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Forever and A Day by Jill Shalvis

August 16, 2012 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: I picked this up from NetGalley. I’m a fan of Shalvis and Lucky Harbor.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) LOVE CAN HAPPEN IN A HEARTBEAT.

Grace never thought she’d be starting her life over from scratch. Losing everything has landed her in Lucky Harbor, working as a dog walker for overwhelmed ER doctor Josh Scott. But the day his nanny fails to show up, Grace goes from caring for Josh’s loveable mutt to caring for his rambunctious kids. Soon Grace is playing house with the sexy single dad…

With so many people depending on him, Josh has no time for anything outside of his clinic and family–until Grace arrives in town. Now this brainy blonde is turning his life inside out and giving a whole new meaning to the phrase “good bedside manner.” Josh and Grace don’t know if what they have can last. But in a town like Lucky Harbor, a lifetime of love starts with just one day…

What worked for me (and what didn’t): Looking back over this latest three books, I think that At Last was my favourite. I enjoyed Forever and a Day but some things about Grace bothered me too much for me to really like her. And Josh was not a good dad or brother for most of the book. His priority was clearly his patients and his family was suffering. There are other doctors but only one Toby’s dad and Anna’s brother.

Grace first: I thought Grace got away with some pretty arrogant behaviour which Josh barely called her on. And when he did, he ended up apologising for it. Grace has no experience with dogs or children or siblings, but almost from day 1 she is giving Josh “advice” on how to manage his life, his son and his sister. I was sitting there thinking it wasn’t any of her business and what made her the expert – it made me a little grumpy. This continues on for most of the book actually. While her advice was essentially good advice, I didn’t really know why Grace would have any insight. It felt to me like the author’s own parenting insights were being channeled through Grace. If Grace had been an experienced nanny and had earned her place to speak so to Josh, I may have taken a different view but as it was, someone who doesn’t know any better coming into to Josh’s home and telling him he’s doing it wrong felt incredibly rude to me.

As for Josh, I found it difficult to see how he’d managed for the previous 5 years, essentially alone. Toby seemed remarkably well adjusted for having a dad who wasn’t around much. How had he managed for that long without things being a lot worse than it was? I mean, things were bad, but not as bad as I would have expected in the circumstances. It was nice to see a male character realise that he “can’t have it all” for a change. Props for that. But, many points were deducted because the minute he got himself some spare time he signed up for a basketball game instead of spending more time with his son, which was like, THE POINT. I liked Josh but taking 5 years to work out that he’s overstretched overstretched me. I don’t see why Josh ended up being the town hero for some pretty neglectful parenting. Like Robin at Dear Author, I think a more interesting story would have been him realising earlier in the book and reconnecting with his family and having a relationship with Grace. I just didn’t buy that Grace could be the fixer here – she’s not Mary Poppins.

Anna, Josh’s sister, read more like 16/17 than 21 to me. The characters in the book treated her like she was younger too IMO.

I also wasn’t sure about Grace’s conflict with her family/identity being based on her being adopted. I certainly get that a child can feel inadequate and believe they’re not able to live up to parental expectations – but because she was adopted? You don’t need to be adopted to feel inadequate. Hanging it all on her adoption and genetics felt a little off to me. Given Grace’s conflict with her family, her parents actually didn’t play a large part in the book and there was no scene where she told them she was living her own life and staying in Lucky Harbor etc like I kind of expected there to be.

That said, the chemistry between Josh and Grace was sizzling and their scenes together (when she wasn’t bossing him around and leaving aside the “what have you done with Toby?” question) were fun and sexy.

I did like the bromance between Josh, Ty and Matt (and even Sawyer) and the scenes where the boys have “found” a copy of Cosmopolitan at the local bar and are poring over the sex advice was hilarious.

Favourite Quote:

Ty pointed his beer at Josh. “Want to know what I think?”

“No,” Josh said.

“I think you have a case of being a little girl. Maybe you should prescribe yourself a heavy dose of man-the-fuck-up.”

Grade: C

Tangle of Need review up at ARRA

August 15, 2012 / Kaetrin

I’m over at the ARRA blog today with a review of Nalini Singh’s Tangle of Need. There’s a giveaway for members – closes September 5. Feel free to stop by and comment. 🙂

At Last by Jill Shalvis

August 15, 2012 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: I picked this up from NetGalley.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) HER LOVE HAS COME ALONG . . .
Amy Michaels loves her new life in Lucky Harbor. A waitress in the local diner, she’s looking forward to her first weekend hike through the mountains. But when a wrong turn takes her off the trail, she finds herself up close and personal with forest ranger Matt Bowers. And even though she’s tempted to kiss that sexy smile right off his face, she won’t make the mistake of getting involved with the town heartthrob.

A former cop whose life went south, Matt doesn’t let anyone get too close. But something about the feisty beauty caught his eye the moment he first saw her in the diner. After a hot night under a starry sky, Matt can’t deny their attraction-or the fact that for the first time in a long time, he feels the stirrings of something more. Now it’s up to Matt to help Amy see that, no matter what is in their past, together they can build a future in Lucky Harbor.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): I think I liked this one a little better than Lucky in Love. While I found the device of Amy’s grandmother’s journal a bit hokey, I did enjoy the relationship between Amy and Matt very much. They are both tortured by past mistakes and hurt and each, for their own reasons, believes that they are unworthy of love. After 6 months of dancing around their attraction, they finally give in and in scratching what they think is only a physical itch (did they ever really think that? Deep down inside?), find that worthy or not, love has found them.

The side plot involving homeless teen Riley was both positive and negative for me. On the positive side, Riley was somewhat of a mirror for Amy and it served as an insight into Amy’s character and made it easier for Matt to figure her out. On the downside, I thought it was terribly naive of Amy (whose character has heretofore been a tough girl ass-kicker type) to just let Riley waltz into her home and give her a key (literally). Given the set up in the previous book of Mallory’s Health Services Centre which included services for troubled teens, I thought it was more a good opportunity gone missing to serve the plot – Amy could have asked Mallory for help to house Riley in a shelter and get some services for her – that would have made much more sense. But, Riley was a point of conflict for Amy and Matt so plotwise a shelter was out.

Amy and Matt had a more usual type of physical relationship arc – and by that I mean that they don’t just jump into bed. Given Amy’s history, this made a lot of sense. I guess I would have liked a bit more exploration of how Amy moved from the physical activity of sex to the intimacy of it and about her comfort level with being physically vulnerable.

I did like the arc of both of them forgiving themselves for past mistakes and coming to believe they were deserving of happiness and Matt gets bonus points for not caring that even if Amy had been selling herself (which she wasn’t) no means no always and no matter what.

What else? There was one section in the book where Matt takes Amy back to his place (which is a bit remote) and wakes in the morning to find her gone. How she went I didn’t know because she didn’t have her car with her and she didn’t take his and it’s a long way to town. Given that he wasn’t worried, I expect this was an editing issue which was maybe (hopefully) fixed before publication. I don’t (generally) refer in my reviews to typos, etc in ARCs but this was a bit more than that and I thought it deserved a mention.

I appreciated (in all three books actually) that the formatting was really good and the text reflowed beautifully when I upsized the font so I could read more comfortably. This is one of the few ebooks which kept identical formatting but just made the text larger. So, props to Grand Central for that.

Grade: B

Lucky in Love by Jill Shalvis

August 14, 2012 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: I picked this up from NetGalley. I’m a fan of Shalvis and enjoyed the previous Lucky Harbor books.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) Mallory Quinn has had enough of playing it safe. As a nurse and devoted daughter, she takes care of everyone but herself. And as the local good girl, she’s expected to date Mr. Right. But for once, she’d like to take a risk on Mr. Wrong. And who could be more wrong than Ty Garrison? The mysterious new guy in town has made it clear that he’s only passing through, which suits Mallory just fine. Besides, his lean, hard body and sexy smile will give her plenty to remember once he’s gone . . .

For the first time in his life, Ty can’t bear to leave. Helping this sexy seductress-in-training walk on the wild side is making him desire things he shouldn?t?including leaving the military for good. As their just-for-fun fling becomes something more, Mallory and Ty wonder if they could really be this lucky in love. After all . . . anything can happen in a town called Lucky Harbor.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): Instalment 4 of 6 of the Lucky Habor series, this is the first book in the second trilogy. The first was about the sisters Tara, Maddie and Chloe. This trilogy features the “Chocaholics”, three friends, Mallory, Amy and Grace, who bond over chocolate. It was fun to return to Lucky Harbor, catch up on their Facebook page and some of the other characters (I’m looking at you Lucille). The girls from the first trilogy don’t appear and their men are barely mentioned or only have small parts to play. You can absolutely start here in the series if you haven’t read any of the previous books (although I have enjoyed them all).

What was a little different about this book is that the sexual relationship between Ty and Mallory starts very early in the book (which I liked :D) – Mallory decides to walk on the wild side and go for Mr. Wrong instead of trying to find Mr. Right. So, when an opportunity to get down and dirty with Mysterious Cute Guy comes up unexpectedly, she goes for it. For some reason it didn’t strike me as at all odd that she would do this with such a short acquaintance with him – I guess Ty’s level of sexy leaps out of the page so well that it didn’t bother me. 🙂

Ty isn’t really all that bad of a “bad boy”. The only thing is that he’s leaving town and not planning to return, but other than that, he’s protective, noble, honest and sexy as all get out so there’s a lot to attract a woman.

Mallory is a good girl – after the tragic death of her sister when they were both teenagers, Mallory thinks that if she is only a good girl then everything will be okay. Mallory is a little too good to be true – buying groceries for the elderly, searching out the homeless to give them food, watering the neighbours flowers, etc. If she had stayed that way I expect my teeth would have started to ache with her sweetness. During the course of the book, thankfully, she learns to stand up for herself and also that being rude and blunt is sometimes more effective than being nice.

There’s nothing too startling about the storyline or the characters. They reminded me strongly of Lilah and Brady from Animal Magnetism – the conflict is essentially the same in both books.

However, I enjoy Ms. Shalvis’ writing style so much, I think that she writes male dialogue very well (although there was one scene near the end where I question whether Ty would really say that – it was a kind of “you complete me” moment which was a little too sappy for my tastes) and she writes hot and steamy sex scenes which convey the developing emotional connection between the couple.

There are plenty of funny one liners and sexy conversations – Ty doesn’t mind a bit of the dirty talk and the style is easy and fun – I breezed through the book in an evening and an afternoon. There’s nothing earth shattering or new here, but I found the book an enjoyable sexy read and would recommend it to anyone who likes a good contemporary romance.

Favourite Quote:

“Hydrogen, helium, lithium—”

She stared at him. “What are you doing now?”

“Listing the chemical elements so I can answer the door without a boner.”

“And knowing my mother is on your porch isn’t taking care of that?”

“Good point.”

Grade: B–

August Ice by Dev Bentham

August 12, 2012 / Kaetrin

Why I read it: The author offered me a review copy.

What it’s about: (from Goodreads) It takes a special kind of person to work in Antarctica. Max Conway, an ex-Navy Seal, loves working at the bottom of the world. Like any other diver, he’s tough and hard drinking. Half the year he’s stuck in the States traveling the commercial dive circuit and hitting gay bars every night. The other six months he’s lead safety diver at McMurdo Station in Antarctica, reveling in the cold blue Antarctic Sea. The only drawback to life way down under is that Max feels like he has to tuck his libido into storage while he’s on station, stashing all those free condoms for use back up north.That is until Andre Dubois, a gorgeous French scientist, shakes up his world. Not only is Andre out and proud, he’s sober as the day is long. And the days are long during an Antarctic summer. Max must choose between his comfortable inebriated closet and a life in the sun with Andre.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): I enjoy this author’s voice and loved the idea of the setting. I also love broken/tortured heroes so I was pretty happy to dive in to this book (pardon the pun). The descriptions of Antarctica and life at McMurdo Station were interesting and felt authentic. I’d love to visit Antarctica (well, except for the cold) – I guess reading about it will have to do for now.The story is told from Max’s deep third person POV so unfortunately we get very little of Andre. What he doesn’t reveal in conversation remains unknown. The book is about 110 pages and I felt it was a little short for the story packed into it.

The author does a great job of showing the reader how screwed up Max is – Andre describes him as a “beautiful wreck”, that it was difficult to see Andre’s attraction and willingness to put him with him and stick with him throughout. Max is an alcoholic and in deep denial about it and he’s also a closet case, so the latter certainly feeds into the former. A former Navy SEAL, he was active when “don’t ask, don’t tell” was in force and he believes he will get no acceptance from other divers if he comes out. The book in fact reinforces that belief somewhat, because when he does come out, his fellow Antarctic divers (with the exception of his boss) remain the homophobic bigots he knew them to be.

There is Max’s alcoholism to be dealt with – and it takes a lot of the book for him to realise it’s a problem and then a lot more for him to be willing to do something about it. The resolution is a few paragraphs which felt unbalanced and made me question its reality – I was so convinced by Max’s early behaviour it was difficult to imagine it changing and I didn’t see enough of that change in the book to completely buy it.

Then there was Max’s coming out. Given how much of a problem this had been for Max and for how long, it seemed a little too easy for him to suddenly be willing to share a tent with Andre on the ice with everyone knowing they were lovers. There was no resolution to his coming out story really – the book ended with him in the midst of it at work and again, I wondered whether the flack from this would fracture his relationship with Andre and drive him back to the bottle.

I didn’t have a lot of confidence in his relationship with Andre because I didn’t see much of them being strong and healthy together and, like I said, I saw so little of Andre because we only had Max’s POV.

All this sounds like I didn’t like the book. But I did. The beauty of Antarctica, the wonder and freedom Max experiences when he dives under the ice, the sympatico he feels when diving with Andre – they were all wonderful. The writing was spare and lovely and I definitely got the spark between the couple. There were some steamy sex scenes which left me in no doubt of their physical connection. It was just that there wasn’t quite enough of the good stuff to balance out the set-up and that left it being somewhat of an uneven reading experience. I would have loved another 50 pages from Andre’s POV.

Grade: B-

Sophia’s Secret (aka The Winter Sea) by Susanna Kearsley, narrated by Carolyn Bonnyman

August 10, 2012 / Kaetrin

Why I read listened to it: I’ve become a Susanna Kearsley fan and when I had a choice of reading The Iron Duke (Meljean Brook) or Sophia’s Secret (both of which I have in print) I decided to “read” both at once and downloaded the audiobook from Audible.

When this book was released in the US it was renamed The Winter Sea and the US audiobook release won narrator Rosalyn Landor an audie award this year. I’m not a huge fan of Landor audie or not, so I went with the Bonnyman option – she narrated Mariana and I enjoyed her narration very much so I chose this version which, apart from the title, is exactly the same.

What it’s about: Carrie McClelland is a successful historical fiction writer. She is writing a novel about the Jacobite rebellion of 1708 and travels to Scotland to attend the christening of her agent and BFF’s child. While there, she visits the ruins of Slains Castle, where The Dowager Countess of Erroll and her son the Earl of Erroll lived during that time, they both having great influence and involvement in the rebellion. Her book hasn’t been coming together and she decides to relocate to Cruden Bay, near Slains and start again, with a “point of view” character. That person is not supposed to be real, but rather someone who can “link the scenes together by her presence”. When Carrie gives this character the name Sophia Paterson after one of her ancestors, she thinks it is a deliberate, conscious choice. She also thinks the ideas about her book, which are coming thick and fast now, are subconscious. She’s wrong on both counts.

What worked for me (and what didn’t): This is a book within a book. We get Sophia’s story and Carrie’s as she writes about Sophia. It is also a dual romance book. Both Sophia and Carrie fall in love and have (mostly) happy endings.The romance for Carrie comes from the son of her landlord (she’s renting a cottage in Cruden Bay), a professor of history at the Aberdeen University, Graham Keith. Graham’s younger brother Stuart also has an eye for Carrie but it is clear early on that the spark is between Graham and Carrie. Stuart is charming but somewhat flighty and not terribly serious in his affections and they actually have little in common. (He put me in mind of a (quite a bit) nicer version of Adrian Sutton-Clark from The Shadowy Horses actually). There is little that keeps Carrie and Graham apart – Stuart is not a serious barrier. I did think that not making things clear to Stuart was more of a plot point rather than organic – in other words, I think it wasn’t made explicit to Stuart much earlier on that he was out of luck to serve the purposes of the book only.Sophia has the more dramatic and angsty storyline and because of that, the easier relationship with Carrie and Graham was a welcome change.

Sophia is an orphan of about 18 years at the start of the book. She travels from her home in Kirkcudbright (pronounced “Kerr-COO-bree”) in the west, to Slains Castle to live with her distant relative, the Countess of Erroll. She is treated there like a daughter of the house. Sent from the court of the exiled James Stewart at Saint-Germain in France, Nathanial Hooke and John Moray travel to Slains, the plan being that they will travel Scotland and gauge support for James. John however has a price on his head of 500 pounds – an enormous amount of money for that time and he is confined to the castle for his protection. John and Sophia are drawn to one another and commence a clandestine relationship – they know that the Countess would not encourage their relationship because John is a wanted criminal. When John returns to France to assist with preparations for the rebellion and to fight with his regiment in Flanders against the English, it is with the promise to Sophia that he will return with King James and they can then be together forever. The rebellion fails (as we know from history) and things get pretty bleak for Sophia for a good long while. There is sadness and a difficult decision but never fear, Sophia does end up happy. Trust me.

I did wonder if John wasn’t being very selfish in having a relationship with Sophia in such desperate times. They did a lot more than hold hands if you know what I mean – and this put Sophia at risk in terms of her future if something should happen to John (what if there were a child, she was no longer a virgin, etc) and also because she could easily be used as a pawn against John if it were ever discovered what she means to him.

The reasons for their secrecy were compelling and made sense. As do the events at the end of the book (about which I will say no more).

I really think I’ve listened to Ms. Kearsley’s books in the right order. Each book so far has, for me, gotten better – and by better, I really mean more romantic. There is plenty for a romance lover in this book. Add to that the beautiful prose and the rich historical setting – well, it’s a gem.

What else? Carolyn Bonnyman’s narration is excellent. Portions of the conversation are written in the Doric – the local language which was fun to listen to (I would have had no hope of pronouncing things so well), as well as Scottish, English and Canadian accents, all well differentiated. The scenes from Carrie’s time were clear because she used Carrie’s Cannadian accent to narrate and when we were in Sophia’s time, the narration had a Scottish accent to it, even though that part of the story is told in third person. I knew where I was in time at each point because of it and it heightened the listening experience.

Grade: A