Hey there!

I hope you all had a great week. My was fairly good overall.

My youngest did it again. She kicked butt and took names and got her orange belt in Taekwondo. She really is doing a great job. I, of course, am a horrible mother and forgot the damned camera! She went up first thing too so I didn’t have time to run home and get it. I suck, I know. My hubby took a couple of shots with his blackberry and 1 came out ok but most came out pretty blurry. I’m gonna post a few anyway cuz I’m so proud of her.

Here’s what I read this week:

I started off the week with The Mane Event by Shelly Laurenston. I really enjoyed her Magnus Pack series so I thought I’d venture over to the Pride series. While I was overwhelmed with love they were definitely cute. The Mane Event had 2 stories in the book. The first was Christmas Pride which Dez, an NYC cop and Mace a shapeshifting lion who has had his sights set on Dez since he was 14 years old. There was a murder involved in the story and some other conflict but overall it was more sex than story. The second story, Shaw’s Tail, involved Shaw, a shapeshifting lion and Ronnie Lee, a shapeshifting wolf. Talk about mixed breeds. lol Ronnie Lee is trying to settle her life down from the craziness of her youth and Shaw is a wealthy hotel owner. Besides their breeds they really don’t have a whole lot in common. This was a really cute story – when the h/h spends the day together and the story shows them going from activity to activity it was highly amusing and very enjoyable. 3.75 out of 5

My second read for the week was Lord of the Highlands by Veronica Wolff. This was a book that I will review for The Book Binge – I’ll let you know when the review posts.

Next up was Bastards and Pretty Boys by KZ Snow. A gay man who’s not quite happy in his 5 month relationship buys a summer home on a lake. His neighbor is hottie mchot hot but he’s not gonna stray…until his “boyfriend” tells him that he’s been with other men. He’s positive that’s sealed the door on the relationship and moves forward with his neighbor. But his neighbor has some secrets of his own. He’s an ex-con and he’s got a man pretty much stalking him. This was a great 74 page read. KZ just has a great way of phrasing the simplest words and making them wonderfully emotional. 4.25 out of 5

After that I read To Tempt the Wolf by Terry Spear. This was an impulse buy while down at the UBS (the first time) but it being a shape-shifter book it was high on my list to read. The story covered Tessa who’s brother is convicted of murder – but she knows he’s not the murderer. Then she finds a naked man on the beach who ends up having amnesia. Not knowing who he is doesn’t stop Hunter from making a bargain with Tessa. She will let him stay at her place and he’ll find out who was the real murderer. Who Hunter really is? An Alpha wolf from a pack that has pretty much deserted him. He falls for Tessa, even though she’s not one of his kind and he can’t mate with her. On top of all this there are humans being turned to wolves, bad wolves stalking Tessa, Hunter’s sister is missing and there’s buried treasure! It is a lot in one book but Terry Spear pulls it off in a way that, hell, it could happen. lol Anyway, an enjoyable read. 3.75 out of 5

My Tracy’s TBR Challenge read for the week was Sleeping with the Fishes by Mary Janice Davidson. My friend gave me this book a couple of years ago and there is has sat on my shelf. And I have to say…after reading it I could have let it sit there a couple of more years and not missed it. The first chapter almost had me putting the book down. Fred, the half mermaid, half human is such an incredible bitch I wanted to slug her…yes, in the first chapter. I did finish reading the book since it was so few pages but I can’t say I enjoyed it too much. I didn’t care abotu Fred, the sea prince, Artur or the water fellow, Thomas. If you don’t care about the characters, do you really care about the story? For me? No. 2 out of 5

The Dickens with Love by Josh Lanyon was released on December 1st and I scooped that puppy up right away. It was 97 pages of wonderful Lanyon goodness. From the first meeting between the two men, to the crazy things that happen (yes, there’s an ocelot involved) I was riveted to my ereader. The story of a lost Dickens novel, a newly uncloseted son of a vicar and a tainted antiquarian is one that I will probably read every year at Christmas time. I think the love and self-awareness that the characters experience was very moving and this is a story I would definitely recommend. 4.5 out of 5

I read a yaoi manga this week. It was ZE1 by Yuki Shimizu and I have to tell ya, that was pretty odd. A guy who’s grandma has died goes to live in this house but he finds out that half of them are dolls and take away pain. It was truly bizarre but the graphics were pretty darned good. The main character’s story was just touched upon in this volume but I’m not sure I want to read any more – IDK, I’ll have to think about it. 2 out of 5

My last read for the week was another book from my shelves that’s been there a long while and that is Black Ice by Anne Stuart. I have to tell ya – I loved this book. From the heroine who seems kind of weak at first but is truly not…to the hero who is working undercover for the good guys but the line between good and evil is so thin he’s not sure where it crosses over anymore. Just a fantastic read. There were a couple of minor discrepancies (editing issues) in the book which were a little annoying but nothing that took away from my overall enjoyment. I will definitely be reading more from this author in the future. In fact I have Fire and Ice on the shelf so I won’t have to go buy anything. 🙂 4.5 out of 5

Happy Reading and have a great week!