Reviews

The ditty of Lyon Redmond

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Wendy the SuperLibrarian’s TBR challenge for this month is a series catch up book.

I read The Legend of Lyon Redmond by Julie Anne Long. Unlike many other readers I know, I have not read every other book in the series. I have read Between the devil and Ian Eversea (which I enjoyed) and I have also read  What I did for the duke (which was fab!). Maybe I am cheating and its not really a series catch-up in only reading 3 in the series (I own another 3 which I will get to eventually). From the first book in the series, the reader knows that Lyon Redmond has gone missing and that Olivia Eversea pines for him. Their storyline is hinted at throughout the series, thus building up the anticipation for their coming together. Perhaps due to having only read 2 books from this series, I didn’t have that long drawn out vested interest in the “missing” Lyon Redmond storyline that spanned all 11(!) books in this series. And though I was certainly interested, it is just as well I didn’t care all that much! But first, the blurb:

imageBound by centuries of bad blood, England’s two most powerful families maintain a veneer of civility…until the heir to the staggering Redmond fortune disappears, reviving rumors of an ancient curse: a Redmond and an Eversea are destined to fall disastrously in love once per generation.
An enduring legend
Rumor has it she broke Lyon Redmond’s heart. But while many a man has since wooed the dazzling Olivia Eversea, none has ever won her—which is why jaws drop when she suddenly accepts a viscount’s proposal. Now London waits with bated breath for the wedding of a decade…and wagers on the return of an heir.
An eternal love
It was instant and irresistible, forbidden…and unforgettable. And Lyon—now a driven, dangerous, infinitely devastating man—decides it’s time for a reckoning. As the day of her wedding races toward them, Lyon and Olivia will decide whether their love is a curse destined to tear their families part…or the stuff of which legends are made.

Though I have enjoyed the Pennyroyal Green series, unike Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton series, I did not feel compelled to buy them all in one fell swoop and then spend a month reading them in one breath. And it was particularly disappointing that this last book, the one that had been built up to deliver an explosive love story, rather than fireworks, delivers a partly spent sparkler.
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My January reading (with shallowreaderbingo shout out)

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It’s the end of the first Shallowreader Bingo month!  A Woot woot! Shout out to A Willful Woman who won this month’s bingo call – head over to her blog to see her winning entry. She won with Laughter, As You Wish, Hero/ine, MnomMnomMnom and used Red for her wildcard. If you have been playing, let us know in the comments which boxes you scored and what you read and there is a new bingo card out on Monday!

As for me, despite not getting any of bingo boxes in a row, I read several books that matched the squares. Here are my notes on them:

Food WhoreFood Whore: a novel of dining and deceit

by Jessica Tom

Bingo Squares: 7 Deadly Sins and MnomMnomMnom

Tia Monroe, a post-graduate student in New York City finds herself ghost writing food reviews for restaurant critic, Micahel Saltz. I wasn’t convinced by how she was caught up in Michael’s fraudulent behaviour, her ethics were (obviously) questionable which culminated in Tia having to reveal all her misdoings and making amends. I think I would . Overall a good read with a view of how reviews can make or break a restaurant.

 

Moone Boy: The Blunder YearsMoone Boy: The Blunder Years

by Chris O’Dowd (yes – the actor) and Nick V. Murphy

Bingo Squares: Red (errmmmm – yep, there is red on the cover)

This book was funny and weird and made me laugh. I loved the whole Imaginary Friend (IF) story and I love love loved IF Loopy Lou even though Martin (the protaganist) didn’t.  I also loved the distinctly Irish voice and culture that is woven through this book.I’m usually wary of celebrity authors but this one is an absolute treat. If you can pull off an Irish accent, it would make a particularly awesome bedtime reading story.

 

 
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MORE Lynne Graham to kick off the TBR challenge 2016

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My pleasure reading disappeared in December of last year. After posting my 2015 Favourites at the beginning of the month, though I planned on continuing reading, my physical self took a big long sigh, caught a summer virus that left me in bed for 3 weeks during which I didn’t pick up a single book. So, just like bike riding and swimming, when I reentered my reading shallows I did so with my favourite type of reading – category romance novels by the venerable Lynne Graham which luckily also matches the “We Love Shorts” theme for SuperWendy’s TBR Challenge 2016! I read Graham’s interconnecting novels The Greek Demands his Heir and The Greek Commands his Mistress, featuring the consecutive romances of two Greek half-brothers Leo and Bastien Zikos and their English rose heroines Grace Donovan and Delilah Moore.

Screen Shot 2016-01-21 at 2.41.27 PMThe Greek Demands his Heir

“Don’t be silly, Leo. Strangers don’t get married.” Leo Zikos should be celebrating securing a perfectly convenient fiancée, but it’s left him cold. Instead it’s stranger Grace Donovan’s impeccable beauty that fires his blood. So he decides to pursue one last night of freedom… But that night and the two little blue lines on the pregnancy test that follow blow Leo’s plans apart. Now he must break with his fiancée and marry Grace. She might resist marrying a man she barely knows, but Leo will claim his legacy and has all the riches and influence he needs to ensure his demands are met!

Grace Donovan, a medical student who is indebted to an uncle and aunt who gave her shelter (but not much love) from when she was eleven, has been coerced to go on a holiday to Marmaris Bay in Turkey with her spoilt cousin Jenna. She is a tagalong and once her cousin hooks up with a guy, Grace finds herself sleeping in their hotel’s foyer. After several nights of this, her cousin insists they go clubbing where she catches the eye of club owner and Greek billionaire Leo. The sparks fly, Leo (unbelievably) claims that he cannot dance but hells yes he is up for one last hook-up before he marries Marina, his betrothed. The reader meets Marina in the opening chapter and already knows that their engagement is a business agreement between two friends who have agreed that having intimate liaisons with others until they actually marry is fine. Leo, considering his hook up with Grace as a one-night stand doesn’t mention his engagement to her. The two of them get down and boogie and oooopsies! the condom they are using breaks. (In classic Lynne Graham dry delivery) Leo accuses Grace of “straining it” because…you know…her virginity was so tight the latex couldn’t take it. Continue reading →

Pea Green Boat reflections

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Just this past week, I was fortunate enough to attend a performance of Stewart Lee’s Pea Green Boat, not once but twice!

From the outset, I need to be clear that I am not, in any way, trying to write a theatre review here. I can barely structure a book review let alone dabble in critiquing immersive theatre. Let’s just call whatever this is that I am writing “reflections”. To add to that, I need to make a full disclosure and say that I have known Director Jim Fishwick for many years as I am friends with his mum and my son has been at school with his brother for gazonkadonks.

I loved Edward Lear’s Nonsense Songs when I was younger. They were weird and silly and enormously fun. One of the most famous, and delightful, of his poems is The Owl and The Pussy-cat which comedian Stewart Lee has appropriated into a darker, macabre tale of love and obsession whilst drifting pointlessly at sea. I love appropriated fiction. Whether it is posted up as fanfiction or fanart, whether it gets the rubber stamp of approval from publishers or production companies, there is something wonderful about a story that gets elaborated upon by many different storytellers. To add to that, every morning for this past month, I have woken up to my husband laughing at Stewart Lee youtube clips. I was already familiar with two major aspects of the theatre I was about to to take part in. In Jetpack Theatre Collective‘s reimagining of Stewart Lee’s reimagining of the Pea Green Boat, we the audience are cast afloat in a pea green boat, a real one.

Jetpack Theatre Collective's Pea Green Boat

Jetpack Theatre Collective’s Pea Green Boat

From here, the audience of three are addressed by the Owl (Hannah Cox)  who talks of her deep love for the Pussy-cat (Jim Fishwick), as inappropriate and species-challenged as their love may be. Meanwhile, the Pussy-cat sits behind us rowing across the water to meet the Turkey (Alexander Richmond) who is to marry them. Continue reading →

The 100, 25, 12 Dresses

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The 100 Dresses by Eleanor EstesWhen I was in primary school, one of my favourite books was Eleanor Estes’ The 100 Dresses. It is about a young Polish girl, Wanda Petronski, who boasts about her 100 dresses. She is visibly poor so a number of kids decide to tease her and claim she is lying. By the end of the book they discover that she did indeed have 100 dresses – all of them were drawings. I’m not sure why, but this book left its mark on me. The cruel kids that taunted the young girl, her life of drawing, imagining, dreaming of the beautiful dresses that she could one day own, and considering her own drawings to be as much a reality and tangible possession as a material dress could possibly be.

I love wearing dresses. I love the way they feel when I walk. I love the way they sway. I love their airiness. Early this year, I realised that I didn’t even own a single pair of trousers*. I have suit bags that lovingly house my dresses from my thinner years. My dresses are not particularly expensive (except for that one, glamorous, plunging neckline, silk, green Merivale) but I can’t throw them out. In the last couple of months I have read two books on dresses. The first is 25 Dresses and the other is Dress Memory. Continue reading →

Victoria Dahl and Taking the Heat

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Victoria Dahl's Taking the HeateIt will come as no surprise to regular readers of my blog or my twitter, or even people who have met me in person, that I love Victoria Dahl’s novels. Do a search for her in my lookitupdooblidob to the side and you will find many mentions of her. So when she told me she was writing a male librarian – YES! a male librarian – I ordered her book when it finally came out and bit my lip in anticipation. Would he even come close to the hotness that is Richard Hindon in Lillian Peake’s The Library Tree. This would not be a difficult task.

I had my reservations. This book was perhaps too close to my own professional life. From the outset, I need to say that I mean no disrespect towards any of my current and former male colleagues, but I have never thought anyone in the LIS sphere to be particularly attractive. So the absolutely amazing, hot, sensitive, buff, amazeballs librarian Gabe MacKenzie in this book truly felt like a fantasy man. He didn’t feel real. He was so far from real that he started to edge toward a paranormal romance hero (this is as close as I can get to this month’s TBR challenge for SuperWendy) – he could climb rockfaces, he creates digital (*snort*) magic in the library, he has a talented tongue in the bedroom and a sexy trim beard as his mild superpower to help him out. He is a figment of Victoria’s imagination! No such man exists! This was becoming such a reading block for me, I decided I needed to discuss this travesty with my husband. Here is our exchange: Continue reading →

Returning to lifelogging my reading

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At the beginning of this year I decided that I was going to give up recording my reading on Goodreads. I have failed. I am a GoodReads addict.

When I was a kid, I was a casual list keeper, including one of all the books I read. I say casual because after an earnest beginning, faithfully writing down every title I read, I would forget my list until months later when I would call on my powers of recall and I would try to add to it again. Inadvertently, I would lose my list (probably my incredibly neat mum would put it somewhere I could never imagine searching for it like my own desk drawers) and after some time I just gave up on my list keeping. That is, until 2007, when I discovered the social aspect of list keeping. This is the only lifelogging I take part in. I don’t have map my runs (haha – make that walks), I don’t have a fitness logger (I probably should) but I do map my reading. Continue reading →

Sarah Morgan’s Playing by the Greek’s Rules

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I had seen Sarah Morgan’s name bandied about on fave author and autobuy lists for quite a while and it was recommended to me by Miss Bates Reads Romance.

I am so absolutely glad that I bought this book. I think that Playing by the Greek’s Rules has got to be one of my favourite category romances in the last 5 years, if not ever. I absolutely adored it.

But first, the blurb:

 It’s time to throw away the rule book… 

Idealistic archaeologist Lily Rose craves a fairy-tale love, but in her experience it always ends in heartbreak. So now Lily’s trying a different approach—a fling with her boss, infamous Greek playboy Nik Zervakis!

Anti-love and anti-family, Nik lives by his own set of rules. There’s no one better to teach Lily how to separate sizzling sex from deep emotions! But while Nik has the world at his feet, he also has dark shadows in his heart… 

It starts as a sensual game, but can Lily stick to Nik’s rules? And what’s more, can he?

*sigh* I hate the word sensual. It just doesn’t work for me. The word makes me think of 80s boudoir photography and this book is far from that.

The story opens with archaeologist Lily angry and despondent having just found out the man she loved was actually married. Lily, who grew up in foster homes, is horrified. Family and marriage is sacrosanct for her. Lily blames herself for she keeps looking for a long term relationship with the wrong men. She swears that she needs to have rebound sex and tuurn her heart to Teflon. Her pursuit for love blinding her to the faults of the men she meets. Lily is a typical 20something year old and works several part time jobs so as to earn money to pay off her student loans so she finds herself cleaning billionaire hero Nik’s house when she gets into a fight with his high-tech power shower and needs to take her sopping wet clothes off. Which, of course, leads to their cute meet. Continue reading →

Listening to Mindy

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I’m back on the ABC’s 702 Sydney show this morning. Linda Mottram is on holidays so I will be chatting with Deb Knight about audiobooks – perfect for roadtrips!

I have a deep, dark secret to admit here. But first, let me point out that I adore being told a story. As a young child, I don’t recall ever being read to but my parents were always telling us stories, and particularly my dad would embellish his with hyperbole (this apple does not fall far from that tree). This storytelling time was either at dinner or at bedtime. Bedtime stories would always put me to sleep, and here is my deep, dark secret. I choose my audiobooks for their ability to put me to sleep. Not in a “I’m so bored I can barely pay attention” way but in a search for calm, soothing voices that work their magic and send you into Morpheus’s arms. This is great when I am in bed, but not so good when I am driving. Continue reading →

Romancing the Duke: Tessa Dare, meta and the TBR challenge

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After several false starts, I have finally finished reading Tessa Dare’s Romancing the Duke from the Castles Ever After series for this month’s TBR Challenge. And to avoid even more false starts (particularly of the blogging kind), I’m going to do a quick blurb cut-and-paste:

Romancing the Duke by Tessa DareAs the daughter of a famed author, Isolde Ophelia Goodnight grew up on tales of brave knights and fair maidens.  She never doubted romance would be in her future, too.  The storybooks offered endless possibilities.

And as she grew older, Izzy crossed them off.  One by one by one.

Ugly duckling turned swan?

Abducted by handsome highwayman?

Rescued from drudgery by charming prince?

No, no, and… Heh.

Now Izzy’s given up yearning for romance. She’ll settle for a roof over her head.  What fairy tales are left over for an impoverished twenty-six year-old woman who’s never even been kissed?

This one.

Spoiler alerts early on in this review:

I enjoyed this book. Isolde inherits a castle but it comes with a duke (Ransom) who was not aware that his castle had been bought as he has been in a self-imposed exile to recover from injuries he received in a duel. He is mostly blind and he is adapting to life without full sight. Izzy is the daughter of a famous (now deceased) English author who wrote stories of romance and adventure with Izzy as the central character. Though she has been left destitute, there is national goodwill toward her and she has a strong, though a tad overthetop fans who follow her to her castle. Ransom has never heard of her father or Izzy and treats Izzy like an adult unlike most people who she comes across in her life. Ransom wants Izzy to leave his castle immediately but homeless Izzy refuses to give up her inheritance even if it seems to be an illgotten gain. Izzy decides to help Ransom tackle his paperwork which has not been read in months due to his inability to read. She becomes his eyes and reads aloud all his correspondence in order to uncover how his castle was sold without his knowledge. Continue reading →