Category: B reviews (Page 59 of 74)

Delusion in Death by JD Robb

March 8, 2013 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: I’ve had this on my TBR for some time and decided I should read it before Calculated in Death turns up on my iPod. Not a hardship.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) ‘What would cause someone to want so many people, surely many of them strangers, to slaughter each other?’The scene that greets Lieutenant Eve Dallas and her team one terrible evening in New York is more shocking than any of them have ever witnessed. A usually comfortable downtown bar is strewn with bodies – office workers who have been sliced, bludgeoned or hacked to death with the nearest weapon available. It appears they all turned on each other in a desperate blinding rage.As Eve and her husband Roarke – who owned the bar among his many properties – investigate the big-business workers of the city, they link the attacks back to the Urban Wars and the chemical warfare used all those years ago. With another slaughter imminent, Eve must turn to unexpected sources in order to stop a killer who is getting revenge by creating mass carnage…

What worked for me (and what didn’t): I’m an unabashed fan of the series. I find the storytelling reliably good and, having read all the previous books, I feel like I know the characters well – not just Eve and Roarke, but the secondary ones too. It’s a little like catching up with family for me. And I’m still not sick of it. Not in the least.

Where Nerves End by LA Witt

March 7, 2013 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: I’ve had this one on my TBR for a while, having bought it shortly after it was released. After reading some other Tucker Springs books, I wanted to read all of them.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Welcome to Tucker Springs, Colorado: Population, 70-something-thousand. Home to beautiful mountain views, two respected universities, and a ridiculously high cost of living.Jason Davis can handle a breakup. And an overwhelming mortgage. And a struggling business. And the excruciating pain that keeps him up at night thanks to a shoulder injury. Handling all of it at once? Not so much. When his shoulder finally pushes him to a breaking point, he takes a friend’s advice and gives acupuncture a try.Michael Whitman is a single dad struggling to make ends meet. When a mutual friend refers a patient, and that patient suggests a roommate arrangement to alleviate their respective financial strains, Michael jumps at the opportunity.

Living together would be easy if Jason wasn’t so damned attracted to Michael. Good thing Michael’s straight, or the temptation might just be too much.

Well, their mutual friend says Michael is straight…

What worked for me (and what didn’t): I quite liked this book. I enjoyed Jason and Michael’s relationship and their mutual friendship with Seth. (Seth’s getting his own book soon – Covet Thy Neighbor – cannot. wait.). It was certainly sexy and I enjoyed the slow build of the sexual tension.

Shards of Honor by Lois McMaster Bujold, narrated by Grover Gardner

March 4, 2013 / Kaetrin

Why I listened to it: I’ve had this on my TBL for a while and I was in the mood for a fantasy (although in this case, it’s really more sci-fi) romance from a reliably good author and I had it on good authority that the narrator was awesome too.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Cordelia Naismith, Betan Survey Captain, was expecting the unexpected: hexapods, floating creatures, odd parasites… She was not, however, expecting to find hostile humans on an uninhabited planet. And she wasn’t really expecting to fall in love with a 40-plus barbarian known to cosmopolitan galactics as the Butcher of Komarr. Will Mother ever understand? And can such an odd beast as love survive an interplanetary war?

What worked for me (and what didn’t): Quite a few of my reader friends have recommended the Vorkosigan saga books to me. This book had been sitting on my TBL for quite a while and I finally found the space to listen.The story is told in Cordelia’s third person POV and I was a little disappointed when at the beginning of the listen it became apparent that she was going to be stuck with a very deep male voice for the whole book. Grover Gardner has a low baritone and he doesn’t even attempt a female voice. While I appreciated there was no drag-y falsetto, it took some getting used to to “hear” Cordelia in that deep rumble. But, my friend Brenda told me that the narrator was awesome and the book was as good so I bore down and kept going. I’m so glad I did. After a while, the deep voice stopped bothering me because Gardner conveyed the character so well in other ways. Even though there was little difference between Vorkosigan’s voice and Cordelia’s, their characters were so different and distinct, that I had littel difficulty in identifying who was talking. I realised that my friend was right. Gardner is an awesome narrator. Continue reading

Second Hand by Marie Sexton & Heidi Cullinan

February 28, 2013 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: Marie Sexton and Heidi Cullinan are two of my favourite m/m romance authors. I’d been saving this one but after reading and loving Dirty Laundry (Tucker Springs #3 Heidi Cullinan) recently, I decided I definitely needed more Tucker Springs.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Paul Hannon moved to Tucker Springs for his girlfriend, but she’s left him with a house he can’t afford and a pantry full of useless gadgets. All Paul wants is to get back to normal, even if he’s not sure what that is anymore. When he wanders into Tucker Pawn for a gift to win her back, he meets El Rozal, pawn shop owner and all-around cynic. El Rozal doesn’t do relationships, especially not with clueless straight boys still pining for their ex. El may make his living dealing in castoffs, but that doesn’t apply to men. Still, when Paul starts clearing out his old life, pawning kitchen equipment he never wanted in the first place, El is drawn to Paul in spite of himself. Paul and El have nothing in common except a past full of disappointments. There’s no reason to believe the two of them could fit, but in El’s line of work, one man’s junk is another man’s treasure. When it comes to love, El and Paul may learn that secondhand doesn’t mean second best.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): I loved the slow build of the romance in this story. Told in alternating POV (first for Paul and third for El), I enjoyed getting inside the minds of both men. El was smitten right from the start and his methods of making sure Paul returned to the pawn shop amused – Paul was so oblivious to what was going on around him but El didn’t take advantage. El tells Paul late in the book that he was happy to be the one to wait around long enough for Paul to notice and I liked that El didn’t make Paul suffer for it – it was part and parcel of who Paul is and El loved him. This is very much juxtaposed with Stacey’s treatment of Paul which is ALL ABOUT HER.

Bellskis 1 & 2 by Astrid Amara

February 27, 2013 / Kaetrin

Carol of the Bellskis

Why I read it: This book (and the next) has been on my wishlist for a while and I was reminded of them again in the comments of a recent Vacuous Minx post. So I went shopping.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Paralegal Seth Bellski is tired of being the secret lover of his boss, Lars Varga, founding partner of Finch & Varga Law. So when he asks Lars to spend Hanukkah with Seth’s family at their kosher B and B in Whistler, B.C., and Lars refuses, Seth realizes he will never get his self-conscious boss out of the closet.So Seth prepares to spend his Hanukkah holiday alone in the B and B. Instead he finds himself running the place, as his aunt and uncle are missing, and seven demanding, peculiar, and danger-prone guests have arrived. To make matters worse, Lars shows up, begging forgiveness. Lars’s touches remind Seth of why he put up with his boss’s behavior in the first place. If only the words that came out of that beautiful mouth were as sweet as his kisses.But how can Seth find time to fix his broken relationship when the guests are demanding kosher, gluten-free diets, losing their pet terriers, and hitting their heads on the ice? Seth and Lars find themselves put through the paces of being a married couple, all while still broken up. But then again, if they can survive this Hanukah, maybe they’ll be singing a carol of the Bellskis.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): This fun Hannukah themed novella is told from Seth’s first person POV. Seth is a paralegal at Lars’ law firm. They’ve been together for a year but on the downlow and Seth is tired of being a dirty little secret. When Lars pulls out (har har) of a holiday to a family run B&B in Whistler for Hannukah, they break up and Seth goes alone. When he arrives his aunt and uncle are nowhere to be found, guests keep arriving (with various special requests) and Seth is beside himself. When Lars turns up (lucky he happens to be a very good non professional chef), Seth accepts (albeit with reluctance) his help so that the guests have a decent Hannukah while he tries to locate his missing relatives. In the meantime, Lars, having realised that if he doesn’t make some big changes, he’s going to lose Seth altogether, uses the holiday period to try and win Seth back and convince him Lars is a good bet.

Priceless and Fearless by Cat Grant

February 26, 2013 / Kaetrin

Why I read them: I received ARCs via NetGalley.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) “When love’s for sale, who really pays?”Connor Morrison is a 3-D optics pioneer, the star of the UC Berkeley physics department, and a socially inept workaholic. And with his dear friend and business partner, Steve Campbell, handling their investors, he’s content to remain in the shadows. That is, until he meets the gorgeous and starry-eyed physics student Wes Martin.Wes is brilliant but broke. Ever since his scholarship fell victim to the financial crisis, he’s had no choice but to sell his body to stay in school. Already half in love with Connor, Wes initially resists Steve’s offer to be Connor’s thirty-fifth birthday present. But in the end, Wes is too broke–and too smitten–to say no.Connor has no idea Steve bought Wes’s attentions, and he quickly falls under the young man’s spell. Yet after one night together, Wes disappears. He can’t bear to hook with a man he could so easily grow to love, but he also can’t bear to tell him the truth. Besides, if he sleeps with Connor again, there’d be no way to hide the bruises one of his regular johns loves to inflict. Only one thing to do: let Connor go. Walking away is painful, but not nearly as much as building a relationship on lies.

Warning: Some non consensual sexual activity – by a client of Wes’s (not Connor).

What worked for me (and what didn’t): This story was part of Riptide Rentboys: The 2012 Collection. I had only read the Anne Brook novella, Where You Hurt The Most but went back and pulled this one up after reading the blurb for Fearless