Book Review: Goodnight Tweetheart by Teresa Medeiros
I needed this. For the past few months I’ve only been reading academic stuff and trying to mold myself into a writer. This is the first thing I’ve read for pleasure for months (except gossipy websites, of course). And honestly I needed a love story, a happy ending, a reason to drink high calorie hot beverages. I needed this.
So how’s the book, you ask? I liked it alot. I love epistolary-style novels. VOCAB! (An epistolary novel is a novel written a series of documents. The usual form is letters, although diary entries, newspaper clippings and other documents are somtimes used.)
Well this one was told in Tweets. Tweets right?! I was expecting to be underwhelmed, but the author really fleshed out the characters in small 140 character snippets.
The heroine of our tale is Abbey, she is a once-famous writer who is struggling to remain relevant. And our Hero is Mark a mysterious follower who doesn’t fess up to much. They carry on a flirtatious online relationship until love blossoms. Then there’s a twist, #$%& gets real and there is an emotional payoff.
All in all, I really like the book. I hear there is an epilogue in the new print of the book (which I’m going to read for free at B&N this weekend.) And it also hit home, ‘cause for months I’ve been logging on to Yahoo! mail to chat with a nice man named Josh..that is probably too good to be true, and/or is too good for me. Apologies to the author for leaking my issues all over her adorably romantic book.
Profess Your Love (BW/AM Version) by Renee LaRuse
First off this was like a choose your own adventure of romance novels. The writer has made 2 versions of this book. One is the black lady + white guy = love and the other is black lady + asian guy = love.
I picked the asian guy one. Full disclosure: Richard Lui, Daniel Dae Kim, John Cho, and Masi Oka. I swear these men don’t get the respect they deserve.
Anyway, this was a good story, but it was just tooooo good to be true. He’s 23 or so, owns his own business, and in a moment of guts and glory he walks up to his professor during office hours and kisses her into oblivion. Seriously?!
It’s incredibly fantasy, but a 23 year old guy with a job whose willing to take you to a movie is miracle enough. But he woos the professor despite thier age difference and Stella inevitably gets her groove back.
Pretty good book but I couldn’t get over the pie in the sky lead. I wish he was more human and flawed.
The Ugly Girlfriend by Latrivia Nelson
I really enjoyed this one folks. It spoke to all my insecurites..being chubby, being brown, being underemployed, having crazy hot friends, thinking no one likes me.
But whaaaat? The fiction overlords see hope for even a wretch as I! In this story LaToya is a cleaning lady and although the title says ugly, but that’s not really accurate. She probably cute but not in a Barbie kinda way.
Well she ends up cleaning for a recently divorced handsome Irish transplant, accent and all. He sees how awesome she is, and how cool she is with his son. And bam…love. All over the place.
All in all this was an easy ebook read from B&N, so check it out.
All There Is from StoryCorps by Dave Isay
I’m a love skeptic. I have friends that are married and I see happy couples all the time. And from this blog you can tell I adore a good love story. But I’ve never witnessed romantic love from behind-the-scenes. The compromises, the let downs, the expectations or the joy.
My folks were close, but for many reasons they couldn’t make it work. And as of yet, I’ve been in various states of infatuation but never in love.
This book has given me page after page of absolute proof that this type of love can exist between two people. There are sections that are as heartwarming as they are heartbreaking.
The next time I feel my bitter spinster self rising to the surface, I’ll be back between these pages reminding myself that Love is All There Is.
(P.S. Research StoryCorps and fall in love with them too! NPR4Life!)
The Darkest Fire by Gena Showalter
This tale is set at the gate to hell. With this book I pushed the boundaries of my affection for paranormal romance for sure.
This is a short prequel story to her Lords of the Underworld series. Although it is well written and sweet, I just wasn’t feeling it.
I would recap the story, but it’s already so short that I will undoubtedly ruin it for you. But the scenes are tenderly written and my Baptist upbringing is in the way of touching stories set in hell.
Sin Undone by Larissa Ione
This is last book in the series. It follows Sin. She’s Lore’s sister, fellow assasin and all around badass. She’s damaged and abused and in need of some old fashion lovin’.
In the course of the craziness of life she meets a wareworlf paramedic named Conall. He’s also a tough character but he convinces Sin to feel her feelings and let someone in.
Alot of this series was based on extreme circumstances forcing the pairs together and watching the intensity of the situations bring them to love. This steamy parts in this one were pretty hot stuff though. Really intense and overwhelming at times.
I suppose I’d say the Demonica series was a job well done by Ione. Paranormal romance is usually ladden with so much detail that the characters can get lost in the world that was created for them. But the author did a really good job this time around.
Now on to a few books with pictures…
Ecstasy Unveiled by Larissa Ione
So..yeah..I just had to finish this series. Maybe its the Virgo in me, but I needed closure.
Lore is a demon with a hand that can kill just by a simple touch. Idess is an angel in training sworn to protect important players on Earth. Well Lore has been held by this evil guy as an assassin. It’s all to help out his sister, but still…it’s a raw deal.
So Lore get his assignment and wouldn’t ya know it..he’s assigned to kill a guy that Idess is sworn to protect. They fight, they get steamy, they fight again. He falls for her tenacity and innocence…she falls for..well..I’m not sure. But it works people.
The best part of this book, IMHO, was the part that dealt with Idess being able to see lost spirits. She was able to help them pass into heaven and the author really wrote those scenes in a beautiful way.
Passion Unleased by Larissa Ione
In this series there is a really cute couple named Kynan and Gemma. In the early books I became somewhat invested in these two characters, but the author kinda glazed over thier romance and went on to another. So while I still enjoyed this book, I really wanted a full book dedicated to those two.
Moving on.
This book centers on Serena Kelly. She’s young, hot and a virgin with a secret. She’s really “Charmed” meaning she’s protected from all danger…as long as she stays as pure as the driven snow. Puritanical much?
But anway, one of the brothers, Wraith, is poisoned and the only way to save his life is to get that charm from Serena. That’s right he must take her virginity to live. (That’s right…it’s like “One @#$% to save them all!”
Well his initial plan is to woo and get her into bed quick, but she turns out to be a pretty awesome lady. Wraith starts to fall for her, and she starts to want to break all the rules with him.
This was a solid read, and the villans in the story really add some danger to this book. Very cat and mouse.
Book Review: Desire Unchained by Larissa Ione
Just in case you’re wondering all of these books have a “Noun Un???” type name. As I reader, I’m Me Unhindered. I had to keep going with this series even though I’m not wild about it. I just had to know how this whole thing panned out.
In this book we meet Runa. She’s a wolf/lady that is bitter about how her transformation came about. She has decided to take revenge on her former lover, the demon Shade. Well..fit hits shan and they both taken prisoner by a 3rd party crazy guy.
Shade ends up confessing his true nature to Runa, and she learns to let some stuff go. The really interesting and intense part of the book was when we learned the story of thier first meeting back when she was human. I really felt like that should have been the book and not just a flashback.
All in all it was pretty good. But I’m not feeling the wolf angle on this one.
Book Review: Pleasure Unbound by Larissa Ione
The Black Dagger Brotherhood Series by J.R. Ward messed me up. I’ve never been into any type of paranormal romance, but alas…thats right..alas..I’m hooked. I searched for another series to fill the void and came across the Demonica series.
This was a really hard start. I was raised Baptist, by Baptist for a Baptist type life. Reading about demons, even if they have ripped abs and hearts of gold was tough. The idea is that all creatures are capable of good and evil, no matter the orgin. Although I want to say “Heck Yes!” to that, it was really hard to become sympathtic and co-sign the stories. Ya don’t play with the Devil!
Well this story centered around a demon named Eidolon, who runs a hospital in the underworld. He’s a moody workaholic that lacks social skills but has been bred to statisfy the ladies. While on duty he meets a humand named Tayla. She works in the Aegis (a group dedicated to fighting evil) and has no patience for passive aggressive demon doctors. But of course his rippled whatnot…and her rippening so and so..and ta da! They are together.
There’s also demon brothers thrown in the mix that end up as the subject for the rest of the series. It’s a decent addition to the genre and it was a decent start.
