fiction

Temporary by Sarina Bowen and Sarah Mayberry

Image katvinson, , ,

Temporary book coverAnother enjoyable read from Bowen. Mayberry is new to me, but their styles meshed together seamlessly.

Temporary features hard-working Grace Kerrington, who’s unofficially taking care of her fifteen-year-old sister because their mom is a drug addict. She has a degree but has struggled to find a lucrative job. She’s temping and landed a gopher-type job at an Australia-based corporation called Walker Holdings. Just as the book opens, she’s given a weird assignment: catalog the belongings of the recently-deceased brother (Jack) of the company’s CEO. As soon as she’s in his condo, she’s in heaven because he was an art collector of sorts, and although she got a business degree out of necessity, art is her true passion.

However, the condo is also where she first meets Callan Walker, the son of the CEO. He’s also an internationally known philanderer with websites dedicated to admiring his body and money. He’s got self-confidence to match his bank balance. But he was really close to his uncle and only found out he’d died when he was hanging out on some yacht. He immediately returned to New York City and let himself into Jack’s condo.

So he’s sitting there when she comes in and she doesn’t expect anyone to be there and says a few things that make everything a tad awkward going forward. Or it would be if not for the steaming tension between them. Grace doesn’t even know who he is, but her sister does, which makes for some amusing conversations.

Callan got screwed over by his first real love and hasn’t gotten over it. And Grace is hoping her temp position will turn into a permanent one, so she knows not to risk it by getting involved with Callan. But it’s difficult since they’re basically working side-by-side in Jack’s condo—and that accent. It’s a struggle for her. What she doesn’t know is that Callan’s hiding the real reason he’s there—he’s looking for a more recent version of Jack’s will that he’s convinced exists. She also doesn’t know that getting involved with him could put her guardianship of her sister at risk and that Callan’s not quite the shallow playboy we think he is.

It takes them a little while to see that they’re the real deal, and there’s lots of fun to be had along the way. On the couch. In the closet. You get the idea.

This book has great emotional depth in addition to the amazing tension between Grace and Callan, which persists even after they first hook up. Dialogue is realistic and distinct among the characters. Grace regularly reminds us of Callan’s accent without it being intrusive or weird. Callan definitely grows in the book. Grace’s arc isn’t as strong to me, as most of the things that she reacts to are external, but she does have to learn to trust Callan. Still, I didn’t find the book lacking for this.

Check it out if you’re a fan of either author, or even if you just like well-written steamy reads, as the book delivers an excellent romantic journey.

On Second Thought by Kristan Higgins

katvinson, ,

On Second Thought book coverOn Second Thought is the first of Higgins’ non-romance* books that I’ve read. And I’m happy to report I loved it. There is romance in the book—two, in fact—but the main storyline is two grown sisters getting close to each other for the first time.

Kate O’Leary is a 39-year-old successful photographer when she meets Nathan. They’re married in a few months and trying to start a family. When Nathan is killed just 96 days into their marriage in a freak accident, she’s devastated and completely shaken. Not just because she lost someone she loved, but because she’d totally uprooted herself and moved (herself and her studio) from Brooklyn to a giant house in a small wealthy town where Nathan’s family lives. On top of that, because she’d known him such a short time, she feels like an imposter mixing among all these grieving people who’ve known him for so much longer.

Her younger half-sister Ainsley is in a very long-term relationship with a Wall Street guy, Eric, waiting patiently for him to propose. But when Nathan dies—at Eric’s free-from-cancer celebration party, right before Eric is going to publicly propose—Eric freaks out a bit. He abruptly and coldly breaks up with Ainsley to go find himself in the wilds of Alaska.

Higgins is a master of digging into the depths of her characters’ thoughts. Nathan’s wake is a long scene told from Kate’s perspective. There is an apparently interminable line of people paying their condolences, leaving time for Kate to think all sorts of thoughts and react to all sorts of people. Near the beginning of the scene, she’s thinking about Nathan’s nephews, who are devastated.

The thought of their sweet, bereft faces made my throat feel like a nail had been driven through it. A spike, actually, a big rusty railroad spike. Their uncle. Their only uncle.

Four days ago, I was married. That had been enough of a trip. Now I was a widow. I ask you—how weird was that? (My brain seemed to be generating only italicized words, like an overdramatic narrator.)

Brooke lost her beloved younger brother. The Coburns no longer had a son.

Nathan was dead.

I mean, really. What the fuck?

The use of that last word is so perfect (I think it’s the only time it’s used in the book) because it’s so powerful here. She also uses the rusty spike throughout the book, which takes us right back to the horrible wake.

We also get to see Ainsley at the wake and get to know her as a great woman rising to the occasion while so many other people fail miserably. We see her on her own before all the bad stuff goes down, as she basically hero-worships her tool of a boyfriend. And when he does dump her, he does so publicly. He invites her to a fancy restaurant and tells her he wants her to move out (he “accidentally” left her name off the mortgage when they bought their house). Then he writes a blog post that goes viral about her reaction. He goes on several national news shows to talk about his intended journey, the whole time humiliating Ainsley. The result of getting kicked out is that Ainsley moves in with Kate, which is such a relief to Kate (she hates being in Nathan’s giant house alone).

Kate’s and Ainsley’s voices are so great—they’re so different from each other yet both are likable (and, I’m happy to report, not silly). As I mentioned, Higgins goes deep into both of their minds, which takes us on their journeys with them. Kate’s grief is palpable and heartbreaking. And while Ainsley’s situation is obviously not quite as horrible, we still really feel her pain. Kate’s journey is primarily getting over her grief and dealing with the aftereffects of such a short marriage ending so abruptly. Ainsley’s journey’s a little different. She has to learn to accept the fact that Eric is a total douche and she’s better off without him.

The supporting characters are all also excellent. So different from each other and well-developed. The three primary men in the book are very realistically drawn despite the fact that we never get in their heads. Setting is wonderful and detailed. Dialogue shines. And although the book is pretty heavy—heavier than Higgins’ romances—it’s got so many funny moments (mostly Ainsley’s).

So if you like deep stories about real women dealing with real issues, you should enjoy On Second Thought. I definitely did.

 

* I know most people call this book “women’s fiction.” But I refuse to acknowledge the existence of such a ”genre.” It’s simply non-genre fiction that focuses on women protagonists. We don’t call Jonathan Franzen’s work “men’s fiction.” It is not true that when men write it it’s fiction and when women write it it’s some sort of deviation from the real thing and needs its own label. That would be sexist.

Beard Science (Winston Brothers #3) by Penny Reid

Image katvinson, , , ,

Beard Science book coverJennifer Sylvester is kind of a joke in Green Valley, Tennessee, where she’s know as the Banana Cake Queen because—well, you can guess why. The recipe is a family secret. People don’t take her seriously. One of the locals called her “stranger than a vegetarian at a barbecue.” And on top of that, her parents are bullies, especially her mom. She’s forbidden to wear anything but her Sunday best clothes out in public. Now, she’s definitely old enough to be living on her own, but with the way her family treats her (borderline abuse), it’s really difficult for her to move out. They have her working full-time in the family bakery, but they don’t give her a salary. What she wants more than anything is to start a family, but with her so isolated, she never really meets men in any useful way.

Cletus Winston is one of the many Winston brothers we’ve met in previous books. He’s the weird one. But he’s also clever and entertaining. Jennifer knows he’s regarded as “the most powerful man in East Tennessee” (because “he could make anything happen”). He’s kind of arrogant, but somehow it’s not as irritating as it is on other people. He also doesn’t think much of her:

The show of confidence had been completely out of character for meek and docile Jennifer Sylvester.

Granted, I didn’t know her very well. I didn’t need to. She was a weak person.

But then she surprises Cletus by catching him on video doing something he shouldn’t, and then using that to get him to help her. Basically extorting him to get his help in finding a husband so she can start that family she so desperately wants.

Cletus decides that to accomplish what she wants, she needs lessons and practice. So he challenges her to do different things (paint her fingernails a bold color, dye her hair a color other than what her mom wants, …). Doing these things is difficult for Jennifer and overcoming this is her character arc. She feels undervalued by her family (because she is) and she needs to find some self-confidence somewhere and build it up. And get on with her adult life. Cletus helps her do that, but she’s the one who does the real work. Cletus doesn’t have as strong an arc, because his main thing is that he learns to see her as more than a meek and docile girl.

Like always with Reid’s books, this one’s funny and fairly steamy at times, though it’s a slow build. It’s equally surprising to Jennifer and Cletus when they end up together. Her dialogue is good even though it’s all about a couple of odd people who speak a little… oddly at times. As with all the books in this series, the setting’s fun and unusual (you don’t see rural eastern Tennessee come up often, do you?). We also see the setup for book #4, which was released fairly recently. Check Beard Science out if you like quirky characters.

Stay (WAGs #2) by Sarina Bowen and Elle Kennedy

katvinson, , , , ,

Stay book coverRead on if you’r interested in more hockey hotness from Bowen and Kennedy. Stay is the second in the WAGs series (that’s wives and girlfriends for those of you not in the know) after Good Boy. And it features a cool girl and another hot hockey player.

Hailey Emery co-runs (with her ex-husband) her own business, a virtual assistant company called Fetch. They’re basically a concierge, finding services like dog-walkers and housecleaners, picking up and delivering items, and doing other such things for clients. She has one client whose account name is Sniper87 and she’s half convinced he’s the hockey star Matt Eriksson. Who she fancies. But she respects her client’s privacy and resists the temptation to peek at his profile details.

She’s not wrong. Matt’s on the same Toronto team as Blake and Wes, who we’ve seen in the earlier books. At 30, he’s getting old for the game and starting to feel it. He’s also unhappily single, with little time to do anything about it. His ex-wife’s deeply unpleasant and he doesn’t see his two daughters enough. He’s been using Fetch and the person he corresponds with the most is Hailey, or Hottie as he calls her (because her initials are all he sees—HTE). He’s seen a picture of a pretty woman on the site and decided it’s her, and he’s theoretically interested.

He’s not wrong either. How they finally get together is entertaining but not overly cutesy. First, the dog walkers she’s hired aren’t doing a good job with his dog—they’re snooping around his apartment, for instance. So she does the dog walking herself the next day, and he watches over his security cam and decides she really is the cute girl from the website photo. So they’re chatting about it over the Fetch messaging app, and he flirts with her a little because he assumes she knows who he is. He arranges to get her two tickets to the next home game, in a card labeled For HoTtiE. Things go from there, as they do.

Hailey’s pretty shy and although she’s been married before, she’s not really experienced much excitement. Matt takes on teaching her a little about life and… other things. The book is funny partially because of her inexperience and shyness, but there’s plenty of unrelated humor, too. There’s an ongoing thread with a client sending dick pics to Fetch which is pretty funny, especially when it gets explained near the end. As always, the dialogue’s good, the secondary characters are entertaining, and the ending’s satisfying. So if you like hockey romances, Bowen, or Kennedy, you’ll like this one.

Flat-out Sexy (Fast Track #1) by Erin McCarthy

katvinson, , , ,

Flat-out Sexy book coverIf you’d told me I’d enjoy a romance about a hot professional race car driver, I wouldn’t have believed you. But Flat-out Sexy is a solid, complex story about a race widow and a young driver. Kudos to McCarthy to making the world of NASCAR interesting to me.

Tamara Briggs lost her husband in a crash at Talladega, which left her with two young kids to raise. Elec Monroe is a rookie driver. He’s almost 26 and Tamara’s thirty-ish, which doesn’t stop them from having a hot hookup the first night they meet.

After a second meeting engineered by their friends, Elec talks Tamara into getting together occasionally for stress relief. Tamara thinks they can’t be anything serious, but for Elec, it soon becomes more than a fling. The fact that Tamara already has kids is not an issue for him. Due to a youthful mistake, he’s sterile, but the problem with that is he wants kids. Perhaps even more than if he could have them. Yet Elec struggles to get Tamara to consider a real relationship.

When the kids get chicken pox, Elec shows up to offer moral support and dinner and the tide begins to turn a little. Tamara finds Elec and her son lying on their stomachs fiddling with an ant farm he’d brought as a gift:

It was so normal, so masculine, so casual, that damned if she didn’t have tears in her eyes.

This was what her son had lost when Pete had spun out and hit the wall at Talladega.

I’m also happy that Tamara’s kids aren’t cutesy stereotypes—they might be young (9 and 7) and cute, but it’s her daughter who’s the race fanatic, while her son isn’t particularly interested.

It’s nice to see Tamara and Elec come to terms with their issues over the course of the book (Elec also has an ex that’s causing trouble and Tamara unsurprisingly is a little self-conscious about her body) while they learn to be there for each other.

As I mentioned, the book has a fair amount going on, but it’s not so much that it overwhelms the reader. Also, it’s definitely funny at times and there were several well-placed turns of phrase. After they met that first night, for several complicated reasons Tamara needs to sleep in her friend Ryder’s coach and ends up having to share a cab with some guy, who turns out to be Elec.

Elec, just as gorgeous as she remembered, leaned out of the cab. “Hop on in, Tamara. I’ll make sure you get home safely.

Said the spider to the fly.

I’m pretty sure this was the first romance I read, on a friend’s recommendation, and it’s what pulled me into the genre. My one complaint is that the part where they temporarily break up near the end felt contrived and manufactured. But this is occasionally true in romances. So if you already enjoy the genre, you’ll like this one if you appreciate steamy and more going on than the romance itself. And if you’ve never read one, give it a try.

Barefoot in the Sand (Barefoot Bay #1) by Roxanne St. Claire

katvinson, , , ,

Barefoot in the Sand book coverBarefoot in the Sand is presented as a fun beach read, but I thought there was more to it than that—it wasn’t a lightweight story. No, there was a lot else going on, which is how I like my romances.

After a massive hurricane turns unexpectedly toward their beach town, Lacey Armstrong and her daughter Ashley survive it by cowering in the bathtub and holding a mattress over their heads. Their house is destroyed and she hopes to use the insurance money not to just rebuild, but to build a B&B.

Then she meets Clay Walker, who is a down-on-his-luck sort-of architect. We aren’t sure what his story is for a while, but soon enough learn that it’s family-related, as his father (who has the same name) is a renowned architect who sabotaged Clay’s career. For Lacey, Clay paints a much more ambitious picture for what she could build: a small resort.

They start working together to design the place and find that the chemistry they have is hard to ignore. Clay makes a move or two but it takes a while for them to really get together. It’s well worth the wait.

In the midst of their resort planning, David, Ashley’s absentee father reappears in their lives after having an epiphany about the value of family. He wants to get back together with Lacey despite the fact that he dumped her when she first told him she was pregnant. She isn’t interested, but Ashley is holding onto the family fantasy herself. Then, to complicate things further, the town council is led by someone completely opposed to the building of Lacey’s resort, and a battle ensues between her and the council.

The book nicely ties together Lacey’s and Clay’s backstories into an intertwined and well-plotted story. Seeing them get past their issues to fall in love is quite enjoyable. Both of these characters are deeply drawn and relatable, even if it takes a little longer for us to really get Clay (his backstory is withheld longer than Lacey’s).

The only complaints I have have to do with Clay’s behavior early on and then the grand gesture. He doesn’t behave like someone who’s trying to get a desperately-needed job—instead, he’s overtly trying to get in Lacey’s pants. I felt like he’d be acting more professionally at the beginning. But whatever—it gets the plot moving, so I looked past that.

Then the other thing is the grand gesture. I won’t give it away, but it was just super-cheesy. I guess a lot of people like gushy and innaproppriately-timed public displays, but they make me uncomfortable. But again, whatever—it wrapped the novel up.

Overall, the book was a good read and I’ll likely read the next one in the series because I like the depth of the story. And St. Claire is a masterful emotion-manager, taking us where she wants us to be with great description, natural dialogue, and good pacing. Anyone who likes longer contemporary romances should enjoy it.

Favorite Reads of 2017

katvinson,

Here’s a breakdown of my favorite romances that I read in 2017 (not necessarily that were published in 2017)…

Of course Sarina Bowen tops the list because she’s always my favorite. I read several of her books this year and loved them all. But I especially love the True North Series, from which I read the latest three. I especially adored Steadfast and Keepsake. These books have great depth where a lot more is going on than the central romance, but it never takes away from the romance. See the reviews here and here.

Pipe Dreams from Bowen’s Brooklyn Bruisers series also gets a mention because I really liked the  second chance story with all the unfair obstacles the two had to get past. I haven’t reviewed this one yet but plan to at some point.

A surprise for me was The Hating Game, a debut by Sally Thorne. It’s a friends-to-lovers story and I’m not generally a fan of that trope, but the tension in this book is fantastic. I reviewed it here.

I’m also a fan of Penny Reid, particularly for Grin and Beard It, a tale of a highly unlikely couple—a pop-culture-oblivious forest ranger and smart and feminist movie star. Click here for the review.

Finally, I’d like to mention one of Lisa Kleypas’s Friday Harbor books. I read these out of order and my first was my favorite—#3, Dream Lake. The hero in this one seems unredeemable at first, but he’s never so horrible that his behavior was unforgivable. See the review here.

A Chicken Review

katvinson, , 1 Comment

There are some people who say that virtually all romance is feminist because it’s finally about women getting something they want. I’m going to come out and say it: No, no it’s not. Some of it is still small-minded sexist tripe. And I’m not talking about that horrible rape fantasy crap that some men (and probably some women) write. I’m talking about mainstream romance.

I recently read a novella that I got free from a writing conference. I’m too chicken to actually write a full-on negative review about a book, but I’m going to go through the basics of the story and talk about how disturbing it really is to me, particularly when it’s accepted as normal or even admirable. And the fact is, this kind of story is so common in romance.

The story is a romantic suspense and starts off with the hero trailing a woman, the heroine. Okay, problem #1. Stalking. Maybe there’s a reason, but that’s what it is. Then a van pulls up beside the heroine and drags her inside and the hero breaks into a run to rescue her (he has super abilities so this is feasible).

And we’re supposed to go, Oh, okay, he’s a Good Guy.

But he was still stalking her. I’m really just not okay with that.

In the meantime, she fights back against her kidnappers, so we’re supposed to realize she’s a Strong Woman, which is probably thought to be a feminist thing by some people.

Then, he rescues her and she stares at him, the instant attraction overwhelming. Yet she realizes he too looks dangerous, so she plans to run again. He tells her she has to either come with him willingly or he’ll take her himself.

Um, no, not okay.

She runs and he catches her, because he’s more powerful than she is. Of course. She manages to convince him not to run off with her (again, this is probably something people find proof of her “strength”), but then they get shot at so we know he was Right All Along. He gets her in his car and she accuses him of planning to kill him, all while admiring his sexy lips.

Then he takes her—against her wishes—to the airport and onto a plane, where he secures her to a chair. Once they’re at a safe place they discuss the need for him to tie her up again but decide to have  sex instead. Afterward, she does something that pisses him off and he plans to talk to her later about her lack of “obedience.“

In the end, she agrees to marry him and just “work on” his barbaric tendencies.

The whole idea that he knows better than she does and is therefore justified in making choices for her is just intolerable to me. Taking away a woman’s autonomy and agency cannot possibly be feminist. Just because a woman gets off in a book doesn’t make it feminist.

Crystal Cove (Friday Harbor #4) by Lisa Kleypas

katvinson, , , ,

Crystal Cove book coverI really enjoyed the first three books in this series and was looking forward to this one, the fourth. There were elements of magic in all the other books, but they were very subtle and mostly unique. More magical realism than fantasy. This book embraces the magic of the series and runs with it and feels more urban fantasy than straight contemporary.

Justine Hoffman is a born witch, although she has rejected the lifestyle and instead runs a successful hotel she owns. Jason Black is a super-rich video game developer. They both have major problems. Justine learns that a spell was cast on her when she was born that prevents her from finding true love. And Jason has no soul. In this context it doesn’t mean he’s a sociopath or whatever—it just means when he dies, that’s it for him.

Once Justine learns about the spell, she’s determined to correct the injustice and finds a spell that should correct it. That night, she meets Jason. I don’t like saying it, but the chemistry between them wasn’t that intense. Definitely not up to the standard Kleypas levels. Plus, Jason was a bit of a douche. (I mean, romance heroes often are, but they at least appear to change and he didn’t seem to.)

The book wasn’t bad by any means, but it just didn’t live up to my expectations. There were good moments, though. My favorite was the scene with Jason’s assistant and her family in Toad Suck, Arkansas (even though it was a tiny bit cliché) because that is a real place and I’ve driven right past it before. And how can you not love a scene that takes place in a place called Toad Suck? I also liked the tension in the relationship between Justine and her mom, who organized the casting of the curse.

I also wondered what would have happened specifically with Jason if Justine hadn’t cast the spell before meeting him. Nothing? Something less than satisfying? It kind of surprised me that Justine didn’t wonder this herself.

In summary, I’d recommend this is you’re a die-hard Kleypas (or Friday Harbor) fan, but just expect it to be different from the others you’ve read.

All I Ever Wanted by Kristan Higgins

katvinson, , , ,

All I Ever Wanted book coverI’ve been reading Higgins for reasons I previously explained, and I’m still feeling an ambivalence about her books. This book, too, is funny, and there were some great scenes in. But here, as well, was a silly heroine. Now, she wasn’t silly 100% of the time, fortunately. No, she was both very good at her job as a marketing specialist and with children.

The book is about Callie Grey, who’s just hit thirty without being married,* and Ian McFarland, who’s just moved to their small Vermont town to take over the vet practice there. Callie’s reeling because she’s just found out that her long-time crush and ex-short-term-boyfriend (and current boss) is seeing someone else seriously. He insensitively reveals this after giving her a sweet birthday present. She is rather obsessed with him, and (too?) much of the book is spent on him.

Ian is a bit of an enigma, on top of being socially inept and kind of a jerk at times. But we have faith that he’s redeemable and that there’s probably a good explanation for him being the way he is (there is). Callie, on the other hand, is super-friendly and everyone loves her. She offers to help him with PR because his vet practice is at risk of suffering due to his poor people skills.

The setup is fine, but here is some of the silly:

  • Callie makes a scene in the DMV when she’s blubbering over her ex’s new relationship. Also funny, because it’s where she meets Ian, who rudely accuses her of having “verbal diarrhea.”
  • Callie thinks it’s a good idea to buy some over-the-counter herbal concoction to get rid of her “food baby” overnight. This is idiotic. Do people really think you can shrink overnight? I don’t get it. However, also funny, because “food baby.”
  • Callie hits a turkey in her car and thinks it’s dead. She races to Ian’s and gets, well, hysterical about the poor, innocent bird. Her overreaction irritated me. Yet also funny, because the turkey comes back to life and trashes Ian’s place while they run around trying to corral it out (but again, she’s acting a little silly during this, so…).
  • All the women in town (at least those who have a pet) make unnecessary appointments with Ian in order to meet him and check him out, all on the same day. Really? Would that many women do that? Maybe I’m just not tuned into the normal woman (Truth).

So I’m definitely not immune to the humor in the book, even if the silliness grates. Below is a snippet from my favorite scene (Callie is escorting a group of five-year-old Brownies on a visit to the vet clinic, and Ian is hiding in the back before being coerced out to face them):

“Dr. McFarland,” I said, “can you tell us some of the most common operations you do?”

He shot me a grateful look. “Okay, well, we neuter and spay animals so they can’t, um, have babies … Uh, I remove tumors, set broken bones—please don’t touch that,” he said as Hayley began squeezing the pump of a blood pressure cuff.

“Maybe we could move on, Dr. McFarland,” I suggested.

…

We herded the girls back into the hall. “Ian, why don’t you examine Angie and sort of show them what you look for,” I suggested in a low voice. “And if you gave out a souvenir, that would be great.”

“I don’t have souvenirs, Callie. This is not a gift shop,” he said tightly.

“Tongue depressors, Ian. Cotton balls. They’re five. They won’t care.”

He nodded. Swallowed.

I liked this scene because it showed Callie being highly competent at something, and the scene is also very funny.

Higgins definitely captures a great voice for Callie, who is very easy to understand. Like all her characters, she’s self-deprecating and funny. She’s also well-loved by her family, including her extremely grumpy grandfather, who she lives with. The book is told in first person only from Callie’s perspective, but despite that, the other characters are very real. Especially Ian, who was probably a little difficult to write because he isn’t the most charming character.

The book’s dialogue and internal thought is natural and witty at appropriate times:

One does not often see one’s grandfather naked in one’s bathroom, after all. And thank the merciful Christ for that.

Finally, Higgins brings us into the setting with wonderfully placed details so there’s no doubt we’re in small-town Vermont or whatever specific setting the scene is in. And from the sample of Higgins I’ve read, I’ve seen that there’s a fairly consistent medium heat level because everything’s implied. This one is in line with that.

As ever, Higgins delivers a charming book that fans of light, small-town contemporary romance will love.

 

* A big deal to her. Not to everyone.

The Next Best Thing (Gideon’s Cove #2) by Kristan Higgins

katvinson, , , ,

The Next Best Thing book coverI’ve entered a bunch of romance contests. The way these things work is that judges read the beginning of the manuscript (usually between 15 and 30 pages of it) and give you as much feedback as they want. Sometimes you get a lot; sometimes a little. The feedback is always a bit all over the place. I had one entry where one judge said, “If the rest of the manuscript is as good as this, it’s publication-ready!” while another judge on the same entry gave me 60-something points out of 100 and said there was too much description and not enough internalization. So you have to take it with a grain of salt (and look for consistent criticism). They’re looking for things to comment on, after all, not just reading for pleasure.

Anyway, one of the judges on one of my entries said my characters thoughts weren’t right and that I should read Kristan Higgins for examples of good internalization. I’ve read her before and know she’s good, so it’s not a great sacrifice. I picked up another four of her books and started in on them.

I’ll be honest, I have sort of mixed feelings about Higgins. She is a masterful writer and that judge was not wrong about her skill with characterization and internal thought. She creates really deep characters you feel for. And she is undeniably funny.

My issue comes in with her heroines. I sometimes find them too silly. I know that’s part of the humor—the ability to laugh at oneself is definitely appealing and relatable. But there’s a limit for me. It’s not unattractive for a woman to be a capable person. She can still have a big love wound of some type.

So I started The Next Best Thing with reservations. And in this case, I was happy to be presented with a heroine who is definitely very capable, at least in one area of her life. Lucy is a very skilled (and professionally trained) baker. It’s true that she could learn to stand up to her family a bit more, though. problem is that the love of her life was killed in a car crash after just 8 months of marriage. She is still very close to her husband’s family, including his younger brother, Ethan. Who she happens to be sleeping with.

The book is told entirely from Lucy’s perspective, so we don’t get Ethan’s view on things. But it’s pretty clear he’s in love with her and that she’s oblivious. After her sister has a baby, Lucy decides it’s time for her to move on from her husband and find a new one. However, she wants a man who she can’t love as much as she loved her husband. She can’t risk that kind of loss again. And she likes Ethan enough that she worries she could fall for him more than she’s comfortable with. So she breaks off their friends-with-benefits thing.

Ethan’s obviously not happy with this, but he’s supportive. Lucy is still oblivious. She goes on a few bad dates (okay, these dip into the uber-silly and are not extremely realistic, but that’s some of the humor) and one good date. But part of her problem is she’s in a small town with not a lot of men to choose from. The question throughout is, How long will it take her to realize that it’s worth taking the risk with Ethan?

As I mentioned above, this book definitely had its humorous moments, but it wasn’t as funny as some of her other books—which I really appreciated. I guess I tend to go more for books with serious substance over lighter romantic comedies (I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with light books, just that I don’t find them as satisfying). This book filled that role for me.

So did I learn anything about what to have my characters think? We’ll have to see…

Thoughts on the Genre

katvinson,

A few weeks ago, an article appeared in the New York Times that shook the romance community up a little. Robert Gottlieb gave a somewhat mocking summary of a handful of current romance out now in “A Roundup of the Season’s Romance Novels.” There was also a response entitled “Who Gets to Write About Romance? A Response from the Book Desk,” which dealt with some of the reader emails the original article inspired.

I have to admit that I am often sensitive to talk of romance, because often it is very disparaging. My boss recently found out I write romance and young adult, and he started chattering about it during my last one-on-one, telling me with a laugh that his wife reads romance novels. After informing me that he’s never read one himself, he said, “She tells me they’re historical novels,” laughed and continued, “I say, no, no they’re not.”

This pissed me off. What, he’s a literary expert because he’s never read one? Where does he get his information? Oh, that’s right—our lovely society. The same one that diminishes everything that women* do. Always. I rather ineloquently defended the genre to him. He got a little flustered and repeatedly said, “I didn’t mean to upset you,” while I continued rambling on. It wasn’t my finest moment, but I did avoid saying what was in my head at the time: “Then don’t say stupid sexist shit.” And also, as a matter of course, “Don’t insult something your employee spends almost as much of their free time doing as they spend at work.” Know what this guy’s hobby is? He rides a motorcycle. You don’t see me going around pointing out that I also liked to play on bikes—when I was nine.

Argh.

So I’m going to look at Gottlieb’s article. First off, I have to say that I find it difficult to imagine him wrapping himself in a plaid throw while curling up on a wingback chair in front of a crackling fire to devour the ten or so novels he references from start to finish. However, it’s clear that he at least skimmed all of them because he was able to identify the sex scenes. And despite the accusation of formula, it’s not true that these scenes always appear at designated points in all novels. It can be hard to find them if you don’t know (or remember) the story well. So I’m a little more willing to listen to what he has to say.**

What he says, basically, is that romance novels coming out now are ridiculous, partially because they include detailed and explicit sex scenes. But he also mocks the plots for being unbelievable, trite, and predictable. He says:

Whichever of these heroines you may be, you are guaranteed to end up in marital (often ducal) heaven, after dealing with one or another of the ingenious obstacles that create whatever suspense the genre can generate.

That does sort of sum things up, I’ll admit. But the implication is that it’s a bad thing. That a “lack of suspense” is a problem. I would argue that there is suspense, even if it’s not for the overarching plot. We do know they’ll get together. But the suspense comes from wondering how they’ll make it work. What solutions will be found and compromises made to resolve the competing differences they have? It’s not always clear what those will be. Furthermore, romance readers are voracious, book-devouring monsters, right? They read fast and often consume multiple books a week. So is it any surprise that there is a bit of repetition and difficulty coming up with something totally new and different without slipping into the slightly absurd every once in a while? And does it matter? Books are supposed to be entertaining, and if romance readers are entertained, who cares?

Some readers like to be deeply challenged. They liked to be made to learn something shiny and new, or think about something from a novel perspective, or at least be fundamentally surprised. And that’s fine. There is a lot of literature out there that does that. I used to read predominately literary novels because I always wanted deep characterization and I liked it when (emotionally) horrible things happen to characters. I also liked it when there was at least a chance that things would end badly. And I really hoped it would make me cry at some point.

However, now, I almost exclusively read romance and young adult (almost always contemporary in both). I write in these two genres and feel obligated to do my best to stay up-to-date and of course I have limited time to allocate to reading. I struggle with reading historical romance novels because I generally find them either sexist or anachronistic. My first BA degree was in history, so blatant inaccuracy bugs me. But it does not make me happy to read period-appropriate treatment of women, either.

Basically—and this is important—the whole point of novels is to take the reader on an emotional journey. Anyone who’s every gotten swept away by a book knows that everything in it is relative. You do suspend disbelief. So all those sex scenes that Gottlieb mocked? A lot of things are ridiculous out of context. I can see how the excerpts printed in the article are a little laughable when read cold. But if you take any emotionally charged moment (fiction or real life) and just dump it in someone’s face with absolutely no context, of course it will seem ridiculous. It’s totally unnatural. But love scenes in romance aren’t like that. No—there’s build-up to get the reader entrenched in the increasing emotional intensity of the moment, so that it flows and the reader goes along with the emotion.

Basically, my point is that not all art needs to challenge people to their core. There is nothing at all wrong with art that purely entertains. And whatever you think of it, romance novels do that.

 

* Actually, this should read “people who aren’t white cis-gendered dudes,” but I’m only talking about what I have more direct experience with.

** It is true that someone else could have done the skimming/reading and just given him the snippets to talk about. But I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Bountiful (True North #4) by Sarina Bowen

katvinson, , , , ,

Bountiful book coverI’m a total Bowen fangirl, I know. Bountiful is the fourth book in the True North series, which continues to deliver. I’m already looking forward to the next one, even though I’m not sure who it will be about (though I have my suspicions).

This one follows Zara, Griff’s ex-hookup. She manages the local bar, The Mountain Goat, under the theoretical watchful eye of her grumpy uncle. But really, she runs the place almost single-handedly.

She was still hung up on Griff when a hot stranger named Dave came to town for a few weeks. They found each other irresistible and hooked up numerous times during his time there. She insisted on keeping things on a first name basis only. Dave was okay with that, being averse to anything long term, though he was a little more drawn to her than to most women.

This was going on at the same time as the events in book 1, Griff’s and Audrey’s story. In a way, Dave helped Zara get over Griff and they kept each other entertained, all while keeping all personal information off the table. Zara turns up pregnant at the end of that book, well after Dave’s left, and who the father is is a big mystery to the town, but she isn’t telling anyone.

Fast forward a couple years, and she’s got a toddler named Nicole who has red hair just like her father. She still hasn’t told anyone who the father is, because the truth is, she doesn’t really know. All she knew was that he lived in Brooklyn and was rich. He’d casually mentioned his last name once, but when it mattered, she couldn’t remember it. So despite searching for him, she’d given up on ever being able to tell him.

And that’s when Dave returns for another short vacation, having nothing but fond memories of his time in Vermont two years earlier. By this time, Zara’s running a coffee shop with Audrey. Dave runs into Zara not too far into the book and she tells him about Nicole. The sparks are still there, but now they have to figure out how each of them can get over their own emotional blocks to figure out how to make things work. Especially after learning that he’s a high-profile hockey player, Zara is convinced that Dave could never be serious with her and would eventually disappear, just like her own father had. Dave believes that he’s incapable of a healthy relationship due to his own troubled childhood. An additional challenge is that they both have strong ties to where they’re living, with no easy way to compromise without someone giving something up.

This book is as steamy as you’d expect, though I admit I found Dave a little too bossy at times. But I guess some people like that. Still, Zara and Dave are both complex and interesting characters and it was a lot of fun to see cameos of characters from the earlier books.

Night Song by Beverley Jenkins

katvinson, , , ,

Night Song book coverThis is Jenkins’ first novel, the one that the publishing world didn’t know what to do with and amazed everyone. A story about post-Civil War black people? What? Who’d want to read that.

Apparently loads of people.

It was also my first Jenkins novel, even though I’ve been hearing about her for a while. And when I was at RT, she came into the hotel restaurant while I was having breakfast and stood about 10 feet from me, which was kind of cool.

Specifically, the book is set in 1882. But the prologue occurs 18 years earlier, when 9-year-old Cara Lee Henson watches her free grandfather killed by Union soldiers who beat him to death for not pointing them to a master he didn’t have. Apparently that happened some back then. The Civil War was clearly more complicated than Good vs. Evil. I’d say it was more Kinda-Okay-Sometimes vs. Evil.

Jenkins infuses the novel with history. And actually, the bulk of the book takes place during (or on the cusp of, depending on the historian you choose) what’s considered the nadir of post-Civil War race relations in the U.S. So there is a lot of interesting history that most Americans aren’t familiar with to convey. Some reviews I’ve seen complain about the amount of historical information included in the book, but I enjoyed it. Jenkins has really done her research and it’s interesting to learn more about the post-Civil War period all while reading a good story.

Cara is a 27-year-old Oberlin-trained schoolteacher working in a small town in Kansas. Two years before the story starts, she had a run in with an arrogant—but highly attractive—soldier named Chase Jefferson in Topeka. So she’s shocked to see him leading the procession of the arrival of the Tenth Cavalry, a famous all-black Army unit. She hadn’t known he was that high in rank and certainly never expected to see him again, despite the fact that she hadn’t stopped thinking about him.

Chase, for his part, hasn’t been able to stop thinking about Cara, either. Things proceed from there, with a lot of back and forth between them until Cara finally caves. But it’s not all roses after that (it wouldn’t be a romance if it were).

For me, the historical nature bugs me like historicals always do. The guy’s a womanizer until he meets this wonderful and feisty virginal woman, who totally changes his habits and mindset. She suffers from the strict moral expectations everyone around her forces her to meet (or try to meet), while he cavorts however he wants. And when he marries her, he owns her and she’s okay with that. And there’s loads of prostitution that’s more or less acceptable. I know this is historically accurate, but reading about it stresses me out a little. However, if you’re a fan of historicals, you’re used to it.

One other little thing that I should mention is that Jenkins is a head-hopping writer (we get into multiple characters’ heads in the same scene, in this case just Cara and Chase). Nora Roberts does this, too, so obviously this is an acceptable thing to millions of readers. I always find it jarring.

Still, Night Song is an interesting novel focusing on the late 19th century, a period a lot of historical romance readers might not have been exposed to. So it’s probably worth giving it a read. Plus, it’s by a legend of the genre and if you’re a romance reader, you should have read Jenkins.

Good Boy (WAGs #1) by Sarina Bowen and Elle Kennedy

katvinson, , , , ,

Good Boy book coverGood Boy is the first in a spin-off series from the Him and Us books by the two authors (about Jamie and Wes), which I previously reviewed. Two of the side characters in Us, Blake (Wes’s teammate) and Jess (Jamie’s sister) reappear in this book as hero and heroine. Blake was probably the most significant secondary character in Us and I have to admit I found him a wee bit annoying. He’s a bit on the effervescent side and is always making up words that make little sense and just being silly in general. It probably says something about me that that annoys me, but whatever.

In Us, we find out that while Jamie is down for the count with a bad flu and Jess is supposed to be 100% focused on taking care of him, she instead hooks up with Blake, who has inserted himself in Jamie and Wes’s lives again.

In Good Boy, Jess is back in Toronto to plan and coordinate Wes and Jamie’s wedding, which brings her back in touch with Blake, who’s the best man. She’s a serial career-changer and although she was sure wedding-planning was going to be her permanent gig, actually carrying it out make her realize she doesn’t ever want to do it again. She has an epiphany based on when she was taking care of Jamie—she wants to be a nurse. So she moves to Toronto and starts nursing school there. She spends a lot of time with Jamie and Wes, which brings her in regular contact with Blake, as well.

He’s as interested in her as he was that afternoon in the chair in Wes and Jamie’s apartment. But she regards him as a mistake. She’s trying to get herself into proper adulthood and messing around with a giant goofball doesn’t seem the right thing to do. Actually, messing around with anybody seems the wrong thing to do. She’s trying to earn her family’s respect, after all.

The one problem? Their chemistry is off the charts. So eventually they do start hooking up but it’s not intended to be a long-term arrangement. How that comes about is a joy to watch. As always with Bowen and Kennedy, the writing is superb. They deliver with all the feels, dialogue, strong characterization, and hot sex that you would expect from them.