Tag: Harlequin UK

Review: Blind Dates and Other Disasters by Ally Blake, Fiona Harper, Barbara Hannay.

Posted December 13, 2011 by Rowena in Reviews | 0 Comments

Rowena’s review of Blind Dates and Other Disasters by Ally Blake, Fiona Harper and Barbara Hannay.

Three easy ways to keep your love life clean and simple …don’t get your friends to fix you up. Party planner Holly can’t find the perfect man – it’s time to turn to her friends to help her out. But after a string of horrific dates, will Jake Lincoln be the man for her? …don’t go on a blind date. Serena wishes she could ignore her unconventional upbringing and settle down with her dream man! So she’s heading out on a blind date. But her date is a man who lives by one rule: never get married! …don’t try your hand at internet dating. Annie is stuck in the Outback without any men for miles. When she meets Damien on an internet chat group, she immediately heads to the city to meet him. Then Theo steps in to take Damien’s place…

Three stories by three different authors about blind dates and other dating disasters. Of course, I wanted to read this.

The first book is by Ally Blake and it’s about Holly Dennison turning to her friends Beth and Ben (the happily married couple) to fix her up with someone because she’s on the husband hunt. Ben tries to fix her up with several different men from his work but there’s only one person that beneath it all, Holly wants and that’s Ben’s boss, Jacob Lincoln.

But Jacob isn’t interested in getting married. He just wants to bang Holly and even though he lusts like crazy for her, he’s not going to marry her and he knows the truth about Holly’s dating adventure. But watching these two bicker their way to that happy ending was too cute for words. I thought it would get old after a few pages but it didn’t. I enjoyed getting to know both Holly and Jacob. I thought they were perfect for each other and the way that they fought their attraction and seeing Holly come to realize that she was head over heels in love with Jacob made this story just so darned cute.

My only complaint was that it was too short, I wanted more (from being the greedy wench that I am) Jacob but other than the shortness of the story, it was a fun way to spend a couple of hours. Kudos to Ally Blake. I’m so itching to read more from her.

Grade: 4.5 out of 5

The second story follows Charles Jacobs and Serena Dove as they make their way to their happy ending. I can’t say that I was a total fan of this book because I just wasn’t. The romance that blossomed between Jacob and Serena felt forced and I hated every time Serena begged Jacob for a little of his affections. You see, Jacob isn’t the marrying kind. He’s just not made that way and after he woos the heck out of Serena, he leaves and tells her that they need to cool things off since it was apparent that she was head over heels for him. He leaves and she tries to move on even though its hard.

Even when Serena finally grows some balls and tells Jacob that she won’t settle for less than it all, I felt like she had done enough begging that anything after that was tainted for me. I just wasn’t comfortable with how needy Serena was in this story.

Jacob was great at seducing women and he may have missed Serena when he went away to New York but he was much too wishy washy for me to truly and completely love him like I usually love heroes. He was a grown ass man and he was still letting his past run his life and usually an author can write that in a way that I would buy it and understand it but with Jacob, I just couldn’t so of course, my enjoyment of the story suffered because of it. I got that he had issues from his past, he thought he was being noble but for the most part, I thought he was just being real stupid.

Overall, this story wasn’t the worst story but it was my least favorite of the three stories in this book. The characters were much to unbelievable and I couldn’t bring myself to like them very much so, that’s that.

Grade: 2.75 out of 5

The final story in this book tells the tale of how Annie and Theo find their happiness with each other. It starts off with Annie eager for her date with Damien, the guy that she’s been getting to know through internet dating. They hit it off and on their first date, Damien stands her up and his uncle is the one that handles the embarrassing phone call letting Annie know that Damien will not be coming. After being stood up, Annie gets pretty trashed with her friends and together, they send Damien a piece of their mind via email and it is once again, Uncle Theo that responds to their email.

Uncle Theo turns out to be a philosophy professor at the college that Annie’s friend attends and he’s hot stuff. All of the students love him and the women students want to bang him so that should tell you just how hot Professor Studly Uncle is. Uncle Theo feels bad because Annie came to town (she’s from deep in the country) for a date and was disappointed when Damien didn’t show up. He feels responsible for Damien and in turn, feels responsible for Annie. So he goes out of his way to make her feel comfortable and before he knows what’s what, he’s full blown attracted to the young woman and wants her for his own.

Annie, on the other hand is just as attracted to Theo as he is to her and their relationship evolves into more than they thought possible.

The story was a delightful story, it wasn’t the best story that I’ve ever read but it was a delightful way to spend some time. Getting to know both Theo and Annie was good but the problems that they went through in this book were kind of unbelievable because the story was too short. The story wasn’t allowed to develop as solidly as I would have liked because it was such a short story but I still enjoyed it.

Theo was a great character, Annie was a great character but Damien’s character (when he finally comes back into the picture) fell kind of flat as did Claudia’s character. I think had this story been a tad longer, their characters would have been able to fully come together and make more sense but their additions to the story felt kind of rushed and so that was where my enjoyment of the story was just a bit tainted. All in all, the story was cute but that’s it, just cute.

Grade: 3 out of 5

Overall, this book provided some great storylines and introduced some great characters. I just wish that I could have gotten more from two of the stories but all in all, it was a delightful treat. Enjoyable way to spend a few hours.

Overall grade: 3.5 out of 5

This book is available from Harlequin UK. You can buy it here.

0 Comments

Tagged: Ally Blake, Barbara Hannay, Chick Lit, Fiona Harper, Harlequin UK, Reviews, Rowena's Reviews

Review: Wish Upon a Star by Sarah Morgan.

Posted November 2, 2011 by Rowena in Reviews | 1 Comment

Rowena’s review of Wish Upon a Star by Sarah Morgan.

Love is in the air this Christmas! Christy was hoping to skip Christmas this year. Her kids have other ideas – they’ve put their dad’s name at number one on their Christmas list. So it looks as if Christy will be hightailing it up to the Lake District to play happy families with her ex! Snow-capped mountains and roaring log fires – Alessandro’s home is like walking into a Christmas card. Is it really safe for her to spend Christmas with her dreamy, funny – no! – entirely infuriating ex-hubby? Miranda has completely the opposite problem. Being single and pregnant at Christmas was certainly not her wish come true. She doesn’t believe in miracles, but then resident hunk Jake sweeps her off her snow-covered shoes. Come Boxing Day dare she dream that Mr Sex-on-Legs might be for more than just Christmas? ‘A picturesque and charming tale’ Star magazine on Angels in the Snow.

It’s been a while since I’ve read a chick lit novel and I thought that was what I was going to get in this book but I don’t think it was, it was a contemporary romance set in the UK. This book has two stories in it and both stories were easy to follow. The first book follows married couple Alessandro and Christy as they try to find their way back to each other again after years of marriage. They’ve been married for twelve years and they have two kids. Christy takes care of the kids and Alessandro goes to work every day. He has long hours and the only quality time they seem to share together is when they’re having sex at night.

Christy used to be a nurse and now that the kids are older and in school longer, Christy is starting to get antsy about staying home all the time. She starts to want a life that’s her own again and when the hospital calls and wants her to come in and fill in while nurses are out sick and what not, she jumps at the chance. She starts to realize that she’s missed the fast paced life at the hospital, she’s missed adult conversations and the hustle and bustle of the A and E unit.

Alessandro can’t get over the fact that his wife left him. She took their two kids and walked out on him, leaving him behind. He didn’t even know that anything was wrong. When she comes back, things are awkward and they’re at a loss as to what to do about their situation. Should they stay or should they go?

This whole story was one giant ball of mis-communication. Both Alessandro and Christy spent a great deal of the story assuming what the other was thinking, not talking to one another and staying mad at each other. More than once, I wanted to smack them both upside their heads and yell, “Get it together you dumbasses!”

When they finally did get it together and talked things out, I was glad for it. I was also thirsty for more of Alessandro’s best friend Jake Blackwell so when I turned the page and found his story starting, I was over the moon.

Jake’s story takes place not too long after Christy and Alessandro’s ends. It’s Christmas day and Jake is out walking by the lake. It’s cold as balls and he probably shouldn’t be out and about since winters in the UK are pretty cold and snowy, but when he comes across a crying woman- a gorgeous crying woman, he sets about rescuing her from the harsh weather and the fact that she’s not dressed for being out in the middle of this weather.

Jake and Miranda’s story happens so fast. One moment, they’re meeting and the next thing you know, she’s moving into his house and they’re getting to know each other and then they fall in love. Jake fell in love first and came to grips with what he was feeling and then set about trying to convince Miranda that what he felt was true and not going to change but Miranda’s past messed her up because she had low self esteem and didn’t think that a man was worth the heart ache.

As their story progresses, my heart went out to Jake. Miranda was stubborn and knew what she knew. There wasn’t anything that Jake could have done to convince her otherwise until she was good and ready. There were a time or two when I wanted to shake some dang sense into Miranda but in the end, things worked out the way that they were supposed to and I was happy for Jake. Seeing him in the first book and finding out that the only woman he loved before Miranda fell in love with someone else made me antsy for his happy ending and I was over the moon when he finally got it.

The romance between Jake and Miranda should have felt rushed but I didn’t get that when I was reading their story. It happened fast but sometimes that’s the way love goes (ha! Who sang Janet Jackson after reading that sentence?). I enjoyed getting to know Jake and Miranda and even though their story seemed too good to be true, I still ate it all up.

Overall, both stories made for an entertaining way to spend a few hours. I enjoyed both stories but between the two, I enjoyed Jake’s story more. This book was cute and fluffy and it didn’t take itself too seriously which I appreciated. It’s the first book that I’ve read by Sarah Morgan and I don’t think it’ll be my last either. This book was an enjoyable way to spend the weekend so I would definitely recommend this book to lovers of the chick lit genre as well as fans of Sarah Morgan’s books.

Grade: 3.5 out of 5

This book is available from Harlequin UK. You can buy it here.