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Red-Hot Renegade by Kelly Hunter

Kat — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 23:00:30 +0000

Red-Hot Renegade by Kelly Hunter (The Bennetts, Book 5)

This RITA-nominated book is sexy, angsty and deeply moving—everything we love about modern category romance. Oh, and the heroine? She’s the tycoon. This one’s a keeper.

You may have noticed that I’m in the middle of a Kelly Hunter glom. How I missed this awesome Aussie author boggles my mind, but Red-Hot Renegade (published in the US as Her Singapore Fling) is the book that made me first try Hunter’s work. Nominated for this year’s RITA awards, the book also features an Asian heroine with an Australian hero.

The back story for this novel is set up in the previous books of the series, which features the romances of Jacob Bennett’s siblings. Jacob’s estranged wife Jianne is being stalked and, having run out of options, she reluctantly comes to him for help.

Jacob is a martial arts champion who runs his dojo in Singapore. For reasons neither he nor Jianne want to acknowledge, they’re still officially married even though Jianne walked out on the marriage twelve years ago. What makes this reunion story different is that neither of them blame the other—instead, they remind each other of the guilt they feel about not having fought hard enough to save their relationship.

Jianne practically begs Jacob to let her stay at the dojo—where he also lives—until Zhi Fu, her unwanted suitor, gives up. Jacob practically begs her not to even suggest it, but they both know that it’s the best solution. They’ll pretend to rekindle the relationship, and if Zhi Fu becomes desperate Jacob is more than capable of physically protecting Jianne.

This is the perfect setup for some delicious angst, as Jianne takes over Jacob’s bedroom and both torture themselves with thoughts of what’s keeping the other awake at night. Jianne starts off as an almost helpless heroine, but in Jacob’s presence she’s transformed into a sensual, wicked and deeply emotional partner.

She turned and smiled at him politely, every inch the poised and perfect house guest. No trouble, no trouble at all. Until something flickered in her eyes, something stolen and sensual and altogether familiar. If Jacob wasn’t mistaken, here stood a woman who’d sought sexual satisfaction in the dark of the night. And found it.

What the hell had she been doing in his bed?

Hunter does beautiful things with this couple. Their bedroom scenes are hot and rough and tinged with desperation, and I found them utterly moving. The way Jacob and Jianne work through their guilt and find the courage to claim what they need from the relationship is so subtle it’s bordering on not enough information. I love this.

I haven’t read all the preceding books in the series, but as a standalone read, Red-Hot Renegade focuses almost entirely on Jacob and Jianne’s reunion rather than their first encounter. Even the reason for their estrangement is only hinted at for most of the book. Those who need to understand Jacob and Jianne’s entire back story will be disappointed.

In my review of the book prior to this one, I made much of Hunter’s references to warriors, tigers and Kung Fu Panda. Red-Hot Renegade uses similar references, but for the most part they’re toned down, with the exception of the antagonist’s name. Zhi Fu is close enough to Shifu that I had to suppress a giggle every time his name was mentioned.

Singapore also comes alive a lot more in this book. The non-Western characters feel less clichéd. However, the dialogue has a distinctly non-Asian feel to it. It’s not that I want it to sound Asian, it’s that there are some turns of phrases that just don’t feel suited to the characters. Jianne was born into wealth, so it’s possible she was the product of a Western education or received top-notch language instruction, but the same probably can’t be said for the homeware salesman.

But by far the biggest weakness in the story is the anticlimactic resolution to the stalker plot. Hunter tries to be too clever and it’s more puzzling than satisfying when all the loose ends are tied up in the epilogue.

But…who cares? Any imperfections in the writing or the plot are easily ignored because the emotional layer of the story is just so, so good.

To top it off, this book is really funny. Hunter knows what tickles a romance reader’s sense of humour—the hero trying to distract himself from the sexual tension, the alpha hero’s manly prejudices, the hero’s brothers needling him while he’s suffering from, well, trying to repress the sexual tension. Oh, and the heroine torturing him with yet more sexual tension.

We love a tortured hero.

Yay or nay?

Sexy, angsty and deeply moving, this story is everything we love about category romance. Oh, and the heroine? She’s the tycoon. This one’s a keeper.

Who might enjoy it: Readers who like to read between the lines

Who might not enjoy it: Readers who need a fully fledged backstory

This book was published in the US as Her Singapore Fling.

Title: Red-Hot Renegade (excerpt)
Series: The Bennetts (Book 5)
Author: Kelly Hunter
Publisher: Harlequin Mills & Boon
Australia (Sexy): 9781742787947 (10/2010)
UK (Modern Heat): 9780263877434 (8/2010)
USA (Presents): 9780373528073 (3/2011)

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Affection: a memoir of love, sex and intimacy by Krissy Kneen

Kat — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 00:45:32 +0000

Affection: a memoir of love, sex and intimacy by Krissy Kneen

Sometimes you find a book impossible to put down, not because of what it says about the world, but because of what it knows about you. Affection is that kind of book.

In Affection, Krissy Kneen intersperses past and present in brief but intense vignettes that readers of her blog, Furious Vaginas, may recognise. And yet the story flows—and does so lyrically, beautifully and at times enigmatically.

It begins with a playful tease—Kneen is bound, at her own request, in the middle of an otherwise perfectly domestic Sunday morning. ‘And that was just the sex part,’ she breaks off cheekily.

Kneen describes her childhood in Blacktown (NSW) and her teen years in Gladstone (Qld) almost always framed against the discovery of sexual pleasure—lying on the carpet, in a crawl space under the house, under her grandfather’s desk, on the beach—and her memories burst with texture.

When she leaves home to study in Brisbane, Kneen’s sexual exploration becomes more uninhibited and more complicated. Masturbation offering comfort in her isolation. Her first (homemade) vibrator—‘perhaps the most romantic present anyone had ever given me’. One-night stands shared with her gay housemate. She parades her lovers and sexual conquests with pride but also, in many cases, with genuine affection and a delightfully sly sense of humour.

Affection is, at times, almost unbearably honest. And yet Kneen’s lyricism dulls the edge off some of the darkest parts of the book: depression, attempted suicide, homelessness. Worst is the emotional cruelty Kneen endures at the hands of careless lovers and friends. It’s not that these events are less shocking when they happen; it’s that Kneen introduces them so gently that we’re smack in the middle of these bleaker memories before we realise where she’s taken us.

The scenes set in the present anchor Kneen’s recollections. Underlying the sex parts are Kneen’s struggle to reconcile her inherently sexual nature with loving relationships that must remain platonic:

…the slow torture of my abstinence, squirming with the fleeting possibility of other entanglements, struggling to contain the force of my love for one friend after another.

[In another vignette, this time speaking with a therapist:]

‘And then I sexualise everybody. I think about sleeping with them. There’s this thing I do where I pick someone as my friend and then I fall in love with them.’ To date, however, I have not acted on any of these desires. They are all unrequited longings…

and her journey to self-acceptance. That she’s a dynamic, indefatigable sexual being doesn’t make her any less vulnerable to the insecurities of someone who recognises she’ll never approach the mainstream image of a beautiful, sexy woman that even she buys into: ‘I feel like a drag queen, strutting a rampant sexuality that is just an overblown façade.’

What doesn’t come across so clearly is how Kneen goes from sexual hedonism to marriage. Scenes featuring her husband are sweet and deeply romantic—they’re some of my favourite moments in the book:

‘Andrew,’ I said.

‘Anthony.’

‘Anthony, then. I am not heterosexual or monogamous.’

He nodded. ‘I understand, but you will be while you are with me.’

‘And will I be with you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Really? For how long?’

‘Long enough.’

He kissed me then, and it was nice. Kissing wasn’t a thing I prided myself on, but there was a tenderness behind this kiss and I drank it down. I felt like coffee and a cigarette but a kiss would do. We were disturbed by the judder of the window being opened again and another man, another neighbour, spidered his way over the sill.

‘Oh,’ he said, but he tiptoed into the room regardless, reached for a guitar that was resting against a wall, nodded, waved and scrambled out through the window once more, all jangly strings and echoing wood.

‘I’ve slept with him,’ I told my husband.

‘Heterosexual and monogamous, Kathy.’

‘Krissy.’

He kissed me. I liked it. I didn’t believe him then, but now, eighteen years later, I wonder how he knew.

But it’s never clear to me how Kneen remains true to herself through eighteen years of monogamy and ‘unrequited longings’.

Yay or nay?

Sometimes you find a book impossible to put down, not because of what it says about the world, but because of what it knows about you. Affection is that kind of book.

Who might enjoy it: Libertines

Who might not enjoy it: Prudes

A review copy of this book was generously provided by Text Publishing.

Title: Affection: a memoir of love, sex and intimacy (excerpt)
Author: Krissy Kneen
Publisher: Text Publishing
C format: 9781921520617 (April 3, 2008)
B format: 9781921656729 (September 27, 2010)

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On The Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

Kat — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 23:00:00 +0000

On The Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta

This is a book to be sped through, then read again and savoured and, when it’s tattered and the pages are curling, passed on to your kids.

This is the Melina Marchetta I thought I wouldn’t finish.

The story begins with a shocking scene of children trapped in a car wreck on the Jellicoe Road. But this isn’t the main story.

Twenty-two years later, Taylor Markham is elected to lead Jellicoe School in the annual territory wars against the Townies from the local public school, and the Cadets, who camp out in town for the summer holidays.

But Taylor has other things to worry about. Her dreams are filled by a boy in a tree who whispers in her ear. Hannah, the closest person she has to a mother, has mysteriously disappeared, and Taylor’s teetering on the brink of a breakdown—or worse.

What happened to the kids in the car accident and the boy on the bike who came along to save them? And what do they have to do with Taylor?

I was so confused, I killed a fairy before I even reached page 50. It was the only way I could get through the start of the book. (In hindsight, I’d recommend patience. The plot takes some unexpected turns that make everything that comes before even more meaningful.)

The violence that begins the story lends a strange, almost unbalanced atmosphere to the beginning of this novel. Taylor’s war seems scary and dangerous, but it turns out to be a fairly run-of-the-mill—if sometimes bloody—rivalry between groups of teenagers for whom the games are primarily a way to stave off boredom.

Things are different this year because Taylor is the first female leader in four years and the usual fisticuffs just won’t be happening. Santangelo, the leader of the Townies, has some history with Taylor’s friend, Raffy. Jonah Griggs, leader of the Cadets, is the last person Taylor wants to see, let alone negotiate with. Gradually, these kids realise that their lives are intertwined in ways that will change them.

I can only guess how long it took to write a blurb for this book, because anything more will give away something about the plot that is best left to the reader to discover. I know; I can’t believe I just typed that.

Marchetta’s protagonists are defiant, vulnerable, filled with courage and…well, they’re fun.

‘I’ll go down,’ Raffy said. ‘I’m the fifteen hundred metre swimmer and can hold my breath the longest.’

I watch the guys. It’s as if she’s stripped them of their masculinity.

‘It’s no big deal. It’s just about better lungs,’ she reassures them, turning to face me and rolling her eyes as she takes off her shoes and socks. The guys are not coping and I sit back and hug my knees to watch the show.

And it wouldn’t be a Marchetta book without some outrageously thrilling teen romance. On The Jellicoe Road delivers some of the must crushable boys you’ll find in teen fiction. I’m glad I didn’t read this when I was younger or I’d have spent high school searching for a boy who would ‘change the way I breathe for the rest of my life.’

Taylor’s story is occasionally interrupted by snippets of the kids from the car accident. The flashbacks aren’t in chronological order, allowing Marchetta to drop one bombshell after the other all the way to the end of the book, when even seemingly insignificant tidbits come together to complete the story. Keep those tissues handy, because Marchetta will squeeze every emotion out of your soul.

And it’s glorious.

Yay or nay?

This is a book to be sped through, then read again and savoured and, when it’s tattered and the pages are curling, passed on to your kids.

Who might enjoy it: Romantics and angst-ridden teens

Who might not enjoy it: Anti-euthanasia cat people

This book is titled Jellicoe Road in the US. Marchetta is reportedly working on a screenplay based on the novel.

Title: On The Jellicoe Road (excerpt)
Author: Melina Marchetta
Publisher: Penguin Australia
C format: 9780670070299 (8/2006)
B format: 9780143011194 (1/2/2010)

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The Many Sins of Lord Cameron by Jennifer Ashley

Wandergurl — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 00:00:54 +0000

The Many Sins of Lord Cameron by Jennifer Ashley (Highland Pleasures, Book 1)

A Victorian romance that doesn’t pull a fast one on the reader. It’s a shame we get only one book a year in this series.

Lord Cameron Mackenzie has been a bachelor ever since his psycho first wife died and has raised his son with the help of his brothers and the women who have married into their family. He’s known for his talent with training race horses, and, of course, for his reputation with women.

Ainsley Douglas is a widowed lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria (yes, it’s not a Regency!) and a good friend of one of the Mackenzie wives’. She’s been sent to their house party to retrieve incriminating letters that are being used to blackmail the queen. She’s encountered Cameron before—in smouldering but unfulfilled circumstances—and finds herself caught up with him again in her attempt to retrieve the letters.

Cameron is the third brother to feature in Jennifer Ashley’s lovely series featuring the scandalous Mackenzie family. Like the previous book featuring Cameron’s brother, Ian, this is not entirely a conventional romance novel. Both Ainsley and Cameron were married before, but while she was married to a kind man to avoid scandal, he was married to a psycho nymphomaniac who ended up causing scandal. His wife’s death is a bit of a mystery in the beginning, but it’s explained rather quickly—none of this dragged-on Jane Eyresque mysteriousness typical in other books.

The theme of the series appears to be about healing—everyone saves themselves and each other from drowning in their own hang-ups or traumas. The Mackenzies are a strong, proud and scandalous family, deeply affected by the abuse they suffered at the hands of their psycho dad, and they’ve come out better for it. Yes, they’re in need of love, and sometimes saving from themselves, but they’re believable, sympathetic characters, not the kind who act like arseholes, and then we’re just supposed to forgive them and let them be redeemed because we feel sorry for them as they had crap childhoods, evil women treated them badly, etc.

The family dynamics between the siblings and their wives is also lovely, which is as it should be because it sets up the rest of the characters for the series!

I liked both Ainsley, for her quiet kind of strength and hidden cheekiness, and Cameron, for his stubborn kindness and the way he grew as a character. I have yet to read a book in this series that I didn’t love—they’re all keepers for me. Ainsley and Cameron’s romance is unconventional for the prudish Victorian age, and I liked how this was played out.

Ashley does not pull any fast ones on you. The Mackenzies don’t have everyone on their side, the Queen doesn’t like them, society loves them—the title’s a dukedom—but thinks they’re crazy, mamas don’t entirely throw their daughters at them, and in the end, it’s still like that. There’s no magic fix. The road to redemption is there, they get their happy endings, but you get to appreciate the entire journey.

Yay or nay?

I highly recommend the entire Highland Pleasures series. You can read this one on its own, but it would be better if you read them all in order. I look forward to the next book, and it is a shame that they only come out once a year!

Title: The Many Sins of Lord Cameron
Series: Highland Pleasures (Book 3)
Author: Jennifer Ashley
Publisher: Berkley
A format: 9780425240496 (2/8/2011)

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The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie by Jennifer Ashley

The Piper’s Son by Melina Marchetta

Kat — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 00:00:00 +0000

The Piper's Son by Melina Marchetta

I’ve made up my mind. This is my favourite Melina Marchetta book. If my house caught fire, I’d probably grab it on the way out.

We have a signed copy of The Piper’s Son to give away. We’ll post details of the giveaway this week, so watch this space!

Last year I declared Saving Francesca as my favourite young adult book, but that’s not totally accurate. It’s my favourite teen novel. The Piper’s Son is a little more grown-up, and in this book, Melina Marchetta moves more firmly into young adult territory.

I was crying before I got to the end of chapter one, right through to the end, and I loved every minute of it.

Thomas Mackee, a character first introduced in Saving Francesca, is recovering from two years of self-abuse. When his Uncle Joe died in the London train bombings his family pretty much fell apart.

Even before I cracked the spine of this book or read Saving Francesca, I had a sentimental attachment to Tom’s story because it’s how I first discovered Marchetta’s work. She took passages from this book and formed them into a short story for 2009’s Books Alive freebie, 10 Short Stories You Must Read. It was, by far, my favourite story in the anthology.

Tom Mackee and Georgie Finch

Tom is in a shocking state when the The Piper’s Son begins—a far cry from the obnoxious but generally well-meaning boy in Saving Francesca. Although it isn’t a straight sequel, The Piper’s Son features familiar characters. Francesca and Justine are now just in the periphery of Tom’s life, and it’s clear that something irreparable happened between him and Tara Finke.

Unlike her previous novels, Marchetta writes from two points of view: Tom’s and Georgie’s, Tom’s 40-something year old aunt. Marchetta switches between these two protagonists effortlessly, and it’s a wonder that she hasn’t written more stories with an adult perspective.

Georgie’s story is a little more complicated. Her childhood always seemed clouded by the spectre of Tom Finch, her biological father, who died in Vietnam and whose body was never repatriated. Marchetta gradually reveals the profound impact that Tom Finch’s death—and their inability to bury him properly—had on Georgie’s family.

When Tom (her nephew) hits rock bottom Georgie takes him in, and Marchetta takes us on an at times heartbreaking journey as they struggle to mend broken relationships and broken selves. It’s a dramatic story that I found much more emotionally draining than Marchetta’s previous books, but I couldn’t put it down.

There is an extensive back story to this book that Marchetta reveals ever so gradually and deliciously. I love Marchetta’s work so much that I didn’t even read the blurb for this book, so I got the full impact of some of the earlier surprises—especially those around Georgie and her relationship with Sam, the father of her child. Some are simply devastating.

Without sounding wankerish about it, there are so many layers to this book that even after five (maybe more, but I’m not admitting it) reads I’m still discovering nuances that I missed before.

The joy and burden of family

I want to talk about what happens in the book, so if you’re a big Marchetta fan and haven’t read this book, you might want to skip to the end to avoid potential spoilers.

There isn’t much to the plot—Tom Finch’s body is being exhumed and returned to Australia, but it’s only one of the many catalysts for the emotional healing that Tom and Georgie so badly need.

Instead, Marchetta does what she does best. She weaves together those seemingly insignificant events in our lives—meeting for coffee, hanging out at the pub, having family over for a visit—and uses them to challenge the characters to grow, with the help of the occasional bombshell.

Imperfect love and imperfect people

Tom is a real wreck, and even though I loved him Saving Francesca I was hard-pressed to find some sympathy for the slutty, doped up and thoroughly unpleasant person he is at the start of the book.

Tom and Tara’s rift stems from a one-and-a-half night stand that occurred just before Joe’s death. Tara is now in East Timor, so most of their relationship development is shown through emails, phone calls and flashbacks. I’m not a big fan of the epistolary form but in this case it works, and their communication is sharp and very often amusing. The distance also helps to sustain the will-they-won’t-they tension through to end of the book.

Tom and Tara’s relationship is rebuilt through the most minute acts of forgiveness and courage and vulnerability, and I love this about Marchetta’s writing. It’s the little jokes, unexpected compliments and things left unsaid that make their dialogue so thrilling:

‘What are you thinking?

‘You don’t want to know.’

Silence again.

‘What are you doing?’ she asks.

‘You don’t want to know.’

‘Yes, I do,’

‘Then if you do, I think you already know.’

Georgie’s story is just heartbreaking. It’s not the kind of story I’d usually pick up, but…it’s Melina Marchetta! Without spoiling some of the big surprises of the novel, Georgie can’t leave Sam because of what he did for her when Joe was killed, but she can’t bear to be with him because of her guilt that they’d never have got back together if not for Joe’s death. Their relationship is skewed by something Sam did that Georgie can’t forgive, but that Sam can’t—and doesn’t want to—escape.

It’s the romance reader in me, but I didn’t think Sam grovelled enough to deserve Georgie after my first read of the book. After subsequent reads I realised it’s all there in the subtext; it would’ve been untenable for him to remain grovelling for the rest of their lives—for him as well as for her. Nevertheless, Georgie’s epiphany at the end of the novel was slightly jarring and I would have preferred a less sentimental reason for her finally coming to terms with their situation.

And if you love Saving Francesca…

I don’t think you need to have read Saving Francesca before reading this book, but doing so adds deeper insight into Tom and his friends. The characters have matured but are still connected by the events in high school.

Marchetta isn’t complacent with her returning characters. Francesca and Will are separated for most of the book—he’s in Sumatra working (and, I have to say, he’s even more swoonable now than he was in high school)—and Justine is suffering yet again from a musician boy crush. Tom’s presence is a source of conflict for these relationships.

The dynamic between Will and Tom—never great even in Saving Francesca—make for some of the most awkward, hostile and unexpectedly hilarious moments. The Piper’s Son doesn’t whitewash Tom’s slightly murky relationship with Francesca, which I found fascinating, although I’m not sure Marchetta resolves it well enough for me.

Francesca and Justine provide the only stable female figures, aside from Georgie, that Tom has for most of the story. Without beating us over the head with it, Marchetta demonstrates why it’s crucial for Tom’s recovery to have these very strong women around him.

Yay or nay?

Months after I first picked up this book I was still thinking about it and digesting the story. It’s a much more accessible book than On The Jellicoe Road, but no less complex, exploring dark emotions and relationships and situations that are not easily unravelled. The story is very much character-driven, with internal and external issues colliding and creating friction and opportunities for self-destruction or healing.

But what I love most about this book—indeed all of Marchetta’s work—is that the progress towards mending broken relationships happens in almost unnoticeable increments that aren’t fully recognisable until after multiple rereads. This, more than anything else, speaks to the richness and depth of Marchetta’s prose.

I love this book.

This book is published by Penguin Books. If you click on the Penguin link below, it includes two videos of the author talking about the book, including the inspiration behind Tom’s book.

Title: The Piper’s Son (excerpt)
Author: Melina Marchetta
Publisher: Penguin Books Australia
C format: 9780670074235 (1/3/2010)
US hardback: 9780763647582 (8/3/2011)

Where you can buy this book

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Heartless by Gail Carriger

Wandergurl — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 00:00:13 +0000

Heartless by Gail Carriger (Parasol Protectorate, Book 4)

The latest instalment of the Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series proves that some things can get even better with time.

Alexia Maccon (nee Tarrabotti) has got herself into trouble again. Aside from the ‘infant inconvenience’ that has led to everyone trying to kill her—featuring, this time around, zombie, semi-mechanised porcupines—she has to solve a plot to assassinate the Queen. All while waddling about, moving, investigating her husband’s past, fussing over members of the pack and having tea.

This latest instalment of the Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series proves that some things can get even better with time. This book was just as witty and compelling as the others—I read it at every possible moment—and even more creative. (The porcupines were totally original.) Alexia, despite being preggers and totally dependent on her parasol, hunky werewolves and her unflappable butler to prop her up, still manages to save the day and pop out a baby besides. (Yes, the progeny makes its appearance in this one, which is not a spoiler since you can tell that from the size of her in chapter one.)

Connal, Lord Maccon, is still the smitten werewolf, but he gets to play a bigger part in this book, what with managing his pack. (In the last book he was a mostly absent ass.) His gruff but affectionate nature has ensured that I kind of have a soft spot for him, especially since his wife is doing such a good job of training him. Lord Akeldama, Alexia’s gay BFF has a bigger role in this books as well, and he invents even more affectionate nicknames for her. We also get further glimpses into his character, and we get to see more than his all-knowing, fashion-loving self.

This book fleshes out other secondary characters. We get to learn more about vampire hives, pack politics and how an alpha becomes an alpha. There’s also a whole bunch of dirigibles and we even get to find out Biffy’s real name.

Which brings me to this important point: I love this book, and this series, but you really can’t start from here. It can, if you must, stand alone. The central plot point is explained in such a way that it finishes in this book, but all the secondary threads, including the one involving the baby that has been stretched for the last few books, don’t end or start here. It will leave you wondering, and the continuity is better if you begin from the start.

Was there anything I didn’t like about it? Well, I kind of figured out a major plot point from just a little after the beginning. I also still really dislike Alexia’s sisters. Also, I don’t really get why it’s called Heartless. I don’t think it fits with the theme of the book—I think they just wanted something that ended with ‘-less’. Other than that, I have to say I liked it better than the last one.

Yay or Nay?

YAAAAY! I’m so glad there is more of this series and I look forward to the next one. (In May, 2012!) Highly recommended for people who are kinda over paranormals and want something different. Yes, this still has vampires and werewolves, but it’s steampunk. And Victorian London. And so incredibly witty it will make you laugh out loud. Also, there’s a lot of tea.

Title: Heartless (excerpt)
Series: Parasol Protectorate (Book 4)
Author: Gail Carriger
Publisher: Orbit/Hachette
B format: 9780356500096 (7/2011)
A format: 9780316127196 (28/6/2011)
Ebook: 9780748122677 (7/7/2011)

Books in the Parasol Protectorate series

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Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison

Wandergurl — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 00:00:22 +0000

Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison (Elder Races, Book 1)

The perfect antidote for a paranormal romance slump. I have been sucked into another series!

Pia Giovanni has been blackmailed into stealing something from a dragon’s horde. After becoming the only being in the world to get away with it, she finds herself targeted by Dragos Culebre, a powerful member of the Elder Races. (Yes, he is a dragon. Yes, he lives in a big tower in New York.)

Dragos can’t believe someone has managed to steal from him, but instead of dismembering the thief he finds himself, well, feeling. At the same time, he knows that there’s more to this theft than meets the eye, and before long he and Pia are on the run, trying to unravel the plot against him.

First of all, I had to overcome a lot of resistance to reading this book. The lead character’s name is Pia, the name of my short, spunky, super curvy, bob-cut Asian ex-flatmate. While she has equally interesting adventures of her own, it was hard to imagine the name as a tall, lanky vegetarian blonde dating an almost seven-foot tall hunkachunkaburnin’ love (Okay, she’d do that too—Who wouldn’t?—but she is definitely not blonde!) and I worried I wouldn’t be able to get past that. Thanks to the amazing Decadence’s persuasive powers, however, I finally borrowed the book from her and promptly devoured it over a few train rides.

You may or may not have noticed that I’ve been in a paranormal slump lately. So much so that I can’t even bring myself to pick up J. R. Ward’s latest—which is ironic since we will freely admit to starting this blog partly so we could get J. R. Ward ARCs.

Thea Harrison’s Dragon Bound was the perfect antidote to that slump. Okay, so dragons have been done before. So have shapeshifters and hunky seven-foot tall alphas. What makes this book a breath of fresh air is just how everything is put together.

Pia is a respectable, admirable heroine who tries hard to get herself out of trouble, especially when it’s not really her fault. She’s spent most of her life lying low, trying to keep herself from being noticed. One nasty ex-boyfriend later and she ends up in the dragon’s den.

Dragos is, of course, the perfect alpha. He’s dark, he’s broody, and he has longish black hair that just brushes against his neck (sound familiar?). He has a personality, though, and it’s not all thuggish. Pia and Dragos come together naturally. It’s not one of those scenarios where suddenly they are thrown together and in two days, whoops, we’re walking down the altar. They do get there eventually, but it’s entirely plausible, at least in their world.

The secondary characters are priceless. Dragos has a bunch of boys who are not only sequel bait but amusing and fun to read. Harrison does a great job with the world building. The urban fantasy element draws you into the world but makes it believable, enough for you to be able to feel that you can live alongside them, the way they’re meant to in the novel. It’s fantastical but believable at the same time.

There’s a plot. It’s about people trying to overthrow Dragos (not that he really has a throne, but you know, he’s a powerful entity). It was a good story and I really got into all the adventure. Harrison does good on the adventure bits. And the romance bits. And the rest of it in general.

What didn’t I like about the book? I would have to say Dragos, while having that personality and being a great read and all, had too many similarities with all the other alphas I’ve read. I realise they all have to be a certain way, but he sometimes felt like an amalgamation of a whole bunch of alphas from other books. That said, I still really liked his character a lot.

Yay or Nay?

A resounding YAY. I intend to get my own copy and, yes, I have been SUCKED INTO ANOTHER SERIES. (Thanks, Decadence.) It is all worth it though. I’m really enjoying this and would highly recommend it to anyone who is a bit over your average paranormal and wants something well written and just a bit different from the rest.

Title: Dragon Bound (excerpts: one, two, three)
Series: Elder Races (Book 1)
Author: Thea Harrison
Publisher: Berkley/Penguin
A format: 9780425241509 (2011)

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Lunch in Paris: A Delicious Love Story, with Recipes by Elizabeth Bard

Wandergurl — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 00:00:35 +0000

Lunch in Paris: A Delicious Love Story, with Recipes by Elizabeth Bard

Well-written, poignant, and romantic. Each chapter comes with a few recipes, most of which feature in the story. I loved it all.

In line with Travel Tuesday (#traveltuesday) on Twitter, Wandergurl will review a travel book once a month.

Elizabeth Bard met her Frenchman at a conference, and later met up with him in Paris. On their first date, she slept with him before dessert. Thus begins Lunch in Paris, a beautiful story of romance, Paris, growing up and learning how to be an adult.

And, of course, there’s the food. All the glorious food. Each chapter comes with a few recipes, most of which have been described as part of the story.

And I really loved the romance:

I arrived in Paris in the beginning of April, just as the song instructs.

I tapped the code into the keypad outside, and the blue door made its characteristic click. My suitcases were wider than the spiral stairwell, but we managed to twist and turn them up to the second floor. Gwendal had already made me a key, and when I opened the door, the apartment was spotless. There were roses on the table and yellow index cards suspended from the ceiling with pieces of string. They fluttered like bright birds in the breeze from the hallway.

Each card described what we would do in a particular place, some of it innocent, much of it not. There was one above the stereo: This is where we will dance. One near the couch: this is where you will distract me while I read. One in the shower… There was one on the refrigerator, held up with a magnet like a Chinese take out menu: Amour, baisers, tendresse-livraison 24h/24-7j/7. Love, kisses and tenderness delivered 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. My refrigerator, my new life.

Paris in itself was a character in this books, the tiny streets, narrow staircases leading up to apartments with beautiful views, the markets filled with vegetables. The fact that I loved this book so much, is a somewhat ironic because I hate Paris. No matter what time of year. As a teenager our visit to France was marred by snobby French people who were not very nice to Asian tourists. (It was the 90s.) Ever since, despite my many opportunities to go back I refuse to, simply because I don’t want to give those snobby Frenchmen my money. This book made me want to go back. And not just go back but stay for a while and eat my way through Paris, never mind the locals.

Yay or nay?

I loved this book. I have been recommending this to everyone I know. It’s well-written, poignant, and I could definitely relate to the author’s what-am-I-meant-to-do-with-my-life-now/how-to-be-a-grown-up conundrum. I also became enraptured with the food and the process of getting it to the plate—from the markets, the cooking, the socialising. I loved it all.

Australian edition

US edition

Title: Lunch in Paris: A Delicious Love Story, with Recipes (excerpt)
Author: Elizabeth Bard
Publisher: HarperCollins
C format: 9780732288785 (1/2/2010)
US: 9780316042789 (2/2011)
UK: 9781849531542 (4/7/2011)

Where you can buy this book

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Exclusively Yours by Shannon Stacey

Kat — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 23:00:00 +0000

Exclusively Yours by Shannon Stacey

The premise may stretch the imagination, but the conflicts and emotions in this book felt so real they made my heart ache.

When Keri Daniels’s boss finds out that Keri had been childhood sweethearts with ‘the most reclusive bestselling author since J. D. Salinger’, she’s given an ultimatum: dish the dirt or get the sack. Keri hasn’t seen Joe Kowalski in eighteen years, ever since she left him to pursue a career in the big city. So when he agrees to an interview if she goes camping with him and his family, she figures she can endure it to guarantee her promotion.

Joe was devastated when Keri left, and his heartbreak led to some serious alcohol abuse. But he feels some old sparks and thinks Keri might be open to one last fling. His twin sister, Terry, doesn’t think it’s a good idea and is determined to make Keri pay for what she did to his brother … and for some other grudges Terry has carried over from high school.

Exclusively Yours starts off with a very category romance feel, with Keri being coerced by both her boss and Joe into stepping outside her comfort zone and into a situation where she and Joe are forced to be in close proximity. But Stacey develops the story into a well crafted exploration of the issues that turn love into something unbearable and what it takes to repair broken relationships.

Romance before marriage and afterwards

The story includes two romantic subplots: Joe’s brother Mike and his wife Lisa are at odds over whether or not to have another child; and Terry is suffering the devastation of her husband of thirteen years walking out on her. Stacey manages to flesh out these secondary relationships so that readers are equally invested in their outcome.

In part, this is because there’s actually very little conflict between Keri and Joe. What conflict there is is mostly superficial, except for the dilemma of whether or not either one is willing to give up family or career to be with the other. The resolution is fairly easy to spot; it’s to Stacey’s credit that it’s also not difficult to understand why the characters take so long to get there.

There’s a lot of drama in this story, interspersed with some very witty dialogue that’s just fun, fun, fun to read. For example, when Joe sends Keri a list of things to bring and not to bring to the trip:

BRING: …one flannel shirt (mandatory); pajamas (optional); underwear (also optional); bathing suit (preferably skimpy)…

DO NOT BRING: cell phone; Blackberry; laptop; camera, either still or video; alarm clock; voice recorder; any other kind of electronic anything.

She had no clue what it meant, other than Joe wanting her half-naked and unable to text for help.

The older heroine

Keri and Joe are also a little older than your typical romance couple, and their discussion about having children reflects their awareness that it’s probably too late for them. The sex scenes incorporate their insecurities about being older without wallowing in them:

‘You nervous?’ he asked…

‘Of course not. As far as this goes, we’ve been there, done that.’

‘Yeah, well…my dick’s two decades older than it was the last time we been here, done that.’

‘So are my breasts.’

He grinned as he sank onto the bed next to her. ‘Good. We can be old and decrepit together.’

‘Hey! I didn’t say anything about decrepit.’ And judging by the strain on his boxer briefs, no decrepitude lurked there, either.

That said, I didn’t realise until this scene that they were almost forty. Keri and Joe are a fairly accessible couple even for readers who prefer their couples at childbearing age.

Kids, siblings and manly pursuits

There are a lot of kids in this story. A lot. They’re mostly boys and very rambunctious. Joe has two brothers and they go off and do manly things away from the women. This could have been a recipe for disaster, but Stacey manages to find the right balance for her characters. There’s one particularly powerful scene in which Mike’s eldest son witnesses the climax of Mike and Lisa’s conflict:

…everybody froze when Mike made a frustrated growling sound and plowed his fist into the side of his camper. Joey was on his feet in an instant, freeze pop dropped in the dirt as he stepped in front of Lisa.

Joe watched the boy—so tall, skinny and scared shitless—facing off against his dad, and felt an odd tightening in his chest…But his oldest nephew had just taken a giant irreversible step toward the man he’d become, and it was an awesome and yet incredibly sad moment to watch.

The what is like WTF?

The biggest fault I can find in this book is the use of some god-awful similes. Some of them just don’t make any sense. For example, Joe thinks about Keri and babies and being alone with her in a cabin and ‘the thought poked at his subconscious like a tongue at a sore tooth.’ Later, Joe checks out Keri in her sarong and thinks: ‘The knot of fabric holding it on accentuated the swinging of her hips, like a pocketwatch that sucked him in and stole his free will.’

Finally, I don’t know what to make of the fact that this is the second keeper I’ve read this year where the hero and heroine both have a career in writing. This is one of my biggest pet peeves, so I’m either mellowing or—and this is my preferred theory—these books have been written exceptionally well.

Yay or nay?

This is a must-read for readers who love contemporary romances with drama, humour and believable characters. The premise may stretch the imagination, but the conflicts and emotions in this book felt so real they made my heart ache.

Title: Exclusively Yours (excerpt)
Author: Shannon Stacey
Publisher: Carina Press
Ebook: 9781426890017 (7/6/2010)

Where you can buy this book

This book is available only in digital format.

Long Summer Nights by Kathleen O’Reilly

Kat — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 23:00:00 +0000

Spontaneous by Brenda Jackson/Long Summer Nights by Kathleen O'Reilly

It’s a labour of love to hunt down the local Blaze release by my favourite contemporary romance author, but it was definitely worth the wait.

I love Kathleen O’Reilly’s writing voice. Love. So if you’re looking for a non-fangirly review of her latest Blaze release, you’re reading the wrong blog.

But stay with me. I wouldn’t recommend the book if it wasn’t good.

Times journalist Jenn Dale is facing the sack—her biggest rival is sleeping with the boss—and she’s on the hunt for a big story to save her dream job. Except she’s stuck in possibly the worst cabin accommodation, to cover a festival that has no hope in hell of making headlines.

Meanwhile, she meets the tortured writer—‘Mr Habitual Scowler’—staying at cabin number three. And discovers that he has great finger technique. Must be all that frantic typing.

Aaron Barksdale is like Dr House, except he’s a bestselling novelist who hasn’t published anything since his first book twelve years ago. Despite his misanthropic ways, he’s drawn to Jenn—initially to her nakedness, but it’s a start—although he resists the pull at every turn.

Jenn isn’t an idiot, and despite the great sex and Aaron’s curmudgeonly charm (i.e. non-existent except it’s charming that he even makes the effort), she cuts her losses when he finally reveals his identity, expecting Jenn to betray him.

What makes the story heartbreaking is Jenn’s complete faith in Aaron and his complete lack of faith not just in her but in pretty much every other person, with the exception of his long-suffering agent. Although there are moments when Jenn veers dangerously into martyrdom—because seriously, Aaron is a bit of a clueless dick—O’Reilly makes Aaron work for his happy ending. He has quite a few issues to work through, not the least of which is a son he practically abandoned at birth.

Writers writing about other writers

Anyone who knows my reading pet peeves knows that I am loathe to read about writers. Not only does this story have a journalist heroine, O’Reilly pairs her up with a novelist hero. And amazingly enough, it works. It works because O’Reilly doesn’t overindulge her characters’ writerly ways. From the beginning, there’s a sense that Jenn is a little bit over the ruthlessness of her profession. And even though there are occasional glimpses of Aaron’s writing, he is often self-deprecating and ends up throwing the thing out.

The first night she was gone, Aaron wrote himself into a frenzy. Pages and pages of rambling tripe that was hokey and contrived. He was trying for the best sort of Joyce, a meandering stream of consciousness to fully show confusion and frustration, but ended up with the bad merging of a schoolgirl’s diary and Penthouse Letters. He told himself that he was better off without her, better without the distraction, but then he wrote the words surging passion and nearly slit his wrists.

And later, this:

Who was he fooling? It blew great chunks of sugary cheese, coating his fictional world in a pink cobweb of Utopian joy. Ew.

If nothing else, two writerly characters in lust provides the perfect setting for a game of strip Scrabble, which may just trump the naked limo ride in Breakfast at Bethany’s for my favourite O’Reilly seduction scene.

Modern heroine meets coffee snob hero (I squee)

O’Reilly blends the somewhat rustic setting at the start of the book with a very modern heroine: Jenn sees her first starry sky and does what any citysider would—she looks up the constellations on her iPhone. ‘It’s a GPS, a coffee-finder, a time-management tool and a calorie counter,’ she tells Aaron, who, of course, doesn’t believe in a word processor, let alone telephones.

Aaron also doesn’t believe in coffee makers. Score one for Aaron. He woos Jenn with fresh coffee beans. Be still my heart.

The very last page of the book (yes, it’s part of the Epilogue) made me laugh with its exuberant embrace of popular culture.

Romance, literature, escapism

So certain parts of the plot seem a tad contrived, and obviously there are sexcapades galore, some in itchy sounding surrounds, and maybe the I-love-yous feel a little underdeveloped, but in general O’Reilly doesn’t seem to believe in spoon-feeding the reader. And I love that.

Even taking into account Aaron’s navel gazing, there’s a bit of a literary feel about O’Reilly’s writing that I don’t often find in category romances, as authors try to fit back stories and plot and character motivations in so few pages. O’Reilly allows the story to breathe while still retaining the sense of melodrama that, let’s face it, category romance readers expect and love.

Actually, let’s go back to the underdeveloped I-love-yous. On one hand, it’s hard to understand how Jenn falls in love with Aaron when he was still so emotionally unavailable. On the other hand, part of the romantic fantasy in the story is the inexplicable connection they feel for each other, which gets them to take risks, however small, out of their comfort zones. Whether or not this works for you will, I think, depend on how well the author’s voice captures your imagination.

Yay or nay?

Long Summer Nights is a bit funny, a bit dramatic, a bit sexy—what’s not to love? Buy this book … and the rest of O’Reilly’s backlist while you’re at it.

This is the third book in the Where You Least Expect It miniseries, although I don’t think the characters are related in any way. You can buy the ebook bundle from Diesel (includes an anthology with Julie Kenner). If you want a print copy, you have less than a month to find it in a local bookshop.

Title: Long Summer Nights (excerpt)
Series: Where You Least Expect It (Book 3)
Author: Kathleen O’Reilly
Publisher: Mills & Boon (Blaze)
Australia: 9781742552330 (November 2010)
USA: 9780373795451 (May 2010)
Ebook: 9781426854972

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