Somebody Killed His Editor by Josh Lanyon (Holmes & Moriarity #1)

Synopsis:
Thanks to an elderly spinster sleuth and her ingenious cat, Christopher Holmes has enjoyed a celebrated career as a bestselling mystery writer. Until now. Sales are down and his new editor is allergic to geriatric gumshoes.

On the advice of his agent, he reinvents his fortyish, frumpy, recently dumped self into the sleek, sexy image of a literary lion, and heads for a Northern California writers conference to try and resurrect his career. A career nearly as dead as the body he stumbles over in the woods.

In a weirdly déjà vu replay of one of his own novels, he finds himself stranded in an isolated lodge full of frightened women—and not a lawman in sight. Except for J.X. Moriarity, former cop and bestselling novelist. The man with whom he shared a one-night stand—okay, maybe three—long ago. The man who wants to arrest him for murder.

A ruthless, stalking killer, or a hot, handsome ex-lover. Which poses the greater danger? It’s elementary, my dear Holmes! 


Christopher Holmes is a writer who writes mysteries a la Agatha Christie’s Ms Marple. Or he used to, apparently they’re not selling anymore. This is why he’s taking a break from his reclusion and going on a trip to a writers’ conference hoping to reinvent himself just enough to sell another book. Well, no. The reinvention is his editor’s idea, who along with everyone else in the hotel becomes a suspect the moment Christopher stumbles on a dead body. Also, there’s a storm.

It isn’t much of a mystery but Lanyon successfully kept me distracted with gossip and Christopher’s reheated love affair with another mystery writer J.X. Moriarity. Yes, you read that right and no, that’s not a typo. Lanyon isn’t paying homage just to Christie but to Conan Doyle as well.

Somebody Killed His Editor is written in Lanyon’s usual style, in first person voice, and is full of witty remarks and the kind of gaslighting an unreliable narrator causes. There is an attempt to sketch a few of the secondary characters in more detail but not quite enough for proper characterisation. The object of Christopher’s desires is left aloof and only mirrored in his reactions to J.X. I’m guessing the rest of the specifics are delivered in the sequel.

Other than that, there’s very little to say about the book. I enjoyed reading it but it wasn’t anything special. Still, I wouldn’t call it a meh-book either.

Review: Threat of Darkness (Witches Knot 06) by Lauren Dane

Synopsis (from Goodreads): 

This book is a spinoff of the Witches Knot series, but can be read alone. 
 Mei is a Warrior for the Balance. She stands between good and evil. So when her boss tells her she's got to head to Tir na nOg to help the Fae she is most displeased. Mei's mother Aine, the queen of the Fae, betrayed and exiled her millennia ago. Or so she's been led to believe. But Aine was misled by her own sister, and suddenly everything Mei has thought was true for thousands of years falls down around her ears as she looks up to see the face of her husband. Her first husband, a man she'd thought was dead. Jayce MacTavish is surprised to find that his wife, thought millennia dead, is alive, but his joy is tempered by the realization that she's got another mate. Mei, Card and Jayce must find a way to be together as three while a threat from the Dark Fae and a new enemy darkens the horizon. 

"Publisher Note: This book contains brief scenes of male/male sexual enjoyment."

My note: just one kiss *snort*. Definitely not worth the publicity it received.

My impressions:

I started to read this novel while on holiday by the sea. I was feeling rather optimistic at the time - you see, it enjoys a pretty high rating average on Goodreads, 4 stars out of 5, nothing less. Why - my mind boggles. It was horrid. It was stupid. It was a fantasy book without one inch of imagination or, well, fantasy. The fact that your characters are fairies, demons, trolls and werewolves DOESN'T mean anything without the proper world build and here there was no such a thing. Still I was the first Goodreads user who actually has given it one star. There must be something wrong: with the universe, with me, with the books and the publishing industry, with the world at large. Horribly, terribly wrong. How cannot people notice? HOW?

It is a relatively short novel - just 133 pages. One third of it consists of sex scenes. Boring, repetitive and schematic sex scenes I must add. Any and every conflict is resolved by either sex or deus-ex-machina magic performed by some gods - Freia and Carl Donovan are among them. Carl Donovan a.k.a. the Donovan is really a strange choice of name for a divine entity but whatever - if you compare it to the fact that all characters of this beauty take the expression "too stupid to live" to quite an insanely low level one inappropriate name is really a minor glitch.

Ponder over this: Mei was imprisoned and tortured by some BDSM demonic afficionados for a millenium. Yes, a millenium of torture and rapes, you read it right. Nobody even thought of looking for her because everybody believed she had been killed in a battle. Why? Her aunt said so. Nobody found the remnants of Mei's body, nobody saw anything but all those great fairies, Mei's mother and her very loving husband, Jaice, among them, assumed that if Eire (the aunt) says Mei is dead then Mei is dead, end of the story. Irrefutable logic, right? 

Then Mei is freed from her prison by Card the half were half demon, soon to be her hubby number two;  after a period of recovery she returns home and she is said that Jaice is dead, her mom doesn't want to see her anymore, she is disinherited and basically she can go and jump to the lake, thank you very much for the visit, don't bother to show your face the second time. Yes, you guessed right: once again her lovely aunt was the source of those completely false revelations. Actually she sent one of Mei's mother flunkies to do the dirty job. What Mei, a clever warrior and a fairy princess several millenia old, does? She believes in every word of that flunkey - without even thinking of contacting anybody else. If you are said by a third party your beloved husband is dead and your mum hates your guts you should ALWAYS believe it straightaway, right? Even without any proof presented? *headdesk*

Then the novel went from bad to worse. Yes, I mean the baddies, whose characterization was non-existent. You see, they are bad because a) they are DARK fae (got it? DARK!!!) and b) they hate humans. Oh well, sometimes I am not so fond of humans either and I dress in black - I bet I am bad too, right? 

Not that the goodies were better, believe me, they were not. Both male interests of the main heroine  could be described very simply as a red-headed, long-braided Scot with great physique (Jaice) and a half-werewolf half-demon with yellow eyes and great physique (Card). Here you go - now you know everything there is to know about them. I bet plenty of male catwalk models show more of their personality during an average photo session than those two. Their main role is to satisfy Mei in bed (or anywhere else if the mood strikes) and generally take care of her.  If you are now wondering I rush to add the crucial bit of info: both do it at the same time. Mostly. In order to spoil you even further: they are her two husbands and they are fond of each other as well. How come? Magic! Nothing else is needed in a successful relationship, right? (btw thanks Tasha/heidenkind for that little beauty below!)

If only magic extended also to the plot, the dialogues and the overall writing quality...unfortunately the plot was HIGHLY predictable, I bet my dog would guess any major turn and twist without any problem, the dialogues were wooden infodumps full of cliches and maudlin love and/or independence declarations (independence so you knew Mei is kick-ass), some sentences were clearly grammatically incorrect and after reaching the half point I decided I really don't need to torture myself any longer so I dumped it. Still I amused myself with  checking the finale grande. Yes, I guessed EVERYTHING right.  What joy ;(

Final verdict:

So not for me that I can hardly contain myself, limiting the amount of expletives to zero. If you want to know how a fantasy erotica novel looks when gone completely awry, read this one but don't blame me afterwards - you have been warned.

Love Has No Boundaries: Short Stories & Short Reviews Part 3

These short stories were written as a part of the M/M Romance Group's "Love Has No Boundaries" event. Group members were asked to write a story prompt inspired by a photo of their choice. Authors of the group selected a photo and prompt that spoke to them and wrote a short story.


Deep in the Count by Madison Parker

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This came as close to perfection as I've seen a short story get in a long while. The plot and characterisations where there as were some of the details. I would've liked a bit more description, which I don't say often.


You Get Full Credit For Being Alive by Cari Z.

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

You wouldn't think that a retired assassin falling in love would make for a good story, would you? Of course it would and thank heavens I'm not alone in thinking that. I enjoyed reading the beginning of this novella even with the gruesome details, but as the story progressed other little details started gnawing at my enjoyment.

I didn't think the tools and skills of the assassin's trade—namely wiretapping—were believable. Neither did I enjoy the bits of French dialogue that read like something I'd get from Google translate. Clunky at best—and I only know the basics of the language. And then there was the ending, which I can see being pleasing others was far from satisfactory for my taste. Such a shame.

The Brat Whisperer by J.A. Rock

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Somewhere between two and three stars. It's not a bad story at all, a character study of sorts with a dose of healthy BDSM. There's spanking and discipline, but those aren't really my thing and neither was there anything to elevate this above all the others. I'm tempted to round down due to that ending but I won't.

Dirty Boys by Kyle Adams

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

That was fun. Ridiculous but fun in a sweet, plotless, sex-addled-mind kind of way.




The Field of Someone Else's Dreams by Amelia C. Gormley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

That was really good. A story about a college student and an injured baseball player drifting, trying to decide what he wants or even dares to expect from the uncertain future. There's a secret boyfriend and there are difficult parents. Read it.

Howards End by E. M. Forster

Synopsis:
The disregard of a dying woman's bequest, a girl's attempt to help an impoverished clerk, and the marriage of an idealist and a materialist — all intersect at an estate called Howards End. The fate of this country home symbolizes the future of England in an exploration of social, economic, and philosophical trends during the post-Victorian era.


This book did not pull me in like Maurice and A Passage to India did, but the allegories won me over. Eventually.

Rather than being a novel about characters and their individual fates, Howards End is like a mirror made of fractured pieces that show the truth about society in small details and in the lack of a full picture.

“The poor cannot always reach those whom they want to love, and they can hardly ever escape from those whom they love no longer. We rich can.”

If this is what you take away from it, you’ve not read the same book I did. No, my experience is closer to these two quotes:

“The poor are poor, and one’s sorry for them, but there it is.”

and

“There are just rich and poor, as there always have been and always will be.”

Aside from the monetary aspects, it’s always sad to read about a woman who sacrifices so much of herself for companionship and deludes herself to being in love. Yet, maybe the true tragedy lies not in the characters and their fate, but in the people who criticise Margaret for her choice and fail to see that women of today still marry their Mr Wilcoxes. Maybe the the most poignant of it is that they never ask why.

A Passage to India by E. M. Forster

Synopsis:
It is India in the year 1924 or thereabouts. After a mysterious incident during a visit to the Marabar Caves, Dr Aziz is accused of assaulting Adele Quested, a young Englishwoman. As he’s brought to trial the fragile structure of Anglo-Indian relations collapses and the racism inherent to colonialism is exposed—a theme which still has powerful, dangerous realities today.


This is a biased review: I am too blinded by the beautiful language and awestruck by the reach of the story and its implications.

Dr Aziz is quite far from a likeable character. He is thoughtless, he has a high opinion of himself and definite opinions of others. He also copes with the English authority by the means of humour. He laughs at them and lets them laugh at him. Dr Aziz meets Mrs Moore in a mosque when he scolds her about keeping her shoes on. When it becomes clear that she’s not wearing any footwear, apologies are made and an honest dialogue begins. That discussion comes to an end when Dr Aziz has escorted Mrs Moore back to the Club into which Indians aren’t allowed.

Through Mrs Moore Dr Aziz meets Ms Quested—a newcomer to India like Mrs Moore—and ends up escorting them both to the Marabar Caves. It is at the caves where something happens.

Like so often in real life, even today, it’s never made perfectly clear what exactly happens at the caves. All that is known is that Ms Quested fled from the scene quite upset and that Dr Aziz is to blame. Or maybe not. He claims he’s innocent and Ms Quested isn’t quite sure herself what happened, but she’s the victim and beyond reproach. She’s a naïve young woman but more importantly she’s an Englishwoman and he’s an Indian.

Watching the events unfold was like watching a documentary from the year 2013. I’m serious, nothing’s changed in ninety years. When a white woman is attacked the dark man is to blame. He’s guilty until proven innocent and maybe not even then. The courts may let him go but that’s a failure on their part not evidence of his blamelessness.

It’s still true today that while individuals may bridge that gap between the races and become friends, society as a group almost never does. Old prejudices die hard.

While the legacy of colonialism is quite foreign to me, I could still identify with Adele Quested because she’s a woman. She’s someone who wants to see the best in people and ends up making a horrible mistake. She’s also the one whose word weighs least when it comes to the crime she’s the victim of. As soon as she’s uttered one accusatory word, the men take over. The Englishmen. They’ve arrested, put Dr Aziz on trial, and judged him before the first hit of the gavel. Dr Aziz is guilty and thus every Indian is. The English are better. Even the women but who listens to the women? Certainly not Dr Aziz who is furious to be accused by someone so ugly.

Contradictions. This book is full of contradictions, but so are people. I just wish we’d learned to know better by now.

Review: White Trash Zombie Apocalypse by Diana Rowland

Synopsis (from Goodreads – short and sweet):

Lights, cameras... zombies!

When a zombie movie starts filming in town, things get crazy, and white trash zombie Angel Crawford suspects it’s not just the plot of the movie that’s rotten. With zombies both real and fake roaming the streets, it’s up to Angel to fit all the pieces — and body parts — together to save herself, her town, and quite possibly the human race. Business as usual, right? Oh, and there will be blood. I mean flood.

My impressions:

As you might remember I've read the first two books and really enjoyed them (my reviews of the previous parts can be found here and here).  Of course it's generally just mind-candy but, hey, I have absolutely nothing against that from time to time as long as it doesn’t feature  too-stupid-to-live characters doing too-stupid-to-endure things. Well, unfortunately I have to admit my enjoyment stopped while reading the third part. Why? I think I expected more from the premise, something, well, apocalytpic, I guess. After finishing that one, though, I got the feeling that the third installment describing the adventures of Angel Crawford, didn’t really go anywhere and nothing important really happened – a perfect example of a weaker ‘filler’ in the middle of a series. We have a bad guy that we never really identify, working on a zombie project we don't completely understand, and a climactic final scene that doesn't seem that dire and climatic after all is said and done.

Small wonder: the cool zombie stuff is already out there. If you, like me, read the previous installments you know that completely sentient, intelligent, long-living, regenerating-after-a-snack-or-two zombies have already been established and described thoroughly. The second book had an evil corporation as the bad guy which was fine; however, we're not really sure who the bad guy in this book is and whether he/she is related to that evil corporation at all. Also, there was pretty much zero humor in this book, which constituted a big chunk of the enjoyment I had with the first two.

Another part of the problem was that I found the pacing at the beginning really slow, and there were some aspects of the plot I could only call cliched and boring. The movie filming, surprise, surprise, didn’t help a lot although I thought at the beginning it was simply a great idea. Well, it proves that great ideas not necessarily translate into great plot devices.

I admit it, Angel is growing as a person and getting her life together - she doesn’t take as much crap as she used to take from anyone and she gets to do some heroic stuff. Still I had that feeling she became a bit tame in the process, I do wonder why. Perhaps Ms. Rowland is just trying to have a zombie Sookie Stackhouse. Angel's relationship with her dad was the most interesting aspect of the book. I was a little frustrated at her coddling her dad and being the parent in their little dysfunctional family of two but I guess it was realistic since her dad was portrayed as such a loser. Also, I thought it was sweet that he never turned his back on her, not even when he found out she was a zombie. I'm not sure I would have liked the book as much if it hadn't been for their relationship.

Let me also add that I find it rather annoying that everyone important in Angel's life is male — her dad, Marcus, Philip, Nick, Derrell, Brian, Nikas, Pietro. The novel passes the Bechdel test but just barely so. Angel needs some female friends or role models… Heather was a nice addition but there were too few scenes with both chicks together. Well, the series is hardly finished so there is some hope, right? Still even the cover I liked less this time...

Final verdict:

I don't know how many books Rowland is on contract for, but I'd like to think by now we'd get some clue as to why Angel is so special and where Pietro's guys are getting all these brains. No such luck. I admit it made me start questioning the whole series. White Trash Zombie Apocalypse wasn't a bad book, not really, but overall it left me disappointed.

If you liked the first two books, go ahead and read this one as well, but be warned: it leaves so many unanswered questions on the table that it didn't really make me want to read the next one.

Love Has No Boundaries: Short Stories & Short Reviews Part 2

These short stories were written as a part of the M/M Romance Group's "Love Has No Boundaries" event. Group members were asked to write a story prompt inspired by a photo of their choice. Authors of the group selected a photo and prompt that spoke to them and wrote a short story.

The Touch Of Hope by Brandon Shire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

It's a really good story about two homeless teens, but the sex scenes almost ruined it for me.



Friends or Lovers? by Sara York

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

"I want to feel that again. I've never felt that before. You were amazing. Like totally and completely over-the-top amazing.

Yeah. Not so much. This is a little pwp without either of the p's. It's simply without. Someone might disagree but I've blocked out the pathetic attempt at the porn from my mind.


Breathing Snow by Dev Bentham

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I liked this one. The author focused on the behind the scenes stuff and relationship development rather on the publicity side, which I would have liked to have seen more of. Snark is one way to my heart and there was a distinct lack of snark here. As for their competitors: Oh how I miss the days when we Finns didn't suck at keeping the doping secret ;) Nah. We've always been terrible at that.

Treasure by Kim Fielding

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm rounding up to four stars. This is where the sickly weak bookworm gets his own story. Best of all, he doesn't he already lives in a fantastical world, which gives this gay version of Tristan & Isolde like meet cute it's own flavour.

I liked it, I really liked it but there were just one too many convenient lessons in Kit's past as well as packing accidents. The vocabulary was off, which I could have ignored had it been revealed that Kit was lying about certain things. And then there was the fact that the author was obviously a keen student in the school of euphemisms. *shudders*

Brandon's Laughter by Ellen Holiday

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I really liked this one but then again I do have a huge soft spot for anything angsty and borderline melodramatic. One of my pet peeves is the presence of lyrics in prose: I don't mind a line or two but a whole song no matter how original is too much. Some stories can overcome that crippling flaw but this one had a tad too sappy reunion and ridiculous ending for my taste.