Reading Fanatic Reviews
Contemporary RomanceWelcome Home, Abby by Jan Gallagher Dunn
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Welcome Home, Abby*
Didn’t Quite Gel for Me
I am not quite sure what to think of this book. For some reason, it never quite gelled for me. We are thrown into this modern marriage of convenience very quickly. I think the book would have been better served if the couple had explored the feelings left over from their previous relationship before they agreed to a marriage of convenience. So, to me, some of their issues seemed contrived, ones that could have been easily dealt with if they had simply talked openly early on or throughout. Instead, by setting themselves up to not talk about true thoughts and feelings, things went awry that shouldn’t. There still could have been adequate conflict and tension given their mutual past history as well as their problems in previous relationships. I loved the hero’s little girl, Erin. She’s such a cutie. Though, in the end, I felt a little disappointed by this book.
Miracle on Main Street by Lisa Hughey
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, Indigo, and Bol.de
Miracle on Main Street*
Didn’t Like the Hero for Most of the Book
This is the first book I have read by this author. I thought the writing itself was well done, with good turns of phrase, dialogue, and descriptions. I had a hard time with the characters, though. The hero, and I’m tempted to put air quotes around that, is a bit of a jerk for a long time. I didn’t like the way he sometimes treated the heroine. The heroine herself seemed almost too good and noble to be believable. Something just didn’t sit right with me from the get-go, and I couldn’t really get into the book.
Ten Things My Husband Hated by Pauline Wiles
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Ten Things My Husband Hated*
Chick Lit Romance
This is the first book I’ve read by this author, and I’m glad that we’ve been introduced. The book feels unusual because it is a good blend of chick lit and romance. Usually, a book is one or the other. The first half is heavy on the chick lit. I actually adored the heroine’s group of girlfriends. They helped her see herself more clearly after a very embarrassing moment, and they attempt to help her move on from her past in the way that caring friends do. I actually liked the structure that the author gave this book, with the divorced women choosing to do ten things that her husband hated as an act of defiance and reclaiming her life. The book is quite amusing at first; there’s almost a giddiness about it as the friends start to work through the list. But as the story continues, things get progressively more serious as the new life and the new love that the heroine has found appear to be threatened. I don’t think it’s easy to make that kind of a shift in a book and make it feel believable, so kudos to the author. The heroine had to grow and change in this book, and the author did a good job of showing it in a sometimes amusing and sometimes poignant way.
Christmas on Hope Street, a collection by Four Authors
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Christmas on Hope Street*
Some I Enjoyed, Others Not as Much
This is a collection of four stories by four different authors that are based in the same small town. I particularly enjoyed the first two stories. I thought that the story based around a holiday film festival was a fun idea. I appreciated that the author kept this story tight and focused, and I felt that the main characters were believable and relatable. In the second story, I like that the community itself almost seemed like the character. I wasn’t wild about the heroines in the last two books, so I had a much harder time getting into the stories. So, like all anthologies, there were hits and misses. But if you enjoy small-town romance and like that anthologies can expose you to different authors and stories with little financial risk as you’re bound to like at least one, you may very well enjoy this collection.
Cocoa & Carols by Marianne Rice
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Cocoa & Carols*
Finding a Family and Love
This is an unusual contemporary romance. It is meant to be a relatively light holiday romance, or at least you get that impression from the cover. (Although I would say that the heroine would have never been dressed like that, especially at the beginning of the book.) Instead, the heroine is actually homeless after a series of stressful events. On Thanksgiving night, a local police officer discovers her car at a closed-for-the-season vegetable stand and eventually figures out that she is homeless and sleeping in her car. On a whim, he invites her to his family’s house for Thanksgiving. As one would expect of the romance, there is an attraction between them pretty much right from the start.
I think what I enjoyed most about this novel are all the characters in the hero’s family. We get to know each of them, and what a wonderfully diverse crew. For one thing, they are loving and accepting of anyone to their circle. While the heroine felt awkward about just showing up, she was literally embraced by each family member, though they did mistakenly think that she and the police officer son were a romantic item. Neither of them let them know anything different. I so enjoy romances where large families take a role, especially with all the different types of personalities that are so distinct and the complex web of inter-relationships. I especially enjoyed all the sibling interaction. That family is just a lot of fun. If you enjoy contemporary romances that are just a little off of the typical with a whole lot of heart, you will most likely enjoy this book.
Finding Tony by Jodie Esch
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Finding Tony*
More About Pregnancy than Romance
In terms of contemporary romance, this is one of the more unusual that I’ve read lately. Not quite sure how to describe it all for this review. The heroine has come to a small island in the Pacific Northwest to lick her wounds and try to fashion a new life. She is fixated on becoming a mother, and she doesn’t mind that she would have to do so a single mother as she feels done with men. The hero is returning to the island as well. He grew up there, and after some serious business reverses on the other side of the country, he’s come to regroup. They literally run into each other, and he actually breaks his foot. They strike up a casual friendship that soon turns into more, even as she is grappling with whether or not to go through with her plan for fertilization. I’ll stop here with the description because I don’t want to give too much away. But much of the book was actually about the pregnancy, birth, and a little after. There were romance elements for sure, but it felt more like it was about the journey to decide on the fertility treatments and then the subsequent pregnancy. I like the hero. Even though he’s got professional issues, he’s still a decent guy.
Pride & Prejudicial by Danica Dawn
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Pride & Prejudicial*
Bold Liza and Bad English
I am a huge fan of Jane Austen fanfiction, though I will admit that I do not usually enjoy contemporary retellings. I prefer the Regency variations. But I was intrigued by the legal aspect of this one, so I thought I would pick it up. There were parts of this story that were quite amusing. This Liza Bennet has a super sharp wit and a certain level of audacity that is definitely greater they more proper original Elizabeth Bennet. I love the scene where she first challenged Will. Actually, that whole dance number was a bit of a surprise! Unfortunately, my enjoyment of the story was completely hampered by the fact that this book was either not professionally edited or was edited by someone who does not know the craft and art. There were issues with tenses and an inordinate number of missing commas, so much so that it actually created problems with understanding. For all of these numerous mistakes, I found this a tedious read.
Josie by Beth Gildersleeve
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Josie*
Info Dumps and Distance
This is the first book that I have read by this author. I had some issues with it. Even though the book is of decent length, the author chose to do several information dumps in the beginning, both on the hero’s side and on the heroine’s side. One of the heroine’s actually happened while she and the hero were in the midst of their initial conversation in the book! It just seemed odd to have her thinking about her troubled romantic past in great detail while she is supposedly sitting and chatting with the hero, who happens to be her brother’s boss. I didn’t like the blackmail aspect of the story. After their marriage of convenience, they didn’t spend enough time together for it to truly feel like a romance. How can the relationship change and grow if they aren’t together? And, no, the texts don’t cut it. I know that work and distance were supposed to be at the crux of their conflict, but to me, the hero and the heroine have to be together more to make it a romance. So, I find myself a little disappointed in this book.
Diamond in the Dust by Mel A. Rowe
Available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Scribd, 24 Symbols, Thalia, Smashwords, Mondadori, Angus & Robertson, Indigo (Chapters), and Bol.de
Diamond in the Dust*
Take an Armchair Trip to the Outback
This is the second or third book that I have read by this Australian author. I remember so enjoying the first one because she really has a way of depicting what life is like in the outback with such clarity that you feel like you are there. This book is the same. From the first scene where the heroine is nearly run down by the hero while he’s driving a big truck, I swear I could taste the grit in my mouth and feel it in my nose just like the heroine. I think it’s really cool that the author was able to portray life so vividly as to make it seem real. Outside of the wonderful descriptions, this is a sweet and beautiful love story between two very complicated individuals. The heroine, we slowly learn, is still recovering mentally and physically from a traumatic accident that nearly took her life. While his backstory is not quite so life-and-death, the hero also is experiencing shifts and changes in his life. He has some grand aspirations that he pursues even though he knows his father would not approve. The hero and heroine, as you might imagine from my description of the first scene, don’t quite get off on the right foot, but they do have a fairly instant attraction to each other. This does evolve and become more profound, and it is a lovely process to watch unfold. I am glad that my Kindle has the attached vocabulary definition function as I had to look up quite a few Australian colloquialisms. But the author’s use of the uniquely Australian termed added flavor to the book. I recommend this book.
Give Me a Christmas by Zoe Ann Wood
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Give Me a Christmas*
Too Much Emphasis on Heroine’s Side Story
WARNING: Some spoilers
I am not quite sure what I think about this book. I liked the hero and the heroine as characters. But the romantic story felt disjointed and rushed to me, almost as if it were two or more different stories that weren’t quite interwoven as well as they should have been. This is a second-chance-at-romance book. I didn’t feel like the romantic aspect was given enough time to grow and evolve in a natural fashion. I also had a hard time buying the heroine’s choice at about the two-thirds mark; she had worked so hard to have Christmas away from her toxic parents, why wouldn’t she try to convince Finn to stay on in Switzerland rather than them both go back because he had a plane to catch? Given all that we had learned about her family dynamic, I found it to be a surprising and nonsensical choice. and she didn’t even discuss options with Finn. Then, of course, once they were back Stateside, the story shifted to being more about the parents than the romance. The story just did not gel for me.
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