Dear Author » Jessica-Bird

Thursday Afternoon Haiku Moment: Man in a Million by Jessica Bird

Guest Reviewer — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 22:00:26 +0000

Live under a rock?
Jessica Bird is also
penname JR Ward.

Spike = hero.
Ex-con gourmet chef hottie
Not millionaire.

Heroine is “Mad”
No, really – that is her name.
She is the rich one.

Reverse HP theme?
Maybe. But Mad comes off as
Poor little rich girl

Will they won’t they?
Goes on a bit too long, sigh.
Just get to the sex!

Second half picks up
Sex: Almost as hot as ‘Ward’
Liked it at the end.

Verdict: Is Ward ‘lite’
But Ward lite is still yummy
B minus in all

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or ebook format from Mills & Boon (epub only folks).

REVIEW: The Billionaire Next Door by Jessica Bird

Janine — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 21:00:37 +0000

Dear Ms. Bird,

After eyeing it all year last year, I finally decided to sign up for Keishon’s TBR Challenge. I figured it would motivate me to dig up some of the older books that have piled up around my house which I have been ignoring in favor of the new and shiny.

Keishon’s assignment for January was category romances. I must admit that though I did have a few in my to-be-read pile, I don’t read many categories. I tend to prefer longer books. But your 2007 book, The Billionaire Next Door, has been in my TBR pile and I’ve wanted to read it for a while. This challenge was my golden opportunity.

Sean O’Banyon specializes in corporate mergers and acquisitions. Although he is now a Manhattan billionaire, pursued by women and sought after by deal-makers, Sean was once an abused child from Southie, Boston. When Sean’s once-abusive father dies, Sean, who hasn’t spoken to his father in years, travels to Boston to collect his father’s remains and get the duplex in which his father lives ready to sell.

It is in Boston that Sean encounters Lizzie Bond. Lizzie is the nurse who lives in the other apartment in the duplex, and was a friend of Sean’s father. Since Sean’s father kicked his drinking habit some time after Sean left the house and before Lizzie moved in next door, Sean and Lizzie each view the deceased Eddie O’Banyon very differently.

Though at first Sean suspects Lizzie of having tried to get her hands on his father’s money, he can’t help but be attracted to her warmth and kindness. And while Lizzie tells herself that Sean is just passing through and she is the long-term relationship type, she finds it hard to resist his good looks, his charm and his obvious vulnerability.

Then Lizzie loses her job. Before too long Sean and Lizzie are spending more and more time in each other’s company. But Sean, who cherishes being appreciated for who he is rather than for the fortune he has banked, doesn’t tell Lizzie about his true career, nor does he tell her much about his childhood. He is afraid to trust Lizzie fully, and Lizzie knows he’s holding back. Will they be able to overcome the obstacles of Sean’s present and his past?

Sean reminded me a bit of some of your heroes from the Black Dagger Brotherhood series, in that for all his external power, he could be very vulnerable at times. His memories of his father’s abuse reduced him to a child whenever he entered the apartment he had lived in as a boy.

He had also exhausted himself with work, and it was good to see him relax a little with Lizzie’s help. One of my favorite scenes in the book was one in which Sean and Lizzie “play hooky” and bask in the joys of a beautiful day. It was very satisfying to see Sean learn to relax and savor the simple things that can make life joyous.

I was a bit less enamored of Lizzie than I was of Sean. She was so sweet, caring and self-sacrificing that it was hard not to feel that she was more saint than human. I appreciated that she stood up for herself in the relationship, and I didn’t dislike her, but the way she was so patient with Sean, and never pushed him to reveal what happened in his childhood, even though she could see signs that something was wrong with the O’Banyon family, did not seem realistic to me.

On one level, The Billionaire Next Door is a classic Cinderella story, in which the sweet, hardworking and impoverished heroine gets her prince. But on another level it is also a story about two people who had completely different experiences of the same man. To Sean, his father was a monster, while to Lizzie, Eddie O’Banyon was someone who looked out for her and worried for her as she worried for him.

While I liked that Lizzie and Sean viewed Sean’s father through different lenses, there were times when I felt that the contrast between the way Sean saw his father and the way Lizzie saw him was too great. Sean seemed to have no good memories of his dad whatsoever, not even from the time before his mother died and his father began drinking. Lizzie did not see even a glimmer of her neighbor’s abusive streak.

Still, I loved that Eddie O’Banyon remained partly cloaked in mystery, even at the end of the book. He was an enigma even to those who had known him best, a loner whose innermost thoughts and feelings were never expressed. The dead take their regrets to their grave, and the living can’t always know what drove them. That was very much the case here, and it made the book more lifelike and real as well as more poignant.

One of the scenes late in the book, in which Lizzie learns about what Sean suffers and they talk about it, made me cry. You made me care very much about Sean and his brothers, and I hope very much that Billy and Mac’s books are forthcoming, since I would definitely read them. As for The Billionaire Next Door, I enjoyed it and do recommend it to our readers. B.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or ebook format from the Sony Store and other etailers.

REVIEW: A Man in a Million by Jessica Bird

Jane — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 21:00:22 +0000

Dear Ms. Bird:

I was cruising the new Mills & Boon ebook offerings when I saw A Man in a Million in e-form. I’m not terribly familiar with your category backlist although I do have a few in my TBR pile that I haven’t yet read (they are in paper form and those tend to languish). In any event, I bought the ebook even though I hate Adobe DRM.

Madeline Maguire has all the trappings of a poor little rich girl. She owns nearly a third of a giant supermarket chain but has never taken an interest in the family business, mostly because of her sucky family. Instead, Mad took up sailing and became a world class sailor competing in events like America’s Cup. Despite her personal success, she is still very insecure on dry land.

Part of her insecurity is due to the constant degradation she received at the hands of her father and then her brother, who tried to gain the respect of their father by being a better and bigger asshole. Part of it is due to the comparisons she suffered with her sister who is so beautiful that she literally makes you catch your breath. Mad is tall and big boned and next to her sister she’s never felt attractive. Added to the physical comparisons is the fact that her sister makes it habit, maybe even an intentional mission, to sleep with anyone who is attached to Mad, including Mad’s fiance.

When Mad is just one of the guys, she feels right but put her in a society setting and she has no recognition of her own appeal.

Spike Moriarity, a gorgeous 6’4″ tattooed specimen of manhood, has eyes for no one else but Mad. Because of his past, though, he feels that he is not worthy of being with someone like Mad, someone so wealthy, so beautiful, and so good. Because of their personal insecurities, every word that is communicated to the other is immediately mis interpreted.

sean O’Banyon, the hero of Billionaire Next Door, plays fairygodmother and matchmaker of sorts. He forces Madeline to confront her brother because her trust terms are ending and she must take control of her part of the fortune now or else risk losing control to her brother forever. He also tells Mad that Spike is interested in her and informs Spike that Mad is interested in him. This absurdity is recognized in the book as one character says to the other “Are we in second grade.”

Much of the conflict is based on Big Misunderstandings, but given Mad and Spike’s positions, it is easy to see how even the simplest of communications are taken the wrong way. I was very intrigued by Mad’s sister who has some revelations of her own. While the dialogue isn’t full of one witty exchange after another, it’s very authentic.

The physical description of Spike as well as his characterization echo the male protagonists of your popular Black Dagger Brotherhood series to the point that I think he could have been lifted, wholesale, from this book, and inserted into BDB. Add fangs, stir, and you’ve got a member of the Brotherhood right here.

There’s some details that I thought were twisted to suit the story such as Spike is a celebrity chef and it’s hard to believe that his past wouldn’t be well known, particularly in New York even though his bailiwick is Upstate. I also thought that the last Big Mis was so obvious and expected in a book that had some intriguing twists. Still, I don’t regret having bought this book in the Adobe format although I’ll probably purchase it again when it comes available in some other, more portable format which I suppose is a recommendation in and of itself. You can really pack alot of emotion, agnst, and characterization in a small package. B

Best regards,

Jane

How to buy this book: it can be purchased via Mills & Boon store in Adobe format. I bought it even though I am not a UK resident. It can also be purchased in used form .

REVIEW: Lover Enshrined by J.R. Ward

Jia — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 09:00:54 +0000

Dear Ms. Ward,

It might be an understatement to say your previous novel, Lover Unbound, elicited some very passionate reactions from readers. I can’t say I disagree with those criticisms. Even though I ended up liking the book because it developed John Matthew’s storyline, the main romance drove me insane for so many reasons, some of which were covered in Jane’s review. You could say Lover Unbound confirmed a suspicion I’ve always had about regarding the Black Dagger Brotherhood series, and I was waiting to see if Lover Enshrined would support it. It did.

I have two confessions to make. When I first picked up Dark Lover, I didn’t particularly like it. I was interested enough to pick up the next one in the series, but I never quite understood the reception the first book received. I still don’t. But more importantly, my second confession is this: If I read for the romance, I would never have kept reading this series. The only romance that ever worked for me was that of Zsadist and Bella, and even then their actual book disappointed me because I thought Bella’s character arc was short-changed in favor of Zsadist’s. But I think we’ve covered the series’s shallow treatment of its heroines in favor of the male characters enough here at Dear Author, so I won’t go into that.

So in the end, I think Lover Enshrined is the perfect example for what I’m talking about — should you read this series for the romance? Or should you read it for the continuing storylines? My opinion? If you’re still reading this series for the romance, I honestly don’t know what’s keeping you coming back for more. You guys are being cheated.

Frankly, I thought the romance between Phury and Cormia was boring. Not only did their scenes comprise such a small fraction of the book that touting this as Phury and Cormia’s book is laughable, I found their romance insipid and stupid. Cormia continues the BDB’s heroine tradition of having an underdeveloped character arc and Phury… Oh, where to begin?

In the previous book, I thought Phury took a slight detour into CrazyLand. Slicing and dicing people in alleyways behind garbage dumpsters? To me, that’s set up for Serial Killer, not Romance Hero. Then in this book, we learn he’s probably always been crazy. We just didn’t notice. I appreciate the fact the book tried to tackle the hard topic of addiction but I have to be honest. Instead of feeling sympathy for Phury’s drug dependence, I was revolted and wondered when he would snap and kill everyone or himself. And maybe that was the intention but in terms of a romance hero, I don’t find those traits very appealing and I think it would take a highly skilled writer to make those elements work.

On the other hand, I thought the secondary storylines were nicely developed. For the first time, I actually felt like the series has moved forward in that respect. Because of my fantasy background, I tend to prefer continuing, developing storylines that go somewhere so I enjoyed this. If you read this series more for those aspects, I think you will find some things to like here. For example, if you like John Matthew, the development of his story and those of his friends’, Qhuinn and Blaylock, continue in depth.

That said, if you dislike the Lessening Society, they get a lot of page time. It’s almost as if the book were trying to make up for their absence in the last one. What I did like about their inclusion here is that while they’re still evil, they weren’t quite as two-dimensional cardboard as I found them in previous installments. Maybe this is because for the first time, I saw they had a goal, motivations, and an actual storyline. Those things go a long way to keeping an antagonist from becoming that character who twirls his mustache and flings his cape over his shoulder. It also helps that this time around, the Lessening Society’s main players don’t bite it immediately. In previous books, I’d seriously been wondering how the Lessening Society was that much of a threat if their leaders kept getting killed off so easily.

The book also starts expanding the world, which is something I always like. While I doubt the worldbuilding will be solid or consistent — let’s face it, the worldbuilding is not the books’ strongpoint and I don’t expect that fact to change — I do appreciate the effort. In particular, I am fascinated by Rehvenge’s storyline and the symphants’ society. I really look forward to learning more about them in future books and given the events that happen in Lover Enshrined, I hope the series will explore them in more detail.

As for a grade, I’m torn. I found the romance so boring, I actually believe removing that storyline entirely would have made the book better. When I came to the scenes between Phury and Cormia, I found myself wishing for them to end so I get back to the other stuff. Not the desired reaction, I’d think, when those scenes are supposed to be the focal point of the book. If I’d have to give that part a grade, I’d probably say a C. It didn’t annoy me enough to give it a lower grade but I thought it was very bland. But for the rest of the book and the events it covers, I’d say an overall B- for me but I will warn that at this point, I don’t think you can read the books out of order anymore.

My regards,
Jia

This book can be purchased in mass market from Amazon or Powells. No ebook format yet, but I suspect there will be.

REVIEW: Billionaire Next Door by Jessica Bird

Jane — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 20:00:22 +0000

Dear Ms. Bird:

One thing that seems a lost art in the new crop of romances is its failure to focus on the development of the actual relationship. Romance, at its best, is character driven with the central plot being the intersecting of two individuals to mesh into one stronger, better unit. A great category novel does this better than any book out there because the focus is solely on the relationship and nothing else. But category novels are so plentiful and the quality so varied that you never know whether you will be getting a rare orchid or common weed.

In this book, I had some trepidation but the quality of the story, the focus on the two individuals reminded me of what makes romance so great.

Sean O’Banyon is a self made billionaire. He put himself through college at Harvard, then an MBA, to become one of the top financiers in New York. Unfortunately, being rich generally means being a target. Women generally only want him for the prestige or the money so he’s made a practice of requiring all the women he dates go dutch. It scares off the gold diggers and saves himself personal hurt but it also prevents emotional attachments.

There are definitely genre cliches in this book but what makes it so brilliant is that the story transcends the cliches or perhaps shows why the cliches are so appealing. Sean O’Banyon might be made of money but inside he’s terrorized by his childhood. You show how vulnerable he is which makes his knee jerk reactions palatable. He’s not healthy emotionally and thus his intimate interactions will be unhealthy as well.

Elizabeth Bond, on the other hand, while low in funds is rich in friends and spirit. Lizzie is a nurse and works more than one job to help care for her mother who is needs financial assistance from time to time. Lizzie rented one half of Eddie O’Banyon’s duplex and in the past two years became close to them with Eddie serving as a kind of surrogate father. When he dies, Lizzie calls the contact number in Eddie’s papers which happens to be Sean, his son. Only Sean has different memories of Eddie and his emotional unrest reaches out to Lizzie. The two begin to forge a relationship but Sean’s unhealthy distrust of females, his fear of intimacy, his fears overall, cause him to sabotage their budding love affair. Lizzie, however, is no doormat. She doesn’t hesitate to show him the door.

It is Lizzie’s emotional state that allows her a position of power within the relationship. She makes Sean work for everything and doesn’t hesitate to send him packing when he can’t treat her right. This isn’t to say that she doesn’t long for him, but she doesn’t rely on him to make her a better person.

When I first read this book, I thought it was a keeper but in a second perusal, I felt that the tone was too flat. There is very little movement in the mood which sometimes feels oppressive. There is also the non stop use of brand names from the clothes, to the cars, to the restaurants. At one point, Lizzie and Sean are having a picnic and Sean reaches into the “Deluca's paper bag and took out a Poland Spring bottle.” Poland Spring? Is it really important I know the type of water that they are drinking? Regardless, this is still a very good book which focuses on the development of the relationship and had an unexpected twist to the happy ever after ending. B.

Best regards

Jane

This book can be purchased in eform from Harlequin or mass market from Amazon.com.