CBR18 Book 32: "Bromantasy" by Máire Rocha

Page count: 352 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Thanks to G.B Putnam's Sons and NetGalley for this ARC. My opinions are my own. This book is out on May 26th. 

Juniper O'Reilly shares a house with his totally platonic best friend, Mo Elthorn, and they run a farm together. Juniper has a tendency to get into bar brawls, while Mo holds him back and takes him home afterwards. One memorable evening, however, Juniper gets into a fight with the wrong guy and incapacitates a henchman enough that he is forced to take said henchman's place on an epic quest (opting out means death). Mo is obviously not going to let his extremely platonic BFF go off on a monster-hunting quest by himself. Especially since Juniper has absolutely no idea how to survive in the wild, hates sleeping outside, away from his comfortable bed and cosy house, and wouldn't be able to light a campfire if his life depended on it.

The quest Juniper and Mo have to try to complete (because they'll be killed if they quit) is locating a dragon who has been terrorising the nearby villages. They are not the only ones looking for this wicked creature. Among their rivals are Bill Bronson, whom Juniper hates (I'm not sure it was ever specified why) and also the dashing Prince Edward. Juniper gets quite star-struck by the prince, but Mo is less impressed. 

When Juniper and Mo discover that at least one of the creatures flying about, setting fire to nearby forests and outbuildings, is just a child, things get even more complicated. Mo is not about to let anyone, royalty or not, hunt or hurt an innocent (if rather inadvertently destructive) creature, and he's determined to get the baby dragon to safety. Even if it means breaking the terms of their mandatory quest.

According to the blurb: "Bromantasy is a cozy, queer fantasy about the mortifying ordeal of being known by your totally platonic best friend and the epic quest that might force you to confront the truth."  Juniper and Mo spend most of the book totally pining and lusting for one another, while also very studiously not talking about said attraction, or the misunderstandings that have arisen in their relationship since Mo took off for a couple of months about ten years ago, leaving Juniper absolutely bereft. 

Juniper is truly terrible at trekking and camping, and also seems to have the common sense of a puppy that's been knocked over the head a bit too often. He has his utterly bull-headed dislike of Bill Bronson, but otherwise seems to be taken in by anyone, no matter how scheming they obviously are. He keeps wanting to do the right thing, and more often than not makes things worse instead. 

I didn't find this book particularly cosy, and the fact that Juniper has the POV throughout, a character I found exasperating at best and downright stupid at worst, did not help. I think it's supposed to be a literary romp; I cared very little for the plot, and the stakes never felt all that serious. 

There's a lot of hijinks throughout, and as previously mentioned, if Juniper can blunder in and make a situation worse than it was before, that's what's going to happen. By about 35% in, it became clear that this book was never going to be more than a 3-star read for me, and I debated whether I should DNF it or not. Instead, I skim-read the rest of the story, mainly to check if the plot gets any more engaging later on. 

This is probably a perfectly fun and entertaining book for some readers, but it just didn't work for me. 

Judging a book by its cover: Don't be fooled by the cat in the lower right corner of the cover. While there is a cat in the book, it stays behind on Mo and Juniper's farm when they go off questing. So it's not like it plays a prominent part in the story. The baby dragon needs to be instructed that cats are "friends, not food", though, which was pretty cute. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR18 Book 18: "Cherry Baby" by Rainbow Rowell

Page count: 416 pages

Rating: 3 stars, I think. It may be 3.5, but I'm not actually sure right now. 

Thank you to William Morrow and NetGalley for this ARC. My opinions are my own. This book is out on April 14th.

Cherry's husband, Tom, is in Los Angeles, working on turning his web comic-turned extremely successful graphic novel, Thursday, into a movie. His semi-autobiographical comic, which happens to have a caricatured version of Cherry in it, who is called Baby. Now that there are multiple trailers, even complete strangers recognise Cherry in all sorts of strange places. She is trying very hard not to pay any attention to all the publicity.

Very few people know that Tom has been away for the last year, and that Cherry asked him for a divorce. The rest of Cherry's family is all very religious and keeps telling her to forgive him and take him back. However, Cherry is bitter. Tom's off living the high life in Hollywood, while she's at home, in the house they bought together to possibly build a family in, taking care of the gigantic dog that Tom wanted and left Cherry with. One evening, when Cherry is out at a concert, she reconnects with an old friend from college, whom she had always had a crush on but never acted on, because he dated her best friend. Russ Sutton is still very handsome and seems utterly delighted to see Cherry again. While she was pretty solidly friend-zoned back in college, he now seems absolutely crazy about her. He also appears to never even have heard of Thursday. 

But suddenly, Tom is back from Los Angeles, ready to pack up his things and make the move permanent. Deciding how to split the contents of the house turns into a long, drawn-out process (after more than a decade together), and Cherry starts realising that she might not be ready to give up on her marriage, after all.

I was so incredibly excited when I was granted an ARC for this novel. Rainbow Rowell is one of my favourite authors. So many of her books have elements that feel like they were written for me, specifically - especially Attachments, Fangirl and Landline. I bought Slow Dance in hardback when I was in Vermont visiting my best friend last year, so I could read it on release day. So it's really difficult for me to write this review, because this is the first book of Rowell's where I'm not actually sure what I think, and how I should rate it. I read it in two days (because I thought it was coming out on April 7th, and I like to try to get my ARC reviews done around the release date of the book - turns out I was a week early) and I feel really conflicted, because while there were things I liked about it, there were also a lot of things that I disliked and/or that made me uncomfortable. 

Things I liked:

- Cherry's friendship with Stacia. 

- The way Rowell's writing always makes the characters feel complex and real. 

- Some of the family dynamics in Cherry's family. 

- Cherry's relationship with her boss.

- Most of Cherry's whimsical dress sense. 

Things I didn't like as much:

- Cherry's insistence on wearing heels, even when it was clear that it was causing her excruciating pain in her feet, legs and lower back. 

- The way Cherry acted towards Russ after one argument

- Cherry may be very good at her job, but she seems like quite an unpleasant person, overall. Most of her sisters also seem quite petty and mean. 

What I actively disliked:

- The massive focus on fatness throughout the book. The word "fat" is used 72 times in this novel, and most of it is to describe Cherry, but it's also made very clear that her mother and four of her sisters are also fat. Cherry and three of her sisters have a group chat, excluding the eldest, Hope, because she has been losing more than half of their body weight in the last year, and they're sure she's on Ozempic and just not telling them. They are REALLY mean about it, and seem to think it's some sort of personal betrayal of all of them that she has lost the weight (even though it seemed incredibly obvious to me that it was probably because of health reasons, and moreover, none of their d*mn business). The fact that it's also mentioned at one point that Cherry is a US size 18, which happens to be the size I am now (after several years of treatment with GLP-1 medication, also for health reasons), made it seem all the more pointed to me. With so many books of hers that felt like they were mirroring me and my life in some ways, this felt more like a personal attack, which is never a nice feeling, and certainly not something I was expecting from a Rowell book. 

Maybe I wasn't in the right headspace for this, maybe it's just that I was still processing my book hangover from This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me by Ilona Andrews (review to come when I catch up on my backlog), but this is my least favourite Rainbow Rowell novel so far, and the only one so far I don't think I actually want to spend money on while it's full price. I may get it if I find it for less than 3 dollars in an e-book sale, but unless I re-read this and discover I was completely wrong the first time around, I will not be wanting a physical copy of this book on my shelves. And that makes me really sad. 

Judging a book by its cover: The cover is simple and cheerful, and the cream, black and red, with a little bit of green makes it eye-catching. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR17 Book 61: "Reading Lolita in Tehran" by Azar Nafisi

Page count: 384 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Nowhere Book Bingo 25: A Bookish Memoir/biography

CBR17 Pie Chart: Education

CBR17 Bingo: Citizen (Nafisi lived and taught in Iran during increasingly more dictatorial strictures against its citizens)

Official summary:

Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a bold and inspired teacher named Azar Nafisi secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, fundamentalists seized hold of the universities, and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the girls in Azar Nafisi's living room risked removing their veils and immersed themselves in the worlds of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. In this extraordinary memoir, their stories become intertwined with the ones they are reading. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny and a celebration of the liberating power of literature.

I got this in an e-book sale during the summer of 2018, because it sounded interesting and like something I should own. It fit in a number of my reading challenges this year, so I decided to read it this summer. Unfortunately, while some of the stories Nafisi told about the increasing totalitarianism that was introduced in her country were really interesting, the actual literary analysis was rather boring, and even the historical events got a bit dry after a while.

This book is a mix between a biography, writing about Nafisi’s life in Iran as it became subject to an increasingly more authoritarian government. One of the reasons I had trouble sticking with it was that, sadly, the news cycle was so depressing and so much in the real world America was mirroring things I was reading about that it was distressing to read. With the world being the way it is at the moment, escapist reading is becoming more and more essential for my mental health. 

So I have to confess that while I didn't DNF this book, I also didn't manage to read all of it. I ended up skipping probably about half, reading the first few sections, then skipping to the last one, to see how everything ended. I also think it’s important to mention that while this book wasn’t really for me, it may be a better fit for someone else. It does feature a lot of literary analysis, though, mostly of books I have neither read nor have any interest in ever reading, so I should possibly have researched it more closely before I started it. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR17 Book 26: "The Gods Time Forgot" by Kelsie Sheridan Gonzales

Page count: 320 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for this ARC. My opinions are my own. 

Rua remembers nothing from before she woke up in a muddy hole in upstate New York. Her maid and everyone around her claims that she's Emma Harrington, missing for two days, but Rua while Rua may look just like her, she is certain there is nothing of Emma in her. Emma's wealthy parents are determined to try bury the scandal of Emma's behaviour, which isn't made easier when Rua in Emma's body behaves in ways a debutante from the 1870s most certainly shouldn't. 

Finn Somethingorother (cannot be bothered to go back to the book to find his actual surname), Lord of Donore, is in New York trying to secure lucrative business deals so he can secure his position in society, and use his wealth and privilege to support a hospital and an orphanage. One of the wealthy magnates would like him to marry his daughter, but at every social gathering, Finn can't take his eyes off the scandalous Emma Harrington, who insists he should call her Rua. He also can't understand why he seems like he knows her from somewhere. 

According to the publisher: "Irish mythology collides with Gilded Age New York in this sweeping debut enemies-to-lovers historical romantasy, perfect for fans of Outlander and A Fate Inked in Blood." I'm a sucker for creative use of mythology in a story, I read far too few books set during the Gilded Age, despite loving historical romances, and I tend to really enjoy a good enemies to lovers plot.

Sadly, I should have remembered that most of the time, publishers have an extremely creative interpretation of what the book they're selling actually contains. Is there Irish mythology in this? Yes, and I thought it was rather creatively used, and wish there had been more of it. We also get an insight into New York in the 1870s, but it mostly involves very snooty and controlling mothers with lofty social ambitions for their offspring. Occasionally Rua wanders around unaccompanied in an inappropriately informal outfit, and gets herself into more trouble as Emma Harrington is more deeply embroiled in scandal. 

Is this enemies to lovers? Not even close. This is former lovers possibly trapped in the bodies of other people and trying to remember how they fit together and what the heck has happened to bring them to where they are now. The romance is probably the least interesting plot of this book, and once the whole convoluted mess of who Rua and Finn really are to one another and how they came to be in New York at this time is explained, the book is pretty much over, and there isn't really any time for the reader to see how their romance is likely to work out now that they know the truth.

There are absolutely elements that work, but as a whole, this book is unsatisfying and leaves you wanting a more fleshed out story with more complex characters and character dynamics. 

Judging a book by its cover: There are a lot of interesting elements incorporated in this cover (the knot work arch, the clock face in the background, the ravens, Rua's beautiful dress. However, I really don't like the way the artist has drawn the people, especially Finn, who looks more like a sinister villain than a romantic hero. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR17 Book 14 : "Two Friends in Marriage" by Jackie Lau

Page count: 233 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Disclaimer! This was an ARC sent to me by the author. My opinions are my own. 

During the Covid pandemic, it becomes very obvious to both Evan Mok and his friend Jane Yin how lonely they both are and how much they wish they had someone to share their lives with. They agree that if they are both still single after Jane's thirty-third birthday, they will get married and buy a house together. By the time Jane's birthday has passed, neither of them is in a romantic relationship, and both have pretty much given up on finding long-term happiness with anyone. So sticking to their pact seems like a good idea.

They pretend that they have been dating for a while, to avoid awkward questions from Evan's family. Jane doesn't really expect any questions from her side of the family. Her mother died of cancer when she was little (by turning thirty-three, Jane has now lived longer than her mother ever did), and once her father remarried, he seemed to entirely lose interest in Jane and her life. He claims he's too busy to make it to the wedding and she doesn't have much of a connection to her stepmother or younger half-siblings. So one of the benefits to Jane in marrying Evan is that she will actually have in-laws who seem to care. 

Once they find a house they like, their quiet life together seems to be going very well. Of course, it wouldn't be a proper marriage of convenience story if the two didn't start catching feelings for one another. Evan is bisexual and Jane is one of the friends he's known the longest. He never felt any attraction towards her before they got married and moved in together, but now he keeps having to fight feelings he's sure his quiet wife can't return. Jane, for her part, is asexual and has been happily celibate for nearly a decade. So she's even more surprised when she starts having pants feelings for her husband. Both are worried that they are going to hurt/upset/freak out their significant other by confessing these feelings - oh noes!

I don't think I've read a single Jackie Lau book that I didn't at least in parts enjoy, but some of her books are absolutely less to my taste than others. This is the third book in the Weddings with the Moks series (only one sibling left to pair up, now) and it's fine, but nothing more. While I like Evan's parents (this is now the third book where they have appeared), I didn't really connect with Evan or Jane, and as a result, I didn't really care what happened to them. There was nothing really drawing me into the story, and if this hadn't been an ARC that I felt a responsibility to finish and review, I possibly would have DNF'd it. 

It probably doesn't help that a couple of weeks before reading this, I read another "marriage pact" romance that worked for me on every single level, and which I had trouble putting down. In a Rush by Kate Canterbary had characters I adored, a great supporting cast, and a storyline that engaged me and kept me wanting to spend more time with them. Evan and Jane are both very aware that they're not very exciting people, and that seems to come across in the writing. Obviously, perfectly ordinary people deserve romance and their happy endings too, I just needed something more from this book to keep me entertained. 

I'm still looking forward to the final book in the series, hopefully Mok brother number 4's romance will be more to my tastes.

CBR17 Book 5: "Stargate - en julefortelling" (Brightly Shining) by Ingvild H. Rishøi

Page count: 144 pages

Audiobook length: 2 hrs 38 mins

Rating: 3 stars

Nowhere Book Bingo 25: Local author (the story takes place about 15 minutes from where I work)

It is impossible for me to review this book without spoiling parts of it, so if you don't want to know how it ends, and why I can't rate this book higher, skip the paragraphs I've highlighted. 

Ten-year-old Ronja and her sixteen-year-old sister Melissa are used to disappointments, living alone with a father who only occasionally sobers up long enough to hold down a job for a month or two. They're used to pretending they've forgotten their food at home and taking care of themselves. Close to Christmas, it looks like this year, their luck may change when their dad gets a job selling Christmas trees. Sadly, it doesn't take long before he returns to the local pubs and Melissa takes the job instead (at much less pay, of course). Since Ronja ends up spending her afternoons near her sister, she's soon recruited to look pitiful and round up customers for Christmas wreaths and decorative pine branches, for an added share of the profits. While the owner of the stand seems ok with turning a blind eye to Melissa's being barely old enough to work, he's not going to risk his business by outright using child labour, so every time he comes around for an inspection, Ronja has to make herself scarce.

SPOILERS START HERE:

Ingvild H. Rishøi wrote this Christmas novella back in 2021, and while it sold well, it didn't become an instant sell-out until it was translated into English. After singer Dua Lipa raved about it in her Instagram stories and said she'd be buying it as a Christmas present for several loved ones, and then Oprah Winfrey included it among her best books of 2024. Since the Norwegian press wrote enthusiastically about this (as they do about any Norwegian thing that becomes popular internationally), suddenly bookshops all over Norway kept selling out their copies, and the book needed to be reprinted more than once. Having now listened to the audiobook, narrated by the author herself, I can see why it's become very popular. I was mentally bracing myself for the book because I have a hard time reading about alcoholic parents (my own father having been one until I was ten - now he hasn't drunk a drop for 35 years), and if I'd been paying attention more closely, the multiple mentions of H.C. Andersen's The Little Match Girl throughout should have given me an idea of what to expect. I read for escapism, and to feel good, and am in no way a fan of books with sad and tear-jerking endings. I keep seeing the plot of this book described as poignant and heart-warming, and I don't see what's heart-warming about dead kids. 

Yes, it's lovely when for a brief while, the girls appear to be making enough money to possibly have a proper Christmas (even though Melissa has to work something like 10 hours a day, pretty much every second she's not in school). It's nice that their elderly neighbour comes to support Ronja during her school's Christmas concert and pretends to be her grandfather so the mean girls can't snipe at her. But just before Christmas, everything starts going horribly wrong. Their almost constantly drunk dad has dragged his drinking buddies home with him, Ronja is badly sick with a fever, the supportive neighbour is away, and the owner of the Christmas tree stand has discovered that Melissa and the other employee have been making money on the side, so fires them without paying them a dime. The writer doesn't straight-out say that the girls die while curled up under a Christmas tree in a massive winter storm, but them waking up in a magical forest just a short, idyllic walk from the cabin they've kept dreaming about throughout the story certainly seems like some "reunited with grandmother" bullshit while the little Match Girl freezes to death on a Danish street corner.

SPOILERS END HERE

I'm very glad that something from Norway that isn't dark and grisly crime fiction is becoming a publishing success and wish the author nothing but good luck, but this story was not for me. They've apparently turned it into a movie, being released at the end of October this year (just in time for people to be depressed while going to the cinema too), so I have no doubt the book will keep selling. 

Judging a book by its cover: The cover of the edition my co-worker lent me was just a plain red book with title and author name in gold, accompanied by a Christmas tree topped by a star. The English version seems to feature a snow-covered tree in a winter landscape, which doesn't exactly convey the tone of the story. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

CBR16 Book 22: "Chilling Effect" by Valerie Valdes

Page count: 464 pages

Rating: 3 stars

From the official plot summary:

Captain Eva Innocente and the crew of La Sirena Negra cruise the galaxy delivering small cargo for even smaller profits. When her sister Mari is kidnapped by The Fridge, a shadowy syndicate that holds people hostage in cryostasis, Eva must undergo a series of unpleasant, dangerous missions to pay the ransom.But Eva may lose her mind before she can raise the money. 

The tagline for this book is "Kidnappers. Alien Emperors. Psychic cats. And she's out of coffee." Two of these things apply to the plot of this book, but only one of them is really central to the story. Like my book club's choice for January, Before the Coffee Gets Cold, this is a book that falsely promises cats and doesn't deliver. Eva also never seems to run out of coffee, so why this was even added is a mystery to me. 

This book was pretty much a hot mess. It's the author's debut novel, which I guess might explain the uneven story structure and the exhaustive amount of plot twists a bit. One of the main plotlines is indeed that Captain Innocente's sister has been kidnapped, which means she has to go on a variety of mini-quests in the first third of the book. Several of my book club members mentioned that this book may have started as Mass Effect fan fiction because so many of the elements are similar. The many many early side quests certainly feel like something out of a game. Unlike in Before the Coffee Gets Cold, there were at least cats in this book. A load of them, although only one seems to feature prominently. Sadly, however, these cats barely appear after the first chapter. There is also an intergalactic alien emperor who inexplicably gets obsessed with Captain Innocente, and stalks her across much of the universe, determined to capture her and add her to her harem (they literally meet for a brief moment in a bar - it's genuinely baffling what his obsession is based on). 

The many side quests do allow the author to show a lot of different alien locations, and it feels very realistic that not everything is uniform and samey in space. There are also many different kinds of aliens, not everyone is humanoid. Although it did make it harder to picture certain individuals (what the heck are palps?)

While I don't regret the time I spent reading the book, there are a lot of things that annoyed me. The story is very slow to start and the story structure is very uneven. Every time you think you know what's going on, the story suddenly takes a drastic turn, and it seems like the author has tried to cram three different books' worth of plot into one book. There's the kidnapping and attempted rescue plot, the subplot of the obsessive emperor stalking her and wreaking destruction wherever he shows up. Then things massively change and she has to find her missing ship and scattered crew, and when it feels like the main story has come to a natural end, they suddenly have to go off and recover alien artefacts. 

There also isn't really any characterisation for any character except Eva and Vakar (and even his came late enough in the book that I'm not sure it counts). It's fun with a crew of varied individuals, but since we found out very little about them, I didn't care all that much about what happened to them. Additionally, I'm all for flawed characters, but Eva was a trainwreck (and not in a fun way) and should have confided in her crew way before she did. I genuinely didn't see why anyone liked her, and she was so reluctant to trust anyone that I have no idea why her crew felt any friendship or loyalty towards her. , I didn't really care what happened to her either, and that's pretty bad when she's the main character.

On the other hand, it certainly wasn't predictable - jumping around and switching directions so many times. Since I've never played Mass Effect, I didn't get annoyed by all the blatant video game references. The general consensus in my book club is that the book was ok, but nothing great. No one really seemed very inclined to read the sequels, and the one member who had read them said that the writing style didn't get all that much better and the structure of the sequels continued to be a bit all over the place. 

Judging a book by its cover: OK, I'll give the cover designer points for the portal, which does in fact play an important part in the final part of the novel. Cute cats are also a plus, even though they sadly don't feature all that much in the plot. I like the blue and violet shades, it's an attractive cover, but having now finished the book, it doesn't really fit with the story we get inside. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Books 100-102: Three audiobooks narrated by Kate Reading

The Strange Case of the Alchemist's Daughter - Theodora Goss

Page count: 402 pages

Audio book length: 13hrs 38mins

Rating: 3 stars

Mary Jekyll finds herself orphaned and nearly destitute. Most of the servants have to be let go, and she's sold off most of what's valuable around the house. She hopes she can get some money by tracking down Edward Hyde, her father's infamous friend, but instead finds a young woman, Diana, who is apparently Hyde's daughter. The girl was raised by nuns, with monthly financial support from Mary's mother. Diana refuses to stay in the convent any longer, and mary has no choice but to bring the girl home with her. 

While trying to assist Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson in investigating the gruesome murders of several women on the streets of London, Mary and Diana meet and befriend a number of unusual young ladies, all the results of strange experimentation - Beatrice Rappachini, whose touch and breath is poisonous; Catherin Moreau, literally a cat-woman, and Justine Frankenstein (Doctor Frankenstein did in fact create a bride for Adam, she decided not to marry him). The young women are all the results of unscrupulous experimentation by immoral scientists, and now it seems like the recent murders are also connected to the secret society of these scientists. Mary, Diana and their new friends have to help Holmes and Watson bring true monsters to justice. 

If this story hadn't been narrated by Kate Reading, I don't actually think I would have stuck with it. There are a lot of cool concepts in this book, but the execution of the story just didn't work out for me. I think it just took too long for the various parts to come together and for the various backstories of the women to be explored. Once they got to the point where they created a found family of sorts and continued the work with Sherlock Holmes, I became more interested. So I might check out the sequel and hope that the story gets better in that.

Miss Moriarty, I Presume? - Sherry Thomas

Page count: 357 pages

Audio book length: 13 hrs

Rating: 4 stars

Listening to Ms Reading narrate a historical fantasy book set in Victorian times, featuring Sherlock Holmes, made me remember that I had two Lady Sherlock books to catch up on, and they would actually be entertaining. 

Charlotte Holmes is contracted by Moriarty himself to track down his daughter, who seems to have joined a cult in a remote village in Cornwall. Charlotte's sister Livia is trying to decipher a clue left by Moriarty's son, Mr. Marbleton, and Mrs Watson and Lord Ingram are just trying their best to assist Charlotte in whichever way she best requires it. 

I really like how Charlotte and Ash's relationship develops in this one. Much as I like Livia, I don't really care about her tragic romance with Mr. Marbleton. I also don't understand why these books are so preoccupied with Moriarty, who is a boring character, no matter which version of Sherlock Holmes one encounters (I very much liked what Elementary did with the character, but even there, Moriarty did not dominate the plot as much as here). I don't care about the character and his stupid machinations. He's also barely in any of the original Sherlock Holmes stories. I want Charlotte and her crew to deal with other mysteries and just move away from this tedious storyline. Sadly, based on the developments of this book, I doubt I'm going to get my wish any time soon.

A Tempest at Sea - Sherry Thomas

Page count: 353 pages

Audio book length: 13hrs 47mins

Rating: 4.5 stars

Charlotte is on a boat! Disguised as an outrageous old lady (for reasons that are obvious if you've read the previous book in the series, but I don't want to spoil that part). Mrs. Watson and Lord Ingram are also there, obviously. Charlotte and Ash are still bonking (yay!) For reasons of extreme plot contrivance, it seems like a large part of the people who have crossed paths with Charlotte in earlier books are also present on this voyage, including Livia and her mother; whatshisface who deflowered Charlotte and whose wife then made a massive scandal out of it; as well as the police detective who investigated the murder case involving Inspector Treadles. 

Surprising no one, there's a murder (during a terrible storm) and Charlotte cannot get directly involved. Lord Ingram has to act as stenographer for the police inspector who takes it upon himself to question everyone, to see if they can solve the murder before reaching land (where they have to let the passengers disembark, and the murderer will have a chance to escape). While there were quite a few early plot contrivances, I'm happy with it, because this book was a lot of fun, and the dreaded Moriarty was mostly entirely absent from the plot. I totally called the identity of plot moppet nr 2 relatively early on, but I'm sure lots of other people did too, this was clearly not supposed to be one of the central mysteries of the story. Charlotte had to solve a murder while having to remain in disguise and only gathering clues indirectly was really interesting. More like this, Ms. Thomas. Moriarty sucks. Fun, clever stories like this instead. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR15 Book 78: "My Fair Concubine" by Jeannie Lin

Page count: 288 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Fei Long is in desperate straits. His sister has been selected to be sent to a foreign court to secure an important political alliance through marriage but has instead eloped with her lover. Once Fei Long catches up to the runaway couple, he doesn't really have the heart to force his sister back home, so instead, he lets her and her new husband go. However, if he doesn't present a princess candidate to the imperial court, his family's reputation will be ruined.

So when he encounters Yan Ling, a beautiful serving girl at the tea house he rests after sending his sister off, he hatches a plan. Not many people have actually seen his sister in the last few years. If he manages to train Yan Ling enough in courtly manners and etiquette to pass for a young noblewoman, they can pretend she is his sister, and he won't have to worry about the wrath of the emperor.

Of course, they don't have a lot of time, and Yan Ling doesn't even know how to read and write, so a lot of work has to be done. To complicate matters further, it turns out that Fei Long's recently departed father had a massive gambling problem and has left the household with massive debts that are now Fei Long's responsibility to deal with. A high-ranking city official also wants to monitor the progress that Fei Long's "sister" is making, to make sure she is a suitable candidate to send off to secure the alliance.

Of course, despite their initial social standings and animosity, Fei Long and Yan Ling fall for one another, and both try bravely to resist the attraction, as their love is impossible, and they only have a few months together before Yan Ling needs to be sent off to a foreign country to marry someone else.

This is my second Jeannie Lin novel this year, and while it was fine, I didn't enjoy it as much as The Dragon and the Pearl. It's another of the novels that originally were published by Harlequin, and anyone looking for high spice should probably look elsewhere. This book is mostly pining. 

I really liked the bits with Yan Ling working to become delicate and sophisticated enough to pass for a noblewoman. The subplot with Fei Long dealing with his father's gambling debts and dealing with a mob boss and having to do a bunch of archery dragged the story out, however. Could have done with less of that. 

Judging a book by its cover: This cover feels pretty generic, except for the fact that it has Chinese people in historical costumes on it, rather than white people in period garb readers are probably more familiar with. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR15 Books 73-74: "The Archduke" and "Daindreth's Outlaw" by Elisabeth Wheatley

Total page count 339 pages

The Archduke: 4 stars

Daindreth's Outlaw: 3 stars

The Archduke is a short novella, that can be found free on Elisabeth Wheatley’s website. It tells the first few chapters of Daindreth’s Assassin from the point of view of Daindreth, from his first meeting with Amira, when she tries to kill him and ends up fighting the demon inside him, to the negotiations with her father to change the marriage contract. Since the entirety of the first novel is from Amira’s POV, I liked the idea of getting to see how Daindreth experienced the same events. It also gives the reader more insight into how much he suffers with the demon inside him tormenting him, and how much energy he has to expend to remain in control.

Daindreth’s Outlaw, the second book in the series starts pretty immediately after the end of Daindreth’s Assassin. Having spent most of her life without full autonomy, since a magic curse had her bound first to her father (who turned her into an assassin and commanded her to murder his enemies) and later to her betrothed, after the controlling curse was transferred with the signing of the marriage contract, Amira was finally able to break the enchantment. When Daindreth was in danger and nobly tried to sacrifice himself, he ordered Amira and his cousin Thadred (also bound to him with the same type of curse) to leave the palace and get as far away as they could. Amira was not going to let the man she had fallen in love with die and after a gruelling internal battle was able to return to the palace and rescue her man, leaving countless dead bodies in their wake.

Now the three of them are fleeing the capital as fast as they can, trying to escape the grasp of the power-hungry empress. They need to track down the small tribe of exiled sorceresses who created the curse that led Daindreth to being possessed by a demon. While everyone says the curse can’t be broken, Amira has just proven that there are possibilities, however implausible. They need to travel incognito, as the empress has sent out her ruthless assassins to find them. She needs Daindreth alive, but Amira and Thadred are expendable. 

The second book is absolutely more of a bridging book. The POV shifts between Daindreth and Amira, with the occasional chapter from Thadred, since he gets separated from the main group after a while. To keep the vast empire successful and safe from natural disasters and the like, the dowager empress, Daindreth’s mother made deals with demons. Amira rescued Daindreth before the next part of the demonic deal could be struck, and now the consequences are starting to show in terrible ways, like earthquakes, landslides, massive storms, and the like. 

Amira and Daindreth are growing closer, and Amira clearly wants their relationship to become more physical, yet Daindreth is still far too aware of the demon lurking inside his mind, watching and waiting. Daindreth doesn’t intend to share and wants to wait until his curse is broken to do anything more than the occasional kiss. 

If this had been the first book in the series, I doubt I would have kept going with the series. It’s clear that it’s setting up a lot for future books, and Thadred is clearly going on to have his own adventure, probably separate from Amira and Daindreth until I’m sure they are reunited at some later point. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR15 Books 70-71: "Daughter of the Pirate King" and "Daughter of the Siren Queen" by Tricia Levenseller

Total page count: 672 pages

Daughter of the Pirate King: 3 stars

Daughter of the Siren Queen: 4 stars

Alosa is a famous pirate captain in her own right, leading a crew of almost exclusively women. She also happens to be the only daughter of the Pirate King, who rules the seas with cruelty and intimidation tactics. Her father has one piece of a legendary treasure map, which will reveal the location of untold riches to the one who can locate and unite the missing pieces. Alosa needs to get herself taken prisoner by a rival pirate crew, so she can sneak around the ship at night and try to locate the missing piece for her father. 

Draxen, the pirate captain, and most of his crew are generally dismissive of Alosa, she’s only a woman after all. Only Riden, the captain’s younger brother and first mate, refuses to let his guard down around Alosa. He observes her closely and suspects that she’s hiding things (he’s not wrong), but none of the rest of the crew seem to heed his warnings. 

In Daughter of the Siren Queen, Alosa has succeeded in her mission, and her father, the Pirate King, seems pleased with her for a change. She’s located and united the three pieces of the legendary treasure map, and defeated not only Draxen, the pirate who held her prisoner in the first part of her quest, but Vordan, another rival pirate captain who held Alosa and Riden prisoner and tortured both of them. Riden is fully aware of Alosa’s siren abilities now (I would spoiler warn, but the title of the book is a pretty big clue as to the identity of her maternal parent), which seem to frighten him, yet he seems determined to serve her loyally as part of her crew. The handsome young pirate is proving both a help and a distraction. When Alosa seems in danger of being overwhelmed by her siren powers, merely a word or a touch from Riden can bring her back to herself. 

While unable to lie, because he was enthralled by Alosa’s siren powers, Vordan revealed certain facts about Alosa’s father. Taking Riden and a few trusted crew mates to snoop around the Pirate King’s quarters, she discovers that not only was Vordan right about her father hiding something that gave him an advantage against other pirates, but it’s also a much bigger secret than Alosa ever expected and she won’t be able to lie to herself about her father and his lifelong abuse of her, which according to him was only to make her the strongest and most fierce she could be. Alosa can no longer allow her father to be the first to reach the fabled treasure and sets off to beat him there, even if it might endanger her own life and that of her crew.

Daughter of the Pirate King is Tricia Levenseller’s debut novel, and it reads a bit like it. None of the characters feel that well developed and while there is promising world-building and some good chemistry between Alosa and Riden, Alosa is quite an unpleasant character early on, and clearly still very much conditioned by the harsh upbringing she’s had at her father’s hands. I was surprised at how dark some of the plot went for a YA novel, but it also made the story more entertaining. 

Daughter of the Siren Queen is a much stronger book and where Alosa really comes into her own as a character. After spending a lot of her life either trying to deny or fight not to be overpowered by her half-siren side, she learns to control it while working closely with Riden (because this is a YA novel and the young woman hasn’t really known much love or affection from anyone) it obviously takes her WAY too long to figure out why he’s the only person who seems to keep her connected with her human side. Some of the siren stuff Alosa can do is very cool and that aspect of the world-building I really enjoyed. 

Alosa’s pirate crew isn’t really a major part of the first book, since she spends a lot of time onboard Draxen’s ship, trying to find the piece of the treasure map. Her crew of swashbuckling women, the few men who are also accepted on the ship, not to mention the surprisingly non-annoying child onboard, were all fun characters and I gather that there’s a third book recently published, set in this world, focusing on two of the other crew members. I’m probably not going to rearrange my TBR to read it any time soon but will be open to buying it if I see it in an e-book sale in the future. 

Judging the books by their covers: The new covers for this series are SO much prettier than these (look them up), which are cartoony and rather simplistic and I'm really not excited about them. At least I only own the books in e-book format, so I don't actually see the covers very often. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR15 Book 41: "Never Been Kissed" by Timothy Janovsky

Page count: 334 pages

Rating: 3 stars

CBR15 Bingo: Hold Steady (Wren is in quite a rut at the start of the book)

Official book description:

Wren Roland has never been kissed, but he wants that movie-perfect ending more than anything. Feeling nostalgic on the eve of his birthday, he sends emails to all the boys he (ahem) loved before he came out. Morning brings the inevitable Oh God What Did I Do?, but he brushes that panic aside. Why stress about it? None of his could-have-beens are actually going to read the emails, much less respond. Right?

Enter Derick Haverford, Wren's #1 pre-coming-out-crush and his drive-in theater's new social media intern. Everyone claims he's coasting on cinematic good looks and his father's connections, but Wren has always known there's much more to Derick than meets the eye. Too bad he doesn't feel the same way about the infamous almost-kiss that once rocked Wren's world.

Whatever. Wren's no longer a closeted teenager; he can survive this. But as their hazy summer becomes consumed with a special project that may just save the struggling drive-in for good, Wren and Derick are drawn ever closer...and maybe, finally, Wren's dream of a perfect-kiss-before-the-credits is within reach.

A feel-good summer LGBTQIA+ New Adult RomCom, perfect for fans of Red White & Royal Blue, Boyfriend Material, and What If It's Us.

I feel quite bad for authors whose publishers keep trying to sell their books based on what's been popular and sold lots already. Now, I haven't read What If It's Us yet, so I can't speak for this one, but pretty much the ONLY similarity between this book and Red, White & Royal Blue or Boyfriend Material is that it features a romance between two men. I adore the aforementioned books, they are both five-star comfort re-reads for me. I'm sorry to say that this book is nowhere near as witty, heart-warming, or entertaining as those books. Had I read the wildly misleading publisher boast before I picked up this book? No, because I tend to ignore stuff like that (cause it's ALWAYS lies) - but if I had, I would have been even more disappointed. 

I'm making it sound like this book was awful, it was not. The fourth of our  Hot Fun in the Summertime Book Club selection for June, I finished this a few hours before the Zoom chat was about to start. I had never heard of the author or title before I picked up the book, but one of my favourite things about book clubs, both the Cannonball one, and my RL fantasy/sci-fi/speculative fiction book club is that I am challenged to read books I wouldn't necessarily choose myself, and I have frequently found myself really enjoying books I would otherwise probably never have picked up, and discovering new authors. For the Cannon Book Club in June, I really liked two of the books (the ones I read way before the selection was even made, Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute and Georgie, All Along). This, and our cozy mystery, Arsenic and Adobo, were both fine, but I'm not exactly feeling motivated to run out and seek out more books by the authors. 

Our protagonist, Wren, is a bit of a sadsack at the start of the book, honestly. He seems insecure and aimless, the only thing he cares about is the drive-in where he works during the summer.  He's been promoted to assistant manager but keeps letting his personal life distract him from his duties, and letting both his crush on Derick and his friendship with his room-mate cause problems for him, and his boss. Wren doesn't seem to know what he wants to do with his life, and until he gets very drunk one evening, he has never had the courage to confess his feelings for any of his crushes. Then he impulsively sends out the e-mails he once wrote to each of the people he fancied (so far, so very To All the Boys I've Loved Before, except Derrick Haverford sure ain't no Peter Kavinsky). Because it wouldn't be much of a book if it ended there, of course, the universe conspires to have Derrick working at the drive-in with Wren all summer.

I didn't really engage with either Wren or Derrick or care much about their romance. My favourite character was the cranky old lady whose cult movie Wren was obsessed with. Do I remember her name? Nope. Can I be bothered to look it up? Also nope. 

This book was fine, but in no way knocked my socks off, and now, months later, I remember very little of it. I don't rule out other Timothy Janovsky books in the future, though.

Judging a book by its cover: A lot of the cartoony covers are getting rather generic, and I think this one is especially non-descript. The cars make sense since the plot is centred around a drive-in. I just don't think I'd ever have picked this book up if it hadn't been selected for book club. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Book 40: "Arsenic and Adobo" by Mia P. Manansala

Page count: 336 pages

Rating: 3 stars

CBR15 Bingo: Edibles (this book features both a lot of food and quite a few drugs)

Lila Macapagal used to live in Chicago and dreamed of opening her own restaurant, but both her business and relationship failed miserably. She's back in her hometown, helping to run her tita (aunt) Rosie run the family restaurant, where they serve Philipino food. Unfortunately, Lila's ex-boyfriend is a food critic and seems determined to come back, again and again, to sample the food and write scathing things about the food and service. Only this time, he collapses at the table and has to be rushed to hospital, where he dies sometime later. Shortly after, the police are at the restaurant and while searching the premises, they also find a bag in Lila's locker containing a large amount of drugs. Now she's not only the main suspect in the murder of her ex-boyfriend but the police think she's a drug kingpin. 

Lila is determined to clear her name and with the help of her barista BFF, said bestie's lawyer brother, and the big network of aunties who seem to know everything about everyone in town, she begins to investigate. Her tita's restaurant will stay closed until her name is cleared, not to mention that Lila risks a long time in prison if she can't find the actual murderer.

The topic for this June's Cannon Book Club was Fun in the Summertime. Three romances and one cozy mystery were selected. This was the cozy mystery. I got it in an e-book sale in July 2022, so it seemed like a good choice to read since I'd already read two of the romances suggested earlier this year. Once upon a time, I used to read a lot of mysteries, cozy and otherwise, but now it seems like I only have the patience for historical mysteries with romantic subplots, featuring Victorian ladies. Sadly, this book didn't really tempt me into continuing the series (book 4 is out in October), as I found the book rather underwhelming, and comments from other members of the book club (who have read some of the sequels) suggest that the writing doesn't really improve. So this is probably my one and only Manansala book.

One of the problems with the book is that Lila, the protagonist, is rather insufferable, and she certainly seems terrible at investigating. She keeps ignoring clues and connections she discovers while investigating, and seems to finally find the culprit more through luck than anything else (I had figured out the guilty party at least three hints earlier, not that Lila seemed to notice any of them). She's completely oblivious to the wants and wishes of her loyal best friend (who wants her to stay in town and open an establishment together), and she's judgmental about her hometown (despite the fact that she didn't really hack it in Chicago either). She seems to love her aunt and her large extended family of "aunties" and cousins and kind of resent them. It's completely baffling to me that she attracts the romantic interest of not one, but two handsome and talented professional men. It doesn't help that I'm instantly wary of love triangles in mysteries, having stuck longer than I should have with Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series (just become a thruple already, or better yet, have Joe and Ranger settle down together and dump Stephanie entirely). 

The book's redeeming feature is its focus on Philipino food and culture, which I really didn't know much about. There's a very helpful glossary (with a pronunciation guide) at the front of the book. The book certainly made me curious about Philipino food (there's a lot of cooking) and the author has helpfully included recipes at the back of the book (not sure I can get ube in Norway, though). 

Judging a book by its cover: While the book was rather underwhelming, the cover is very cute. I like the bright colours and the presence of the tiny sausage dog (not that anyone working in food service would let a dog into the kitchen). 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Book 25: "Funny You Should Ask" by Elissa Sussman

Page count: 352 pages

Rating: 3 stars

#CBR15 Passport Challenge: Books I Already Own

15-word review: Chani reunites with actor Gabe, the man she wrote about ten years ago. Sparks fly.

Official book summary:

Then. Twentysomething writer Chani Horowitz is stuck. While her former MFA classmates are nabbing book deals, she's in the trenches writing puff pieces. Then she's hired to write a profile of movie star Gabe Parker. The Gabe Parker--her forever celebrity crush, the object of her fantasies, the background photo on her phone--who's also just been cast as the new James Bond. It's terrifying and thrilling all at once... yet if she can keep her cool and nail the piece, it could be a huge win. Gabe will get good press, and her career will skyrocket. But what comes next proves to be life-changing in ways Chani never saw coming, as the interview turns into a whirlwind weekend that has the tabloids buzzing.

Now. Ten years later, after a brutal divorce and a heavy dose of therapy, Chani is back in Los Angeles, laser-focused on one thing: her work. But she's still spent the better part of the last decade getting asked about her deeply personal Gabe Parker profile at every turn. No matter what new essay collection or viral editorial she's promoting, it always comes back to Gabe. So when his PR team requests that they reunite for a second interview, she wants to say no. She wants to pretend that she's forgotten about the time they spent together, years ago. But the truth is that those seventy-two hours are still crystal clear, etched in her memory. And so... he says yes.

Chani knows that facing Gabe again also means facing feelings she's tried so hard to push away. Alternating between their first meeting and their reunion a decade later, this deliciously irresistible novel will have you hanging on until the last word.

Ok, so first of all, this is not a "deliciously irresistible novel", it's a fairly forgettable run-of-the-mill contemporary romance. The only thing that makes it in any way different from a lot of books, is the dual timelines, where the past sections of the story are told in flashbacks, and even that isn't exactly unusual in the genre. Emily Henry has used it in two of her contemporary romances, for instance. This book is fine. Nothing is offensively bad, it's competently enough written, but it certainly didn't deserve to be on multiple 'Best of 2022' lists. That certainly gave me expectations for something more special than what I got.

Chani is not a particularly engaging heroine. She's insecure, and constantly questions her success as a writer. Based on the writing samples from her famous feature article and her blog (which are included in between the various chapters), I will admit that it seems unlikely that this woman got three different essay collections in the space of ten years. I also question whatever editor gave her the writing job that made her famous in the first place - why would you send a writer who hadn't ever seen a Bond movie to write about the new up-and-coming star who will be the next Bond? 

There's also the issue here that the romance is not very convincing to me. Chani spends three days with Gabe ten years ago, meets him a few times in the intervening years when her marriage is in trouble, before she's asked to write a follow-up article about him, and reluctantly agrees. She spends another three days with him or so, and then is apparently convinced that he is her one true love. I could maybe have believed how quickly Gabe persuades her that they are meant to be, if the two of them had had any kind of communication in the interim. If the interludes between chapters hadn't just been article and essay samples of Chani's work, but some letters, e-mails, or text messages exchanged between the two to show that they were actually getting to know one another better. 

I love a romance based on correspondence, there is something incredibly romantic to me about a person falling in love with someone else based on their letters - possibly because some of the most meaningful friendships in my life were strengthened by years of correspondence (yes, I'm old, I grew up in the years before mobile phones and the internet. We wrote actual multi-page letters to one another instead). But no, we are just told that Chani and Gabe have been thinking and pining about the other for the whole decade, making no attempt to contact the other. 

The book was a fairly fast and easy read, and the dual timelines made it a bit of a mystery what happened in the past that potentially caused a rift between them. Neither Gabe nor Chani were especially memorable characters. Now, three months after reading the book (yes, I'm super behind on my reviews), the character I remember best is Oliver Mathias, Gabe's best friend. He was charming and interesting and I would frankly have preferred to read a novel where he was the hero and eventually found his happily ever after.

I've heard that Elissa Sussman's follow-up to this is a bit of a disappointment to fans. Considering this didn't do much to stick in my mind, I doubt I'll be reading it. The book did make me want to watch The Philadelphia Story, though. So I guess there's that. 

Judging a Book by Its Cover: Not really fond of the combination of pepto-bismol pink and bright red on the cover, and the cartoony style of the cover art is less appealing to me than many contemporary romances. I guess it stands out on a shelf or on a bookstore display table, but in this case, the book actually could get judged by its cover. Bit disappointing all around. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Book 24: "A Sinister Revenge" by Deanna Raybourn

Page count: 320 pages

Rating: 3 stars

This is book 8 in the Veronica Speedwell series. It's not a good place to start. You want the first book, A Curious Beginning.

15-word review: Veronica tries to discover who wants to murder Stoker’s brother. Stoker is sadly mostly absent.

Official book summary:

Veronica's natural-historian beau, Stoker, has been away in Bavaria for months and their relationship is at an impasse. But when Veronica shows up before him with his brother, Tiberius, Lord Templeton-Vane, he is lured back home by an intriguing job offer: preparing an iguanodon for a very special dinner party.

Tiberius has received a cryptic message - along with the obituaries of two recently deceased members of his old group of friends, the Seven Sinners-that he too should get his affairs in order. Realizing he is in grave danger but not knowing why, he plans a reunion party for the remaining Sinners at his family estate to lure the killer out while Veronica and Stoker investigate.

As the guests arrive and settle in, the evening's events turn deadly. More clues come to light, leading Veronica, Stoker, and Tiberius to uncover a shared past among the Sinners that has led to the fatal present. But the truth might be far more sinister than what they were prepared for.

Good things: 

- We get an exciting new location, the Templeton-Vane's family estate.

- Stoker's brothers are always entertaining - we get both Tiberius and Merryweather in this one.

- Who doesn't love a dinosaur fossil?

Bad things:

- Stoker is mostly absent for the majority of the book. He's off restoring the model of the iguanodon and avoiding Veronica.

- The mystery of this one ended up being a bit preposterous.

- I found Veronica pretty insufferable in this one. 

While I have enjoyed a lot of the previous Veronica Speedwell mysteries in the past, this one felt underwhelming and it took me longer than usual to get through it. Veronica is a character who is frequently portrayed as somewhat self-centred and oblivious to those around her, and while I fully respect Ms. Raybourn's choice to let her heroine be flawed and dislikable, I'm not sure I want to keep reading the series unless Veronica, our main protagonist, goes through some changes. Stoker is by far my favourite character in these books and the choice to have him off-page for much of the mystery certainly didn't help things. 

I'm choosing to hope that this was just a weaker entry in the series, and will give the author at least one more chance, based on the many novels of hers I've enjoyed in the past. 

Judging a book by its cover: I'm really not sure why the little silhouette that's supposed to be Veronica is holding a butterfly net, as her main pastime of lepidoptery seems to have been entirely forgotten by now. I do, however, really like the various dinosaur bones and other fossils decorating the cover on this one. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Book 21: "He's Not My Boyfriend" by Jackie Lau

Page count: 180 pages

Rating: 3 stars

15-word review: Annoyed by family meddling, Iris tries to ignore her growing attraction to hot one-night-stand Alex

Iris Chin is happily single and doesn't ever want to enter into a long-term relationship, certainly not marriage. She can't understand why her mother and grandmother are so eager to set her up, both seem to have made very poor choices in their own marriages. One-night-stands feel much more uncomplicated to Iris, but once it turns out that one of her previous hook-ups, Alex Kwong, works on the construction site she's the head engineer for, and she'll keep running into him when on the job, things absolutely get more confusing for her.

Iris has also had to move in with her grandmother after her flat lease was finished, which brings with it several additional challenges. Obviously, saving money and having her grandmother cook for her is great, but she also has to contend with her grandmother's well-meaning meddling a lot more. 

This is one of Lau's earlier romances, and while it's not bad, as such, it doesn't have as much of the wit and sparkle that makes her more recent books stand out. This book was perfectly fine, but it didn't exactly blow my socks off, and now, a few months later, I'm struggling to remember the finer details of the plot. 

Judging a book by its cover: Just as I think Lau's general writing has improved with time, her covers featuring stock photo images have also definitely become better. This lavender colour-scheme is nice, but who cuddles in bed fully clothed, covered by a top-sheet?

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

CBR15 Book 11: "Not My Valentine" by Jackie Lau

Page count: 136 pages

Rating: 3 stars

This was an ARC from the author. My views are my own. 

Helen Tsang has sworn off love as a lost cause after her boyfriend dumped her last Valentine's Day and someone filmed it, making her a very involuntary viral sensation. However, as Valentine's Day is approaching once more, she feels like she is getting excessive sympathy and pity from friends, family, and even the staff of her regular bubble tea shop. She doesn't really want to field any more questions and decides to ask her friend Taylor to act as her fake boyfriend. They can "break up" a while after Valentine's Day, very amicably, so no one needs to remember the viral video anymore or think about Helen's love life in the future.

Of course, as is always the case with fake dating stories, it doesn't take long before Helen starts seeing Taylor in a new light. They've been friends for years, and Taylor was extremely supportive when she was so very publically dumped last year. For some reason, a lot of the romantic gestures which Helen claims to hate are rather adorable when Taylor does them. He sends her flowers, and pictures of heart-shaped cakes to tease her and doesn't at all mind posing for cutesy couples pictures for her Instagram feed. Of course, as Valentine's Day approaches once more, Helen starts wondering if she wants her fake relationship with her friend to become a real one. 

The grumpy-sunshine pairing is a relatively common trope in romance, as is the fake dating scenario. Helen and Taylor are a cute couple, and as always, in a Jackie Lau romance, there's a lot of descriptions of food and baking. Nevertheless, while this novella was a perfectly fine read, it never became anything special, and now, about a month after finishing the story (I'm once more behind on my reviews), I'm having trouble remembering much of the specifics at all.

This was OK, but there are much better Jackie Lau romances out there - including several fake dating stories. This won't be a waste of your time, but it's also unlikely to stick in your memory. 

Judging a book by its cover: While this is an illustrated cover, I appreciate that there are no cartoony people anywhere on it. Just a bunch of brightly-coloured baking supplies and a little phone. It doesn't hurt that I'm very partial to teal, which is the dominant cover colour.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

CBR15 Book 6: "The Duke Undone" by Joanna Lowell

Page count: 384 pages

Rating: 3 stars

Lucy Coover is on her way to her painting class at the Royal Academy one morning when she stumbles across a body in an alley. The man is completely naked, and she assumes he's been the victim of a crime. Then she realises he's breathing, so he seems to only be dead drunk. As a female art student, Lucy is fascinated by human anatomy but is also not allowed to ever attend life drawing classes at the Academy. She's late for class but also makes sure to get a good eyeful. This might be her only chance to ever study a naked man up close.

Several months later, Anthony Philby, the Duke of Weston is confronted in his office by a furious man pointing a gun at him. The man is convinced that the duke has had an affair with his wife, despite Anthony's vehement claims that he's never even heard of the woman. Because the angry man is a terrible shot, Anthony escapes with nothing but a nick on the arm, but shooting a duke is nevertheless a serious enough crime that he's able to pressure the man to show him his alleged proof, which certainly looks extremely damning. The mythological figure depicted in the painting, purchased by the man's wife, is clearly the duke of Weston's extremely naked form. Of course, Anthony has never posed nude for a painting and has no idea how this image could have been captured. The existence of the painting were it to come to light, would spell out inevitable scandal, something Anthony cannot afford.

Anthony's life has been plagued by controversy and scandal. He was originally the second son, and never meant to inherit the title.  However, after Anthony's brother died while sinking a stolen barge, accompanied by a young sex worker, after a very public drunken escapade, his father had no choice but to accept him as the new heir. Anthony's brother was known for his utterly unhinged and scandalous behaviour, he rebelled against all of their father's constraints and delighted in causing outrageous scenes and bringing negative attention to the family.  The children's mother was from Greece, extremely beautiful and extroverted, and exuberant. While Anthony was still a teenager, his father claimed their mother had grown promiscuous and hysterical and had her committed to an insane asylum, where she fell into a depression and committed suicide. Throughout his childhood and adolescence, Anthony ended up in fistfights defending his mother's honour. Additionally, while Anthony was stationed in India as a soldier, his younger sister Effie ran away with a circus performer and was promptly disowned by their father as a result. Now no one has heard from her in years.

All of these things mean that when the former duke died, he made sure to write several very unusual provisions into his will. While Anthony inherited the dukedom of Weston immediately after his father's death, all of the money and property associated with the title were tied up in a complicated trust, meant to control and curtail Anthony's behaviour. Unless Anthony lives a life of sobriety and moderation, avoiding even the merest hint of a scandal until his thirtieth birthday, he will not gain control of his money and estates and remain under the thumb of his father's friend and advisor, Mr Yardley, who seems more than happy to continue his guardianship. The nude painting and accusations of adultery would certainly count as scandalous and ruin any chances Anthony has of escaping his tyrannical father's control from beyond the grave. 

Anthony goes to the Royal Academy to track down the mysterious L. Coover and is surprised to find that the painter is a young lady. He's not sure how she could possibly have seen him naked, and therefore mistakenly thinks she moonlights as a prostitute when not taking painting classes. Lucy instead reveals that she found him dead drunk in an alley and promises that the painting he saw was the only one she ever made of him. Anthony demands that she give him all her notes and sketches, or he'll get her thrown out of the Academy. It seems as if the two might never have to meet again after that, only Lucy discovers that the area of Shoreditch where she and her seamstress aunt live is scheduled to be demolished shortly, and the only powerful man she knows is Anthony. She shows up at his London townhouse and demands that he use whatever influence he has to try to persuade the city officials in charge of the decision to change their minds. In return, Anthony asks her to search for his missing sister, Effie, who he's very worried about.

Of course, now that they're seeing each other regularly, there's bound to be an attraction between them. However, Lucy discovers that to rebel against his father's strict rules, Anthony takes every chance he gets to get drunk in secret, hiding it from his servants and Yardley. Lucy's father was an alcoholic and she remembers all too well how devastating his drunkenness was for her and her mother. She's never going to let herself fall for an alcoholic. There's also the fact that she's an orphan from Shoreditch, while he's the duke of Weston. A happy ending for them isn't exactly in the cards.

There is a lot to like about this book, but also quite a few things that took me out of the story. As I've seen pointed out in a lot of reviews, the provisions left in Anthony's father's will, where he wouldn't be able to touch any of the money from his inheritance or estates until he turned thirty, or even beyond if he was involved in any scandals, just isn't something that could ever have happened and the complications around this plot strand just keep getting more and more ridiculous as the story progresses. Obviously, ridiculous will demands are frequently a trope in historical romance, but this one takes things a bit too far. 

As the daughter of an alcoholic myself (my father stopped drinking when I was nine, and hasn't drunk a drop since, so it could have been a lot worse for me growing up) I have a really hard time sympathising with characters with severe substance abuse problems that they refuse to deal with. I found the A Star is Born remake with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper almost insufferable to watch because I could not for a second emphasise with Cooper's character, and Lady Gaga's character should have gotten far far away from him as soon as she could. Similarly here, I found Anthony's habitual drinking, seemingly a direct result of him trying to spite his already dead father, rather immature and not at all an attractive character trait in what was supposed to be a romance hero. I'm sure it was meant to make him more tragic, but this misfired for me.

The novel also takes a turn for the rather melodramatic in the final third or so of the novel. Lucy does in fact manage to track down Effie, Anthony's missing sister, eventually but the details of her whereabouts for the past several years and who put her there and why, as well as the motivations of the villain of the piece just made me roll my eyes. 

Lowell has a really good turn of phrase, and I liked her more unusual choice of heroine (and several of Lucy's friends at the Academy), but I doubt I will be re-visiting this book in the future, and I feel no particular need to read the next book in the series. 

Judging a book by its cover: The delicate flowers on the cover and the whimsical silhouettes, make this look like a much more frothy and light-hearted novel than it actually is. There's a lot of dark subject matter being discussed in this novel, and this cover might mislead a reader into thinking they're going to get an undemanding romp, rather than a hero with PTSD, substance abuse problems, and a truly sordid family history. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read