I’m going to give it to you straight: Feeling Hot is light on substance and extremely heavy on erotica. Some readers may be fine with 100% pure smut, but I need at least a semi-decent story to go along with my smut. This book meets the storyline requirement just fine, but you won’t find any great character development, suspense, or deep issues explored.
Hate Notes is an office-based enemies turned lovers story that delivers an entertaining mix of whimsy, feuding, and romance, with a whiff of mystery.
Ugh, just some evidence of my tiny, hard, shriveled heart. I had some issues with this book, and none of them were necessarily the issues you’d expect from this type of set up. Everything was just so perfect.
Across the Horizon is such a witty treat that I kept forgetting it was written by Aly Martinez, AKA the Dame of Doom, Sovereign of Suspense, and Matriarch of Mystery and Misery.
Mariana Zapata slays it again with an utterly entertaining enemies-to-lovers story set within the world of professional figure skating. I listened to the audiobook of From Lukov with Love which is 15 hours long (524 pages), and I can honestly say that I didn’t want it to end.
Well…yay! Beginner’s Luck feels like it belongs on that shelf with Act Like It or The Hating Game (if anything belongs on that shelf with The Hating Game) in terms of contemporary debuts. There were so many great things about this book.
Dirty Headlines showcases a softer side to L.J. Shen’s writing, and I liked it. A lot. I swear she’s one of the OG creators of truly despicable alphaholes. Shen’s enemies-to-lovers stories are typically dark, filled with a massive amount of tension and hatred between the lead characters, and yet deliciously addictive. Truthfully, she’s the only author who can make me fall for a character who is virtually unredeemable (Case in point: Vicious). Dirty Headlines manages to keep the alphahole, the feisty underdog heroine, the push and pull, but adds lots of fun.
There is something about a Christina Lauren book that just makes me happy, so it comes as no surprise that My Favorite Half-Night Stand left me with a goofy smile on my face.
“If you only shine a light on your flaws, all your perfects will dim.” Romance readers typically want to read about people falling in love and living happily ever after. The fairytale is a nice distraction from mundane life, but the truth is that sometimes I hunger for more. What happens after the happily ever after? I’ve been married to the same man for quite some time, and it’s nice to see my truth reflected on the page every once in awhile.
It sucks when an author whose work you admire writes a book that falls short of your expectations. I was pretty disappointed in Bring Down the Stars, the first book in the Beautiful Hearts series, especially since all my friends loved it. However, I think it makes the triumph of Long Live The Beautiful Hearts all the sweeter. It contains everything I felt the previous book lacked.
I was hesitant to read Bring Down the Stars because I knew it was a modern day re-telling of Cyrano de Bergerac. Nothing good can come from a relationship built on a foundation of lies. And yet I willingly waded into what I was confident would be turbulent waters, praying that the characters would be worth the risk to my heart. Weston and the beautiful poetry are shining stars in this story and the main reason for nudging the book toward 4-star territory.
It’s nice when you pick up a freebie, months later cruise through your Kobo and find a cute cover with a cute guy in a suit and think “this looks fun,” and then lo and behold, it is fun…