Tag: Sean Kennedy

What I’ve Been Reading

Posted September 14, 2009 by Tracy in Features | 16 Comments

Greetings and Salutations!

How the heck are ya? All doing well I hope. It was a good week in Tracyland this week with the family. Everyone’s doing well. Well, I’ve got a horrid cold/sinus thing and sound like a teen going through puberty, but other than that we’re all good! 🙂

I read quite a bit this week so I’ll just get to it. 🙂

I started the week off with Viking Heat by Sandra Hill. I read this one for The Book Binge so I’ll let you know when my review posts if you’ you’d like to check it out.
Btw – TBB is having an awesome book giveaway so if you haven’t checked it out go now! 🙂

Next was a short by J.A. Saare called A Kiss Before Dying. I saw this review on Anna’s Book Blog and got interested so I got it. It was about a blood who was in love with her vampire master and was basically willing to die just to have sex with him. It sounds weird but it actually pretty good. 3.75 out of 5

Next up was a novella by Crissy Smith called Pack Alpha. This is the first book in the Were Chronicles series and I have to say I really liked it. The story was about Marissa who comes from a pack family but can’t shift. She had issues with her last pack and has been pack-less for the past 10 years. Her sister is getting married so she goes to attend the ceremony. She meets Gage, the sexy pack alpha, and sparks fly. 4 out of 5

My Tracy’s TBR Challenge read for the week was Come Up and See Me Sometime by Lucy Monroe. This was a book about Alex who is an information specialist who is bent on seeing justice/revenge on the man he holds responsible for his father’s death. He falls for the man’s daughter and even though he originally plans on using her for his own nefarious purposes he ends up marrying her and trying to keep her out of it. Yeah, like that ever works. Although I had some issues with the heroine going from independent woman to doormat backt to independent woman I really liked the story. And of course I always like Lucy Monroe’s writing style. 3.75 out of 5

Wing and Tongue by K.Z. Snow was my next read. The novella followed Elrisa who is a web weaver (it’s fantasy) who has been selected to be the wife of a Dragon Caller. In order to become a wife she must meet with/have sex with 3 men. After that she selects the one that she felt closest to or the one she feels is the one that chose her. I’m not normally one who goes in for seeing the heroine of the book with different men but this was fantasy so I didn’t mind too much. Besides, I like Snow’s writing so that made it better. 🙂 3.5 out of 5

The rest of the books are all m/m. I didn’t intend for it to be an m/m weekend but it ended up that way! I needed to read the yaoi and pass it on!

Kris from Kris ‘n’ Good Books told me I should get cracking on reading Sean Kennedy so I read Tigers and Devils. I really liked this book. The story (set in Australia) of a self-proclaimed “arty wanker”, Simon, and a footballer, Declan, who try to have not only a long-distance relationship but the trials of having one man out of the closet and one in. On top of that they had to deal with Declan’s celebrity status and all that entailed. It was a great book with lots of humor but also some very serious moments. I will definitely be reading more from Mr. Kennedy. 4.25 out of 5

Next was Make Me A Match vol. 1 an anthology by Dreamspinner Press of m/m stories. I really liked the whole book – especially the stories by Clare London and C hrissy Munder. 4 out of 5

Hanky Panky by Koreaki Kamuro was a yaoi manga. I didn’t love it but I didn’t hate it. This one had some stories that were a little hard to follow. 3 out of 5

Next was yaoi novel called Dark Walker by Hikaru Yura. This was a fantasy yaoi novel and I just couldn’t really get into it too much. I read fantasy but not that much but I just found this one too far out there for me. 2 out of 5

Last up was Gentle Cage by You Shizaki. Another yaoi novel that followed Itsuki who got into serious financial trouble and was saved by a businessman. Unfortunately he basically became his pet and wasn’t allowed to contact anyone for 8 years. Sent on an errand to Tokiwa’s house, Itsuki falls and breaks his ankle. He stays at Tokiwa’s house for 10 days and during that time his former friend takes care of him, but also takes his anger out on him sexually. It was an interesting read, that’s for sure. It took until almost the end of the book but I very much liked seeing Itsuki becoming his own man again and figuring out who he was and what he wanted to do with his life. 3.5 out of 5

Happy Reading!

16 Comments

Tagged: Crissy Smith, Dreamspinner Press, Hikaru Yura, J. A. Saare, K.Z. Snow, Koreaki Kamuro, Lucy Monroe, Sandra Hill, Sean Kennedy, What I Read Last Week, What I've Been Reading This Week, You Shizaki

What I’ve Been Reading This Week & Lots of Other Stuff

Posted April 6, 2009 by Tracy in Features | 19 Comments

Hello my fellow Book Sluts! Thanks to all of you who broke free from your chains and freely admitted to being one of us. I felt my heart swell with pride at the wonderful admissions. sigh That’s good stuff right there. Now, according to the poll on the blog Ad #2 won the contest. But when I tally from the comments it would have been #3 but apparently not everyone voted and since I have no idea who voted and who didn’t I’m going to have to go with the poll and take #2 for the win, Bob.

On to other things…CELTICPIXE was the winner of the Highland Warrior Book Giveaway a couple of weeks ago but I’ve not heard from her. When I click on her account it goes to Bebo which I don’t have so unless you contact me sweetie I’ll have to pick someone else. Sorry. You can email me at redneyrae AT ca DOT rr DOT com to send me your snail mail address.

Let’s see we took the girls to see Monsters vs. Aliens in 3D last night. What a cute movie. I laughed and laughed. Very funny. The kids loved it and the 3D was really good. Didn’t take over the movie at all – very subtle, which I liked.

I got new glasses this week. It’s amazing what a difference such a slight change in my prescription made. I only need to wear them for driving and distance stuff like movies or tv but it’s so nice to not be blurry at all…which is about where I was with the old ones. AND I got new frames! Here’s the old (left) and the new (right). My oldest daughter had to get glasses for reading too and she picked out the cutest frames but I’ve not been able to pin her down for a photo but as soon as I do I’ll post it.

My oldests State project was due this past Monday. She got an A+ on her display board but she forgot part of her speech (I’m not sure how since she had flash cards) so it was too short and she ended up with a C on that part of it. So she got a B on the whole project which is stil A-OK with me. The display board had to have specific items on it and there had to be 10 interesting facts about the state on the tower part of it. Here’s a picture of her board…she had Kentucky. Yes, we know that Bluegrass music doesn’t have a saxaphone but she needed filler! lol

I need to apologize to those of you whose blogs I’ve not been to in a while. I don’t think I’ve done a full blog crawl in 2 weeks – it’s horrible. However I work at a church and since Holy Week is upon us I’ve been hella busy..and will continue to be until Thursday. Thank heavens I have Friday off. I’ll need lots of R & R by that time. So again, if I haven’t been to your blog in a bit don’t take it personally…I’ll get there soon, I swear!

Ok – finally on to what I’ve read this week:

I started off the week with a bang. I read Crash Into Me by Jill Sorenson. I didn’t really get the romance part of it. I just wasn’t feeling it between the h/h…but the end was wonderful and of course the rest of the book was fab. I did have the villain picked out almost immediately but it certainly didn’t stop my enjoyment of the book. So in the end: Really good book. I loved it and will definitely be reading more of her work in the future.

Enticing Elliot was the next edition in the m/m Moon Pack series by Amber Kell that I started last week. Do you ever start series and wonder why you’re still reading it after a certain amount of books? That’s how I feel with this one. There incredibly short stories but they’re not fabulous, they’re entertaining though. That doesn’t seem to stop me from reading them. IDK…they are going in alphabetical order so maybe by the time I hit H I’ll be done. lol

My TBR challenge book for the week was Show and Tell by Jasmine Haynes. I picked this one up last Sept. when I went to RAW and it’s been on my shelf ever since. I recently read a review on The Book Binge that Casee did and decided to finally pick it up. It’s the story of Trinity who caught her hubby of 6 months in the shower with another woman. She couldn’t stand to be at home so she goes to a hotel for the night. She decides to pleasure herself and the guy next door is getting horny listening to her. He decides to knock on her door and ask to watch. She lets him and it begins a phone sex/sexual affair between the two of them. This was not a bad book but I kept having to talk myself into picking it up again. I wasn’t a fan of how the relationship was run or how it began. Yes there are other things happening in the book – Trinity’s personal growth, the problems she has at work (her 1st job at age 30) and Scott’s decisions about his job that he makes but it just still felt lacking to me. This had a ton of hot sex in it but it was just an ok book for me in the end.

I read The Secret Wedding by Jo Beverley for The Book Binge so I’ll let you know when the review is up.

I won The White Knight by Josh Lanyon this week on DIK so I read The Dark Horse first since TWK is a prequel/sequel to TDH. I really liked this book. There was a lot going on with the characters. Sean’s been stalked for the past year and Dan was put on detail to be his bodyguard. The stalker is supposedly now dead but he’s still “seeing” the villain and getting postcards from him. Is he going crazy? When the story begins Sean and Dan have only been together for 1 week and I found it terribly interesting to see the play between the 2 men and how they reacted to each other in such a stressful situation. I’ve just loved Josh’s writing in the past and this one proved no different. I can’t wait to read TWK.

Darkness Unknown by Alexis Morgan was my next read. I’ve read all the books in this series so far and I’m enjoying them. I’m thinking that it might have been my last book in the series though. As much as I like her writing there’s just not a lot changing and going on to pique my interest further. It was a very cute romance and it did have a new challenge involved but I don’t think it was enough for me. IDK I’ll have to see what the next one has to offer.

And last but not least a category that Barbara sent me -just cuz…isn’t she sweet? Thanks again Barbara! It was called Bound to Please by Hope Tarr and it was really cute. A young girl and boy meet at a fair one day when she’s 14 and he’s 12. He falls immediately for her and she’s pretty taken with him. They do a blood pledge that neither will marry another. Now it’s 10 years later and the girl, Brianna, is now Laird of her clan and the boy, Ewan, has been captured for crimes that his twin brother supposedly commited. But Briana just wants a baby by Ewan to end the blood feud..at least that’s what she’s telling herself. But when these two come together they realized that those innocent feeling they had 10 years earlier haven’t faded at all and were only growing stronger. I very much enjoyed the story (I had no idea that there were Blaze historicals – have I been living in a bubble? I thought they were all contemporaries) and will definitely be checking out some other books by this author.

That’s it for me for the week. If you feel like having a little fun hop over to Kris’s blog and help her write a short story. She’s given several elements to be included in a story. You pick the ones you like best and the ones with the most votes will then go to m/m author Sean Kennedy who will have two weeks to write a short story for her blog. Fun stuff Maynard.

Have a great week and Happy Reading!