Tag Archives: romance

Sweet Agony

Book Review of Sweet Agony, by Charlotte Stein

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Sweet agonyI purchased a copy of Sweet Agony, by Charlotte Stein.

Description from Goodreads:
New job, new boss, and he’s cold, strict, but terribly attractive. Does Molly Parker stay or does she go? Because beneath Cyrian’s chilly front, there may be a heat that’ll burn her up.

Giving in was vicious bliss.

The live-in position is an opportunity for Molly to earn and escape a problematic family. There’s just one drawback. Her employer is the most eccentric, aloof and closed off man she’s ever encountered. His rules are bizarre and his needs even more so, and caring for his ramshackle Dickensian home is far more than she ever bargained for. Only their increasingly intense conversations stop her heading for the door. Cyrian Harcroft is a man of many mysteries and secrets, and the more she learns the greedier she is for each and every one. Especially when she discovers his greatest fear: any kind of physical contact. Now all she has to do is dig a little deeper, to unearth the passion she knows he can feel…

Review:
“Oh, that was just marvelous.” This is what I exclaimed, out loud, when I hit the last page of this book. I really, truly enjoyed it. Granted, the first half more so than the second, but still an over all win. The voice was just to die for.

I call the first half the comic half and the second the erotic, and I imagine if either one wasn’t the sort to thrill you they would feel they went on forever. But for me, I ended happy. The first chapter alone had me laughing so hard I bounced the hammock I was laying in, which of course just made me laugh harder. Eventually, I just put the Kindle down and let myself have a minor hysterical moment. Alternatively, the second half left me wishing for a few moments alone with my other half. Unfortunately, my 5-year-old declared, quite innocently, “You will never get rid of me,” so…

Stein’s humor, though a little on the juvenile side for a 34-year-old protagonist, managed to hit just the right note for me and I thought the sex was hot. There was a lot of it once it eventually hit the page. It was maybe even too thick, but it still scalded my knickers. All in all, though not a perfect book (I was especially squinked out by the use of sex as a rudimentary cure for past abuse and psychological illness), it left me wanting more and I’ll be looking for further Stein novels.

Book Review of The Vampire’s Mail Order Bride (Nocturne Falls #1), by Kristen Painter

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The Vampire's Mail Order BrideI picked up a free copy of The Vampire’s Mail Order Bride, by Kristen Painter, on Amazon. It was still free at the time of posting.

Description from Goodreads:
Welcome to Nocturne Falls, the town where Halloween is celebrated 365 days a year. The tourists think it’s all a show: the vampires, the werewolves, the witches, the occasional gargoyle flying through the sky. But the supernaturals populating the town know better.

Living in Nocturne Falls means being yourself. Fangs, fur, and all.

After seeing her maybe-mobster boss murder a guy, Delaney James assumes a new identity and pretends to be a mail order bride. She finds her groom-to-be living in a town that celebrates Halloween every day. Weird. But not as weird as what she doesn’t know. Her groom-to-be is a 400-year-old vampire.

Hugh Ellingham has only agreed to the arranged set up to make his overbearing grandmother happy. In thirty days, whatever bridezilla shows up at his door will be escorted right back out. His past means love is no longer an option. Not if the woman’s going to have a future. Except he never counted on Delaney and falling in love for real.

Too bad both of them are keeping some mighty big secrets…

Review:
This was a cute, fluffy idea that turned out to be heavy on the fluffy and short on just about everything else. There’s an interesting set up, but that’s all it is, a set up. The situation that sends Delaney into Hugh’s arms pops up now and again, then drops away. It carries no tension and is never satisfactorily concluded.

Other predictable problems show up and resolve themselves with ease. Hugh has a pathological, phobic, paranoia-level fear that dissolves into thin air to such a degree that he goes to great sacrifice to obtain a magic to alleviate this fear and then starts the process in question before he even has it in hand.

Delaney is apparently a strong-willed woman because she speaks her mind (Yep, this is one of those he-loves-her-because-she-talks-back and isn’t feminine books.), but it’s never really believable because it lacks any sort of depth of character. All-in-all, that last comment kind of carries my opinion of the book in general. It’s cute, but lacks any sort of depth or character.

Oh, and there is no mail-order bride. There’s a vampire bride and a potential arranged marriage, but no mail order bride. It’s a cute title, sure, but maybe it should have been made relevant. It is a clean read though, if that’s your thing.

Stumptown Spirits

Book Review of Stumptown Spirits, by E.J. Russell

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Stumptown SpiritsI received a copy of Stumptown Spirits, b E. J. Russell, from Netgalley.

Description from Goodreads:
What price would you pay to rescue a friend from hell?

For Logan Conner, the answer is almost anything. Guilt-ridden over trapping his college roommate in a ghost war rooted in Portland’s pioneer past, Logan has spent years searching for a solution. Then his new boyfriend, folklorist Riley Morrel, inadvertently gives him the key. Determined to pay his debt—and keep Riley safe—Logan abandons Riley and returns to Portland, prepared to give up his freedom and his future to make things right.

Crushed by Logan’s betrayal, Riley drops out of school and takes a job on a lackluster paranormal investigation show. When the crew arrives in Portland to film an episode about a local legend of feuding ghosts, he stumbles across Logan working at a local bar, and learns the truth about Logan’s plan.

Their destinies once more intertwined, the two men attempt to reforge their relationship while dodging a narcissistic TV personality, a craven ex-ghost, and a curmudgeonly bar owner with a hidden agenda. But Logan’s date with destiny is looming, and his life might not be the only one at stake. 

Review:
I have to admit that, while I didn’t dislike this, it wasn’t a big winner for me either. As much as I liked Riley and Logan (and I did), as interesting as I found the mystery (and it was), as amusing as I found the side characters (and they were), as often as I laughed (and I did ) I thought this was inelegantly written and at times just too over the top.

I completely understood that the characters were meant to be conflicted, wanting one thing but trying to do another, but the constant back and forwards annoyed me and it felt clunkily done. Logan’s internal dialogue was not enough to pull it off for me. What’s more, it all came down to an unwillingness to communicate that I found frustrating.

There was also one last twist toward the end that I thought way too coincidental and unbelievable. I don’t even think it contributed to the plot. The last event it prompted to action could have still happened without it.

All-in-all, I had complaints that kept me from loving it, but I did enjoy it. There is plenty of room between a book being a favorite and not liking a book at all. Riley was especially likable.