Does anyone else have relatives who bug the heck at you about Christmas presents when there's weeks and weeks to go? I swear, I'm going to murder my in-laws if they send me any more bloody texts asking about what the kids want for Christmas, especially as they KNOW we have this rule that Hub has to deal with his side of the family over Christmas present ideas. Grrrrrrr! I wouldn't mind but my Mum is just as bad. The thing is, two of my kids have just had a birthday so they've no idea what they want yet. Give them a couple more weeks and they'll have some ideas but for now, leave me alone!
My Reading Week
I read a book. Yay!
I've no idea why I pulled this out of the TBR pile. JC Owens writes pretty decent master/slave fantasy romances which have enough in terms of emotion but are, on the whole, quite tame in terms of the slavery aspect. In this book Jaden has been captured, separated from his young sister and forced into slavery. On a diplomatic mission, his warlord (warlady?) mistress approaches the Emperor, Dersai, and asks for access through his lands which he grants as long as Jaden will remain as his slave. As the weeks pass, Jaden discovers a very different man in Dersai to that of his reputation as a fierce and hateful man of war, and that there's a reason why he acts so violently during war time.
This turned out to be just the ticket for me this week. It contained enough in terms of emotion that I found the story engaging, quite a lot of sex which I was in the mood for, and a story which was easy to put down and pick up again during the random times I was able to read. I liked Jaden and thought the romance between him and Dersai was well written. I liked the healing that Jaden undergoes at the hands of Dersai and how he finds a purpose and use in the unconventional relationship. My only niggle was a bit of a silly ending where both characters behaved in stupid pig-headed ways for no reason, but since that part didn't last too long and then led to a satisfactory conclusion to the story, I forgave any temporary frustration it caused. If you like master/slave stories but don't want anything too heavy going, this would be a good book to pick up. Grade: Very Good.
I also reviewed the poor Double Up by Lissa Matthews. I am still going to review Gleams of a Remoter World by Fiona Glass. I was going to do it on Thursday but ended up with no time to get online so it will be done tomorrow now.
On Tuesday I had guest reviewer Joshua Skye talking about his new book Angels of Autumn. If you get chance do pop over here and leave a comment. My blog looks like I'm a Billy No-Mates at the moment because I don't think anyone's getting time to comment on any of the posts!
Next Week
On Sunday I shall have a guest post by Laura Lee who is going to talk about her purpose in writing her new book Angel. Then I shall have reviews of Something Like Winter by Jay Bell and Second Time Lucky by Dakota Flint, followed by the weekly round up post on Friday.
ETA: I completely forgot that I have a second guest post this week! I've got a post from the Riptide Warriors of Rome series blog tour. I think I'm hosting Sam Starbuck who is going to talk about his/her new book The City War, although I can't say for certain as I haven't received a post from them yet. I suppose I'll have to chase them up. Again.
And that's all folks. Have a great weekend!
We've come to a sorry state of affairs when it's a very exciting thing to have had time to read during the week, haven't we?!
ReplyDeleteThat's so true, Chris. My time is so caught up with books that I HAVE to read because I need to review them, I'm not getting time to read other books from my TBR pile. Also, I'm out of the mood for reading at the moment and have to force myself to pick a book up sometime which isn't good :(.
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