July TBR Challenge--Romantic Suspense

This month's TBR Challenge: Romantic Suspense

Title: I See You

Author: Holly Lisle

Year published: 2006

Why did you get this book? I enjoy Holly Lisle's RS novels

Do you like the cover? Yes

Did you enjoy the book? Absolutely

Was the author new to you and would you read something by this author again? No

Are you keeping it or passing it on? Keeping it

Anything else? After spending the last few weeks bemoaning the fact I don't like romantic suspense, I read one that I loved. I ordered this through my local indie bookseller, so I have no idea where it's shelved in a bookstore, by looking at it you have no idea it's a romance. It's published by Onyx and the spine reads "novel" not "romance" or "romance novel". It is a romance, but first it's a good suspense novel. And, when I closed the book, I realized that's how I like them, strong suspense with some romance. It's probably why I like Linda Howard's newer books, still occasionally read Tami Hoag and am a closeted Sandra Brown reader. I like the books that appeal to a wider suspense audience.

Now, don't get me wrong, this is a romance, I don't think it's an equal balance of romance to suspense. But, I guess for me to find it chilling and thrilling enough, the romance is slightly secondary.

Very good book.

Changing genres a little...

I finished Jennifer Armintrout's The Turning yesterday morning and decided to pass it on to my husband. Now, keep in mind my husband has never read a romance in his life, but he does read horror and an occasional thriller. This isn't a romance, but it is a fast paced, read, not to scary and at times gory, in the bloody sense of the word not necessarily in the horror sense. I've come to the conclusion I've a high gross out factor and an even higher fright factor, it has to be incredibly scary to actually frighten me. This book never frightened me, but it did gross me out a couple of times.

Carrie Ames is an ER doctor accidently changed into a vampire after a particularly grisly ER trauma, during which she realizes the dead man isn't dead and fighting her fears goes into the morgue in searching for the "dead man", there she's attacked. After her recovery she quickly realizes somethings not right and figures out she's a vampire?!? An internet search brings her into the realm of Nathan Grant and his "son" Ziggy. It is with them she's told she needs to pick sides. Good Vampires vs. Evil Vampires. The evil ones embrace their animal side in all it's brutal, disgusting glory. The good ones are control freaks, join them or be hunted right along side the evil ones. This book is about her entry into both the good and evil vampire worlds, by the end she's made a decision. Ms. Armintrout does a good job world building and kept it fairly simple.

It's the first in a series and it does not have a HEA ending, but it has the makings of a HEA future, so I guess that's why it is being marketed to romance readers.

*edited* Anyone else having problems with blogger? I accidently published this before I corrected it. Blogger kept dumping me out, I finally gave up a came back a couple of hours later.

Just call me cranky.

I'm wondering if CW will let me borrow her Cranky Reader title for a few days.

I don't know if it's the heat or what I'm reading, but for some reason just about everything I've read this month has left me wanting, with the exception of Hope Tarr's Vanquished.

A look at my sidebar will tell you I've read 13 books so far this month...

• 1 Very Good
• 3 Good
• 8 Okay
• 1 Not worth my time

The very good is obviously Vanquished and I've already admitted that one's a keeper. The books listed under "good" are good books, but they could have been listed under the title of "good/but"--I had issues with each one. The issues with the "okay" books were even larger and that poor lone "not worth my time" was lots of boring sex and next to no story.

Issues, issues, issues, nit picking at everything I'm reading.

That's the crux of my problem. It seems like everything I'm reading has something I don't like, plot twists, character changes mid story, too frantic a writing style. I realized my dislike of romantic suspense stems from not having enough suspense in the stories. I've complained about paranormals not being scary enough, well, most suspense romances aren't all that suspenseful.

See, I'm cranky, it must be the heat!

At what point did I become so nit picky that I expect every book I pick up to meet my wants and expectations, that's so unrealistic. Once again I really need to read for entertainment and stop.

Why is it sometimes we can be completely entertained by a book that's okay and sometimes an okay book is one step from wallbanger?

Tagged

Keishon tagged me, so here goes:

1. When did you start blogging and why?

March 2005, why? I thought blogs were interesting and entertaining. I could be more myself when blogging than on message boards. I love talking books.

2. What don’t you talk about?

Politics.

3. Are you and your blogging persona the same person?

Completely me.

4. How do you use blogging to build friendships?

It's very easy to find people with similar interests especially reading, and like groups seem to gravitate together, reading tastes, sense of humor etc.

5. How would you describe your writing style?

Conversationally convoluted, kind of how I talk.

Who should I tag?? Well, let's see, who hasn't been tagged?

Amanda I think Amanda started blogging within minutes of me, like minds and all.
Nicole because I love the name of her blog.
Wendy because she's The Super Librarian.
And anyone else who would like to this one.

Walk away from the book

So, I've spent the morning blog hopping and discovered by floating around the pool for the last 2 days trying to avoid the heat, I'd completely missed the latest disaster to hit the romance reading world. You'll have to search for it yourself, I don't think the whole thing was worth the hour I spent searching it out.

But, something posted at Dear Author got me thinking.

When I see a complete stranger in a bookstore looking at a book that personal experience tells me is a wallbanger, I've always wanted to say something to the effect of:

Wallbanger Alert***Wallbanger Alert
Put down the book, step back, now slowly walk away, no, no, no run, run as fast as you can.
Wallbanger Alert***Wallbanger Alert

I once asked on the RT Readers Board if you wanted to post a comment to the effect of "Don't do it, it'll be a complete waste of your time." Of course, there were people who were horrified that I would want to say something so mean,they didn't realize I was being sarcastically tongue-in-cheek.

Maybe I shouldn't be so shocked when my son comes out with his rude comments, maybe he takes after dear old mom.

Have you ever been tempted to warn a complete stranger "Don't do it, it'll be a complete waste of your time"?

The Kiss of Death

Why is it as soon as I post a cover or covers to my currently reading section of the sidebar I completely lose interest in reading those books??

Picked up 3 more books yesterday. Figured I'd already completely blew this months book budget so what the heck.

1. Wicked Under the Covers by Barbara Pierce--read this one last night, don't know why I picked this one over anything else on the TBR pile, it wasn't all that impressive even though RT gave it 4 1/2 stars. There's something very slimy about the whole thing. The heroine is seduced because her father dumps his mistress for a new one. Mom and Dad are bed hoppers but are horrified that their daughter is ruined. The only likeable characters in the whole book are the Maccus and Fayre, the hero and heroine--don't you love those names--NOT.
2. The Rogue Report by Barbara Dawson Smith--BDS used to be a favorite, bought this one for old times sake, have no idea why.
3. Tempting by Hope Tarr--I went looking for Hope Tarr's backlist, this was the only one the UBS had, but it's an autographed copy, how nice is that? Megan left a comment that it's a good one, so it's next up on the TBR pile. Note, I wont jinx it by posting it to the sidebar, hopefully I'll have it finished sometime today.

It's too hot to do anything besides swim and read, I guess I shouldn't complain to much.

Have a good one and happy reading.

Vanquished by Hope Tarr

Great book!

Callie is a some what sheltered suffragette, Hadrian is a photographer in desperate need of funds. He is hired by the villain to not just ruin but to completely vanquish her. And, provide photographic proof. Not quite sure about it, Hadrian is strong armed into the plan. She is tricked into sitting for a series of portraits and in the process he teaches her that women's rights is only a small part of the overall human rights issue. And, he learns love is more important than money.

Beautifully written, incredibly erotic and yet not erotica and so much more sensual than probably any erotic romance I've ever read. This one's a keeper.

While blog hopping I discovered a fabulously brilliant rant over on Vanessa Jay's Blog that originated at AAR's ATBF Message Board. I haven't worked my way through the responses to the rant, but I am floored by how right on accurate it is. Wish I had even thought to write it.

And where the heck were the Ja(y)nes when Nora came to for a surprise visit?

Warning Major Spoilers

How does a book go from almost perfect to wallbanger in a few short pages????

I can not express how annoyed I became while finishing Whispers of the Night. Honestly, I can not believe the left turn Lydia Joyce took and RUINED this book. Okay, I've taken a deep breath and maybe I'll be able to pass on a decent review.


The heroine, Alcyone (Alcy), is brilliant, a true mathematical and engineering genius and the daughter of a rich English industrialist. Alcy travels across Europe to marry a man she believes is a Hungarian Baron. Our hero, Dumitru, is a poor Rumanian Count, trying to hold together his little fiefdom as Austria, Russia and the Turks seem to want control of his little world. He basically steals her away and marries her before she realizes he's not the Hungarian Baron she's been corresponding with, but being the brilliant soul that she is, she figures it out on her wedding night, confronts him, he fesses up and their attraction is so strong they have a fabulous wedding night and 2 months of wedded bliss. To this point the character development and writing is page turner fabulous.

Then the book tanks, completely.

Our intrepid heroine over hears a meeting between the hero and his steward. Her father has set up an unusual marriage portion. She controls 1/2 of it, and our hero wants it to help protect and improve the life of the people in his care, and devises a plan to steal it. She already knows how desperate he needs money to make these improvements. Instead of confronting him and having a big, "all you needed to do was ask" blowout fight, she does the mostTSTL, moronic, unbelievably stupid thing!! She runs away. Yes, she runs away into the wilderness of Eastern Europe, without a single clue as to where she is going, the political climate, the actual climate. How the heck does she go from genius to moron in the matter of a few pages? I have no idea, but from there on the book becomes a spy/road story, of course he goes after her. She continues to do stupid things which gets them caught up in all sorts of political crap and are ultimately helped by some English diplomat/spy. Who cares, the book is ruined as soon as she becomes a moron.

The first half of the book is an A, the second is an F, average the damned thing and give it a pathetic C. At least it's a well written pathetic C.

*Edited* Okay, the book is too well written to say the second half deserves an F. But I would still say it's an overall C, simply because the plot and characters stopped working for me in the second half of the book.

Men and Church

Romance by the Blog, asked a question about romantic fantasies and if you notice men "in church, on the train or at PTA" since I'm a day late and there are 64 comments on the post, I decided to post a few thoughts here. And to be completely honest, with the exception of reading romances, I really don't want to know about other peoples' romantic fantasies, it's way too much information about real people

But it's funny that she would ask a question about men in church as I've been thinking about this since Sunday.

I don't really construct romantic fantasies about men other than my husband, this probably explains why I'll never be a romance writer--no imagination. But, I do notice attractive men in the strangest places.

Church. I have no idea why I notice attractive middle aged men in church, but I do. For some reason, I find men who bring kids to church on their own attractive, I'd even consider some sexy, which I thought was a creepy thing to do in church, but apparently not. Our church has a priest from Nigeria, his accent is getting better, but he has incredibly long homilies and I find my attention wondering.

The Neighborhood. One of my neighbors is a very attractive man, he's about 50, 3 kids. Miserable personality, loud and needs to be the center of attention. But, he's really good looking and plays ball with his son everyday.

The Supermarket. Love to see men shopping with or without kids, and what their buying.

You can tell I'm into being a mom, until I had Junior I never noticed men with children and how they interact with them, unless the kids were being miserable. I must be getting old, or middle aged, I wonder which is worse?

When did middle aged men get sexy? And, I'm not talking about celebrities, just everyday people we see and meet?

And, has everyone read today's RTB post. I left perky breast in the dust long before I had Junior. They're now heading way south. At this point, perky will only be perfected by a really good plastic surgeon.

Have a good one and happy reading.

The Perfect Child... Right **eyes rolling**

I can't tell you how many people in the last 2 days have told me "He's such a well behaved little boy." Or something similar.

Please note, the lady in the supermarket that he said "Halt, who goes there?" to didn't make this comment, to which she said "he's four right?"

Nor did the very nice couple from down the street who were walking their dog after his lovely "We don't want anyone's dog peeing or pooping on our property." When I told him to apologize for being rude, he got real angry with me and said "No, that wasn't rude, it was honest." I explained to him if we had a dog we wouldn't want anyone to say that to us. This is how the rest of the conversation went:

Him: "Petey doesn't go on other people's property."
Me: "No, Petey's a house cat."
Him: "They should have a house dog then."
Me: "Dogs have to go potty outside."
Him: "Then they should let him go pee and poop on their property."

Well, he had me there.

He's a cross between Dennis the Menace and Calvin. It's the Calvin thing that has me frightened.

Monday's Books...

Finally getting around to listing the books I picked up on Monday:




I've already read this one, it's the second in the Buchanan series. I liked this one more than the first, yet I've got one huge problem with both--the grandmother is way too over the top evil, to the point it takes away from the book.




I'm currently reading this one, and am about a third of the way. I love Lydia Joyce's writing style and voice. But, for some reason I don't remember her being so prosy...

The sun was a fat yellow yolk over the ring of the mountaintops when Dumitru finally opened his eyes. He had been teased into half-consciouness nearly an hour before when the first tentacles of steely gray light had begun to trickle through the valleys in pursuit of night, but he had been uncharacteristically loathe to greet the morning, burrowing deeper into the quilts and burying his face in his new wife's soft hair without even a conscious rejection of the daily call to duty.

That's the opening paragraph from chapter 6, isn't the second sentence a doozy?




Holly Lisle is a favorite. I've decided to read this one for Angies TBR Challenge. I know, it's a TBR challenge, but technically it's now on my TBR pile.





I've heard good things about Robin T. Popp's writing, I can only hope it lives up to expectations as I bought the second before even reading the first. Supposedly these have an interesting paranormal twist--an El Chupacabra story. I'm still not quite sure about the concept. I've always considered the El Chupacabra myth to be rather creepy and gross, unlike vampires which have blatant sexual overtone. We'll see.





The second in Popp's Night Slayer books.

My next book order should be in today or tomorrow. I'll post that list after I pick up the books.

Have a good one and happy reading.

Good Lord, I've got 9 more years of this???

Okay, I survived my first day of bingo.

Five hours of chaos. I'm shocked by how extreme these "bingo people" are. They've got special bags that hold there dot bottles, special seat cushions for their butts, and strange good luck charms. And, they're all old, really old, God bless them.

The first thing the "Team Captain" said was watch all the cash boxes, people like to steal. Excuse me, it's a church run bingo, people steal from the church? Have they heard of the wrath of God and bad karma?

I learned about T's, L's Postage Stamps, Butterflies, top line/bottom lines--who knew there were so many ways to play bingo?

Actually, everyone was very nice, but the old people start to grumble when they don't win, and their patience is rather short. I guess when you reach that age that's okay.

Bingo is mandatory

We started paying Junior's tuition this month. Today is my first day working bingo. It turns out bingo is mandatory. Not a big deal as it helps keep tuition costs down, and I only have to work one day a month. I've never even been to bingo, ever. A friend's husband runs the Tuesday afternoon sessions. From what I've been told, only diehards show up. I guess it will be a baptism of fire.

Whenever I think of bingo, I'm reminded of the bookkeeper at my first job. I worked for an interdenominational Christian Minister who did speaking engagements, wrote books and sold his teaching courses on tape. Nothing radical and certainly not Jimmy Swaggart or Jim Bakker. Our local bank at the time refused to give the Ministry free banking, which they offered other "churches" and non-profits. The branch manager made the mistake of saying "Well, we all know you're not really a non-profit organization." To which the bookkeeper responded "Just because we don't have bingo in the basement doesn't mean we're not a legitimate non-profit..." on and on she went, I was rather shocked, as I'd never heard her raise her voice before. The bank gave us free checking, but she pulled the accounts anyway.

I've got to go, my parents are picking up Junior for the day, hopefully he'll be an angel.

I picked up new books yesterday, hopefully I'll have time to post a list tonight.

Have a great day, and happy reading.

New Book Order

I finally picked up the August Romantic Times at the bookstore and while there I realized I didn't order anything from the July issue. I pulled 5 or 6 books off the "New" bookshelf and asked them to hold them until this week. I only had enough money on me to pick up the RT. Honestly, I'd gone through it and nothing appealed at the time.

I've decided to be a little more diligent this month and actually put together an order:

• Calamity Jane Rides Again by Kthleen Bacus, I enjoyed the first one in this series, though it's not romance.
• Scandal in Spring by Lisa Kleypas, this one's obvious, last in the Wallflower series.
• Just One Of Those Flings by Candice Hern, I didn't "love" the first in this series, but this one is a May-December thing and sounds interesting.
• The Grail King by Joy Nash, it's set in 130 Britian, now that's a setting we don't get very often. It's published by Love Spell and to be honest they're probably my least favorite publisher.
• His Lordship's Desire by Joan Wolf, okay, I know I swore off Joan Wolf, but I can't seem to help it, I keep hoping her writing style goes back to that of her early books.
• Lady Katherne's Wild Ride by Jeane Westin, Restoration England!
• Vanquished by Hope Tarr, I've already ordered this one, but it's actually coming out this month.
• Darcy's Story by Janet Aylmer, this sounds interesting Pride and Prejudice with a twist, from Mr. Darcy's perspective, completely in his head.
• Gucci Gucci Coo by Sue Margolis, sounds interesting and I'll pass it on to my mom, she's a Sue Margolis fan, well, kind of.
• The Privilege of the Sword by Ellen Kushner, I rarely pick something from the "science fiction/fantasy" pages, but this sounds really good.
• Marriage By Design by Lynn Michaels, listed under contemporary romance, but it has a little RS feel to the synopsis.
• Summer At Willow Lake by Susan Wiggs, this takes place in the Catskills, my own backyard, I couldn't pass this one up.
• Viva Las Bad Boys! by HelenKay Dimon, 3 different stories on the same timeline sounds interesting.

That's a lot of new books for me, but what the heck, I'll need to bring something to The Shore in August.

Have a good one, and hapy reading.

PS--as I was flipping through I couldn't help but notice the Samhain Publishing ad, for an epublisher their covers seem to be of a much higher quality from other epublishers, I wonder why?

Romantic Suspense Stats

When I posted my 6 month reading stats I was very surprised to see I'd only read 14.

And, then I shocked to see of that 14, 5 were Linda Howard rereads, so that only left 9 romantic suspenses in 6 months.

And, then I was even more shocked to realize that of that 9, 3 were contest books, so that only left 6 romantic suspenses in 6 months. The 3 contest books were pretty good, but I wouldn't have read them on my own.

And, 1 of the 6 was Linda Howard's new one, being a fangirl I'm compelled to read anything and everything she writes.

Hey, I can do simple math--LOL.

So, I only read 5 non-Linda Howard RS by choice. I've always considered myself a RS fan, obviously not--LOL.

Okay, what's my problem with RS? This was mulling around in my head last night as I was trying to fall asleep. And, it dawned on me, I'm really picky about it. How many people LOVE the Crazy series? I read the first one last year, it was good, but I've had no interest in reading the rest.

What's the problem--too much suspense and not enough romance or too much romance or not enough suspense? Or is it because you have to suspend belief in order to read them? Hmmm, maybe this will keep me up tonight.

And, did anyone else see HelenKay's post about LH going back to her roots and writing another category romance for Silhouette?

This post will contain spoilers from On the Way to the Wedding, so if you're planning on reading it, please move forward at your own risk.

The heroine in OTWTTW is engaged to be married to another man, in fact she actually goes through with the wedding, which I'm discovering is one of the biggest complaints about this book. It didn't shock me as Lucy has a tendency to be something of a doormat, but a very pleasant one. The man she marries turns out to be gay and not interested in marriage in the least, but realizes he needs to marry or the "Earldom" will be passed to a toady cousin. I was relieved that he wasn't the villain (his father and her uncle are the villains) because I often find it offensive when the bad guy is a homosexual, somehow it infers something that it shouldn't. Of course, he offers to have the marriage annulled, and she offers to find him a wife. How nice.

I really liked Lord Haselby and found myself wondering about his story more than Gregory's and Lucy's.

So, that got me thinking, would a bestselling romance writer be willing to write something like Phyllida and the Brotherhood of Philander a book with a married, bisexual hero?

I'm interested in this book, I've read good and bad reviews and have heard it's self-published. Normally, I would avoid this like the plague, can anyone say Dara Joy. I'll probably hem and haw until I breakdown and buy it.

Six Month Stats

Since Rosario is still in Japan I thought I'd pick up the stats reins and share some info for the first 6 months of 2006.

Books Read YTD 2006 = 122
New to me authors--34
Rereads--19

87 of the 122 were rated good or better and 74 were published between 2005 and 2006.

Historicals--61
Romantic Suspense--14
Contemporaries--13
Paranormal--10
Erotic Romance/Erotica --10
Category--10
Chick Lit--3
Anthologies--1

I know I'm not the only geek out there, so what do your YTD stats look like?

The Quinn Thing

It only took 5 days to read Julia Quinn's On the Way to the Wedding. Now, the problem really wasn't the book, but rather a time crunch over the holiday weekend.

Once again Quinn is witty and funny. Her dialogue is quick and entertaining. Which is the main reason I read her books. Overall I liked this book, Gregory and Lucy are likable characters, but at times they seem young, He's 26 and I didn't pay much attention to her age, maybe I missed it, but she was just finished with school and hadn't had her "debut" yet.

Through half the book, he believes he's in love with her best friend. She gives him advice about how to catch the friend and things grow from there. She realizes she's in love a little sooner, but has a long standing engagement planned by her guardian/uncle that she is forced to keep.

The wedding scene is very emotional, and I must have been hormonal as I cried, cried so hard I had to take my glasses off.

It's not the best in the series, at times the story moves too slowly, but the dialogue seems to keep it from completely bogging down. The main characters and almost all the secondary characters are very amiable, maybe too much so as there is very little conflict, with the exception of the situation forcing her to marry someone else.

Let's face it those Bridgertons are a nice bunch.

But, boy am I glad this series is finished, eight books in one series is way too much for me, but then I rarely make it past a trilogy.

A Quickie

We're on our way out for another family barbecue, this one is rather impromptu as we had a message on our machine last night.

A great time was had yesterday, we visited with one of my husband's cousins and his family.

I'm struggling through the Quinn, but I've not had much time to read so maybe that's part of the problem.

Hope everyone's having a nice holiday weekend. And, of course, happy reading.