• Book Database

    Magic in Manhattan (series) by Allie Therin

    Content Notes Warnings: Violence/Death, Child Abuse (off screen), Racism (minor) Medium-paced plot and slow-ish romance with fade-to-black sexytimes. HTBB Review Really enjoyed this book! Arthur is adorable, despite being a very rich, well-connected fellow who likes to boss people around because he’s a worrywart. Rory is also adorable, though in a scrappy kind of way. They’re both insecure (in different directions) and together they’re kind of a mess– but it’s cute. Sort of a slow burn because they don’t even kiss until more than halfway through; weirdly surprised about the fade-to-black sexytimes in a Harlequin book, but it didn’t ruin anything about the story for me. Also very much enjoyed…

  • Discussions & Chit-Chat

    On not being "a reader" anymore

    For the last four or five years– ever since I started graduate school and a full-time job– I’ve been finding it more difficult to focus on reading books. I start them, but don’t finish. I collect them, but they never move from the shelf. I borrow them from the library, but return them with spines still uncracked. Mostly, I don’t read like I used to (aka multiple books per week). There’s a couple reasons for this. Being tired from grad school + work is one reason, though really that’s only half a reason because I’m not in grade school any more. Being busy trying to start my own business is…

  • Book Reviews

    Any Old Diamonds by K.J. Charles

    K.J. Charles is one of my favorite authors, and I love basically every single one of her books– and this one is no exception. It’s very difficult to write a coherent review for a favorite author because all my positive feelings overwhelm my analytical thoughts until my brain is just a big ball of “yay, this book was good!” Well, it IS good and I DID love it, and if you haven’t read K.J. Charles yet, you desperately need to. Any Old Diamonds is about Alec, a son of a duke with a grudge against his father and step-mother. He’s desperately in need of money and revenge, and so he…

  • Book Reviews

    Spectered Isle by K.J. Charles

    Let’s speed past the fact that I’ve been on a 1.5 year hiatus from blogging and have fallen out of writing for fun or even reading and let’s get right to the review: This is the first in KJ Charles’ newest series Green Men; it’s a historical horror-fantasy romance set in interwar England, roughly connected to her book Simon Feximal. This first book is about a disgraced archaeologist (+1) and an upper-crust sarcastic fucker (+1), with a mysterious evil entity and malignant government forces providing much of the antagonism. I really like the fantasy setting, particularly as it incorporates the older, scarier British paranormal elements of a similar kind to…

  • Book Reviews

    The Only Option by Megan Derr

    What a sweet little book! I wasn’t sure what to expect with this book, partly because the cover and the series name makes it look like a much darker book than it actually is. It looks like it’s full of drama and depressing things and angst, but it’s almost completely the opposite. I mean, there’s still a little angst, but it’s the good kind, the delicious kind that makes the sweet goopy parts that much more fun. It also has many of my favorite story elements: grumpy dudes being pursued by rays of sunshine; dragons!; wizards!; accidental/forced marriage; road trips; and pining. So much pining! I’m a huge sucker for…

  • Book Reviews

    Skip Trace by Kelly Jensen and Jenn Burke

    This is the 3rd Chaos Station book! I haven’t reviewed the first two here, but I enjoyed them and obviously kept reading the series. The first book is a second-chance lovers romance, with scifi thriller stuff! There’s super soldiers, a government conspiracy, outer space shenanigans, aliens, secrets, and kissing. And the second book builds off various plot-related repercussions in the first book– thriller and romance both– while expanding on the relationship between the two leads, Zander and Felix. This third book, while continuing on the major plot points from the previous two books, ramps everything up by, like, ten. It does this great plot thing where terrible events happen that…

  • Book Reviews

    Bellingham Mysteries by Nicole Kimberling

    This is a mystery-romance series about a newspaper reporter and his artist boyfriend, and the constant shenanigans they get into while trying to solve crimes! The first book is very mystery-centric, which makes sense because the protag’s love interest is also technically a suspect. Sidenote: I super loved having a newspaper journalist as the detective, as it allows him to use his natural nosiness and writing capabilities to solve the mystery! Also, his love interest is an artist. Fun! Anyway, the first book was good, but the SECOND book was even better, despite being shorter and less mystery-y. It’s set in a winter artistic retreat. This time the mystery took…

  • Book Reviews

    Think of England by K.J. Charles

    Easing back into reviewing with a book that has been on my TBR since June of last year! At first I wasn’t sure of Archie’s hero-ness, as he has some historically-accurate feelings about Jewish people, effeminate men, and “queers” that didn’t mesh well with the romantic element and furthermore made me very uncomfortable. It also isn’t that usual for a romantic lead to feel disgust for his romantic interest, either. But over the course of the book things changed! His thinking was forced open by his interactions with his queer effeminate Jewish love interest, in a way which I found realistic-ish as Archie wasn’t a horrible person, just prejudiced and…