Beauty by Laurell K. Hamilton, All I Want by Lynsay Sands, Slow Burn by E.B. Walters, Trust in Me by Beth Cornelison, Pull the Trigger (Seduction in Memory Grove, #1), Mount Up (Seduction in Memory Grove, #2), Feed the Fire (Seduction in Memory Grove, #3) by Melissa Ecker

Beauty by Laurell K. Hamilton, All I Want by Lynsay Sands,  Slow Burn by E.B. Walters, Trust in Me by Beth Cornelison, Pull the Trigger (Seduction in Memory Grove, #1), Mount Up (Seduction in Memory Grove, #2), Feed the Fire (Seduction in Memory Grove, #3) by Melissa Ecker

It was raining and I had some time on my hands so I caught up on some of my e-books TBR.

Beauty by Laurell K. Hamilton – a short out-take from an Anita Blake book.  Basically just a sex scene in the tub with Jean Claude and Asher. Fun but I’m not sure it was worth $3.

All I Want by Lynsay Sands – A sweet, funny historical.  Lady Prudence wants to grant her mothers Christmas wish by convincing her dad to quit drinking and gambling so they don’t end up in debtors prison by the new year.  While a romance Ms. Sands doesn’t shy from the troubling reality of addiction. 

Slow Burn by E.B. Walters – Romantic suspense.  The mystery was great.  The romance was a little confusing.  But all in all a good read from a new to me author.  I will be checking out Ms. Walters backlist.

Trust in Me by Beth Cornelison – A sweet contemporary. Claire Albritton is trying to find herself.  At 24 she is tired of allowing her wealthy Daddy to dictate her life.   She flees to where she was happiest, her grandmothers’ hometown.  She manages to get a job as a cashier at the local hardware store where she meets Kevin Fuller.  Kevin lost his dad in Iraq.  His mother was a hippie.  He has always been the “responsible one”.  He is trying to go to school, pay off his mothers hospital bills and run the hardware store.  Kevin was incredibly sweet without being a wuss.  I fell in love with him right along with Claire.

Pull the Trigger – Rebecca Harper is a recent divorce’.  She needs to start over.  She is headed out of town in two weeks when she runs into her high school crush now Detective Justin Cain.  He has only those two weeks to convince her she needs to stay with him.

Mount Up - Dr. Natalie Shea moved to Arkansas to get out of the big city and to be near her grandmother in Memory Grove.  She never counted on the heat generated by rodeo star and local legend Luke Reilly.  Can the bad boy win the heart of the good girl?

Feed the Fire – In my opinion the best of the Memory Grove books.  Olivia Andrews is coming home to Memory Grove not only for Rebecca and Justins wedding but to escape her abusive relationship.  She is not prepared for the heat between her and firefighter Cade Reilly (Luke’s brother).  

Rant - Slave To Love by Nikita Black

Sometimes I go for a few days without posting.  Sometimes it is because life has interfered with my escapism and sometimes it is because I don’t have anything to say about a book for instance I just finished Crystal Gardens by Amanda Quick aka Jayne Ann Krentz.  It was a fun read but if you’ve read any of the Arcane series books you’ve read this.  You still buy them and read them because they are fun but there is really nothing new to say.  Sometimes I don’t post because I don’t like to pan the books I’ve read.  I am going to make an exception to that today with Slave To Love by Nikita Black.

With all the hoopla surrounding the 50 Shades trilogy BDSM books are coming out of the woodwork.  If you want to read good BDSM erotica find something by Joey W. Hill, Desiree Holt, Cerise DeLand or Madeline Oh.  There are a lot of really good authors out there. 

I’ve not read anything else by Nikita Black but one of my authors had been pushing Slave To Love and it was free on Amazon. 

The plot – There is a serial killer on the loose.  The only thing tying the victims together is a fetish club.  Detective Michael "Mick" McGraw  aka “The Iceman” is lead investigator.  He has a troubled past and so does Special Investigations Officer, Caroline Palmer who Mick taps to help him go undercover. 

The mystery was solid.  The relationship between these two left me cold.  The violence may have been consensual but did nothing for me. 

My advice pass this one by there is a lot better out there.

In the Company of Witches (Arcane Shot #2) by Joey W. Hill

If Something About Witches (Arcane Shot #1) was about redemption then In the Company of Witches is about balance.  Light and Dark.  Too much of one or the other for too long can be detrimental even fatal. 

In the first book we got to know Derek a light guardian.  In this book we get to know Mikhael a dark guardian and find that the goal isn’t too different for them though they do tend to go about getting there differently.  And then there is the interaction between Mikhael and Raina a ½ human/ ½ succubus witch.  Oh my!  Hot and caring and so not the relationship that Mikhael had with Ruby in the first book.  I love that Raina has the squickies knowing that Mikhael and Ruby had some kind of thing before. 

I look forward to Ramona’s story.  

Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse #12) by Charlaine Harris

I couldn’t put it down!  Poor Sookie.  What a rollercoaster ride her life is.

The underlying theme for this book is trust.  Eric is being framed (or is he) for the dead girl on his front yard.  The one Sookie found him snacking on in her room.  What is J.B. DuRone doing shaking his stuff at Hooligans when his wife is about to pop with their twins and why didn’t he tell her?  What exactly is Danny doing Monday, Wednesday and Friday and why doesn’t he tell Kennedy?  And Jannalynn has to get over her jealousy thinking there is something going on between Sam and Sookie. 

We do find out what happened to Mr. Cataliades and Diantha. Quinn checks in. We find out who cursed Dermot. Terry gets a girlfriend.  But questions still linger.  Will Felipe de Castro punish Eric for Victors’ death even though he doesn’t really mind?  Will Eric choose becoming Queen Freydas’ consort over Sookie? Will Sookie ever get through a book without a dead body on her kitchen floor?

Kiss of Pride (Deadly Angels #1) by Sandra Hill

Sandra Hill writes about Vikings.  Usually historical romances. So when she chose to write a PNR it had to have Vikings right? 

Kiss of Pride tells the story of Vikar Sigurdsson.   He and his brothers are being punished as they’ve each been singularly attached to one of the seven deadly sins.  For Vikar it is pride.  As punishment they’ve been turned into vangels (vampire/angels) to do good and to fight Lucifer's vampires (lucipires) whose goal was to collect the souls of sinners before they had a change to repent. 

Alexandra Kelly is a reporter who has lost her faith.  Her estranged husband and her daughter were killed by cartel mobsters and she is angry.  She is considering mortal revenge against those that killed her daughter which makes her ripe for reaping by the lucipires.  Archangel Michael thinks she can be saved and arranges for her to meet Vikar. 

I think this series is very ambitious and if anyone can pull it off Ms. Hill can.  I enjoyed the book but as with every first book in a series there is a lot of world building which in this case is so convoluted as to be distracting.  I had the same problem with Gena Showalters Lords of the Underworld series but came to love them all.  I will definitely be checking out the next installment.

Anya Bast Contest

http://www.anyabast.com/2012/05/01/release-day-giveaway

Anya Bast is having a giveaway to celebrate the release of her latest Embrace of The Damned which I've purchased but not yet read.  I am a fan of both her Enchantment and Elemental Witches series and am anxious to give this new series a try.

A Little Harmless Fascination (Harmless 7) by Melissa Schroeder

We meet security expert Conner Dillon in a hospital suffering from chest pain.  Conner is in his late 30’s.  He is a former FBI agent now building a security company with his best friend Zeke.  He is a total workaholic.  The doctor orders a month off and Connors’ sister convinces him to go to Hawaii where he can learn to relax and stay in the apartment her former college roomie rents out. 

Jillian is an erotic author with family issues.  With her braids, tattoos and piercings she looks like the opposite of uptight, bossy Connor.  But in reality she has just as much stress in her life.  Attitude is everything.

Connor isn’t happy to be on forced vacation but when he sees Jillian he thinks it might not be so bad after all.  Jillian has had a crush on Connor since college.  After scratching the itch they find once is not enough.  Top it off with a threat to Jillian and Hawaii gets even hotter.

I get a kick out of this series.  I was tickled to catch up with several of the characters of the previous books in this one.  Connor is a Dom but he is also really bossy.  It is done with a good heart but he is bossy anyway.  It is going to take someone as well centered as Jillian to put up with and deal with him.  I really liked Jillian.  I think it would take someone with history, like Connor, to help her get over her trust issues.  This is a well thought out, romantic, suspenseful, smoking hot read.