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The Book: The Pride of Jared MacKade by Nora Roberts

The Particulars: Contemporary Romance, Silhouette Special Edition, Dec. 1995. It was apparently SSE #1000 (Series romances are numbered, ya know.)

I chose this book as my TBR challenge book, because yesterday, I realized (when SuperWendy tweeted about it) that today was the day to post my TBR challenge, and I hadn’t read anything in the past week or so that might constitute a TBR book. (I’ve been working really hard on my “reading all the RITA nominees, plus a few Hugo/Nebula nominees, plus some of the Edgar finalists” challenge thing.)

BUT there was this book. It’s been under the futon in my office a while–who knows how long? I’m pretty sure I bought it at my RWA chapter meeting. And I read it in the past few weeks. It’s not a marriage of convenience story (which is one of my favorite hooks), or pretend engagement or arranged marriage story, but I don’t care. It’s been hanging around the house, and I read it.

So. The Review: (Short, as usual) This is a pretty early Nora. The MacKade brothers live on/near what was once a Civil War battleground, so that history–stories about what happened back then, and maybe even ghosts–play a part in the stories. The hero is a divorced lawyer who’s come home to build his practice there. Heroine is a single mom who’s finally found a place to call home and raise her son. She’s prickly and determined not to depend on anyone. He’s got issues with pride (duh), though he does seem to work through them pretty quick. I liked the heroine’s characterization as a tough woman who’s willing to try again, and I liked the hero who takes being smacked upside the head (Not so much literally, but sorta) pretty well and is willing to admit that he’s being a dumba$$ once he gets it. And the more I’ve thought about it, the better I like it. And I liked it a lot. I gave it 4 stars at GoodReads.

And there you have it. I have some other things I want to say–both here and on my website. (Geez, I haven’t updated in Soooooo long.) But I will see if I can figure out how to schedule a post–Blogspot’s supposed to let you do that these days–and have it post tomorrow or Friday or something. Whenever I get it written. I shall leave this review more-or-less pure.

I was on track to keep up with the blog posts, and then the wind changed.

It’s not like in Mary Poppins, where the wind only changes when she leaves town. The wind changes a lot in Texas, especially this time of year. And every time it changes, it blows in something else that somebody in our house is allergic to. This time, it’s me, and it’s got me trying to cough up a lung. I don’t know if I’m light-headed from the coughing and dripping (yeah, the nose is going too), or from the meds I’m taking to stop it, but I can’t turn or stand up quickly without having to grab onto something.

And I’m leaving town tomorrow for the Popular Culture Association meeting in San Antonio! I get to play author for one of the romance track panels, and hang out with smart people who love romance. What could be more cool?

Anyway, it’s been hard to motivate myself to write blogs or anything else while I’m coughing so hard. But I did read a book I decided would qualify as a TBR challenge book.

I’m pretty sure it hasn’t been on my TBR shelf more than a couple of years. We’ve only been in this house for three, and I’m pretty sure I didn’t move it here, but it’s been waiting for me to read it long enough to get moved several times and eventually wind up under the futon where the grandboys sleep when they come to visit. So, here goes.

The Book: GOOD GRIEF by Lolly Winston

The Particulars: Paperback reprint of a hardcover released by Warner Books in 2004. It’s a “Women’s fiction” story.

Why do I have it? Who the heck knows? I saw it, thought it looked interesting, and brought it home. I’m pretty sure I bought it used–maybe from a writer’s group exchange, maybe at a Friends of the Library sale…

What did I think? The book is about a woman’s recovery from the death of her husband. It begins several months after the funeral, and continues past the first anniversary of his death. It is sad and funny and poignant and at times I wanted to give the woman a hard shake. Not so much for “get over it already,” but for–well, idiocy. Yes, she was grieving, and maybe not entirely sane (she wears her bunny slippers and robe to work at one point–hence the cover), but there are several points where she’s so totally clueless about the people around her that I thought she needed a little shaking. But then, I guess that’s what those people are doing–shaking her up. It was a pretty good book, but wasn’t exactly what I was looking for when I read it. There was a bit of a mismatch between my mood and the book. Still, it was a good read, especially if you’re in the proper mood for it.

And I’m not finishing this review the same day I started it. I had to catch up with the dayjob, then I had to get ready to leave town. I will make a BIG effort to get a post about the PCA/ACA conference and about the trip to San Antonio up this week. I don’t have anything else to do this week…well, except finish my revisions and get the ms off, and start work on a world-building workshop for next week…

I finished it. So, I figure I ought to tell y’all what I thought about the whole thing. I never could put it down.

And the little things that bothered me so much at the beginning of the book? Not so much as I got into it. I got used to “the blonde” popping up to do things, I guess. The near-caricature-ness of the characters began to change. The dumb one wasn’t so dumb as she seemed–though she’s still got a LOT of room for growth, this is apparently only the first book of a series–and the “too-good-to-be-true” one wasn’t. The evilly-evil one stayed over-the-top evil, but–well, I’ll try not to be spoiler-y.

In the end, I liked the book. There were things I wish had been done differently–some people died that I wish hadn’t, things like that–but this is an epic fantasy. People die in epic fantasies, and sometimes it takes a REALLY long time for character growth to occur. Sometimes I don’t have the patience to wait for that growth–but we’ll see.

The Night Holds the Moon was a pretty good read. The central character–though this follows epic fantasy pattern by having more than one POV character–is something of a wanton, who is the “chosen” of a goddess, by being the one who can play the magic flute, and when she plays it, things happen. Weird things. She’s kind of a go-with-the-flow girl, who tends to be somewhat gullible, and perhaps trusts unwisely. She’s not really into politics, so when politics get all stirred up around her, she lets other people take care of things. There’s a cross-country trip, magic, betrayal, politics, death–you name it, it’s in here. Lots of twists, more than one of which surprised me. Pretty good stuff. Give it a try.

There are 12 categories for the RITA awards. There are only six Nebula categories, including one for short story, novelette, novella and screenplay, but then the science fiction/fantasy market is about half that of romance.There are 15 categories in the Hugo, but three are for people, and a bunch of others are for screenplays and stuff. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I had read quite a few of the RITA finalists.

I’m reading a book, one co-authored by a friend of mine in a genre new to her. Co-authoring is also new to her, I think.

I’ll be honest–the book isn’t the best written thing I’ve ever read. (And I feel bad saying that, because this co-author IS a friend, and I’ve read other things by her that are very well written.) But it grabbed hold of me, and I’m having a really hard time putting it down, even to go to work.

Overall, the writing isn’t horrible. Though–once the main character is named, she needs to be referred to by name, pronoun, or title–like if she’s ‘the queen’ or ‘the priestess.’ Something more generic, like ‘the blonde,’ just jerks me right out of the story, because I wonder if it’s the barmaid or something, who just happens to be blond. It’s just too generic to be used to name the main character, once the main character is named and described.

I’m also finding the characters almost caricatures–this one is supposed to be carefree and fun-loving and maybe a bit ditzy–and she’s SO ditzy, she’s on the verge of stupidity. That one is not only evil, she’s fat and disgusting. This other one is a total snob with no redeeming characteristics. This one is too good to be true. That one is so focused on scholarship there’s no connecting with people. Caricatures. And yet–and yet…

I cannot put the book down.

I HAVE to see what happens next. It’s an epic fantasy published on Smashwords (and other self-publishing e-book platforms) about a girl who’s chosen by the magic flute to be its player. There’s an evil queen and her suckups, and a noble count who wants to help the girl, but also maybe use her to save his country–and maybe the whole land–from the queen, and things happen, but we don’t know why they happen or what they mean, and the magic-flute-player is supposed to be a virgin, but this girl SO isn’t, and…

Well, the book just sucked me in. I’m rolling my eyes at the extreme extremeness of the characters, and occasionally stopping to figure out just who, exactly, is doing or saying whatever (I mean, surely, there’s more than one blonde in this universe), and gulping it down fast as I can. I sure hope the end answers all the questions raised and all the nasty bad guys get theirs and– Well, I’ll let you know.

Yeah. So, if you want to take the chance of this book grabbing you by the throat (or the eyeballs–whatever), it’s called THE NIGHT HOLDS THE MOON, by Colleen Thompson and Parke Roberts.

Oh, I am still working on the revising of the book. Making notes about large changes–haven’t really reached the parts where I think it may need them, just reading through, marking small changes, and making notes…

Okay, I’ve been busy lately. I’ve been reading. I’ve even been working on the book. But at the moment, I don’t recall exactly what I’ve read, though I could, I guess, if I worked at it. However, I certainly couldn’t recall whether the stuff I’ve read is old or not.

You see, my very first granddaughter arrived the day after Valentine’s Day. We have three grandboys who are loved dearly, but balance is important. And now, Rocket Girl has come into the family. I haven’t thought about writing a review or anything like that. So… I guess this is about all you get for my TBR review for Feb.

I am once again attempting to take part in the TBR Challenge, this year MCed by Wendy the SuperLibrarian.

This year, I am not going to choose my books ahead of time. Who knows from January what books they’re going to be in the mood to read come June? I am just going to go to my massive TBR pile, which now includes books 2 years old on my Reader, and see what I feel like reading. Therefore, so as to not fail this challenge in the first month, I have pulled the underbed storage box out from under the bed (the one that doesn’t hold Christmas wrapping paper), and discovered that there are not as many books in it as I thought there were. But I found one to read. I am going to copy SuperWendy’s format for the actual review–at least partly.

The Book: COWBOY BOSS by Kathy Denosky

The Particulars: Contemporary romance, Silhouette Desire #1457, August 2002, Out of Print, but available in e-book format.

Why was it in my TBR?  I know Kathy. She’s a friend of a friend and a nice person. When I see books by people I know, I tend to buy them.

The Review:  Back of the book:

This is a nice book. Faith is nice, Cooper is nice. Even the stereotypical crusty old ranch hand who sets up the stranding plot is nice, if crusty. The story was a series of romance novel cliches to give the leads a chance to lust after each other–the “catch her naked in the tub” scene, and the “watch him do manly stuff without a shirt on” scene, and even the “falling on top of each other cute and sexy” scene. But that was about it. Everybody was so nice, there wasn’t much conflict, and what angst there was seemed easily brushed over and set aside. I really wanted to like this book more than I did, because I like Kathy. But it was just too…nice.

So. Here is where I depart from SuperWendy. I don’t give grades to books. (Okay, yeah, I do put stars on them over at GoodReads, but my stars are more shiny than most people’s. The like is higher.)

And that’s it. My first TBR Challenge review of 2011. I will try my darnedest to keep it up this year. We will have to see how that works…

In other news, all is quiet on the parental front–though that isn’t necessarily a good thing. It’s just a thing. And as I am going back over the Big Book I finished last year, I am discovering a lot of drivel, and also a fair bit of “Wow, that’s really good. I wrote that?” So now the trick is getting rid of the drivel and making the good stuff still work.

It has been a lazy week. I am ashamed for being so lazy–and yet…

It felt so good! I sat goofing off with the laptop in the living room where I could at least be in the same room with the family, if not actually speaking to them. (I did not actually use my feet on the laptop…) I think sometimes it’s fill-the-well refreshing to just be a lazy lump. And sometimes, it’s just being lazy. The trick is figuring our which state you’re in when.

I did have appointments three afternoons after the dayjob this week–two doctor and one to get my hair shortened. (I look lovely now, have no new skin cancers and will see what’s wrong with the sore toe when the x-rays are examined.) That took up much of the after work time this week.

Next week, I am doing a workshop on writing action, so need to pull it out and spruce it up.

Oh– We have an official due date for the new grandbaby. She (or maybe he) will arrive via C-section, because big brother did, on Feb. 16. I need to make my plane reservations so I can go up and help. Mostly chauffeuring big brother around, I think.

So I guess I’d better get all my work done between now and then, huh? Yeah, I’m just being lazy.