Digital Review: There's Something About Ari

Disclaimer: I'm friends with L.B. Gregg.  She's also been known to keep me in chardonnay at RWA conferences.  All of which has nothing do with the fact that I frickin' LOVED this novella.  You'll just have to take my word for it.  The free wine had nothing to do with it.

I am an unrepentant sucker for a friends-to-lovers romance.  So I was probably predisposed to liking There's Something About Ari by L.B. Gregg.  But then you mix in what I enjoy about her Gregg's writing in the first place (more on that in a bit) on top of friends-to-lovers and the undercurrent of angsty character baggage?  I was totally gone.  Over the moon.  I had my full swoon on.  Yes, I can see that this story isn't perfect.  Because it's not.  I had quibbles.  But frankly?  I didn't care.  The quibbles were pretty easy to ignore once I had my full-blown swoon on.

Buck Ellis had one mission in life: getting the hell out of Bluewater Bay, Washington.  And he was so close!  Full-ride college scholarship in hand.  Then his mom dies and it's just Buck and his kid brother, Charlie.  Dad passed away years earlier, which means the boys are now orphans and Buck is "technically" an adult at 18.  What other choice is there?  Buck doesn't leave, determined to raise Charlie, get him off to college, which means no full-ride scholarship and sticking around in Bluewater Bay to work as a crappy coffee barista.  On top of all this (because, you know, this isn't enough), his best friend, his only friend, Ari Valentine helps himself to Buck's saved money and skips town.  Runs away for good.  Ari.  Who Buck fell in love with when they met on the playground as kids.  As childhood turns to teen hormones, Buck realized he was fully in love (and lust) with Ari.  Complicated, nothing but trouble, Ari.  He watched while Ari "dated" (OK, banged) every other girl in high school and kept his crush to himself.

Back then, I'd died small deaths every time he looked at me, or talked to me, or slept on the floor of my bedroom, or borrowed a fucking pen.  God.  He made me cold.  He made me hot.  Sweaty.  Sick.  Happy.  Sad.  Horny.  Ashamed.  The whole fucking enchilada.  Squared.  It hadn't made sense then, because I'd been so afraid, so terrified of making a fatal error and losing him forever.

Now Ari is back in town.  He's an actor and has landed a part on the new TV show, Wolf's Landing, which is filming on location in Bluewater Bay.  So Ari is back in his hometown, living right next door (literally) to Buck.  Complicating all the baggage, all the words left unspoken between them?  Yeah, Buck's still got it bad for Ari Valentine. 

This novella opens up with Ari and Buck meeting on the playground as kids and that opening scene had me half-gone before I even got to Chapter 2.  There's a sweetness, a charm, to those moments.  Watching two boys, both outsiders, find each other - which had nothing do with romance (because, hello?  Kids!) and everything to do with finding your first real friend.  That other person who just seems to "get" you.

What charms me the most about Gregg's work is her ability to weave tangible, believable, human interaction.  Her relationship building.  I genuinely like her characters - flaws and all.  These are the kind of people I would want to know in real life - warts and all.  And certainly there are warts.  Ari taking off like he did (although he had reasons), Buck who is emotionally stunted (again, reasons), and the various secondary characters.  As Ari and Buck navigate their way towards each other, they also must navigate their pasts, all that has been left unsaid and, in a bit I especially loved, the idea of a "real" relationship.  Buck's been busy trying to keep what family he has left together.  Which means his past "relationships" (and I use the term loosely) were self-destructive, furtive one-night-stands that mostly took place with out-of-town tourists in public restrooms (Real relationship experience?  Nil).  And now here's Ari....right next door.  Ari who he has all of the these complicated feelings for, which means yeah - not exactly quickie in the restroom material.  Plus, Ari broke his heart once.  Buck doesn't think he could survive round #2.

Even as I was swooning from the characters, the relationships, the baggage, the "fun" that is Gregg's writing style - I could see some cracks.  There's not a lot of scene setting here, this being the second entry in the Bluewater Bay, multi-author, continuity series.  On one hand it's great, because there's no annoying sequel-baiting "walk on" characters mucking up the already tight word count.  But on the other hand, while I was intrigued by Buck and Ari right away as characters, the back-story of the series was slower coming into focus.  Also, the ending is a bit rushed.  I've seen other reviews stating this and I'm not going to say those readers are wrong.  This is a novella and I loved these characters, their romance, their baggage, their relationship, so much that I easily, happily would have spent 300 pages with them.  It helps tremendously that Gregg employed the ol' friends-to-lovers trope here, as it's more believable that two people who already have a shared history together can declare true love for each other in 100 pages - but still?  It's rushed.  But damn, that ending is sweet all the same.  Genuinely, lovingly sweet.  I wanted to jump through my Kindle screen and hug every damn person in this story.

There's also a few dangling threads, mostly revolving around Buck's identity as a gay man.  I wouldn't necessarily say he's been living in the closet - I mean, his boss knows he's gay.  But when it comes to younger brother Charlie?  That's where I'm not sure.  I mean, Buck's no virgin - but again, it's been wham-bam one-night stands.  Buck doesn't "do" sleepovers for obvious reasons.  So it would have been interesting to read about Charlie finding out that Ari (who he follows around a bit like a puppy) and Buck were hooking up as a couple - and, you know, confirmation that Charlie is aware that his brother is gay.  Seeing more on that front would have been nice.

However, as it is, I still enjoyed this story immensely.  I inhaled it in fact.  It charmed the ever-lovin' snot out of me.  I just loved everything about these characters and it pushed every. single. one. (seriously) of Wendy's friends-to-lovers trope buttons.  No, it's not perfect.  But I loved it.  I wish I could reread it for the first time all over again.

Final Grade = A-

ETA: I labelled this as a "digital review," but it is also available in good ol' fashioned print!  My bad.

The DNF Round-Up

My pile of ARCs is beyond out of control and if there is any hope of me seeing the light at the end of the tunnel I have given myself permission to start DNF'ing (Do Not Finish) more.  I DNF for a variety of reasons - which this round-up will ably illustrate.  Here are three titles I recently gave up on, but hey - maybe they'll work for you!

Snowbound Surprise for the Billionaire by Michelle Douglas was downloaded via Netgalley because 1) Harlequin Romance 2) Christmas read and 3) Boss/Secretary trope.  Unfortunately I ended up DNF'ing it around 30% out of disinterest.

It starts out promising, with the hero buying the heroine's family farm but stipulating that he wants her to stay on to help jump start his business plan.  She's desperate to "escape" and have a life of her own.  When the hero overhears this he proposes she travel with him to Munich on business.  His PA cannot travel with him for some reason that I forget now and heroine would serve as his temp.

This lost steam for me with the, what I felt was, odd transition from the farm to being the hero's PA on a business trip.  After that it descends into a travelogue of Munich, the heroine being a wide-eyed tourist, happy to finally escape the Australian countryside.  Nothing terribly "bad" about this per se - I was just bored by it.  It didn't grab me.  It was totally shaping up to be an "average" C read for me, and I was ready to move on.

If you know absolutely nothing about baseball there's probably a good story in A League of Her Own by Karen Rock - an author I've really enjoyed in the past.  Heroine was collegiate softball star and now coaches.  Her Daddy owns a minor league, Triple-A baseball team.  Daddy has heart attack, heroine convinces him to give her the vacant head coaching job on the team.  Hero is a washed up pitcher, now sober, who was signed by Daddy and hopes his second chance jump-starts his baseball career.

The baseball stuff here is wronger than wrong.  Triple-A is the top minor league stop before you go to the big leagues.  Minor league owners do NOT sign players.  General Managers and the front office with the "big clubs" are responsible for filling out rosters (through free agency, the draft, Rule 5 picks etc.) in the entire farm system (Single, Double and Triple A teams).  Their job, their desire, is to pick talented players who will eventually become major league baseball players.  Your farm system, at all levels, is there to serve the major league club.  Hence no minor league owner anywhere would sign a player.  A major league owner might have some sway, but not a piddly minor league owner.  It's not plausible.

Minor league owners do NOT hire coaches!  Again, GMs and the front office at the "big clubs" do that.  The major league club has drafted all of these talented players, they're not leaving those players in the hands of a some coach that the minor league owner hired who could be a total wahoo.  And while I'm at it?  There is more than one coach on any minor league team.  Using the Toledo Mud Hens as an example (Detroit's Triple-A team) you have a pitching coach, hitting coach and yes - then your manager (head coach).  Hell, when the Tigers hired new pitching coaches for both Triple A and Single A this off-season the announcement came from Dave Dombrowski's office (Tigers GM).  And while I'm at it - even though Daddy is looking to sell his Minor League team because they are losing money?  He'd have a hard time doing it without input from the major league club, who he would be under contractual obligation to.  Major League Baseball teams enter into agreements with these minor league affiliates.  Teams can even change affiliation over time (the Syracuse Chiefs, now Washington Nationals Triple A was once the Triple A team for the Toronto Blue Jays, one example) - but again, these are contractual agreements.  Like stadium deals.  You're going to be "our team" through 2017, for example.  Now if the major league club decided to not renew the contract?  Then yes, Daddy could sell the team.  But he'd also have no players - since the abandoning major league club would move their rosters to whatever city they set up camp in next. 

Then the heroine gets the job as manager and starts thinking of ways to increase attendance.  Uh, no.  NOT YOUR JOB CUPCAKE!!  Your job is to manage.  To coach.  To get the players ready for a possible call-up to the big club.  The job of PR?  The job of getting butts in the seat?  Minor league teams, especially as high up as Triple A (!!!) have front office staffs for that.  Minor league promotional departments are legendary in fact.  Best family fun a little amount of money can buy in a lot of cities.

So yeah, the baseball stuff is jacked up.  But if you know nothing about baseball and don't rightly care?  Heroine is desperate for Daddy's approval, the hero is a recovering alcoholic, and if you combine both of the chips they have on their shoulders you've got Texas.  I've liked Rock's books in the past but this one was a non-starter for me. Because, you know, baseball. 

You can all wake up now.  This concludes Inside Baseball Hour at the Bat Cave.

Texas Mail Order Bride by Linda Broday is the first book in a trilogy and doesn't release until January 6.  For that reason I hesitated blogging about it, but figure my quibbles are minor enough that they won't turn off every reader of this blog.  Heroine is a mail order bride from the South (uh, somewhere - I can't remember) who steps off the train only to realize her groom (the hero) has no idea she even existed.  He didn't write her all those letters, some impostor did - and his two brothers have assured him it wasn't them.  She has nothing to go home to so convinces the crotchety general store owner to give her a job.  Hero continues to be flummoxed by her very arrival and presence even though they were barely on page together for the first couple of chapters.  Naturally, you have the two sequel-baitin' brothers hanging around and it appears someone is out to settle a score with the hero over Lord knows what because I didn't get that far.

I DNF'ed this one because of writing style.  I've read Broday in the past and liked those books to varying degrees.  But here?  Ever start a book and feel like you should "know" the characters already?  Like you're jumping into book #3 in a series without having read the preceding two?  Yeah, that.  And since this is book one in a trilogy?  It was really unsettling.  There's just....no early character development.  I was like, "I don't know these people so why should I care about them?"  What I did read led me to believe this is going to be a "fun" historical western of the light, bantering variety - and honestly?  Those are harder sells for me.  I like dark, gritty, holy crap are we gonna die when winter hits?! historical westerns.  But if you like fun westerns?  Read a sample, see if it's your thing.  The older I get the pickier I get with westerns, mostly because I want what I want - and so very few western romance authors seem to be working in "gritty" milieus these days. 

Maggie Osborne could come out of retirement any day now.  Seriously.

Don't feel too sorry for me though.  In between the DNFs I found several quality reads, including two books that will make my eventual Best of 2014 list.  We'll see how many more of these style posts I do in the future.  One of my resolutions for 2015 is to put books on shorter leashes.  Otherwise, I'll never get through the pile. 

A Beaumont Christmas Wedding

Disclaimer: Anderson and I presented a workshop together at RWA 2014 (San Antonio).

Back in the Long Ago Time when Wendy first discovered the goody-goodness that is category romance, Desire was my favorite line.  I loved the short word counts (less than 200 pages), the sizzle (PG-13ish), and you still got the fairy tale without wading through too many Alphahole sheikh tycoons.  And then, predictably, the Desire line changed to the point where it started smacking of Harlequin Presents II, just with more cowboys and babies.  I strayed from the line, taking my category addiction elsewhere.

Then in 2011 I was standing outside a conference room, on my way to a cocktail party at RWA (this was Wendy's Librarian of the Year year - there were lots of parties!) and I met Sarah M. Anderson a debut author whose first book was slated for a December release.  As tends to happen when I meet authors at RWA, I read her book, and really, really liked it.  It reminded me so much of "old school" Desires that I started to pay attention to the line again.

A Beaumont Christmas Wedding is the third book in her series about an American brewing dynasty that puts the FUN in DYSFUNCTIONAL!  Matthew Beaumont is the PR whiz for the company and has convinced his six months older half brother (remember, FUN!), Phillip and his bride-to-be, Jo to have a big splashy society wedding.  Being one of his father's long string of illegitimate bastards, Matthew has a driving need to prove that he's a "real" Beaumont and his way of doing that is controlling and spinning the press, all while digging his various siblings out of various PR snafus.  What he didn't plan on?  The maid of honor, Whitney Maddox....or should I say Whitney Wildz.

Think of Whitney as an older, wiser Miley Cyrus.  She was a Disney Channel-like pop princess who sex'ed and boozed up her act once she hit 18 to make everyone forget she was a Disney Channel-like pop princess.  Publicity follows Whitney around like Britney Spears back when she had her meltdown and shaved her head.  Anywho, those days are long past.  Whitney is a respected horse breeder, which is how she knows Jo, and lives a very quiet, solitary life.  But this does little to quell Matthew's concerns.  Whitney Wildz at his brother's wedding?  This can only mean disaster.

I wanted to like this story more than I did.  On paper it's a really great idea.  Matthew is damn near wedding obsessed and is wound so tight I wouldn't be surprised if he pooped out diamonds.  These are normally character traits reserved for romance heroines, more so than heroes.  And I liked the idea of Whitney being a reformed teen idol who is now living life as a normal person, but who has enough of a past that she's going to generate headlines once those cell phone cameras start clicking.  Plus both characters have very similar baggage - they essentially don't know who they are.  Is Whitney Whitney Maddox or Whitney Wildz?  Is Matthew Matthew Beaumont or Matthew Billings?  That's compelling conflict for a romance novel.

So where does it misfire for me?  Mostly with execution.  The way Matthew wants to spin the PR after he discovers just who the maid of honor is doesn't make it seem like he's that good at his job - but then I always thought a good defense was a good offense.  Also, there's events during the climactic finish that struck me as not very plausible.  I mean, by all accounts the Phillip/Jo wedding is a big ol' society event with muchos celebrities crawling out of the woodwork (although Jay Z and Beyonce sent their regrets).  I had a hard time believing that a once scandalous teen idol who had dropped out of the public eye would cause that much of a stir at such an event - but hey, what do I know?

There's also the small matter that Matthew is a bit of a jerk.  I actually still "liked" him despite him being a jerk because the author made me believe in his baggage.  But, that being said?  He still does some things over the course of the story that had me muttering under my breathe. Both instances were when he used his family members for his own gain in some way - especially Phillip's alcoholism, which was beyond the pale for me since I loved Phillip's book.  Baggage, Wendy has it.  Also, speaking of substance issues, I felt like this aspect of Whitney's past was not addressed very well.  Or, at all.  Granted the author just published a book where substance abuse was a big, huge part of the conflict, but the surface is barely scratched with Whitney.  Instead we get to read about her klutziness, which I suspect like all klutz heroines before her I'm supposed to find "cute."  But I don't.  I'm just kind of annoyed.  Hold the klutz, give me the Angsty McAngst-Pants please.

Which makes it sound like this is a "bad" book.  No, it's not.  It's really quite readable, I enjoyed most of it, and there were even two instances where I laughed out loud (the name of Whitney's Christmas album is priceless!).  It just didn't tick off all of Wendy's Personal Trope Boxes and I found myself comparing it quite a bit (OK, a lot) to Phillip's book.  Which, you know, I really, really enjoyed.

Final Grade = B-

Under The Skin: Intrusion

You start a book.  You read a few chapters and think, "Hmmmm, this is OK. Maybe."  You're not quite sure if it's your thing or not, but you keep reading.  Then the author gut-punches you.  You swoon under the sheer weight of the emotion.  You wonder, how is she going to tie it all up?  And then?  AND THEN?!?!?!  You get to the finish line and you're thinking, "Wait. Is what I think is happening REALLY happening?!"

The answer would be yes.  And yes, the above is an exact moment by moment account of what my reading of Intrusion by Charlotte Stein was like.  It was one hell of a roller coaster ride.  I cannot remember the last time a story put me through these kinds of paces and for that?  Yep, my second A grade in a matter of days.

This is going to be a hard review to write, mostly because I think it's the sort of story one needs to go into "blind."  But I'm going to try.  Stein's latest follows the lives of two damaged people who have been touched by violence - Beth and Noah.  They meet when Beth, still picking up the pieces, thinks Noah has dog-napped her dog.  So even though his house looks like something out of a horror movie, she goes over there to confront him.  Naturally he did not, in fact, dog-nap her dog - but she soon realizes that her sleepwalking neighbor is also living in fear.  What follows is them tentatively forging a friendship, and succumbing to their mutual attraction for each other - which is, hello, complicated.

First things first - Stein has a very unique writing style.  She writes the way some of us think.  It's very stream of consciousness and can be a little jarring.  I like Stein's writing, but even so it still took me a few chapters to wrap my head around it.  So I always recommend that new readers download a sample before ponying up for the whole book.

Also, as much as I don't want to give too much away, given that both characters have been exposed to violence?  Expect some thriller elements at play here.  I have a hard time classifying it as romantic suspense - but if you're a reader who prefers to not read romantic suspense?  That's all I'm saying.

Now, on to the good stuff.  Of which there is so much in this story.  I read an exorbitant amount of romance, and of that?  I read my fair share of what can be classified as "erotic romance."  You would think this wouldn't be so hard to come by, but erotic romance with real passion?  With real intensity?  Not always easy to find or pull off and Stein does it with Beth and Noah.  The tension, the sizzle, these two tap-dancing around each other?  I'm getting heart palpitations just thinking about it.  This is a very common pitfall in the sub genre.  Authors get so hung up on writing about kink or fetish thinking that's going to make the book "hot" - when in reality?  No.  No it doesn't.  It just makes it kinky.  What makes a book "hot" is that intensity between the characters.  You know that saying about the brain being the biggest erogenous zone?  Yeah, Stein gets that.

She gets it because she excels at awkward.  People are people.  We like to think we're cool and suave and will say all the right things - but in reality?  No.  No we won't.  We're not cool.  We're not suave.  And for most of us, when we meet a person who gives us that zing of attraction?  We turn into blithering idiots who can't string a full sentence together.  Stein gets that.  She really, really gets that.

Instead of "meet cute" it's more like "meet holy crap did I just make an ass out of myself?  Of course I did."

Beth and Noah are the types of characters who aren't comfortable in their own skin.  They're damaged goods.  Damaged goods who are wildly attracted to each other but also frightfully scared.  With good reason.  These are people who need each other so desperately and yet you wonder if they're going to be able to get past the scared.  This is a romance, so they do - and those moments?  Oh happy sigh!

The ending is - well the ending is where this book is going to divide or conquer the reader.  I'll be honest - I can poke holes in it all day long.  Hell, I could drive a truck through the holes.  And yet?  I don't care.  Because by this point Stein had grabbed a hold of my hand and was dragging me along for the ride.  I was swept up in it.  The intensity.  The emotion.  I had ALL THE FEELS!!!  So yes.  Will the ending work for everybody?  No.  And I can respect that.

I read a lot and I've read a lot of good books this year.  But it's the amazing book, the cut above book, that sticks with me and sends me on a journey like Stein does here.  It's not going to be for everybody, but it totally was everything for me.

Final Grade = A

A Cowboy For Christmas

I have read Lacy Williams' entire Love Inspired Historical backlist to date.  She has a way of delivering a Christian message without completely running off the rails into preaching territory.  She is able to do this because she does have "pet themes."  All of her books, to varying degrees, have covered things like redemption, forgiveness and fear.  These fit nicely into a Christian doctrine, but are also amazingly universal.  Redemption, forgiveness and fear?  I defy one person who claims to have never been touched by any of those, whether or not they believe in a higher power.

A Cowboy for Christmas is the latest book in the author's long-running Wyoming Legacy series, about the large White family of mostly adopted children.  This is Ricky White's story, and Ricky has a lot to atone for.  After a falling out in the previous book, he's in a neighboring town when a saloon fight he's involved in gets out of hand.  Daisy Richards ends up as collateral damage when her wagon overturns, catches fire, and she ultimately loses her right arm.  This accident has changed Daisy.  She's afraid.  She's a prisoner in her father's home, by her own choosing.  But now her father is getting remarried (after many years of widower-hood) and Daisy finds herself saddled with two rambunctious stepbrothers and a stepmother who feels like Daisy has been coddled long enough.  The girl has to start living sometime.

The accident was a wake-up call for Ricky.  Having spent the last several years boozing, gambling, and carousing, he is sickened by the knowledge that his actions have adversely affected someone else.  He wants to atone.  He wants to help Daisy.  So he hires on at her father's ranch, so he can keep an eye on her, maybe help her in some small ways.  What happens instead?  He finds himself drawn to her.  He finds himself falling for her.  An added complication since she has no idea that it was his carelessness that led to the accident.

Ricky and Daisy are both afraid for their own reasons.  Daisy is still coming to terms with the accident.  As a woman, she feels that her "worth" is now "less than."  Who is going to want her now that she's lost an arm?  How will she be able to take care of a household?  Children?  Heck, even write legibly (she was right-handed and lost her right arm).  And even though she's carrying around her fair share of self-pity, she cannot abide being the object of others' pity.  Which is why she has shut herself off from her friends, has refused to attend church or go to town, to essentially hide in her bedroom at her father's ranch.  Some of the best emotional moments in this story are when Daisy accuses Ricky of pitying her.

Ricky is afraid of not only Daisy learning the truth, but of his past in general - which he is ashamed of.  There's the baggage from his childhood, the fact that he feels like he "abandoned" his family, and now Daisy.  He doesn't pity her, but he does feel guilt.  He has changed this woman's life and now she's a shadow.  So he goes about showing her that she may have lost an arm, but she's not dead yet.  Out of these moments spent together blooms a tentative friendship and ultimately, attraction.

It's the attraction between the romantic couple that really struck me with this story.  When inspirational romances stumble for me, this is usually where it happens.  Williams has a way of keeping the romance "gentle," but not undercutting it to the point where you begin to wonder if the characters are eunuchs.  I'd hardly call it steamy, but she gives their interaction some sizzle - with the looks, the inadvertent light touches, and finally - the kisses.  When Ricky and Daisy kiss it's enough to make your heart swoon.

Even though part of a series, I think this book stands alone very well.  Ricky and Daisy have a pretty big hurdle to their happy ending, and while it's typical Romancelandia how Daisy learns the truth about Ricky (sigh - the one misstep for me), I loved that it's also the moment in the book where Ricky learns to stand up and not run.  A lovely read, ideal for this time of year.  It's the kind of story you want to curl up next to a fireplace with on a snowy Christmas Eve.

Final Grade = A-

Drowning And Rebirth

Drowning by Jassy De Jong is a complicated book to write a review for.  A lot of this is probably going to come off sounding like "damning with faint praise."  However, as much as I had quibbles, I was also drawn into the story.  In other words, it got a reaction out of me.  Which, especially in the case of erotica, is always a good thing.  Technically a romance, it features some triggers that will probably not work for some readers, but they mostly worked for me.  And given my current case of reading malaise, that's saying something.

Erin Mitchell is a New York City photographer currently in South Africa with her husband, Vince.  Vince, also a photographer, has brought her to the country on assignment, and despite somewhat still being newlyweds, they've had a fight.  A pretty big fight.  While he's in the Land Rover, she's following behind with a driver in a teeny Toyota Yaris.  Then a raging storm kicks up, Vince pulls a way, and a bridge washes out underneath the Toyota.  Erin almost dies, but is rescued and revived by Nicholas de Lanoy, a wealthy man who lives nearby.  Her husband on the other side of the river, with no way to join him, Erin finds herself stranded on Nicholas' estate until the bridge can be rebuilt.

The first trigger warning for readers is that, while technically a romance, Erin does commit adultery.  Yes, she is married.  Yes, she has sex with Nicholas.  Erin is struggling, emotionally, physically and psychologically - and there is handsome Nicholas, her rescuer, the man who saves her from death, sending heated glances and sexual signals that could light up Times Square.

It's evident early on that Vince is an abusive a-hole.  De Jong also writes suspense novels under the name Jassy MacKenzie, and this background is put to good use in Vince's character.  He hasn't beaten Erin bloody (yet), but you can see it unfolding - the barbs, the mind games, the violent fits of temper, the isolating her from her family and friends, the totally irrational jealousy.  Things are so bad, Erin is so mindful of not setting Vince off, that she downplays her ordeal.  She doesn't tell Vince she almost died (and the reasons for that are mind-blowing).  It made the hair on the back of my neck stand up and do the rumba. 

For those following along at home:

Trigger Warning #1 = Adultery
Trigger Warning #2 = Abusive husband

Eventually the author has to set things right for Erin, which she does.  For a long while I would have classified this story as "erotic women's fiction," and I think it works best on that level.  It practically screams "book club read," if you're lucky enough to have an adventurous book club.  The sex here is what I call Hot Vanilla.  I read my fair share of erotica and erotic romance and honestly?  It's nice to read a story every once in a while that isn't loaded down by the kinky and bizarre.  Yes, I'm well aware that kinky and bizarre is in the eye of the beholder - but the sex between Nicholas and Erin is blessedly pretty straight forward.  It's something I would have no problem recommending to a reader who isn't 1) familiar with erotica and/or 2) isn't always entirely comfortable with it.

The ending lands us smack dab into romance territory as Erin does get her happy ending.  I'm slightly torn over it, mostly because I don't think heroines like Erin should jump right into a "happy ending."  They should be jumping right into therapy and "finding themselves."  But the author wisely employs an epilogue (one year into the future) and it's a case where the book really needed that epilogue.  I suspect some readers will be disappointed that our villain isn't dispatched with in a bloodthirsty manner - but the author sticks to a more (sadly) true to life ending in that regard.

Drowning is the story of a woman finding herself and the man who hands her the road map to do it.  It's certainly not a book for everyone, and is not always easy to read, but it is thought-provoking and compelling.  I'm, admittedly, always a little leery of authors who jump into erotica after establishing themselves in other genres - but De Jong has written a fundamentally sound erotic piece of women's fiction while staying true to the number one rule.  That is, it's all about the character's journey.  In this case - Erin's.  Erin who finds herself by almost dying.

Final Grade = B

Sign Up Now: 2015 TBR Challenge

The TBR Challenge has been kicking around Romancelandia, in one guise or another, for a number of years.  I took over hosting duties in 2011 and have decided that, once again, I'll bring the challenge back for 2015.

What is the TBR Challenge? Simply put, it's where readers pick up a long neglected book from their TBR pile, read it, and comment on that read on the 3rd Wednesday of every month. The idea is to read those long neglected books that you just had to get your hands on at the time, but have been languishing in your pile, all lost and forgotten.

Commentary on your chosen TBR read can happen anywhere online (your blog, Facebook, GoodReads, Twitter, a message board etc.) just provide me with a link when you sign-up so interested readers can follow all the challengers!

Why do I make you do "homework?"  Honestly?  Because it's fun.  Over the years many people have commented how much they enjoy following along with the TBR Challenge participants to discover "long lost gems" and maybe get a different perspective on a book they read years ago.  Plus is the one day every month where you are guaranteed to get some good book chatter.

This is a voluntary challenge and I want it to be fun.  Which means if you skip a month (or, uh, several), I'm not going to publicly shame you.  Hey, life happens.  Even to the best of us.  Also, I am keeping up with the tradition of providing monthly themes.  Some participants like that added focus.  Some prefer to go "off theme" and read wherever their mood takes them.  And both are perfectly and totally acceptable!  The goal of this challenge is to read neglected books out of your TBR, whatever they may be.

Monthly Commentary Dates + Suggest Themes

January 21 - We Love Short Shorts! (Category romance, novellas, short stories)

February 18 - Recommended Read (A book recommended to you by another reader/blogger etc.)

March 18 - Series Catch-Up (A book in a series you are behind on)

April 15 - Contemporary

May 20 - Kickin' It Old School (Copyright date is 10 years or older)

June 17 - More Than One (An author who has more than one book in your TBR pile)

July 15 - Lovely RITA (past RWA RITA winner and/or nominees)

August 19 - Impulse Read (The book you bought because of the cover or The book you bought on impulse or The book you cannot remember why you bought in the first place!)

September 16 - Historical

October 21 - Paranormal or romantic suspense

November 18 - It's All About The Hype (a book or author that got everybody talking)

December 16 - Holiday Themes (Christmas, Valentine's Day, any holiday!)

If you would like to sign-up for next year's challenge - please leave a comment on this post, and include a link to where you will be posting your commentary.  Or feel free to e-mail me the information.  I will then post the links to all the participants on the 2015 TBR Challenge Information Page so people can follow along (and discover new blogs!)

I take sign-ups for the challenge year round - so if you don't get on board in January, it's not too late. I hope to see plenty of veterans back and a hearty round of newcomers!  All aboard!

Reloading The Canon: A Look At Erotic Romance

The idea of a romance genre "canon" has been discussed and debated before, even by yours truly (now the most popular post ever to exist on this blog).  Canon is not always a word I'm entirely comfortable with, mostly because all genres ebb and flow over time.  For me, genre fiction (all genres, not just romance) are a reflection of their times.  Therefore, when looking back on important books in genre history, it often requires readers to put on those rose-colored glasses.  To view the work through the lens of history.  Not all books "stand the test of time" - nor should they be required to.

I got the idea for this post from Victoria Dahl and some kerfuffles that have erupted over the past few days.  Victoria pointed out an influential erotic romance book, now ten years old on Twitter.  I agreed with her, and stated that it's a book I point anyone to who is interested in erotic romance "history."

Which leads us to this post.  Wendy's Top 10 "Canonical" Works In Erotic Romance.  First, the caveats:

1) I'm going to be focusing heavily on the past 20 years or so.  There are countless works (from the bodice ripper era specifically) that I'll leave off.  Mostly because I'm not an expert in this era of romance and don't want to talk out of my backside.

2) I'm going to focus heavily on the "romance" word.  There are countless authors who will not make the cut because their work is more "erotica" than "romance" (Zane would be a prime example.  She's hugely important when we're talking erotica written for a female readership, but I have a hard time classifying her as romance.  Feel free to disagree with me in the comments).

3) I'll name specific titles when I can, but that's really hard for some authors.  In which case, I'll just be naming names.

In no particular order....

1) Skye O'Malley by Bertrice Small (1980). You can make a serious case for Small's The Kadin, but I'm going with that erstwhile Skye O'Malley, the heroine who launched six books and a thousand erotic ships.  Literally.  O'Malley is captain of her own ship, caught in the intrigue of Queen Elizabeth I's court.  Bodices rip, the language is lush and purple.  Love her, hate her, it doesn't really matter.  Small is one of the grand dames of not only erotic romance, but the romance genre as a whole.  If erotic romance were an envelope, Small would be the stamp.

2) Thea Devine.  I can't pick one book by Devine, it's just not possible.  Her writing style is....different.  Her plots are pure Soap Opera Bodice Rippin' WTFBBQ Sauce.  And gods help me, I love her for it.  I love her for it because Devine allowed her heroines to be just as morally ambiguous, just as duplicitous, as her Alphahole heroes in an era when we were overrun with Sweet As Pie, Butter Doesn't Melt In Her Mouth Virgins.  OK, I'll pick a book by Devine.  Desired.  Because it's trashy and southern and gleefully over the top.

3) Susan Johnson.  Again, nearly impossible to pick one title.  Most fans point to her Braddock series (book one is Blaze) and that seems a solid place to start as any.  Queen of the Footnote, Johnson was known for (especially in her earlier works) to really delve into her research.  Then she tossed in plenty of Old School Shenanigans and naughty Sexy Times.  She also published with Playboy Press early in her career, meaning that Johnson found a way to get her work out there, even before the "erotic romance" label was a "thing."

4) The Lady's Tutor by Robin Schone (1999). Or How A Married Victorian Mother Of Two Finds Her Groove Thang.  We see a lot of virginal ingenues in the genre, but Schone delivered a heroine who was older, married, with two kids, who goes looking for something more outside of her passionless marriage to a cold and indifferent husband.  To this day, we still don't see a ton of that in the genre.  Schone really kicked open the door for older heroines.

5) Menage by Emma Holly.  I'm going with Menage because, well, it's about a menage.  It's also the book most readers point to when discussing Holly's work as a whole.  Menage romances are a dime a dozen these days, but Holly did it 1998 and addressed how such relationships can get very complicated, very quickly.

6) Portia Da Costa.  It's just too hard to pick one book by Da Costa, but I'm including her on this list for one very important reason.  She writes "fun."  She's one of the few erotic romance writers out there who hasn't forgotten that sex is supposed to be fun.  There is a playfulness to her work that can sometimes get overlooked in a sub genre that can wallow a bit too much in angst.  In Too Deep is a good illustration of Da Costa's brand of playfulness.

7) Natural Law by Joey W. Hill.  A Domme heroine and a submissive hero.  An author who takes the time to really explore what a BDSM relationship means (trust baby, it's all about trust).  Published in 2004.  I had issues with this story when I read it not too long ago, but seriously?  Shockingly, breathtakingly ahead of it's time, published ten years ago.  Mores the pity that we continue to see tired retreads in BDSM storylines (clueless heroine = sub ; Alphahole hero = thinks he's Dom but he's really just an Alphahole).  Hill showed us another way 10 years ago - why didn't we listen?

8) Passion by Lisa Valdez (2005).  I'm probably going to get flack for this one, and Lord knows I wasn't personally wild about this book, but I'm including it because everyone lost their damn minds over it.  Why?  To this day I think it's because it looked and was packaged (mass market as opposed to trade paperback or digital) as a "historical romance."  But once you got inside those pages?  Good Lord above!  Turns out a lot of readers didn't like that surprise.  Others were all on board, and blessedly overjoyed they weren't paying trade paperback prices for a change to get their naughty fix.  Turns out, yes - marketing is important.

9)  The Breed series by Lora Leigh.  Go ahead, argue with me that it should be the Men of August series.  I'm not going to tell you you're wrong.  However I'm going with the Breeds for sheer volume and crossover appeal.  Certainly there were other Ellora's Cave writers who parlayed their success into contracts with "traditional" NY publishers (Jaid Black, Angela Knight to name two off the top of my head), but Leigh took her Breeds and turned them into a NYTimes Bestselling, 30-volume juggernaut (includes short stories and March 2015 release).  She also played a hand in the popularity of shifters in paranormal romance.  Hence, she's on the list.

10)  Fifty Shades trilogy by EL James.  I'm including it for two reasons and two reasons only - the first being that it captured word of mouth frenzy outside the confines of the genre.  The second being that it revived the idea that you could follow the same characters over the course of several books and still call it a romance.  Others had done it before (Bertrice Small, Rosemary Rogers), but it had been out of vogue for a number of years.  For good or ill, James helped bring that back.  But really, what I really want to say is Yada yada yada, Fifty Shades, yada yada yada. 

Erotic romance existed prior to us knowing what to call it, but the first big wave really launched in the late 1990s with Kensington Brava and the birth of Ellora's Cave in 2000.  Readers have always had a desire (ha!) for erotic work, but those two events really galvanized with strategic marketing.  Prior to that readers floundered around and magically found erotic content through trial, error, dumb-luck and that ever elusive word of mouth.  Once the marketing was in place?  It got easier to identify "those books" - then it was just on the reader to flounder around some more and discover the writers who struck a chord with them.

So, what books and authors did I miss?  Make your case in the comments section!

TBR Challenge 2014: A Sunday Kind Of Love

The Book: Mistletoe Marriage by Jessica Hart

The Particulars: Contemporary romance, Harlequin Romance, 2005, Out of print, Available digitally

Why Was It In Wendy's TBR?: It's 1) a Christmas book and 2) by Jessica Hart.  Of course it's in my TBR pile.

The Review: The romance genre, at this moment, is on a High-Angst Alert.  Heroes who are either Billionaire Alphaholes With Mommy Issues And Red Rooms of Pain or Emo Dudebros.  So it's easy to forget that sometimes romance novels can be nice.  About nice, normal people who find themselves in, sometimes, extraordinary circumstances.  Given my own current state of reading emo, I was past due for a Jessica Hart romance and lucky me, she published Mistletoe Marriage in 2005 (fitting nicely into this month's Holiday theme).

Sophie Beckwith thought she had met The One.  Nick is the stuff of fairy tales.  Exciting, passionate, she falls hook, line and sinker.  And then he meets her sister, Melissa.  Melissa who is amazingly beautiful and the sort of fragile creature that seems to kick up men's protective instincts.  Sophie sees the writing on the wall even as her heart is breaking.  She cuts Nick loose, he pursues her sister, and naturally Nick and Melissa get hitched.  Sophie is slow to get over the passionate connection she had with Nick and now that the happy couple has settled back in her hometown?  She only visits her parents when Nick and Melissa aren't around.  But now her mother has poured on the emotional guilt.  You will come home for your father's birthday.  You will be home for Christmas.  What Mom does not know?  That Nick once dated Sophie (their relationship was still new when he met her sister, hence he never met the parents as Sophie's beau).  Mom just thinks, "Oh Sophie broke up with that boy she was seeing who also happened to be named Nick."  I mean, Nick is a pretty common name.

Anyway, Sophie is reeling and goes to her BFF since childhood, Bram.  Once upon a time (10 years ago), Bram and Melissa were engaged.  He now owns the family farm, making a go of it, and still reeling a bit from his mother's sudden death.  He's alone on the farm and knows he needs help.  He also cares for Sophie.  They're not getting any younger, they are fond of each other, why don't they get married?  Sophie is, naturally, reluctant to agree.  She doesn't want to ruin Bram's chances of finding The One.  She cares too much for him to marry him simply out of friendship.  But before you know it?  Stuff happens and Bram and Sophie are officially engaged with Mom gunning for a Christmas wedding.  All while Sophie has to navigate the waters of seeing Nick and Melissa again, drunk in love.  Blergh.

Sophie is a heroine without an anchor.  Her life in London is falling apart (she realizes the city isn't for her plus her employer is downsizing) and she wants to come back home to the country.  But Nick is in the country and Sophie cannot see spending her days as the lonely spinster pining for a man she cannot have.  She knows she can make a great farmer's wife, and she wants that life - but with Bram?  How is that fair to him?  Of course what neither of them realize is how much they really care for each other.  Yes, they are friends.  But the love is there as well - they just need to recognize it. 

This is a "quiet romance."  Yes, there's a bit of jealousy flying around and yes the angst quotient concerning Nick ramps things up a bit.  But Bram and Sophie together feels right from the first page to the last.  These two go together like peanut butter and jelly or Bogey and Bacall.  It's a classic friends-to-lovers set-up that hits all the right notes.

What is great here is that the author somehow manages to not make Melissa completely despicable.  She's clueless and careless, but not evil.  Nick is, well more of an ass.  It's easy to see how Sophie fell for him as he's charming and exciting on the surface.  Also, their affair didn't last very long before he locked eyes on Melissa.  Had the relationship run a natural course?  She probably would have kicked him to the curb.  Melissa, however, has not.  He's a raging egotist, but Melissa is a different bird from Sophie.  Maybe those kids can make it work?  I was kind of hoping Nick would end up getting the snot kicked out of him by the end - but alas.  Not to be.

On Wendy's Jessica Hart Scale - this isn't my favorite by her so far, but it's good.  It's pushes all my romance trope buttons in just the right way (I adore friends-to-lovers stories! Squee!).  These are nice people who quietly come to realize that they love each other more deeply than mere friendship.  I inhaled it in one day, which at this moment in time seems like my very own Christmas miracle.

Final Grade = B+

Digital Review: Christmas at Seashell Cottage

Christmas at Seashell Cottage by Donna Alward is a long novella that sits in the middle of the small town Jewell Cove Maine series.  It features likable characters, plenty of Christmas flavor, and the requisite small town atmosphere.  That said, I'm about to critique a story where I felt like a novella was too long. Yep, you read that right.

Charlie Yang is an only child of brilliant parents who has always carried the yoke of responsibility.  Charlie is so responsible it hurts.  So yes, she goes to medical school.  But in a tiny show of rebellion she decides to practice medicine in a small town in Maine.  Hardly the lofty ambitions her parents had for her.  Being a newcomer in a close-knit community isn't easy and Charlie is having a hard time meeting people outside of her exam room.  So she volunteers to decorate the town church for the holidays.  Which is how she meets Dave Ricker, a dreamboat who works on the docks.  Charlie has been watching him afar for months and now here's her dream man in the flesh!  Watching her wrestling with a Nativity scene and talking to herself.  Nice.

What follows is the dance.  Dave is an ex-SEAL (because, of course he is), new to town and has been having trouble meeting people just as Charlie has.  Then one night, after leaving a holiday gathering, they find a real, live baby boy has taken baby Jesus' place in the church's Nativity scene.

This story clocks in at just under 200 pages.  Honestly?  It could have been half that and I think this story would have been better served.  There's just not a lot of oomph to the conflict.  This is actually my beef with 90% of small town contemporaries.  Not enough conflict.  And it shows here.  The abandoned baby almost feels like an afterthought, and the social work is handled on the same level as it tends to be in most romance novels (in other words, it strained for me).  No, most of the story is about Dave and Charlie making googly-eyes at each other and spending time together.  No fire, no angst, it's pretty vanilla.

But then something funny happens.  The author flips the ol' Alward-Angst Switch.  Finally, at that moment when Charlie realizes she has real feelings for Dave and Dave is too scared and unsure to return those feelings openly we get The Scene.  The Heartbreaking, Angsty, Emotional, Gut-Punching Scene.  That's the Donna Alward I know and love.  That scene saves the book for me.  It takes it from a Ho-Hum, I'm Kinda Bored Here story to an OMG Where Were You For The Previous 130-Some Pages story.

So where does this leave me?  Well it leaves me not knowing what grade to assign this book.  C is too low.  B- feels a little too high.  So we'll split the difference.  It's a perfectly serviceable holiday read with a knife-twisting moment.  I just wanted more knife.

Final Grade = C+

Reminder: TBR Challenge for December

For those of you participating in the 2014 TBR Challenge, this is a reminder that your commentary is "due" on Wednesday, December 17.  This month's theme is Holiday.  That's right folks, y'all are suffering because Wendy likes Christmas books.  But any holiday will do, not just Christmas.  However, remember - the themes are totally optional and are not required.  I know just as many of you loathe holiday books as those who love them.  It's not important what you read, just that you pull something (anything!) out of the TBR pile.

OMG, this is the last month of the TBR Challenge for 2014! Thanks to everybody who participated this year.  Information about TBR Challenge 2015 is forthcoming.

Comfort Read Alert: The Unexpected Honeymoon

Struggling to find my blogging and reading mojo, I knew it was time to call in the "big guns."  Yep, I needed a "comfort read."  A story I knew I would be able to fall into.  I basically needed the romance genre version of "turn on, tune in, drop out."  Not that the genre should be confused with psychedelic drugs - but you get my drift.

The Unexpected Honeymoon by Barbara Wallace has been languishing on my Kindle for a while and I thought it would fit the bill nicely.  The first book in this trilogy is going to make my Best of 2014 list, I obviously like Wallace's writing and it's a Harlequin Romance.  That line is the very definition of "comfort" for me. I started reading and fell right in.

Larissa Boyd was supposed to get married.  Then her groom left her for another woman.  On his way out the door he made sure to get in a parting shot.  He accused her of caring more about the wedding than him.  A truth that stings since Larissa's own friends had "jokingly" referred to her as a "bridezilla."  Raised by a seamstress grandmother, surrounded by wedding gowns, bridesmaid dresses, prom dresses, and growing up the "pudgy" girl in straight teeth, big-hair blonde Texas cheerleader country - Larissa has dreamed of having her one moment.  That fairy tale wedding moment.  She wants a perfect memory.  That doesn't make her bridezilla, does it?

Now she's in Mexico, at the exclusive resort where she was supposed to get married.  And instead of a groom, she's got a bottle of pricey champagne thanks to her well-meaning friends who talked her into making the trip anyway.  A whole bottle of champagne and a healthy dose of self-pity.  Oh boy.

Meeting her while she's three-sheets to the wind is hotel general manager Carlos Chavez.  Not only does his family own La Joya del Mayan, but a whole string of hotels.  Think of them as Mexico's version of the Hiltons - just without blonde daughters who carry tiny dogs in their oversized purses.  He's new to this particular location thanks to the former general manager making a muck of things and running off with their on-site wedding coordinator / events planner.  Adding insult to injury, they left a mess in their wake, and it's up to Carlos to clean it up without bad press (and bad reviews) falling back on the resort.  Which is how he comes into contact Larissa. 

We've all read versions of this story before.  The honeymoon for one, the unexpected chemistry, the brooding, haunted hero and the heroine who is making lemonade out the bag of lemons.  However as any romance reader worth her salt will tell you, it's not the familiarity of the story, it's how the author puts their own spin on it.  Wallace does some very interesting things with her characters.  For one, Larissa has to face some hard truths.  She's not a heroine who chalks this experience up to 1) I'm right 2) he just didn't "get" me.  No, she really looks at herself and faces the music, as it were.  Her wedding obsession, her need for her fairy tale moment, all that stuff.  Larissa looks at herself and realizes that just maybe she's been chasing all the wrong things for all the wrong reasons.

Carlos is your typical brooding romance hero with a tragic past - in this case, a dead first wife.  A wife he was crazy in love with but whom he failed to make "happy."  It's hardly a spoiler (assuming you can read between some pretty broad lines), that the first wife had mental health issues, specifically depression.  There will be some readers who may feel that this woman is demonized.  And to a certain extent, she is - by Carlos.  There's a couple of moments in the story where he muses that she bled him dry and you realize just how angry he is.  Loving someone with depression can hardly be categorized as "easy."  Readers see Carlos dealing with that aftermath.  You accept that her depression is not her "fault" - but you also can understand how Carlos came to be so angry.  But hey, consider this long paragraph your trigger warning.

What you're waiting for in this book is the Pay Off.  That tipping point when the emotional blood, sweat and tears start staining the pages.  And let me tell you, it's a doozy in this book.  You know that saying about hurting the ones you love?  You know how it's always the people you love most who can say the things that will hurt you the most?  Oh man, this.  As the conflict comes to a head, those scenes between Carlos and Larissa, the words they say to each other - they rip the reader's guts out.  I'm pretty sure I could actually see Larissa's heart breaking right on my Kindle screen.  It's that emotionally gut-punching.

I could have done without the syrupy epilogue at the end, but given that this is the final book in a trilogy that was probably inevitable.  Still, it's a good solid read by an author who consistently delivers for me.  It may look, feel and seem like the "same old story," but it's the author's emotional spin on it that makes it her own.

Final Grade = B+