Showing posts with label review. Show all posts
Showing posts with label review. Show all posts
Friday, August 4, 2017
Can't Hardly Breathe Review
Monday, October 12, 2015
VIRTUAL TOUR: STRANDED WITH MY STEPBROTHER - MADISON COLLINS + EXCERPT + REVIEW + GIVEAWAY!!
Enter to Win a Gifted Ebook Copy of
STRANDED WITH MY STEPBROTHER
STRANDED WITH MY STEPBROTHER
Madison Collins
Self Published
On the way to our parents wedding in the mountains, the mother of all snow storms attacks, leaving me stranded in a remote cabin with my new stepbrother.
My hot as hell, I-need-to-change-my-panties because-they’re-soaked, cocky asshole of a stepbrother, Bentley McAllister.
The kicker of it all?
The only items he's packed are liquor and condoms, and he’s looking at me like he wants to put both to good use.
My name is Sierra, and my libido can only take so much.
Send help!
a Rafflecopter giveaway
My hot as hell, I-need-to-change-my-panties because-they’re-soaked, cocky asshole of a stepbrother, Bentley McAllister.
The kicker of it all?
The only items he's packed are liquor and condoms, and he’s looking at me like he wants to put both to good use.
My name is Sierra, and my libido can only take so much.
Send help!
BUY NOW
“Listen,
princess.” I lift her chin toward mine, meeting this gorgeous big blue eyes. “I’m not sure if you noticed, but we’re
stranded together in the middle of fucking nowhere, with only each other to
count on. You can fight me all you want,
but there’s one thing you need to understand.
I’m going to protect you. I’m
going to take care of you. And in case
you haven’t noticed, I’m six-foot-four, and probably have a hundred pounds on
you. My body is going to produce a lot
more heat than yours. Now calm the fuck
down, and let me get you warm. Got it,
sweetheart?” Her fighting stops
immediately.
She
nods, coyly, blinking those baby blues at me, all of her fight
disappearing. “Got it.” Her voice is
small, and I suddenly feel like a dick.
“Good.
Glad we’re on the same page.” I tug her body closer so we’re pressed tightly
together, and I hold her to my chest, wrapping her in my arms. A contented
little sigh escapes her lips. The top of her head doesn’t even reach my chin. She
packs a lot of sass for such a small thing.
I inhale, and breathe in the scent of her shampoo. The smell of vanilla
and lavender fill my nose. Damn, who
knew that combination could be so perfect?
It’s intoxicating and I can feel my body slowly start to react to the
smell and the images my mind starts to produce.
The way her slight curves mold to my body serves to warm me up pretty
damn quick.
***Disclaimer: I received this book via Tasty Book Tours in exchange for an honest review. Any thoughts and opinions are my own.***
Stranded with My Stepbrother is a quick novella about Sierra and her soon-to-be stepbrother, Bentley. This subject is a little on the taboo side but not too much since they weren't raised as brother and sister and aren't even related by marriage yet at the beginning of the story.
I liked both of the characters, and they were well-written, but I feel like there were some things missing to their story. Sierra has a lot of anger towards Bentley at the beginning of the story but it is very unclear as to why she is so angry with him. I feel like there maybe should have been a little bit more of a backstory.
The chemistry between the two of them is palpable and sexy. The actual sex scenes were steamy and I loved their first time being written from the male POV. It gave things a different perspective and is not something that is very common in stories like this.
I give this book a solid 3 stars. I would like to give more but I think Ms. Collins needs to have the book read through again by her editor, there were quite a few typos which can sometimes make it hard to read. I also would have liked to have seen a little bit more of a backstory or some kind of other character development in order to connect with the characters a little better. Overall though, it was enjoyable and incredibly sexy!
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Madison Collins is
the author of romantic short stories such as Caged, Stranded with My
Stepbrother and the upcoming Monster Prick. She enjoys the occasional stiff
cocktail, and watching romantic comedies. Most days you can find her curled up
with a good book. She currently resides in New Jersey.
Friday, October 9, 2015
GIVEAWAY TIME!!! YOU COULD BE HOME BY NOW - TRACY MANASTER + EXCERPT
In honor of the paperback release of Tracy Manaster's amazing book You Could Be Home By Now, the wonderful people at F+W Media have allowed me to give away TWO copies of this book!
You can read my review of You Could Be Home By Now here!
Excerpt:
Excerpted
from You
Could Be Home By Now Copyright © by Tracy Manaster and published by F+W
Media, Inc. Used by permission of the publisher. All rights reserved.
Down below, the runner veered off the path and ran
through the sprinkler. She stopped, resecured her ponytail, then made for a
prickly clump of succulents. She’d probably appreciate the Fixit. Everyone did
(well, everyone minus one). They were funny, yeah, but they were meant to help.
Look better, feel better, be better. It was as simple as that. Like Sierra
said: the most noble and magnanimous Headmistress Brecken should have given her
community service credit instead of summoning her parents. But no one would
listen that day in la Brecken’s office. Lily wasn’t picking on anyone. She
didn’t go around looking for Fixits. Girls sent in their own pictures.
And she was careful. She’d listened to the bajillion assemblies on Internet
predators. The policy was right there on her blog. She’d only consider photos
with the heads cropped off.
Another Visiting Grandchild, a little-kid version, had
appeared in the hot tub courtyard. They should exchange cards. He walked robot
style, knees locked. Between the goosesteps and his bowl cut he kind of looked
like a mini Hitler. He found a stick and brandished it at his reflection in the
sliding glass door. He poked it at something on the ground. He tapped it against
the hot tub.
Lily reached for her bag. She still had one airport
magazine left. Down in his courtyard, Der Führer stood on a picnic bench
and jumped.
Lily flipped through a couple of pages then tossed the
stupid thing. It skidded across the roof. Mom had given her a fat stack of
magazines when they’d said goodbye at airport security, like what was eating
Lily alive was a dearth of articles on how to perfect your cat-eye liner. The
beauty tips weren’t the point. Her blog could be about the mating cycles of
fruit bats. The point was, Lily had friends. Saintblonde lived all the way in
Tampa and wanted Lily’s opinion on what haircut to get. Fizzimiss was from
somewhere in Arizona and if Lily didn’t ping her to let her know that she was
nearby and eminently visit-worthy then she really would be as snotty and
shallow as all of a sudden everyone was convinced she was.
Dad had said they weren’t real people. He’d joked about
outgrowing imaginary friends.
No. The person who wasn’t a real person was her mystery
classmate, Anonymous Crybaby VonFragilekins.
This time, Der Führer climbed onto the table to
jump. He stuck the landing.
Lily hadn’t even had the chance to face her accuser.
Headmistress Brecken identified her as a classmate-whose-image-you-appropriated-without-her
-knowledge-or-consent.
A classmate-who-you-then-held-up-for-public-ridicule. As
I’m sure you’re aware, Miss Birnam, we expect better of our student citizens.
Lily hadn’t even known the girl went to Day.
She hadn’t been wearing her uniform or anything, and the
image arrived in her inbox pre-cropped.
Der Führer was
back on the picnic table. He made a running start.
Lily shifted, chin in her hands.
Three stupid paragraphs and boom. Goodbye, two years of
work. Auf wiedersehen, au revoir, and sayonara, international
following. Not to mention two weeks’ grounding and total technological
confiscation.
She wasn’t mean. Ever. She had a rule. Only criticize
what a girl can actually change.
And there’d been compliments in the Fixit in
question.
First things first, chickie-dee: can the lace collar and
the cutesy little cap sleeves. You’re not ten. Obviously. We can all see the
Boob Fairy thought you were a very good girl. If you weren’t wearing a blouse
like a first grader in the Thanksgiving pageant, everyone here would be dead of
envy.
Second, the Boob Fairy was generous but she forgot to
leave an instruction manual. Your bra strap is showing. Bonus points for purple
though. Is that satin? I wish more readers had your guts.
Third, I’m worried about your necklace. Points for taking
on that whole charm and bauble boho thing, but between you and me and the
Internet it looks a little bit Etsy.
Lily frowned and watched Der Führer jump again,
his thin arms flapping. He landed on the hot tub cover, but only barely.
He toppled off, stood, wiped his palms on his shorts, and climbed right
back up to try again. Talk about easily amused.
She took another swig of water.
Sierra said she was lucky. Anyone else would be suspended
for sure, but nothing’s going to stick to you for long. Nothing scares the
trustees like the prospect of a big fat lesbian lawsuit. Be all angel food cake
and they’ll let you up again in no time. That sounded a bit optimistic to Lily,
but she didn’t say so. Sierra probably felt guilty.
The Boob Fairy had been her invention. Lily’d balked
about posting it but Sierra said no, it was hilarious. She even drew a cartoon
Boob Fairy for Lily’s locker.
Down in the courtyard, Der Führer missed the hot
tub. He landed square on his butt. A shocked, solid breath escaped.
Lily stood and checked the back of her legs for color,
pressing a finger to the flesh of her calf. The white mark flared then faded.
It was a hundred and eighty degrees today and, in the absence of her iPhone,
terminally boring to lie out. She’d stay for ten more little Hitler jumps and
then head in. The kid positioned himself and ran. He cleared the space between
table and hot tub, landed, and let out a small cheer.
The ponytailed runner circled by once more.
Der Führer made
another headlong start. Another perfect landing, maybe half a foot beyond the
lip of the hot tub cover. She should start holding up cards, awarding points
out of ten.
Or not, bearing in mind what happened the last time she
made any kind of critique.
Der Führer scrambled
back into position. His feet pounded down the length of the table and he hurled
himself into the air. His landing was a bit off. He wobbled backward and then
overcorrected.
He staggered toward the tub’s center.
Then he was gone.
The hot tub cover collapsed in a brutal V.
Every hair on Lily’s body stood straight. “Hey, kid,” she
called down. Her hand went by instinct to her hip, but she didn’t have pants
and didn’t have a pocket and she didn’t have a goddamn phone. The day
went wonky. All the colors crisped. She’d taken the Red Cross babysitting
class. A little card in her wallet said she knew CPR, but all she could recall
was the dummy’s plastic lips, their red worn away in patches.
“Kid!” she called again.
She saw a small sneakered foot and pulsed with bright
relief.
Then the foot twitched and she worked out the physics. If
it was above water then the rest of him was under.
Her bones went hollow. She made it off the roof, and then
into her grandmother’s kitchen. There was no phone anywhere. She checked the
living room. The bedroom. The weird little desk alcove where she spied one
beneath a sheaf of papers. That kid. That poor kid. The time she had cost him.
She should have had her cell. The landline buttons sank in when she pushed
them, nine then one then one. The phone was blue, with a blue tangle of cord.
There was an impossible amount of wire involved in getting the signal out.
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
VIRTUAL TOUR: THE HEAT OF THE MOMENT - KATIE ROSE + REVIEW + EXCERPT + GIVEAWAY!!
Enter to Win a
Select Ebook Bundle from Loveswept
THE HEAT OF THE MOMENT
The Boys of Summer #3
Katie Rose
Releasing Sept 22nd, 2015
Loveswept
Physical therapist Jessica Hart has learned her lesson: Never date professional athletes. She’s been down that road, and barely recovered after the relationship crashed and burned. Then Jessica meets Gavin King. An All-Star slugger with chiseled good looks, Gavin was traded to the Sonics because he hurt his knee sliding into second, and now his future is in her hands. Gavin’s no bad boy—but he’s tempting enough to make Jessica think twice about all her rules.
Gavin is trying to find a comfortable routine. If he wants his old life back, he must take it easy, stay out of the limelight, and keep his distance from gorgeous redheaded physical therapists. The thing is, Gavin isn’t the kind of guy to sit on his ass and let other people pull his weight. And when he sees something he wants, he can’t help but fight for it, even if it means risking everything, even if it only lasts a single moment: like one kiss from Jessica.
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Amazon | B
& N | iTunes | Kobo
Review:
There are two things in this world that I love very much: baseball and a good romance. Combine those two and I'm in heaven! Seriously, I love sports romances so I was really excited about this story. And I can say that I was not disappointed!
Jessica has sworn off heart-breaking ball players. Gavin is trying to start over in a new place with a new team. Once he meets his new physical therapist, Jessica, his mission becomes wooing her and changing her mind about ball players. But Jessica tries as hard as she can to resist this sexy hunk of man in front of her.
I really liked Jessica's tenacity and her tomboyish-ness. As a girl in the sports world, you have to be able to be "one of the guys" when the situation calls for it and Jessica is very good at finding that balance between being "one of the guys" and being a girl. Her determination to resist Gavin just made me want them to get together even more because you can see how hard it is for her to resist him. And, come on, Jessica, the man is HOT, HOT, HOT!! :)
I liked Gavin's character and how he pursues Jessica but not to the point of being annoying or creepy. He even bought her flowers. Even if they did turn out to be a disaster. I also liked the vulnerability of his character. He went from being a star baller to the new guy on a different ball team in a different place without his arm-candy girlfriend. He's trying to crawl himself out of rock bottom and sometimes his fears of not getting back on top really shines through.
This was a really quick read for me because once I started it, I could not put it down. The chemistry between these two was on fire and I loved every second I got to spend getting to know these characters!
Excerpt:
Review:
There are two things in this world that I love very much: baseball and a good romance. Combine those two and I'm in heaven! Seriously, I love sports romances so I was really excited about this story. And I can say that I was not disappointed!
Jessica has sworn off heart-breaking ball players. Gavin is trying to start over in a new place with a new team. Once he meets his new physical therapist, Jessica, his mission becomes wooing her and changing her mind about ball players. But Jessica tries as hard as she can to resist this sexy hunk of man in front of her.
I really liked Jessica's tenacity and her tomboyish-ness. As a girl in the sports world, you have to be able to be "one of the guys" when the situation calls for it and Jessica is very good at finding that balance between being "one of the guys" and being a girl. Her determination to resist Gavin just made me want them to get together even more because you can see how hard it is for her to resist him. And, come on, Jessica, the man is HOT, HOT, HOT!! :)
I liked Gavin's character and how he pursues Jessica but not to the point of being annoying or creepy. He even bought her flowers. Even if they did turn out to be a disaster. I also liked the vulnerability of his character. He went from being a star baller to the new guy on a different ball team in a different place without his arm-candy girlfriend. He's trying to crawl himself out of rock bottom and sometimes his fears of not getting back on top really shines through.
This was a really quick read for me because once I started it, I could not put it down. The chemistry between these two was on fire and I loved every second I got to spend getting to know these characters!
Excerpt:
Pete
walked into the PT room a moment later, popping his gum with a grin.
“I
want you to meet our new player, Gavin King. Gavin, this is Jessica Hart. She
is the best sports therapist in the business, and a hell of a trainer. Jess,
Gavin just joined the team, but he’s on the DL.”
Jessica
turned to the coach, saw the ballplayer beside him, and her heart stopped.
He
was exactly her type. Or her former type. As she took in his magnificent
physique, black eyes, and Colgate smile, she felt an instant attraction.
Gavin
was the kind of guy she used to dream about, drool over, and date. She’d met
enough of them growing up, friends of her brothers who started out as decent
guys but got caught up in the hype and eventually stomped all over some poor
girl silly enough to give up her heart. Unfortunately, she’d had to walk that
path herself. She’d made the fatal mistake of falling for an outfielder who
played for Cleveland, and eventually played her. Zach had the same dark hair,
heart-stopping smile, and killer body.
He’d
taught her what the word devastation
meant.
“Good
to meet you.” She extended her hand, reminding herself to think of him in
clinical terms: he was a pro baseball player, a young athlete, and he was hurt.
“So what seems to be the problem?”
“I
had surgery for a meniscus tear,” he said, lifting his left pant leg and
indicating a bandage. “It’s pretty much healed, but the surgeon wants me in
physical therapy for a few months to build back up. I think they sent my test
results, the MRI, and a script.”
She
nodded, squatting before him and removing the bandage to examine the pink
half-inch line on his knee. “I’ll take a look at the films. Red zone?” she
asked, referring to the location of his tear.
“Yeah,
I think so. But they said it spread into the white zone.”
Her
eyes shot to Pete’s, and he gave a slight negative shake of his head. This news
wasn’t good, and neither one of them wanted to share their misgivings. A tear
that went into the white zone could mean big trouble for a ballplayer, or it
could heal well and the limb would fully recover. It would take weeks before
they’d know, and she understood now how the Sonics had acquired this
magnificent specimen of a man:
His
previous team didn’t want the risk.
So
New Jersey had rolled the dice, gambling on his recovery. She could only hope
they’d beat the odds.
“Okay,
let’s get started. Have you done any therapeutic exercise up until now?”
“Yes,
for a couple of weeks,” he said, flexing the knee to demonstrate. “They had me
doing leg raises until they took the brace off.”
“That
makes sense. We won’t do much today; we’ll do an evaluation, take a look at
your records, and then we will put together a program.”
“How
long?”
Her
eyes met his and she saw the pain and frustration there. No player ever wanted
to be on the disabled list, especially for any period of time. She didn’t want
to raise false hopes, but she also didn’t want to discourage him. She took a
deep breath, carefully choosing her words.
“It’s
different with everyone. Some people recover much more quickly than others. A
lot depends on how well you heal, how much you can tolerate, and if you’re
willing to do the exercises at home. That will give us the quickest
turnaround.”
“I’ll
do whatever it takes,” he said fervently. “I just want to get back in the
game.”
Jessica
nodded as she wrapped the limb with the heating pad. No way in hell would she
tell him the truth:
He
might never be back.
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Award-winning historical author Katie
Rose makes her contemporary debut with the Boys of Summer novels, Bring on the
Heat and Too Hot to Handle, which combine Katie’s true loves: baseball and
romance! When not watching baseball, Katie is at her lake house in New Jersey,
hard at work on her next book.
Thursday, September 24, 2015
REVIEW TOUR: MONDAY, SUNDAY - FENTON GRACE + REVIEW + GIVEAWAY!
Monday, Sunday by Fenton Grace:
Publisher: Hanover Press (May 4, 2015)Review:
Monday, Sunday is a very interesting book. You often see and read on the news about adults who have inappropriate relationships with teenagers but you never really think about how they happened or what may have lead them to that point. This is an interesting take on such a taboo topic. As much as my stomach wanted to turn at the thought of an older woman with a teenage boy, I understood Laney's feelings of loneliness and of longing to feel youthful and desirable again after she felt like life had beaten her down.
I give this book a solid 4-star rating. I won't give it 5 stars because I HATED the ending. This was one of the only negative point in the entire book for me. I don't want to give too much away but I feel like it just ended. For me there was no resolve, no finish. Just "the end". And I don't like books that end like that. I don't like that unresolved feeling.
I also feel like it was a little shorter than it should have been. I don't think the characters were as developed as they could have been if maybe the book were just a little bit longer. Things seemed a little rushed in places like the author was hurrying the characters along.
I did enjoy the characters, though. As a young mother, I can see bits of myself in Laney. I understand that feeling of wanting to feel young again. I don't think I'd have gone to the extreme she did in order to gain that feeling back but to each their own! This is a great, quick read. I finished it in about two days. I look forward to seeing more from Fenton Grace!
About Fenton Grace:
Buy Monday, Sunday by Fenton Grace:
Amazon.com | Barnes & Noble | Book Depository | LuLuFollow the Monday, Sunday by Fenton Grace Tour:
Teddy Rose Book Reviews Aug 3 Kick Off & Giveaway
