#CBR5 Book 111. "Wallbanger" by Alice Clayton

Page count: 320 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Caroline has many things to be happy about. She's got good friends, a devoted cat, a job she enjoys, a very nice Kitchen Aid mixer and a beautiful new San Francisco apartment. What is missing from her life, and has been missing for over six months, since a particularly disastrous date, is the big O. To make matters worse, the main flaw in her otherwise lovely apartment seems to be that the walls between her bedroom and that of the one next door, are very thin. And her neighbour has a very active, frequent and loud sex life with at least three different women (all of whom Caroline gives snarky nicknames). She keeps losing sleep, and one night, in a fit of frustration, pounds on the wallbanger's door (forgetting that she's clad only in a skimpy nightie) and demands he keep it down. Simon, as the wallbanger is actually called, answers the door wrapped only in a sheet, and seems very amused by the whole situation.

Caroline and Simon start out fairly antagonistic to one another, but when his two closest friends start going out with Caroline's two besties, they are naturally thrown together more often than not. They start out with a tentative truce, which turns into friendship, which eventually seems to blossom into something more. Will Clive the cat ever be united with his one true love, the woman who mieows through Caroline's walls intermittently?Will Caroline ever recover her lost O? Will Simon be able to give up his little harem of women and settle for just one woman?

This is a book that popped up in my recommendations on Amazon, and Goodreads, and which I completely discounted because of both the title and cover, which didn't really appeal to me at all. Only after reading rave reviews of it on a number of romance review sites that I follow and trust, did I decide to give it a chance, and I'm so glad that I did. It's a funny and frothy contemporary romance very much in the style of Jennifer Crusie at her best. The confident and very uncomplicated heroine who loves baking seemed taken straight out of one of her books. She's happy with her life, her friends and her job. I did get a little tired of just how much she obsessed about her missing O (really, this is a very central feature in the first third of the book), but in her position, I'd probably be pretty frantic, myself.

Simon is a great hero. He's not ashamed of his sex drive, or his multiple partners, all of whom are aware that he's not seeing them exclusively, and all of whom are vastly different women, in personality and body type. He travels the world in his job as a photographer, and clearly isn't happy with the idea of being tied down to one person or one place for too long. The secondary cast of friends and employers is also very well done, creating a very believable support network for both characters. The romance between Simon and Caroline isn't instantaneous, and even after they admit their attraction towards one another, without obstacles. It felt like a fairly realistic way for a relationship to develop, and I just wish that the climax, so to speak, of all the tension in their romance hadn't played out quite the way it did.

MINOR SPOILER!

I'm by no means I very obsessively clean person, but the mess the two make out of Caroline's kitchen, had me cringing and took me completely out of the book. I don't think smexy times and food should mix, and I certainly couldn't be passionately seduced if there was flour and honey and other sticky substances all over myself, my partner and my kitchen. *shudder*

SPOILER ENDED.

Caroline's somewhat long-winded whining about her missing O in the first part of the novel, and the somewhat messy romantic reconciliation of the couple aside, I really did enjoy this book immensely, and would recommend it to anyone who'd like a fun and quick read. It also made me want to learn to make zucchini bread (which Caroline bakes more than once) and re-visit Spain (where parts of the novel take place). None of those are bad things, though. Highly recommended, especially for Crusie fans.

#CBR5 Book 110. "Assassins in Love" by Kris DeLake

Page count: 352 pages
Rating: 3.5 stars

In an exciting sci-fi future, on an interstellar cruise ship, rogue assassin Rikki (I seriously can't remember her surname, it's not important) is trying to dump a body. While assassination is legal if you have a license and a contract, Rikki's not a member of the Assassin's Guild, and generally feels that she doesn't need anyone controlling her or regulating how she does things. A very attractive man helps her get rid of the body, and then escape the security guards on the ship. One thing leads to another, and the next morning, Rikki discovers that the hot guy, Misha, is the one who actually hired her to perform the hit - trying to observe her technique. He's the licensed assassin who's recently been blamed for most of her hits in the region, and he wants her to either join the Assassin's Guild and start observing the set guidelines, or he's planning to stop her.

This is just the first section of the book. Rikki uses underhanded methods to discover Misha's real identity, and flashes back to her childhood, when his mother, also a licensed assassin, killed Rikki's father. She becomes convinced that he's trying to kill her, as well, and drugs him so she can escape the cruise ship. He chases after her, still determined to make her join the Guild or stop being an assassin, and there's a plot to kill the head of the Assassin's Guild and various back and forth of now they trust each other, now they don't.

August 2013's theme for Vaginal Fantasy Hangout (the online book club run by Felicia Day and three of her friends) was space assassins. Having nearly burned myself out reading in July, I figured light-hearted romance was just the thing the doctor ordered. So despite my misgivings, having considered both the spectacularly awful cover (even in a genre which features a lot of bad cover art) and the dumb title, picked, I'm assuming from some sort of generic name generator. Kris DeLake is a pseudonym for Kristine Kathryn Rausch, who writes a lot of fantasy and sci fi. Goodreads also tells me that she writes straight romance under another pseudonym.

The book is not bad, but certainly not great either. Rikki and Misha spend a LOT of time in bed with each other for people who don't trust each other. There's also extremely little assassining (this is a totally valid verb that I just made up) being done, and quite a lot more exploring joint (if repressed, in Rikki's case) back story. Like the ladies on Vaginal Fantasy Hangout, I liked Misha as a character a lot more than Rikki, who just never really grew on me. He's probably the reason the book gets 3.5 stars rather than just 3. This is by no means the worst book I've read as a result of the book club, but certainly not the best either, and I don't think I'll be bothered with any more in the series.

#CBR5 Book 109. "Jellicoe Road" by Melina Marchetta

Page count: 437 pages
Rating: 5 stars

Taylor Markham is seventeen, and has lived at the boarding school by Jellicoe Road since she was abandoned by her mother when she was eleven. She's just reluctantly accepted the post as leader for her house (boarding school dorm - think Harry Potter), which means caring for the well-being of the younger girls in the house, as well as masterminding the territory war between the town kids, the boarding school kids and the group of cadets who camp near the town for a number of weeks each year.

Hannah, the only grown-up that Taylor is really close to, just disappears one day, leaving behind the house she's been slowly restoring over the years, and an unfinished manuscript, which tells the story of four teenagers who met on Jellicoe Road more than twenty years ago. No one wants to tell Taylor where she's gone. Then she discovers that the leader for this year's cadets is none other than Jonah Griggs, the boy who helped her run away years ago, but who also betrayed her by getting them found. Hannah's disappearance and Jonah's reappearance in Taylor's life sparks a series of events that will finally lead to her discovering why she was abandoned by her mother, what really happened to her father, and what may be in store for her in the future.

I'm not doing a very good job of summarising this book, which started out very confusing (you see everything from Taylor's rather surly POV, and you're just plunged immediately into the action of what seems like the story of a very confusing and intricate way of playing 'Capture the Flag'. Taylor doesn't come across as very likable, and I was a bit confused as to how she had any friends at all. Still, the book has garnered a slew of awards, and came very highly rated on a number of review sites that I trust, so I kept reading, which is good, because it was SO worth it. Trusting her readers' intelligence, and ability to pay attention, Marchetta portions out new information sparingly with each chapter, making you grasp more and more of the big picture, and changing your opinions about the characters involved as the story progresses.

Another thing that was initially confusing in the book is the sections about the four other characters, who at first seem to have nothing to do with Taylor at all, but which you come to realise are extracts from Hannah's manuscript. This isn't spoilery, by the way, it's revealed fairly early on in the book, and I figured mentioning it here may help other readers accept it as an important supplement to the main story. It does become apparent why we're being allowed to read along with Taylor, and just take my word that you'll miss out on important stuff if you skip the sections in cursive.

This book made me laugh, and cry, and desperately want to hug several of the characters. If I were a teenager still, I'd want Taylor to be one of my friends, and as an adult, I want to embrace her and help her resolve her many understandable and conflicting emotions, not to mention her trust issues, fear of letting anyone get close to her, and her fear of abandonment. Then there's Jonah, the mysterious and brooding boy from her past, who killed his own father. Suffice to say, neither Taylor nor Jonah have any reason to particularly trust or rely on adults, and the running away incident in their past means there is a deep well of tension between them when they meet again. While the chief focus of the plot is Taylor trying to discover where Hannah went, and what actually happened with her parents, there is also a strong romantic subplot, which for all that this is a YA novel, took my breath away.

I've been putting this review off, trying desperately to get across why EVERYONE should read this book, and what a wonderful reading experience it turned out to be. Once I got through the first rather confusing chapters (which are still excellently written, just very sparing on helpful exposition), I was completely engrossed and I resented having to put the book down for things like sleep and doing my job. I read during the breaks between lessons, and every chance I got. I love this book, I quite possibly love every single significant character in it. I'll be very surprised if this book doesn't end up in my top 3 of the year.

#CBR5 Book 108. "Messy" by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan

Page count: 368 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Green-haired alterna-girl Max MacCormack only goes to Colby Randall, a posh Hollywood prep school, because her mother is the principal. She's full of scorn for the rich and spoiled around her, and especially loathes that her mother forces her to take part in extra curricular events like planning the spring carnival. Max needs to earn money, and her current after school job is not working out as well as she expected. When she is offered insane amounts of money to ghost write Brooke Berlin's blog, she can't afford to refuse. Now she just has to spend most of her free time with a girl she can't stand, and convincingly channel her on the internet.

Brooke Berlin, Hollywood starlet and daughter of mega superstar Brick Berlin (think Arnie, Bruce Willis and Tom Cruise rolled into one) is convinced that she's one step away from the stardom she deserves. A popular blog showing the world what an "It Girl" she is, will help launch her rising star, she just doesn't have time to write it herself. So why not hire some creative writing nerd who will be grateful for any time she gets to spend with Brooke? Unfortunately, the only serious applicant to her ad is the spiky malcontent Max, Brooke's half sister's best friend. Can this girl be trusted to help jump start Brooke's career?

Brooke and Max are forced to agree to a truce, and before long, they're spending most of their time together, after Brooke's blog becomes a roaring success. Can the two wildly different girls learn to be friends? Even when there's a cute boy in the middle?

Messy is the second novel from Go Fug Yourself goddesses Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan. It's a sequel of sorts to Spoiled, where Brooke discovers that her father has a second daughter, whose mother has just died, when the girl (Max' best friend) comes to live with them in Hollywood. While Brooke was more of the antagonist in that book, here she gets to be one of the protagonists, and a very fun one at that.

The authors have admitted that when they were writing Spoiled, their model for Max was Mac from Veronica Mars. Max copes admirably with the fact that she is seen as somewhat of a freak at Colby Randall, and that her best (and pretty much only) friend is dating her brother, but her main worry is the terrible case of writer's block she suffers; not useful when she needs to write an admissions essay for a creative writing class in New York. That class is also the reason she needs to earn money. Unlike most of her classmates, Max' parents are not loaded. In fact, Max' father is unemployed, and the entire family are managing on her mother's salary. So when Brooke offers Max a ridiculous paycheck to ghost write her blog, Max forces herself to accept.

Naturally, as the two very different girls spend more time together, they start discovering that they may have more things in common than they expected. They even start approaching something close to a friendship, at least until a cute boy enters the mix. Max has been infatuated with the school quarterback for years and is so used to pining for him, that she refuses to accept her obvious  mutual attraction to Brady (real name Taylor!) Swift. Brady/Taylor is Brooke's co-star in the new edgy Nancy Drew movie (where Nancy grows up in a slum, trying to read Les Miserables by candlelight, and her father's a drug dealer - I would pay good money to see this film!).

Brooke doesn't really like Brady (he's shorter than her and quite geeky, after all) but she knows all about how romances between co-stars can help publicise a film. Max keeps insisting that she doesn't really like Brady as anything but a friend, and when Brooke really puts the moves on a boy, he's pretty powerless to resist. Normally such a love triangle can feel contrived, but as the main focus in Messy isn't the romance angle - which girl will Brady choose in the end, but rather, will Brooke and Max realise that despite their differences, they've actually become really good friends? Brady is just the device to put some tension between them, which they have to work through to come out better friends in the end.

I liked Spoiled, but it didn't amuse me as much as Messy, which had me cackling with laughter several times while reading it. The authors, as anyone who reads Go Fug Yourself will know, have a wonderful snarky wit, and their observations on celebrity culture, both real and made up for this fictional universe, are wonderful. There are so many digs at movie stars, and reality shows, and celebrity culture, and at the same time, they manage to make both Brooke and Max so very likable. If you want a light-hearted, amusing read, you could do a LOT worse than picking up this book.

#CBR5 Book 107. "Blade Song" by J.C. Daniels

Page count: 174 pages
Rating: 2.5 stars

Kit Colbana is a mercenary, who will work as a thief, investigator or even hired killer, if the pay is good. She's a half-breed (her mother's family are some sort of Amazon-like species who can turn invisible at will, and summon their favourite weapon to them by just thinking hard), rejected by her relatives. She keeps having vivid dreams where the local vampire bigwig invades, and tries to sway her to work for him/most likely become his new chew toy, and she's generally not doing super great. Then the dangerously mentally unstable Alpha of the local Cat shifters hires her to locate her missing nephew. Along for the ride until she finds the boy, is the Alpha's sexy lieutenant, who will stay with her 24-7. If Kit succeeds, she'll be paid handsomely. If she fails, she will die.

While investigating, Kit discovers a whole slew of other missing teens. Humans, other shifters, witches. Witnesses remember a van, so it's quite clear that someone is kidnapping them. For what purpose?

J.C. Daniels is a pseudonym for the romance/paranormal author Shiloh Walker. She writes so prolifically that she has to publish books under multiple names. I saw Blade Song highly recommended on a number of review pages I follow, and figured it would be a good late summer read, especially when I was a bit burned out after all my Cannonballing. It turned out to be mostly annoying. While readers on my blog know that I read a LOT of paranormals, this one just didn't grab me. I didn't really care much about Kit as a character, despite her unusual (at least in paranormal fantasy) background and lousy family relations. Her relatives certainly made sure her life was hell growing up, but I need to actually emotionally engage with a character to be affected by these things.

Then there was Damon, the love interest. SPOILER! He starts out by choking her so hard she has visible bruises, even with her advanced healing abilities, and her voice is affected because he squeezed her windpipe so hard. He's full of remorse later, blah blah blah, needed to make his alpha believe he didn't like Kit, she's his chosen mate, all that crap. I don't care if he's the hottest thing since lava and very conflicted because his alpha is a grade A beyotch, I can't really believe in any sort of romantic development between characters with this brand of twisted "meet cute". Just doesn't do it for me. Certainly not when it progresses as quickly as it did in this book. Maybe if it had been months or even a year down the line, and Damon did a whole bunch of things to atone for the fact that he nearly KILLED Kit - but that's not the case.

There's banter, romantic tension, investigations, witches, vampires, shapeshifters, advanced skills with various weapons. I finished the book mainly to see when it got so exciting that these other internet bloggers squeed excitedly about it and recommended it to all and sundry. I do appreciate that Daniels/Walker has some touches you don't usually see in paranormals, it's always nice with variation in a genre that can get a bit samey. Even with my theory that you nowadays have to read at least two or three paranormals in a series to really get an idea if it's something worth spending your time on, I can't invest in this series. The Colbana Files will not be added to my future reading list, one book was enough.

#CBR5 Book 106. "The Chocolate Touch" by Laura Florand

Page count: 320 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Dominique Richard worked in an abattoir in his early teens, but is now one of the chief chocolatiers in Paris. His chocolate, like his reputation, is darker and his flavour combinations are much more unorthodox and edgier than those of his rivals. Yet for all that Dominique is known for his volatile temper, his employees all adore him, and treat him more like an older brother than a boss. They all want him to find lasting happiness, not just indulge in meaningless one night stands.

Jaime Corey is recovering from a terrible ordeal. She used to travel the world, trying to develop sustainable farming and fair trade practices among the suppliers to her family's chocolate empire. Now she's a mere shadow of herself, slowly recuperating in Paris, resenting the cloying concern of family. Every day, she spends some time at Dominique Richard's shop, watching him from afar, never dreaming that he's taking just as much notice of her. Why would the darkly charming and brilliant creative genius have a scarred little nobody like her, when sophisticated Paris ladies keep throwing themselves at him?

Laura Florand really has found a formula that works for her. The naturally romantic setting of Paris, gourmet chocolate, and large, temperamental, arrogant men who are also deeply emotionally vulnerable, and just need the right woman to bring them happiness. The woman in this book is Jaime Corey, younger sister of Cade, the heroine of The Chocolate Thief (I still miss the brightly coloured and cartoony covers of the first two books). The Corey sisters are heirs to the massive Corey Chocolate fortune (read Hershey) and the arrogant chocolatiers of Paris, with their gourmet creations, scorn their mass produced candy bars.

Dominique has no idea that the waif he's fallen so deeply for is a Corey, however, because Jaime doesn't reveal her surname. In her experience, guys are a lot more interested in the family fortune than they are in her. For all that Jaime has travelled the world, doing good deeds, she has massive self esteem issues, especially after being physically and emotionally scarred while on the job. She's always compared herself unfavourably to her older sister, and doesn't really believe that she can measure up toe the same standards.

Dominique, for all that he is tall, dark and brilliant, has huge emotional issues. His mother was an alcoholic, who left him and his violent father when Dominique was a young teen. Dominique worked in an abattoir until he was 19, and then managed to apprentice to a top chef and turn himself into the man he is now. He has terrible anger issues, and worries that he will turn abusive, like his Dad. He has massive abandonment issues, and because he dropped out of school when his home life became too complicated, believes himself to be a coarse, uneducated brute, not really fit for anything but short term, meaningless sexual encounters.

Jaime and Dominque are both so very messed up, and in previous Florand book, it's tended to be one or the other who needs "saving". Jaime believes she's not worth loving, and Dominique is convinced anyone he gets really close to, will leave him. The two have to save each other. For anyone who's read Florand's other books (and you should, they're delightful), there are appearances from most of the major characters in both The Chocolate Thief and The Chocolate Kiss. This book works perfectly well as a stand alone, though, as do all of her romances.

#CBR5 Book 105. "Magic Rises" by Ilona Andrews

Page count: 320 pages
Rating: 4 stars

This is book 6 in a series. It's therefore not the best place to start reading, and I can guarantee that the review will contain spoilers for at least some of the other books that have come before. If you haven't read these books, run, don't walk to a bookstore or a library, and get started.

When several of the Pack's children threaten to turn Loup, and may have to be killed, mercenary bad-ass Kate Daniels and her mate Curran, the Beast Lord of the Pack realize that they need to get their hands on more panacea, a herbal concoction that ensures the survival of most of the young shapeshifters. It's obvious to both of them that the invitation they have received from a couple of European packs is a big ol' trap, but they're offered so much of the precious panacea (which they have absolutely no way of making themselves), that they simply cannot afford to refuse. So Kate and Curran ally with someone they normally wouldn't trust, gather up a band of their best fighters, and set off to Eastern Europe on an adventure.

Once they get there, they quickly discover that it was indeed a trap, but one of a completely different nature than expected (I may have cheered at this revelation). The Pack are far away from home, and the task they've been set, to guard a pregnant shapeshifter princess until she gives birth, is not an easy one. The biggest danger may be to Kate and Curran's relationship, however.

This is the road trip book, the one where the authors take the characters out of their established comfort zone (even if that is a zone frequently fraught with incredible danger, and near death experiences) and move them somewhere, with new and exciting challenges and threats to their lives and safety. During the journey, the Pack encounter pirates, and I may have been rather vocal in my appreciation of the type of shapeshifter they turn out to be. I love how creative this author team is with their world building.

Then they arrive in Eastern Europe, with rivalling shapeshifter clans, to do a job that seems nearly impossible to complete without sparking some sort of turf war. Kate, who's still getting used to not isolating herself and trusting no one, experiences jealousy for the first time, and starts questioning Curran's devotion to her, especially as she's dismissed by all the European shifters as the Beast Lord's human plaything. Why wouldn't he want a powerful shifter girl instead? I must admit, invested as I was in Kate and Curran's relationship and happiness, I was extremely unhappy with this part of the book, and I wanted to punch Curran in his pretty face for what he was doing to Kate. Of course it turns out to be a lot more complex than Kate knows, and Curran has very good reasons for what he's doing, but even after I found out what was going on, I was not happy with him. There is a great explanation for why both Kate and Curran acted the way they do on Ilona Andrews' blog, where the authors answer FAQ about the recent book - don't read it until AFTER you've finished the book, there are spoilers!

Because of the jealousy drama, this doesn't quite get included among my favourite Kate Daniels books, but it's a wonderful read. I laughed, I cheered, I cursed and bit my knuckles in suspenseful scenes. Reading an Ilona Andrews book tends to be quite an emotional rollercoaster, and while they always end on a happy note, there are very real dangers in each book, and casualties along the way. Don't be sure everyone's going to make it out unscarred, or even alive. I'm so glad this book got Ilona and Gordon to the top of the NYT Bestseller list, they deserve it.