Tag: Adra Steia

A Letter In Which Holly Gets "Nasty"

Posted May 31, 2008 by Holly in Discussions | 43 Comments

Dear Anon Author,

A word of advice from your friendly local book reviewer:

When you submit a book for review to this review site, you have to understand that it’s going to be reviewed, whether it was a fabulous book or an awful book. In case you aren’t aware, in the “About Us” section, we have a disclaimer that states authors and/or publishers are free to submit books for review, but just because you submitted it does not guarantee a good review. If it sucks big donkey balls, we’re going to tell the world.

Unfortunately, your book sucked big donkey balls. I felt the need to tell the world. Leaving comments to the effect of “You’re mean” and “It’s unethical to tell people to steer clear of my book” isn’t going to change the fact that your book sucked big donkey balls. I’d also like to point out that leaving comments saying things like “I meant to write them as idiot characters” and “It was supposed to be written with grammatical and typographical errors” (not that you actually used those words..I think they might be too big for you) “because that’s my writing ‘voice'” does nothing but make you look like a fucktard.

Yes, a big fucktard.

As long as we’re discussing you being a fucktard, I’d like to go one step further here and say it’s probably not advisable to Google the title of your book and then leave tell your friends so they can leave “annoymous” comments on posts saying things like, “There’s a difference between honesty and nastiness”. Because you’re right, there is a difference.

I’d say I’m being honest when I say your book was one of the worst books I read in 2007. I’d say I’m being nasty when I say if you aren’t one of the stupidest people on the face of the Earth, I don’t know who is.

I’d also say I’m being nasty when I state the following:

“Adra Steia is a fucktard. She writes shitty books and then cries when she gets bad reviews for said shitty books. Then she leaves anonymous comments on said reviews and/or other posts further cementing her fucktard status. In my not very humble opinion, no one – and I mean absolutely no one – should read A Year Of You. Ever. Unless they want their eyes to bleed and/or their head to explode. Trust me, that’s time you can never get back. Don’t waste it.”

See, that was nasty. Uh, and honest. Jeez, I guess there isn’t really a difference between honesty and nastiness after all.

Just Sayin’.

Holly

P.S. The sad part is, had you not said a word about it, I would have gladly bought more of your books, because I really liked the first one I read. Maybe next time you’ll think about that and control the impulse to comment..anonymously or otherwise.

*Turns out I was wrong, and Adra Steia herself didn’t leave a comment on our Worst Reads of 2007 post. One of her “friends” did. Since Ms. Steia has changed her story some, I’m not sure exactly HOW said friend came to leave a comment there, but according to our Stat Counter website, AS did a Google search for her book, found our Worst Reads post and emailed it to her friends so they could “laugh” about it.


Tagged: , , , , , , ,

Joint Review: A Year of You by Adra Steia

Posted September 28, 2007 by Casee in Discussions, Reviews | 13 Comments

Joint Review: A Year of You by Adra SteiaReviewer: Casee and Holly
A Year of You by Adra Steia
Publisher: Self-Published
Publication Date: September 15th 2007
Add It: Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Ripped Bodice | Google Play Books
one-star

The con was supposed to be simple: Get in, get the money, and get out.

When dark family secrets come to light, Mattie must be silenced. Someone will do anything to keep her mouth shut—even commit murder.

Asking for help will cost her as much as keeping silent. When the ones she loves are threatened, Mattie will have to become what she hates most to save them. Will she have the strength?

Casee: After my last review of a book by this author, I was hesitant to read this book, let alone review it as my 2nd review here at Book Binge. Alas, I couldn’t help myself when the other girls asked me to give it a try.

Holly: I want to start out by saying I loved Muse. It was well written and had a great creepy factor to it that kept me glued to the story and anxious to turn the pages. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for A Year of You.

I have one word for this book. Painful. This was like the worst train wreck in the history of train wrecks. As I was reading it, I forged on thinking that the book could not possibly get any worse. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

 Casee: Painful is a great way to describe this book. That and confusing.

Let me tell you the plot, then I’ll get to the many issues I had with this book. It might seem a tad confusing…b/c, well, it is confusing.

Mattie Delacourt goes to Florida at the request of her estranged (and very wealthy) biological grandmother, Ruth Ellen McKendrick. Though she had no intention of going, she was blackmailed and threatened into it by her stepbrother. Though she is one of the long-lost McKendrick daughters, she’s posing as the other daughter, Elaine, who disappeared when she was 6. The daughter that she is not. Her grandmother wants Mattie to pretend to be Elaine while trying to find Elaine’s dead body. Mattie will do anything to prevent her stepbrother from harming her daughter, even if it means breaking the law. Desperate to get her hands on enough money to make him ago away, Mattie travels to Florida prepared to lie, cheat, and steal.

Total chaos and confusion ensues.

Holly: That’s an understatement of massive proportions.

The family dynamics here are completely dysfunctional. The reader is warned about this by the author in the beginning of the book. That wasn’t really my problem. My problem started on page 8. While Mattie’s stepbrother (whom she calls “K”), sends her off, we get a little family background. The woman who raised Mattie (whom at that point I thought was her mother), married K’s (I hate this nickname, btw) father 12 years earlier. Then we learn that K raped Mattie for the first time when she was 8 years old. That would make her around 20 years old, assuming that she was 8 when they got married. Not. It’s later revealed that she’s 28. Twenty eight. That’s not the only mathematical error here. You know the daughter? The one Mattie is trying to protect? She’s a product of one of K’s rapes. Still on page 8, we learn that Mattie’s daughter, Molly, is 14 years old. Fourteen. How can she be 14 if she didn’t even meet K until 12 years before? At the end of the book when we actually meet Molly, she’s described as a 13 year old teenager. WTF?

Casee: Really? I thought she was 13 when she got raped for the first time. I guess I didn’t pay close enough attention. Of course, it was kind of hard to pick up on all that kind of stuff when there was so much going on. Moving along…

After Mattie arrives in Florida, she quickly falls for Brant West, her half-sister Emeline’s boyfriend. West and Emeline have been a couple for three years. He is blind to her faults. Completely and totally blind. Unbelieveably blind. While the three of them plus a few of Emeline’s friends are at a nightclub, Mattie sees her getting it on with two guys. West refuses to believe his own eyes, even when Mattie points out that she’s wearing the same lime green that Emeline was wearing. Mattie ends up dragging West out of the club and into the car where (presumeably) they’re going to wait for Emeline. West is in denial. Then Mattie and West start going at it in the car. When Mattie starts performing oral on him, West is thinking “I hope you see this, Em. I hope you see your sister blowing me“.

This is about the time I started getting pissed off at the book. I mean, he catches the love of his life in an extremely compromising position with two guys and he still wants her? And the fact that Mattie went down on him while he was thinking about her sister just set the tone of the book for me….and it wasn’t pretty.

Holly: Seriously, could it get any worse? The answer is yes.

headesk

The book description describes West as a “moody musician” when he’s actually a business owner. He owns a nursery and landscaping company. While he does have passion for music, he puts everything he has into his business. So after Em’s father tells West that he’s calling in his loan (which will bankrupt him), he goes and proposes to Emeline. Who flat out refuses him. Says she can’t marry a landscaper that lives in a trailer. That she never intended to marry him. Just basically emasculates him. And he goes back for more. This guy has some serious issues. So he goes to find Mattie and spills out all his feelings. Mattie then offers to marry him. Sprinkled between all the dysfunction that’s going on, Mattie has learned that she has a trust fund of 3 million dollars. If she’s married, she can access the money after three months, thus saving West’s business. She offers West marriage as a business proposition. She also hopes it will help keep the money away from K. After West accepts, they go to tell the family and Emeline (who just refused his proposal 20 minutes before) tells him that he can’t marry Mattie, he is supposed to marry her. West starts changing his mind about marrying Mattie until Em’s father tells him that he will never let his daughter marry a man like West. So West goes charging off after Mattie again.

I can’t believe how hot and cold West ran. He wanted Mattie, he wanted Em. He was hot for Mattie, he was thinking about Em while they were making out. He needed Mattie for her money, but he wanted Em. ARGH!

Casee: During the wedding ceremony at the Courthouse, West stared at Emeline the whole time he was being married to Mattie. The wedding night? Mattie once again performed oral on him and when he didn’t return the favor, she pulled out a vibrator right in front of him. The rest of the book was so wishy-washy, I could barely keep up. One day West would decide that he couldn’t give Mattie up. Then Emeline would call him or he’d run into her and he’d forget all about Mattie. Another day, West and Mattie would be screaming “Bite me!” to each other, some name-calling thrown in between. West called Mattie a bitch at least once a page. Mattie said “Fuck you” just as often. I swear, I felt like I was watching fights between two teenagers. The phrase “Bite me” was used way too much. Way, way, too much.

Holly: I didn’t notice the “Bite Me” thing, but I couldn’t stomach the way West kept going back to Em. Talk about being in denial. Even after he realizes her true nature, he still pretends like she’s the best thing since a blowjob from Mattie. Funny how that worked out, huh?
Casee:Added to all this chaos was K calling Mattie wanting to know where his money is. K sent someone to “remind” Mattie that he was waiting. This guy, posing as a delivery driver, poisoned six of West’s dogs (killing them) and almost killed Mattie. When West got home and found his dogs dead, he immediately started screaming at Mattie, thinking she killed his dogs b/c she was scared of them. Obviously the fact that she had bruises around her throat where someone tried to strangle her didn’t register. Ooookay then

Holly: .Meh, I skimmed this part. Ok, well, I pretty much skimmed everything after this part, too. I just couldn’t deal with West. Or Mattie. Or the rest of the fam damily.

Casee: A few days after that, Mattie was abducted from her grandmother’s nursing home, while waiting for West (who was with Emeline) to pick her up. Beaten up and left by the side of the road, West vows that he won’t leave Mattie alone to be hurt again. Yeah, that lasted about a day. When Mattie is driving home from the drug store after buying a pregnancy test, someone runs her off the road. She crashes through some brush and into a tree. When West arrives, all he can think about is that Mattie purposely wrecked the truck that was all he had left of his dad. Seriously. That night while they’re having sex (after West accuses Mattie of all sorts of wonderful things), West calls her “Em”. Lovely. Just lovely. The next day, West goes back to tow the truck back to his property and finds a disposable cell phone that K gave Mattie. He calls, wanting to know who it is and K tells him that Mattie is his, blahblahblah. Then he goes to Mattie and tells her that he wants answers. She tells him a little bit of what she went through as a child. West was properly horrified.

Holly: Describe “properly horrified” for me, will you? Because I must have missed the memo. Especially after what happens next…

Casee: Though his wife has almost been killed at least three times, all West can worry about is Emeline. When it comes to light that Mattie is a McKendrick and Emeline is, in fact, not a McKendrick, West tells Mattie that her coming to Florida ruined Emeline’s life. This guy really has his priorities straight. He’s also crying while he’s telling her this. Though he just found out that a sociopath is after Mattie and she’s pregnant with his child, he’s worrying about Emeline.

Again with the Emeline. I mean, the woman was a straight up psycho bitch. She was selfish and immature and often threw temper tantrums. She wanted to party – and party hard – and wasn’t concerned at all about West, or anyone else. As long as it made her happy, that’s what counted. I think the worst part of it for me is….West admits to himself more than once that Em isn’t who he makes her out to be in his mind. He admits she’s selfish and immature. He admits she cares only about herself and the only reason he’s so obsessed with her is because he did nothing to save Elaine (if you remember from above, Elaine disappeared when she was 6 and Mattie is pretending to be her while she searches for her body). He feels responsible for what happened to Elaine because they were close and West thought he saw something strange the night she disappeared, but didn’t tell anyone. So it isn’t Em herself he loves, but instead he’s obsessed with protecting her, as he didn’t protect Elaine.

Then the shit really hits the fan. K arrives with his goons and abducts Mattie and West. They soon learn that Emeline has also been abducted. K insists that Mattie pretend that she’s kidnapped Emeline for money. While West and Emeline are tied up, Mattie is gang raped in front of them. West is more concerned about Emeline than the fact that his wife was violently attacked. When Mattie convinces K that there is money to be dug up on West’s property, she goes to say goodbye to West, knowing she’ll never see him again. What does he say to her? You guessed it…”Fuck you”. Are you freaking kidding me?!?!?! He just saw the woman he apparently loves, his PREGNANT wife get raped by at least 2 men and he says “Fuck you”? OMFG.

Holly: This is where I completely lost it and said “fuck this, I’m not reading anymore”. Not because Mattie got gang raped. I mean, that sucks big donkey balls, but I wasn’t horrified at the violence. I was horrified at West. Emeline was FINE. There was nothing wrong with her. But Mattie, the woman he married and the woman who is pregnant with his child is brutally raped in front of him and his only concern was for someone he described as selfish and hurtful?

But even worse, IMO, was Mattie. Because through everything, the con, her abuse from K, her constant lying and manipulating, she continued to believe she was being strong, that she would move on with her life and that she was doing the best thing she could. But she never once stood up for herself. She never once said, “fuck you” and meant it. She never once considered walking away or leaving West or telling him to back the fuck off. Not one time. A woman who does that, no matter what she tried to tell herself, it isn’t a strong woman that just puts up with that kind of abuse – and the way West treated her was abuse, even if he didn’t harm her physically – isn’t strong or brave, she’s just stupid. And after she was gang raped, and West was more concerned for Em that he was for her, she just went on her merry way, still accepting him and wanting to be with him. Who does that?

Holly: If you’ve stuck with me this far, kudos to you. I haven’t even gotten into all the subplots or the subplots of the subplots. The inconsistencies in the book were amazing. In one scene, Mattie dressed in jeans and a tank top. In that same scene, while West and Mattie were walking around the property, they started going at it against a tree and West put his hands down her loose gym shorts. I had to actually go back, thinking I’d missed something.

That’s just the tip of the ice berg. There were so many inconsistencies and plot holes I was tempted to bang my head against the wall.

Casee: I would give this book a DNF, but I finished it. Unlike Holly, once I start a book, I’m in it until the bitter end. I actually liked Steia’s book, Muse, better than this one. Though I gave Muse a 1 out of 5, the writing wasn’t bad at all. This seems to be written by a different author entirely. She also needs to get a new editor b/c some of the grammar in this book is atrocious.

Holly: I am giving it a DNF. I just couldn’t finish. I think I ended up skimming to…I don’t know. I know I couldn’t get to the end, though.

I would strongly advise all of you to steer clear of this book. I’m honestly surprised this is written by the same person who wrote Muse. The writing itself seemed choppier, the dialogue lagged and the spelling and grammar were the stuff of nightmares. Not to mention the characters. *shudder*

Casee: 1 out of 5

Holly: DNF

one-star


Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Review: Muse by Adra Steia

Posted June 28, 2007 by Book Binge Guest Blogger in Reviews | 7 Comments

muse
Isabel’s review of Muse by Adra Steia.

Leah and Miguel have been separated for ten years, after the birth and adoption of their child when they were just teenagers. Reunited, they discover their psychic bond is as strong as ever. Miguel is now a troubled artist, and Leah is struggling to make a life for herself. As they decide to resume their turbulent, passionate romance, Miguel summons his Muse, a seductive, violent spirit that haunts their home. After several violent, bloody attacks, Leah learns very quickly that his Muse is not all he claims she is, and that the vindictive spirit will stop at nothing to possess Miguel. To save him, Leah must sacrifice everything.

Holly and Casee did a review of this book earlier. You can read their review here. Since they went over the plot summery, I’ll go straight into what I liked/disliked.

What I Liked:

Holy crap, I was wiped out when I was done reading this. I was hooked after reading the first chapter. I wanted to throttle Leah’s jerk employer. I wanted to kick Jose in his butt a few times and there were times I wanted to throttle La Mariposa and Miguel. I was getting jealous with Ophelia telling Leah how it took a lot to get Miguel going in the bedroom. That’s how drawn in I was. I felt something towards almost every character.

The twist with La Mariposa. Damn. Did not see that coming. Like Leah, I didn’t want to believe it. I did not see that coming at all.

All in all, it was a good story. I made sure to read it during the day so I’d have time to read/watch something happy. This book did give me creepy crawlies. I did read a chapter once while eating my breakfast before work. I swore I heard weird noises.

What I Disliked:

I don’t hold this against the book at all by the way but that fact it was a freaking e book. I started off printing the chapters so I could read in bed. But that was wasting paper so I ended up just reading it at the computer. Didn’t care for that.

I didn’t dislike Jose or Miguel, they just irked me sometimes.

Jose. He was such a jerk wad to Leah at first. He was mean to her because 1) He felt it was Leah’s fault Miguel became depressed. You see, after their baby was born, Miguel left Leah. Miguel failed to tell Jose this. So when Leah came back into their lives, Jose feared for his brother’s health. Which I get he was just being protective. 2) Jose never really understood/believed Miguel and Leah’s psychic abilities. What he didn’t understand freaked him out. 3) Jose felt Leah was a little know it all. Because she was always the one with the high grades and all that. So he felt Leah was one upping him on purpose. 4) He had a crush on her. You know how in elementary school boys tease the girls they like. Towards the end, Jose redeemed himself. After he realized the truth and saw Leah for the loving caring person she is.

Miguel. Oh Miguel. Poor boy was falling for a ghost. A very vengeful and possessive ghost. He had a great woman in Leah and yet he was drawn to La Mariposa. His muse. He saw how La Mariposa hurt Leah, yet he was convinced Lead did it to herself on accident. Yet, I still hoped that Miguel and Leah would have their HEA despite me getting irked at him.

Additional Comments:

Like Holly, I’m torn with the end. I can’t say much cause I don’t want to ruin it. I am still deciding if I’m ok with it or maybe… I don’t know.

This story was good though. I really enjoyed it. Go read it.

Grade: 4.5 out of 5

This book was available from Tease.


Tagged: , , , , , ,