Speed-Reading Book Nerd Reviews

Well Traveled

By Jen DeLuca.

Previous book here. I say "previous book" but that was book 2. I could not finish book 3 in the series because I was very bored and there was like no conflict and once they were like, talking about guacamole recipes or something (?) I got bored and quit it. But I spontaneously read book 4 today and liked it better. Also book 2 and book 4 are pretty closely related since they follow the same band, the Dueling Kilts. 

Lulu Malone, Mitch's cousin, is a lawyer because her family is high-powered like that, and she's been doing her damndest to make partner. But once the clue bat drops on her head that only mediocre white men are gonna partner at this firm, she not only quits, but chucks her phone into the nearest washtub, because she happens to be at a Renaissance Faire at the time.

Lulu then spends the next few months hiding from life, with Mitch covering for her and she joins her friend Stacey in following around the Dueling Kilts, wearing costumes and selling turkey legs. She also gets into organizing the various appointments of the tarot/rune readers at the faire, which she gets into more than she expected to be. It's a nice break and I enjoyed Lulu's personal journey towards a more healthy mental attitude. I'll note that she goes back to a similar situation, but a better one.

The romance is with Dex, the player guy in the band that Stacey used to have a thing for. I thought this one was sexy--of course it was--but I dunno if I was as into the relationship. Like he enjoys hanging out with her daily, they like badonkadonking, but I don't know if I felt like they were MFEO or whatever.  In the end, the "traveling musician vs. I wanna stay home and get laid" issue is worked out with some nice part-time compromising that I'm not sure how plausible that is in Lulu's profession, but it sounded nice.

I'm giving this 3.5 stars. It was a bit more interesting than books 2 and 3, I'll say, and I enjoyed Lulu's journey, even if I didn't feel that strong at the love. 

The Spare Man

By Mary Robinette Kowal.

Excerpt here.

This is "The Thin Man IN SPACE," and that's all to the good.

Tesla Crane is an inventor/heiress/famous rich lady who was in a horrible accident several years ago that left her disabled, with a pain device in her back, and THE WORLD'S MOST ADORABLE SERVICE DOG EVER, a tiny white Westie named Gimlet that everyone loves. She's just gotten married to recently-retired private detective Shal Steward, and they're trying to have an anonymous space honeymoon to Mars, when guess what, here's a dead body, Shal finds it, and is immediately targeted as the murderer even though he literally didn't even know the woman. (In a space future where everyone is "Mx. Whatever" and pronouns are everywhere, I still note the brown guy is fingered for the crime. I started watching the new season of Schmigadoon! this week and the same thing happens to poor Dr. Josh when he finds a dead lady and is checking the body. Weird coincidence.)

Anyway, as Shal is literally getting beat up by the cruiser police, Tesla needs to lose her disguise (even if it means she's got to sign autographs), keep trying to get her Internet connections back and her lawyer on the space phone, fight against her bodily issues, and solve the crimes (more bodies pile up, and one appears to be missing) even if the space police have some issues with that. We get an interesting cast of characters, including a kid who recognizes Tesla from a competition and has a shady parent, the ship magician, some other famous/rich people, and cruiser staff ranging from nice to naughty. She also deploys her adorable dog in many helpful ways to both investigate and disarm people (and in one case, the one person who doesn't like her...watch it!), which is utterly charming. 

I would like to note that the lawyer on earth, Fantine, is a frantic crocheter while under stress AND THAT'S AMAZING AND I LOVE IT SO. She's delightfully scary and foul-mouthed and exactly who you'd want to defend you against wrongful murder charges. I admit it's kind of hard to comprehend exactly how their phone-calls-at-a-several-minutes-lag conversations must be going IRL, but I'm not sure how you'd handle that in a narrative either. 

Overall, I enjoyed this very much and it was a fun read. Should these two solve more mysteries, this would not surprise me. Four stars. 

Funny You Should Ask

By Elissa Sussman.

Chani Horowitz writes celebrity profiles, and we're told they're good ones. Ten years ago she wrote her most famous one, about spending time with Gabe Parker for a weekend. Gabe was cast as the first American James Bond, which surprised everyone since he usually plays good ol' boy/bohunks and is from Montana, and he's also best friends with the super urbane English Ollie, who everyone (including Gabe) thinks should have gotten the role instead. Gabe has been reading up on Chani's work, likes her blog, is happy to see she's broken up with "The Novelist" (her boyfriend Jeremy) because he wants to move to NYC and she does not, and he invites her to a premiere and to some parties, and they get near to sexin' but it never quite happens. To this day, Chani has never, ever heard the end of "So did you sleep with him or not!?!?" in her career. 

Ten years later, Chani's been booked to write another profile of Gabe. She went back to Jeremy, moved to NYC, and got divorced (which you'd figure, Jeremy sucks). Gabe eloped with his "just friends" Bond costar a few days after her profile came out, making Chani look like a complete ass, and since then he's become an alcoholic, gotten in an altercation with a director, got fired from Bond, got divorced and went to rehab. He's crashed, he's burned, and he's back making another movie (remaking "The Philadelphia Story" with Ollie) and they're opening a theater in Montana. Will they manage to make it work this time? What do you think?

It takes a good long while for us to finally find out what the heck went wrong with Chani and Gabe, why they married who they did, what happened the one time she went to see him in NYC, why Ollie didn't get the Bond job, etc., as the details are doled out on a stretched out basis throughout the book. It gets kind of weird after awhile when she foreshadows "oh yeah, I saw him ONCE and it didn't go well"-type stuff and you just want to be all, oh, come on, already! The author goes back and forth between their initial meeting and the current meeting and sometimes it's hard to keep track of it all. 

But other than that, the romance...mostly works? I don't super get why Gabe decided to spontaneously elope with his costar or what the hell their mutual feelings were towards each other (we don't really meet her other than Chani making one awkward phone call and clearly Jacinda knows Something Is Up at the time), but some things did play out better over time, such as the whole "who gets Bond" storyline. Ollie is an adorable sweetie and Gabe's family is mostly all pretty nice as well, even if his niece is in Teen Cranky Mode. Gabe is somewhat too good to be true in how he's SO appreciative of Chani--he's kept up with her blog/newsletter/writing over the years, basically waiting to ask her out again, notes that she keeps ordering books from his family's bookstore states away, etc. You do kind of wonder what he sees in a normal chick, BUT he's also really nice? It....works. And good for them, you think.

I do wonder if there's going to be a sequel to this, since there's a mention of his older sister and a younger actor on The Philadelphia Story being interested in her, but the guy reminds Gabe too much of his old partying days. I'd be curious to see it.

Overall, four stars. 

Mysteries of Thorn Manor

By Margaret Rogerson.

This is a novella sequel to Sorcery of Thorns.  It's kind of a sweet little story that happens in the happy-ever-after, in which some weird stuff starts happening at Thorn Manor--the place shuts them in, and the ghost(?) of Aunt Clothilde seems to object every time Nathaniel and Elizabeth kiss. They deduce that Aunt Clothilde/the house/um, whatever (see spoiler space) will be appeased if Nathaniel does some traditional courtship of Elizabeth, which they then do in adorable ways. It's all very sweet. The relationship between the couple is sweet, as is their relationship with Silas. Plus there's fun stuff like animated clothing and snappy grimoires that just need some love and a hidden ballroom. 

I admit I did seriously wonder if Elizabeth was also "in love" (not just "I love him" in general) with Silas, who also seems quite fond of her. I think they are more or less going to be a threesome of a family as is, but I did wonder if this had the potential to uh...go sexual and maybe they all have a threesome. There's a dance scene and a scene in which she finds Silas's artwork in particular that made me wonder. And Nathaniel is bi (or at least made out with a dude once).... Then I thought, "Silas raised Nathaniel, never mind THAT thought." 

Anyway, it's all very sweet and cute and charming and romantic. Four stars. 

Love and Other Words

By Christina Lauren.

I do not know what to make of this book.

Macy lost her mom at a young age and she and her dad lived in Berkeley during the week and had  this vacation home in Healdsburg, where she fell in perfect soulmate love with the neighbor kid next door, Elliot. However, it's been eleven years since they last saw each other, and by the time they meet again, Macy's gotten herself quickie-engaged to a guy named Sean who has a kid. The book alternates back and forth between Macy and Elliot's sweet, innocent teen love story and how they are whammy-back-into-each-other-again immediately in the current timeline. Like Elliot IMMEDIATELY breaks up with whoever the heck he was dating after running into Macy again because nobody compares to her. Smart move, Elliot, let's not drag that shit out.  Macy, on the other hand, has yet another Disposable Fiance (a trope I am truly, truly sick of) to eventually break up with. Sean lost his wife to drugs years ago and while he's blandly nice, both of them are clearly in Settle For Me, I won't be hurt if this breaks up mode. Yawn. Okay, fine, break up already. This is even more pain-free than the breakup in Sleepless in Seattle because of their mutual "well, you're a warm body, that's cool" meh. It kind of makes me feel bad for the kid, but the kid probably won't super care either?

I will not deny that the adorable teen romance of Macy and Elliot is super sweet. There's pages and pages of their understood love and their slow creeping up on sexual activity together and Elliot wanting to be with her forever.  However, you spend the entire book waiting around to find out what tore this perfect soulmate couple asunder. As a person who doesn't have a soulmate and never will, I just wanted to yell WHY DID YOU MESS THIS UP so many times. Like if you KNOW, why aren't you? What was SO BAD that it wrecked these two so much? I will note that it's pretty much the most typical reason ever that you can guess (I'll discuss in the spoiler section below the cut), while also being SO out of character for Elliot that I hated it. I know stories like this you have to have some good reason for the breakup, but frankly, I wish the breakup impetus had been something else. Anything else. 

It's also handled confusingly because while one girl is foreshadowed as being a possible issue between the two in their teen years, in modern times some entirely different ex girl from their interregnum is invited to Thanksgiving for...some reason, and even though Macy hasn't been in touch with Elliot in eleven years, somehow she knows to Red Flag this particular girl's name and have things Get Weird at the holiday over it. Like I started wondering, did the authors write down the wrong name at some point and nobody caught it in editing? And in the end, girl #2 doesn't even seem to be involved? I'm so confused. 

Like I said, the reason why they broke up isn't told until the very end of the book, and I wish (a) it had been something else and (b) had been revealed sooner because it felt way too long to drag out that depressing mystery and not explain. And finally, (c) SOMETHING COMPLETELY HORRIBLE AND WHAMMYING (note: it's not quite out of nowhere, but suffice it to say I'd forgotten about the other outstanding mystery of the book by the time it's told) finally happens in the past that just gutted me to have it revealed at that moment in time. I'll discuss this below the spoiler cut as well, but partnering two disasters together at once just ...oh god, it hurt. Again, I rather wish all of this had crept out sooner in the novel's plotline rather than smashing the reader in the face at the end. Sure, there's a happy ending, but I was so wrecked reading "oh dear god, THAT happened?!" that I found it hard to recover and be all "oh, everything's great now!" after that.

So...basically this is good except for the too-long dragout of why they broke up, and throwing the excruciating double whammy at the end as well, and the reason for the breakup also is blech. It came out problematic for me, I'm afraid. I have been trying to talk myself into giving it a higher review because the romance itself is sweet, but overall I don't think I can recommend it for the stuff that made it problematic for me. Two and a half stars. 

Just Another Love Song

By Kerry Winfrey.

This book feels like it was written to be sold and turned into a Hallmark Channel movie. I would not be surprised if Hallmark/Lifetime/Ion/whatever buys this one up. I pretty much expect it to be? It's the book version of a romance movie.

Sandy Macintosh and Hank Tillman were high school sweethearts who both wanted to leave their hometown of Baileyville. Unfortunately, Hank got a scholarship to Berklee, while Sandy's art school scholarship fell through and she was forced to stay at home and go to community college. After people made her feel guilty about being the hometown girlfriend, she dutifully/sadly broke up with Hank, who has since then become some kind of famous-ish musician. Sandy's got a gardening business, never did leave town, and has dutifully dated every guy in high school once apiece or so and nobody lives up to Hank. Unfortunately, the one time she went back to see him since the breakup, he'd gotten married. But now Hank's back in town with a son and a divorce and obviously, he's ready to get back into town life and back together with Sandy.

Overall, I was into this book at first, as the heat/steam/memories were pretty potent. And I liked the reasons why she liked him (he literally gave a kid the pants off his own butt, in public, and otherwise is sweet as pie). But they pretty much went back together easy-peasy-ish and there wasn't much in the way of plot to keep me interested because it's everyone hanging out at the town fair, etc. and having a good time getting back together. What are the obstacles here? Sandy's own angst about having not done her dreams like Hank and her best friend Honey have, feeling trapped in town (which is fine, but also...not fine), and a brief visit by the ex-wife claiming to be his wife again/wanting him back, which blows over in about a minute. It just felt...sweet, easy, but I was kinda skimming after awhile and not totally hooked into it. Probably just didn't have enough plot/drama for my preferences, I fear.

Three stars. Pleasant but I probably won't remember this one in the morning, sigh. I pretty much agree with this review as well.

The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy

By Megan Bannen.

This is a science fiction/fantasy version of You've Got Mail/The Shop Around The Corner/She Loves Me, only without the two being actual feuding coworkers (more like client and customer). I loved this, the only issue I had with it being that frankly, the worldbuilding going on here is a bit hard to explain. I cannot claim that I quite understood this old school alternate universe with old gods, new gods, and here's a magic world where we used to keep gods and now humans can get into it and get themselves in trouble thing. (This review does better at it.) I do note that gods can procreate and produce demigods with powers/possible immortality, which seems useful in certain professions. Anyway, people who head into the land of Tanria, if they get killed there, can get turned into drudges (basically zombies), and they're required to book a funeral package before they go.

This is how Tanrian Marshal Hart Ralston, cranky demigod still mourning the losses of his family/mentor/dog, runs into Mercy Birdsall, the undertaker-in-all-but-name at Birdsall and Son. (Unfortunately, the son turns out to get grossed out at bodies, secretly changed his major at college, and decides he wants to be a chef.) These two got off to a bad start and have been sniping at each other every time Hart has to drop off a body. Added bonus is when Hart gets assigned a new kid to mentor (with the name "Penrose Duckers," which never ceases to amuse me) and the new kid falls madly in love at first sight with Mercy's little brother. 

I note this world also has immortal animal beings who used to deliver mail to the gods and now deliver mail to humans. When Hart's feeling mopey AF again, he writes an anonymous letter to "A Friend" and posts it with no one to mail it to. But the nimkilim postal carrier who gets it decides to mail it by heart to Mercy, who reads it, is intrigued, and writes back. And seriously? Their letters? These are good. I've never been a fan of the generic "dear friend" letters I've heard in other properties  and rambling about pencils, but these two legitimately show personality and flair and hint at their lives without giving it too obviously away.  Those letters work and hooked me, thankyouverymuch. Both of them are secretly angsty AF and get this about each other.

However, their eventual meeting date goes pretty much the way it does in all the other stories (i.e. unrevealing to one party and poorly), but Hart and Mercy end up hitting it off on a more personal level (and it's hot). This leaves Hart feeling squeamish AF about revealing the truth (I'm not sure why? Why wouldn't she like you when she knows?). Meanwhile, the drudge population is going up, the rival chain business owner is trying to buy out the Birdsalls, and Hart's got a really weird personal mystery going on in Tanria regarding his powers and seeing a replica of his family home that was quite intriguing. 

The ending, well, that's where science fiction comes in, is what I'll say to that. I also appreciated that for once, the couple wasn't some kind of work rivals and that kind of plot didn't go on here. 

Overall, I was captivated by the characters, both main and side, and loved hanging out with them all. It made me want to write an anonymous letter to "A Friend" and see what that got me, but alas, without magical animal people about, that's probably doomed. The only thing that isn't great in this is my confusion on the whole gods/worldbuilding concept, but overall I guess I didn't super need that to be clear for me to get what the characters were dealing with.

Four and a half stars. 

With and Without You

By Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka.

This is a very thoughtful and interesting book. 

Siena and Patrick have been together for three years of high school. They are pretty much an ideal, perfect, happy couple...except for how Siena is having the teenage equivalent of the quarterlife crisis. Am I too involved with Patrick? Do I have my own identity or do I just do Model UN because Patrick does Model UN? Maybe I should break up with him and see what it's like to be Single Siena again, she thinks. So she plans to break up with him. However, this gets thrown awry when Patrick tells her that surprise, his family's moving a few states away for his senior year!

You'd think this would make Siena be all "Sweet, here's a good excuse to break up!" but instead, she finds herself in a bit of a panic and committing to an LDR. Which....actually kind of works for her on some level in the relationship? Absence is making the heart grow fonder (and hornier), and theoretically this gives her some breathing space to quit Model UN and find her own thing...whatever that may be. (I loved her thing, btw.) Patrick obviously misses home and Siena, but is managing to find new things and people where he lives too.

I rather liked that these two didn't break up....well, I have to vaguely spoiler this one but you might have guessed it given the title: for most of the book, they stick it out despite whatever weird feelings one or both of them may be having. These two are thoughtful and caring towards each other, even if finding where they are different and not just PatrickandSiena has some weirdness to them. They seem pretty well adult for 17-18-year-olds and even if there's some pre-quarterlife-crisis-angst going on, they find their way through, and I really appreciated that. I don't think we see too many romances where the couple have been together enough to feel "stale" and then realize they still do want each other, but the authors make it work.

Four stars. 

The Roughest Draft

By Emily Wibberly and Austin Siegemund-Broka.

Pretty simple plot here: Katrina and Nathan met at a writers event, hit it off, decided to partner together on book writing. Their first two books were hits, and they were attracted to each other. But Nathan was engaged before they met, got married, and they never ah, quite got together. The partnership split up. Katrina has had writer's block for 4 years and got engaged to their agent, sleazy Chris. Nathan got divorced and wrote a solo book that nobody likes. Four years later, their publisher and sleazy Chris force them to write the last book on their contract in the same house they wrote the last one in. The only other person around is their mutual friend Harriet, who got friend-dumped by the both of them after their partnership broke up and is reasonably annoyed about it  but willing to take them back.

It's a pretty insular and simple novel. But written well? And steamy, no less. These two clearly have some kind of soulmate connection here even if one of them is with someone else, and nobody else is going to live up to that. Chris in particular is heinous--we're told by Katrina that he had some really good moments early in the relationship, but the engagement is dragging on with no wedding set, Chris is bothered that Katrina has writer's block, and oh, he's totes kewl if she sleeps with Nathan as long as the book gets written. (Milking jealousy is A Thing for Chris.) What a sleazebag. At one point Katrina remarks that they've served the sentence for a crime they didn't commit (i.e. everyone assumes they slept together). 

I did enjoy how they wrote together--clearly their feelings for each other creep into their writings, literally so. And then there's the touching and things like that, which is hot. And when Katrina finally just spits it out in an interview as to why the partnership broke up--wow. Also, there's stuff like this: "I smile, recognizing my own descriptions plagiarized on my mouth. We know exactly how the other likes to be touched. We've read each kiss, studied every caress. The result is the feeling of a first kiss with someone you've kissed a hundred times." 

The one thing I didn't like is the back-and-forth-hedginess that goes on for a bit after they get back together--you just wanna be like "oh, come on, stop it and just go there already." But it all works out in the end. Four stars. 

 

Paladin's Strength

By T. Kingfisher.

Previous book in this world here.

Sister Clara is a lay nun* with the Order of St. Ursa. Her entire order was attacked and kidnapped. Sister Clara got sick and was left for dead, has since recovered, and been having an interesting time of things since.then. She ends up meeting Istvhan, one of the paladins from the previous book. He's on the lookout for the Smooth Men, the creepy clay/necromancy murder creatures on the loose in the last book. Clara's looking to rescue her friends, and Istvhan is totally willing to partner up and help her with this. Of course both issues come to light in the creepy town they're traveling to, where fighting pits are A Thing and the place sounds horrible in general.  

• I gather this translates into "didn't swear a vow of celibacy, is fine for her to get laid." Given that their religious order is based on a trait of birth rather than being super dedicated to religion, I suppose they might allow for people to do that under the circumstances. Also, it's a romance novel and doesn't strike me as being one of those romance novels where you're seducing someone away from their religious order.

Istvhan and Clara hit it off right away, as both of them are amiable large people and don't get to be around others like that very much. Clara...oh hell, I'll just spoil it since it comes up pretty quickly in the book: she and her entire order are lady werebears, which is A Thing That Happens where she's from, and that's why her order got kidnapped to be forced into fighting pits. Clara has some issues with being rejected for her beariness, which Istvhan doesn't mind at all. Much like the previous book (I think it's A Thing) for the author, they have issues of "But I'm a bear!" "But she's a nun!" and whatnot to drag it out some, but once they start badonkadonking, they're quite happy about it. The sex scenes are quite hot. The snark is similar yet different to the last book and I enjoyed it mightily.

This one also goes into far greater (and somewhat gorier) details about the Smooth Men, specifically as to how they came to be. I think this one sounds resolved by the end of the book, but since there's a third book, I'm not totally sure about that? It's super creepy but well done, I suppose, explaining all that weirdness magically. 

Quotes:

• "I go screaming berserk at the drop of a hat. You turn into a bear. Honestly, I'm a little relieved that I'm not the strangest one in the room any more." -Istvhan
• "I was just thinking, first you were with Beartongue and now you're chasing after someone with an actual bear's--" "Look, I'm just saying you have a type. A weirdly specific type." -Galen
• "I have made love. I have had sex. I have bedded, rutted, fucked, and on one occasion, with enthusiastic consent and a great deal of oil, I have sodomized, but I have never, not once, canoodled." -Istvhan, who clearly Has Standards
• "If I had just thrown myself on his cock like a sensible woman, this would be an amusing anecdote that happened afterwards." -Clara
• "Now. Before I lose my nerve or we're drowned in salamanders or somebody shows up wanting a fight." -Clara, learning from her mistakes.
• "Well, that's a load of horseshit if I ever heard one," said Sister Sigrid, and slapped him upside the head....If the two of you get any more in love, I'll puke on the floor right here." (I like her. Too bad she's not in it much.) 
• "Dear god, he'd told her he loved her and she'd said, "That's very nice." How was she supposed to live with that?" 

Four stars.