Love Romance Passion » Journalism http://www.loveromancepassion.com Because Books Don't Fall Asleep Afterwards! Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:00:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Review: C.J. Hawke on Assignment: Mexican Flames by C.J. Hawke http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-c-j-hawke-on-assignment-mexican-flames-by-c-j-hawke/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-c-j-hawke-on-assignment-mexican-flames-by-c-j-hawke/#comments Mon, 16 Jan 2012 09:49:45 +0000 Cara Lynn http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=13640

Reviewed by Cara Lynn

This book was long on sex, maybe short on story.  I finished it a while back and can't say I particularly liked it.  I felt more neutral, so I put off writing a review. I read the PDF provided by LRP on my iPad.

What I liked: I liked the colored pictures in the text, though at times I felt she looked very young.  Does that let you know how old I am?

I liked that she was a journalist/reporter which is an interesting twist on a romantic suspense.

What I didn't like: I didn't like the idea that a professional journalist/reporter would sleep her way through her assignments.  Somehow that seemed like a setback for women, not progress.

The sex: Yes, it's hot.  And with two men, at different times.  And which of them turns out to be the criminal?

But it doesn't seem like the real dilemma that Janet Evanovich poses between Ranger and Morelli.

My feeling: I suspect that there are other books in the series, or at least planned for the series.  I would likely read another one to see if I still felt the same.

And I suspect she will sleep her way through the next assignment too. And that bothers me.  As a character, she seems too immature for the level of assignment and for her naivete about dangers, both real and perceived.

But the sex is hot.

Most other romantic suspense that I read has a more believable main character who actually falls in love with the man she is with, who also falls in love with her.  It is not gratuitous.  Ultimately it keeps them both safe.  That last sentence could be said about this book too.  But somehow it wasn't as believable, at least for me.

Have you read it?

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Buy: C.J. Hawke on Assignment: Mexican Flames

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-c-j-hawke-on-assignment-mexican-flames-by-c-j-hawke/feed/ 0 Review: Off the Record (Love on the Line, Book One) by Camryn Rhys http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-off-the-record-love-on-the-line-book-one-by-camryn-rhys/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-off-the-record-love-on-the-line-book-one-by-camryn-rhys/#comments Fri, 13 Jan 2012 09:45:46 +0000 Lynn Reynolds http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=13613

Reviewed by Lynn Reynolds

Katrina Parker is a chef at a new restaurant. Because of a mix-up, she’s seen buying some food at the local supermarket. There she gets a nice surprise by meeting Emily Reed. Emily’s son Ben seems fascinated by Kit’s coat. Kit is fascinated by Emily but she’s not sure if Emily feels the same.

They meet later when Emily shows up at Kit’s restaurant. Both women give off mixed messages which just confuses the other. Camryn gives us some indication in how Emily feels by giving us glimpses of her fantasies. You’ll just have to read to see if any of Emily’s fantasies come true.

Kit wants redemption for a less than stellar food critic review so she cooks a meal for Emily and a co-worker. We get to see the connection between the two women blossom. I like how Camryn keeps the story real by showing how prejudice still exists. But those prejudices don’t stop the women from forming a relationship.

Camryn also leaves the reader wondering what life has in store for Emily and Kit. But what happens to Ben? Does Kit’s restaurant become a success? What better way to end a story, where one of the characters is a chef, but with a delicious sounding recipe.

Rating: ★★★★☆

Buy: Off the Record (Love on the Line)

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-off-the-record-love-on-the-line-book-one-by-camryn-rhys/feed/ 2 Review: Risking Trust (Private Protectors, Book 3) by Adrienne Giordano http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-risking-trust-private-protectors-book-3-by-adrienne-giordano/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-risking-trust-private-protectors-book-3-by-adrienne-giordano/#comments Sat, 31 Dec 2011 09:00:18 +0000 Sandra Scholes http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=13420

Reviewed by Sandra Scholes

As part of the Private Protectors series released by Carina Press, Roxanne Thorgesson has never felt life like she has now---where she is so out of control she might risk everything to make it all seem worthwhile. Having to take over the business after her father has had a near fatal heart attack; her task is to take on his firm of the second largest newspaper in Chicago.

It isn’t easy, and she didn’t expect it to be either, but the heat is turned up when former boyfriend, Michael comes around wanting a favour from her. She has an idea he will spell trouble for her, but she can’t say no, especially when he is a part of a scandal that won’t go away.

She didn’t expect an exclusive story like his would come up, but she indulges his every word as it is important to him, as much as it is to her. Michael left her once and offered no reason as to why. It is now that she can send him away, or use him to get her one big story from him. Only this story is bigger than the both of them – his wife has been murdered, and he is high on the list of main suspects. He tells her he didn’t do it, but why should she believe him?

There are many things that the reader will find from the characters in this story, and one of them is that Michael isn’t the sort of person who would murder his wife; she was the only woman he ever loved as much as he hated her.

Even in their darkest times of arguing, which was most of the time, he had never thought of ending her life – he was a very wealthy man and as far as he was concerned, he could have ended their arguments easily enough, and he did for a time when they were going through a rather lengthy divorce settlement.

His wife had gone from being a loving and caring woman to becoming a money-grabbing bitch, something he watched happen through the course of their marriage. As it was common knowledge that it was a rocky one, Michael is thought of as the prime suspect in her murder even when there is someone else lurking out in the shadows who is actually responsible.

This is a story that is easy to get into, and you won’t help but keep turning the pages to find out more.

Rating: ★★★★½

Buy: Risking Trust

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-risking-trust-private-protectors-book-3-by-adrienne-giordano/feed/ 0 Review: A Tale of Two Lovers by Maya Rodale http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-a-tale-of-two-lovers-by-maya-rodale/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-a-tale-of-two-lovers-by-maya-rodale/#comments Thu, 21 Apr 2011 09:01:15 +0000 Keira http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=10158

A Tale of Two Lovers is the second Writing Girls novel by Maya Rodale. Don't you just love the cover?

The Situation: A pair of lovers is caught in a compromising situation. Soon all of London knows. There’s just one problem – it wasn’t quite what it looked like!

The Heroine: Lady Julianna Somerset is a widow and a Writing Girl for the London Weekly. Gossip is her thing and she loves secrets, as long as she knows them. The ton suspects she’s the London Weekly’s Lady of Distinction but they have no proof. When she comes across a piece of gossip so juicy she’s ecstatic because she knows her rival at the other newspaper, the Man About Town, hasn’t a clue, and she’ll be the one to break the scandal.

The Hero: Lord Simon Roxbury is not happy. First his father gives him an ultimatum to get married with a short time limit or he’ll be cut off from his allowance. Then the Lady of Distinction insinuates that he was intimate with a man, ensuring that no respectable woman would talk to him let alone marry him. He’s determined to get the gossipy she-devil to recant and hopefully get his old life back.

Review: The public and private battle for control was predictable but cute. They both do stupid things that kind of make you roll your eyes. The heroine wants to eek out as much juice from her Roxbury scandal as possible and plays every situation in such as way as to continually cast doubt on the man’s sexual preferences. The hero causes such a huge ruckus that the ensuing scandal embroils both that can only be fixed by a marriage of convenience. If you’re looking for a romp this is the book for you. :)

The Writing Girls:

Rating: ★★★½☆

Buy: A Tale of Two Lovers (Writing Girls)

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by Sharon S., guest reviewer

Snowball in Hell was previously published in I'll Be Dead For Christmas, Partners in Crime #2.

Consistent. That’s the word I would choose to describe Josh Lanyon’s stories, as in consistently great <G>. He knows how to tell a story and tell it well. His characters are emotionally satisfying.

This story is set in the 1940’s and the world views on gay men were quite different than they are now. I think Josh showed this well. It must have been lonely and scary to be a gay man at this time. Nathan Doyle’s situation broke my heart. Not only is he plagued by nightmares from the war, all he wants is to love and be loved, but he has given up on that dream. Until, Matthew Spain comes into his life. Spain recently lost his wife to cancer.

I am surprised at how easily Spain is able to accept his feelings for Doyle. It was a little to quick for me. There wasn’t much lead up to them expressing their feeling to each other. This story focuses more on the relationship, not the sexual parts. There is also a great murder mystery in there too <G>. That is the beauty of Josh Lanyon’s stories. They are all that and the bag of chips.

Rating: ★★★★☆ (would have been 5, but the relationship happened too fast for me.)

Buy: Snowball in Hell

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-snowball-in-hell-by-josh-lanyon/feed/ 2 Review: Cowboy Trouble by Joanne Kennedy http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-cowboy-trouble-by-joanne-kennedy/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-cowboy-trouble-by-joanne-kennedy/#comments Mon, 21 Mar 2011 09:13:27 +0000 Keira http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=6312

Joanne Kennedy’s debut novel will put the honky tonk back into your life. Pull up a stool in the Roundup and have Crystal Hayes pour you a beer as I’ve got the latest gossip.

Libby Brown is a city girl with a dream of owning her own chicken farm. When her boyfriend ran off with her boss at the Atlanta Journal Constitution, Libby packed up and headed to Wyoming. In addition to getting her chicken farm started, she works as a reporter for Lackaduck Holler.

Lackaduck is very small town. Neighbors are few and far between as ranches sprawl in all directions. Luke Rawlins is Libby’s sexy new neighbor. He is so typical stereotype cowboy in his whitewashed jeans, chaps, and Stetson hat, Libby can hardly believe he’s real. Aren’t traditional cowboys a myth? Not in Lackaduck!

Hearing about an unsolved local mystery perks Libby’s interest. With her background in crime stories, Libby dives headfirst into solving the case of Della McCarthy. Is she merely a runaway and missing or was she murdered? As clues stack up it begins to look more like the latter and not the former. The top suspects? A taxidermist, a chef, and a veterinarian... the real killer is close and he has his eyes set on Libby.

It's a little predictable as far as the mystery goes as I solved it pretty quick, but I had a lot of fun reading it anyway because of the relationship between the hero and heroine. Luke is a wonderful hero who knows how to handle a nervous filly.

Rating: ★★★½☆

Buy: Cowboy Trouble

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-cowboy-trouble-by-joanne-kennedy/feed/ 3 Audio Review: Bridget Jones’s Diary: Edge of Reason by Helen Fielding http://www.loveromancepassion.com/audio-review-bridget-jones%e2%80%99s-diary-edge-of-reason-by-helen-fielding/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/audio-review-bridget-jones%e2%80%99s-diary-edge-of-reason-by-helen-fielding/#comments Fri, 04 Mar 2011 18:23:34 +0000 Keira http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=4764

bookreview2

There was a different reader for this book. It’s something that bugs me when it comes to series and sequels. Same reader please! Tracie Bennett was okay part of the time.

Sometimes I found her Bridget’s voice too harsh. I absolutely hated the mother’s voice; she sounded like she hated her daughter every time she saw her/spoke to her with the sharp hoarse, “HEh-LLooo DAH-ling.” Darcy sounded like a nancy boy instead of a sharp sexy lawyer.

There was more cursing in this book than the first.

The book and the movie are also very different:

  • Plus – storyline is better than movie. Go Helen Fielding.
  • Rebecca the Jellyfish is the woman after Mark not Rebecca Gilles. The Rebecca in the book is not a lesbian and is truly after Mark. Bridget is not crazy.
  • No Daniel Cleaver, which is where the movie is better than the book. Hurrah for mixed up stories and sightings versus giving the wrong slip of paper. Grant and Firth are hot and dorky when they fight.
  • I wasn’t a fan of the Gary the builder/fisher sideline. Seemed more like filler.

Bridget finds out not long after she quit her job with Sit Up Britain in September, that upper management loves her. She supplied 68% of the ideas for the year she worked there, that they produced and put on the show. Talk about awesome! Go Bridget. They want to give her a raise, pay her for the months she wasn’t working for them and call it paid leave, and rehire her as a manager something or other, forget the exact title, or as a consultant. Oh and Richard was fired due to personal reasons a month after she quit. Hurrah!

Rating: ★★★½☆ because of reader

Rating: ★★★★☆ otherwise.

Buy: Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (paperback), Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason (audio)


Buy on Audible.com: Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/audio-review-bridget-jones%e2%80%99s-diary-edge-of-reason-by-helen-fielding/feed/ 1 Review: Saving Grace by Norah Wilson http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-saving-grace-by-norah-wilson/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-saving-grace-by-norah-wilson/#comments Thu, 20 Jan 2011 09:21:59 +0000 Karin http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=9255

by Karin of Savvy Thinker, guest reviewer

Saving Grace by Norah Wilson is another perfect book from this author. Guarding Suzannah is the other one of hers that I have reviewed. Both are in her Serve and Protect Series.

Full disclosure: I was given a pdf file for review.

There will be no spoilers - I don't want to give anything away it was so good.

My take: If you love reading romantic suspense, you will love this book.  It is perfect in every way.

Suspenseful -- yes!

Heavy on romance -- yes!

Gruesome -- No, thankfully, though there is some violence.

It is more than erotica, because there is love, not simply sex.

The Story: Police Detective Ray Morgan is clearly drunk, because he has not handled his wife's bombshell well.  She has left him for another man.  But when John Quigley (the hero from Guarding Suzannah) phones to tell him that Grace is barely alive, because she has rolled her car, he manages to pull himself enough together to be driven to the hospital.  There he is told that along with a concussion, she has amnesia.  She doesn't remember anything from the past week, and she doesn't know that she has left Ray.  Her doctor tells Ray that he mustn't tell her.

Then Quig gives him 2 weeks off to straighten out his marriage. Ray still loves his wife, and at the same time he can't bear thinking of her being with another man. It is hard for him to be civil.

The action: The action is fast and furious, starting with the accident, then realizing there is a lot of cash in her car.  And she no longer has her job as a reporter (news to both of them.) The bullets start to fly and she and Ray have to stay one step ahead of the threats on their lives, without knowing why, since she still has no memory of the missing week.  Making it worse, internal investigations thinks Ray has gone rogue.

I really liked it all.

It was a perfect mix of romance and suspense.  There wasn't any gratuitous violence, and there were no deaths.  I look forward to reading another book in the series.

The relationship between Ray and Grace is loving, even as they are both puzzled by her actions. It doesn't sound like her.  Grace is strong, and yet sometimes unwise, just like most of us would be in the same circumstances.  They come out of it stronger.

I guessed at some of the plot before it unfolded, and sometimes I was right.

Have you read any of Norah Wilson's books?

She is a 3 time Golden Heart Finalist and winner of New Voice in Romance contest.

Rating: ★★★★★

Buy: Saving Grace (Serve and Protect Series)

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bookreview2

This is the first time I read the books. I admit I am a bad girl and watched the movies first. That said, I really liked the reader, Barbara Rosenblat, as she reminded me of the movie. Her voice for the mother was fabulous. It was airy, a bit ditzy, and a tad lofty. Her Bridget was cute, the voice and inflections similar to Renee Zellweger in the movies.

There was less cursing than you’d think considering the movie which was full of fucks. The most used curse word was probably bloody.

The book and the movie are very different:

  • For instance in the book there was no mix-up of who cheated who’s wife. That’s a plus.
  • However on the other hand there wasn’t a fight scene between Daniel and Mark, which really was a deliciously wonderful and sexy dorky scene. Boo.
  • Also, Bridget’s mother’s new boy toy Hoo-lio (Julian) is a scam artist opposed to a home shopping sales rep.
  • Richard, the television boss, is not a rescuing savior but a revoltingly nasal and crass man. There were elements of the ridiculous in the movie but not nearly as over the top as in the book.
  • Sadly Mark never read her diary in the book as he did in the movie and the super cute ending with kiss in snow isn’t there either. They do share a cute ending though.

On another note, Hugh Grant must have a great sense of humor because he’s mentioned in this book for the prostitute thing and Bridget compares Daniel Cleaver to Grant. I busted a gut laughing. It is only funny because he ends up playing Daniel Cleaver in the movie.

Overall, I loved the book. In my opinion it is much better to get this as an audio book versus reading because I didn’t mind at all the cigarette, alcohol units, and calorie counting as I would have in reading it. I also would probably skipped them all after a certain point and missed the subtle humor in it.

Rating: ★★★★½

Buy: Bridget Jones's Diary

Buy on Audible.com: Bridget Jones's Diary

Online Stores ]]> http://www.loveromancepassion.com/audio-review-bridget-jones%e2%80%99s-diary-by-helen-fielding/feed/ 0 Review: This Time for Keeps by Jenna Mills http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-this-time-for-keeps-by-jenna-mills/ http://www.loveromancepassion.com/review-this-time-for-keeps-by-jenna-mills/#comments Sun, 21 Nov 2010 09:34:56 +0000 Keira http://www.loveromancepassion.com/?p=8722

Jenna Mills tackles some very hard issues in This Time for Keeps. A miscarriage tore the hero and heroine apart and annihilated their marriage two years prior to the start of the novel. Neither one has really dealt with the fallout of their lost child. At the opening of the book the estranged couple is on the verge of divorce when Megan Montgomery’s husband blows back into town.

He’s there to collect his niece and bring the baby to his folks across the pond. Megan is the baby’s official guardian based on Ainsley’s will. What she doesn’t know is that Russell is there to challenge it, but she’s willing to fight tooth and nail to keep her sister-in-law’s baby, Charlotte.

She blames him for their marriage falling apart. In her eyes Russell acted as a callous man only interested in trying to get some boom-boom and to replace their lost baby. Russell views the failure of the past and sees his wife pulling away, never opening up or talking to him. She retreated so far away that he couldn’t touch her without her flinching, couldn’t be in the same room with her without her running away.

Megan is furious with Russell for leaving his baby sister behind like he left her. Cutting Ainsley out of his life was worse than cutting her out in her mind because his sister had moved to a whole new country to be close to him. When he insists he found out her death only two weeks ago, it doesn’t placate Meg. It only makes it that much sadder.

As the two navigate around the other and rediscover their lost passion Charlotte’s father comes back to town and suddenly the two are a united front. They want to keep Charlotte at all costs… but when do the costs become too high?

In the end this just wasn't the book for me. There were too many lows giving the book a sad feel.

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Buy: This Time for Keeps (Harlequin Superromance)

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