4 posts tagged “book review”
So sorry again for not posting. I'm so bad at slacking, plus I've been super busy at work and life things.
I've suddenly developed a loving for a new author in my world. Her name? Anne Stuart.
Amazon's book description:
Chloe Underwood, a 23-year-old American who regards herself as a disappointment to her high-achieving family, makes a meager living in Paris by translating children's books into English. After accepting a last-minute translating job in the French countryside, she discovers that rather than working for a consortium of food executives, she's stumbled upon a group of sadistic international arms dealers. Cold-blooded assassin Bastian Touissant, who was sent a year earlier by a nebulous "the ends justify the means" agency to infiltrate this shady group and try to stop its illegal activity, seems to blend right in. On meeting Chloe, Bastian isn't sure whether she's a spy, perhaps sent to kill him, or the innocent she appears to be. Despite his ruthlessness, Bastian can't resist saving Chloe's life (on multiple, graphic occasions) and attempting to send her back to her family in the U.S.
One thing Stuart does amazingly right that most romance authors do not: she doesn't soften the characters up too much. Bastian is a killer and he remains one at the end of the book. He doesn't suddenly become a big mushy sentimental guy because he realizes he loves Chloe. He doesn't lose that edge that you've loved from him throughout the entire book. Sure, I love mushy sentimental books like every romance reader, but I like true characterization every now and then. Stuart doesn't lay the sap on too thickly and her sex scenes aren't over the top or too many that you get bored with the amount of sex in one book lol.
I really recommend everyone pick up an Anne Stuart book if you like romance and you like suspense/thrillers. I also recently read Cold As Ice by her as well and although I didn't like the characters as much as Bastian and Chloe (who make a brief appearance), I still loved Stuart's writing.
Grade: A+
Well, I finish Nora Roberts MacGregor Brides recently and I thought I should write a review of it for those interested.
Now, anyone who knows me that Nora Roberts is my favourite author other than Jane Austen. Nora is the tops in the romance world for me and you cannot beat her writing style, though I do love other romantic authors like Linda Howard, Julie Garwood, Elizabeth Lowell and more. With Nora though, it's never hit and miss for me. Sometimes with the other authors I've mentioned, you can pick up one of their novels and feel that it wasn't their best work. It's never this way with Nora, at least for me.
This novel is broken into three separate, but linking parts. The main characters Laura, Gwen and Julia are all modern day career women focused on their individual lives. They are cousins living in the same house together and share the same meddling grandfather who thinks they should get married and have babies to perpetuate the MacGregor line. While I think it's sweet that the grandfather, Daniel, cares about his granddauthers, I also found it a bit sexist of him to think that they should get married young and have kids soon after. This did not hamper my enjoyment of the book, though.
The first story focuses on Laura, the second on Gwen and the third on Julia. I liked that the stories were connected since the women were all related so that I could see what happened with the past characters while still enjoying the new. Roberts keeps all the characters around and I love that. She follows the same path with her trilogy books. I felt that the romances were a bit quick, but that is to be expected since there were 3 in one book. The only downside to that is that we don't get as much character development as we would in a three part trilogy, but then again, this was a Silhoutte imprint originally and they don't usually do trilogies.
So, overall, very good book and a quick read. I can't ever give Nora a thumbs down :)
Grade: A
Up next: Janice Harrell's The Secret Diaries trilogy. It's young adult fiction I have had since I was 14ish, but it's still enjoyable. Who says you can't read these books later in life?
Sorry for the lack of blogging here lately, school is almost over (1 day left!!!) so I have been super busy with assignments and even have an exam tomorrow, blah. Sorry to those of you who actually read this and are interesting my bookish thoughts, which I'm begininng to think is only my friend Sarah lol.
Anyway, I just finished Laurie King's The Beekeeper's Apprentice for my exam and thought it was a pretty good detective fiction. King takes on Conan Doyle's character of Sherlock Holmes and teams him up with a 15 year old girl named Mary Russell. Russell grows older throughout the novel and she soon becomes his apprentice in all things detection.
I'm a bit of a novel purist at times, so I had some issues with the idea of King writing the character of Holmes since it was a Conan Doyle creation and who can do it better than he can? Also, the characterization of Mary Russell at times was very late 20th century and I found that distracting since women obviously did not do certain things back then. I suppose this is the writer's choice and she does it willfully, but still, it was distracting.
Grade: B+
Up next: MacGregor Brides by Nora Roberts
So, I just finished this novel two days ago for my Literary Appreciation course. It was a good novel overall, but I did find it to be slow to start, which may bother other readers.
The novel is in first person narration, by the main character Del (Della). Del starts the novel as a young girl growing up in South Western Ontario with her younger brother and parents. Her father is a fox farmer, which is all I will tell you since this part disturbed me greatly as a vegetarian and animal rights activist. If I was conducting a reader's advisory, I would steer people like myself away from this novel.
Anyway, Del grows up on the farm with her father and mother and then her parents separate so she, her brother and her mother can live in the small city/town nearby. Del tells us her experiences growing up from a child to her early 20's. I thought it was interesting the way she described the life of a girl becoming a woman. Her mother hates patriarchy, but Del does not seem to have a problem with it until she gets her first serious boyfriend. There are some sexual experiences in the novel, one fairly graphic one that will leave you cringing, and as such it is not suitable for younger audiences.
Overall, a good novel in the tradition of early Margaret Atwood (i.e. The Edible Woman). I'd recommend it to those who like rural and Canadian literature. Grade: B+
