Tag Archives: book reviews

Rules of Scoundrels Series: A Rogue by Any Other Name and No Good Duke Goes Unpunished by Sarah MacLean

book review December 10, 2013 Comments: 2

There are many reasons that Sarah MacLean is on my autobuy list, but one of them is that she has enormous potential that is coming into full flower. No Good Duke Goes Unpunished has a twist at the end that not only guarantees I will be combing back through this and the other two books in her “Rules of Scoundrels” series, but I will purchase next book, Put Up Your Dukes*, the second it becomes available. These historical romances feature four displaced aristocrats who have joined together to run a wildly successful gambling hell called The Fallen Angel. Each book features one of the exiles, i.e. A Rogue by Any Other Name (Bourne), One Good Earl Deserves a Lover (Cross), No Good Duke Goes Unpunished (Temple), and Put Up Your Dukes** (Chase).

A Rogue by Any Other Name

Theoretically, I read A Rogue by Any Other Name last year, but it was during my frantic romance devouring phase and it didn’t really capture my attention. This is not the first time that has happened and it won’t be the last. I read the novel again properly this year after One Good Earl Deserves a Lover because I loved the latter so.

Michael, Marquess of Bourne, and Lady Penelope were childhood friends. He went away to school and she stayed home as was the curse of women in her era. They wrote letters, but Michael’s responses petered out and then stopped after he gambled away his inheritance and left Society behind. For ten years, he has been bent on reclaiming the property that he considers his birthright. There are a lot of people in romances who gamble away their fortunes, but they are rarely the hero. It’s a great touch. Bourne is cold, driven, and, as I said in reference to him in the One Good Earl review, suffers “from a prolonged case of Head Up Posterior”. When Bourne discovers that “his” land is now tied to Penelope’s dowry, it brings him back into the orbit of his childhood friend. Wallflower Penelope is surprised to see Michael again and not happy with the changes in him. They gradually come together as he both resolves and relinquishes his issues. Overall, I enjoyed A Rogue by Any Other Name, but it was not as good as either of the two that followed it.

No Good Duke Goes Unpunished

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The Ice Princess & Scandalous Desires by Elizabeth Hoyt

book review December 3, 2013 Leave a comment

Elizabeth Hoyt is one of the big names in historical romance and her novel The Raven Prince is considered a classic of the genre. She tends to be a little earthy for my tastes, but I have read portions of several of her novels and I did indeed read all of The Ice Princess and Scandalous Desires.  I really liked the former, the latter was nothing special.

A novella, The Ice Princess features Coral, the madame of a brothel called The Grotto which is featured in other Hoyt works, and Isaac Wargate, a naval captain who spends time in the brothel not being serviced, but looking out for his men and watching out for Coral. In a common romance trope, Isaac wins exclusive access  to Coral for a period of seven nights in a card game. (My inner feminist cringes while typing such things, then I read another romance because being a feminist is about the right to make choices.) Coral has not been with clients in a long time, although she was not spared years as a prostitute, and Isaac wants desperately to get to the woman he glimpses underneath her literal and figurative mask. He is a patient man. Coral uses her experience and acumen to put him off, but he wins her over with kindness and patience, she rescues herself, and they sail off into the sunset together. It’s a lovely little novella not about the redemptive power of love exactly, but more the power of seeing one’s own freedom through another’s eyes.

Scandalous Desires is a standard up-from-the-gutter romance featuring a Pirate King because, yes, this is a genre in which a “Pirate King” is standard fare. Mickey O’Connor works ships on the Thames for his living and he has amassed a considerable fortune and a formidable reputation. Romance heroes who clawed their way up from nothing always do. About a year ago, Silence Hollingbrook (I don’t care what you say, that name is AWESOME) spent one night with Mickey because of something, something, her husband, something, widow. Mickey has a bastard daughter he wants Silence to take care of, first at the foundling home she helps run and then living at his Pirate King pad. Hijinks and romance ensue. Hijinks that weren’t very compelling to me, didn’t rise above what is common in the genre, and, this is important part, their relationship was uninteresting. It always comes back to that one detail. If the emotional lives and connection of the characters are sincere and well-portrayed, the book becomes engaging. Mickey and Silence’s weren’t and the book wasn’t.

Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful.

Welcome to Temptation and Bet Me by Jennifer Crusie

book review November 21, 2013 Leave a comment

To sum up:

duck soup 1

Jennifer Crusie’s Bet Me is number 15 on All About Romance’s readers poll of the Top 100 Romances of all time* and Welcome to Temptation comes in at number 20. I managed to take four of Crusie’s books out of the library, but not the one I really wanted which was Bet Me. I put it on hold and then just bought the darn thing on Amazon anyway. It was worth it, Bet Me is a definite keeper.

Welcome to Temptation

This was an extremely entertaining read. Sophie and her sister arrive in Temptation, Ohio to film a C-list actress’s demo reel and it expands into a full movie of dubious content. The internecine political squabbles only a small town can provide are the backdrop for Sophie to fall in love with the Mayor, Phineas (Phin) Tucker.

Welcome to Temptation was frequently laugh out loud funny. Crusie created likeable and believable leads with excellent chemistry and a sexy, light-hearted tone. There are multiple players and machinations to track and the whole thing careened along very enjoyably, buoyed by its own charm, until it veered into farce. Let’s just say that it’s a lot of larceny for one small town and the resolutions were ludicrous in proportion to events.

Bet Me

This was one of those books you read while quietly adjuring, “This is so awesome, please don’t mess it up, please don’t mess it up, this is so awesome, please don’t mess it  up.” Crusie did not mess it up. The Come Here Go Away went on a bit, but Bet Me was absolutely delightful, a fantastic read that I highly recommend.

Do you need to know the plot, too? Fine. Minerva overhears an Adonis making a bet with her former, for all of thirty minutes, boyfriend that said Adonis, Calvin, can’t get Minerva into bed inside a month. Everything is exactly and absolutely not the way it appears. There were subplots involving an ex-girlfriend of Calvin’s and Min’s ex-boyfriend conspiring against their success as a couple which went on too long and veered into farce; time spent on Minerva’s sister’s impending nuptials which went on too long and veered into farce; and the coming together of Min and Cal’s groups of friends which was just fine and did not veer into farce. That’s still a lot of veering. What exactly is my problem with silly over-the-top fun? I think I need to re-calibrate my willing suspension of disbelief, if I’m complaining that a romance novel is insufficiently realistic.

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Not My Wolf by Eden Cole

book review November 20, 2013 Leave a comment

Not My Wolf was a fantastically silly free novella, a smoking hot fantastically silly free novella.

blancheThe skim coat of plot for this paranormal romance involves, let me see if I get this right, a group of wolf shape-shifters living in remote area of Colorado who have a territorial bone to pick with the other local group of wolf shape-shifters. It’s all very log cabin meets paranormal. Corey is the leader of the pack, the Alpha, and he has been dreaming of claiming his mate. (There’s a lot of mate claiming in fantastically silly free shape-shifter novellas.) When he meets Devin and gets the mate vibe from him, Corey is totally freaked out that his mate is a man. Devin is fine with it. Corey is fine with it soon enough, as well.

Devin and his sister are between packs as he is a such a huge hunk of man-wolf that their former Alpha considers him a threat. No longer welcome, they have come to Colorado to find a home. Corey is quite the monolith himself and not intimidated by Devin. This allows for a certain amount of manly wrasslin’ and vulpine posturing to go along with the love scenes.

Not My Wolf  is the first in a series of several “Wolf Pack” novellas by Eden Cole. A rivalry between local shape-shifter groups provides the veneer of justification for continuing the story, but it’s all just an excuse for the love scenes and the shape-shifting.

Did I mention that they glow electric blue in their wolf form? They glow electric blue in their wolf form. It would have been remiss of me not to mention it.

The (Shameful) Tally 2013

Attracting Anthony by Amber Kell

book review November 19, 2013 Leave a comment

Key elements in Attracting Anthony, a novella by Amber Kell:

  1. The new-to-me word “werekin” for members of the human-to-animal shapeshifter kingdom.
  2. The werekin have their own nightclub.
  3. The club is owned by a man named Silver. He is the most powerful wolf shifter in North America.
  4. The hero, Anthony Carrow, is so extravagantly gorgeous that he casts a pulchritude diminishing “glamour” over himself so he won’t steal attention from his friend when at the club.
  5. It bears repeating that the characters use “glamours”.
  6. If the novella had been longer, I suspect they would have used “magicks”, as well.
  7. Silver is so rampagingly Alpha Male that he does everything but pee in a circle around Anthony.
  8. An ensemble consisting of black leather pants and a silver mesh shirt is “elegant”.
  9. Vampires are metro-sexual real estate professionals.
  10. Silver thinks Anthony is a fae-witch hybrid, but what he doesn’t know yet is…
  11. “My grandfather is Zeus,” he mumbled.
  12. As an added bonus to being a fae-witch with a godhead grandpappy, Anthony can teleport.
  13. Anthony is “claimed” when Silver puts an ancient Egyptian bejeweled gold collar around his neck.
  14. While Anthony and Silver’s large age difference wasn’t creepy, the parent/child undertone to their  submission and domination relationship was super creepy.
  15. Yes, it was free.
  16. No, they did not get it on as animals.

LGBTQ romance recommendations can be found here.

Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful.

The Travis Series: Sugar Daddy and Blue-Eyed Devil by Lisa Kleypas

book review November 18, 2013 Leave a comment

Having read Smooth Talking Stranger by Lisa Kleypas and being desperate for more good romance to read, I went and got her other two Travis family books from the library. It’s what always happens to me with a Kleypas series. She really does have the most scrumptious men in romance. Scrumptious men and sexy smolder, those are her by-words. I adore Courtney Milan and she is the best author currently publishing historicals, but have I re-read all my favourite Kleypas novels more times than I am willing to admit.

All three books in the Travis series, Sugar Daddy, Blue-Eyed Devil, Smooth Talking Stranger, are told in the first person from the heroine’s perspective. Normally, romance has an omniscient narrator so the frame of reference flips back and forth between the two main characters. The single viewpoint means that one sees the object of affection exclusively as he presents himself to the female lead. It makes each novel her story as opposed to “theirs” and this is appropriate given that each of the heroines has a rather fraught history.

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The Travis Series: Smooth Talking Stranger by Lisa Kleypas

book review November 13, 2013 Leave a comment

“I had always gone in the other direction, toward men like Dane who made you kill your own spiders
and carry your own suitcase.That was exactly what I wanted. And yet someone like Jack Travis,
unimpeachably male, so damn sure of himself, held a secret, nearly fetishistic allure to me.“

Jesus, GOD, YES! Lisa Kleypas, you just get me. You marry suitcase guy and secretly hope he will carry heavy things for you anyway, not because you can’t, but because you are lazy. You read romance novels for fetishistic allure guy.

Ella Varner is the product of a repeatedly broken home and, far worse, of a narcissistic and manipulative mother. Through time and counseling she has built a healthy life for herself. The same cannot be said for her mother or younger sister. When Ella’s sister leaves her one-week-old baby with their mother, Ella is summoned from Austin to Houston to help sort out the mess. Ella drops everything, including her long-term, vegan, environmental activist live-in boyfriend, to go and help out. This turns into a three-month sojourn while Ella’s sister receives psychological counselling.

But enough about the maguffin and on to the main event of any Lisa Kleypas romance: Jack Travis is Ella’s first candidate for the child’s father despite his protestations that he a. “always holsters his gun” and b. did not have sex with Ella’s sister. He is quickly dismissed as a possibility, but sticks around anyway because of his interest in Ella. Jack is a self-made man and the son of a billionaire. He’s tall, dark, handsome, friendly, helpful, possessive in a secretly attractive way, smart, sexy, supportive, wry, a good listener, seductive, mature, chivalrous, manly, mellifluous-voiced, physically fit, generous, emotionally available, funny, polite, mad for Ella, and willing to take on a newborn. I’ve never said this about a romance novel hero before, but this guy is too good to be true. Jack is too perfect. He’s certainly a very comforting fantasy. Who wouldn’t want Captain Perfect to show up in your life while you are in a crisis, worship the ground you walk on, and provide the moral support you need? It would have been fine if the final timeline had worked differently, or if the do-gooder boyfriend was not painted as an unsympathetic jerk, or if I could believe for one second that someone unexpectedly and without any experience taking care of a newborn baby could have the time or inclination to fall in love with anything other than the notion of a full night’s sleep.

Smooth Talking Stranger features the trademark Lisa Kleypas smolder. Her heroine is independent, self-sufficient, and kind. One certainly can’t fault Ella for falling for Jack. The problem is that the point of a romance novel is not that there is a perfect man, it’s that two people find something more in each other or fit together in a way unique to their personalities. Succumbing to the magnificence of the ultimate man misses the point.

This was my first Lisa Kleypas contemporary romance, but not my last. Please visit my complete summary of Lisa Kleypas’s catalogue for recommendations.  Start with Dreaming of You or The Devil in Winter. Both are classics of the genre.

Addendum: Having made a point of Jack being too perfect, I have reread the book because of the “nearly fetishistic allure” factor.

Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful.

FBI/US Attorney Series: Something About You and About That Night by Julie James

book review November 12, 2013 Leave a comment

Same willing suspension, different disbelief.

I don’t read contemporary romances because they don’t provide the narrative distance my obsession calls for, but I was looking for a book to fill an evening and I had quite liked Julie James’ Love Irresistibly, plus my romance spirit guide, Malin, had spoken approvingly of Something About You.

Girl overhears murder. Boy is investigating. Boy and girl have history. Boom chicka wow wow.

Jack Pallas is a glowery, stubbly, hot FBI agent. Cameron Lynde is a successful Assistant US Attorney with a stereotypical “women love shoes” fetish. Cameron ends up in protective custody after overhearing a murder in the hotel room next to hers. The victim was a woman a senator was paying to have sex. Mercifully, as I dislike murder mystery sub-plots, the killer’s identity is revealed early and not the point of the novel. The point of the novel is that Cameron needs protectin’ and she and Jack need to get around to the kissin’ and the lovin’. There were legalities and procedures that strained credulity and/or reality, but it is a romance novel and I can’t be bothered to get my knickers in a twist about suspected jurisprudence inadequacies as long as I’m being entertained.

Something About You had leads with excellent chemistry, he was kind of delicious, as well as fun secondary characters, a nice dose of humour, and, saints be praised, a completely non-stereotypical gay best friend. The novel helped me pass a pleasant evening and I would recommend it to do the same for you.

About That Night is my third Julie James book, my second in a week. I only read it because I was trawling the romance spinners at the library and I stumbled across it. The reviews said it wasn’t as good as the other novels in the series and they were right. Each of these books features either an FBI Agent, a US Attorney, or both (see above). This time it’s the middle one.

Boy and girl clicked, but missed chance. Boy is back, but a felon. Boom chicka complications wow wow.

Kyle and Rylann (I know) met in university, but life got in the way of their incendiary spark. Eight years later, Kyle did something impulsive and stupid that landed him in prison. Rylann is the Assistant US Attorney who represents the federal government in the hearing to commute his sentence to time served. The story behind the sentencing change is covered in the book A Lot Like Love which falls between Something About You and About That Night in the series.

Julie James is a competent writer who gives good smolder. These books are all set in Chicago and I suspect residents will recognize all the local sites and eateries mentioned. Because I don’t live in Chicago, these details did not disrupt my reading experience with any intrusions of realism.

Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful or my  streamlined recommendations list

A Man Above Reproach by Evelyn Pryce

book review November 11, 2013 Leave a comment

This Regency novel won the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award in the Romance category, in addition to being an overall finalist. Very well done, Ms. Pryce. I can understand why she won. I will definitely be adding her to my Fingers Crossed for Potential list, so Caroline Linden best skooch over.  As this book clearly sets up a trilogy, there will be at least two more chances to see what Evelyn Pryce can do.

Josephine Grant has fallen from society and is eking out a living running the bookshop she inherited from her wastrel father and by playing piano in an upscale brothel, the Sleeping Dove, at night. Elias, the Duke of Lennox, an intimidating and often dour aristocrat, is dragged to the Sleeping Dove one night for a wallow in debauchery. The only problem is that he is not and does not want to be that kind of man. Elias sees Josie playing piano and is instantly drawn to her. He is arrogant and high-handed, but ultimately well-intentioned. Josie isn’t for sale, but she is drawn to the gorgeous, stern man who insists on speaking to her while she plays.

There are a couple of problems in the book, such as initial bumpiness in the hero’s conduct and the plot hangs on a Big Misunderstanding at one point, but they are issues that occur in lots of these kinds of novels and they can be ironed out.  The writing overall is excellent and entertaining, and you do really feel for the characters.

The book is a free loan for Prime on Kindle, but maybe go ahead and buy it to encourage a writer starting out. She has what it takes and needs the chance to write more.

The (Shameful) Tally 2013

The Mackenzie Series: The Untamed Mackenzie and The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie by Jennifer Ashley

book review November 7, 2013 Leave a comment

I’m not sure there is any historical romance author who believes in the redemptive power of love as deeply as Jennifer Ashley. It’s the only reason I can think of for her persistence in creating exquisite examples of Victorian Douchelordery and making them her romantic leads.

The Untamed Mackenzie

First up is the novella The Untamed Mackenzie. Unless you are the magnificence that is Courtney Milan, or perhaps Tessa Dare, novellas are generally just a way to tide over fans and earn some extra money between major releases. They build a love story around previous secondary or even tertiary characters and, this is the important part, allow readers to revisit old favourites.  Jennifer Ashley is not Courtney Milan, or perhaps Tessa Dare, so this is a rickety love story stopping over with each of the  Mackenzies from the first four books in the series. Lloyd is the illegitimate son of the same fu*king monster that raised those tortured heroes. Louisa is the younger sister of Mac Mackenzie’s wife, Isabella.

If pater familias Hart Mackenzie is Douchelord in Chief, Lloyd is the Bastard Douchelord and/or Douchelord Bastard. An obsessive police detective, he was one of the villains in The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie and he acquitted his role in a thorough and reprehensible manner. I hated him and had well-founded concerns for his emotional stability. Admittedly, this is true of 78.3% of Ashley’s heroes. Lloyd and Louisa have flirted in previous encounters and when she is accused of murder, they feel the need to interview each of the Mackenzie characters to solve the crime. Whatever. The other characters are more interesting than Lloyd and Isabella anyway.

The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie

I wanted to like The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie.  I wanted to like it so much. Daniel is an absolute doll, just the sweetest guy. He’s not really wicked at all, not even a little bit, although he does smoke which I thought was a fantastic period detail. Still, it’s a Jennifer Ashley novel, so Daniel’s mother was batshit insane and he has abandonment issues related to his father.

It is Ashley’s best written book to date, she generally excels at sincere romance, despite frequently getting mired in overwrought and histrionic plotting. The Wicked Deeds of Daniel Mackenzie avoided this pitfall. Ashley toned down the melodrama, ratcheted up the romance, and had just enough Mackenzie brothers camp to make the whole thing fun. But. There’s always a but.

The heroine, Violet, is a rape survivor, a “tortured heroine” if you will, and coming to terms with and moving past this episode was a major plot element. Violet’s experience infringes on her ability to form trusting relationships and complicates her attraction to Daniel. Ashley handled the subject matter sensitively and one could not help but feel for Violet, but I don’t want to read a romance novel which includes rape as a plot point; I don’t want to read a romance novel with any kind of abuse, sexual or otherwise. If the abuse is physical, I can just skip over these episodes.  If it is sexual, it discomfits my entire reading experience. Violet’s recovery was central to the plot, so it doesn’t matter how well it was handled, it ruined the book for me. I am sure there is a book out there that could defy this rule, but I read romance novels for escapism. Every time the Violet’s experience is relived or described, it removed me from the disconnected reality I look to these books for.

A summary of  Jennifer Ashley’s catalogue can be found here. Links to my other reviews can be found on my complete reading list of books sorted by author or Author Commentary & The Tallies Shameful.