Ravings of the Semi-Lucid

This year, I decided to participate in Avid Reader's TBR Challenge 2009. I decided I wanted to post the books I read over on LJ rather than on The Good, the Bad, and the Unread, because I thought that way if I ever came down to the wire and wrote something up at 11:59 on a Wednesday, it could still count.

Anyway, this year she did things a bit differently and assigned us different reading goals. This month, we were to read a category romance. Since one of my best discoveries last year was the romance of Janice Kay Johnson, and since I had one of her books in my TBR pile, I decided she'd be a perfect place to start.

So, without further ado:

Title: Snowbound
Author: Janice Kay Johnson
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Harlequin Super Romance
Publication Date: November 6, 2007
Summary: When a blizzard strands Fiona MacPherson and her students in Oregon's Cascade Mountains, their only hope of survival is to seek shelter at Thunder Mountain Lodge. Their host is John Fallon, a handsome, enigmatic war veteran haunted by secrets and scars that may never heal.

John Fallon never imagined he'd be playing host to this captivating teacher and her eight teenage charges. But when his solitude is shattered by their arrival, his world shifts on its axis. He needs Fiona—but does she need him? There's only one way to find out. The ex-soldier must find the courage to reach out to the remarkable woman who has transformed his life.…
( My thoughts )

Final Grade: B

( And while I'm at it, the rest of my TBR challenge choices )

Aren't you glad you read all that?

Testing something. I don't know if I'll actually use it.

( Dear Yuletide author. Feel free to skip if you don't care )

Hey, annamatic, and anyone else local.

Anyone want to do a spontaneous BPAL meet and sniff? I've got stuff I'd like to get rid of to good homes, including a shit ton of imps that no longer have labels on them that I can no longer identify. I figured I'd offer the stuff to anyone local first, since it's been a long time since we had a mutual enabling session, plus hey, less for me to pack up and ship to other people. Also, I'm home every day but Tuesday this week so the timing is perfect. Let me know if anyone's interested!

Halloween Meme

annamatic summons the undead
armies of shazza59 to steal your candy

atalantapendrag TPs locazuluna

ember_myst eats laurelian's spicy, spicy brains.

emilemur shows up with burning torches, pitchforks and dip

flashmasterh runs around screaming for hours until abruptly silenced by shantih, wielding a sharpened
sock

laurelian puts real eyeballs in your Wings Greatest Hits

locazuluna puts fake eyeballs in your Bank Manager's lunchbox

miss_sophia sacrifices flashmasterh's brains

moirarogers puts apples in your razorblades

quirkofonic gives you
a toothbrush

shantih haunts your pumpkin

shazza59 carves singeruvsongs's effigy in the medium of gerbils

singeruvsongs creates an unholy monstrosity
from slutbamwalla, locazuluna
and shazza59

slutbamwalla
TPs your cutlery

LJ Name

VoicePost 964K 4:54

(no transcription available)

Snagged from tinyholidays:

Voice posts are fun, right? You get to hear funny accents if your friends are from far, far away. All we really want is to hear your voice, we don't care what you're saying. So here's a list of typical meme questions that would otherwise be boring, but when communicated aloud - well, it's entertaining. Answer these questions in your post, and encourage others with voice-posting abilities to do the same.

1) What's your name?
2) How old are you?
3) Where are you from? Are you living there right now?
4) Is it cold where you are?
5) What's the time?
6) What are you wearing?
7) What was the last thing you listened to?
8) What was the last thing you ate?
9) What was the last thing you watched on tv?
10) What's your favorite tv show? Why?
11) Quick! Find a book, or something with text on it! Flip to a random page and read some of it! GO!
12) What was the last movie you saw? How was it?
13) Do YOU think you have an accent? Talk about that.

I meant to post this days ago, but kept getting distracted, and figured since I'm not blogging on my actual website anymore I might as well put up my reading list for the month over here. I'll link to the reviews I've written where possible, but in case you don't want to go clicking, I'll insert random thoughts about each of these in the list.

( September's reads )

OK, well, the new site is still not really ready for human consumption, but it can be found here. I finally figured I should do something with this domain I've owned for a few years which has basically sat there.

I also figured out how to post to wordpress so it's delayed and will show up when I want it to. So there will be stuff other than some of my archived LJ entries on the site at midnight.

I've finally decided that I really ought to put my book reviews on a wordpress blog, because I like a lot of the wordpress features that are on offer, so today I've been importing my LJ to wordpress. It's an exercise in complete tediousness, because I have to go through each entry and figure out whether it needs to be included or not.

Incidentally, I haven't done any reading at all this week. Which is horrible because the book I am reading was one I should have knocked out very quickly. However, I'm thinking that this book epitomizes a lot of the things that tend to bug me about the paranormal romance genre, so my review might just wait until I am fully switched over to Wordpress since it'll be fairly ranty.

Anyway, off to import more entries.

Title: Thunder and Roses
Author: Mary Jo Putney
Genre: Historical romance
Grade: A-
Reason for Reading: You know, I'm not really sure why I originally got this book, except that the title is kind of cool. When I read the plot synopsis and the prologue, though, my interest was piqued.

Synopsis: Nicholas Davies, the latest earl of Aberdare, is the only one who can do anything to improve the lives of the villagers in Penreith, in Wales. Clare Morgan, a Methodist schoolteacher, knows this and seeks Nicholas's help. He strikes a devil's bargain with her--he'll aid the village if she lives with him for three months and let him claim a kiss every day, thus ruining her reputation. Furious at his audacity, Clare accepts his challenge, and gradually finds herself struggling with her growing fascination for Nicholas.

My Thoughts: A lot of Regency-set historical romances have similar plot premises. There's invariably a rogueish rake of a hero and a supposedly intelligent heroine who likes to help others and be a martyr. And there seems to be a trend in the books I've been reading where the rake has a group of friends who are all confirmed bachellors with ridiculous nicknames.

Fortunately for me, Mary Jo Putney's Fallen Angels series was one of the first with the whole rakes club thing, and a wonderful gift for storytelling and highly relatable characters makes it so that I believe in these people and can see them as something other than archetypes.

I really loved the main characters. Nicholas is a strong, forceful man, but he isn't an arrogant jerk and he is that rare breed of romance hero that has a sense of humor. He mistrusts people, because lots of bad things have happened, but I bought his emotional struggles and he wasn't really an idiot about them. Clare is also anb interesting character. I loved that she struggled with her faith, and didn't just give lip service to the whole "Oh, I really want him to kiss me, but it simply isn't right" hand-wringing that often happens in this sort of story. I really felt Clare's angst about whether or not she should let Nicholas seduce her was justified.

As for the secondary characters, well, it's obvious that Nicholas's friends are sequel-bait, but Putney did a good job of giving each of the three men his own distinct personality. I really want to see what she does with them in the rest of the series, especially with the intense, war-scarred Michael and the shrewd Lucien, who plays the dilitante well but has hidden depths.

My quibbles are fairly minor. The suspense subplot was kind of cheesy, and the villain practically wore a sign on his back reading "I am the villain! Ph34r me!" There were also a couple of moments near the end where, to bring off a climax, Clare went haring off into danger. But aside from that, I really did enjoy this book and would definitely recommend it.

Title: Miles Errant
Author: Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Science Fiction
Grade: A
Reason for Reading: I've fallen in love with the Vorkosigan series, and I think this is the last Vorkosigan omnibus there is. After that, it's all individual books.


Note: I normally like to write slightly more detailed reviews that contain less fangirl squeeing, but, really, I love this series to distraction so that's impossible.

( Read the rest of the review )

Title: Dream Man
Author: Linda Howard
Genre: Romantic Suspence
Grade: B-
Reason for Reading: One of my Yahoo groups chose Linda Howard as our author of the month, and since I'd never read her before, I chose a book on my librarything recommendations to get started.

Synopsis: Had she finally met the man she longed for...or was she dreaming?
Marlie Keen was trying to lead a quiet, ordinary life. She thought the
knowing
-- the clairvoyance that allowed her to witness crimes as they happened -- had been
destroyed in the nightmare of her past. Then one night it returned with a vengeance,
and she desperately needed to find someone to make it stop.
Detective Dane Hollister of the Orlando police department had never met anyone like
Marlie. He had doubts about her clairvoyance, but there was no doubt how much he
desired her. Her soft, sweet scent set his blood afire, and he wanted to wrap her
in his arms and chase the sadness from her eyes. To Marlie, Dane was all heat and
hard muscle, and he made her body come alive as it never had before. But not even
she could foresee where their passion would lead: a hungry quest for the elusive,
dreamy ecstasies of love...and a dangerous journey into the twisted mind of a madman
who would threaten their happiness and their lives....
-
My Thoughts: I really liked this book. It manages to score some points with me by being a romantic suspense novel that doesn't feature the world's most retarded heroine. In fact, both characters were well-drawn, and I thought Dane was hot, except for the times where he acted like the romance novel hero that he is. There were also some fun secondary characters, too.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure whether it was the book or just me, but I never felt fully engaged in the story. The characterization should have worked for me, but didn't entirely, and I set the book down several times and wasn't in any great hurry to resume reading.

That being said, romantic suspense is not my genre, so it was nice to read a book this pleasant so I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt and give it a slightly higher grade.

Title: Sword of Ice
Author: Mercedes Lackey, various
Genre: Fantasy
Grade: C
Reason for Reading: This was 1 on my librarything suggester, and an anthology was pretty much perfect for me during these last few weeks, since I could stop to read a short story when I needed a break.

A couple of years ago, I decided I needed to go on a rereading bender, revisiting the Valdemar series by Mercedes Lackey. I didn't make it through the series because shiny things distracted me, but I've always had a soft spot for the Valdemar books, since they were perfect for my dreamy teenage self, all full of romance and adventure and empathic animals and life bonds. Unfortunately, time has made me jaded and the gloss has worn off of Valdemar. But it's still very much a place I would like to visit, so I thought reading a collection of Valdemar short stories would be fun.

Since these stories are significantly shorter than, say, the offerings in a romance anthology, I'll keep my summaries to a minimum.

Also, there'll be spoilers for the rest of the Valdemar books interspersed, so you might not want to read this if you're sensitive about that.
( This ran long, so I'm cutting it )

Title: Daughter of the Blood
Author: Anne Bishop
Genre: Fantasy
Grade: B
Reason for Reading: Someone on a Yahoo group I'm on wanted a reading buddy for this one so I figured that, given that this is yet another fantasy series I haven't read, I might as well.

Synopsis: Seven hundred years ago, a Black Widow witch saw an ancient prophecy come to life
in her web of dreams and visions. Now the Dark Kingdom readies itself for the arrival
of its Queen, a Witch who will wield more power than even the High Lord of Hell himself.
But she is still young, still open to influence-and corruption. Whoever controls
the Queen controls the darkness. Three men-sworn enemies-know this. And they know
the power that hides behind the blue eyes of an innocent young girl. And so begins
a ruthless game of politics and intrigue, magic and betrayal, where the weapons are
hate and love-and the prize could be terrible beyond imagining...
My Thoughts: I think that, if there had been a few different stylistic choices made, this book would have been a keeper for me. As it is, I like it well enough that I'll probably continue the series, but there were definitely some issues that I had.

What works for me is that the setting is appropriately grand and epic--a complex world that has obviously been created with diligence and thoughtfulness. And I like political intrigue, of which there was a lot. And I even liked the depths shown by our PoV characters. And there was something in the storytelling that was compelling and kept me reading even when I realized afterwords that I was reading the bastard love child of Laurell K. Hamilton, Christine Feehan and George R. R. Martin.

The setting is very dark, which was an aspect I liked, overall. The people in power are essentially terrified that they're not strong enough to hold it, so they abuse those weaker than themselves. And I have to admit that the concept of a Ring of Obedience brings a smirk to my face.

Unfortunately, though I did enjoy this book, there were flaws. First of all, though our three male protagonists were nicely fleshed out, the female character who is the center of all the drama never quite worked for me. She really is, essentially, a Mary Sue, looked upon by people who generally adore her. That kept me pretty distant from hjer, and so I pretty much failed to see what was so compelling about her.

As for the other secondary characters, most of the women seem to be either evil or brainless, and the men either bow before the awesomeness that is Jaenelle, queen Sue of the Universe or they rape little girls for fun. (No, I'm really not exagerating about that.)

That also being said, I found the struggle of Jaenelle's eventual love interest over his feelings for her a bit squicky, especially at the end, given that Jaenelle is twelve.

So would I recommend it? Maybe. I think I'd have loved it had I not read George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire, which is a lot darker and actually contains a whole cast of multifaceted characters. But it's a nice enough read if you simply want to be taken to a fascinating, original world.

Sadly, they let me out of my cage, and I have a post over at Sybil's blog as part of their duodecimal holidays, where they asked a bunch of readers and bloggers to come up with various top twelve lists.


Here is mine.

Go forth and enjoy.
In other news, I am a little under halfway through Anne Bishop's Daughter of the Blood. I would absolutely love this book if I'd sat and read it cover to cover without stopping for a break. Sadly, a little perspective makes the book's flaws pretty clear, like that our protagonist hasn't once gotten her own PoV, or how her eventual love interest was borrowed from romance novel central casting. And seriously, what is it with dark fantasy and incest? Someone tell me there is a book classified as dark fantasy that managed to completely leave out creepy women who want to have sex with their brothers/sons/nephews.

Title: Alien Taste
Author: Wen Spencer
Genre: science fiction?
Grade: A-
Reason for reading: If memory serves, I decided to try these because my reading twin recommended them.

Synopsis: Ukiah Oregon isn’t your average man. He’s not even your average human….
Ukiah Oregon is quickly becoming one of the greatest trackers in the country. Some
call it luck
—
those closest to him call it instinct. Abandoned as a child, he was found running
with a wolf pack. Now, in his job as a private investigator, he puts his nose to
the ground to track down missing persons and fugitives from the law.
A heightened sense of smell and taste
—plus a photographic memory—
make him an invaluable asset to his partner. But when Ukiah kills a crazed young
woman in self defense, he draws the attention of the FBI’s most wanted: a violent
and elusive gang known as the Pack.
And it won’t be long before Ukiah discovers just how much he has in common with the
Pack: a bond of brotherhood, blood…and destiny.

My Thoughts: Wow. This book was exactly what I needed. Everything is just about perfect, from the very well-drawn characters to the setting (which I don't normally pay attention to but which I was impressed with) and the themes explored.

First the characters. I loved Ukiah Oregon. In fact, he may have to supplant Miles Vorkosigan as the fictional character I would run off to live in sin with if he were real. He's a sweet, noble guy who loves deeply and purely and with all that he is. And you know that being raised by a lesbian couple has made him into the kind of man any woman would want to be with.

The secondary characters are also very well drawn. I was especially intrigued by Max Bennet, Ukiah's mentor and partner. I loved watching them interact. Max has also had a ton of crap heaped on him, but thanks to Ukiah, he is slowly beginning to heal. And we know this because we are shown, not told, which is one of the book's other strengths.

I mentioned the setting was well-done. The book is set in Pitsburgh, and it's very clear that Spencer knows about Pitsburgh. In fact, it's sort of amusing that the setting stuck out to me at all, because I kept being reminded of a Mage: the Ascension game I used to play in, which was run by a native of Pitsburgh who mentioned several of the same settings Spencer used in the book, which was cool and added more pleasant associations to my reading.

As for the plot, you'll notice the question mark under the book's genre. I really don't know how to classify this book. It's got a very definite urban fantasy feel for about the first two-thirds, reminding me of a somewhat grittier Charles de Lint (which is, natch, a good thing), but then it takes a left hand turn and goes wandering off into science fiction land.

The sci-fi elements of the plot were definitely not my favorites. They seemed straight out of a cheap B movie, and even though they made sense for the story, some of them seemed beyond preposterous and I had to roll my eyes.

I'm also not sure how well the romance worked for me. I can't decide if I thought it was rushed or if it made sense that Ukiah would fall for the person he falls for so quickly because he just seems to love people so intensely anyway. I think I'm leaning toward the latter, because it is one of the sweetest romances I've read in a while, but I'm not normally a fan of the characters meeting and professing their love mere days later.

Overall, despite its flaws, this was a great book which I highly recommend. I definitely intend to read the sequel as soon as possible.

For some reason, I have always conflated the Black Jewels trilogy by Anne Bishop with the Nightrunners trilogy by Lyn Fluelling. Both series have been recommended to me, and I need a new series to follow like I need a hole in my head.

So I offer it up as a question to the masses:

Black jewels or Night Runners? Why?

Title: If his Kiss is Wicked
Author: Jo Goodman
Genre: historical romance
Grade: DNF
Reason for Reading: Everyone ever on the romance blogosphere loved this book, so I figured I would, too. Oh, there was that nagging voice that reminded me that Rosario, my reading twin hadn't liked it, but I ignored that voice.

Synopsis: Shy by nature, Emma Hathaway usually leaves the drama to her rebellious cousin, Marisol.
But when Emma agrees to meet with her cousin's secret lover to end the affair, she
is pulled into a dangerous game. Now Emma is convinced her involvement in the scandal
has put her life in jeopardy. The trouble is none of Emma's confidantes believe anyone
is trying to harm her. As whispers of madness begin, Emma turns to the only person
who might be able to help...The very handsome, barely respectable Restell Gardner
has gained a reputation for helping people out of compromising positions. Never one
to turn away a lady in need, Restell agrees to help solve the intrigue. Sensing there
is more to the green-eyed beauty than meets the eye, Restell feels himself falling
for Emma. But he resists succumbing to his passion...at least until he learns the
truth about the danger that is haunting her. For if he gives in to temptation too
soon, he could lose Emma forever...


My Thoughts: I should have liked this a lot more than I did. In fact, it's so very frustrating because I know that there were things here I should have loved. Like the dialogue, which reads very authentically to me. And the characters, like the very tortured heroine and the Regency-era PI. But there was something missing from what little I got through, and at one point I even fell asleep on the bus as I attempted to read. I think I might try it again, but clearly I am not quite ready to get back into reading historical romances yet.

Title: Star King
Author: Susan Grant
Genre: science fiction romance
Grade: B
Reason for Reading: It was a pick from librarything, which typically suggests books I will either like or hate with a passion.

Synopsis from Amazon: Air Force Lieutenant Jasmine Boswell was flying her fighter jet over Saudi's no-fly
zone when the missile coming out of nowhere hits her plane. She bails out of her
disabled jet, but lands on an alien-looking desert with spaceships flying overhead.
She also encounters an injured Romlijhian B'Kah, whose starfighter crashed killing
his brother. Only his vision of the angel Jas saves his life.
Two decades later (in earth time), Jas has divorced her spouse, has two young adult
children, and struggles with a mid-life crisis. Due to Rom's injuries and his failure
to save his people on that fatal day, years ago, he no longer leads. Instead he is
a minor smuggler, estranged from his own family. Rom and his people make first contact
with earthlings. Will Rom and Jas find each other to follow up on that dream and
if they do will each take the necessary steps to embrace their love?
My Thoughts: I enjoyed this and will definitely be reading the other books set in this universe. Susan Grant manages to convey a depth of feeling in her writing, and her books contain an element of humor that really works for me. It's also obvious that Grant knows what she's talking about regarding being in the Air Force. I'm not sure if she actually was, though I think I read that this is, in fact, true.

The characters here are for the most part good. I liked that Jasmine is a little older than your average romance heroine, and for the most part she acts like it. Her experiences as a soldier come in handy, and I was glad that she was given the chance to shine in this way.

Rom, too, was a great hero. At least, I thought he was pretty sexy in a Han Solo sort of way. I liked that the anger he felt at his assumption that Jas had betrayed him lasts for only a short while and he soon becomes fascinated with the woman that she is, not the one his mind has made him out to be.

As for the secondary characters, they were less impressive, though my favorite by far is Rom's bodyguard, a great big hulking berserker named, of all things, Muffin.

I also really liked that the sequel baiting wasn't terribly obvious. There aren't really any characters who show up in the book screaming, "Look, look, I'm hot and tortured. My book is next! Buy it now!"
Also, I liked the definite empowering of women message that was rather subtly drawn in the book. If it weren't 1:00 in the morning, I might want to analyze it in more detail, but suffice to say it was nice to see that Rom worshipped and adored Jas, and she in turn got to reclaim her sexuality, which is a theme I love.

Now for the bad. First, as I mentioned in my last post, sometimes the characters did veer a bit into wish fulfillment territory. When Jas thinks that it's incredible that Rom loves her stretch marks, my eyes rolled. No doubt in 20 years I will totally swoon over that scene myself, but I'm too young to appreciate it now.

Also, the villain? Well, TV tropes would call him a knight templar. At one point, he even gives out an evil laugh. (Note that tvtropes.org is a huge time suck, so I highly encourage you go go exploring.)

There were also some problems with pacing. The beginning was lovely, the middle drrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaggggggggggggged, and the end finally picked up speed. I would have liked for some of those issues to have been ironed out a bit better.

Overall, this was fun. It's not rocket science (heh heh, rocket science? In a sci-fi romance? Aren't I clever?) but it is a lot of fun. Recommended if you can look over the pacing and the villain.

Ahhh, today was my last full day of official classes. I just have a test tomorrow and then finals next week, after which I can commence with my plans (now on hold) to take over the world. (Or at the very least to finish my Winterholyday shopping.)

I am also reading Susan Grant's The Star King. I need to see if Mom has read it, because I am thinking she would love it. The book was starting out hopping along somewhere in the A- to B+ range, but I think I'm going to have to dock points because I think a romance should have fully realized characters, not my mom's wish fulfillment fantasies, and unfortunately, the characters in this book have started going off in that direction.

However, we shall see by the time I'm done. And I might finish the book tomorrow, after I write a two-page paper on "An Inconvenient Truth", which I am hoping to finish downloading sometime tonight.

Also tomorrow = grocery day. I seriously have not had a chance to restock my section of the cabinets in a long-ass time, what with being worried about finishing school projects. But a two-page paper over a movie is small potatoes compared to the monstrosity I cranked out yesterday.