On My Bookish BS

This has been this month of ARC goodness. Next up? The INCREDIBLE Tips and Trysts by Rebecca Kinkade.  Previously, I talked about Streams and Schemes by Rebecca - because it was incredible - and now I was lucky enough to get an early peek at the sequel.  Tips and Trysts follows the story of Everett and Cora who we met in Streams and Schemes when Everette was a GRADE A SCHMUCK and INSULTED HER about her profession in SPECTACULAR FASHION.  That of course meant that they would have sparks like the Fourth of July...  Here we find out that he was a total bag of flaming dicks because she did the one thing that's nearly impossible to do to a politicians son, she made him nervous and he lost his shit.  Now, he does the nice thing and rescues her when one of her customers gets all aggressive with her at a bar and that of course leads to hot make outs. Which ends... poorly and then they get all aggressive and hateful with each other again... until a disgruntled voter tri...

I was lucky enough to get to be an advanced reader for The Key by Jo Morgan Sloan and I am SO GLAD I have the chance to tell you all about it.  In a beautiful twist on the second chance romance trope, a cis-gender bisexual man falls in love with a transgender man ... who he doesn't realize he's been in love with before... when they were in high school and they were first loves. Complex, layered, full of twists and turns that gave me pits and butterflies in my stomach The Key was a beautiful story about the journey Tabby and Jax go on to find each other AGAIN after Tabby moves from Colorado to California and is able to finally live as his authentic self.  When Jax finds his fiancee cheating on him with his best friend he takes a chance on a brand new job and moves to California. He is sad and looking to connect not just with people in Cali but also with who he was before his ex so he finds a D&D group from an ad and goes off to maybe find some new geeky friends in his new ...

 I finally gave in and read the Twisted Series by Ana Huang .  I have to say I am a bit disappointed in the Booktok/Bookstagram folks. All I heard about when people talked about this was "ohhhh Alex Volkov...."  And yes, he is a solid choice for a book boyfriend - a genius, a billionaire, over the top possessive, a stud in the bedroom. I get it. Alex is a fine choice... but ... why drool over Alex when JOSH CHEN IS RIGHT THERE.  I know, not the same name but close enough for government work... Josh is a doctor, smart, funny, cocky, protective, willing to do anything for his family, stubborn AF, and HOLY CRAP THE BEDROOM ACTIVITIES. The spice in Twisted Hate was *SPICING.* Seriously though, if I had to rate the men of the Twisted series it would be  Josh (Twisted Hate) Christian (Twisted Lies) Rhys (Twisted Games) Alex (Twisted Love) Now, are they all delicious, ABSOLUTELY. Would I turn any of them down? Nah. But still - Alex is the least interesting of the four ...

 Oh the Langfield Brothers. Kings of sarcasm as a love language, ducking swear word replacements, and shenanigans that lead to true love. Of course it was time for Aiden Langfield to find his happily ever after and I am HERE FOR IT. Let's get in to it with Hockey Boy.  Aiden and Lennox were high school sweethearts who ended abruptly and both of them... kind of gave up on the whole love thing. I guess they weren't all that over after all... Which is even more evident ten years later when Aiden proposes to his long term, and really horrible girlfriend, and Lennox winds up as their wedding planner and after their first meeting he ends the engagement. POOF. Bye horrible lady! Seriously, every mention of that chick in the previously books has made my skin crawl... she was even worse than expected. Anyway, road block gone... he keeps up the facade of being engaged and keeps planning a wedding just to stay close to Lennox. Because that's the kind of insanity these boys do to get a...

Hannah Tigone, best selling Australian crime writer, has started writing a new novel and begins a friendship via email with Leo, one of her biggest fans. She shares chapters of her newest work, set in Boston where he's currently located, and he helps to fill in gaps about local trivia and the colloquialisms of Boston.  As the tensions in the book heat up so too does the rhetoric in the emails Leo sends to Hannah. With the world changing around them with the onset of wildfires in Australia, the outbreak of COVID-19, and general civil unrest, Leos emails to Hannah become more and more worrying... is he as dangerous as the killer in her own novel? And who is the killer of the Woman in the Library ?  The unique narrative device where the mystery within the internal novel and the mystery in the letters between Leo and Hannah both being INCREDIBLY INTRIGUING made this a very fun and fast read. I couldn't tell which mystery I was more involved in. What the HELL was Leos deal? Who kil...

What if the story of Cinderella was real and was the basis for the system of law? What if it was responsible for the way women were expected to act and the way people were expected to interact with the royalty? What if every year young girls did everything they could do hoping to curry favor with a fairy godmother so they would be chosen at the ball they were required to attend in hopes they would be chosen and married off at the age of 16? And if they weren't they had 2 more chances before basically being sold into slavery? That's the set up of the incredible book Cinderella is Dead by Kaylnn Bayron.  Sophia, who is now 16 and being sent to the ball, is less than happy with the way things are in Lille. All she wants is to be free to love as she chooses and be done with living under the weight of some stupid fairy tale. People don't like that idea very much. In fact, every time she talks to her best friend, or her mom, or well ... anyone... there's kind of "stop t...

Sloan St. James is a fantastic writer. All of her men are boyfriend material... but Lee Sullivan is a book HUSBAND.  Meet Coach Sully .  Retired captain of the Lakes hockey team Lee Sullivan is looking for love and getting bored out of his mind with the dating game. When one of his best friends wives asks him to take a meeting with one of her friends about a reality dating show, he reluctantly agrees. What he finds is so much more than he could ever have possibly expected. Meet Kendra Ames, the young television producer who pitches the AI based reality dating show to Lee. He has no intention of doing the show but he has every intention of doing Kendra. The sparks are immediate - not just physical but more than that. They just connect.  Then he has to do the show or he doesn't get his dream job of being a hockey coach.  Awkward.  This book has sports, a women's hockey team becoming awesome. It has romance, seriously Kendra and Lee are so fucking cute together som...

What would happen if you blended black, southern traditions and Arthurian legends? The Legendborn Cycle by Tracy Deonn.  Sixteen year old Bree Matthews is starting the early college program at UNC Chapel Hill with her best friend, dealing with the memories of her deceased mother who was a student here years ago, dealing with being home sick, and ALSO being a hormonal teenager. It's enough to destroy anyone. She begins to see things that can't really be there.  The weird things she sees brings her into the world of the Legendborn and a secret society of students that track down and keep the weird creatures at bay. Also, the heads of the secret society are the descendants of KING ARTHUR AND THE KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE. So... yeah, that's a thing. Along the way Bree begins to get in touch with her own ancestors, her history, and the mystical force known as 'root' which is a mystical-life-force-energy that the Legendborn also call 'ether.'  Bree also gets cl...