Month: October 2013

Review: The Perfect Match by Kristan Higgins

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5 stars for this October 29 release!

I’m a romance junkie, and after reading so many, I’m hard to impress. The Perfect Match totally impressed me. This novel has it all – sweetness, complications, misunderstandings, true love, misgivings, honesty, and family loyalty. Higgins writes a complex, well-thought-out story with multi-layered characters and relevant subplots. I’m telling you, this is one of my favorite romances of 2013!

So now that you know the writing is awesome, here’s a little bit about the story line and characters:

Honor is a hard-working woman who takes care of her immediate family’s needs before her own. She also has had a 15-year crush on an old friend that she hooks up with once in a while. When he rebuffs taking the relationship seriously, Honor shifts her focus to finding pretty much anyone to marry – so she can settle down and have a family of her own.

Enter the meddling grandparents setting up a date for Honor and a visiting Brit named Tom. Unbeknownst to the matchmakers, Honor and Tom have already, embarrassingly, met. They do end up in a relationship, albeit an unconventional one. And then the reader is on the journey with Honor and Tom to see if love will grow and thrive.

Higgins masterfully weaves Honor’s low self-confidence into the story without making her seem pitiful. She writes Tom’s character as sweetly, appealingly arrogant in some ways, and sad and lonely in others. The brothers, sisters, friends and children are all real – whether we see jealousy, sullenness, anger, reluctance or joy.

When I opened The Perfect Match, I expected a typical, light, enjoyable romance. What I got was so much more. The Perfect Match is brilliantly written, complex, and emotional. And the bits of Brit-speak were lots of fun, too.
Love, love, love it!

-Calliope

Buy it now (preorder before 29Oct) The Perfect Match

Review: Candlelight Christmas by Susan Wiggs

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20131022-173802.jpg Release date October 29. 4 stars!

Want to feel the magic of Christmas? Complete with snowy mountains, a house full of loved ones, peppermint hot chocolate, and walks in a winter wonderland? Susan Wiggs delivers all that and more in Candlelight Christmas.

Darcy meets her best friend India’s brother Logan and it’s Like At First Sight. When she sees him again at Thanksgiving, sparks are flying. By Christmastime, they know they have to decide whether or not to pursue a relationship.

Between Darcy’s ex and her demanding family, and Logan’s hard-to-please dad and beautiful son Charlie, the pair have many outside influences. Together they figure out how to overcome the family challenges so their relationship can grow. As Darcy and Logan find out, the spirit of Santa Claus doesn’t only touch children at Christmas. The magic is alive and well in romance too.

I love this book for the Christmas romance, but I appreciate it even more for the family dynamics. Wiggs achieves realistic holiday scenes, positive and negative. We see arguments, hugs, dumb moves, apologies, honesty, bluntness and forgiveness.

I bawled my eyes out during the scenes with Logan’s son Charlie, and sighed with a bursting heart more than a dozen times. Candlelight Christmas is joyous, real, and touching. I’d read another Susan Wiggs novel in a New York minute.

-Calliope

Pre-order and it will appear on your kindle October 29.
Buy it now Candlelight Christmas

Review: Jagged, by Kristen Ashley

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15817361“…love is a show, it’s not a tell”

Ham Reece was always moving around. But he always came back to Zara Cinders. If she called him, he was there. If she was hurt, he’d fly to be with her. But when she found someone more stable, he walked away.

But three years later she finds herself alone and barely scraping by.

By some near death experience, they are brought together. And when he discovers how little she has and what she has gone through, Ham decides to help her. But she doesn’t want to get sucked into Ham again. It’s hard enough being near him, without all her feeling bubbling up to the top.

Ham wants her. He’s always wanted her. He waited til she was ready and now he’s going to show her how ready he is.

“I’m here, Zara, as in I intend to stay here…I like the people, I like the work…But this is mostly where I wanna be because your’re here.”

Ham gets her a job and takes care of her. But she tries really hard not to fall for him, but, of course, she does. How can you not. The man was sex on legs. HOT. The way he bosses her and talks to her, very hot. No nonsense kinda guy. Needed to fan myself a few times.

Of course there’s a HEA. This is a Kristen Ashley book. And we love her rough and sexy men who practically throw their women over their shoulders and make them listen. I’ll probably grab the first four books in the series, just for more sexy alphas.

I received this ARC for an honest review.

~Melpomene

Release date November 5, 2013
Forever(Grand Central Publishing)
Buy it now Jagged

Review: Heating Up the Holidays 3 Story Bundle

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18283138 Heating Up the Holidays is a 3 story bundle with Play With Me by Lisa Renee Jones, Snowfall by Mary Ann Rivers, and After Midnight by Serena Bell.

I want to devote this whole review to Snowfall because I overwhelmingly loved this novella. I count myself as incredibly lucky to have read Mary Ann Rivers’ debut of The Story Guy just a few months ago. I fell in love with her intelligent and humorous writing then but hoped that it wasn’t just a one time thing. This second novella shows me that I’m not to be disappointed!

Jenny Wright moves into her new housing in Ohio where she is doing research as a Microbiologist. When she moves in she gets mail for the previous tenant which leads to online communication between herself as “Lincoln” and “C’. They begin to flirt online back and forth less and less innocently. Meanwhile Jenny is dealing with slowly losing her sight due to a degenerative disease. She’s horrified at this idea and cannot wrap her mind around this. Jenny is working with Evan Ford, her Occupational Therapist to try to make her life a little more manageable while the changes happen.

I cannot express my love for this book and this author in the right way. Yes there are scientific and technical terms throughout the book due to Jenny’s technical occupation. Halle-freaking-lujah! I, for one, was so happy to read a book, even a novella, that had an intelligent woman, with a scientific job as the main character. I’m not a scientific person but I was able to read this just fine. There are many books that tend to be dumbed down in general and I didn’t feel like this at all with this book. I was racing to get to the end of the novella, the last 20% or so I finished and then immediately re-read because I was doing my speed reading to get to the ending.

Jenny and Evan are so very real, very funny people. Jenny does not take slowly losing her eyesight very well and tends to throw fits, which I can only imagine would be the case in the real world. I just really appreciate the intelligence and humorous insight that this novella seems to have.

So obviously, I am supposed to be having some kind of therapeutic moment here, where my other senses get honed on the strap of this exercise and maybe later I’ll finger-spell W-A-T-E-R into his ginormous hand and we’ll embrace with joyous laughter.

Also there is a small piece at the end of the story that just about killed me. A very small detail which will probably stick with me for a very long time.

I absolutely cannot wait for the full length novel debut of Mary Ann Rivers, Live, coming in January of 2014. I have a feeling that she will be an auto buy for me for pretty much ever.

Buy it Now Heating Up the Holidays 3-Story Bundle (Play with Me, Snowfall, and After Midnight): A Loveswept Contemporary Romance

Review and a GIVEAWAY#1!!!!

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Are you wondering what book??? One word……..SLAMMED. Are you excited??? Not only that but it is a SIGNED copy!!!

This is a book that is really hard to describe for me because it’s one of my favorites, by one of my favorite authors. Okay, I’ll start with a summary and try to go from there and see if I can make any sense.

At 18, Layken, her mother and her younger brother pack things up and relocate to Michigan after her fathers’ death. The first person she meets there is her neighbor across the street, Will, and his little brother. They have a sudden, intense attraction to each other that only intensifies after a fantastic first date. Layken is thrilled that this move isn’t turning out to be as horrible as she feared.

However, almost immediately after the first date they are shocked to discover they cannot see each other anymore. Layken and Will are both miserable, which is made even worse by having to see each other daily as neighbors and as their odd little brothers become best friends. They try to deal as best they can but Layken is ready to explode.

That description does absolutely nothing for the book because the book is awesome. The dialogue is incredibly funny between the little brothers who are both nerdy and ridiculous but adorable. The slam poetry is amazing. I found myself reading and re-reading each slam, trying to get the intonation that would make it sound best. Layken’s best friend Eddie, is great and provide both an outlet for Eddie and more laughter the book needs to balance out the seriousness it has.

I literally both laughed and cried while reading this book. I don’t cry a lot when I read. I mean, I did cry reading Little Women and Gone With the Wind at certain points if you know what I mean…not to give any spoilers away. But I don’t cry at the majority of books, and I read a lot of angsty stuff. This one made me cry, but I was laughing while I cried. It’s so hard to explain. But other Colleen Hoover fans get it because once you read Slammed you will want to read Point of Retreat. Then you realize she’s written a few other things. Then you’re pretty much hooked. You’re welcome for that!

A couple of us muses were lucky enough to go to a book signing this week and we have a few signed books to giveaway. In case you didn’t notice the #1, there’s more to giveaways to come. The first will be this wonderful, awesome, gut wrenching book. We’re also including some swag Atria Publishing was kind enough to give out at the signing! With the SIGNED book you will also receive a great Hopeless bookmark, an I ❤ Atria Authors card and a great purple Colleen Hoover bag! You know you want it. So we'll make it easy, just like our Facebook page and comment on this post and that's it. We'll keep it open til next Thursday. Good luck!!!

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Review: Always on My Mind by Jill Shalvis

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20131021-222044.jpg Jill Shalvis’ Lucky Harbor line of romance novels win my heart every time, and Always on My Mind doesn’t disappoint. As a matter of fact, Shalvis threw in some crime/suspense as a bonus, and I loved it!

Leah and Jack have had a thing for each other FOR-EVER. Due to guilt and work issues and being too chicken to “risk their friendship,” they’re not honest with each other about their true feelings. Enter the “let’s pretend” concept that eventually morphs into a very real happily ever after.

I liked Shalvis’ authentic “guy” scenes where the firefighters are busting chops and being competitive — but always having each others’ backs when needed. The scenes with female friends having girl talk didn’t seem as natural, but were still fun to read.

Jack is of course the hero in this novel, but before he can save Leah from herself, they both have to figure out who is committing some local crimes. Jack and Leah have the help of some local amateur sleuths, and I was entertained by their capers.

Shalvis gives us enjoyable subplots – a grandmother and a middle-aged mom each embark on budding romances, a bakery and other small-town businesses evolve, and Jack and Leah’s friends are set up for what I hope will be the next installment of a Lucky Harbor love story.

Always light and fun, Lucky Harbor romances include likable characters and loyal friendships. Four big shiny stars for Always on My Mind!

–Calliope

Buy it now Always on My Mind

Pre-order the next Lucky Harbor book, coming in February Once in a Lifetime
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Sneak Peek Review: Parasite by Mira Grant

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Parasite** The release date for this book is October 29th **

I am not often surprised by a series.  However, the Newsflesh Trilogy by Mira Grant did just that.  I’ve read some zombie books and these books just didn’t *read* like a zombie series.  When I saw that this new book was coming out by Grant I was terribly excited!  I was sad to see the end of the Newsflesh series and wondered what Grant would do next.  Then I found the book on Netgallery as a “read now”  and I got SUPER excited!  I just couldn’t wait and I read it as soon as it downloaded onto Kote Kindle.  I really enjoyed this book. It’s a good follow-up to the Newsflesh Trilogy and it did not disappoint me much.   There’s no doubt when you get to the ending that there will be more to follow. I am somewhat disappointed that I knew what the ending was going to be. It wasn’t that hard for me to figure out the “big shock” at the end.  However, I am not really sure that Grant intended for it to be a surprise. I think the main character was just faced with having to accept facts that she already knew…she was just unwilling to believe…After all, if it was staring me in the face for most of the book, I reckon it was staring her in the face as well….just saying….I would also like to say that many of the characters of the book the reminded me of some of the characters from  the Newsflesh Trilogy.  I think that if I had not read that series, I would have perhaps enjoyed this book a bit more.  The storyline was somewhat new and exciting, but the players, for me, were not….Only the names seemed different….not the personalities….

This book reminded me a lot of Stephenie Meyer’s book “The Host”. Having said that, I will say that I can actually see Grant’s story happening one day in the future. Meyer’s book takes a much larger stretch of the imagination. I believe that science could find a way to introduce organisms into our host bodies to help combat illnesses as in this book….I am not so sure they will be extraterrestrials as in Meyer’s book….I will be looking forward to reading the next book and I hope that I don’t have to wait too long!

ARC provided by NetGallery for an honest review…

Until next time….

– Urania xx

Buy it now  Parasite

Review: The Iron Traitor, by Julie Kagawa

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15811405I was so excited when I received this ARC. I even did a happy dance. But no, you don’t wanna see it. This book is the second in the Call of the Forgotten series, which is a spin off of the Iron Fey series. I loved The Iron Fey so much, I just knew I’d love this one as well. I was not wrong.

This book takes place a few days after The Iron Prince ended. We find Ethan Chase trying to get back to normal life. Well, as normal as you can get, when you see the fey no one else can see. He’s determined to be a good boyfriend to Kenzie and to NEVER go back to Nevernever. But you know what they say….

When his nephew, Keirran, goes missing, Ethan decides to go and find him as quickly as possible. But finding him and stopping him from doing something so drastic, are two different things. Keirran is determined to save his love, even if it causes great damage and forever change this world. But Ethan tries to help him anyways, cuz he’s family. But that help, just may be the thing that destroys him.

I love that we get a glimpse of Meghan, Ash, Grim and Puck. It was wild seeing Ash as a formidable man and father. He was frightening. But I just love Puck!! I loved the way he never changed and was still the jokester at times, but at the same time, he could also step up and help.

All Puck’s scenes made me wanna go back and read the Iron Fey from the beginning. Many of Ethan and Keirran’s scenes reminded me of Ash’s and Puck’s adventures, from the Iron Fey. They may be different, but they fight together against anything that was thrown their way.

Grim still helped them, too, and yet disappeared when trouble comes. I wonder about that cat….

This book took me four days to read, and I made sure to highlight everything I deemed important. I don’t wanna forget a thing. But that ending…..A CLIFFY!!!!! I am speechless….What…..where……how…..And now I have to wait til next year!! I was seriously shocked. I NEVER saw that coming.

Well done Ms. Kagawa. You have written another fabulous YA book. And, like you tweeted me, your muse was well feed by my tears. So glad I could help you out. 😉

I received this ARC for an honest review.

~Melpomene

Release day: October 29th
Buy it now: The Iron Traitor (The Iron Fey)

Amazing book signing last night!

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Last night was the first night of Atria Indie Author’s fall tour with their 3 best selling authors – Colleen Hoover, Jamie McGuire and Abbi Glines! These authors are really huge in the New Adult/Romance world of books and 2 of us Muses have been pretty much beside ourselves with excitement and not doing a very good job of hiding it very well! Melpomene is a huge fan of Colleen’s and had introduced her books to me, and I promptly fell in love and read every single book she wrote.  We were both ecstatic to see all 3 authors coming to this area.

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The big day finally came and it definitely lived up to the hype! Melpomene was so excited that her fabulous husband drove her down early in the day and she basically cased the joint all day. However, she was not alone – there were a few hardcore fans there to keep her company on and off during the day. By the time I met her there she was pretty much telling others in line about our little blog and discussing the awesomeness of the authors. They were in line to get a line number to get books signed.  Our friend, Vi, joined us there and it was pretty great to be amongst our people – other people who loves books as much as we do.

Vi went upstairs to sit down and save 2 seats while we got our 2 line numbers. By the time I went to sit down another huge fan was reporting us to the bookstore for saving seats unlawfully or something. Which was very confusing because this other woman was in the front row and at this point the rest of the rows were pretty empty so I was confused as to why she was so upset, my line number was 16, the friends Melpomene had made were 13 and 14. Vi is a petite woman who was there only to meet us and this other woman kept talking about it very loudly for about 45 minutes so it was kind of hilarious to see her start a mini riot. We owe Vi lots and lots of favors! I would have gladly sat 3 or 4 rows back if this woman would have asked us to! So that was the mini drama of the night.

Then the authors came in – Colleen first, then Abbie Glines and finally Jamie McGuire.

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I just have to say that it’s not fair for authors to be this talented AND pretty! Then they had to open their mouths and be funny in person too. Colleen came out taking pictures of the crowd and when the commentator started asking them questions she immediately did not want to answer – as in she preferred one of the others answered first. What struck me the most is how much they seem to get along. I don’t know how it works in other publishing houses but either these three are superb actresses or they really are friends.

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Most of the time was spent laughing – the authors were charming and answered the questions about their current releases, their musical inspirations and their advice for aspiring authors. My favorite answer of the night was Colleen’s that she likes Eminem, but that’s just because I do too. All 3 authors signed a ton of books, bags, kindle covers, and pretty much whatever we asked them to. They were super friendly with the fans and took pictures. The place was packed but they didn’t give the impression that they were getting tired at all.

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I left a bigger fan because all 3 were great in person! If you can make it to one of their tour dates – GO!! Atria made it a very cool event with some neat swag and it was very organized. Plus you know the AWESOME AUTHORS kind of made it even better. I might still be on a weird kind of high this morning 🙂 I’ve been to multiple signings this year and it’s just so fun to be around people who love to read and people who are interested in what you’re interested in. We made friends sitting there, all of us talking about our favorite books, which authors we loves and getting recommendations for more. Such an excellent experience!!

Oh and you might want to stick around this week and next for some possible giveaways tied into this awesome signing!!

~Clio

New Releases for October 22, 2013

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Happy New Release Day!! I’m hoping that you woke up to all the books you were waiting for. Here are some of the books, that have caught my eye.
16055479The Temptation of Lila and Ethan (Ella and Micha)
This is the third book in The Secret series. I’ve read the first in this series. The second keeps taunting me. And now that one is out, it’s really gonna get annoying. So I must hurry up. so I can read about Lila.

16070143Teardrop (Teardrop Trilogy)
I am sooooo excited for this one. I loved her Fallen series and I know this is going to be good also. She writes the perfect YA books. I can’t wait to start this one.

17860217Trust in Me: A Novella (Wait for You)
This is a novella, which is basically Cameron’s POV. I’ll admit, the first one didn’t snag my attention, like I hoped. However, I love the male’s POV, so this may redeem it. So it looks like I may be buying this one. 🙂

10616322Allegiant (Divergent Trilogy)
And last but definitely not least, we’ve Allegiant. I know for a fact that no one will be on their computers, unless it’s to update Goodreads, when this downloads to their kindles. Since I’ll be on the road, driving home from a book signing, I’ll be staying off it, until I can sink my teeth into this one. I am so excited for this last book. I think the hype about the Divergent movie will help the sales of this one. Plus being only $6.99 pre-ordered, can’t beat the price.

Now go and enjoy your books.

~Melpomene