Review: Up Close - Henriette Gyland

How close is too close? Dr Lia Thompson has swapped her native Norfolk for a life in America, but returns to sort out legal matters after her grandmother's death. Unprepared for the viciousness of village gossip, she's vulnerable to insinuations that her grandmother knew something about the recent bomb threats against a nearby army base. Even so the longer she stays, the more she realises this is where she belongs.

Wounded ex-navy man and artist Aidan Morrell has accepted his physical scars, but is still bitter over the army's treatment of his older brother, which had a devastating effect. He expresses himself in his sometimes disturbing paintings and through scuba-diving, and sees Lia with her fear of water as a challenge. The attraction between them is undeniable. Should they dare to let the other get close?

My thoughts:

I kept wondering and wondering, yes this book brought me quite the mystery to solve.

Lia is a doctor who comes to Norfolk to settle her grandmother's estate as her mother refuses too. Yes drama at the beginning. Lia is smart, sensible, but with a few issues from her past.

Norfolk is painted as harsh, those who live there, well live there, they know the land. But it fits well with the story, because something is going on. Someone was watching Lia's grandmother, and did someone kill her? That is the mystery. Because strange things keep on happening while Lia stays there.

There is also a friendship that slowly builds, a friendship that might or might not lead to romance. Aidan has his own issues from the war, and there is secrets he is keeping too. Those I did figure out..after a while. I also liked how their story was built, there was friendship and something that could be more. It was real.

The mystery was good, so many questions and so many different roads to take.

Conclusion:

A good suspense novel, with a hint of romance.

Genre: Women's fiction, suspense, mystery
Pages: 369
Published: Dec 7th 2012 by Choc Lit

US Kindle / UK 

Review: What I need - Theda Black

This novella surprised me. It’s written in first person voice from Jacob’s point of view and in some ways it reminded me of Muscling Through, which I absolutely loved. Jacob isn’t quite up to par with Al, but he does have his own voice.

The focus here isn’t the M/M romance or the sex, it’s Jacob’s characterisation. It’s the moment in his life when something needs to give and change. For too long Jacob has just been ignoring his needs, not just sexual but social. As awkward as interacting with strange people and huge groups is for him, he soldiers on and forces himself to face his fears each and everyday. He just never stopped to think that facing someone isn’t the same thing as opening up to them.

Then he falls for Elijah.

This is where the trope I’m not overly fond of comes in. Elijah is a hooker who works in an alley Jacob walks through on his way home from work. They both know it can’t possibly work, but they throw themselves into the attraction anyway, and figure out a way. Or try to. 

What I absolutely loved was the fact Black doesn’t make it easy for her characters. I was a little worried I wouldn’t be able to suspend my disbelief for the fairytale ending with the magical I love you’s that fix everything in fetishistic M/M erotica. I shouldn’t have been, because there isn’t a fairytale ending with magical I love you’s for these men. There’s something better. It’s raw and real and it’s on both of their terms. 

It feels good to add something on my “recommending” shelf again.

4 stars

Series: N/A

Pages: 66 (Kindle ebook)

Publisher: Self-published

Published: June 20th 2012

Source: Freebie

Lady Scoundrels' Saturday: The Raven Prince - Elizabeth Hoyt

Today is the last part of Lady Scoundrels review: The Raven Prince. Next week we will be back with a new book. Stay tuned for that.

Part 1 Scorn 

Part 2 Sense

And today it's my turn, Sensitivity *coughs*

I was unsure about the grade but I am just gonna go all bitchy on this book. Truth be told, I sat there reading and nitpicking and never truly connected. Did it make me want to read more by this author...no. Would it make me pick up more books by her if I found them at the library, no, and that really means it should get a 2. Which is still of course an ok grade. Cos it was not all bad.

So many things irritated me with this book. The first time Anna sees and hears Edward she thinks of one thing..is that how his voice sounds when making love? Honestly? Wtf, someone needs to get laid and fast. I doubt a prim 18th century widow would think that.

Then she becomes his secretary, again, wtf is this? She is a woman! Then she dines and rides with him. Oh girl, do not talk about that your reputation might take a hit, everyone, I mean everyone would already think you are his mistress. And if they are not then something is seriously wrong with that village.

The sexual tension continues *yawns*. She is also not repulsed by his scars cos he is pretty on the inside or whatever. Really? I found him to be quite the ass in the beginning. Also how they sparred at once. No no, that is not proper etiquette. You are obviously a loose woman. Why he keeps thinking of you are a virtuous saint I do not know.

To the brothels! Yes she finds a note and begins to think why men gets to smex around but women don't. Hello, because that is the era you live in. Do not go all modern on me or I will kick your ass. Anyway, what does our prim heroine do, yes she talks to a whore for 2 minutes and decides to go to a brothel and have sex with Edward. What? When did this happen? I am totally lost by this plot. WHY on earth would you do that? Just lift your skirts to him in the library and have at it. Yes he would not think you all prim and proper afterwards but at least you would get laid. Pretending to be someone else behind a mask at a brothel is something that does not go through my head. You also put yourself up to be raped by strangers, sold, killed, where is your head?

Of course he later finds out, duh, so we could totally have been spared the stupid brothel story, oh and I must also mention that he has a magic penis. A very magical penis that cures every womb.

Let's see, anything else I can snark at....I actually liked that she took pity on the prostitute, that I liked.

Oh the villains. Do not even get me started, another stupid plot that made no sense. Someone making a big deal of nothing. I could have been spared that too, it was just embarrassing and I wanted to hide behind my book.

Last, I am sure all these things could have been forgiven one way or another but at the end I realized that I suffered through the book and never connected. Why would I connect to the prim widow who just thinks about sex. Or the earl who goes on and on about how ugly he is and lusts after his secretary. An easy way to fix that, try to seduce her, if that fails, pay her off. I did not feel the chemistry, I did not get why she liked him, or he her, as she was so plain and that he says a lot. But hey she was outspoken, he must like a challenge.

I fear that yes I like HR, but HR does not like me back. I keep trying and I am sure everyone thinks I love HR to pieces, but I don't. It seldom impresses me. I enjoy it, it's a good genre, good escapism in it's silliness. But great, no, not that often. Really seldom really.

Would I recommend it..no not really.

Cover Snark:

So that is the ugly guy..yeah, sorry can't see it. Then I do prefer this other cover:

Review: Sleight of Hand - Mark Henwick

genre: urban fantasy, criminal mystery, paranormal fiction

Synopsis:

Amber Farrell is not your ordinary PI. She has been very well trained in one of the US Army super secret units. Unfortunately now the Army don’t want to have anything to do with her although they watch her carefully. She was a cop. Now most cops distrust her. All because of a bloody incident in the South American jungle. She was bitten by something strange and she survived against all odds; now she doesn’t know what to do with her life which is simply slipping out of her hands.

It is not a big secret what she is becoming: a vampire. However even as your average vampire aspirant she is still unusual. The whole process is taking her longer for one thing and she doesn’t seem to need a mentor. She can also identify other vampires by their coppery smell.

As a self-employed PI Amber is doing not very well, but soon she is given a very profitable job. Her new client is Jenniffer Kingslund, a rich local businesswoman with a bunch of problems of her own: normal and paranormal. All of them seem to revolve around one undeveloped location of Jennifer called Silver Hills. Will Amber be able to help her? What will it take?

What I liked:

You might say it is just another paranormal fiction series with a mixture of everyday life in a big American city (Denver) and different fantasy creatures like vamps and werewolves but it was highly readable.

The world building was interesting, especially concerning the Athanate or vampires. The author tried to outline their existence in a fresh way (if it is possible at all with vampires swamping popular literature) and I appreciated his efforts. The criminal mystery actually was overshadowed by that thread, at least for me.

Amber is a highly-trained woman but her proficiency in martial arts and using  conventional weapons didn’t come from thin air. It is one of my pet peeves – a more or less ordinary chica is turned into a vampire and in the matter of seconds, practically as soon as she touches a sword, she becomes a warrior extraordinaire. Here at least the author gave his heroine a proper background, making her exploits far more believable.

Also I truly enjoyed the fact that this novel didn’t feature either insta-love between the main lead and, say, a devastatingly handsome vampire master (ugh!) or an ugly love triangle. Amber is a sensible girl who knows her priorities and keeps her desires in check, concerning both her male and female acquaintances. I hope the author will continue that course.

Finally some secondary characters like Bian, the Vietnamese vampiress who likes Goth girls, Tullah, Amber’s secretary and her mother were really nice to read about.

What I didn’t like:

The biggest problem I had concerned my relating or rather not relating to the main heroine, Amber Farrell.  Don’t get me wrong – I like kick-ass women who never pull their punches and make a career on their own, without needing a strong man by their side, vampire or otherwise. Still…whenever I felt I finally knew what made her tick I was led astray by her actions again and again. Let me be more precise: Amber is not a badly-constructed character but she is neither here nor there, a work in progress.

Sometimes she acts like a straight adult woman, sometimes – like a young gung ho man from a Bond movie. She kisses both men and women. For some period of time she is a kind of live-in girlfriend of Jen but without fully realizing the implications of her status. She publicly dances with her for heavens’ sake and still she never bothers to ask herself what others might think of it. When her sister is angry at her she is simply surprised. Although she is half way into becoming a vampire but she hates most of vampires and is afraid of her own future as one. Still she doesn’t look for the answers – not really, taking into account the fact that she is an investigator – and when it comes to werewolves she doesn’t have any trust issues or problems…

I understand that it is just the first part of a whole series. Perhaps with hindsight everything would have become perfectly reasonable but reading the first part I sometimes found myself wondering whether Amber is a she or a he or a person somewhere in between. I bet there might be several explanations of such a character construction. First: it was done deliberately by the author for reason or reasons unknown, to be revealed later. Second: male authors, even very good ones, sometimes have difficulties getting into a female mind and their heroines come across as tomboys at best, hermaphrodites in the middle, something misshapen a cat might drag in at worst. Creating a complex character is never easy. In my opinion the jury is out when it comes to Ms Farrell. Her background (a stint in special forces, another one as a cop) definitely would predestine her to be a bit less feminine than your ordinary vampire chick and it’s fine by  me but I wish she found her inner core, spoke with herself and took a mature, informed decision about her preferences – rather sooner than later.

Final verdict:

An interesting beginning of another urban fantasy series. I wish Amber and her author all the best!

Bridget/anachronist