Casee
It took me two long weeks to finish Annihilation Road by Christine Feehan. It wasn’t my favorite in this series. I couldn’t bring myself to read Savage Road, which is the second of a duo within the Torpedo Ink series. More about that in my upcoming review. So I’ve decided to switch it up a little and am reading a paranormal called Immortal’s Honor by Rebecca Zanetti. Fingers crossed that this book will bring me out of my pnr slump.
I’ve still been listening to Julie Garwood on audio. I’m going to listen to Honor’s Splendour next.
Holly
I managed to listen to Burn for Me, White Hot and Wildfire by Ilona Andrews, but those are the only books I finished. My busy season has arrived and my reading is suffering for it. Sigh.
I read two books that the women on the Fated Mates podcast included in their Favorite Books of 2021: AFTER THE BILLIONAIRE’S WEDDING VOWS by Lucy Monroe: an HP about a five-year marriage in big trouble and the husband’s attempts to turn things around. It was fine, but Monroe is not one of my “HP Queens of angsty heartache,” like Caitlin Crews, Jackie Ashenden, Claire Connolly, or Maisey Yates, and I was really anticipating more angst. The other book was RUN POSY RUN by Cate C. Wells, a dark mafia romance—it’s rather interesting because, unlike most mafia romances, the heroine is not a protected, virginal mafia princess, she’s a tough cookie who’s been around the block a few times. Oddly enough—even though the plot and style of the two books is completely different—RUN POSY RUN is similar to AFTER THE BILLIONAIRE’S WEDDING VOWS in that both books are about men realizing they have caused problems in their relationships and attempting to repair the damage.
I liked RUN POSY RUN enough that I started Cate C. Wells’s most recent book, THE TYRANT ALPHA’S REJECTED MATE, which is a shifter romance (with a rather HP-esque title). I don’t read many shifter romances, but I’m loving this one: it has excellent world-building; a scrappy and self-sufficient heroine, who refuses to give in to self-pity because of her damaged leg or the fact that she’s never been in heat or shifted; and an alpha hero, bordering on alpha-hole, who is completely baffled by the heroine claiming he is her mate. He doesn’t believe it, but the fates have other plans.
Since last week ~
— for my local book group ~ Yellow Bird: Oil, Murder, and a Woman’s Search for Justice in Indian Country by Sierra Crane Murdoch. It is not what I would call an uplifting read, but it was very well researched and readable.
— Someone to Wed (The Westcott Series Book 3) by Mary Balogh: I enjoyed this historical romance.
— the contemporary romance Sweetheart (The Busy Bean) by Sarah Mayberry which I quite enjoyed.
— The Lost Letter: A Victorian Romance by Mimi Matthews. I enjoyed the book, but I don’t think it’s a book I’ll be rereading.
— a reread of The Protector (Guardsmen) by Cooper West which I enjoyed once again. This is a male/male romance with a paranormal element.
Thank you for recommending Sweetheart, @DDD!
I read The Heart Principle by Helen Hoang. I’d heard it was pretty emotional and that was no joke, I had to skip a bit in the middle because it was just too heavy, but still it was a fantastic book. There’s so much going on in the book and although there is a lovely romance in it, that wasn’t really the focus of the book. It was much more about the heroine’s struggle to deal with her inability to play music anymore (she’s a concert violinist), a new autism diagnosis, a toxic family relationship, and the need to obey her older sister and be a caregiver for her dying father. Still, I’d recommend it.
Also read and enjoyed All the Feels by Olivia Dade which although it also was pretty emotional, was much lighter by comparison with some great banter between the two leads and a lovely slow burn romance. The author is great at writing heroines who are “round” and body positive and I really enjoyed that aspect of the romance also.