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REVIEW: What Remains of Heaven by C.S. Harris

Jennie — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 10:00:34 +0000

Dear Ms. Harris,

I have been anticipating the release of What Remains of Heaven, the fifth book in your Sebastian St. Cyr mystery series, for several months. I’ve come to expect a new book in this series every year, and while I’ve liked some of the offerings more than others, each has been satisfying (with grades ranging from A- to B), and the continuing turmoil in Sebastian’s personal life has held my attention from book to book.

Just a quick note: I think it’s probably going to be hard to entirely avoid spoilers for earlier books in the series in this review, so if you haven’t read the series, intend to, and are fanatical about remaining spoiler-free, you might want to stop reading now.

Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, has rather inadvertently and reluctantly become known as a murder investigator (don’t you hate when that happens?). His imperious aunt comes to him accompanied by her friend, the ailing (but still formidable) Archbishop of Canterbury, to request Sebastian’s assistance in finding out who killed the Bishop of London, Francis Prescott. Bishop Prescott had been summoned to the village of Tanfield Hill one night upon the discovery, in a recently opened crypt, of a body that did not belong there – a long-deceased man found not in a coffin but on the floor of the crypt, with a knife sticking out his back. The Reverend Earnshaw, who had ridden to Lond to inform the bishop of the grisly discovery, is late in meeting him at the crypt and discovers Prescott practically atop the first body, with his skull bashed in.

Sebastian has no particular personal interest in this crime (unlike some of the previous ones he’s investigated), but agrees to look into it because of his regard for his aunt. Bishop Prescott, as it turns out, had any number of enemies (don’t they always?). He had angered many with his abolitionist stance, and the fact that he was being considered for the powerful position of Archbishop of Canterbury may have made some who opposed his views on slavery nervous. One of this group, a foppish aristocrat named Lord Quillian, was overheard threatening the bishop shortly before his death. Additionally, Prescott was see arguing with a butcher the day he was killed (it turns out the butcher’s son has an unpleasant past association with Sebastian, which ends up complicating his investigation), he had had a run-in with William Franklin (a real historical figure and son of Benjamin Franklin, William had been exiled to England for his support of the British during the American Revolution) and there was apparently acrimony between the bishop and his nephew Peter Prescott, an old school chum of Sebastian’s. Things get even murkier with the introduction of a subplot about a mysterious spy who had operated against the British during the revolution 30 years earlier; this thread ends up involving both Prescott’s family and Sebastian’s own (this is another one of those series that makes me wonder if there were only a couple of dozen people living in London in the 19th century, since the same people turn up over and over again).

As with previous books in the series, the mystery didn’t engross me hugely. At times it felt like there were lots of potential red herrings and improbably coincidences thrown at the reader, but those may be par for the course in mysteries, for all I know; I haven’t been a regular reader of the genre since I was a teenager. When I read mysteries these days, I tend to filter out the very same information that mystery fans are probably filing away to see if they can figure out the solution to the crime. I really don’t care about solving the crime myself, and untangling the clues makes my head hurt, so it’s hard for me to assess the worth of this book as a straight mystery, except to say that I was impressed by how neatly all of the pieces fit together in the end. That’s really all I ask of a mystery; other readers may have more stringent requirements. (I guessed one fairly obvious “surprise” early on, but the the ultimate identity of the killer did surprise me.)

Again, as with previous books in the series, my real interest is the setting and the continuing characters. Sebastian remains an intriguing and highly sympathetic hero, one who has been buffeted by a number of distressing revelations over the course of the series. This book is no exception, and while these revelations are fairly melodramatic, even soap-operaish in nature, there was an internal logic to the ways in which the characters were manipulated, I thought.

As in past books, Sebastian’s romantic travails are featured in What Remains of Heaven, but I was a little disappointed that the characters seemed to pretty much tread water for the course of the book. Sebastian’s relationship with Hero Jarvis is complicated by the consequences of their night together in the last book, but while they meet up a number of times in What Remains of Heaven, their conversations have a repetitious quality that frustrated me. (Hero has her own reasons for wanting to get to the bottom of the bishop’s murder; he was a friend of hers and was helping her with a personal problem.) Sebastian’s relationship with Kat Boleyn is rocked by an entirely unshocking shocking revelation, but there are still considerable obstacles between this couple and their HEA (and honestly, I’m more on Team Hero at this point). I would have preferred a bit more balance between the mystery and Sebastian’s relationship drama. I don’t mind the series being drawn out, and I realize that this dictates that things go slowly on the personal front, but I do want to see some progress in the course of a book.

Sebastian’s relationship with his father continues to intrigue; the two have been very up and down in the course of the series, owing to the fact that Hendon was hard on Sebastian as a boy and continues to lie to him about Very Important Things now that Sebastian’s an adult, things that Sebastian has a way of finding out, leading to a fresh round of recriminations and then estrangement. I can’t help but like Hendon in spite of his flaws because he really is a fully drawn character; he loves his son but he can’t seem to stop making mistakes with him. He has functioned at times as an antagonist in the series, but he’s anything but one-note (unlike, say, Sebastian’s sister, whose personality seems to be permanently set on Witch).

The prose is mostly smooth, marred here and there by a lack of subtlety and a tendency to over-explain (Hero at one point thinks that it’s tedious that as an unmarried female the rules of society dictate that she can’t visit a man she wants to question in the murder case; I would think the vast majority of readers would understand enough about the mores of regency society that they would not need to have these circumstances pointed out to them so explicitly). My enthusiasm for the series really does rest mainly with the characters; Sebastian, Hero, Hendon, Kat and a few others are sympathetic enough to make me care about them and faceted enough to keep me interested from book to book.

My grade for What Remains of Heaven is a B+.

Jennie

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.

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REVIEW: Bound and Determined by Jane Davitt and Alexa Snow

Joan/SarahF — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 10:00:33 +0000

Dear Ms. Davitt and Ms. Snow.

I love the title of this book, because it’s so true to the characters and to the book. I’ve been disappointed, sometimes even sickened by some of Loose-Id’s titles recently (no, I didn’t review them, I couldn’t bring myself to do so), so I was happy to be intrigued enough by the excerpt to buy Bound and Determined. And I’m so glad I did. This book, while lacking slightly in the pure romance department, is a fabulous look at a BDSM relationship with some amazing characterization and some really hot sex.

First a warning for readers, though: the characters in this book are a masochist and a sadist. Yes, much of the relationship is about dominance and submission, which many people have less issue with than with pain play, but the sadomasochism in this book is strong. Not violent and visceral like Anah Crow’s (brilliant) Uneven, but it’s there, its unabashed, and if that bothers you, don’t read this book. However, if you’re intrigued by the psychology behind masochism, this is the book for you, because it’s beautifully depicted.

Sterling is a college senior. He figured out that he was gay years ago, but he’s only figured out his attraction to BDSM very recently. He’s been domming a friend, but they both know it’s not working, and the friend takes Sterling to a BDSM club, where he watches a well-respected dom Owen (and Sterling’s former English professor) scene with and then break off his relationship with a submissive woman. Sterling has a moment of clarity (he’s not a dominant, he’s a submissive and a masochist) and chases down Owen and asks Owen to be his dom. Owen, understandably, refuses. After all, he’s just broken off a relationship, Sterling’s a former student, not yet 21, and almost half his age. But Owen is not proof against Sterling’s persistence, and, to be honest, his beauty, and finally agrees to become Sterling’s dominant.

One thing to make clear is that this IS a dominant/submissive and sadist/masochistic relationship. Owen does not consider himself Sterling’s boyfriend. They do not have a traditional relationship. And although Sterling gets to come and their connection is a sexual one, because fundamentally, BDSM *is* aobut sex, Owen refuses to have either anal or oral sex with Sterling until Sterling is 21. Which pisses Sterling off, because he’s not a patient person, and over which they fight a few times. Which makes it awkward every now and then when they’re not in dom/sub roles and find they have very little in common. This is the one concern I had with the book: what kind of relationship can they have beyond the D/s? Because at the end of the book, they’re together as committed partners as well as dom/sub, and I think the relationship building gets skimmed a little too much and I wonder what they’ll talk about of an evening when they’re just lounging around together.

That aside, everything else is wonderfully done. The characterizations are perfectly clear: Sterling’s bratty but conflicted, so used to getting his own way, brought up to be a hard-ass by his dick of a father, but so desperate to submit, to serve, but so eager to get off because OMG, he’s 20 and a walking erection. And Owen’s older and wiser and very much in control but still vulnerable to a pretty pout and a desperate “please,” just like we all are. And oh, the BDSM is beautifully done. The scenes are hot and these boys TALK. In fact, that’s part of the characterization: both Sterling and Owen are in their heads too much, too smart not to take apart everything they do, alone and together. And so the reader understands every step of the way, everything that’s going on.

In fact, at a climactic (harhar) point in the book, Owen says to Sterling, “I’m not your father,” which causes Sterling to freak out and leave. And the characterization is so perfectly done that even though the scene was told from Owen’s perspective, I was in both of their heads to such an extent that I knew why Owen had said that (he wanted Sterling to know he wasn’t doing something to punish him the way Sterling’s asshole of a father did), felt his utter shock when Sterling reacted apparently illogically by running away from a reassurance, and yet, at the same time, completely understood WHY Sterling was running away (he thought Owen was saying that he thought Sterling was looking for a father figure and he felt Owen didn’t really know him). The scene was so well-done it actually pulled me out because I was astounded at how well I viscerally understood the motivations and feelings of both Sterling and Owen right away.

Back to the BDSM, though. It’s a very formal BDSM. Owen likes things just so and is very much into training Sterling. It sounds too much like hard work to me, especially since Sterling’s quite so much of a brat, but you make it work beautifully, precisely because it’s so much a part of their characters. And the BDSM is done lovingly and well. Here’s an description of Sterling’s masochism:

God, it hurt like nothing else ever. He screamed so desperately that it didn’t even come out very loud; there just wasn’t enough air behind it to create volume. It was like his nerve endings were using up all his oxygen, and he couldn’t breathe or think through the searing pain.

He couldn’t do anything. He was gone.

The scary part was how fucking good it felt, the bright agony ripping him free of restraints that weren’t made of rope or chain. He used the pain, just as Owen had told him to, shaped it, loved it, let it take him. Dimly, distantly, he felt his climax begin, lagging long moments behind his scream, an afterthought, as if his body was trying to kill the pain with pleasure, which was stupid, really, because they were both the same.

And one of Owen’s sadism:

“It’ll hurt,” Owen said, and there was something in his voice that told Sterling how much it would hurt and how much Owen wanted to do it. It was hard to wrap his head around at the beginning of their relationship; the way that for all Owen made him feel safe and protected, Owen got off on hurting him, leaving him bruised, marked, crying. With anyone else, that would have freaked Sterling out, but he didn’t just love Owen, he trusted him. Totally. No limits.

It was what allowed him to ask for more than he could take, made reckless by arousal, knowing that Owen was more aware of his limits than he was. Spanking him scarlet and hot turned Owen on, but controlling Sterling, reining him in, curbing his impulses, did even more for him, and Sterling knew that.

But both of these are told from Sterling’s perspective and brings up one tiny niggle more that’s my own personal issue more than anything else. You GET submission *and* masochism, or at least Sterling does a brilliant job of showing it to us and making us understand it. But when we’re in Owen’s head, it’s much more about the dominance than it is about the sadism. Yes, he gets off on hurting Sterling, but that’s much less explored than his dominance is. And that disappointed me slightly. But not enough not to thoroughly enjoy this book.

The book was a wonderful, slow, thoughtful read with some really REALLY great sex and a fascinating depiction of some very formal, very safe, and yet still emotionally dangerous BDSM. The plot of the book, such as it is, is focused on the emotional trajectory of the relationship and on Sterling’s issues with his idiotic father. There’s no suspense plot, no saving the world, nothing but two people falling in love as they explore each other, both physically and emotionally. Which is why the lack of exploration of what they have in common besides BDSM and hot hot sex was vaguely disappointing as well. But only vaguely. In the end, I trusted that they’d stay together because they were both too damn stubborn to do anything else: Bound and Determined indeed.

Grade: B+

Best regards,
-Joan/Sarah F.

This book can be purchased at Loose Id in ebook format.

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REVIEW: Tangle Girls (anthology edited by Nicole Kimberling)

Janine — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:00:31 +0000

Dear Readers,

Back in July of 2008, I reviewed Tangle XY, an anthology of short speculative m/m stories. Earlier this year, Blind Eye Books, the publisher of Tangle XY, came out with Tangle Girls, an f/f anthology. As with Tangle XY, some (not all) of the stories are multicultural, and many have fairy tale or science fiction elements, but in this anthology the commonality all the stories share is the focus on girls who love other girls. Here are my reviews of the six stories:

“Raccoon Skin” by J.D. EveryHope

In “Raccoon Skin,” Sophia, a college student, arrives at her parents’ home on a pre-dawn morning. After seeing that her parents’ trash can that has been upended by a raccoon, Sophia goes outside to put it back up, and while there, she sees crows attacking a golden eagle. The eagle falls to the snowy ground, and Sophia chases the crows away. Just as she is debating whether to take the eagle inside, the bird shifts shape and turns into a human girl — and not just any girl, but Sophia’s girlfriend, Caterina.

Caterina and Sophia met in college and began dating, but Sophia never told Caterina that she hadn’t come out to her parents. Now it seems Caterina has also been keeping secrets: not only is she a shapeshifter, she is also a princess from another realm, and her younger brothers’ lives are in danger. Caterina wants to return to her land and rescue her brothers, but her injuries are serious. Sophia convinces her to ask Sophia’s parents for shelter and help and allow Sophia to save her brothers instead.

Caterina gives Sophia a ring which will open a path to Caterina’s world when dawn arrives. Just as Sophia is about to go through the portal, a raccoon speaks and warns her that Beyond, where she is about to venture, is a dangerous place. Her odds of success will be better if she and the raccoon trade skins.

Sophia agrees. Clothed as a raccoon, she enters Beyond and it is indeed a dangerous journey. Fortunately, the raccoon skin proves very helpful.

“Raccoon Skin” is a charming quest story that reminded me a bit of some of fairy tales I read as a child. I loved the way the mundane was transformed into the magical, and enjoyed the clever ways Sophia found to see past the deceptive illusions of the Beyond. It was also neat to see the traditional gender role upended, so it was a heroine who charged to the rescue. I would have liked to see more of Sophia and Caterina’s relationship, but on the whole, I really enjoyed the story. My grade for “Raccoon Skin” is a B+.

“Amazons” by Jesse Sandoval

“Amazons” was the reason I plopped down $12.95 for Tangle Girls. I loved Sandoval’s story in Tangle XY, “Los Conversos.” The setting of “Amazons” is unnamed, although the title of course alludes to the Amazon. As the story, which appears to be historical, begins, its unnamed female narrator is rowing a boat on a jungle river. She observes the crocodile beneath the water and the black snakes hanging from the trees above with respect.

Once I saw one of those snakes lift a grown man off his feet and swallow him whole. The man pissed himself as the snake wrapped herself around him as if she were falling in love. She opened her thin mouth and took him in a deep kiss. I watched her eyes the entire time. She had the mesmerized gaze of utter adoration, as if this man’s form, his meat and muscle, had entranced her and drawn her into an unthinkable action.

I remember seeing that same unflinching stare long ago, looking back at me from a silver mirror. My hands trembled as I tried to load the pistol, the slender bullets wavered and slipped between my fingers. Then I caught sight of myself in a mirror. I gazed into my own eyes, the wide pupils dilated, entranced with desire. My reflection knew that I was a murderess before I did. She passed that assurance to me in a glance. My fingers have never trembled since.

How did the narrator come to look in the mirror and see a murderess? Since this story is only six pages long, I don’t want to give it away, but the story begins in Europe, where the main character met a woman named Maria, with whom she shared slices of cake and stories about the New World.

The imagery in “Amazons” has a hallucinatory beauty that captures what it is like to be drunk on love, willing to do anything for the other person. The story is haunting and powerful, though I wish it were longer so that I could feel I really knew Maria. I can’t wait for Jesse Sandoval to write a novel or a short story collection so that I can drown in his gorgeous prose. Ms. Kimerbling, if you’re reading this, can you do anything about that? My grade for “Amazons” is a B+/A-.

“The Conclave” by Trent Roman

Tanya Drake has been dating Erin, a centuries-old fey, but the relationship is becoming frustrating for her. The two met at the private Catholic school in which Tanya was enrolled. It wasn’t long before they became lovers. But Erin has a habit of comparing Tanya’s lovemaking to that of lovers from her past, lovers as famous as Sappho and Gengis Khan’s concubines. Erin also disappears for days on end only to reappear expecting the relationship to resume as though she’d never left.

After one such disappearance, Tanya tries to question Erin and find out how serious she is about their relationship. To make it up to Tanya, Erin offers to sneak her mortal lover into “the biggest bash in two worlds,” a party for immortal beings known as the Conclave. What kind of adventures will Tanya have at the Conclave, and how will they affect her relationship with Erin?

“The Conclave” is written in a crisp, snappy style I enjoyed. I liked the way Tanya and Erin arrived at the Conclave, too. But though Tanya is said to be a high school student, the character comes across as older. Erin is jaded and doesn’t treat Tanya that well, taking their relationship very lightly, so it’s hard to care about her, but Tanya isn’t sure if she’s serious in her feelings for Erin, either, so it’s also hard to care about how the relationship will change.

I felt that essentially, nothing that is deeply important to the characters happened in the story, so nothing that happened was all that important to me as a reader, either. After “Raccoon Skin” and “Amazons,” it was hard not to be disappointed in this one. My grade for “The Conclave” is a C-.

“Under Suspicion” by Dr. Philip Edward Kaldon

Set on the spaceship Mastodon, “Under Suspicion” begins when a shipwide alarm sounds, alerting United Star Fleet Ensign Lily Branoch and her fellow crewmembers to an accident in the main hanger. In the process of helping to rescue people trapped under “cargotainers,” Lily encounters a beautiful marine whose name she doesn’t catch. She glimpses the woman again before she learns that she is Lt. Cruz-Ortega.

Lily is powerfully attracted to the woman, so much so that she can’t get the lieutenant out of her mind. But this distraction becomes a problem when Lily begins to suspect that the beautiful Daniella may be involved in a plot to smuggle weapons off the Mastodon. Could Daniella Cruz-Ortega’s lovely face be hiding treachery? And even if not, will Lily ever get up the gumption to ask her out?

“Under Suspicion” was an enjoyable story and it probably had the most relationship focus of any of the stories in this collection. Lily was likable and the enigmatic Daniella was compelling. The worldbuilding was solid and I liked the military atmosphere. My main complaint is that due to the nature of the plot, the relationship between the two women did not develop that much. Nonetheless it was fun, though I would have liked it to be a bit more substantial. C+/B- for “Under Suspicion.”

“Cupcake” by Erin MacKay

Erin MacKay’s “Cupcake” takes place in the future, on a colonized world. The viewpoint character is Stasya, a professional assassin. As the story opens, Stasya receives an assignment from Rupi, a man who has hired her to kill in the past. This time Stasya is astonished at the target, whom she describes as “just a…a cupcake.”

Mitusko Jennings-Villega’s husband wants to collect on his wife’s life insurance policy, but Mitsuko is constantly watched by her wealthy father’s guards. To kill her, Stasya has to infiltrate “High Street,” Mitusko’s rarified world of corporate celebrities. Yet once she meets Mitusko, Stasya is in for a surprise. Mitusko realizes she is an assassin, and she is willing– no, ready — to die. Will Stasya be able to kill the woman she is beginning to admire and care for?

“Cupcake” is written in clean, straightforward prose and while the worldbuilding isn’t completely fresh, it’s well-executed. The story felt a little oppressive to me (though not nearly as much as MacKay’s story in Tangle XY, “Crossing the Distance”), but on the whole I liked it.

Stasya is a compelling character, though I wish her past, and especially her reason for becoming an assassin for hire, had made her more sympathetic. Mitsuko isn’t as morally ambiguous, but her life hasn’t been very meaningful. Though neither character is always likable, the story still kept me involved, probably because of the danger and high stakes. My grade for “Cupcake” is a B.

“Dead and the President” by Tenea D. Johnson

Set in a dystopian future, Tenea De. Johnson’s “Dead and the President” begins when the consciousness of the main character, a young black woman named Dead, is inhabiting the body of the President. Dead intends to speak to the world from within his body, but the President pulls out a gun and shoots himself in the head.

Dead then begins recounting her history to the reader. She was born in the Basin, where many people have inherited the special abilities given to blacks by a doctor who believed he was making genetic reparations. Dead’s talent is “phasing” into other people and controlling their actions.

Dead is a motherless twelve year old when she is tagged by the Internal Processing Department, which tracks those with unusual abilities, and uses her talent to escape. She ends up Topside, where life is much nicer and safer, but she can’t forget about the hungry kids she left behind in the Basin, and eventually, she hatches a plan to help them.

Dead has the potential to be a sympathetic character, and there were a number of relationships that could have been involving in this story, not just the sexual one Dead eventually has with another young woman, but also her friendships with a girl named Nina in the Basin, and with an elderly woman named Cecilia in Topside. But these pass by the reader quickly, like houses glimpsed briefly from the window of a moving car. It is hard to get invested in these people, even when they mean a lot to Dead, because we readers hardly get to spend time with them.

What gets the most attention in “Dead and the President” is the setting. Dead’s world is an interesting place, but I almost stopped reading a few pages in, when the unfamiliar terms became difficult to decipher. I still don’t understand exactly what a couple of them mean, even after reading certain paragraphs three or four times. Johnson has a nice writing style, and another thing I liked about the story was the way the futuristic setting reflected social and political injustice. This aspect of the worldbuilding was well handled and thought-provoking, but for me, it’s not enough to make up for what’s missing. C- for “Dead and the President.”

Overall, the anthology was a bit uneven, but still worth reading in my opinion, with four enjoyable stories and two weaker ones. I want to reiterate my plea for more fiction from Jesse Sandoval, who writes so beautifully. I will be keeping my eye out on future offerings from Blind Eye Books, too. My overall grade for Tangle Girls is a B-.

Sincerely,

Janine

This book can be purchased at Amazon. No ebook.

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CONVERSATIONAL REVIEW: Indiscreet by Carolyn Jewel

Jennie — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 10:00:00 +0000

PLEASE NOTE: this conversational review does contain some spoilers.

Jennie: I was one of many readers mightily impressed with Carolyn Jewel’s previous historical romance Scandal, which I read in January and graded an A-.

Janine: Totally with you on that. Scandal was one of the most impressive books I’ve read this year, and it’s stuck with me so much that I recently went back to my own review and raised the grade from an A- to an A-/A.

Jennie: I was very much looking forward to Indiscreet. While I had some problems with the second half of the story, overall, it did not disappoint.

Janine: Agreed again, although, as readers will see our opinions about what works in this book differ a bit more than they usually do.

Jennie: The book begins:

How everything started.

This incident took place at about two o’clock the morning of September 3, 1809. The location was the back parlor of a town house owned by the Duke of Buckingham but lived in by the Earl of Crosshaven on a ninety-nine-year lease, presently in its twenty-third year. It should be remarked that Lord Edward Marrack, the younger brother of the Marquess of Foye, was in attendance that night. Lord Edward had been something of a rake until his engagement to the daughter of a longtime family friend. The Earl of Crosshaven currently was a rake.

Several chapters start with this unconventional stage-setting device, and while it startled me at first, I found I rather liked it.

Janine: Although I liked the book very much, this device was one of the few things in it that did not work well for me. I was fine with it for the first chapter, but after that I often found these omniscient narration chapter openings distracting because I would get caught up in the action of the story and then would come a chapter break and this type of description and everything would come to a standstill. And often the information being given would be something I already knew, so it was frustrating — though not enough to seriously mar my enjoyment of the book.

Jennie: Hmm. Well, I think it worked for me for an unusual reason: it did take me out of the story (which is something I also don’t like, usually), but in a way that I found slyly amusing, a sort of wink and nod acknowledgement that it was just a story, after all.

I also liked the scene that follows this introduction, in part because I really wasn’t sure who the hero was or where the story was headed. The Earl of Crosshaven proceeds to boast that he has seduced Miss Sabine Goddard, a young lady recently come to town and one whose reputation had so far been spotless. Lord Marrack disapproves of his friend bandying the young woman’s name around; he doesn’t know her, but he does know that the boast will be all over town by the next day and that she is effectively ruined. His last thought is that her uncle, an eminent scholar who has recently been knighted (the reason for the Goddards’ presence in London), and Sabine’s guardian, will probably put her out on the street when he hears the story.

Janine: Yes, this was a very good scene and it intrigued me on multiple levels.

Jennie: Cut to a year and a half later, where the action has switched to Turkey. Lord Marrack has become the Marquess of Foye with the untimely death of his brother, and has fled England following the breaking-off of his engagement. He encounters the infamous Miss Goddard and her uncle at a party, and immediately finds himself drawn to her.

The scandal that Crosshaven’s lie produced has forced Sabine and her uncle, Sir Henry Goddard, to withdraw from English society, and they are traveling for a book Sir Henry is writing. Sabine acts as an assistant and to some degree a caretaker to her uncle, who is in poor health.

Contrary to Foye’s earlier speculation, Sir Henry Goddard did not turn his back on his niece after the scandal with Crosshaven erupted. However, Sabine is convinced that he does not believe her protestations of innocence, and indeed he does treat her interactions with men with suspicion. The affair has obviously strained their close relationship (Sabine’s parents died when she was very young; Sir Henry is the only real parent she has ever known).

Foye has been made cynical by the way his engagement ended. He is determined to marry an older, experienced woman if he marries at all; he’ll have no love match. His attraction to the young Miss Goddard (23 to his 38) is inconvenient for him, and he tries to fight it.

I know a lot of readers aren’t crazy about huge h/h age differences; honestly, in the past I’ve never been much bothered by them, and just as I began to get old enough to perhaps view them differently, they became a lot less common in romances. The age difference between Foye and Sabine in Indiscreet didn’t bother me, but the agonizing Foye does over it did annoy me. To be fair, I suppose that a hero that recognizes the potential problems and is concerned about them isn’t a bad thing. It’s just annoying because it’s not really a “problem” for which there is any resolution. He’s not going to get any younger, and she’s going to age at the same rate that he does. So the only resolution is for him to get over it, and the reader is aware of that from the start. Which makes any time spent on the issue feel like a bit too much.

Janine: I understand your perspective, but this didn’t bother me. I think I would have had a harder time with the fifteen-year age difference had it been presented as no problem whatsoever for either of the characters. As it was, the fact that Foye agonized over it made me like him better than I think I would have if he had been excited to have found himself a much younger woman.

Jennie: Yes, I’m not sure what sort of acknowledgement I would’ve preferred, because I think an acknowledgement was necessary. I just find that sometimes the more characters agonize over something that I know can’t really be overcome, the more annoyed I get. So I guess I prefer to have such agonizing be as succint as possible.

More interesting is Foye’s insecurity over his looks. He is not your typical breathtakingly handsome romance hero – his features are often described as “irregular”, and he’s a big hulk of a man. He’s somewhat self-conscious about his lack of beauty, and tends to be vain about his dress, which I found a touching detail.

Janine: I liked that very much too. Just in general I loved Foye — more on that later.

Jennie: Sabine, of course, has also been burned (and has her own set of insecurities, chiefly about being very well educated; when she first came to London she discovered just how unusual her interests made her). The fact that Foye was a friend of Crosshaven’s does not make her at all inclined to think well of him. In fact, when they first meet, she is afraid that he intends to expose her to the circle of expatriates and British military officers she and her uncle socialize with, or that he may proposition her. Thus, she’s extremely wary about the interest Foye shows in her.

Janine: I loved the tension that resulted from that. Foye and Sabine both had this heightened awareness of one another that was delicious to read about.

Jennie: Yes, and I loved the fact that as a result, Sabine’s awareness wasn’t based on attraction, at first. I find it so rare in a romance that either the hero or the heroine isn’t immediately attracted, that every instance thrills me a bit.

Through a series of meetings Foye and Sabine do come to a wary sort of understanding, and eventually, love. Nevertheless, there remain some significant barriers to their HEA. This all occurs in the first half of the book. The ease with which those barriers were swept away made me realize how flimsy they were to start with. (Which is often the case in a romance, if you think about it. I see it as an author’s job to make me not think about it.)

The second half of the book shifts from the interpersonal conflict between Sabine and Foye to a conflict that is almost entirely external and action-based. I liked this section less. I do sometimes like action, especially when it’s well written. But the lack of hero/heroine conflict in this section and the abrupt shift from small and internal to large and external left the book feeling unbalanced. I think it may have worked better if the sections were switched – at times the story was vaguely reminiscent of Laura Kinsale’s The Dream Hunter – a book I love. That book has the big action-adventure part first, and then the story shifted to a smaller, more character-driven tale. Somehow this works better for me.

That’s not to say that there is no interpersonal conflict in the latter half of the book, but it’s mostly beneath the surface and focused on the hero and heroine’s doubts and insecurities. I think it’s tricky to write “does s/he really want and love me?” hand-wringing in such a way that it’s not tiresome, and I did occasionally find it tiresome in Indiscreet.

Janine: Thanks for the shout out to Kinsale’s fabulous The Dream Hunter. I do agree that the two books were a bit similar. As for the internal conflict in the second half, I loved the subtlety and complexity of it.

As mentioned before I loved Foye. I loved the way he transformed, or rather, showed another facet of his personality, in the second half of the book. Where he had been a thoughtful, even sensitive man, he also showed that when it was necessary for him to have a harder edge and do what was necessary to ensure his and Sabine’s survival, he could do that as well.

I felt that Sabine’s response to that was fascinating. While she was grateful, she also wasn’t sure she recognized him as the man she’d fallen in love with, and this made her uncertain of her feelings for him and his for her. Foye sensed her reaction, and what’s more, he was also torn between his desire for her and his need to protect her good name. I thought that all this added layers of complexity to the story and I enjoyed it very much.

Jennie: You make a good point, and it reminds me of something I’d forgotten that I did want to mention. I thought that Sabine’s reaction to being disguised as a boy was very interesting and well-done. Her observations about the freedoms her disguise allowed her, in spite of the fact that her male persona was in a much lower social position, were really compelling and thought-provoking.

Janine: Agreed. It also highlighted Sabine’s vulnerability and added tension to the story. So overall, I liked the contrast between the first half of the book and the second, after I got used to it. My main issue with the second half was that it made me think of a friend of mine. She is Lebanese-American as well as a romance reader, and she often finds it difficult to read romances set in the Middle East due to negative stereotypes. As much as I enjoyed Indiscreet myself, I would feel leery about recommending this book to her, because none of the Turkish characters were fleshed out, including the villain.

Jennie: Hmm. Well, I did not feel that most of the Turkish characters conformed to any negative Middle Eastern stereotypes that I’m aware of. That said, I agree that they were not fleshed out at all. The story (and most of the characterization) focused on Foye and Sabine, so it wasn’t quite so noticeable to me that there weren’t any fully realized native characters. Though I was a bit uneasy at the “white slaver” aspect of the villain’s character, because that does conform to some stereotypes in my mind. So I can understand you having qualms about recommending it to your friend.

To get back to my complaints about the second half of the book, I want to be clear that I’m not saying it’s bad by any means; it’s really not. I have a lamentable tendency when reviewing to expound at length on the negative, and I don’t want to ignore the positives of what was overall a very good book. Indiscreet features excellent prose, sympathetic and well-drawn characters (even the villainous Crosshaven is allowed a small measure of redemption in the end), and an unusual setting. It’s really only the pacing and arrangement of the plot that I have any real issue with (minor complaints about hand-wringing aside).

Janine: I didn’t have a problem with the arrangement of the plot at all. There were a couple of happenings in the last chapter of the book that raised questions in my mind but to go into them would involve revealing some big spoilers, so I’ll refrain. Suffice to say that I thought the ending felt a bit rushed.

I want to take a moment to appreciate Jewel’s prose. Few authors do a better job of conveying a character’s interior thoughts and emotional responses. Take for example this excerpt, from Foye and Sabine’s first conversation, when Sabine is telling Foye’s fortune based on a reading of what remains in his teacup.

“Lady Foye, perhaps?” she said in a sweet voice.

“No,” he said after too long a silence. “There is no Lady Foye.”

She looked up, interested more by his flat tone of voice than by his declaration of bachelorhood. He wasn’t looking at her. His attention was interior, on some deep and private pain. She hadn’t expected to see anguish, yet that was what she saw in his eyes, and her heart pinched a little on his behalf.

“Another woman, then,” she said. Looking at Lord Foye, with his irregularly put together face, was suddenly too intimate an experience. His eyes were too raw with loss. Had she inadvertently reminded him of a lost love? “Someone who will love you, my lord. Exactly as you deserve.”

Without thinking, she leaned forward, peering into his face. Foye’s gaze came back to the present. Their eyes locked, and with no warning, her breath caught in her throat. Her skin prickled up and down her body, all in pointed awareness of the man sitting across from her. He wasn’t handsome. He wasn’t at all. But Sabine’s heart beat hard against her ribs as if he were.

She leaned away, still struggling to get enough air into her lungs. She felt she had not moved soon enough, that she had unwittingly allowed an intimacy she would never permit in actual fact. A spark of fear settled in her chest because even with the distance between them, she remained lost in his eyes. Lost.

It was Foye who broke their gaze. “What else do the tea leaves predict?” he softly asked.

I think that’s just marvelous writing, the kind that makes me want to savor every word. There is such a smoothness to the language here and yet it doesn’t call attention to itself because it directs all of our attention to the characters and what they are feeling. The result is some powerful emotion in the reader. This is a writer at the top of her craft, which is why, caveats aside, I highly recommend this book.

Jennie:I agree with you about the gorgeousness of the prose (and about the rushed ending, alas). My grade for Indiscreet is a B+.

Janine: Mine is a B+/A-.

This book can be purchased at Amazon or in ebook format from Sony or other etailers.

This book was provided to the reviewer by either the author or publisher. The reviewer did not pay for this book but received it free. The Amazon Affiliate link earns us a 6-7% affiliate fee if you purchase a book through the link (or anything for that matter) and the Sony link is in conjunction with the sponsorship deal we made for the year of 2009. We do not earn an affiliate fee from Sony through the book link.

ETA by Janine (in the way of FTC disclosure): I met Carolyn Jewel at RWA this past July and had the opportunity to tell her that I enjoyed Scandal.

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REVIEW: The Last Will of Moira Leahy by Therese Walsh

Janine — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:00:55 +0000

Dear Ms. Walsh,

You don’t know me, but I sometimes lurk at your blog, Writer Unboxed, which is one of the best blogs for writers I know of. I’ve been following it since the days when you were writing this book, under the working title of Unbounded, so when Jane told me that we had been sent an ARC of The Last Will of Moira Leahy, I was interested in reading it.

The Last Will of Moira Leahy is narrated in both first person and third person. The first person sections take place in the present day and are narrated by twenty-five year old Maeve Leahy, the book’s main character. The third person sections take place between 1995 and 2000, and are mostly written in the POV of Maeve’s identical twin, Moira.

It becomes clear early in the present day story that Maeve lost her twin nine years ago at the age of sixteen, so although we are not told the details of how and why Moira’s life ended, we do know that the “Out of Time” third person sections, which begin when the twins are happy ten year olds, are slowly and inexorably leading us to a very painful event.

Meanwhile, in the present day, Maeve, now a foreign languages professor thanks to an accelerated academic career, is haunted by Moira’s absence. She bleaches her red hair because she can’t bear to look at her reflection, since it reminds her of her twin. She never visits her parents in Maine, doesn’t date anyone and doesn’t play music. She focuses almost entirely on her work and has only three friends — her roommate and childhood friend, Kit; Garrick, an elderly antique store owner; and Garrick’s grandson Noel, whom she has known since they were both freshmen at Betheny U.

Although Noel is now away in Europe, his years-long friendship with Maeve has taught her how to bid at auctions, and since the time of year in which she lost Moira has arrived and Maeve is badly in need of a distraction, she decides to attend one.

Once there, Maeve finds her attention captured by a Javanese knife called a keris. It reminds her of a similar blade which her grandfather once owned, and which she lost. She ends up bidding a lot more than she planned to in order to acquire it, and afterward, she learns from Garrick that kerises are said to have magical properties.

Mysterious things begin to happen soon afterward. Maeve has been hearing piano music for a while, but now these experiences intensify. She is haunted by strange dreams, and discovers a book about Javanese weapons nailed to her door, and then a note bearing only the word eling, Javanese for “remember.”

In the interspersed third person sections, we learn that Maeve and Moira were very close, even having their own language in early childhood, and a sixth sense connection with one another that persisted well into their teen years. Their mother did all that she could to distinguish between them, to encourage them to grow in different directions. But when Maeve and Moira developed feelings for the same boy, and he was only interested in one of them, things began to go awry…

Back in the present day, Maeve receives an invitation from a maker of Javanese knives to come find him in Italy and learn more about her keris. As a young girl, Maeve always wanted to travel, but she buried that dream at the age of sixteen, and has never been out of the country. But the people in her life insist that she go, and she finds herself on a plane to Rome.

In Italy, Noel is waiting, and Maeve has been missing him badly. She is afraid to admit that her feelings for Noel may be more than platonic, afraid to live her life fully again. But when more mysterious notes appear, and a man who wants the keris begins to seem dangerous, Maeve is brought closer — to her painful memories, to romantic feelings for Noel, to herself, and to Moira’s last will.

The Last Will of Moira Leahy is a cross genre novel, with elements of mystery, women’s fiction, paranormal/magical realism, coming of age novel and romance blended together almost seamlessly, an impressive feat. I loved the way all those genres entwined.

The book got off to a slow start for me because the present day sections within the first hundred or so pages struck me as melancholy. While this was totally fitting to Maeve’s circumstances, I found myself looking forward to the “Out of Time” sections in Moira’s third person POV, which showed the twins’ growing up years and provided a respite from Maeve’s suffering.

Maeve seemed older than her twenty-five years, and while I understood that this was because she was so steeped in grief, there were times when I wished she’d show more signs of youthfulness or immaturity because it was difficult to remember that she wasn’t in her thirties. It wasn’t until Maeve arrived in Rome, about one-third of the way though the book, and her relationship with Noel was revealed, that I became deeply engrossed in the story and from then on, it was impossible to put the book down.

I loved Noel — the section in which his feelings for Maeve came to the fore was touching, romantic and in many ways my favorite part of the book. I did wonder though, if Noel wasn’t a little too perfect, a little too much exactly what Maeve needed. It seemed like he was patient when she needed patience and impatient when she needed a push.

But this is not something I can complain about too much because Noel was such a great guy and so different from the typical romance hero — perceptive, artistic, tender, but at the same time romantic, sexy, and so clearly in love with Maeve that I was rooting for him to get the girl and for Maeve to let herself find happiness again.

As for Maeve, she was a somber, sensitive woman whose grief for her twin was still palpable even after nine years. Even though I wanted her to move on, I empathized with her inability to do so, and when the tragedy she had suffered was fully revealed, I cried so hard that I had to wipe my glasses over and over.

The teenaged Moira was more flawed, but it didn’t make her any less sympathetic to me, and I also felt a lot of compassion for the girls’ parents.

All the settings were beautifully evoked, Rome especially, and the last two thirds of the book were so gripping that I forgot the rest of my life and became wholly absorbed in the story. This book was ultimately about healing from grief, about Maeve’s relationship with Moira, and about remembering past and yet letting it go. While I wish that the first third had been as engaging to me as the rest, and that the romance had been longer and more drawn out (romantic relationships being my favorite kind to read about), I think this was ultimately an emotional and rich journey, and I recommend it highly. B+ for The Last Will of Moira Leahy.

Sincerely,

Janine

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REVIEW: A Most Lamentable Comedy by Janet Mullany

Jayne — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 10:00:32 +0000

Dear Ms. Mullany,

Two years ago I feel in love with “The Rules of Gentility.” Its first person spoofing of the Rules of Writing a Regency Romance had me in stitches. When Janine mentioned that you were going to have a sequel to it published this summer, I rubbed my hands with glee.

Deep in debt, widowed Lady Caroline Elmhurst and her maid Mary are decamping from their rented room literally one step ahead of the bailiff. Caroline’s two marriages – first to much older man who left her money and second to a young man who spent that money – plus her slight slip in social mores by allowing a man unrelated to her pay her rent, have left her with a soiled reputation among the ton. Luckily for her, she’s received an invitation to a country house party given by an amateur thespian with plans to stage Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” using his guests and servants as the actors. With luck, she’ll be able to find a wealthy man here to marry.

Mr. Nicholas Congrevance and his valet Barton, lately of the Continent, are also among the guests present. In the past ten years since leaving England, Nicholas has turned his hand to many occupations, including cicisbeo, and changed his name almost as much. After the servants of his latest lover’s husband toss him in a canal in Venice, he’s overcome with a desire to see his homeland. And hopes that he can find yet another wealthy wife or widow among the guests to charm and fleece.

So the two of them meet among the many guests roped into presenting a play about star crossed lovers and amateur actors. But what will happen after each discovers the true financial status of the other and how will their hearts work out a future in the face of their pasts.

Anyone expecting a regular Regency novel ought best to change their expectations before starting “Lamentable.” As with “Gentility,” this is a delightful spoof of what we’ve come to expect in this historic subgenre. Caroline and Nicholas are cheerfully honest with themselves, if not with each other, about their plans to take the other for everything they can get. The only difference is that Caro needs marriage to remain halfway respectable in society while Nicholas plans to take the money and run. If they had been plotting against anyone else, I would have had more trouble with their dishonesty but since they are each other’s marks, I can sit back and enjoy the fun.

The humor is razor sharp yet underneath lies the precarious situation of Caro and Nicholas’s need for money and the risk that they will fall out of polite society, both of which were ever present in this age. They are surrounded by a complicated set of secondary characters, many of whom we first met in “Gentility,” and several of whom we see from a different POV than in that book.

Since this book isn’t trying to be a serious presentation of Regency life, even Romance Regency Life, I can accept the unconventional relationships among the secondary characters, though I still found them odd, and that these people would be accepted in polite society even if it is in the country. After all, how likely is it that a man, his wife and his son would also be in the company of two of his former mistresses, his son by one of those women and her current beau? Plus his mother and her second husband.

I was sorry that Nicholas turns to a tired romance cliche late in the book and that Caroline believes it. There’s also a deus ex machina character who suddenly springs into the story and allows for a happy ending for our lovers. But despite his appearance which Changes All, I laughed hysterically during the scenes in which he interacts with Caroline and at the correspondence which is sprinkled through this part of the novel.

The final resolution of Caro and Nicholas’s romance is a farce** in the positive sense of the word rather than as a mockery or sham. I love that Caro is well aware that she’s being manipulated and that Nicholas has his doubts about the whole enterprise. Caro also calls Nicholas on his earlier action that I disliked and generally gives him hell – much to the dismay of some of his workers. But he knows that she’s the woman for him and underneath it all, she’s aware that he is her true love as well. A final thing that delighted me is how you worked out a final station in life for these two which fits with the character limitations you’ve given them.

Comedy is so subjective with one person’s delight being another’s “I simply don’t get it” so I hesitate to recommend this as a comedy but those who like conventions turned on their heads and something slightly different might enjoy this. Since I’m a reader who is tired of yet one more Duke spy/rake crossed with a martyr heroine who tosses convention aside for some quick, hawt sex, I dove into this with gusto. If it had not been for those two issues I mentioned, this one would have garnered an A range grade but as it is, I give it a strong B+.

~Jayne

**(Wikipedia: A farce is a comedy written for the stage or film which aims to entertain the audience by means of unlikely, extravagant, and improbable situations, disguise and mistaken identity, verbal humour of varying degrees of sophistication, which may include sexual innuendo and word play, and a fast-paced plot whose speed usually increases, culminating in an ending which often involves an elaborate chase scene. Farce is also characterized by physical humour, the use of deliberate absurdity or/of nonsense, and broadly stylized performances.)

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This book was provided to the reviewer by either the author or publisher. The reviewer did not pay for this book but received it free.

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REVIEW: Quatrain by Sharon Shinn

Janine — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 21:00:05 +0000

Dear Ms. Shinn,

I remember being very excited when I first heard about your plans to write an anthology of four novellas set on four different worlds, the places first introduced in Archangel, Heart of Gold, Summers at Castle Auburn and Mystic and Rider. I’m happy to report that I enjoyed all the novellas in Quatrain to varying degrees. Here are my reviews of them:

“Flight,” the first novella, is set on Samaria, the world popularized by Archangel and its sequels. A few of Samaria’s people have wings and live in the high reaches of the angel holds. The angels, as they are known, also have the power to sing prayers for weather intercessions from the god Jovah. This makes them some of the most powerful people on Samaria, although they are as fallible as anyone else.

Even more powerful is the archangel, who rules all the angels. Since “Flight” takes two years before the events of Archangel, the archangel at this time is Raphael, a selfish and corrupt man. As the novella begins, Raphael and some of his fellow angels from the angel hold of Windy Point arrive at a farming community in Samaria’s Jordana province to pray for sunlight after many days of rain.

The story is narrated by Salome, a woman whose distant past was colorful but who has settled down and become a cook in the farm’s kitchen. Salome wants nothing more than to raise her niece, Sheba, in safety and peace, and thinks that one of Sheba’s best prospects is a devoted young man named David.

But Sheba is a pretty, flirtatious seventeen year old, not ready to settle down. She longs for romance and adventure as much as Salome craves security and safety for her. And no one represents romance and adventure more than the angels.

Unfortunately, Salome and Raphael are old enemies. Salome tries to remain hidden from Raphael’s sight during his visit, but when she slips into the kitchen for a nighttime meal, she finds him waiting for her. Raphael has recognized by Sheba’s resemblance to Salome that Salome must be nearby, and he wants to torment Salome with the power he holds over her.

During their conversation, another angel named Stephen is mentioned, and it becomes clear that Stephen and Salome were once romantically involved. In those days, Salome was an angel-seeker, a kind of groupie to the angels who hopes to bear an angel child. Despite her current bitterness toward angels, Salome is not entirely over Stephen, whom Raphael tells her left Windy Point for another angel hold following Salome’s departure.

Will Salome be able to protect Sheba from the glamorous lure of the angels? Will she reunite with Stephen and will they be able to forgive one another for past wrongs? And what of Raphael and the danger he represents? “Flight” answers all these questions.

While the novella contains a couple of romantic pairings, the central story is about Salome’s need to protect Sheba from Raphael and her own recklessness. For the most part, this story is well executed. Although I did feel that Salome had a change of heart that happened too quickly, otherwise her character was extremely well-drawn.

Salome and Stephen’s relationship felt a bit rushed to me, and it seemed like most of the interesting events in that relationship happened in their past and not during the course of the story, but I still liked Stephen a lot. The other romance (I don’t want to say too much about it) was touching and sweet.

Samaria is a fascinating place, and Raphael a delicious villain, the kind I love to hate. Sheba was a complex and believable young woman, and the secondary characters were all believable as well. As usual for me, I savored your prose. Although I would have liked more romantic developments in the two love stories, I enjoyed “Flight” and I give it a B.

“Blood” takes place on the world your readers have encountered in your novel Heart of Gold, which is peopled by three races, the gulden, the albino, and the indigo. As in Heart of Gold, the point of tension here is the difference between gulden and indigo societies when it comes to gender relations. Geldricht, the country of the golden-skinned race, has a patriarchal system while Inrhio, where the blue-skinned people live, has a matriarchal one.

The protagonist of “Blood” is Kerk, a gulden young man, who, as the novella opens, has just arrived with his family in the unnamed indigo city where it takes place. The differences between this city and Geldricht are so stark that at first Kerk can hardly take them all in.

Kerk is a kind of stepchild in his family (his exact relationship with them is revealed only gradually), and he knows his situation is therefore somewhat precarious. He is lucky to have survived to adulthood because before the age of twelve, children have no rights whatsoever in Geldricht. As the story reveals, the gulden’s social system works when the adult male in charge of the family is benevolent but fails when he isn’t.

Kerk’s stepfather Brolt has given Kerk a position in the family’s company. Kerk is hardworking and bright, but he worries that when Makk, Brolt’s biological son, reaches twelve, he himself will be displaced.

Although Kerk is close to Tess, his stepmother, he still remembers his biological mother, who took his baby sister and ran away when Kerk was seven. Such runaways are not entirely uncommon among the gulden. Women whose husbands or fathers are abusive sometimes leave their family and make for the indigo city, despite the grave dangers inherent in doing so.

Now that he is in the same city with her, Kerk can’t stop thinking of the woman who gave birth to him and raised him for seven years. He is determined to find her and try to reconnect.

When Brolt gives him a few days off from work, Kerk takes advantage of the opportunity to look for his mother. His search takes him to the Lost City, a place where impoverished gulden women and their children live. He doesn’t find his mother there, but an indigo woman confronts him about his presence in what is a refuge for women seeking to escape gulden men.

In the course of their argument, the woman explains that she aids the runaway women, and Kerk realizes that she might be able to help him find his mother. The two go to a cafe and the indigo woman introduces herself as Jalciana or Jalci for short. Jalci peppers Kerk with questions and he tells her a portion of his life story, but only a portion.

“Why did she leave your father? The usual reasons, I suppose?” He gave her a cold look. “What would those be, in your opinion?” She waved a hand. “Cruelty, abuse, starvation. Was your father a mean man?”

Kerk narrowed his eyes and did not answer. A gulden man did not disparage his father, not to anyone, even if his father was dead. Kerk would never speak a word of his father’s rages, his screaming fits, the beatings he had administered to his wife and his son.

Jalci agrees to help Kerk, and takes him to a compound of buildings. In the compound’s office, Jalci introduces Kerk to Del, a gulden woman whose first reaction to Kerk’s presence is hostile. Eventually, though, Del agrees to ask her contacts for information that will lead Kerk to his mother.

Afterward, Jalci takes Kerk to a community center where he sees young gulden boys playing the game of baltreck in the gym. The boys, who don’t see gulden men often, are fascinated by Kerk and want him to teach them to improve their play. Kerk is pulled into the game, and in the process, he sees how much these boys need a father figure, someone to teach them right from wrong.

As he returns to the compound periodically to inquire if his mother has been heard from, Kerk grows closer to the fatherless boys — and to Jalci. But what would his stepfather say if he knew that Kerk was going to such a place, and that after his visits there, he always dines out with a blueskin heiress? Is Kerk putting his position within Brolt’s company and the only family he has ever known in jeopardy by consorting with a young woman who behaves differently from any woman he knows? What about Tess, who has raised Kerk since age seven? How will she feel about Kerk’s search for his biological mother? And what will Kerk find at the end of that search?

“Blood” is a multifaceted jewel of a story. On one level it is about Kerk’s search for his mother, on another about his assimilation into the world of the indigo’s city, which is so different from Geldricht, and on yet another, it is about his growing emotional intimacy with Jalci. Ultimately, though, “Blood” is also about our universal need for connection and the way it can transcend our differences.

I loved everything about Kerk — his honor, his strength, his decency and his capacity for empathy. I loved the way he struggled to open his mind to encompass the differences between his culture and that of the indigo, and his willingness to do so. In fact the only criticism I have of the story was that I thought he was a little too quick to do so, and a bit too good to be true. But since he is now one of my favorites among your heroes, I can’t complain too much about this.

I also loved the gradual way the relationships in this novella unfolded, from Kerk’s family ties to his growing closeness to the boys at the community center and his coming to see Jalciana with new eyes.

As for Jalci, she was also likable, though impulsive and quick to speak her mind. I felt that she was what Kerk needed, whether he knew it or not. Like him, she was caring, strong-minded and empathetic, and if neither of them was what the other was used to in terms of behavior from the opposite sex, that was not just part of the conflict, but also part of the attraction.

Kerk and Jalci both represent their societies — Kerk the patriarchal gulden and Jalci the matriarchal indigo — but they are also the best of those societies. Although there were times when their differences tried their patience, they never asserted their superiority over the other, or tried to steamroll over each other.

The novella shows that sexism in either direction is not a good thing, and it is Kerk and Jalci’s ability to begin to negotiate a relationship of equals, one that is based on trust and admiration, that gives me a lot of optimism for their future, though I know they will face challenges.

My favorite scene in the novella was not a romantic one, but rather the scene in which Kerk’s stepfather learns about Kerk’s activities, and reacts to them. I don’t want to reveal what happens, but when I read this scene, I was completely enthralled.

The secondary characters in this novella were wonderfully well-drawn. The world in which the story is set is a complex, fascinating place in its diversity, and reading about it has left me greedy for more. More about Kerk and Jalci, more about Kit and Nolan, more about the gulden and the indigo, and what about a story featuring the albino? Please, write more. In the meantime, I give “Blood” an A-.

“Gold,” the third novella in this collection, unspools like a ball of magic yarn in the forest we readers first visited in Summers at Castle Auburn, some twenty years after the events of that story. Zara, the princess of the realm and daughter of characters from Summers at Castle Auburn, is traveling through the forest with a guardsman, Orlain, to the magical kingdom of Alora, which is hidden between the trees.

Zara has never been to Alora, but her great-uncle Jaxon lives there, as does his love Rowena, queen of the magical beings known as the aliora. Now Zara has been sent to Jaxon and Rowena because Castle Auburn may soon be attacked. Until they know the war is over, Zara’s parents want their children hidden in safety, so Zara and her brother Keesen are both sent away, in opposite directions, so that if one is captured the other may still survive.

But there is danger in going to Alora, because no human who has entered it has ever returned permanently to live among mankind. Jaxon is the only man who can move between the fey realm and the human one, but even he is always restless to return to Alora. To ward Zara from Alora’s enchantment, Zara’s mother, an herbalist, has given Zara potions which will remind her of home. She has also laden Zara with gold jewelry, since the aliora cannot touch the metal without feeling pain.

Seventeen year old Zara is concerned for her loved ones and filled with trepidation about visiting Alora. She does not want to forget her parents and brother, so she promises not to remove any of the gold pieces from her body, and to drink a vial of potion each night.

On the way to Alora, Zara and Orlain bicker, and Zara is miffed that the guardsman expects her to help him make camp instead of showing her the solicitude due a princess. Zara says she will marry for love, not politics, and describes the man she’ll give her heart to thus:

“He must be handsome and funny and intelligent and brave,” I burst out, goaded past endurance. “He doesn’t have to be noble, but he has to have an elegance of mind. And he will love me. He’ll shield me from the wind if it’s blowing and from the wet if it’s raining. He’ll–he’ll make great sacrifices to attain me, and he won’t care if those sacrifices put him in danger. It wouldn’t matter to him if I wasn’t a princess. He would love me just as much if I was a tavern girl. And he will never say an unkind word to me as long as he lives.”

There was as short silence after I finished up my list of attributes. “Well,” Orlain said. “I’m surprised it’s taken you this long to find him.”

The truth is that Zara is in love with Orlain, but she has no idea if he returns her feelings. Most of the time, he seems indifferent to her, but when Zara’s uncle Jaxon arrives and leads them to Alora’s borders, Orlain shows concern for Zara and promises to return once every ten days in order to see how she is faring, and bring her news of home.

Alora proves to be as ethereal and beautiful place as the aliora themselves, who look “as if moonlight had mated with a weeping willow and tried to produce a human shape.” They welcome Zara wholeheartedly and only her gold jewelry prevents them from touching her. But as she grows to know them, Zara feels horrible each time one of her bracelets burns an aliora’s skin, and she starts to remove her gold pieces.

Life in Alora is so contenting and wonderful, and Rowena’s son Royven begins to court Zara. Will Zara remember her love for her parents and brother, whose lives are in grave danger? Will Orlain return in ten days, as he promised, and if he does, will Zara still love him? Will she ever see Castle Auburn again?

I enjoyed “Gold” quite a bit, although it is not a perfect story. It is clear what Zara’s response to life in Alora will be from the outset, since it is heavily foreshadowed, and even if it weren’t, anyone who has ever read stories about humans entering fairy kingdoms would know what to expect. For this reason, I was more absorbed in the parts of the novella set outside Alora than in those set within it. I also wished that Zara had grown up a bit more during the course of the story.

But I loved the fairy tale feel of this novella. The descriptions of Alora were as magical as the place itself, and made me feel as though I, too, had entered an enchanted kingdom. I also loved the small fantastical details like the effects her mother’s potions had on Zara, and the way Alora’s borders shifted.

You have a knack for writing terrific, sympathetic male characters, and Orlain was one. Though a simple guardsman, he was also steadfast, loyal and determined. I wanted more of him, but Zara’s interactions with him were wonderful, and I enjoyed every scene he appeared in, so I give “Gold” a B+.

“Flame,” the fourth novella in Quatrain, is a prequel to your Twelve Houses series, which is set on a world where people with magical abilities, known as mystics, are sometimes persecuted for those talents. “Flame” takes place shortly before the events of Mystic and Rider, and Senneth, the heroine of that book, is also the main character here.

When the novella begins, Senneth, who has the ability to call forth and put out fire, is visiting with a relative named Evelyn in the province of Kianlever. Evelyn persuades Senneth to dress up for a dinner with guests of hers, which include a couple named Albert and Betony, and their neighbors, a brother and sister named Degarde and Julia. Julia’s toddler, Halie, is also present.

The conversation turns to Albert’s failed attempts at a trade arrangement with men from the nearby Lirrenlands. Senneth, who lived with a Lirren clan for a while, gives Albert pointers on earning their trust, and he asks her to join him on his next scheduled meeting with them, which is only days away. Because it seems rude to refuse, Senneth reluctantly agrees.

Shortly after that, the restless Halie catches her clothes on fire while running around and playing, and Senneth uses her power to put out the flames. There is some tension in the four guests’ reactions to the revelation that Senneth is a mystic, but they are also grateful to her for dousing the little girl before she can come to harm, and Senneth journeys with the group to their town of Benneld as planned.

Once there, Senneth is put in a quandary by Degarde’s fascination with her. He keeps asking her personal questions she does not feel comfortable answering, and wants to pursue a relationship with her, though she does not reciprocate his interest. Things get even more complicated when a fire bursts out in Benneld and Senneth’s abilities are revealed to the townspeople.

I enjoyed “Flame” more than I expected to. I am the kind of reader who prefers to read about new characters rather than revisiting protagonists from earlier works, and I also prefer other types of fantasy to high fantasy.

But “Flame” won me over — in fact I stayed up late to see how Senneth’s new acquaintances would deal with her powers. Senneth has always been a strong, self-reliant and sympathetic heroine, and the ominous sense of danger she faced kept me turning the pages even before that danger presented itself. I wasn’t sure which, if any, of Senneth’s new acquaintances could be trusted, and that made me keenly feel what it must be like to be a mystic in her position.

I did guess who the arsonist in the story was and there were a few scenes that were a bit similar to things we’ve seen in the other Twelve Houses books. But despite that, “Flame” really sucked me in, so I give it a B/B+.

To readers who are not familiar with your books, Quatrain will serve as an introduction to the angel series and the Twelve Houses series, as well as to the worlds of Heart of Gold and Summers at Castle Auburn. I would recommend though that readers who haven’t read the latter book do so before reading “Gold,” since “Gold” contains spoilers for Summers at Castle Auburn. I think for those readers who know these worlds, Quatrain presents an opportunity to revisit four magical places. I know I enjoyed the journey. My overall grade for Quatrain is a B+.

Sincerely,

Janine

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REVIEW: Indiscreet by Carolyn Jewel

Janet — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 21:00:09 +0000

Dear Ms. Jewel:

When I met you recently, I had to sheepishly admit that I had not yet read any of your books. So I volunteered to review your new release Indiscreet, relishing the added bonus that it was a Regency set in Turkey. Despite all of the stereotypical sheikh novels and the often fetishized relationship genre Romance has with Middle Eastern settings, I have a very soft spot for these fictionalized locales, and Indiscreet did not disappoint in that respect. In fact, there were very few disappointments for me along the way, and while Indiscreet might be the first Carolyn Jewel book I read, it certainly won’t be the last.

When the Marquess of Foye was merely Lord Edward Marrack, he had the displeasure of overhearing a terribly indiscreet boast from his then-friend, the Earl of Crosshaven. It seemed that Miss Sabine Godard was, as Crosshaven put it, “’no better than she ought to be’” in submitting to Crosshaven’s seduction. And Lord Edwards knows that “’Tomorrow…Miss Godard will not find the world so pleasant a place. That is a fate you ought to have avoided for the girl,’” because “’the consequences of an indiscretion always fall hardest on the woman.’” Edward, soon to be Foye, does not understand at the time why his friend would be so selfish and careless with Miss Godard’s reputation, but he does know that true or false, the charge will likely ruin the young woman, and for that he is disgusted and sorry.

So nearly two years later, when he runs across the lovely Miss Godard and her uncle (and guardian) Henry Godard in, of all places, Turkey, he is grateful to see that Sabine’s uncle did not turn her out on the street, even if they had to flee England in the wake of her ruined reputation. Sabine, who is helping her uncle with his book on the East, amuses herself by reading tea leaves for other English travelers, mostly men who are taken with the lovely young woman. The amusement hardly satisfies, however, the mind of a woman who is more intellectually capable as many men far above her station, although her gratitude for her uncle’s public loyalty makes her loathe to leave him. And she is not at all pleased to see Crosshaven’s good friend Foye among the coterie of English travelers. She has no idea that his sympathies lie with her and not Crosshaven, and is merely waiting for him to act as so many other men have around her – with the ultimate proposition for indiscretion.

Foye and Sabine are, at first, as mysterious to each other as the Eastern cultures are to so many of these Western travelers. Foye is, as Sabine notes, not a handsome man: “[h]is nose was hooked, and the remainder of his features were set irregularly in his face, as if someone had put the parts together and then given them a hard shake before everything had quite settled into place.” He appears aloof, but, Sabine realizes, instead he is just “reserved,” because “[h]is consequence fit him like his clothes: exquisitely and without ostentation, but underneath there ran a river too deep to sound.” Still, Sabine finds Foye arresting, even as she fears what he will say or attempt to do to her. While Foye is trying to adjust to a shift in his own expectations, from “a sweet young woman, weeping for her lost reputation” to a sensually-featured woman with “dark honey” eyes, a surfeit of personal dignity, and an unexpected measure of wit and insightful intelligence. Not a victim, by any measure, despite Crosshaven’s careless sacrifice of her reputation.

One of the things that is most amazing about Indiscreet is the way the unfamiliar setting of Turkey (which was and still is one of the most popular vacation spots for Europeans) sets off the personal dynamics between Sabine and Foye. On one level, any interest they have in each other – however reluctant, on both parts – is less forbidden. But on another level, Sabine’s reputation is even more fragile outside England, because her status and safety as a female is doubly dependent on male protection. And then there are the more mundane considerations, such as the fifteen-year age difference (Sabine is 23 and Foye is 38), Foye’s self-perception as a beastly man (he is 6’6” for one thing), who is beyond the desire of a beautiful young woman like Sabine, and Sabine’s loyalty to her uncle, a man who stood behind her even though he most certainly believed Crosshaven’s story. Henry Godard, in fact, would rather think of Sabine as having a man’s mind and disposition in an inconveniently female body, and he thinks nothing of taking her through politically unstable, geographically remote regions, oblivious to or unconcerned with the potentially unhealthy interest of Nazim Pasha, whom Henry Godard is intent on visiting.

Before they can leave, however, Sabine and Foye become acutely aware of their attraction to each other, buoyed by the unexpected pleasure of it and yet firmly convinced that it cannot end in marriage and happy domesticity:

He reached up and took her hand in his. She’d never put on her gloves, so her ﬁngers were bare. Slowly, he brought her ﬁngers to his mouth and kissed the back of her hand. His lips touched her bare skin. “Sabine,” he whispered, “what am I to do with you?”

“What is it you want to do?”

He did not step away, and, God help her, she trembled with anticipation. He tipped his head to one side. “To make up my mind about you.” The skin around his eyes crinkled when he smiled. “Am I too beastly for you, Sabine? Or is that something you can overlook?”

She was aware that the future of her relationship with him, whatever that was to be, hung in the balance now. Her whole life was about to change, and this time the choice was hers. Her chest felt tight. She could hardly breathe. “You and I will continue to disagree on that, I think.

So when the Godards leave for Northern Syria and the pashalik of Nazim Pasha, Foye tries to believe that Sabine will be safe in the company of one infirm old man and a pasha who is known for selling women or making them part of his seraglio, beyond the protection of the British consulate. And when he arrives at the pasha’s compound, he is informed by the pasha that Henry Godard has died and Sabine is grieving, inconsolable but safe. Which he does not believe for a minute. So one daring rescue and a bit of costuming later, Foye and Sabine escape the pashalik for a treacherous journey to the relative safety of the consulate, many anxious days and treacherous miles away.

At this point in the review I need to say that no summary I could offer of Indiscreet is likely to do the book justice, because so much of its depth, like Sabine and Foye’s relationship, is revealed in the experience. Foye is a man who knows he is not handsome, and who is almost freakishly tall for his time, but who has enough social position to secure a desirable wife one day. However, he has a sad history with the one woman he loved before Sabine, and so he is convinced that he will never be happy in love, and therefore convinced that no woman as lovely and intelligent as Sabine would ever be suitable for him. Sabine, while traditionally beautiful, must disguise her acute intelligence and broad education, and is forever hampered by the consequences of her tarnished reputation, whether she actually earned that reputation or not.

To complicate matters, just as the two seem to be working through these initial barriers to happiness, the nature of their relationship changes when Sabine goes undercover as a young male, native dragoman to the powerful Lord Foye. Now the woman who never noticed how much the world deferred to her sex must live the physical life of a man and a servant. This life is foreign to her, and as a result, she becomes estranged from herself in a way:

While she understood and wholeheartedly agreed with Foye’s decision to disguise her as a boy—a brilliant ruse, she thought—she was profoundly unsettled by everything to do with it. The experience made her a foreigner in her own body; riding astride, the way her clothes ﬁt, and perhaps most of all, the way others reacted to her. . . .

As it was now, she was being shaped inside and out by the sort of person she was and by the expectations of those around her.

And she becomes aware of Foye in a new way, as well:

They were safe enough speaking English, so long as she was appropriately deferential to Foye. That wasn’t difﬁcult. He was a nobleman after all, and just now he intimidated her. The gentleness of his manners from Büyükdere had disappeared somewhere between then and now. She wondered if he was aware that he behaved differently. He must be; he was too intelligent not to be. A line between them had been erased, and she wasn’t sure where, if anywhere, a new one might be drawn. She was a boy and not a boy. His servant and not his servant. Female and not female. And when she looked at him, her stomach leaped off the end of the world.

So many Romance novels treat the road trip as a whim, the costumed heroine as a farce, and the East as exotic backdrop, but Indiscreet challenges each of those stereotypes and brings each device back into fresh use. The road trip is fraught with dangers both physical and emotional, the costume functions to reveal the depths of both protagonists, and the Eastern setting a means to explore the nature of foreignness, customs, and social structures. I don’t think I can emphasize the extent to which I was completely caught up in reading Indiscreet, at least until the final handful of chapters, that is.

For at least two-thirds of the novel, the emotional tension is taughtly maintained, and it was a profound pleasure watching these two characters transform, inside and out, to themselves and each other. Like Sabine, I saw the sharp angles in Foye’s face as “beautiful” rather than “beastly,” as the face of “[a] man who tried to see the world as it was rather than what it was said to be, and still retained his hope.” Like Foye I was impressed with Sabine’s dignity and proud of her studious dedication to saving her own life. She is no silly ninny, no helpless naif, even if she is vulnerable in a number of ways.

However, because there is so much tension in the novel around securing Sabine and Foye’s safety from the pasha and other dangers, once safety is secured, the novel, like Sabine’s stomach, seems to “leap off the end of the world.” The final chapters, in fact, started to read like a summary of a novel more than the novel itself, and while this is not the sort of book where we are in doubt up to the last page as to how things will turn out, there are a number of twists in those final chapters that beg for more opportunity for emotional catharsis than what is allowed in the somewhat abrupt resolutions. Had the pace of these chapters been slowed, Indiscreet would have easily been an A read for me. Even with the sometimes tiring repetition of Foye’s insistence that he was too beastly for Sabine to love, even with the sometimes awkward introductory paragraphs at the beginning of chapters (the book had a sense of scripted scene changing that was both interestingly effective and self-consciously artificial). There is just so much to admire about Indiscreet, from the restrained but lyrical prose to the depth of the protagonists’ characterizations, to the lovely surprises placed throughout the novel that challenged and shifted my expectations subtly but effectively.

For the reader who wants fresh settings, for the reader who likes traditional Regencies, for the reader who likes character-driven stories, and for the reader who likes adventure and a larger scope in Romance, Indiscreet is a wonderfully satisfying read. B+

~ Janet

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REVIEW: Sindustry II

Joan/SarahF — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 18:00:27 +0000

Dear Authors:

I opened THIS anthology because I liked Sindustry I. But this volume is so obviously all the leftover stories from the Sindustry I anthology that didn’t quite make it into the first volume. And most of these stories should NOT have been included. This anthology had very few redeeming stories and some that make me want to puke, which kinda dampens any enthusiasm I might have for the whole. Mostly it’s filled with stories with awful, weak, boring, TSTL characters who couldn’t characterize their way out of a paper bag, and their ridiculously over-protective and unrealistic saviors. I have never really understood what m/m readers are complaining about when they say that that one of the characters doesn’t have to be the woman, but I do now. In this volume, one half of the relationship was invariably the damsel in distress who needed saving, the other the knight in shining armor who knew just how to take care of things, pretty lady…uh, I mean lad. Yech.

As in Sindustry I, the premise is that these are all stories about people in the sex industry, either strippers, prostitutes, or porn actors. This volume does a much worse job of speculating about whether it is possible to have a realistic representation of tricking and yet still have a good romance. Because the other problem with most of these stories is how glamorized prostitution or stripping is made out to be. And it’s not. That’s why I liked “Sunshine” so much, I think, because it showed some gritty realism about what money does to a relationship.

“Package Boy” by Connie Bailey
A strange little story about a high-end rent boy who has fallen in love with a client who happens to be the heir to a Mafia family. He hears a hit ordered on his lover while on another call and the rest of the story deals with how he and his lover respond to the news. Told mostly in choppy, untagged dialogue, the conflict is mostly external. The relationship conflict isn’t sign-posted very well so I didn’t know that it existed until it was solved. The affection between the lovers is genuine and the sex is pretty hot, but there’s a bit too much grating, unexplained mafia language. Grade: C

“Dance for Me” by Maria Albert
This story was both so melodramatic it was funny, and so completely disturbing I was sickened. Carlo is saved from an abusive john by Michael, a bouncer at a club. Carlo is barely 21 and has been kept in literal sexual slavery for 7 years, only to have been thrown out by his captor 2 weeks previously. Michael is 43 and lives at the club, which seems to be a kind of halfway house for gay homeless men, complete with Leprechaun-like Irish owner. Carlo and Michael instantly fall in love, but can’t communicate enough to actually figure things out without intercession by Michael’s boss. Carlo is a complete mess and Michael seems a few cards short of a deck and to have a relationship between them when Carlo is only 2 weeks out of 7 years of abuse and Michael seems emotionally unstable was unbelievably appalling. There’s a limit to what can be solved in a novel, let alone a short story. Don’t set up characters who need years of therapy and think some sex and a few kisses makes everything all better. Ew. The ending’s even worse, the HEA degraded beyond compare by the creepiness of Michael’s final words to Carlo. Grade: F

“Unorthodox Utopia” by G.S. Wiley
Stephen owns a salon but needs extra cash. He hires on as hair and makeup artist for a low budget porn shoot, where he meets Jeff, one of the actors, who has an abusive boyfriend. The story, told from Stephen’s first person point of view, is a nice, gentle blossoming of a good relationship, as Jeff leaves his boyfriend and grows closer with Stephen. There’s no sex, just two men getting to know and care for each other, even if they do it rather too quickly considering Jeff’s abusive relationship. Grade: C+

“Leather Dancer” by Andrew Grey
Denny is dragged to a Leather Expo by his way-more-outgoing friend. There he sees Robbie, the next-door-neighbor he’s been crushing on for months, dancing at a booth. Over the next month, they build a solid relationship. The characterization seems non-existent. Denny is a shy introvert, then he’s the driving force behind the relationship. Robbie is an annoying wet noodle who seems to bend to Denny’s whim and whatever the story needs him to do. Complete lameness: having Denny buy books from a booth at the Expo that is obviously the Dreamspinner booth, complete with titles mentioned. Stretching credulity: Robbie takes Denny to his father’s restaurant on their first date. Boring writing, very little conflict. Grade: C-

“Corona & Lime” by Sonia Devereaux
Jacob hasn’t wanted or had a relationship — or even sex — in ten months, since his boyfriend dumped him. Race is paid by Jacob’s friends to pick him up in a bar. They go to Race’s apartment, but Jacob puts on the breaks and they fight in a very amusing way (to me, at least). The next morning, they find a way to the beginnings of a relationship. The story is told from the point of view of both Race and Jacob as they each feel out their vulnerabilities and find how the other could fix them. Each convinced that the other couldn’t want them, the end is sweetly optimistic. Grade: B

“Sunshine” by JL Merrow
I thought Merrow’s story in Sindustry I was one of the best in that volume. “Sunshine” is definitely the best in this. The story is set in England, I presume in London, and replete with British slang. Daniel is a street-walker, Rob a bouncer at a bar who checks up on Daniel on the way home. He takes Daniel home with him once, paying for sex, ruining their tentative friendship and the story tells how they find their way back to each other. Sweet and sad and wonderful. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Merrow has any full-length novels yet, just short stories. Pity. Grade: B+

“Night Moves” by Patric Michael
Guy who is NOT a trick spontaneously rescues a hustler and vows to protect and keep him all of his days. Huh? Over-emotional, crying at the drop of a hat, unbelievable love at first sight, out-of-left-field motivations, and generally a story that makes absolutely no sense. And don’t people know that relationship tattoos are incredibly bad juju? They’re a death knell to a relationship, so if characters go out and get one, I’m pretty much ready to chuck the book. Not sexy and romantic, just stupid! (But that might just be me.) Grade: D

“Wanting More” by Cari Z
Alex is a stripper who goes home with a trick, only to be discovered by the guy’s long-term partner. He is surprised when the partner, James, shows up at the club 2 weeks later and asks for a private dance. Surprised but thrilled, because he’s very attracted to James. They establish a relationship of sorts, with lots of really hot D/s sex, that eventually works into something more. A satisfying development of a wonderful relationship. Although if James didn’t learn from his previous lover or from Alex, when IS he going to learn?: a fact which threatens my belief in the HEA. Grade: B-

“The Cowboy and the Movie Star” by Kate Roman
Oh, blech. Jake is the foreman of a ranch hired out for a gay porn shoot. Matthew is the star of the show and a complete and utter wet blanket. If any heroine acted like Matthew—completely unable to take care of himself in any way—I’d chuck that book across the room without hesitation. One night of hot man-lovin’ changes their lives and Matthew quits in the middle of the shoot, except Jake doesn’t believe him….blahblahblah. The core of the story is when Matthew says to Jake, “Jake, do you know how long it’s been since someone’s touched me because I asked them to? Or because they wanted to? Because they wanted me?” And, I mean, sure. That’s the fantasy, right, that prostitutes and porn stars want their One True Love as well, that sex isn’t worth it without love. But these characters are awful, the story is unbelievable, the villain is ridiculous, and the sex is boring. Grade: D

“The Meaning of Perfection” by Taylor Lochland
A prostitute falls for the owner of the hotel who rents him and his roommate rooms for their jobs. Julian, the hotel owner, takes payment in kind from Felix’s roommate, which makes Felix very jealous because he wants to be the one servicing Julian. He eventually gets the chance, only to have Julian reject anything more in the morning. They eventually find their way back to each other, and poof! Felix quits whoring. Um, yeah, not so much. Grade: C-

“See Me, Feel Me” by Zahra Owens
A stripper takes a private gig for a friend, only to be wined and dined by a blind massage therapist, who does his own, unofficial sex work during his business. A fun little read, but the length of these “short” stories sometimes leaves me feeling like the story could be 2000 words shorter. Very little conflict and merely a progression of the relationship ensues and while that’s enjoyable, there’s no incentive to keep reading besides some moderately enjoyable sex—nothing’s at stake. Grade: C+

“Exposure” by Marguerite Labbe & Fae Sutherland
Whoa, hello head hopping! Give me whiplash, why don’t you! Ahem. That aside, this was a surprisingly hot story about a photographer introducing one of his models to a little bit of BDSM. The instant attraction between the two made me roll my eyes a bit, but then I was completely sucked in to the sexual and relationship tension between the characters and was very happily following along until the photographer called the model “Pretty baby.” That just stomped on all my squick buttons and pulled me right out of the story. I could tell that it was still hot in the same way it was before, except every time “pretty baby” showed up again, I’d get squicked all over again. Except for that, very enjoyable, and very very hot, very well-written D/s sex with a little bondage thrown in. Grade: B

Looking through the whole, now that I’m done, there’s quite a few more Bs than I thought there were. But still, the awfulness of “Dance for Me,” “Night Moves,” and “The Cowboy and the Movie Star” overshadows the good of “Exposure,” “Sunshine,” and the quirkiness of “Corona and Lime.” Skip this volume unless you can find those three stories separate.

Overall grade: C-

Best regards,
-Joan/Sarah F.

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Friday Film Review: My Best Friend’s Wedding

Jayne — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 10:00:32 +0000

My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997)
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Grade B+

Let me be honest and say that Julia Roberts is not my favorite actress. I like her in “Steel Magnolias,” loved her in “Erin Brockovich” but beyond that, not so much. And make it a double if it’s a chick flick. So when “My Best Friend’s Wedding” was released, I didn’t see it. Nor did I make any effort to in the years that followed. That is until I started doing these reviews and checked out a few “Top romances” and “best romances” lists. This film kept making the lists. Finally I caved and clicked on it at Netflix and it was here that I read the Roger Ebert review that changed my mind about watching it.

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Julianne Potter (Julia Roberts) and Michael O’Neal (Dermot Mulroney) are two people who’ve been best friends since college. He’s always been her standby, the man she thought she could fall back on if, and when, her romantic relationships failed. But one night he stuns her with a phone call and tells her he’s fallen in love and is getting married to Kimmy Wallace (Cameron Diaz). He wants Julianne to be there at the wedding, hence the title of the film.

Julianne is rocked back by the news. She’s always loved him but never thought she was in love with him. Until now when she realizes all she stands to lose. So Julianne decides to make her move but will it get her what she wants?

What I love about the film is how it turns so many of the standard chick flick moves on their heads. Just when I thought I’d get the kind of silly movie that Julia Roberts seems to specialize in, there was something different, something deeper. Standard plot lines that I’ve rolled my eyes at and fast forwarded through took new and unusual directions. The director, PJ Hogan, surprised me and I love that in a film.

Yes, we get scenes of Julianne plotting and scheming to break up the wedding but things don’t go according to plan. And far from being the usual clueless morons upon whom the main character works her wiles as we, the viewers, groan and shout to the screen, “How can you not see what she’s doing?!” Kimmy and Michael are surprisingly astute at several times about what is going on. Not always, of course, or the whole movie would be over quickly but enough so that they don’t come off as idiots.

And then there’s the question of who will end up getting Michael. Does Julianne win the day or are Michael and Kimmy the ones to walk back down the aisle. For the few of you who haven’t seen the film, I won’t ruin the surprise but suffice it to say that the best woman wins.

There are several scenes in the film that linger pleasantly in my memory. I’ll never be able to hear Dionne Warwick sing “Say a Little Prayer” and not think of giant crab claws waving in the background. Ditto when I hear “Annie’s Song” and think of chipmunks singing under balloons. And then there are the many times that Julianne calls her editor, George, to loudly complain about how things are going and to beg his advice and help – all of which are overheard by the people he’s with at the time. Oh, and the catfight scene in the women’s bathroom of Comiskey Park.

No, I haven’t been magically converted into a rabid Julia Roberts fan based on this one film but I am very glad I decided to give it a chance.

~Jayne

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