Month / February 2011

by mvbookreviewer

Review: By the Book by Nancy Warren

Format: E-book
Opens with: Amazon Kindle
Length: Novel
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Harlequin Blaze, #85
Publisher: Harlequin
Hero: Luke Lawson
Heroine: Shari Wilson
Sensuality: 3.5
Date of Publication: May 1, 2003
Started On: February 6, 2011
Finished On: February 9, 2011

I just had to get this book after reading its blurb on Amazon. Nancy Warren shot into the list of authors to be definitely checked out time and time again after I read and reviewed her book My Fake Fiancee which was my first Nancy Warren and an unforgettable one at that. So taken away by the blurb, I found myself with the book loaded onto my Kindle, ready to indulge in a story many have reviewed to be hot, hot, hot and then some more hot and this title definitely lived up to my expectations in that area.

28 year old Luke Lawson is a journalist who works from home and the only son from his parents 4 children. His father’s lifestyle isn’t one conducive of a committed man and he is about to get married for the 5th time when the story begins. The combination of Luke’s charming smile, tall, rangy body and the twinkle in his green eyes with a hint of devilry in them makes Luke a definite hit with the ladies and he is quite comfortable with his happy and carefree lifestyle as the cynic inside of him believes that he is just like his father and would never have the potential to be in a committed relationship of any sort.

Shari Lawson is an English teacher for high school kids and lives above her totally hot neighbor Luke Lawson whom she has been eying for quite some time now. A dyslexic postal worker who keeps mixing up their mails lends both Luke and Shari the opportunity to drop in and see the other and all the while the sexual zing between them is hard to ignore for both of them. The night Shari decides to take matters into her own hands so to speak, she encounters Luke with a how-to-guide on sex, i.e. Sex for Total Morons – A How to Guide written by a Lance Flagstaff which makes Shari do a total 180 degree turn on acting upon her attraction towards Luke.

Luke doesn’t know whether to fall at a heap at his feet in embarrassment about being caught with a book that he has authored and he has no clue as to why he doesn’t own up to the fact that when it comes to women and hitting the sheets, he is quite the ladies man. Luke who has been hankering for Shari for quite sometime decides to hit 2 birds with one stone and make use of the opportunity to test out whether his philosophy published in the book works in real life and get Shari into his bed, and thus strikes up a deal with Shari to help him along from Chapter 1 – 4 in the book in return for his presence at the wedding ceremony of her ex-best friend and ex-boyfriend; all the while never owning up to the fact that the how-to-guide was authored by Luke himself.

What follows is funny, endearing and so very hot that I couldn’t help but laugh out loud, sigh over every now and then and find myself unbearably flushed from one moment to the next as the story progressed. Both Shari and Luke who are reluctant to look for anything more with the other than just their attraction towards each other finds more than each of them bargained for as things heat up between them. Shari takes it upon herself to tutor the shy Luke in the art of pleasing a woman and finds herself totally overwhelmed when Luke hits all the right spots, in and out of bed. And the extremely commitment phobic Luke finds himself slowly and irrevocably falling in love with the wonderful woman he finds in Shari who changes his views about love, life and commitment once and for all.

I liked the gradual build in Shari and Luke’s relationship and the fact that they didn’t just straightaway jump into bed, but rather built up the sexual tension in a believable manner which does great things for the reader as well. I found myself totally caught up with Shari and her best friend Therese’s conversations – because they were so funny and I couldn’t help but laugh on Therese’s logic when it comes to men and their prowess in the bedroom. The side characters were wonderfully done for a novel such as this one and the sensuality just rocked at all levels and went  totally off the charts when both Luke and Shari try to seduce the other. Totally dig the love scenes in this one. And I won’t read a “Chapter 7” after this without getting a little hot around the collar after this one! *grin*

Though I loved so many things about this story, I found myself a bit disappointed in the abrupt manner it ended. Everyone knows that I am always a sucker for a good epilogue and I just know that an epilogue would have done wonders for this one. Would have loved to see Luke and Shari and their happily ever after sometime after the last chapter in the story ended.

I also didn’t get to see how Luke resolved his issues with being commitment phobic as a result of his father’s carefree nature when it comes to relationships, marriage and women. I would have loved to see Luke interact with his father and maybe see Luke’s father through his eyes, maybe at his father’s wedding so that I would have felt better about Luke’s total turnabout towards the end of the novel.

Recommended for fans of the Harlequin Blaze line stories, fans of Nancy Warren and anyone who loves a light contemporary romance that can make you tingle all in the right places!

Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes&Noble | BooksOnBoard | Kobo

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by mvbookreviewer

Review: In His Good Hands by Joan Kilby

Format: E-book
Opens with: Amazon Kindle
Length: Novel
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Summerside Stories, Book 2
Publisher: Harlequin
Hero: Brett O’Connor
Heroine: Renita Thatcher
Sensuality: 2.9
Date of Publication: February 1, 2011
Started On: February 5, 2011
Finished On: February 6, 2011

Right after I was done with Sarah Mayberry’s The Last Goodbye, I was blindsided with a ton of recommendations from Amazon for readers who loved the aforementioned book, which I absolutely did, in spades. So against my better judgement, I found myself purchasing my first title from Joan Kilby, intrigued by the thought that the hero and heroine has a shared past which had not ended that well for the heroine which would make for a good angst-filled read. So all in all, my introduction to Joan Kilby was not a bad one though I won’t be in a hurry to buy the rest of the books in the Summerside series of which this is the 2nd book.

Brett O’Connor is a retired pro Australian Rules football player who makes his way back to his hometown of Summerside years after he left it with his 13 year old daughter Tegan in tow. Just recently divorced from his wife Amber who has made Brett reluctant to try anything in the relationship department, Brett is a man who is determined to make it big and show that he is not just a sports jock without a brain. With all his savings tied up in the divorce settlement proceedings, it is up to Brett to convince the local bank to grant him a hefty sum in order for him to purchase and refurbish the only gym in Summerside and open it up as a successful venture.

32 year old Renita Thatcher works as the loans manager at the Community Bank in Summerside and is a bit overweight and always at battle with self-esteem issues which had not been helped much by the fact that she had once had the mother of all crushes on Brett only to be rudely brought back to Earth by his firm rejection of her obvious feelings for him. 13 years later, Renita thinks herself to be over her painful crush on Brett O’Connor only to have her theory disproved when he walks in sinfully handsome and hot as ever into her bank to ask her to grant him the loan to start up his business.

Though Renita tries to ignore Brett and his obvious effort to charm her, she can’t help but be aware of the effect he has on her senses. And before she knows it, she and her father are cornered by Brett into joining his gym and its not long before Renita finds herself losing weight and her heart in the process as she gets to know the complex man that Brett is inside and out.

I liked the fact that this story is about real people with difficult problems in their lives, trying their hardest to overcome them. And there were no instant or magical solutions to their problems and the fact that they made mistakes along the way and had to own up to the fact makes this story a uniquely different one based on that fact alone.

As someone who is always ordered/adviced by doctors and well-meaning family members to lose weight, I could totally understand and relate with what Renita goes through during the first half of the story and surprisingly I found myself a bit more motivated than usual to experience what she goes through during the story to come out a winner in the end. Kudos to Renita for seeing through what must have been a tough journey, especially with the man who makes her insides go aflutter being her instructor.

The relationship that forges between Brett and Renita doesn’t happen overnight which is alright in itself and though Renita still has feelings towards Brett, he takes a longer time to return them which was an irksome factor for me in this story. I want the hero to have some sort of awareness of the heroine even if she is not his “usual” type of woman, a fact that makes a romance worth reading. Brett is refreshingly honest with his feelings and though that’s a good thing in itself, I would have loved it more if he had been just a tad more aware of Renita throughout the story.

Recommended for readers who like their romance with a mix of family drama in an Australian setting.

Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes&Noble | BooksOnBoard | Kobo

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by mvbookreviewer

Review: The Last Goodbye by Sarah Mayberry

Format: E-bookthelastgoodbye
Read with: Amazon Kindle
Length: Novel
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Going Back, #30
Publisher: Harlequin
Hero: Tyler Adamson
Heroine: Ally Bishop
Sensuality: 3.5
Date of Publication: February 8, 2011
Started On: February 4, 2011
Finished On: February 5, 2011

Sarah Mayberry delivers on all accounts once again with this Harlequin Super Romance letting faithful readers of her delightful stories know that she definitely is an author that should remain on your auto-buy list when it comes to a good dose of contemporary romance, which just happens to be my favorite genre of romance. I have been keeping a close eye on the release date of this book since Harlequin always tends to release its books much earlier than the designated release date and it was just by chance that I happened to stumble upon this book, ready for download on the Harlequin website yesterday. Needless to say, 7 pages in, I was hooked line and sinker and nearly snarled in frustration every time something or the other took me away from the magic that Sarah Mayberry has woven with this beautiful story.

37 year old Tyler Adamson, owner of the largely successful T. A. Furniture Designs is a man haunted and tortured by the unpleasant memories of his childhood at the hands of his emotionally and physically abusive father Robert Adamson (Bob). Tyler and his elder brother Jon had never had a happy moment to reflect back upon and Tyler had followed in Jon’s footsteps and left home when he had barely turned 17 years old. It had only been a sense of guilt and obligation that had made Tyler visit his home in Woodend, a small Victorian town when his mother was alive. The day she had died, Tyler had said goodbye to his father as well and never looked back, until Ally walks into his life, all rightful indignation forcing Tyler to face the demons of his past.

33 year old Ally Bishop is a nomad at heart. Commitment phobic to the extreme, Ally is the unwanted child of an artist who had always been free spirited and flitted from one place to the other. Ally’s mother had discovered the fact that she was pregnant with Ally when it had been too late to do anything about the unwanted pregnancy. Ally had grown up, never having known her father with a mother who had been really too selfish to stop and think about the needs of a child and it had been up to Ally to mold herself even as a child into her mother’s lifestyle which has left its own sort of emotional scars on Ally. The author of the Dear Gertude column in the Melbourne Herald, Ally is a house sitter who occupies one home after the other, looking after other people’s homes for them which gives her free accommodation all over the country which suites her needs pretty well. Haunted by the thought that she is just like her mother, Ally shies away from relationships that makes her feel too much and which requires a commitment from her part until silver-eyed Tyler Adamson changes how she views the world once and for all.

It is when Ally house sits for her friend Wendy that she comes across Bob and rescues him when he collapses from stomach pain to be rushed into surgery for doctors to discover that Bob has cancer and that its a stage where they can do nothing more for him than keep him comfortable till his time comes. It is the fact that Bob is to face his death all alone that propels Ally to seek out Tyler, never really comprehending the can of worms that she was about to open with her good intentions.

It is a Tyler who is torn between doing what is right and seething with anger and unresolved issues that reluctantly goes to visit his father to say his goodbyes and give him a piece of his mind for what he and Jon went through at his hands. But what happens is the farthest thing from Tyler’s mind when he finds himself the caretaker of his father, who wants to go home to die. The only good thing Tyler finds amidst all the pain, grief and anger is the presence of Ally and her warm brown eyes that soothes his tortured soul unlike any other and her touch that starts a trail of fire deep within and comforts him at the same time.

This story encompasses complex relationships combined with the red hot passion that flares between two people who are as tortured and emotionally scarred as they come. The relationship if it can be called that between Tyler and his father played with all my emotions, making me want to rage at his father for the hell that he put his children through and at the same time made me watery eyed to think of what the cancer would be doing to his body, making him just a scared little man who must have had many a regret when he let out his last breath. It also made me want to be the fierce protector of Tyler and Jon, who makes an appearance very late in the book and just begs for his story to be told because I have a feeling he would make a great, drool worthy hero for a romance.

I loved a lot of things about this story. The way it reeled me in from page 1 and refused to let go the hold it had on all my emotions was what I loved best about this story. It makes you root for every single person in the story, makes you want  to get to know them, and even makes you shed a reluctant tear or two for the abusive father towards the end. It brings home a lot of hard truths, to do good unto others during the short life that you live because you never know how much time you really have left to walk this Earth.

I loved both Tyler and Ally and deem them just perfect for each other. Ally the nomad who craves stability and a home of her own without even knowing about it and Tyler the man who is ready to provide all of this for her and is understanding to the max without crowding her, who finds his own home & ultimate happiness in Ally’s welcoming arms just made this story a wonderful one all around.

If you want a contemporary romance  that grabs you right from the very start, a romance that delivers on all fronts and makes you cry towards the end, this one’s for you!

Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes&Noble | BooksOnBoard | Kobo | Harlequin

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by mvbookreviewer

Review: Two-Step Temptation By Emma Jay

Format: E-booktwosteptemptation
Opens with: Amazon Kindle
Length: Novella
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Standalone
Publisher: Samhain Publishing Ltd.
Hero: Eric Viera
Heroine: Haven Reynolds
Sensuality: 4
Date of Publication: December 8, 2010
Started On: February 2, 2011
Finished On: February 2, 2011

Yeap, you guys guessed it right. This novella from Samhain Publishing caught my eye solely due to its uber-beautiful cover. Reading the blurb I was sold and have been on the look-out for its release date since then. February is definitely going to have a huge impact on my book budget with several great romances which I am keeping an eye on coming out within this month.

My first Emma Jay definitely started out with a bang and finished in a riot of beautiful colors leaving a huge smile on my face. Mr. Sex-on-legs aka Eric Viera might have had a thing or two to do with that fact as he strode into the story in his long, lean form, close-cropped brown hair and his sexy little goatee and deep blue eyes that just begs a girl to get into trouble of the right kind with him. Being an anthropologist means that Eric rarely stays around in one place for long unless it is to study behavior of some forgotten tribe of people.

Elementary school principal Haven Reynolds finds herself definitely in trouble of the right variety when she meets the sexy Eric Viera at their friends Jared and Christine’s engagement party 8 months back. A two week affair had left Haven certainly begging for more and eventually her heart had gotten involved and it had killed her to see Eric go on his anthropology trip to the Costa Rica afterwards. Though she would rather die than admit to the fact Haven knows that Eric owed her nothing when both of them had gone into the purely sexual affair with their eyes open.

Eight months later, Eric again walks into Haven’s life, this time for the wedding of the couple whose engagement brought these two together in the first place. Haven with her shields strongly in place face an even more appealing and a sexier version of Eric who has no intention of letting the best thing that has ever happened to him walk away from him as he is looking for something a bit more permanent with the woman who rocked his world 8 months back and the woman who has occupied all his thoughts since after. It is a highly enjoyable and a sensual journey done very well by Ms. Jay I must add that these two take and I loved every minute of it!

Things that made this book rock:

1- Eric Viera. No two ways about it. Mr. Sex-on-legs is definitely what he is! His at times gentle and other times no-holds-barred methods of seduction just makes me want an Eric of my very own! ^_^

2- Haven Reynolds. Though she is wary of getting her heart trampled upon, that doesn’t stop her from having a little fun with the only man who rocks her world. That makes her my kind of heroine and getting her happily ever after at the end was just icing on the cake for me.

3- The sizzle factor. Awesome hawtness throughout the story. Dancing has never sounded as good as it did in this story!

4- The beaaaaaaaautiful cover! Love it!!

Things that could have  made this book more awesome? I would change not a single thing about this book!

Recommended for fans of awesomely hot novellas. This one is just sinfully delicious!

Have definitely added Emma Jay’s list of published books to my wishlist!

Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes&Noble | BooksOnBoard | Kobo | Samhain

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by mvbookreviewer

My 2 Favorite Things in the World – Music and Books!

Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I am a huge fan of music. In a country where Indian movies and Hindhi songs used to take the lead when I was growing up, I opted to listen to English songs, maybe because of my love for a language as beautiful as the English language proves to be. Though scholars of the language may cringe and roll over in their graves at the content of some of the songs that I listen to, nevertheless they provide an escape without which I don’t think my life would be complete.

That being said, as you all know very well, books or rather books of the romance genre come hand in hand with my method of escapism from the real world. All those who stumble across my review site would know that I tend to read all sorts of romances if it delivers a hotter than sin alpha hero & a story worth my while which would stay with me for a long time.

And so it happens that my favorite two things converge a lot as in I happen to listen to music a lot as I read. Sometimes the music that I listen to whilst reading tends to make a huge impact on the way that I feel about a book.

For instance whilst I was reading Sing My Name by Ellen O’Connell, her latest American-Western historical romance, Ijust was listening to Just the Way You Are by Bruno Mars and for me the song just perfectly described how the hero Matthew Slade feels about the heroine Sarah Hammond. Even now as I listen to the song on and off, I am reminded of the novel and the impact Matthew Slade made on my senses. *Sigh*

Moving on, I come to Breaking Benjamin, my utmost favorite rock band in the world. Benjamin Burnley’s voice coupled with their awesome music and lyrics that make a deep impact on the listener goes a long way in making Breaking Benjamin my favorite music to listen to whenever I feel in the mood for rock or whenever I need an uplifting from some funk I find myself in at that moment. That being said, I was listening to Dear Agony their latest album when I raced through the Ice series by Anne Stuart with her ruthless heroes who ALWAYS manage to make my heart go thud-thud at the merest thought of them. Into the Nothing featured in this album is a song I relate a lot with Black Ice, the first novel in the series. It somehow manages to capture the reluctant hero that the story makes out of Bastien and my love for him an everlasting one! It was only much later that I found out that Anne Stuart herself listened to a lot of Japanese rock music & whatnot when she was writing the series and I guess I hit it spot on when I was reading this great series.

Last but not the least comes my eternal love for Crispin Phillip Arthur Russel III (Bones) from the Night Huntress series and anything to do with him. As it happens, this is also one series that I holed myself up in my room to race through as I practically gobbled book 1 – 4 in the series because simply put, I just couldn’t get enough of Bones! Now there’s something we all didn’t know huh? Anyhow I for the world of me don’t even know why, but this crazy tune Good Life by Leslie Millis featured in the movie What a Girl Wants was a song that I was practically hooked on when I was reading the Night Huntress series. And even now when I listen to that tune I can practically envision Bones striding towards Cat with all his lethal charm focused on me, errrm I meant to say Cat, with the sides of his leather jacket flapping in the wind, with his collar pulled up to graze his fantabulous cheekbones, mmmm.. shall I go on? So its practically a given that I am dying for the 22nd of this month to get here to get my hands on This Side of the Grave, the 5th book in the series!

I don’t think that it’s only I as a reader that feels the same way about books and music. I for one know of authors who have their own play-lists while writing their novels. For instance Pamela Clare very recently published on her blog the track list which she was listening to whilst writing the latest book in the I-Team series; Breaking Point which is to come out this May. I got some cool tracks off of her list and would definitely be listening to them whilst I read the book when it comes out.

So here’s to good music that works as a soothing balm on your soul or lets you pound out your anger and frustrations in life in a more productive manner and to great books that offer you a world to get lost into – as far away from reality as possible!

by mvbookreviewer

Review: A Not-So-Perfect Past by Beth Andrews

Format: E-booknot so perfect.JPG
Opens with: Amazon Kindle
Length: Novel
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Series: Serenity Springs Series
Hero: Dillon Ward
Heroine: Nina Carlson
Sensuality: 3.5
First Published on: April 2009
Started On: 31st January 2011
Finished On: 1st February 2011

I can see why this book received the 2009 RITA award for the Series Contemporary category. As I delved into my first Beth Andrews story, delighted was I to find such a well crafted one, a hero that I needless to say salivated over and a heroine who was real enough with genuine problems and fears that she needed to overcome to find everlasting happiness and love with the man who even though is not perfect, is the one for her.

Ex-convict Dillon Ward has spent 5 years in prison for killing his stepfather. Dillon moves back to Serenity Springs after he is released and 2 years on, people still avoid him like the plague and he goes out of his way to isolate himself because being in prison, continuously having to look after your own hide changes a man for better or worse. Dillon is a man who has never had it easy in life. Dillon’s father had died when he was 4 years old from a drug overdose and his mother had turned to vodka to drown all her sorrows leaving Dillon to look after his younger sister Kelsey who gets her own happily ever after in book 1 of the series which I have yet to read.

Single mother Nina Carlson is the new owner of Sweet Suggestions, a bakery in Serenity Springs which is Nina’s salvation. Blonde, curvy and full-figured, Nina has always been the good and golden girl of Serenity Springs. Nina had dropped out of college to marry her ex-husband Trey Carlson, the self important and arrogant psychologist of the town who not only abuses her emotionally and physically but leaves her to marry the tall, thin, sexy and successful Dr. Rachel Weber which puts a huge dent in Nina’s self esteem as a woman. Nina is a woman who continually wages an internal battle within herself with the need that arises in her to assert herself and become independent from the shackles that bind her and what she has always been till now.

It is because Nina bows down to pressure from her ex-husband Trey and her well meaning family members that she decides to remove Dillon from her building, the tenant which she acquired along with the purchase of Sweet Suggestions from her grandparents. Nina has never really come to know Dillon that well and with half the town afraid of him, Nina goes along with the flow until circumstances force Nina to look up and see Dillon for who he really is. Dillon who acknowledges that he has a strange fascination for the town’s good girl but refuses to do anything about it finds himself on the losing side of the battle when emotions and feelings he had thought long since buried rise to the surface making him hope and believe that he is indeed worthy of the good things in life if he could have just a little bit of courage to let go of his past and move on.

Stuff I liked:

1- Dillon Ward. I always love my heroes to be a little bit tortured and just a tad dangerous. Hell, the more dangerous the better. And Dillon proves to be as sexy as they come and brings to the story that elusive quality which makes a romance come alive in the little ways that matters so much in the end.

2- Nina Carlson. What I loved about her was the fact that I could see her struggle with very real problems that many a women go through in the real world and come out the winner in the end. Because she tries so hard to be a better woman, to be more independent and to rid herself of her dependent nature on others, its no small feat that she accomplishes within the story that unfolds.

3- I loved the sizzling variety of sexual tension in this book. From the many a Harlequin Super Romances that I have read, this one comes out on the top in delivering sensuality that knocked my socks off as I read along. I always love it when the tough hero loses control and that is exactly what happens in this delectable story towards the end!

4- Loved the character development. Harlequin Super Romances always deliver on that and this one’s no exception to the rule. Because of this very reason, this line from Harlequin is rapidly becoming a favorite of mine.

What could have made this better?

The lack of an epilogue rankled me in this one because I so wanted to see how Nina and my deliciously sinful Dillon with Nina’s two adorable kids fare in the end. Would have definitely made this novel a much more complete one in my opinion.

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