Welcome to another mash-up of reviews. I'm actually running out of books to review because I'm not sure if I should review the Psy Changeling books I'm reading. What do you guys think, would like reviews of them? I could maybe put something together. I'm always uncertain about reviewing series (even if each book has its own standalone story) just because I don't want to reveal any big spoilers. Anyway, that's unrelated, here is a mix of reviews for books I've enjoyed this year.
Her Twin Baby Secret – Therese Beharrie
Published: 1st February 2020
Source: Author
Genre: Romance, contemporary
My Rating:
Could her biggest competition... become her babies’ father?
Alexa Moore is the definition of empowered and independent. She runs her own successful business and she’s decided to start the family she’s longed-for—by herself! But after business rival Benjamin Foster comes to her rescue and pretends to be her boyfriend for a night, their earth-shattering kiss sparks Alexa’s desire to share much more with him… can she find her Happily-Ever-After with this unexpected love?
Therese Beharrie always makes me smile with her books. Some of her romances absorb me more than others but no matter the book I'm always drawn into the romances she writes and by the end, she has me with a silly grin on my face. She does make me a little emotional along the way, but she always rewards us for the emotional journey by giving us that happy ending which we all love and she makes sure to leave you with a smile on your face. Thank the lord, because some of those emotional twists can be absolutely heartbreaking. I was definitely smiling at the ending of this one.
Alexa had some major trust issues going on in this book and I couldn't blame her. She needed to get one over her brother for once and what better way than to pretend to be in a relationship with her rival and the man her brother had gone into business with? There were many reasons that man, Ben, shouldn't have gone along with such a plan but he has a bit of a saviour complex and likes to help people. Even though that means folks can take advantage of his good heart. Because of this, he was willing to help Alexa, he saw his rivalry with Alexa as a bit of a laugh he never wanted to see her hurt, not like her brother seemed to so when he saw this he obviously helped her out.
I mean, this was a fake relationship in a way I'd not seen. An enemies to lovers fake relationship where they aren't really enemies just former classmates with a little bit of good-natured rivalry going on. It just worked. Maybe because the relationship was meant to last as long as a couple of weeks before they faked it fizzling out until fate intervened forcing them to drag it out. And in that time they grew closer and became friends (with some benefits). And if all that wasn't enough Alexa was also pregnant! Say what? Yep, she's pregnant (with twins if the title doesn't give it away) and rather than being a deal-breaker as the two grew closer Ben (being the wonderful man that he is) is cool with that and comes to care all the more for her anyway. He doesn’t care who the baby daddy is because he knows if their relationship goes anywhere he will be the dad, he’s the father when it matters.
Honestly, trying not to spoil it but this was so satisfying to read. My only complaint is it couldn't have been longer so that we could have explored the pair's family far more but that's almost always a complaint for me with Mills and Boon books because they are shorter you do miss some of the background plot development you get in a longer book. But I expected that here and I still totally enjoyed it anyway. Honestly, if I’m feeling a little down I will always turn to a Therese Beharrie book. How could I not when they’re always so good?
Source: Purchased
Genre: Historical Romance
My Rating:
Amelia Hathaway is the oldest of four sisters and has only one brother to drive her mad. They live a genteel but impoverished life until they come into an unexpected inheritance. Amelia tries her best to rein in her colourful and unmanageable siblings to match society's expectations. Until the mysterious, extremely wealthy half-gypsy Cam Rohan appears.The irresistible attraction between Amelia and Cam poses a huge problem for both of them. However, as Amelia deals with a multitude of problems, including trying to save her alcoholic brother Leo from ruin, she finds herself turning to Cam Rohan, whose friendship turns into a passion that neither of them can deny...
This was the first book I read after an epic book slump. It was very exciting for me to actually want to read a book and to feel the motivation to read. It was also a quick read for me. I finished it in a little over a day. I’d planned to binge the whole series… but I was put off by the £5.99 price tag for each book. I do really need to continue the series soon before book amnesia strikes once more.
Anyway, this was my first time reading the Hathaway series from Lisa Kleypas and I actually kind of forgot everything which happened in the Wallflowers books, as well. I’d feel bad but honestly, my book amnesia is strong and I’m fine with that. Turns out I just have to suffer with that and I gradually began to remember all of the characters.
Our introduction to the Hathaway's here was good. I love this family and can’t wait to get to know them all through each of the books. Amelia was probably the best one for us to meet, as well. She is the oldest sister in the family and she has committed herself to being the family carer and organiser. She’s taken on this role for various reasons and I won’t spoil things for you, but the woman was ready to not marry and be a spinster… and then she met Cam Rohan and before she knew it her plans to be alone were forever changed.
Amelia was a strange one. I found her slightly controlling behaviour of her family frustrating. She set a role for people and tried to control their life because she felt she knew best. Often characters like that frustrate me, I think it comes down to the fact I hate being told what to do so hate when characters are like that. But, despite this, I really loved her, she was just so easy to like. She took responsibility for her family as Leo (her brother and head of the family) was utterly failing at life and I felt her struggle. She was trying to ensure the Hathaway's succeeded even though they had had numerous struggles in life. She just wanted the best for everyone and her controlling came from a good place.
I had forgotten who Cam was when I started reading this. He was actually in the Wallflowers books and anyone who remembers books better than me will know that, but he was essentially a brand new character to me. I was charmed by him. I’ve not really seen any Romany characters in historical fiction and so this was new for me. Learning his Roma background and seeing how he was brushed off as a Gypsy and certain characters judged the Roma way of life. I felt for him and how he was utterly split between his current life and his old Roma way. I wanted to learn more about him and see how he reconciled the two things. And what really struck me was how generous he was. I will say, Cam was quite controlling and I would say that was off-putting. I managed to overlook it, though. I know others won’t like his overbearing behaviour and I know I’m basically complaining about a similar trait in Cam as I did with Amelia but whatever.
The romance was strong here. Honestly, I adored them together. As soon as I met them both on the page I knew they had a good connection and they were both opposite and similar and they worked (once they both got out of their own way and let the romance happen). Amelia was fascinated as soon as she met Cam and the same was true for him. They might have thought they wouldn’t see each other again but even when they thought their thoughts were still stuck on the other and I loved that. I did have a few issues, like I said, with some of Cam’s behaviour, but the romance was still good.
One thing I will say is I didn’t expect the slightly supernatural element to the book. Honestly, it almost put me off of the book, but it also kind of worked because it related to Cam’s Romany heritage and also as the Hathaway family had strong Romany links (that will obviously come in more on the second book) but they had taken in Merripen and so they already knew some Romany things. Anyway, the supernatural element wasn’t the strongest and felt a little throwaway and wasn’t fully explored. But I felt like there was a lot going on in this book and it was quite obvious some of the story threads weren’t going to be explored but were alluded to and related a lot to the next book. Like the Merripen parts are totally coming next, but I have so many questions!
And those are my word vomit thoughts. Honestly, who writes coherent reviews anyway?
Source: Kindle Unlimited
Genre: Sci-fi, Romance
My Rating:
He's awkward. He's adorable. He's alien as hell.
Zylar of Kith Balak is a four-time loser in the annual Choosing. If he fails to find a nest guardian this time, he'll lose his chance to have a mate for all time. Desperation drives him to try a matching service but due to a freak solar flare and a severely malfunctioning ship AI, things go way off course. This 'human being' is not the Tiralan match he was looking for.
She's frazzled. She's fierce. She's from St. Louis.
Beryl Bowman's mother always said she'd never get married. She should have added a rider about the husband being human. Who would have ever thought that working at the Sunshine Angel daycare center would offer such interstellar prestige? She doesn't know what the hell's going on, but a new life awaits on Barath Colony, where she can have any alien bachelor she wants.
They agree to join the Choosing together, but love is about to get seriously strange.
This book was mental. It was like nothing I've read before and I kind of went in thinking it would be totally not my thing but quite fun to read all the same. I was not wrong. It was fun to read. But not my kind of read? Yeah, it could have converted me to other weirdly fun reads like this one. If I were to describe it I’d kind of put it in the realm of crack fanfiction, it was a little insane but also good?
I kind of expected the male MC, Zylar, to be kind of alpha-like. Even though everything I'd seen about this book said he was a beta hero I just assumed because he abducts Beryl and that's not the most beta action but oh boy was I wrong. And from the misunderstanding at the start, everything just kept getting better. I mean Beryl gets abducted with her dog, Snaps. And then she fully expects probing (that's what aliens do, right?) and instead is given a room, has a translation device installed in her and gets asked to alien marry him. Like, that's hilarious. The whole concept was funny. Especially when there was a talking dog involved (I ❤️ Snaps 4eva).
Then the book went kind of Hunger Games with a competition involved for folks to get alien married and that almost seemed weird and the book almost lost me there. But then during the competition Zylar and Beryl grew closer and the romance happened. I was all ready to be like romance won't work in this alien space romance they're just too different but it totally did! Just trust me if you read it you'll get it. But it's safe to say alien physiology was very different which made the sex scenes interesting to read. Yep, there were sex scenes and I did not hate them.
The other thing I liked was the inclusivity of this book. An aliens characters pronouns were they and them and I never saw a massive conversation about it it just was (which obviously why should this alien marriage thing be exclusively heterosexual?). Also, before you begin questioning why it was human concepts used in an alien world. Well, that's the translation device in play. For both Beryl and Zylar they didn't speak each other's language so the translation device worked to change things to the nearest concept for each of them so Beryl was understanding it in a human context.
Anyway, this was a trippy read I didn’t expect to enjoy as much as I did. By the end of the book I was very much thinking 'there is gonna be another, right?' so that's a sign of a good read.
And there we have three reviews for three very different books. This was definitely a mash-up of reviews but I kind of liked it. Have you read any of these books? What did you think? Or have I convinced you to try something new?
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