Review: Kissing Tolstoy by Penny Reid

Kissing Tolstoy by Penny Reid
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was really cute. This is a longer version of Nobody Looks Good in Leather Pants, which was originally released in installments via Penny's newsletter in 2017. It is a standalone and my understanding is that the next book is going to continue as installments beginning in the June 2018 newstletter and will eventually be published as standalone as well. I really liked reading this as a complete book, I didn't always read the parts of the newsletter, even though I could have gone back and read them. I prefer to read serials in their entirety when they are complete. It's a preference thing.

This follows Anna, an intelectual student who hasn't had the best luck with boys and relationships. Her best friend Emily gives her the name of a guy to email to set up a date thinking they will hit it off. Anna mistakenly types in the wrong email and upon meeting her mystery guy, she finds out he isn't who she was supposed to meet. Anna panics and runs from the hansome leather pants wearing stranger and proceeds to make up all kinds of crazy things that he does in his spare time just because he rides a motorcycle and wears leather pants. She being being a lover of Russian literature, triva night, and puzzles surmises that he would never be into a quite, nerdy girl like herself. Fast forward a few weeks when Anna finds herself in a Russian literature class that she's been dying to take, the professor happens to been none other than leather pants wearing Luca Kroft, her mystery date. She eventually goes on a date with Lucas Kraft the boy she meant to email, but he turns out to be a terrible match for her. Professor Luca Kroft, however, ends up being more than she can handle. She can't ignore the initial attraction she felt towards him that night they met, and neither can he. He also can't help that she inspires passion in their debates about the Russian works they are discussing in class. In his attempts to be non-biased about his feelings towards Anna, he ignores her, which makes her angry. When she calls him out on it, sparks fly and things get tricky between the student and the teacher. Luca doesn't want to lose his teaching position and Anna doesn't want to risk her heart or her education for some guy. I feel like the taboo nature of their relationship was handled and covered appropriately.

I loved that Luca loved Anna for who she is. He didn't want to change her in any way. He just wanted to be with her and get to know her Anna is immature at times, but she is young and he takes her reactions in stride and goes with it. While they don't seem like a typical couple, they work. I also loved that he took things slowly with her. Sure there were some steamy times, but he didn't push her. They built a relationship, which is something I love about Penny's writing. Her characters while they usually have chemistry at first site, they don't typically jump right into bed and that's the rest of the story. There is a relationship that is built between the characters which makes the intimate scenes so much better.

You can tell that Penny puts so much time into researching every book she writes. I've read some of the works mentioned in Luca's class, and while Russian literature is not my favorite I do recall having similar discussion about those works in my classes. You can tell she takes pride in making sure her work is accurate in addition to being well crafted. I also loved the discussion Anna and Luca had about him not being able to math. As a person who studied engineering myself, and as a patron like Anna, I very much appreciated that humor. My favorite quote "I love to read, but I’m not a writer. I love philosophy, but I’m not a philosopher. I love art, but I can’t paint, I can’t draw or sculpt. I love movies and the theater, but I’m a terrible actor. Therefore, I’m a patron," as this describes me in a way.

I really enjoyed this and look forward to reading the next one.


View all my reviews

Review: Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was fantastic! This is one of the most fantastic books I’ve ever read. I think Trevor Noah is hilarious. His brand of comedy is funny to me, and I wish I had been able to get a hold of the audio version of this because the delivery of his one liners in this are so funny and perfectly placed. I can only imagine how funny it is to hear him narrate the story of his life. He covers some very heavy issues, but he diffuses each situation with comedy so you can pause, catch your breath, and move on. This was a hard read, but it is also important.  He has some great insights to race and how children see the world.  If only some of those things were actually true the world might be a better place.

This is one of those books, where you think “hey that guy is on TV, he has it all”, and then you read about the hardships and terrors he’s faced in his life. Trevor Noah did not have it all, in fact he had very little, and it’s a testament to his survival skills that he made it through his childhood in South Africa during apartheid. You read about some of the things he and this mother survived and it is amazing they both lived through it all. His very birth was a crime and the deck was stacked against him and his family for much of his life. Reading this was hard, but he laces his life story with his brand of comedy such that he takes something awful and he puts a joke in lighten tough situations. I got quite the education on the settling of South Africa, apartheid, and how gender and race are seen in another country.

This is a story about a defiant little boy who tested his mother’s patience as often as possible, a mother who loved him and did her best, a country that had very interesting laws about people of color, and survival. I highly recommend this book.


View all my reviews

Review: Unbreakable by Sara Ella

Unbreakable by Sara Ella
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be published on May 1, 2018.  If you enjoyed Unblemished and Unraveling, I do recommend reading this to find out how it ends.

I hate to do this, but I really struggled with this book. My review is going to be critical. I’m OK with the ending but I did not enjoy how we got there in this installment. It took far too long to resolve things from the 2nd book and actually get to the plot of the 3rd book. I enjoyed Unblemished and Unraveling, but it took me almost a month to finish this book and that is rare. I typically finish a book in a few days, especially if it is YA. I found the writing to be very immature in this book. I didn’t find that to be the case in the first two books. The things the characters say are phrases I expect from a child, not from teenagers. They act like petulant children, not like warriors who have faced and overcome struggles in their lives that the first two books have outlined. While they all have baggage, the actions and dialogue of the adults and teens in this installment were just too immature for my taste and they didn’t fit with the other books.

There wasn’t much character development in this book. We started to see some of the characters develop in book 2. The concept of loving yourself and not needing a boy to make you strong were apparent, but again immaturity struck and I felt that the characters just didn’t really develop much. There are moments when I really respected how far our main character Eliyana Ember, also known as El and Em, has developed throughout the series. Then in the next section she is a sniveling child. In the end she finds her strength and comes to love herself, but I found the conclusion to that plot line very weak and poorly written. Much of her development was centered around the love triangle, not self love as I think the author intended. Atleast that’s how I was left feeling after it was all over. Joshua and Ky are both fighting the Void, but it doesn’t really change their character. They are both the same as they always were. The characters don’t really develop beyond who they were in the beginning. They make some critical decisions that guide the plot, but it doesn’t really impact their development. Ebony on the other hand changes quite a bit from the first book to the last. Much like book 2 there is quite a bit of inner monologue going on and we get a lot of Ebony’s inner perspective about why she is the way she is and what she is feeling. She wants her mother’s acceptance and love, and nothing she ever did was good enough. We come to find that while she puts on a tough exterior, she may just be as broken as everyone else on the inside. Her inner monologue got to be a bit much after a while, especially with the immaturity of the writing. I do like the plot twist at the end that involved Ebony, thought. I didn’t quite see that coming.

I found it very hard to keep track of which perspective we were following. Now I was reading an ARC, and I’m hopeful that in the final edits of the book the chapter headings will include a note about which character we are following. If the final copy doesn’t, it should. The plot, like the perspectives jumped around so much, I never knew what was going on in the book. I often had to go back and reread pages because I felt like I missed something. In the end I realized, the content just wasn’t there. The ending gives enough closure to make the series feel complete but it felt rushed and just very convenient. I didn’t like spending so much time in the character’s heads again. There was a lot of inner thought going on and the characters having conversations with themselves instead of the other characters or words on the page moving the plot forward.

There was so much potential with this series. It was original with the magic system and the fantasy elements. I really liked where it was going with the concept of the Void and the Verity and the different Reflections. While I still feel that the while Void and Verity thing could have been flushed out and explained better, I think the concept was good. The idea of the Reflections and the thresholds was a really unique take on different dimensions existing at once, I just think the execution in book 3 could have been a little stronger. I liked the kind of fairy tale elements that were brought into the story. I just don’t like the way this last book was written. The writing was jumbled and confusing. The plot was all over the place and it didn’t make for an enjoyable reading experience for me.

View all my reviews

Trailer Reveal: Moolight Seduction by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Moonlight Seduction: A de Vincent Novel from New York Times bestselling author Jennifer L. Armentrout is coming June 26th and we have the trailer reveal!

The de Vincent brothers are back—and so is the intrigue that surrounds them—in New York Times bestselling author Jennifer L. Armentrout’s sizzling new novel . . .

Nicolette Bresson never thought she’d return to the de Vincents’ bayou compound. It’s where her parents work, where Nikki grew up . . . and where she got her heart broken by Gabriel de Vincent himself. Yet here she is, filling in for her sick mother. Avoiding Gabe should be easy, especially when so much of Nikki’s time is spent trying not to be stabbed in the back by the malicious hangers-on who frequent the mansion. But escaping memories of Gabe, much less his smoking-hot presence, is harder than expected—especially since he seems determined to be in Nikki’s space as much as possible.

Gabriel spent years beating himself up over his last encounter with Nikki. He’d wanted her then, but for reasons that were bad for both of them. Things have now changed. Gabe sees more than a girl he’s known forever; he sees a smart, talented, and heartbreakingly beautiful woman . . . one who’s being stalked from the shadows. Now, Gabe will do anything to keep Nikki safe—and to stop the de Vincent curse from striking again.

Watch the Trailer:

Trailer by: Jillian Stein

Preorder Today!

Amazon US: http://amzn.to/2GiWCeo

Amazon Universal: http://mybook.to/MoonlightSeduction

iBooks: https://apple.co/2p38gCM

Nook: http://bit.ly/2Dn6v7B

Kobo: http://bit.ly/2p4hHlm

Add to GoodReads: http://bit.ly/2FBrHIW

Start the Series Today!

Moonlight Sins (de Vincent series, book 1)

Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2v8VLen

Amazon Universal: https://mybook.to/moonlightsins

Nook: http://bit.ly/MoonlightSins-Nook

iBooks: http://bit.ly/MoonlightSins-iBooks

Kobo: http://bit.ly/2EHHQLQ

Audible: http://amzn.to/2DJB1JZ

About Jennifer L. Armentrout

# 1 New York Times and # 1 International Bestselling author Jennifer lives in Charles Town, West Virginia. All the rumors you’ve heard about her state aren’t true. When she’s not hard at work writing. she spends her time reading, watching really bad zombie movies, pretending to write, hanging out with her husband and her Jack Russell Loki. In early 2015, Jennifer was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a group of rare genetic disorders that involve a breakdown and death of cells in the retina, eventually resulting in loss of vision, among other complications.  Due to this diagnosis, educating people on the varying degrees of blindness has become of passion of hers, right alongside writing, which she plans to do as long as she can.

Her dreams of becoming an author started in algebra class, where she spent most of her time writing short stories….which explains her dismal grades in math. Jennifer writes young adult paranormal, science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary romance. She is published with Tor, HarperCollins Avon and William Morrow, Entangled Teen and Brazen, Disney/Hyperion and Harlequin Teen. Her Wicked Series has been optioned by PassionFlix. Jennifer has won numerous awards, including the 2013 Reviewers Choice Award for Wait for You, the 2015 Editor’s Pick for Fall With Me, and the 2014/2015 Moerser-Jugendbuch- Jury award for Obsidian. Her young adult romantic suspense novel DON’T LOOK BACK was a 2014 nominated Best in Young Adult Fiction by YALSA. Her adult romantic suspense novel TILL DEATH was a Amazon Editor’s Pick and iBook Book of the Month. Her young adult contemporary THE PROBLEM WITH FOREVER is a 2017 RITA Award Winner in Young Adult Fiction. She also writes Adult and New Adult contemporary and paranormal romance under the name J. Lynn. She is published by Entangled Brazen and HarperCollins.

She is the owner of ApollyCon and The Origin Event, the successful annual events that features over hundred bestselling authors in Young Adult, New Adult, and Adult Fiction, panels, parties, and more. She is also the creator and sole financier of the annual Write Your Way To RT Book Convention, a contest that gives aspiring authors a chance to win a fully paid trip to RT Book Reviews.

Connect with Jennifer L. Armentrout:

 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JenniferLArmentrout

Twitter: https://twitter.com/JLArmentrout

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jennifer_l_armentrout/

GoodReads: http://bit.ly/1DiIjRa

Stay up to date with Jennifer by joining her mailing list today: https://bit.ly/2qBce5m

https://jenniferlarmentrout.com

Review: Defy Series Review by Sara B. Sarson

I'm trying something a little different here, I'm going to post reviews for all 3 books in the series.  I recently read them and I'm very behind on posting my reviews.  I wasn't overly impressed with this series.  The writing isn't great, but I found the series OK on audio.  They were fairly short.  Be warned though, this is not a fantasy series as it is often labeled.  It is a romance series with some fantasy and magic elements thrown in.  The third book is a little more centered around the plot and fantasy, but the plot is centered around the romance and A LOT of teenage emotional decision are make throughout.

Defy by Sara B. Larson
Narrated by Rebecca Mozzo
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Let me start out by saying that I was expecting a fantasy. This was recommended to me as a book I read because of several of the fantasy books I'd previously read. This is a romance with fantasy elements. Even the description promises a powerful female lead in a fantasy environment. I was pretty disappointed from that perspective because it was not what I was expecting.

Alexa Hollen is in hiding as a boy in the prince's guard. She and her twin Marcel joined the army and then the prince's guard after their village was destroyed and they were orphaned. In an attempt to keep Alexa out of the breeding houses, she pretended to be a boy and join the military. The breeding houses are horrid places where women are raped and mistreated by the men of the land in order to have children to feed the kings fighting forces and create more women for the breeding houses. It's as awful a concept as it sounds. Alexa becomes Alex and she is a formidable soldier. She has earned her place in the guard by beating pretty much every man in the guard. No one can beat her including her brother. Alex has a level head on his shoulders, but as soon as people begin to admit that they know that Alexa is a girl she starts to act flighty and second guessing herself. This was irritating. She played her part as a boy for years, then as soon as a boy bats his eyes at her everything is all heart all aflutter, and blushing, and swooning for the rest of the book. Alexa is supposed to be this strong, warrior but she is suddenly worried about her appearance and letting her emotions lead her every move when she didn't do so as Alex. Its like she got a lobotomy when the dreamy prince and her best friend told her she was pretty. I'm all for my heroines keeping their femininity, but they can keep their wits about them too.

Onto the boys, Marcel is pretty much a non-player in the story. Her best friend Rylan tells her that he always knew she was a girl and that he's madly in love with her. The prince, Damian, who has also been putting on an act as a spoiled brat prince, reveals that he's known her identiy all along as well and wants her to know his secrets. Rylan doesn't stand a chance and she and Damian have a love at first sight kind of connection. This is where hearts start beating out of control and Alexa loses her mind. The love triangle is awkward because Rylan keeps pushing even though Alexa isn't interested. Alexa and Damian have all kinds of issues, but you know they will end up together. There isn't even a moment when you think Rylan will get the girl. So much of the plot focuses around the romance that you forget that there's a war going on and that there is literally bad magic going on that's causing trouble in the kingdom. Once that is resolved everyone thinks things will be good for a while and perhaps peace will reign for a bit.

There wasn't much world building in this, they live in a jungle where there are snakes and panthers. There's a war going on but we don't really know why. The characters aren't very well developed. We don't know much about the magic system other than there are sorcerers and black sorcerers. The plot is weak and overshadowed by the romance. I wanted a fantasy, I was expecting a fantasy, I got a romance novel. On a bright note, the audiobook isn't very long and is well narrated.

Ignite by Sara B. Larson
Narrated by Rebecca Mozzo
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I'm happy to say book 2 is much better than book 1. It is still heavily focused on the romance, but there is more plot to this one and the characters are a little more developed.

I found Alexa's denial of her feelings for Damian to be quite irritating. She bases everything on her looks which a strong female lead shouldn't do. Damian wants her for his queen and makes it very clear that he doesn't care that she has battle scars, he loves her unconditionally. She pushes him away, yet her inner monologue is childish and immature. Just as things in the kingdom seem to settle after Defy, an emissary from a neighboring kingdom named Vera shows up. Curiously, Damian's ally's begin to attack his borders as she arrives. Alexa is jealous of the way Damian acts with Vera, he is quickly captivated by her beauty. When the visitors taster is poisoned and Damion's brother Jax suspiciously disappears, Alexa rises to the occasion to uncover the mystery and save the boy. Rylan goes with her to save the boy, but they both get captured. The weak love triangle tries to resurface, but not with much success They find an unexpected villain in the camp where the boy is being held, and Alexa and Jax eventually escape while Rylan is left behind injured. Damian and Alexa have a new enemy, and new challenges to face one of which is how to get Rylan back.

Again, not much world building or development of the magic system. The plot is better as is the character development but its still weak. I had my expectations set from the first book, so this was entertaining for what it was. It is a fluffy romance with some fantasy elements. I did appreciate the bonus scenes on the audio book.

Endure by Sara B. Larson
Narrated by Rebecca Mozzo with an appearance by Steve West
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

The finale was the best of the 3 books in this series. It was much more plot based and was much more fantasy focused. While this is still a romance series, this particular installment focuses more on the magic, thought we never fully understand it, and the actual plot and I enjoyed it much more than the other 2. The writing and character development is still lacking, but it made for a decent audio book. This is one of those guilty pleasure reads, you roll your eyes the entire time but find yourself enjoying it.

I will say I was disappointed that we got Steve West to narrate Damian’s perspective, but it was just a tease. I did appreciate the extras that were added to the end, they did add to the story and were a nice bonus. I would have liked more of Damian's perspective and more of Steve West's narration.

The pacing of this book was slow, and some of the scenes could have been edited down as they didn’t really add to the plot. This book is one that a very slow build, then everything happens in the last 25% of the book and the end feels rushed. The book is filled with Alexa running into situations head first without much thought. I often found myself rolling my eyes at her dumb decision making throughout. She’s supposed to be this amazing warrior, but she doesn’t have a bit of sense or battle strategy that came with her gift of fighting. She gets captured trying to rescue Rylan, who if you remember from book 2 was taken hostage by the enemy. This part of the plot line felt unnecessary, especially because it had no meaningful outcome to the story, it was just long and unimpactful.

In the mean time, Damian is preparing to go to war and trying to protect the source of magic in the lands. We never fully understand the magic system and why it’s worth going to war over, but we do get more about it in this book. I would have liked more about it, but I felt like we got enough. If this were a series more heavily based in fantasy I would have expected much more and wanted to understand it much better, but given how little this series was actually centered around the fantasy elements I’ll let it go.

As far as the romance goes, Alexa is still head over heals in love with Damian and not quite sure why he loves her. Eventually she accepts his proposal to be his queen. Damian is always asking her not to do things because he may lose her. He’s selfish that way throughout the series, but you just know they are going to live happily ever after in the end. Rylan never stood a chance, but I think the love between Alexa and Rylan was addressed well. She never led him on, but he held on to something that was never there to begin with. I think there was decent closure there.
Something unexpected that you don’t see much in books that Larson managed to pull off is that she killed off several of the main side characters. Some of them are fairly prominent throughout the series while others aren’t as significant. You don’t see authors kill their darlings off in books very often, but in Endure we see most of the players die by the end of the series.

Again, this series wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t the worst either. It was entertaining as an audiobook. I will say again, if you go into this thinking it is a fantasy series, it is not and you will be disappointed. The series gets better as it goes on, but its not a favorite.


View all my reviews

Free Book: The Hooker and the Hermit by Penny Reid and L.H. Cosway

✮ ✮ ✮ FREEBIE ALERT!✮ ✮ ✮

The Hooker and the Hermit by Penny Reid and L.H. Cosway is FREE for a limited time only!

Grab Your Copy Today!
Amazon US: https://amzn.to/2H6glxj
Amazon Universal: http://mybook.to/HookerandtheHermit
iBooks: https://apple.co/1zmAAPA
Nook: https://bit.ly/2H07Jsa
Kobo: https://bit.ly/2FLZFLc
Google Play: https://tinyurl.com/ya9x4ta5

New York’s Finest
Blogging as *The Socialmedialite*

April 22
LADIES AND GENTS! I have an announcement!

You know that guy I featured on my blog a few months ago? The really, really hot Irish rugby player who plays the position of ‘hooker’ in the RLI (Rugby League International)? The one with the anger management issues, the body of a gladiator and the face of a movie star? The one with the questionable fashion choices leading me to ask whether he was the lovechild of a leprechaun and a hobbit? Ronan Fitzpatrick? Yeah, that guy. Well, I have a confession to make…

THE HERMIT

Annie Catrel, social media expert extraordinaire at Davidson & Croft Media and clandestine celebrity blogger, can make anyone shine in the court of public opinion. She is the Socialmedialite, anonymous creator of New York’s Finest and the internet’s darling. Virtual reality is Annie’s forte, but actual reality? Not so much.

THE HOOKER

Ronan Fitzpatrick, aka the best hooker the world of rugby has seen in decades, despises the media—social or otherwise. The press has spun a web of lies depicting him as rugby’s wild and reckless bad boy. Suspended from his team, Ronan has come to Manhattan to escape the drama, lay low, fly under the radar. Only, Ronan isn’t easy to overlook, and he can’t escape the notice of the Socialmedialite…

THE PLAN

When Ronan is sent to Davidson & Croft Media to reshape his public image, he never expects to cross paths with shy but beautiful Annie, nor does he expect his fierce attraction to her. He couldn’t be happier when her boss suggests pairing them together.
What lengths will Annie take to keep her virtual identity concealed? And what happens when the hooker discovers who the hermit really is?

The Hooker and the Hermit is a collaboration between authors L.H. Cosway and Penny Reid, is a full length 110k word novel, and is a standalone.

Release Blitz: Birthday Girl by Penelope Douglas

Title: Birthday Girl Genre: Contemporary Romance Author: Penelope Douglas Release Date: April 17, 2018

Synopsis:

JORDAN

He took me in when I had nowhere else to go.

He doesn’t use me, hurt me, or forget about me. He doesn’t treat me like I’m nothing, take me for granted, or make me feel unsafe.

He remembers me, laughs with me, and looks at me. He listens to me, protects me, and sees me. I can feel his eyes on me over the breakfast table, and my heart pumps so hard when I hear him pull in the driveway after work.

I have to stop this. It can’t happen.

My sister once told me there are no good men, and if you find one, he’s probably unavailable.

Only Pike Lawson isn’t the unavailable one.

I am.

PIKE

I took her in, because I thought I was helping.

She’d cook a few meals and clean up a little. It was an easy arrangement.

As the days go by, though, it’s becoming anything but easy. I have to stop my mind from drifting to her and stop holding my breath every time I bump into her in the house. I can’t touch her, and I shouldn’t want to.

The more I find my path crossing hers, though, the more she’s becoming a part of me.

But we’re not free to give into this. She’s nineteen, and I’m thirty-eight.

And her boyfriend’s father.

Unfortunately, they both just moved into my house.

*BIRTHDAY GIRL is a stand-alone, contemporary romance suitable for ages 18+.

Buy a Copy Here

Amazon / Amazon CA / Amazon UK / Amazon AUS

About The Author:

Penelope Douglas is a New York Times, USA Today, and Wall Street Journal bestselling author. Her books have been translated into thirteen languages and include The Fall Away Series, The Devil’s Night Series, and the standalones, Misconduct, Punk 57, and now Birthday Girl. Please look for Kill Switch (Devil’s Night #3), coming later this year, and the standalone, Motel, coming in 2019.

She lives in Las Vegas with her husband and their daughter.

Subscribe to her blog: Click Here

Be alerted of her next release: Click Here

Follow Her Here: Website, Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Instagram, Pinterest

a Rafflecopter giveaway