June TBR Challenge 2011: Lead Me On

June is the month of contemporaries. I have quite a few contemporaries in my TBR pile. I wasn't really sure when I started the TBR Challenge which one I would pick there are so many I've been hoarding, even more on my list of books to buy. As the months went by my choice became a lot easier.

I hang out on twitter. A whole lot. I follow some of the smartest and funniest people in the romance community. Some of them are actually twitter friends; others are just people whose twitter conversation is full of useful information or timely links. Or in the case of Victoria Dahl, fun. Dirty, smutty fun. If you haven't seen her around twitter you really should check her out. She's hilarious.

So when June rolled around I picked up her 2010 release, Lead Me On. It's the final book in a trilogy. I didn't realize it when I bought it and it undoubtedly is part of the reason I was so slow to get around to reading it. I tend to be pretty uptight about reading a series in order. Based on how fun it is to read her tweets, I wanted to give Victoria's book a try. I'm so glad I did. I'll even go back and read the earlier books.

Here's the lowdown: Jane Morgan is trying her damnedest to repress her past, her family, even a part of herself and live her perfect life. She isn't perfectly happy, but it isn't for lack of trying. Then her younger brother gets arrested and her carefully constructed lies begin to unravel.

Adding to her family problems, is the hot, hard, tattooed Chase. In a great twist, it's Chase who falls for Jane, despite her desperate attempts to remain uninvolved. They have amazing, raw and passionate sex and Jane does her best to make sure it stays nothing but sex. Chase is the one pursuing a more real emotional attachment.

This is a book that deals with some very serious issues. Family issues are hard to escape. Hard to make peace with even years later. Jane is a mess. Watching her futilely flee her past should be painful. Jane certainly faces some harsh problems. But layered over that, the book is sensual and playful. When Jane is near tears, Chase always manages to make her laugh. In the end that is the my favorite part of the book. Even when things seemed grim, I never doubted that Jane and Chase would somehow find a way to be together.

TBR Challenge 2011: Her Singapore Fling

I cheated a little bit this month with the TBR Challenge 2011 book I chose. It is a new release, so obviously not something collecting dust on the night table. In my defense, it's the last book in a string of connected books about the Bennet siblings and I have had to wait some time for it to be released! Right off the bat, I can tell you I think it was worth the wait.
The Book Her Singapore Fling  by Kelly Hunter


The Particulars an April 2011 Harlequin Presents title (published as Red Hot Renegade in the UK)

Why it was my next had to read? I loved the other Bennet family books. Enough that I went back and hunted down the first in the series after jumping in the middle, something that I rarely bother to do.

The Blurb:In desperate need of protection, Jianne Xang-Bennett reluctantly turns to her estranged husband, martial arts expert Jacob Bennett, for help. But there are problems: they've been separated for twelve years and cannot be in the same room together without arguing or ripping each other's clothes off—often at the same time!

But Jacob will go to extremes for those he loves, and Jianne is the only woman who can bring this honorable warrior to his knees. Can they delve beneath their red-hot desire and blazing anger to find the love that has always been hiding?

Review: I was a bit nervous about reading this book. Jianne is mentioned by the other siblings as the biggest source of guilt and regret from their wild youth. I didn't really want to read a book where either the heroine had made a huge deal of something minor or beloved characters from other books were villainised. Hunter walks that fine line of keeping me happy in both respects very well. Jianne is a sympathetic character with real complaints about her husband's past treatment, but she's not above acknowledging her own part in the failure of their marriage. She is also a great study in how to make a quiet and non confrontational heroine something other than a doormat. She politely and resolutely stands her ground and backs down her larger, louder ex-husband.

Jacob is taciturn and even veering into sullen. But he knows it and he's trying hard to do the right thing, even if he isn't always correct about what that is. I had a real soft spot for him and I enjoyed seeing his interactions with his siblings which are appropriately brief. I loved watching him as he rediscovered the wife he never stopped loving. Slowly he learns to bend enough to meet her halfway.

It's not a flawless book. The suspense element is wrapped up a bit too easily at the end to fit into the brief word count, but, as with most Presents titles, the couple is more interesting than the plot.

One of the reasons that I wanted to write about this book in particular is the surprising things about this book. The heroine is Chinese. She's the first Asian Presents heroine I can recall reading and it really worked well here. It defined many things about Jianne's character.  Hunter even uses the language on the page to evoke that musical cadence that native Chinese speakers have when they talk.

The hero isn't wealthy. He's not a business tycoon at all. Make no mistake he's successful by any measure, except that of the Presents hero. And the heroine? Tons of money. Loads more than her husband. And Jacob has a problem with this the way many men would. What's more, the antagonist is more the model for traditional Presents hero: an absurdly wealthy man who won't take no for an answer. A delicious bit of irony there. And yet Jacob is clearly cut from the same cloth as the Presents hero. 

Honestly it didn't bother me at all. The money thing actually added depth to the conflict between Jianne and Jacob. It all ended up feel surprising unpredictable. It seems to me that the category romances that I've read lately have been surprisingly fresh and innovative, while still honoring what I see as the core of expectations. Sharing the shelves this month with Hunter's book are other books that even from the blurb are clever twists on the traditional tropes.  One has a secret pregnancy that happens through IVF; the parents had never even met. Another has the book opening with the heroine rescuing the hero from drowning. I love the play on our assumptions that is occurring here. That just means my TBR pile is growing taller.

TBR Challenge 2011: Bayou Moon

The Book: Bayou Moon by Ilona Andrews

The Particulars: urban fantasy, Ace 2010, book #2 of the Edge series of connected books. This isn't actually a sequel, rather the story of a secondary character from the first book in the series, On the Edge. Although the book has some spoilers for the first book in the series, it isn't necessary to read them in order.

Why was it in my TBR pile: I bought this the month it was released. I bought it because I'm a huge fangirl of the Kate Daniels series by the same author. I have no idea why I didn't pick this up to read right away. I did read the first Edge book and I liked it as well, although not as well as Kate and friends.

The review: Bayou Moon is the story of William, a shifter hunting down an old enemy and Cerise. Cerise Mar and her family live in a swamp in the Edge, the world between the magical Weird and our ordinary world the Broken.Cerise is poor and her large extended family struggles for everything they get. A rival family is threatening Cerise and her parents are missing, leaving her to save them all.

William and Cerise meet as they both are sneaking their way back into the Edge in disguise. William's enemy is hot on their trail, but it is Cerise who is being hunted. To complete his mission, William convinces Cerise to take him back to her family's compound. From there he can hunt the men hunting her.

The thing that Ilona Andrews really excels at I think is the world building. All the details of the magics and changelings (shifters) are fascinating. The world is fully realized, yet leaves room for still more to surprise in any future novels in the Edge series.

I think perhaps one of the things that worried me about reading this was Williams character. I had such a strong image of him from the first book, and I wasn't sure how he would work for me as a romantic hero. He actually is probably my favorite part of the book. William is a broken and betrayed man. Everything that he had  is gone and he is a bit lost until he is handed the opportunity to hunt down an old adversary. I totally loved watching him fall in love with Cerise without losing the side of him that is more beast than man. Cerise and William both are characters who refuse to be beaten down by their circumstances and I longed for their happy ending.

One thing I didn't love about Bayou Moon is the many points of view. It's all well done - no random head hopping. It's just me.

I did really like the book. I'll have to say I don't like the Edge books quite as much as the Kate series, although I'm not sure I could say why. Kate is actually written in first person, which I don't as a rule enjoy. The Edge books might also edge more into Paranormal Romance which I prefer to Urban Fantasy. That said, I'm really glad I read both of them. Bayou Moon is fun and clever, with a whole cast of amusing characters.

For more from the TBR Challenge 2011, check out the award winning  Wendy the Super Librarian.

TBR Challenge 2011: Exposed: Misbehaving with the Magnate

I am participating in the 2011 TBR Challenge being hosted by Wendy the Super Librarian. 

Each month participants read one novel from their TBR list and post a review. I’m hoping this will help with the large number of books I have that I haven’t read yet, but can’t seem to part with. I mean to read them, but I find something else to distract me and somehow never get back to it.

There are a series of suggestions for each month’s post. There’s no obligation to stick to the suggested categories, or even to post every single month.

I have a few rules for myself. I’m only going to post about books I liked. If I didn’t like a title, I will pick another book or just skip that month. If there are bits that didn’t work for me or flaws, I’ll point them out. But if my overall feeling is that the book just was off, I don’t wish to post paragraphs on why it’s not for me. It’s not that I feel that the authors aren’t adult enough to take the criticism. It’s not that I don’t support the rights of bloggers to be honest in their reviews. I just don’t want to waste my blogging time writing something so negative. 

The first suggested read is a category romance. I actually read a fair amount of category so I didn’t have any unread laying around the house.  I did have a bunch of free ebooks from Mills and Boon that I’d never even opened over the holidays and when I looked through these, I did find a reissue of an 2009 Kelly Hunter book I had never read. I had read the sequel to this 'Hot Bed of Scandal' duo. It was actually my first ever Hunter book and I adored it so much that I hunted down all of her Bennet family stories as well.

Exposed: Misbehaving with the Magnate is a reunion story. This is a trope that I love, but that can have so much go wrong. The book opens with Gabrielle's return to her childhood home and her first love Luc. The opening does a great job of setting both the plot of the book and the feeling of the story. Hunter's books for me all have a huge emotional punch without feeling too dark and heavy. And that's really saying something considering some of the issues in this book.

Here's the blurb from Hunter's website.

Forbidden desire... unleashed passion!

Seven years ago Gabrielle was the housekeeper's daughter, and Luc Duvalier, as the heir to a vast fortune, was forbidden! One hot kiss got Gaby banished, but she's returned home determined to face Luc as an equal - in every way!

Both know it's only a matter of time before they give in to their passion - despite the scandal this will cause.

 I loved that she didn't go away and pine for Luc. She lived her life. Gabrielle had a full personal and professional life. She didn't come home a 25 year old virgin. Having had that kind of full life, it's all the more poignant when she realizes what is missing. Gabrielle is a real and flawed heroine. She had plenty of problems in her past (I won't divulge to much here), but she didn't always react well to them. The fact that she recognises and accepts that fact made me love her even more.

The relationship between Gabreille and her mother is complicated and painful. The end of that plot line did feel a little rushed, not surprising given the constraints of a category word count. It was a believable and satisfying ending, where again the heroine refrains from self-pity.

Luc's sister Simone plays a fairly large part in the story, enough of a part that she's more than just sequel bait. And I loved her just as much here as I did in her book Revealed: A Prince and a Pregnancy.