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On brand, between two series

Revisado: 01-12-25

Amy Lane is a master at fitting all the elements of a spectacular story into a tiny package. I tend to prefer longer reads, but I know even her shorter books are going to have hilarious dialog, great character development, lovable side characters, believable tension and endings that make you wish you could spend more time in the worlds she has created. This book checks all these boxes.

One warning: This story will be a much more enjoyable read if you realize that it takes place at the nexus of two other series. Read those first!!! Start with Lane’s Johnnie’s series, then her Fish Out of Water series. This book moves way, way too fast to be able to explain all the backstories, but the story is so much better if you know them. You can probably enjoy it on its own, but it’ll shine so much brighter in context.

A note on the narrator: at first, I HATED his voice. It just seemed all wrong. Too clipped and abrupt, almost disinterested. I mean, over-acting is bad too, but at the outset I felt like this guy could have been reading a menu, for all the inflection and storytelling quality he was demonstrating. But 1, stick with it, he does actually loosen up and get better, and 2, increase the playback speed a bit. It helps.

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Worth a credit

Revisado: 01-02-25

This book was charming. Admittedly, I had figured out what was going on behind the scenes about six chapters before the characters did, but the interactions between the. MCs and supporting cast were continuously engaging, and the character development was good, so in this case, I didn’t mind waiting for the characters to catch up to what I already knew. Some of the scenes were laugh out loud funny, I think the guy in the pizza shop where I picked up my dinner thought I was crazy, sitting, smirking, waiting for my order. No, this book isn’t going to win a Nobel prize in literature, but it’s enjoyable, well paced, and definitely worth a read.

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More clever than I anticipated

Revisado: 01-02-25

Well written, funny, and with likable characters. I wasn’t sold at first because I hadn’t ever read anything by either of these authors, and at the beginning of the book, the portion released as a sample, Dante was acting in a way that if I encountered similar antics in real life, I would classify as annoying. But I took a chance on the book because I didn’t have anything else to read, and I’m glad I did. Nick J Russo is a solid narrator, and I’m excited to see that some of the characters introduced in this first book will eventually get their own. There was a point in the middle of the story where I was a little concerned that some of the conflict was of that obnoxious, manufactured sort that inexperienced authors include just to extend the plot. But as I kept reading, I realized that actually, the characters did have good reasons for what they were doing, that made sense within the context of their development and the story as a whole. Definitely worth the credit.

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A look back and a look in the mirror

Revisado: 06-22-24

I wouldn’t say this book was “enjoyable“. But I definitely think it was worth reading. Gregory has carefully drawn here a picture of the nearly millennium long curtailment of the rights of women, and how in the last 150 years or so women have begun to reclaim those rights. She has also carefully sketched places where women were able to carve out rolls and spaces for themselves despite the broader societal backdrop that slowly stifled them and limited their political and social agency. It’s a timely book, given the state of the geopolitical landscape. For those like me who came of age straddling the line between Gen X and millennials, it’s a reminder that the lives we grew up expecting (and expected) to live as women were, on the one hand, portraits painted on a canvas spread across the framework of centuries of socially imposed expectations and limitations on women, and were, on the other hand, simultaneously reflective of the efforts of women to reshape their roles in society into something more expansive, inclusive and individual.

The book is divided into chronological sections, and within each section Gregory examines various aspects of the female experience over time across societal strata including education, employment and earning potential, leisure, and legal status. She also takes a look at topics such as rape, prostitution, societal views on sex, gender and female/female relationships.

I came away from this book smarter. As a cis-gender female from a traditional middle-class protestant home who has worked for two decades in the female-dominated world of early childhood education, I took a lot for granted about what it meant to be “a successful woman“. What’s even more insidious is that while I have done the intellectual work over the years to closely examine my understanding of race, sexuality, and gender, I was never strongly compelled to examine my own perception of myself. I am female, therefore, I assumed I knew what it meant to be female. This book made me re-examine that, and so was a valuable read both on an intellectual and personal level. Definitely worth the credit.

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DNF, I really tried

Revisado: 06-16-24

I almost never DNF a book, but I just could not get through this one. Plot holes, words misused (and I mean a lot, not just one or two)… it read like a B-minus 10th grader wrote it, and while I’m all for B-minus 10th graders trying out their writing skills, this is why the publishing industry invented editors. There are lots of high heat, enemies to lovers romances out there, skip this one. The narrators were good, I’ll give them that. They did the best they could with less than mediocre material, but there was just no saving this book.

Examples:
People’s eyes kept “slinking“ all over the place. Eyes don’t slink. They dart, they flick, a gaze can even slide, but eyes can’t slink.

Sentences like: “I glimpsed at her.” No dear, you glanced at her. You caught a glimpse of her. you can’t “glimpse at“ someone.

“I teemed” as a synonym for “I seethed“. This is a classic thesaurus error. Teeming is a word that you would use to describe movement within a space, For example, “the reef teemed with fish”, or “the corridors were teeming with students”. It doesn’t carry the connotation of high intensity or anger that “seethed” does. Their meanings are similar, like glimpse and glance above, and so the lazy use of a thesaurus would lead one to think you can substitute one for the other, but you can’t. .

One of my all-time favorites of poor writing “my face jumped to him.“ Really, like a Jim Carrey movie? Your face literally jumped off? Did you turn your face to him? Did you snap your head around to face him? Did your gays even flash to him? Your face can’t jump. Sorry.

I’ve written many, many reviews, and in quite a few of those I’ve called out an author for vocabulary and sentence structure errors. Most of those reviews are positive overall, I ordinarily wouldn’t pan a listen just because of these kinds of errors in moderation . But this book takes the cake. And this is before we even get to the second string quarterback suddenly magically, ending up in the NFL, or a lawsuit being settled in under a year, when anyone knows anything about the real world knows that such things take years. I bought this book on sale for five dollars. I’m glad I didn’t waste a credit, and I hope you don’t either

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Fun start to… a new series?

Revisado: 06-02-24

A twisty mystery, good side characters, cameos from old friends, as well as MCs with well-drawn personalities, believable challenges and room to grow? What’s not to enjoy? I’m glad there will be at least one more book following this one, although I think James has left herself room to go beyond a Duet with the back-stories she’s given these characters. Worth a credit for sure!

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Worth the credit

Revisado: 05-19-24

I’m sorry to see that this seems to be the only book this author ever wrote. I looked her up both on Audible end on Kindle and couldn’t find anything else. This book was funny, sweet, engaging, and clever. The main character is extremely likable and it’s fun to see the world through his completely oblivious eyes. It’s a skilled author who can write in such a way that the audience sees what’s going on even though the POV character hasn’t got a clue, without stepping out of the POV character’s head. Enjoy this one, it’s worth a credit and a reread.

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Timely

Revisado: 04-14-24

On her website, KJ Charles has an essay called “characters, politics, fish, and you“ in which she gives tips to writers about building characters and worlds in historical fiction by paying attention to the backdrop of the times.

“Consider the water your fish swim in. Then you can decide how clear or turbulent you want it to be.”

In Death In The Spires, Charles paints her world and characters with tremendous skill. Not only does she place the events of the book within a vivid historical context, she does so in such an easy, digestible, transparent way that you never feel confused or jarred by period details,

In addition, many of the themes in this book are very timely for those of us living now and watching the news. I can’t say more without spoilers, but, be prepared to have events from 1905 resonate with the world of 2024 in a resounding way.

This author is hands-down the best writer of historical romantic suspense on my bookshelves. If this is your first book by her, get ready to enjoy yourself.

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Light and sweet

Revisado: 02-15-24

Not too angsty, but setting up for what looks to be a terrific series. It’s the side characters and their entanglements and potential complications that made this book more than mediocre. I enjoyed it and will reread, and am looking forward to the next book in the series!

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Think holiday novella, not crime busting. 

Revisado: 12-17-23

I love this series, and have reread most of them. I gave this book 5 stars because it’s a very cute holiday story. Also because I love these characters and all of the peripheral characters that have made this series so much fun. However, the reality is that this book probably could’ve been condensed Because there’s an awful lot of fluff.  there’s no great mystery here, because trying to figure out who has who for the department secret Santa, and figuring out what each person should get their secret Santa, does not count as a mystery. A tremendous amount of time is spent with the MCs as they negotiate picking wedding invitations, a wedding cake, wedding clothing, a wedding venue… You get the idea. All against a cozy Christmas backdrop. Cute but not very substantive compared to the other Valor and Doyle novels.

That said, Nicky James does dig a little deeper into some side characters, and introduces an interesting new character, so I’m hoping there’s either going to be a spin off series or at least one more book in this one, because she definitely left some loose ends dangling on purpose.

If you’re a fan of this series, go ahead and read this book. It’s charming and it’s fun to revisit such lovable characters. Don’t expect a suspenseful mystery, well, any kind of mystery at all, really, and you’ll enjoy yourself.

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