not what you would consider a rabid squee'ing The Author Can Do No Wrong fangirl. No, I just keep listening because I haven't gotten pissed off enough yet to quit.

I think, that's the key. I listen. I have never, ever read one of these in print format. It's been audiobook all the way since #1. If I were a reader? Yeah, I probably would have thrown in the towel already, because my reading time is valuable. My listening time? Not so much. I mean, I'm trapped in my dang car during my commute anyway. Stephanie Plum or inane DJ chatter? Hmmm, what to choose, what to choose.....

So what were my thoughts on #17. Well? Stephanie has turned into a slut. Now, I know - she's been bouncing between two men for ages, and she's just now a slut? Hear my out....

I've always felt that Stephanie should be with neither man in her life. She shouldn't choose either of them. Joe wants to change her and Ranger would never be a true partner. If a man wants to change you? Yeah, no thanks. And if a man is always going to hold some of himself back from you? Yeah, no thanks. But, since those are our choices, I will say that Morelli has mellowed in recent books. He's not quite as authoritative. I see him and Stephanie as "in a relationship" - even if they won't put a name to it. Hell, in this book - he even says he "loves" her. Now, this is Evanovich so it's not a mushy declaration - but Morelli says the word "love" in Stephanie's general direction. Which in my mind means - the guy cares about her. He's not just in it for the sex.

The problem comes in when Stephanie has smokin' hot sex with Ranger in this book. I can't entirely blame the girl - but now that it feels like Morelli and her are a "couple?" And Joe says the L word in the course of the book? Yeah. Skank Alert At 12 o' Clock. Look, I'm all for keeping your options open, but what is good for the gander needs to be just as good for the goose. Stephanie gets jealous when other chicks come sniffing around Joe. He cares about her, and she knows it. And she still bangs Ranger.

Ho Bag.

Yeah, I just said that.

I know that may sound strange from someone who reads some pretty skanky erotica, but the minute there are "feelings" involved and someone could get their wee lil' heart stomped on? Yeah.

Ho Bag.

However, this wasn't actually the entire issue for me. If Stephanie wants to be a skank, she should at least own it. Which she doesn't. She blames her bangin' Ranger on the fact that Morelli's creepy grandma Bella put a spell on her. A horny spell.

Seriously, shoot me.

So yeah, not only is Stephanie now a ho bag, but she's a ho bag who won't even own her own skankiness.

There's also a thin mystery angle here, which is actually thinner than usual. I know, it's hard to believe that's possible - but it is. Now, I know nobody actually reads these books for the mysteries - but this one was obvious and telegraphed early on, and no amount of the author throwing around a half-baked, runny-egg red herring was enough to make me overlook it.

Seriously. Thin. Epically, colossally thin. Kate Moss isn't this thin.

Which sounds like I'm ready to break-up with this series doesn't it? You'd think that, but no. Again, listening not reading. And honestly, even with Stephanie being an inept, won't own her skankiness, ho-bag - I'm not angry enough yet to call it quits. To quit on a series, I really need to be angry. Hulk-mad, Hulk-smash, feeling like I'm being taken advantage of, angry. And since I've always firmly believed that the author will never resolve the love triangle, that the author will continue to give me the same book over and over and over and over....sorry....again? Yeah, I know what I'm getting. And I'm not angry. Yet.

But I can see and understand why some other readers are.

Discussion time: When do you call it quits on a series? What tends to be the final breaking point for you? The straw that broke your reading back?

A Princess, A Knight And A Mixed Bag

2011-08-22T15:40:00.000-07:00

I have never naturally gravitated towards the medieval time period in Historical Romance Novel Land. However, I do like to read them, on occasion, to stretch my wings and keep my palate from getting bored. Which would explain my theory on there being two types of medievals. The first are those books that speak directly to medieval history junkies, those readers who already adore the setting. The second are those medievals that can (and do) often work for the first group, but also have that ability to transcend to historical romance readers in general. Those readers who love historical romances, but might not be that gung-ho on the time period. I love finding the latter, but run into the former just as often. Lindsay Townsend's To Touch The Knight is, I suspect, the former.

Edith of Warren Hamelt is a blacksmith's widow. She has also buried a fiance' who died before they could take the trip down the aisle. She's a resourceful girl, who uses her wits to get her whole village out of a jam. When the Black Death comes rolling into town, their lord, fearing the spread of the disease, locks them all in the church (healthy and sick), leaving them to die. Once she frees them, she hits upon a plan. Using the fine silks and stories her sailor grandfather brought back from his travels, she'll play an exotic eastern princess with the other villagers playing her entourage. They travel the circuit of various tournaments, where Edith, as a veiled princess, has many admirers among the competing knights. She and the villagers are safe and well-fed, until an old enemy comes creeping out of the forest.

Sir Ranulf of Fredenwyke is a widower, who competes in the tournaments in the name of his dead wife. He doesn't compete to win ladies' favors, or even the glory. His motives are never entirely clear, but one gets the impression he isn't wild about moldering around Fredenwyke, where memories of his wife are everywhere. When he hears rumblings about a princess, he decides to check her out for himself. He's not that impressed, and isn't about to grovel at her feet, but something about her does intrigue him. There's something more there than meets the eye....

On the surface, this story held a lot of promise. I have not read an extensive catalog of medievals, but even I'm aware that stories centered around tournaments of archery, jousting, and the like aren't terribly common. It gives this novel a nice backdrop, with not only the pageantry and chivalry, but also with the shadow of the Black Death lurking around every corner; giving the setting an intersting mix of "light" and "dark." When looking at the sense of place and detail of this tale, there's a lot here that medieval fans should really enjoy.

The problem for me came with the romance. Edith is lying. OK, she has an excellent reason for lying, and lying characters aren't a deal-breaker for me by any stretch of the imagination. The problem here is trust. Edith and Ranulf keep a lot of details to themselves for a very long stretch. Again, Edith has some cause, but she keeps on lying even after she should have gotten somewhat of a clue that Ranulf is a trustworthy sort. That he's not going to throw her to the wolves. These two have doubts about each other up until the very end, and it did not instill me with confidence that their love story was going to transcend the ages.

The pacing of this book was also an issue for me. Admittedly, I do read a lot of category romance, but the first 100 pages of this story take a while to get off the ground. There's a lot of set-up. There's a lot of moving around of various chess pieces. Because of this, I felt the conflict lacked a real sense of urgency. The villain is present for the whole book, and while he is a "bad man," I never read those moments when he was on page with my heart in my throat. A more foreboding sense of danger would have definitely helped move things along.

I appreciated the sense of place, the history, and the idea of the story. It all boils down to the execution not entirely working for me. Which leaves me with one of those books that sort of evened out in the end. It didn't light my world on fire, but it also didn't have me reaching for ~~vodka~~ liquid courage either. However, if you're a reader who adores medievals, and consider yourself a fan of the time period? This one may be worth your consideration.

Final Grade = C

She's Alive! She's Alive!

2011-08-21T15:05:00.000-07:00

So yeah. This blog has been a bit of a wasteland this past week. I misplaced my mojo, and then this weekend was my belated birthday trip to Malibu. Although honestly, it was also My Man's Work Is Kicking My Butt Right Now getaway trip. Good times, good food, great wine, whoa momma great desserts, great view, a bunch of What Was She Thinking? Plastic Surgery Watching, and What's He Overcompensating For By Driving That Car Watching.

I'm back home now, back on the Interwebs, and back to reality. Now, back to the laundry.

Stupid reality.

TBR Challenge 2011: Wendy's Deep Dark Secret

2011-08-17T06:00:00.000-07:00

The Book: Beyond Desire by Thea Devine

The Particulars: Historical erotic romance, Zebra, 1993, Out of Print. Reprinted by Kensington Brava, 2003, edition still appears to be in print.

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: Only Rosie seems to "get it" (OK, Lisabea too...), but I have mad, insane, crazy love for Thea Devine.

The Review: I need to be upfront about this: I cannot be objective when talking about a Thea Devine book. I just can't. Yes, I know her writing style is...uh, colorful. Yes, I'm well aware her plots are beyond convoluted and tend to cause brain bleeds. Yes, I see all this, and you know what? I don't give a good golly gosh darn. The reason? This woman saved my life. Back in 2001, after a string of lackluster romances featuring heroines I wanted to run over with a bus, I read my first Thea Devine. It was also the first book I ever read that could be construed as erotic romance. People, it was like the clouds parted, sunshine rained down on me, and a heavenly choir started singing.

Beyond Desire is vintage Devine, which is to say if I had discovered this book as a teenager (which I was in 1993), it would have warped my fragile lil' mind. Our fair heroine, Alexandra deLisle has buried both her archaeologist father and her shrew of a mother. Daddy left behind many secrets, including a mysterious pair of stone bracelets. Her dippy sister, Allegra, has taken to sleep-walking around their house, searching for something...possibly these bracelets. Why? Because she's fallen under the spell of our dastardly villain, Dzmura.

Our hero, Ryder Culhane (!), is another archaeologist of dubious reputation who also appears on the scene looking for those bracelets, but also to take down the villainous Dzmura. For some added WTFBBQ spice, he also has some sort of sixth sense that smacks more of plot-shortcutting. When Allegra goes missing, presumably kidnapped by Dzmura, he finds his path blocked by Alexandra who has hidden the bracelets and tells Ryder he must take her along on this merry chase.

See, seriously...it's convoluted. On top of that, Devine hasn't met a set of italics or ellipses she didn't love. I have a hard time recommending her to anyone who doesn't already have a fascination with her books (hence, when Rosie and I meet over lunch? We talk about Devine....uh, a lot).

So you're probably wondering, if I can see the flaws, if I can pick apart her books like a cotton ball - why exactly do I love her? The short answer? The heroines. What I love, love, love about Devine is that there are no separate rules for heroine and hero. Her heroines are allowed to be just as conniving, manipulative, sneaky and mysterious as her heroes. And when I discovered her books back in 2001, after a string of vapid, insipid books featuring brain-dead ninnies passing themselves off as heroines?

Yeah, you get something like Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally:

I'm in it for the soap opera more so than the romance (because honestly, it's a rare book by Devine that works for me at the romance level). However, I'm also in it for gems like these:

"'Never,' she shot back, 'but of course you are very used to grabbing women in the dark and having them curtsy and say thank you very much."

::swoon::

"You know nothing about manners, Mr. Culhane, nothing at all."

"I know enough to let you precede me out the door."

"Oh no...no. We need not stand on any kind of protocol here, Culhane. I would infinitely prefer not to have you at my back."

::double swoon::

"She wanted to cut him up into little pieces and stamp on them. 'You have it all wrong Culhane,' she said finally when she had some control over her hostility. 'You were the one yearning all night for that. And I know it was worth the wait.'"

I wonder if this heroine will marry me?

"'May I say neither do you?' he said acidly. 'But you don't need to think to obey the terms of a bargain.'

"'Thank you, but we've done that already,' she muttered, struggling against him.

'But I prefer you wide awake and willing.'

'And I prefer you far away and disinclined.'

'You win,' he said, dropping his arm abruptly."

And that's why I love me some Ms. Devine.

I have a devil of a time assigning grades to Devine books - because I know I can't be objective. Still, even overlooking what I tend to overlook, I had major issues with this one. Ryder is a bit of a jackass, even by Devine standards. Alexandra gives as good as she gets for a while, but in the end I'm thinking the path she's chosen isn't all that different from what her precious snowflake sister wanted - and we're to believe the sister is massively warped? Also, I'll be honest - I love Devine, but her straight-up historicals without any half-cocked paranormal woo-woo just work infinitely better for me on the Guilty Pleasure scale. So yeah, no desire to horde this one among my stash of Devine keepers. Although now I want to reread Desired....

Final Grade = C

Who Got You Hooked?

2011-08-13T06:56:00.000-07:00

I'm on the road this morning, over at Random Houses' Romance At Random community, talking about how I got hooked on the romance genre. I also talk about the first romance novel I ever read (ever) and what I really thought of the ending of A Knight In Shining Armor (back when I read it as a teenager).

Why not go on over and take a gander? There's even a giveaway attached!

Reminder: TBR Challenge For August

2011-08-12T07:00:00.000-07:00

For those of you participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge, a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, August 17.

This month's theme is Steamy Reads. Erotica, erotic-romance, or just something really sensual, it's all good! Remember, the themes are completely and totally optional. If you're not one for the super steamy stuff, or there's nothing lying around in your TBR that fits, please go off the beaten path. The themes aren't as important as digging something (anything!) out of your TBR Pile.

It's also not too late to sign-up. If you are interested in doing so, or just want to learn more about the challenge, please see the information page.

The Month That Was July 2011

2011-08-11T06:00:00.000-07:00

Lemon Drop: Oh thank heavens you're finally here Auntie Wendy!

Me: Getting a little light reading in kiddo?

Lemon Drop: As you know, my favorite thing to do is pull all my clothes out of my dresser and dump them on the floor. However, Mommy has decided this is not a fun game (pfft, what does she know?), so I've resorted to looking for something to read. All I've found are Daddy's textbooks. Help!

Me: Say no more. Your Auntie Wendy is here to save the day. I had a very solid month, getting through 12 books, and only one DNF in the bunch!

Title links will take you to full reviews

Her Wyoming Man by Cheryl St. John, Historical western romance, Harlequin Historical, 2011, Grade = B-

Former "kept woman" heroine (OK, prostitute) escapes her old life by answering a mail order bride ad. Hero is a widower with three young children and political ambitions. Vintage St. John. Feel-good vibe. Heroine with a past. Gentle love story. My only quibble? The resolution to the main conflict was a little too pat. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Heroine With A Past, Widower, Single Father, Mail-Order Bride, Big Secret.

Molly Cooper's Dream Date by Barbara Hannay, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B+

Heroine desperate for adventure, but with little funds, agrees to a home-swap style vacation with the hero. She'll be at his posh London home, and he'll be working on his neglected novel at her tiny island cottage in Australia. A nice romance, about nice people, who develop their relationship through an e-mail exchange. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Lookin' For Love Heroine, Well-To-Do Hero, Pen Pals, Big Secret

The Silent Girl by Tess Gerritsen, Mystery/Suspense, Ballantine, 2011, Grade = B

The latest entry in the author's Rizzoli/Isles series. Solid suspense thread set against the backdrop of Boston's Chinatown. Can't wait for the next book.

Ever Yours by Gabriella Anderson, Historical romance, Zebra, 2003, Grade = DNF

A Beauty and the Beast book that I picked up for the TBR Challenge. I gave up after 75 pages or so, mostly because I was bored. Honestly, it's Beauty and the Beast. Where's the angst? There wasn't any. I don't want to label it "fluffy" - but it did fall flat for me.

Soldier On Her Doorstep by Soyara Lane, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B

Hero made promise to heroine's husband before he died - hence, he's on her doorstep. A lovely, quiet story about a wounded hero and a heroine who finds love again. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Widow Heroine, Military Hero, One Not-So-Talkative Kidlet, Big Secret

License to Pawn by Rick Harrison, Non-fiction, Hyperion, 2011, Grade = B

Behind-the-scenes look at the business, and personalities, of the Pawn Stars TV show. A super quick read, but one that will probably be best enjoyed by those already addicted to TV show. Excellent book for "reluctant readers" - says me.

A Family For the Rugged Rancher by Donna Alward, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B-

Heroine in desperate need of a job hires on to be the hero's temporary housekeeper. He just didn't plan on her bringing a kid with her. Nice, believable angst - although I thought the hero's logic behind why he couldn't have a family of his own was a bit cracked. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Heroine Done Wrong, One Lonely Little Boy, Wounded Hero, Rancher Ahoy!

The Wanton Governess by Barbara Monajem, Digital historical erotic romance short story, Harlequin Historical Undone, 2011, Grade = B

Hero comes home from America to discover his family has invented a wife for him. The "wife" in question? A woman he has a serious case of love-at-first-sight for. Sexy, fleshed-out story with likable characters and plenty of shenanigans. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Ruined Heroine Down On Her Luck, Love At First Sight, Reunion, Meddling Family

With This Ring by Carla Kelly, Traditional Regency romance, Signet, 1997, Grade = C

Cinderella heroine with a vapid, dippy sister and a shrew of a mother, ends up falling for Army major slash Earl who needs to come up with real wife to replace the one he invented via letters home. Really enjoyed the heroine, but wasn't nearly as enamored with the hero.

The Governess and the Sheikh by Marguerite Kaye, Historical romance, Harlequin Historical, 2011, Grade = C+

Jilted heroine is visiting her married sister in Arabia when she hires on to be a governess for a neighboring sheikh's hoyden daughter. Likable romantic couple, but felt the conflict needed a shot in the arm. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Sheikh Ahoy!, Heroine Done Wrong, Happy Couple From Previous Book, One Ill-Behaved Little Girl

Mr. Right There All Along by Jackie Braun, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B+

Heroine who was bullied in high school gets invitation to 10-year reunion. She wants to make a splash, gets on the make-over train, much to the dismay of the hero, her BFF. A lovely story that utilizes one of my absolute favorite tropes! Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Heroine Done Wrong, Hero With Daddy Issues, High School Reunion, Friends To Lovers

The Army Ranger's Return by Soraya Lane, Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2011, Grade = B+

Breast cancer survivor heroine strikes up pen-pal relationship with Army Ranger hero. When he returns home, they meet in person. Naturally sparks fly. Emotionally angsty story about two wounded characters. Harlequin Cheat Sheet: Military Hero, Widower, One Over-Protective Brother, One Surly Teen, Big Secret

Lemon Drop: Oh man, that's so much better. I needed that. I love Daddy, but the guy's a geek. Group theory? What the heck is Group Theory? Is that like what happens in some of the naughty books you read Auntie Wendy?

Me: Uh, not quite. Seriously, your father is going to kill me.

She's Come Undone

2011-08-10T09:04:00.000-07:00

I'm over at Heroes & Heartbreakers again today.

For those romance readers among you who have "known" me a long time, you will recall that there was a moment in the not-too-distant past where I was fed-up, burnt-out and just plain "over" anything involving Regency England. And naturally, since my timing has always sucked eggs, my burn-out set in during a period when every flippin' historical romance (or maybe it just seemed like it to my burnt-out brain) was set in Regency England.

Well my latest post? All about how I got over that burn-out. Go on over and take a gander.

Marrying Miss Marshal

2011-08-08T13:40:00.000-07:00

Contrary to my reputation in some circles, I'm a fairly easy-to-please reader. No, really - I am. Give me a good story, interesting characters, with competent writing, and I'm all in. Which is where Marrying Miss Marshal, Lacy Williams' debut novel comes in. I'll be honest, I was a little hesitant as I started this book. It's an inspirational western romance about a heroine who is a town marshal. Yeah, we're talking major potential land mines all the way. But you know what? Sometimes it's not about what ~~I think~~ I know, but all about what the author can make me believe.

Danna Carpenter's was one of her husband's deputies. When Fred is killed, the town council appoints Danna marshal. However, even with their endorsement, it's been an uphill battle. Nobody will work for her, which means no deputies. Plus, she's had no success tracking down the culprit who shot her husband. The last thing this gal needs is some citified private detective rolling into town. Especially when she finds herself rescuing the idiot from a stampede.

Chas O'Grady has been hired to look into some suspected cattle rustling in the area. When he's almost mowed down by a stampede, he's shocked to discover that his rescuer is a....woman! And when he discovers she's the town marshal? Yeah, his brain almost self-destructs. Since he's a stranger in town, doesn't really know the lay of the land, it's imperative for him to be on the right side of the local law. Which means working with Danna. A woman he finds exceedingly interesting, and attractive, despite her unconventional ways.

OK, let's get this out of the way upfront. Yes, a heroine who is a lawman in 1889 Wyoming. Yes, yes, I know. I've never been one to drone on about "historical accuracy" in historical romance novels - but even this gave me pause. I'm not saying it couldn't have happened. Maybe it did happen? But it's certainly eye-brow raising. Now, that being said, the author does eventually close this plot hole. How did a woman end up being the town marshal? It's explained, and in a way I could buy-into. She just takes a while to do it (in other words, you can't read 50 pages and expect to have the answer).

What made this story work for me is that I could believe Danna as a town marshal. I really could. She's competent, intelligent, hard-working and observant. In many ways, she reminds me quite a bit of a Maggie Osborne heroine. Unconventional, an outsider, not a frippery-frou-frou sort of female. She's a straight-shooter, which is what I really liked about her. Danna is the kind of heroine that you would not only be friends with, but who would also give you an honest opinion if you asked for one.

Chas is a decent guy, but also a fairly typical man. I don't want to say he immediately dismisses Danna (I mean, she did save his life), but the idea of a woman being the marshal? Ha! However, what I really enjoyed here is that while Danna and Chas do get off on the wrong foot, while there is some animosity there early on - they eventually get past it. Once Chas realizes that he needs her help, and also that she's pretty good at her job. She proves herself to him, and dang if he isn't drawn to her in a way that complicates matters.

There's a fair amount of internal angst floating around. Danna was married before, so there are her feelings for her first husband (she cared for him, but it wasn't a grand passion). Chas feels guilt over his role in a woman's death, and is determined to bring the murderer to justice. Add in the cattle rustling, and Danna's struggles to gain the town's acceptance, and it adds up to plenty of conflict to keep the pages turning.

Since this is an inspirational, I feel it's important to mention The God Stuff. I tend to treat religion a lot like sex in my romance novels. If it doesn't feel organic to the story, it annoys the stuffing out of me. Here, the religious elements are painted with an extremely light brush. So light, that it's easy to forget this wasn't published by Harlequin Historical. When it enters into the story, it's pretty believable fare. Danna believes that God watches over her. At one point, during a crisis, she prays. That's honestly about it. Readers looking for a "heavier" religious tone in this story will likely be disappointed. But if you're like me, and just looking for a good western romance? You won't feel like the author is trying to convert you.

I really enjoyed this debut novel. It was a good story, well told, and featured interesting characters. I liked Danna, a lot. And Chas is also a pretty darn decent guy (red-headed hero alert!). I believed they were falling in love, I liked that they worked together, and I also liked that they rescued each other....in more ways than one. If that's not a good romance, I'm not sure what is.

Grade = B

(Sidenote: Squeeeeee! New historical western author!)

Like A Butterfly, A Wild Butterfly

2011-08-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

I think it's been fairly well documented that I like to read "short." In fact, it's actually my preferred method for finding erotica writers. I'll be honest, as much as I love erotica, there is nothing more brain-bleed inducing than poorly done erotic-anything. Hence, reading short. It allows me to sample at the buffet, and if I stumble across something that evokes my gag reflex? Hey, at least I don't have a full plate of it to wade through.

Obsessed: Erotic Romance For Women is edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel and features 19 stories. With this book only clocking in at 216 pages, plus the forward and introduction? Yeah, these are super quick reads, but lengthy enough to turn me on (ha!) to some new-to-me writers.

Silent Treatment by Donna George Storey is a reunion story. The heroine is off on a "silent" retreat. A weekend of yoga, relaxation, and total silence - when she runs into an old lover. Did I mention the emphasis on "silent" retreat? This was an OK story, but I found the lack of disclosure on "why" their relationship fizzled the first time around frustrating. Grade = C

One Night In Paris by Kayla Perrin finds the personal assistant heroine jetting off to Paris to surprise her hunky boss, a former NFL-er turned venture capitalist. I've read erotica, romance and suspense by Perrin, and I really think she's "at home" with erotica. Steamy stuff. Grade = B

Concubine by Portia Da Costa features a hero with a twisted ankle begging the heroine to tell him a naughty story. She does - about a concubine and her warrior prince returned from battle. The story was OK, but what I really wanted more of was the modern-day couple! Those two were vintage Da Costa - cheeky and fun. Grade = B-

Love And Demotion by Logan Belle is another secretary/boss offering. Heroine moonlights as a burlesque performer. Uh, which is where her hunkalicious boss tracks her down. Really liked this story a lot - mutual attraction, pent up frustrations, and plenty of sizzle. Grade = B

Mephisto Waltz by Justine Elyot pairs the heroine up with her former piano teacher, now a famous performer. This was OK, but not really my speed - namely because the heroine is a virgin and needs to be "awakened." Yeah, not so much in contemporary settings thanks. But I did think it was done well, if this happens to be your bag. Grade = C+

Then by Emerald finds the heroine exploring her attraction with another man, with her husband's consent. This story was a wee bit emotionally uncomfortable, but one aspect I really enjoyed was how open and honest the married couple were with each other. That was a very nice element to the story. Grade = B

It's Gotta Be Fate by Jennifer Peters finds our submissive heroine looking to break the mold of a previous relationship disaster. Wanting to be "on top" for a change, she places a personal ad and gets more than she bargained for. I'll admit it, I like reading about dominant heroines, and this story worked well for me. Grade = B

Hooked by Ariel Graham finds our married couple moving into a new place, and the heroine becoming fascinated by a giant hook hanging from their bedroom ceiling. Gee, why is that there? Plenty of tension, a solid married couple, my only quibble is Graham doesn't quite give me everything I wanted with the ending. Grade = B-

Aftershocks by Bella Andre features an almost-divorced couple reuniting when an earthquake traps them in a storage building. This story really didn't work for me. Repeat after me: Dominant Does Not Equal Asshole. I also wanted to bitch-slap the heroine when she said, "I thought I was marrying a man. I thought I was marrying someone who would give me what I needed." Seriously, where's a gun when you need one? Grade = D

Secret Places by Adele Haze is a lovely story about the heroine who teaches her street musician lover to accept himself. This was a nice surprise, with a sweetness to it that I wasn't expecting. Grade = B

Loser by Charlotte Stein is about a woman who is boinking a "loser." No, really. An odd-job working, living in a filthy run-down trailer, skeevy-looking loser with a capital L. I'll be honest, this story felt very sleazy, more than a little trashy, and unromantic to boot - but it knocked the wind out of me. I'm not sure what it says about me (probably nothing good), but I liked it. A lot. Maybe because it shocked me? Maybe because it felt different? Whatever it was - more please. Grade = B+

Here In Between by Kristina Wright finds our heroine heading to New York when she gets a flat-tire in the middle of nowhere, very late at night. The hero rescues her on the side of the road, and takes her to the nearest motel. This wasn't a poorly written story, and I'm capable of enjoying hot stranger = hot sex stories, but here? Too-Stupid-To-Live kept running through my brain. Grade = C

Spellbound by Garnell Wallace finds the heroine traveling to Haiti to film a documentary. There she meets the hero. I liked how timely this story was, even if it did skirt the unsavory bits due to word count. It's also the lushest, most hypnotic story in the bunch. Very atmospheric. Grade = B

Raven's Flight by Andrea Dale finds the heroine falling for her hunky new Irish neighbor, who happens to have a wicked tattoo. This was a solid story, but I felt the author tried to do too much with it. She should have just given us a small window into the relationship, instead of trying to develop it all the way through to the end by jumping forward in time. It felt jarring. Grade = C+

Raindrop and Rooftops by Elizabeth Coldwell features a travel magazine writer heroine checking out a posh new hotel in Manhattan, as well as the owner of said hotel. This was a great story until I got the part where the hotel provides sex toys in the honeymoon suite. Major eyeroll. Also, I understand that the heroine is looking for adventure, but really? With a total stranger you're going to do that? Grade = C

Topiary by K.D. Grace is another story I'm not sure I should have liked, but I did anyway (don't judge). The hero really likes to landscape. Uh, a lot. Which is where our heroine comes in. Seriously, I'm not sure I'm going to look at gardeners the same way ever again. Oh and that whole dominant shouldn't be shorthand for asshole gripe of mine? This author gets it right. Says me. Grade = B+

I Want To Hold Your Hand by Rachel Kramer Bussel features a hero who has recently lost weight, gotten hunky, gotten more female attention - and his wife is out of sorts over it. How one partner's weight loss effects the other is an issue you hardly ever see addressed in fiction (or in real life for that matter), and it was a lovely angle to explore here. Grade = B

Storm Surge by Teresa Noelle Roberts is about two adrenaline junkies who like to do it in extreme weather. So they're off to Cape Cod just as a tropical storm is bearing down on them. A little silly for my tastes, but well told and executed. Grade = C+

Undercover Kink by Louisa Harte is about a heroine who likes wearing really naughty lingerie underneath her conservative clothing. She's at the store to pick up her latest purchase and the hunky sales clerk shows her to the nearest dressing room. A great way to end the anthology, steamy, sexy, whoa doggie! Grade = B+

Finally, a couple of things in closing I'd like to mention. I'm firmly in the Erotica As Fantasy camp, which means I tend to flip that switch while reading stories of this nature. Hence, I can roll with No Condom Moments. For readers who can't roll? Yeah, this anthology is pretty light in the safe sex arena.

Also, a word about the "romance" label. All of these stories do end on a positive note. They have "happy endings." However, some of them are pretty vague in that area. Using the Louisa Harte story as an example - I don't think her heroine and hero are through with each other - but are they riding off into the sunset proclaiming their undying love for each other? Yeah, not so much.

So, if you need the condoms, if you need that Let's Get Married And Be Together Forever moment at the end? Yeah, this ain't your bag baby. But it was mostly my bag, and I've already jotted down a few authors I must be on the lookout for. Heck, I've already bought another book by Charlotte Stein.

Easy, thy name is Wendy.

Overall Grade = B

Hello Cowboys!

2011-08-04T17:10:00.000-07:00

So I got Linda Lael Miller's latest newsletter in my inbox and this was the banner - large as life - right there filling the top of my browser screen:

Uh......

Yes, please?

Is that an acceptable answer?

(Seriously, guys with their clothes on. Even when I'm totally inappropriate and objectifying men - I somehow end up doing it "wrong." But hey, at least this blog is still safe to read at work. Or for that matter, in front of your kidlets.)

Signed Sealed Delivered

2011-08-03T07:00:00.000-07:00

As a reader, there's a certain magic in discovering a new author, especially one who is just starting out. It always makes me feel smart and a little "hip" to get in on the ground floor, instead of playing catch-up well after the fact (which is what I'm doing most of the time). In only her second published book, The Army Ranger's Return by Soraya Lane totally nails it for me. That feeling I get when I read a really well-done, well-executed category romance. Yes, reading any type of good book is rewarding, but category holds that little bit of added magic for me. If this story is anything to go by? That added magic is emotional intensity.

When Jessica Mitchell was undergoing treatment for breast cancer she found out about a pen pal program that pairs up people at home with military personnel serving overseas. That's how she meets Special Forces Ranger Ryan McAdams. They quickly become active pen pals, exchanging letters back and forth on a regular basis. They also discover that they live near each other! So when Ryan returns state-side thanks to an injury, they agree to meet in person.

Ryan is very nervous about coming home. When his wife passed away, he shut down and ran away. Unfortunately, that means running away from his young son, who is now a surly 12-year-old and not all that happy to see Dear Old Dad. He needs to repair his relationship with his son, deal with his physical therapy, and somehow thank Jessica, the woman who got him through to the other side.

This is a wonderful emotional story. In Ryan's case, Jessica's letters got him through the day-to-day monotony of his last tour, and also the struggles. He was able to tell her things he hasn't been able to talk about with anyone else. An instance of where it's easier to tell a total stranger about your problems than those who are living those problems with you. Jessica listens, and gives him good advice. Without her, and her letters, he doubts he'd have the courage to face the mess he's made with his son.

The fly in the ointment is that Jessica has not told Ryan about her breast cancer, or the fact that it's casting a long shadow. The disease took her sister, and her own breasts. She's in remission now, but it's something she's going to have to deal with for the rest of her days. She doesn't tell Ryan because she just wants to feel normal again. She's tired of people close to her wanting to protect her. Baby her. Looking at her differently. She just wants to feel like a normal, everyday woman. The woman she was before The Big C rolled into town. Then Ryan shows up and she fears that learning the truth might bring an end to their friendship. Of course this all gets very complicated when she realizes that she just might be falling in love with the man.

The one sticking point here is definitely The Big Secret. I totally understood, and even sympathized, with Jessica's plight. This bit of conflict felt very organic to me, and realistic. Should Jessica have kept this from Ryan? OK, no. But then, I understood why she did - because the author made me understand why she did. As the reader, we know that Jessica is selling Ryan a little short - but he's a man with his own baggage to deal with. A kid who "hates" him and his feelings over his wife's death. Would the knowledge of Jessica's cancer be too much for even a strong, tough Army Ranger to bear?

Which means you have to read the book to find out. The conflict with Ryan's son is fairly well done, although I did want some more of that. The author makes it work given the page count of the Harlequin Romance line, but oh what she could have done with it in the SuperRomance world! I also liked that snippets of those letters Jessica and Ryan wrote to each other were included, and I really appreciated the emotionally draining final chapters. It's the stuff keepers are made of, and I suspect this book will be one for many, many readers. Soraya Lane has two books out now. Catch the elevator on the ground floor folks - she's turning in her fifth book at the end of this month.

Final Grade = B+

Digital Review: She's A Super Freak

2011-08-01T07:00:00.000-07:00

Not all short stories are created equal. I know some readers out there who pretty much loathe everything "short" - but I happen to love the format when it's in the hands of an author who can make it work for them. The Wanton Governess by Barbara Monajem is her second short for Harlequin Historical Undone, and I'm just as taken with it as I was with her first. This is a strong story, that gives me an actual story, flesh and blood characters, a supporting cast (!), and sexy times - all without making me feel like I'm missing out because it is "short."

Pompeia Grant is in a pickle. When she dispatched of her virginity, she made the mistake of choosing the wrong man. Oh, the guy was skilled - but he couldn't keep his big, fat mouth shut. Word gets back to her brother, which means word gets back to her parents - which means she's working as a governess. The problem is that Pompeia is very beautiful. So beautiful that she apparently turns men into cads. In short, she keeps getting fired. Her latest dismissal occurs near Sir James Carling's estate. His sister is a friend, and she's thinking of begging for a night's lodging. Instead she gets roped into playing James' wife to appease their old goat of a grandmother!

James has just returned from America, and is shocked to learn that his siblings have invented a wife for him. He's even more shocked to discover it's Pompeia acting the part. They met years ago - and it was lust at first sight. But James, being a gentleman, never pursued an affair. Well now he's older, wiser, and here's the delectable Pompeia right under his nose. I mean, a guy can only resist so much.

What I liked about this short story is that it felt like a full story. Even factoring in the word count, I felt like I really got to know Pompeia and James. I was also charmed by James' two siblings, their banter with each other, and the farce of keeping the wool over grandmother's eyes. I'm not a huge fan of "love at first sight" style romances, but the author makes it work here, and also more palatable by coupling it with the "reunion/reunited" trope.

James is suitably hero-worthy, with strong Alpha tendencies without being a raging asshole. He's charming, slightly roguish, but also a gentleman. He wants to do the right thing by the heroine, even as he's planning on debauching her. What I liked about Pompeia was the little twist the author gives her character. Yes, she's a fallen woman - but her greatest sin wasn't actually having sex. Oh no. It was admitting that she ::gasp:: liked it. For that reason she thinks she's a wanton. Immoral and improper.

What readers will have to be able to swallow though is the whole Impossibly Beautiful Heroine trope. I mean, apparently just looking at Pompeia turns men into ravenous dogs. Different time, different era, life didn't equal living in a PC world, blah blah blah - but every guy mentioned in this story (OK, not her father or brother) is trying to get underneath her skirts. Hey, boys will be boys - but 99% of the ones Pompeia encounters in Regency Romance Land just have to come on to her? I mean, really? Normally this sort of thing gets on my nerves in a full-length novel, but as a trope for a short story? It worked better for me.

I've read a lot of these Undone stories since Harlequin launched the line - and I enjoy them for what they are - quick, sexy reads. That being said, they aren't all created equal. Some authors seem to handle the constraints better than others. Monajem is now firmly on my "she can make it work" list.

Final Grade = B

Gee, Thanks Mom

2011-07-31T09:11:00.000-07:00

Courtesy of my mother, who took the time to clip it out of the newspaper and send this to me. Gee, thanks for the depression Mom. What will I get for Christmas?

Credit: cartoonist David Fitzsimmons