Tag: Contemporary Romance

Review: Becky Wade’s MEMORY LANE (Sons of Scandal #1)

· 4 Comments ·

Memory_LaneAmnesia romance narrative? Sold. I love the possibilities of what it allows the romance genre to explore: how the familiar is skewed for the character without memory, how it is anchored for those who are possessed of memory and how the twain can’t meet. And I’d read and enjoyed Becky Wade in the past. Much of what I enjoyed then is still present and something more besides: as Wade is no longer under the constraints of traditional Christian publishers, she includes narrative elements worth exploring, make for something deeper, more real, and interesting. But there are also losses, all of which I’ll discuss by and by. For now, the blurb to help orient us with some detail: 

After surviving a trauma several years back, Remy Reed relocated to a cottage on one of Maine’s most remote islands. She’s arranged her life just the way she wants it, spending her time working on her wood sculptures and soaking in the beauty of nature. It’s quiet and solitary—until the day she spots something bobbing in the ocean.

Her binoculars reveal the “something” to be a man, and he’s struggling to keep his head above water. She races out to save him and brings him into her home. He’s injured, which doesn’t detract from his handsomeness nor make him any easier to bear. He acts like a duke who’s misplaced his dukedom . . . expensive tastes, lazy charm, bossy ideas.

Remy would love nothing more than to return him to his people, but he has no recollection of his life prior to the moment she rescued him. Though she’s not interested in relationships other than the safe ones she’s already established, she begins to realize that he’s coming to depend on her. Who is he? What happened that landed him in the Atlantic Ocean? And why is she drawn to him more and more as time goes by? There’s no way to discover those answers except to walk beside him down memory lane.
(more…)

Review: Emma Barry’s CHICK MAGNET

· 4 Comments ·

Chick_Magnet I’ve enjoyed Emma Barry’s romances since reading her histrom, Brave In Heart. I have sentimental affection for it because it was one of the first romances I reviewed on this very blog (turning TEN in May). So I was awfully glad to see another Barry romance on the horizon, except I admit approaching it with a gimlet eye: while I love Barry’s romances, I really really hate chickens. When I used to spend summers in my parents’ Greek village, stray, mangy dogs and squawking, fluttering, pea-brained, eat-anything, gag-inducing-smelly chickens were what I hated most about it (also roosters crowing at sun-rise when you’d been pickled in ouzo the night before). Like Chick Magnet‘s hero, Will Lund, I never warmed to heroine Nicole Jones’ chickens, but like Will, I liked Nicole and I liked what Barry wrought. I don’t think Chick Magnet has the wit and fun of Barry’s Political Persuasions series (once in a while, it peeked through), but I still read this in one sitting during a work-week from hell (five-hour Zoom, anyone?); and, except for an uncertain beginning, it got better and better with each page-turn. To give you a more-details picture, the publisher’s blurb:

Nicole Jones needs a fresh start. “Chick Nic” to millions of internet fans, the social media star and her flock of chickens bask in the spotlight—until she’s publicly dumped by a YouTuber for clout. She has no choice but to round up her birds and move on.

But when one of her hens has an emergency, Nic gets her first taste of her new stomping grounds—and it isn’t good. Veterinarian Will Lund is wildly attractive, yes, but he’s also surly. In fact, he comes right out and calls her a menace for parading her chickens on social media.

As neighbors, Nic and Will can’t exactly avoid each other. Then again, maybe they don’t want to. The two can’t deny their smoldering attraction, and it isn’t long before late-night confessions lead to backyard shenanigans.

Is this the start of a neighborly relationship—or could something more be hatching?

(more…)

Audio-Book Review: Amy Andrews’s BREAKING ALL THE RULES

· 8 Comments ·

Breaking_All_RulesRomcom is the new chicklit, or chicklit was the old romcom: chicken-egg, does it really matter when entertaining, light-hearted, heartfelt romance is being written? Because that’s certainly what you’ll get in Amy Andrews’s standalone, Breaking All the Rules. Andrews loves a life-restart-romance, especially on her heroines’ parts: Beatrice Archer has burned bridges big-time and docked her life-shambles in small-town Credence, Colorado with resolve to burn even more by “breaking all the rules” which held her rigid and controlled in the past. No more of that, baby, is her ‘tude! The publisher’s blurb will fill in some further details:

Sometimes you gotta toss your whole life into a burning dumpster to find what’s most important…

Beatrice Archer has always done everything she’s supposed to ―worked her ass off, ignored her non-existent personal life, and kept her mouth shut. Now she’s over it. The rat race, respectability…the underwire bras. She’s taking her life back. Starting with moving to Nowhere, Colorado to live life on her own terms.

Now Bea gives exactly zero forks. Beer for breakfast. Sugar for everything else. Baggy sweats and soft cotton undies FTW. Then a much younger and delightfully attractive cop is called to deal with her flagrant disregard for appropriate clothing outside the local diner (some folks just don’t appreciate bunny slippers) and Bea realizes there’s something missing from her little decathlon of decadence…and he might be the guy to help her out.

When it comes to breaking rules, Officer Austin Cooper is surprisingly eager to assist. He’s charming, a little bit cowboy, and a whole lot sexy. But Bea’s about to discover that breaking the rules has consequences. And all of the cherry pies in Colorado can’t save her from what’s coming… (more…)

Audiobook-Mini-Review: Helena Hunting’s MAKE A WISH (Spark House #3)

· 12 Comments ·

Make_A_WishOnce again I’m enjoying romance more via ears than eyes. Impatience is my middle-name when it comes to romance-reading and while I am sometimes impatient at the  length of a romance audiobook, it doesn’t compare to how finger-drummingly ho-hum I feel when I’m eyeballing it.

I certainly both enjoyed and grew impatient with Helena Hunting’s contemporary romance, Make A Wish. It has a cutesy cartoon cover (not a fan) moments of rom-com-ish humour (weak ones), a touch of women’s fic psychologizing (better than I thought it would be), and a fairly standard romance, not too passionate, or compelling, but in the context of its two other qualities, solid. There’s a handsome single dad, aspiring child-care expert, soupçon of May-to-December, and saccharine plot poppet; the publisher’s blurb offers further details:

Ever have a defining life moment you wish you could do over? Harley Spark has one. The time she almost kissed the widowed father of the toddler she nannied for. It was so bad they moved across the state and she never saw them again.

Fast forward seven years and she’s totally over it. At least she thinks she is. Until Gavin Rhodes and his adorable now nine-year-old daughter, Peyton, reappear at a princess-themed birthday party hosted by Spark House, Harley’s family’s event hotel. Despite trying to avoid the awkwardness of the situation, she can’t help but notice how unbearably sexy he looks in a tutu. Add to that a spontaneous hives breakout, and it’s clear she’s not even remotely over the mortification of her egregious error all those years ago.

Except Gavin seems oblivious to her inner turmoil. So much so that he suggests they get together for lunch. For Peyton’s sake, of course. It’s the perfect opportunity to heal old wounds. Or it could just reopen them. This is one of those times Harley wishes she could see the future…

(more…)

Recent Wintry-December Reading

· 14 Comments ·

The school term came to a close with exams and a tradition of “winter games”. I was assigned to supervise a vigorous round of musical chairs to Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas,” which I like well enough, until I hear it for the umpteenth time to accompanying squeals of adolescent enthusiasm. Still, it was nice to see young people off their phones and having some “old-fashioned fun.” As old-fashioned as reading, I guess.

I read three books in an attempt, quite successful I might add, to avoid grading essays. Hurrah. (If ChatGPT is going to end the “essay,” I say bring it on…maybe English class can be reading books. What could be better?)

I desultorily read three books. December is a low-energy month: winter is settling in, I have endless anxiety about what my commute will be like on any given day (snow, sleet, freezing rain, or arctic temps alone or in combination). The books were good, none enthralling; weather, appalling. I’ll have to let these titles settle before any final verdicts, but, for now, here are initial impressions of:

Menachem Kaiser’s Plunder: A Memoir of Family Property and Nazi Treasure

Uzma Jalaluddin’s Ayesha At Last

Robert Harris’s Enigma (more…)

TBR Challenge Theme “Animals” and Marion Lennox’s MISTY AND THE SINGLE DAD

· 14 Comments ·

Misty_Single_DadMeh, I wish I could have loved this. Lennox writes good banter, employs light, wry humour, usually has a wonderfully atmospheric setting and characters who are fundamentally good, but not flat. Certainly Misty has those elements, but there was a problem in the execution that, sadly, coming in the second half, left yours truly with reader-disappointment. First, to the back-cover blurb:

Teacher Misty Lawrence has lived her whole life in Banksia Bay, cherishing a secret list of faraway dreams. Just as she’s finally about to take flight, Nicholas Holt; tall, dark and deliciously bronzed turns up in her classroom with his little son Bailey and an injured stray spaniel in tow.

Misty soon falls head over heels for all three but her scrapbook of wishes keeps calling. Misty must decide: follow her dreams, or her heart? Because a girl can’t have it all or can she?

I do confess I chose Misty and the Single Dad out of the TBR because the cover screamed Wendy’s “animals” theme and it’s true “Ketchup”, the dog pictured, brings these two together and offers cute gamboling-dog scenes. He’s joined by another pooch, “Took,” and the two provide even more of those. So: animals, favourite category romance author, school-marm heroine, handsome single dad, and adorable plot moppet. What could go wrong? (more…)

Audiobook Review: Jen Devon’s BEND TOWARD THE SUN

· 8 Comments ·

Bend_Toward_SunWell, it looks like the only way I can now “read” romance is via audiobook. Roni Loren’s For You and No One Else worked this way for me and so did Jen Devon’s Bend Toward the Sun. While Loren is one of my tried-and-true authors, I would not have considered reading, or listening to Devon’s début without Tree at Words About Words’s review (check it out). I’m glad I did: it was thoroughly enjoyable and a dose of romance that I didn’t think I’d be able to enjoy again. Before getting into the details, here’s the Netgalley blurb:

Rowan McKinnon doesn’t believe in love. With a botany PhD, two best friends who embrace her social quirkiness, and some occasional no-strings sex, she has everything she needs. But she hides deep wounds from the past—from a negligent mother, and a fiancé who treated her like a pawn in a game. When an academic setback leads Rowan to take on the restoration of an abandoned vineyard, she relishes the opportunity to restore the grapes to their former glory.

She does not expect to meet a man like Harrison Brady.

An obstetrician profoundly struggling after losing a patient, Harry no longer believes he is capable of keeping people safe. Reeling, Harry leaves Los Angeles to emotionally recover at his parents’ new vineyard in Pennsylvania.

He does not expect to meet a woman like Rowan McKinnon.

As their combative banter gives way to a simmering tension, sunlight begins to crack through the darkness smothering Harry’s soul. He’s compelled to explore the undeniable pull between them. And after a lifetime of protecting herself from feeling anything, for anyone, Rowan tries to keep things casual.

But even she can’t ignore their explosive connection. (more…)

Audiobook Review: Roni Loren’s FOR YOU AND NO ONE ELSE (Say Everything #3)

· 17 Comments ·

For_You_No_One_ElseI knew I was taking a gamble listening to Roni Loren’s For You and No One Else for two reasons: one, I’ve struggled getting through a romance at all these days; and, two, I did not enjoy the first in the series, Yes and I Love You. I can’t say anything about #2 because, having been burned by #1, I didn’t read, or listen to it. And that’s the main reason why I settled on this one: I could listen to it, maybe that would help get some of my romance mojo back. It did and it didn’t. I enjoyed it, think it’s likely the best of the series, can safely assume contemporary romance fans will enjoy it, but I still grew impatient with the genre’s flaws and won’t be rushing out to read as much romance as I used to. But maybe, just maybe, I can take the genre in small doses, preferably aurally. 

To start, for some background and context, the novel’s blurb:

“Eliza Catalano has the perfect life. So what if it actually looks nothing like the story she tells online? As a therapist, it’s part of her job to look like she has all the answers, right? But when she ends up as a viral “”Worst Date Ever”” meme, everything in her Instagram-filtered world begins to crumble.

Enter the most obnoxiously attractive man she’s ever met—and a bet she can’t resist: if she swears off social media for six months, Beck Carter will teach her the wonders of surviving the “”real world.”” No technology, no dating apps, no pretty filters, no BS.

It seems like the perfect deal—she can lay low until her sudden infamy passes, meet some interesting new people, and maybe even curate this experience into a how-I-quit-the-online-dating-racket book along the way. But something about Beck’s raw honesty speaks to Eliza in ways she never expected. She knows he’s supposed to be completely hands-off…but as complex feelings grow and walls come tumbling down, rough-around-the-edges Beck may be exactly what Eliza needs to finally, truly face herself—and decide who she really wants to be.” (more…)

Wendy’s TBR Challenge: February is Fairy-Tale Month!

· 11 Comments ·

The_Man_Behind_the_ScarsContinuing with my category romance reading for Wendy’s TBR Challenge 2022 I was happy to see this month’s fairy-tale theme. After all, what are romance novels but fairy tale retellings? And what is closer to fantasy and wish-fulfillment than the HP category romance? Which is why I chose to read Caitlin Crews’s The Man Behind the Scars. When an HP is done right, you stay up reading till past your it’s-a-work-day bedtime, as I did with Crews’s little HP gem. It’s over-the-top and groans under the weight of its melodrama, but I enjoyed it. Is the premise ludicrous? Yes, that’s what makes it fun. The scarred hero, Rafe McFarland, eighth Earl of Pembroke, is lurking in the shadows of a society wedding when Angel Tilson, “former model and tabloid darling,” spots him. On the lookout for a rich husband, one waltz later, Rafe and Angel are engaged! She needs money and he, an heir. Before you know it, they’re ensconced in Rafe’s “remote Scottish estate” as husband and wife and the interplay of two lonely people who feel unworthy of love prove how much they deserve it.   (more…)

Wendy Superlibrarian’s TBR Challenge: January Is “Quickie” Month!

· 12 Comments ·

Nanny_PlanAm going to do my darndest to stick with Wendy’s TBR Challenge this third year of our pandemic. Grateful to Wendy for hosting and, eons ago, launching me on a love of category romance. I am going to use the challenge to get through some of my VAST category romance TBR. If you like, you can check out the other great participating blogs and Wendy’s treasure-trove of reviews at her blog, linked here.

As Wendy quipped, this month’s theme is “quickie,” which I took to mean category-length romance (yay to my category romance reading plans!) rather than, um, a fast-paced amorous encounter. What I pulled from the TBR was one Wendy herself lauded…which is how it ended up in my TBR, Sarah M. Anderson’s The Nanny Plan. I’d read Anderson’s Lawyers in Love series and enjoyed it and this one had a cute baby on the cover, so I was pretty much a goner from its first appearance on Wendy’s blog. (more…)