This, That, The Other, And A Holiday Break

First, let us all bask in the glow that is this cool postcard that Lil' Sis (AKA The Mother Of Lemon Drop) sent to me this week.  This is how awesome my sister is.  While driving all over creation to various used bookstores to unload unread books her students refused to read (I don't care how low your lexile level is, I don't know a single high school student on this planet who would willingly choose to read Junie B. Jones) she found this gem.

Although really, didn't we already know Satan was a man?  Because really, if Satan was a woman - well, I'm just sayin' - girlfriend wouldn't have been banished to the bowels of H-e-double-hockey-sticks.

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On Wednesday, my Detroit Tigers made a move heard 'round the world, and basically caused 1/3 of my Twitter feed to lose it's mind (it was business as usual for the 1/3 romance novel and 1/3 librarian/publishing groups).  Prince Fielder, or as Wendy likes to call him when yelling at the TV every summer, "Fatty," has been traded to the Texas Rangers.  In exchange the Tigers sent cash and second baseman Ian Kinsler.

In the long run, this is probably a good move.  Prince's contract (something I've loathed from day one) was like three elephants in the room.  Kinsler's contract is nothing to sneeze at, but at least it's not as long term as Fielder's.  Also, the Tigers have to figure out a way to sign Max Scherzer (you know, the guy who won the Cy Young award this year) to an extension when he's represented by Scott Boras (an agent that most of us have made up a voodoo doll for).

So yeah.  So long Prince.  Yes, your contract drove me insane, and yes, you were non-existent in the playoffs the last two years.  But you're big and cuddly like a teddy bear, you have more Daddy Issues than a boatload of Harlequin Presents billionaires and you were Miguel Cabrera's Super Best Friend.  Bon voyage, and best of luck to you in Texas.

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And finally, next week is Thanksgiving here in the States - and Wendy will find herself unplugging due to various commitments.  Not that this blog has been a scintillating hotbed of interesting content this path month, but it's going to be even more of a vast wasteland next week.

On the bright side?  I hope that while I am unplugged I'll get a ton of reading done - which means once I'm back to my normal routine in December?  I should have lots of reviews coming down the pipe.

See you on the flip of the calendar!

TBR Challenge 2013: The Duke of Shadows

The Book: The Duke of Shadows by Meredith Duran

Particulars: Historical romance, 2008, Pocket, Out of Print, Available digitally

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?:  When this book was first released, everybody and their dead grandmother seemed to be reading it.  Dear Author even got a wee bit of blowback for posting three separate reviews for it.  I had nothing better to be annoyed about at the time, so basically dug in my heels, resisting.  Because that is what Wendy does when everybody is talking about the exact. same. book. for what seems like weeks on end.  At least until I went to RWA 2008 (Washington DC?) and got a copy for free - which has been languishing in my TBR ever since.

The Review:  Emmaline Martin was sailing to India with her parents to reunite with her betrothed when tragedy strikes.  There's a shipwreck, her parents die, but Emma miraculously lives.  Of course her rescue causes quite the gossip because she was, after all, rescued by.....men!  Surely she must have been ravished or compromised and thoroughly ruined.  Besides the speculation regarding her person, there are numerous rumors that people are delighted to share with her regarding her fiancé's various paramours.  Between the grief she feels for her parents, the uncertainty of finding herself in such a foreign land (India), and her fiancé being an asshole?  She meets Julian Sinclair, the Duke of Auburn.

Julian is also not immune to gossip and scandal.  He's part Indian, which naturally causes all sorts of talk among the British occupiers in that country.  Julian also feels, quite strongly, that mutiny may be at hand among the Indian troops.  Naturally though, the British occupiers are paying him no mind, and there is rampant speculation that Julian cannot be trusted.

This was a tale of two books for me.  The first half (Part I), which takes place entirely in India is really the money shot.  It's fantastic.  The author does a great job of showing the country through the eyes of her unsettled, grieving heroine, painting a portrait that shows the reader how Emma could, on one hand, be captivated by India, but also uncertain of her.  This is also where the real meat and potatoes of the romance lies.  Julian and Emma being thrown together, and literally fleeing for their lives once Julian's predictions come to pass.

The author gives us a romance between two outsiders.  Julian's struggles and the sheer amount of assholery he has to put up with given his "mixed" bloodlines is handled deftly.  Emma is an proper heiress, from a good family, who finds herself thrust into the spotlight at a time when she should be allowed to lock herself away and grieve.  As the reader, you want these two people to get together, if only for the fact that you know they're perfect for each other.

Where the book faltered for me was in Part II - once the story leaves India and moves back to England.  Frankly, this whole portion of the story hinges on improbability.  Emma is an heiress, a notorious one who survived a shipwreck, escapes India, and has a broken engagement to boot.  Julian is not only a bloody Duke - he's a bloody Duke who is part-Indian that people love to gossip about!  How these two could go three years (three years!!!!!) without having any contact or inkling about the other one is just patently absurd.  Honestly the only thing keeping them apart during this time is Emma's stupid pride, which was just annoying enough to, well - annoy me.  And Julian?  It doesn't say much for his intelligence and powers of deductive reasoning that he doesn't ferret out the truth about Emma once they both land in England.  It takes a chance encounter for them to come face-to-face again.

And by this point I started to lose interest.  Emma's haunted by what happened in India.  Emma paints some pictures.  Someone is out to silence Emma permanently.  Yada, yada, yada.

Which makes it sound like I didn't enjoy this book.  I did.  The first half is really great and Duran's prose is flat-out lovely (coupled with the fact that this was her debut - wow!).  I just spent the entire second half wishing things had taken a different path.  Like, oh, that the couple never left India at all and that story started, stayed, and finished there.

Final Grade = B

Rumors That Ruined A Lady

Rumors That Ruined A Lady by Marguerite Kaye is the fourth book in her Armstrong Sisters series and now is quite possibly my favorite.  The first two sisters were whisked off to Arabia to marry handsome sheikhs.  The third sister completely ruined herself by falling head over heels with an Italian painter and ran off to live blissfully happily-ever-after on the Continent.  Next in line is Caroline "Caro" Armstrong, long believed to be the obedient sister.  The girls' distant, emotionally neglectful father is a diplomat who is always looking to work the angles.  Now that he's remarried and his new wife has been doing her duty for King and country by squirting out baby boys - well, that means Lord Armstrong just wants to get his bothersome girls married off - preferably to men who will advance his own political standing.  The previous three girls proved very tiresome, but Caro?  It was always believed that Caro would do the right thing and marry the man her father hand picks for her.

Which she does, mores the pity, because that's how we as readers are introduced to her in the prologue.  Tossed out on her ear, with her husband spreading malicious rumors of her infidelity, and her former next door neighbor, Sebastian Conway, Marquis of Ardhallow finding her nearly overdosed on opium at house party. 

Caro and Sebastian go way back.  While an heir to one of the oldest titles in England, and technically "a catch" - Sebastian has a wicked reputation.  A reputation he has largely cultivated to get back at his own emotionally distant, cold father.  They tap-dance around each other, but given her ingrained sense of duty to please her father and his completely unsuitable reputation?  It's not shocking that Caro ends up married to her rat-bastard husband and Sebastian carries on for a few years, flitting about the Continent before his father's death calls him home to take over the title and estate.  He's positively shocked to find Caro in the state that she's in, and without his intervention, she could very well end up dead from an overdose.  So he does probably the best and worst possible thing for her and her reputation.  He takes her back to his home.

A good portion of this story is told in flashbacks, which I would normally consider one part fool's errand and another part the devil's playground.  Flashbacks are tricky things, and are much easier to muck up than pull off - but pull them off Kaye does.  It's really a good way to unfold this story, especially since we come into the whole affair with Caro already having left her husband.  As one could imagine, this does not do much for her reputation and it takes just a few whispers for her to fall very far indeed.  The flashbacks are utilized to unfold how Caro and Sebastian first met and how Caro comes to be married to another man.  It alternates back and forth in time in this manner until around the second half, when the flashbacks give way entirely to present day (in this case, present day being early-1830s).

The action in the story is mostly quiet, with Caro and Sebastian's internal angst mainly driving our story.  However the author tackles the very tricky subject of Caro still being married to her rat-bastard husband and her options when it comes to extricating herself from that union.  Here's the short answer: none of them are good.  Even though the man is swine, it's not as if divorcing him would favor her, let alone be easy even if she was able to pull it off.  The author does a good job of getting inside Caro's head, dealing with the pressures that someone in her situation would unenviably have faced, and in the end, resolves it all in a satisfactory manner - which given the historical facts of separation and divorce in the 19th century is not an easy feat!

It's a lovely angst-filled read featuring two emotionally damaged characters.  Sebastian has both Mommy and Daddy Issues, while Caro feels the pressure to return to a husband who frankly should be locked up in Newgate and a father who really has no regard for her person whatsoever.  As the reader we know that Caro and Sebastian will eventually find a way to be together (hey, it's a romance!), but this is one of those books where you really do wonder "How the hell is the author going to pull a rabbit out of this hat?!?!"

It's a great emotional, angst-filled historical romance - something I'm a total sucker for.  And oh goodie - we've got one more Armstrong sister to look forward to!

Final Grade = B+

Reminder: TBR Challenge for November

For those of you participating in the 2013 TBR Challenge, this is a reminder that your "commentary" is due on Wednesday, November 20.

The theme this month is All About The Hype.   You know, that book that everyone and their dead grandmother raved and raved about until you finally succumbed and bought the damn thing and naturally it's been languishing in your TBR for ::mumble mumble:: months/years/eternity.  However remember, the themes are totally and completely optional.  Maybe you're not a sucker like I am and have built up a strong resistance to rabid squee'ing.  Or maybe you just can't deal with the idea of dealing with hype this month. Hey, that's totally cool! The themes aren't important - it's the act of reading something, anything!, that has been lying neglected in your TBR pile.

Details about the challenge and a list of participants can be found here.

The Month That Was October 2013

Lemon Drop: Wee-woo, wee-woo, wee-woo!

Me: Cool costume Lemon Drop! 

Lemon Drop: We got a call that your hopes of hitting 100 books read in 2013 are going up in smoke.

Me: Hardy, har, har.  Yeah, it's not looking too good.  Too much working for a living, losing the summer months to baseball season, working for a living.....

Lemon Drop: Well, I'm here.  Stuck waiting for a grown-up to take me out for candy.  Why not tell me abut the pittance you did read?

Me: Only five books in October, which is pretty sad.  I blame work sucking out my brains.  But what I did get read was pretty good.  Nothing outright terrible and woohoo!  I found an A read!

Title links will take you to full reviews.

The Sword Dancer by Jeannie Lin - Historical Romance, Harlequin Historical, 2013, Grade = B

• Take swashbuckling and frontier-style themes of justice, toss them in a blender, and you get this book.  I enjoyed the action-oriented plot and Lin has this knack for including at least one scene between her romantic couple that damn near rips my guts out.

The Suicide Club by Gayle Wilson - Romantic Suspense, Mira, 2007, Grade = C-

•  My TBR Challenge read for the month.  I liked the idea of the plot, but the execution of said plot, along with the romance, didn't really gel for me. 

Expecting a Bolton Baby by Sarah M. Anderson - Contemporary Romance, Harlequin Desire, 2013, Grade = B-

• Third book in a trilogy featuring motorcycle guy heroes.  I was "over" this trend before it even began, but I liked the way Anderson wrote about these guys.  They don't come off as hairy, tattooed, misogynistic one-trick ponies.  The book was a little heavy on internal monologue for my tastes, and I wanted more dialogue - but a solid, enjoyable read.

A Cadence Creek Christmas by Donna Alward - Contemporary Romance, Harlequin Romance, 2013, Grade = B-

• The last book in this series really didn't work for me, but I had high hopes for this one and I thought the author pulled it off well.  The highlight?  While there is the whole Sparkly Small Towns Will Save Us All vibe, the author doesn't fall into the trap of letting her heroine be "rescued."  In other words?  The heroine solves her own damn problems - and falls in love along the way.

Now Or Never: Part I by Logan Belle - Erotic Romance Novella, Moxie Books, 2013, Grade = A

• The read of the month.  40-year-old woman just diagnosed with breast cancer finds her very own sexual "wingman" in the hero - a guy who trolls AA meetings looking for one-night-stands.  A gut-wrenching read - don't miss it.

Lemon Drop: "Wingman"is that like a pilot?

Me: Uh, go ask your mother....

Digital Review: Everything You Need To Know

When I first heard about Harlequin teaming up with Cosmo to launch the new digital line "Red Hot Reads," I'll admit I had certain preconceived notions.  When I think of Cosmopolitan magazine I think of sex, fun, a bit of glamor, a bit of that "upwardly mobile" stuff and hot guys.  Frankly walking into this new publishing endeavor thinking Heavy Soul-Crushing Angst would just be plain ol' nutty.

HelenKay Dimon has spent the last couple of years working within the Harlequin Intrigue universe.  Because of that it's easy to lose sight of the fact that she started her career publishing with Kensington Brava.  Brava, while probably considered tame in the wake of all that has followed, was one of the first mainstream erotic romance imprints - which means to say they're "sexy books."  Oh sure, Dimon writes a very good romantic thriller, but she's hardly a stranger to writing sexy, and Everything You Need To Know is a good reminder that she's not a one-trick pony.

Single women dating in Washington D.C. should get hazard pay.  After breaking up with her disastrous ex (he sort of forgot to mention he was already engaged!) and getting downsized from her job, Jordan McAdam gets a genius idea.  She starts a membership only dating web site called Need To Know.  For a fee, women join the site and can get the dirt, from other members, about the men they're dating.  For her part, Jordan is now working as a secretarial temp following up on some of the dirt that gets dished on her web site.  Which is how she meets elusive eligible bachelor Forest Redder.  Forest is at Jordan's latest temp job to put the kibosh on a deal with Jordan's temp boss - a guy who urinated on his last date's front porch after she wouldn't invite him in for an after dinner "drink."

Needless say, sparks fly.  Forest is so intrigued that he ends up running Jordan to ground even though he only has her last name to go by.  In turn, Jordan is intrigued by this sexy, successful man - even though he's the type of guy she has vowed to stay away from.  The fly in the ointment?  Their own personal baggage (he's the family black sheep, she's got a mother who has been married more times than Elizabeth Taylor) and the wee small fact that Jordan's identity as the owner of the infamous Need To Know web site is a big ol' secret.

This novella basically details "the chase" and "the fallout" once both characters learn to trust and let go of their secrets.  What I appreciated is that even with a Big Secret plot, Dimon doesn't have her characters resort to silly misunderstandings or temper tantrums.  In other words, Forest doesn't throw a big ol' hissy fit and behave like a toddler when he discovers that Jordan hasn't unloaded all her secrets to him the moment they hit the sheets.  It was nice to read about two characters, while both screwed up in their own ways, that didn't behave like petulant babies.

What didn't work quite as well for me was the pacing.  I cannot quite put my finger on it, but even reading this story in one sitting, it just felt a little "off" to me.  Maybe Jordan spending too much time with her BFF Elle in the beginning?  Maybe taking a little too long setting up the tango between Forest and Jordan?  Or maybe I'm just a deviant and wanted the Sexy Times to show up a teensy bit sooner.  Honestly, I could see some readers being surprised by that (pleasantly and unpleasantly).  There is hot sex in this story, but the novella isn't wall-to-wall-nothing-but-bumping-uglies.  There's, you know, an actual plot here.  So depending on what type of reader you are?  That could be a good or bad thing.

I mostly found it a very good thing.  I enjoy Dimon's cat-and-mouse-style thrillers, but I also really liked a number of her sexy contemporaries prior to her move to the Intrigue line.  Reading this novella is a good example that an author really can go home again.

Final Grade = B-

A Spoonful Of Sugar

I might have mentioned a time or two (or three....) that I judged a local RWA contest recently.  That's how I came to read my first book by Susan Meier - whose book Nanny For The Millionaire's Twins, won first place for category romance.  I did have issues with that particular book, but Meier slathered on enough angst and tugged at enough emotional heartstrings, that I knew I'd try another book by her.  Which is how I came to pick up Single Dad's Chrismas Miracle.  Besides the fact that I'm a sucker for Christmas stories, the author once again slathers on plenty of angst.  Unfortunately, just like the first book I tried by her?  The execution didn't really work for me.

Growing up in an abusive household (Daddy is a jackass), Althea Johnson ran away to California before the ink was barely dry on her high school diploma.  She became a pretty good teacher, but not good enough to survive budget cuts.  She's now on her way back east and her well-meaning sister (see: A Father For Her Triplets) has offered to give her a job in her bakery.  But Althea doesn't want to work in a bakery and she's not all that keen to go back to the hometown where her father still lives.  So through a friend of a friend she takes a job homeschooling Clark Beaumont's troubled son, Jack.

Clark's wife died in a car accident three years ago, when their daughter Teagan wasn't quite six months old.  It was only after the fact that Clark learned his wife was having an affair.  The "other man" literally threw himself on the casket at the funeral and started wailing.  So yeah, there's been a tiny bit of gossip - to which Clark's response has basically been to isolate his kids in their house.   Jack's now rebelling and Teagan doesn't speak out loud.  Clark, in such a deep state of denial, doesn't really see there being a problem.  Teagan is "just shy."  Jack is just being lazy and not showing initiative.  Althea, wishing someone had seen something, done anything, when she was growing up tormented by an abusive father is determined to save this family.  But can Clark and Althea keep their relationship strictly professional?  Because heaven knows they both think they're too damaged to move on to any sort of romantic entanglement.

Yes, what we have here is your basic Mary Poppins romance.  Althea swoops in, with her drive and determination, takes the kids into town, bakes cookies with them, shows Clark the error of his ways, and everything turns out rosy in the end.  Well, sort of.  The only thing keeping this story from collapsing under the weight of a mountain of sugar is Althea's baggage.  Part of me thought she probably should have been more screwed up, but certainly she's not one to hop into healthy relationships.  Prior to Clark, her boyfriends consisted of a series of "beach bums" who mooched off of her.  Of course they also didn't beat the crap out of her like Daddy did - so there's that.  So it's easy to see why she fights her attraction to Clark the way she does.

What didn't really gel for me was Clark's baggage.  Dead Wifey was having an affair for a year prior to her death.  Teagan is six months old.  Clark has real fears that Teagan ain't his kid - but instead doing anything about it, he lives in fear that The Boyfriend will just magically show up one day and take her away.  He doesn't talk to a lawyer.  He doesn't get a paternity test.  He basically just works and keeps his kids at home.  All the time.  He doesn't quite succumb to Magical Thinking, and I get that he would be afraid, but this Other Man is dealt with in a very perfunctory manner.  A guy who bursts into tears and throws himself on his lover's casket at her funeral, in front her husband and family - does this sound like a guy who would just go quietly into that good night?  Especially when he accuses Clark of not giving his wife the divorce she asked for (when in reality - she didn't - but Clark doesn't tell Other Man that).

The angst, while intriguing, just never quite came together for me.  And while I am reading a romance novel and I do want things to be rosy and sunny in the end?  For me, none of the problems that these characters faced were dealt with in a manner I felt were realistic.  Jack's problems are solved by Althea taking him out of the house and promising him that if he gets his grades up he can go to public school.  He's a boy who is angry and resentful of his father, and that's all it takes to turn him into a perfect kid?  And why exactly doesn't Teagan talk?  Yes, she would be shy since her only playmate is her big brother, but kids don't just not talk for a no reason.  All it takes to fix that is Althea swooping in, letting her pick out a gaudy wreath for the front door and putting pretty barrettes in her hair?  Color me skeptical.

At the end of the day this ended up being an OK read.  I had issues, but I kept flipping the pages and zipped through the story at a fairly fast clip.  There's a lot of promise here, it just never felt fully executed and delivered to me.  Would I try another book by this author?  After two C reads in a row?  Maybe if the right back cover blurb came along.

Final Grade = C