Zee Reads! June edition

Good evening and how are we all? How is the weekend shaping up for us? I am eating and sleeping and not much else. Oh. House hunting. Luckily, after the vast disappointment of not getting the house we looked at on Tuesday and nothing being acceptable, about a dozen acceptable houses hit the web while on our way up. I have an appointment on Wednesday for one, and I’ve emailed about 11 others. Just keeping the faith that God’s hand is in this and the right house will come along.

That said!

I managed to do some reading this month, despite packing and packing and a little bit of writing. Let’s get this party started!

 

Wizard’s Chess – a book with a Contest – 

Cake Contest Murder

Okay so this was installment #3 and I’m expecting for established relationships etc. However…

This is a tiny town. How many bakeries is it supporting?

How is one judge’s comments in winning or losing this annual sugar frosted contest can make or break a bakery? How is it this woman can put a bakery out of business?

The novel was too short, waaaaaaaaaaay to sweet and the bad guy came out of left field in the last 5 pages. Unsatisfied. Next.

Golden Egg: A book with a dragon

You know, I put the word ‘dragon’ in my PC Kindle finder. I had over 400 titles to choose from. I could have chosen one of these –

I’m wishing I’d gone with the kiddie one. For real. What I chose, was this

Reawakening the Dragon

Yes. Part 1. I feel sullied and used. I mean, if there is time when this challenge is over before the end of the year, I will go back and find a DECENT dragon book to read. A real dragonbook and not a poor excuse for a shifter.

First off, the dragon is a separate soul, so rather than the animal be a part of the man, it’s a separate entity sharing the body. This body argues with the dragon and his eyes change when this inner dialogue is going on. The dragon is constantly horny. And rude about it. Nothing ‘alpha’ about this. Just obnoxious.

Equally obnoxious is the female protagonist. I understand being a journalist and wanting to be taken seriously by your boss, so going after the big story on your own, but going into a seedy bar, pretending to be a ditzy American (no jokes, please) and cozying up to a group of ‘dragon hunters’ who are too busy trying to look down your blouse, and agreeing to go home with them in order to get your story, ain’t going to get you your story. She didn’t deserve to get rescued and I actually felt sorry for the dragon shifter who rescued her.

Third, you’ll notice is says – part 1. No, it’s NOT the first of a trilogy. It’s the first 4 chapters of 3 books that don’t equal up to a novella. Shitty premise, shitty writing, shitty plot development. No way I’m wasting my time on parts 2 and 3 – which yes I have. No, I didn’t pay for them, thank you Jesus, pass the gravy.

Eat, you’ll feel better: Treat yourself to a new book. 

Well! That’s not hard to talk me in to!!!

Dwarves in Space; Tempus Interruptus

At the end of the year last year, I read a rather funny space opera in which the plot was all over the place and wrapped up at the end. Star Wars meets Star Trek meets Lord of the Rings meets Space Balls. This story had it all from the cranky human Han Solo-esque female captain who appears to be on the run from everyone and apparently has quite the past, a crusty, rude, socially unacceptable, and unwashed dwarf for a pilot, his equally crusty, rude, socially unacceptable but smarter than shit elven wife for an engineer, a soft-spoken, scared of his shadow Orc – or is he a troll – for a doctor, a djinn running around mostly invisible, and a pair of permanent elven passengers – a brother and sister team (no, not sexually involved) who are assassins for hire. There is an old saying about family not being blood, but being the people who love you and accept you anyway. That’s what this story is about. Sort of.

Anyway, I was delighted to discover there were other books in the series, so I snatched up two of them!

Tempus Interruptus explains how some personal were hired, why they were hired, and small bit of space hijinks (theft) gone wrong. At times, I had to go back and reread – something I normally hate, but didn’t mind so much this time. The bad spot is resolved by the end and our merry crew continue on their space voyage in a galaxy far far away.

Why am I reading series backwards?

Free Space

Dwarves in Space: Family Matters

In which after discovering everyone else’s background, we finally get some on our captain. A private soul, our dear captain’s past catches up to her in the worst way, when a cheap ass lawyer uses a virus to shut down her ship by remote, leaving them with only a few days of life support, floating in the middle of nowhere, and the only person who has the key to get them out of drifting in space is…

Well I don’t want to give it away. Funny, irreverent… makes me want to NEVER get married!

Luna Lovegood: Diverse Reads

Fiona’s Mates

You know, I had a TRUE diverse read originally planned for this – an Arturian Nights novel with a MMF pairing – which yes is very different from an MFM pairing. There’s really only one MFM book I”ve really found enjoyable and believable and that was Lexi Blake’s Men with the Golden Cuffs. Her other MFM’s are pretty good, but I read Men first and that’s hard to top. I figured if the male on male action was to much for my tender anti-slash sensibilities, I’d just skip over that chapter and go on. Or if push came to shove, I’d have the next Masters and Mercenaries by Lexi Blake lined up for this. I’ll take her hot alpha males any day!

Somehow, this is when I started having problems with my Beast and so I grabbed something off the external to put on my handheld. I got this.

So our poor little lady heroine has kicked her husband out for screwing her step sister. Apparently, he’s a sponge and hates her because she’s got curves. He only married her for her money! He’s extra pissed when he goes to get money out of the ATM and finds himself locked out of her account. His family is harassing her, he’s harassing her, she lives in effing Boca Raton, which is a millionaire’s paradise, so you know she’s loaded! She’s gotten a restraining order, but that’s not enough. She decides that until the divorce is finalized, she’s taking a vacay to Alaska.

There’s trouble afoot there too and before you can say Imagonnafuckapolarshifter, she’s done the absolute unthinkable and hopped into a giant CAT with 2 brothers who are polar bear shifters and is soon to be into bedding them and their 3 brothers, while violence is following behind.

Now, I figured out what was going on with the trouble by the 2nd chapter and I found the entire plot premise as pretty frickin’ unbelievable. This was simply an excuse to get the girl laid by as many people as possible. There is no build up for a relationship(s) or connection. Just hot n horny I just met you and this is crazy here’s my body so take me baby

What’s really scary is I have 30 of her books. They don’t look any better.

Black Lake: Book with Sea Creatures or Mermaids

This was a very disturbing read because the door is left completely open for the reader to come to their own conclusions as to what happened. I found the main drunken characters to have way to great a command of the English Language to take seriously. For real.

I am fascinated by abandoned places. Some years back, my son and I visited a place close to where we used to live. The owner of the 2 side by side service stations had been jailed for laundering money and both facilities had been left to nature. I had vivid memories of the place- I bought the majority of my gas there because it was so cheap. They sold Florida oranges and tangerines and to see the pumps falling apart and the awnings in shreds and the billboards shattered and empty…

I also find abandoned amusement parks to be fascinating. And that’s what this story is about – 3 drunks, talking about the abandoned amusement park up the road that’s been closed for years and one of the drunks – the lone woman – deciding at midnight, while completely blitzed, to visit the abandoned amusement park. She’s able to get in and she talks to everything, from the abandoned stone seal to remembering the things in the sea tanks.

And that’s when it gets weird.

Harry Potter: The Chosen One

I’m probably going to have to back and revisit this. I put in ‘Chosen One’ in my search again in my PC kindle and got 4 books. I picked one for obvious reasons.

I mean, that’s pretty specific. But it’s a preview – the first 3 chapters. The other also were previews. I think I”m going back to redo this. Fated Mate or some such.  So not including this one, 6 books. Not shabby.