The Professor's Wife by Marina Delvecchio

Rating: WARTY!

From an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

I did not like the title of this novel, but I started reading it anyway and about 60% in I decided I should have gone with my first instinct. The problem with the title is that it presents the main female character as an appendage or an extension of some guy - subjugated to him, not having an existence of her own. It's a poor choice to depict a character like that particularly when far too many women are so readily marginalized in society anyway.

The idea behind the story is one that I liked, which is why I read this, despite my misgivings over the title. I know that some people, particularly younger readers, are turned-off or even disgusted by May-December relationships, but I am not. I don't even like the term May-December which, if we assign about eight years per month, means the one participant is 40 and the other is in their nineties. A better depiction in this case would be a March-July relationship which sounds much sweeter to me!

All kidding aside, it's none of our damned business when two (or more!) consenting adults choose to be together. It's their choice, not ours; not society's; not the law's; not religion's. In this case, college student Camilla, falls for professor Carl. Her purported BFF (more on that anon) Chelsea, has dire misgivings, but the author offers us no valid reason for her revulsion. Regardless, Carl and Camilla start dating, marry quite soon and seem to be in an idyllic relationship. Camilla quits the professor's classes so the author at least avoids any impropriety in terms of authority figure versus supplicant here. Far too many so-called romance novels are oblivious of power imbalances in relationships.

For me the problem with this one though, is the same problem in very nearly all modern romance novels, which is that it's predicated entirely on sex. There is no meeting of minds. It's not about romance. It's not about any of the big C's: chemistry, commonalities, companionship, or compatibility. No, I'm not talking about carat, clarity, color, or cut! Here, it's all about the sex, and repeated descriptions of that act do not make it more exciting; they make it boring, which destroys the novel because it was only about sex.

Consequently, at that point, I could no longer take this story seriously, and writing sleight of hand couldn't disguise exactly where this story was going. At least, without having read the ending, it seemed to me like it had an awful lot in common with a certain 1959 novel by Robert Bloch

Talking of dates, there was an issue for me regarding exactly when this novel was set. It felt like it was contemporary, but no one seemed to have a cell-phone and Camilla and her BFF never texted each other or emailed - they wrote "letters" to each other, so maybe it was historical, but if so, I was lost because I had no good idea when it took place which further added to the 'fake' aura it projected to me. Maybe somewhere in the text it reveals when it's set, but if so, I missed it.

As so often happens with stories like this one, I found myself much more interested in the main character's friend than I was in plain vanilla Camilla. Chelsea plays a very minor role which seems odd given all the telling we get at the start of the novel as to how close they are and how much they love each other as friends. But that's telling; when it comes to showing, we get very little. It occurs to me that a story about Chelsea had the potential to be much more interesting, and rather less predictable than this one was.

The big betrayal of their BFF myth came when Chelsea revealed to Camilla that she had been accepted into a prestigious art program, and when Camilla asked when she was leaving, she was told it would be the very next day. Seriously? How close could they be if Chelsea has applied to this program, been accepted, and made plans to move her life away from Camilla, and she gives her supposed BFF only 24 hours notice of the entire thing? That, to me, gave the lie to their supposed closeness. The whole story felt exposed for the fakery that it was at that point; it all seemed so shallow.

We're told that Camilla is a young artist, for example but we're never shown that. Oh yeah, we get a mention of her painting and it plays a role in revealing her sickness later in the story, but I never got the feeling that she was an artist at all. Like I said, it was all about sex. She never was an artist, not even in bed! She never talked about art; she never went to any exhibitions or galleries, and we're never shown her actually doing any painting. Again, it felt fake.

The same applied to the professor who was weirdly described as a professor of British literature (not English, British!) As with Camilla, we're never shown any of this side of him. All we get is telling that he arrives home with a bunch of papers to grade. It felt superficial - like frosting on a badly-baked cake. This is why it was amusing (to my warped mind!) to find some technical writing issues. They seemed to fit right in with this threadbare world-building.

At one point I read, "The only light that broke through the dark blanket covering the small kitchen came from the streetlight peeking through the small window above the sink and the dusted chandelier that hung low above the table they had gathered, about to eat." Not only is that a horribly run-on sentence, but it makes little sense. I assume the blanket didn't literally cover the kitchen, but covered the entrance to the kitchen, or maybe a window in the kitchen? Who knows? Even so, why? Why was there a blanket covering anything?

This was just dropped in there without any prior or following reference, and it made no sense. I honestly have no good idea about what author was trying to say there. On top of this - literally - was "...the dusted chandelier..."? Did this mean it had just been dusted or did the author mean it was dusty? And who has a chandelier above the kitchen table?! And "the table they had gathered" Did she mean 'around which they had gathered'? Or should that comma before 'about' have been after it? That sentence was a godawful mess.

Later I read, "...lift her t-shirt, and follow the trail down to her cervical bone. He slipped his fingers inside her panties...." The cervical bone is the first one in your neck right below your skull. The one I think the author means here is the pubic bone, which lies right underneath the mons pubis. Just a wild guess!

At another point I read, "Carl is a tab bit of a weirdo" That would be ‘tad’ not ‘tab’ and since 'tad' already means a very small amount, the ‘bit’ isn’t necessary, although given the lax way people speak this is fine to use in a character’s speech. There were probably other such issues that I missed since I was reading for entertainment and not editing this; fortunately, the novel wasn't replete with them so this wasn't a huge problem. A little judicious editing is definitely called for though.

The real problem though, was with the story-telling here. To me, the story seemed more like a series of disconnected vignettes than a coherent whole, and having timeline jump around only served to confuse things more. Like I said, I DNF'd this when it became too bad for me to continue. Rightly or wrongly, I felt I knew exactly where it was going and it wasn't anywhere engaging to me. I lost interest in it and skimmed for a little while longer, but around 60% I decided I had given this enough chances to appeal to me and it failed. I can't therefore commend it was a worthy read.

Hold Me by Hildred Billings

Rating: WORTHY!

Errata: "In Sapporo she would text a friend or gone to a party to score some sex." should read ‘have gone’ or 'would go’? "She bore her teeth" - No! She bared her teeth! "Jun was always one who treaded it with trepidation." - 'Trod'. "as Jun brought their vulva together" - 'Vulvas' "She chose the softest voice had" - 'she had'

This was, overall, an enjoyable read. I fell in love with the main character Junri - unrequited as it was! It was a chalk and cheese romance between two women who were not only set apart by a decade in age, but who also hail from widely different backgrounds: Junri Isoya being heir to a hotel empire - if she plays her cards right - and Saya Nemoto being an itinerant worker from a relatively backward part of Japan. They meet when Saya rebels against an abusive coworker. Junri intervenes, and the relationship continues on and off as Saya swings back through her 'home base' of Nagoya between jobs.

Junri isn't happy at being sent to manage the Nagoya hotel, but her uncle, the current chairman, tells her she is badly in need of experience before he can consider her as an elligible heir for taking over when he retires. After resolving the harrassment dispute, Junri never expects to see Saya again, and is both unnerved and excited to find her waiting in the corridor by her temporary hotel accommodation that night.

Thus begins their on-again off again relationship as Saya drifts in and out of Junri's life between working trips to different parts of the country, alternately thrilling her and driving her to distraction as Junri falls ever more deeply for the feisty, exciting, enigmatic, and intriguing young woman.

I really enjoyed this for the most part, but I ran into an issue here and there which took some of the pleasure away. I found the acciental encounters between Junri and Saya to stretch credibility too much: that in all of Tokyo, for example, they should both happen to be riding the same train at the same time and encoutner one another. Additionally, it was a bit much to swallow that one night when Junri is out having a few drinks, she just happens to be walking down the precise alley behind the exact bar that Saya exits right as Junri passes the door.

I also didn't like that Junri so readily leapt into bed with complete strangers without a moment's thought about STDs. We live in a world rife with them, and some are becoming more and more resistant to treatments. Some are deadly; some are debilitating. Naturally no one wants a rather explicit and erotic story like this to screech to a halt for a lecture on veneral disases right in the middle of the 'action', but a word of caution carefully embedded in the characters' exchanges here and there would be entirely appropriate.

Reading this, it seemed to me that someone as smart as Junri wouldn't take such risks, not when her career was at stake and she was so proper and cautious in all other aspects of her life, so this lack of concern betrayed her character quite glaringly. There's a big difference between trading partners within a small group of trusted friends, and wantonly stepping outside that group, and thereby betraying everyone in it. It would surely ring alarm bells for someone like Junri, yet it never did; never once were STDs talked about between anyone in the entire story. That, to me, is a big problem with novels of this nature. I think authors have a responsibility and it makes me sad to see so many of them shirk it.

There were some writing issues, such as when I read, for example, "she could still smell Saya’s body in the sheets" - this was two months after Saya had left. Seriously? Yuk! Those sheets wre in dire need of a serious wash! At another point, I read, "who was used to sex in public sometimes" which felt badly-worded. Something like 'used to occasional sex in public' would sound better. Later, I read, "In the countryside, with people who don’t judge others" yet Saya's whole problem had stemmed from her growing up in exactly such a place, so this made no sense to me!

These were relatively minor issues which I see often, especially in novels which are one-person operations without the might and mein of a big publishing conglomerate behind them, complete with book editors and so on. For me, the biggest let-down was the reveal of Saya's 'problem' toward the end of the novel. It would be easier to talk about this were I to publish a spoiler here, but I won't do that.

I'll just confine myself to saying that I felt let-down when this supposedly relationship-crippling issue turned out to be such a mundane and minor one when all was said and done. It felt like a betrayal of Saya's character. This was a woman who had proven herself to be impressively resilient, strong, and independent. It seemed to me like this 'problem' would have been been the least of Saya's worries, and yet it's built-up to be this towering onstacle when it really isn't anything at all, especially given Junri's position of wealth and power. In my opinion, that whole bit ought to have been changed to turn it into something truly critical, or it ought to have been ditched altogether, and Saya's objections left to what were really potential problems, such as Saya's itinerary lfiestyle versus Junri's necessarily static one. I never did consider their age difference to be an issue.

But the author had won me over plenty before this happened, so I wasn't going to let this sour me on the whole story, which for the most part, was well-written, inventive, amusing, absorbing, and heart-warming. I commend it as a worthy read. This (the novel not my review!) was published in 2013, and there's a suggestion at the end of it that there could be a book 2. Whether this materialized or not, I have no idea, but I am not a fan of series, so I doubt I will read any sequels. I do intend to read other novels by this author, however.

Vulnerable AF by Tarriona Ball

Rating: WORTHY!

From an advance review copy for which I thank the publisher.

Written and read by Tarriona "Tank" Ball, this book of hard hitting poetry tells a very personal story of relationships and the attendant hurt, and I enjoyed it a lot. It's very short - only about 40 minutes in audiobook form. The author is talented, with a strong poetic voice and a good reading voice, and her choices of words and phrasing are lively and challenging.

The actual audiobook apparently comes with PDFs of the illustrations from the print book, but my review copy had no such augmentation, so I can't speak to those. The subject matter is relationships, so the 'vulnerable' in the title has a very limited meaning. No prizes for guessing what the 'AF' means! The poet behind this has a slam poetry kinf of a background - not my faovrite, but this isnlt quite that. Some of the couplets might seem a bit off here and there, but you cannot deny the depth of feeling that underlies this. amd the relationship resonance that powers it.

Having said that, I had two issues with the audiobook version that I should mention. The first is that the author, who read this herself (for which I commend her), would often launch into a poem strong and loud, only to tail off into a whisper at the end, so this was an issue in that you'd have to have the volume up to hear the end, but then the start of the next poem was too loud and brassy, or you'd have the start at a comfortable volume only to miss the ending because it was so sotto voce. I listen to audiobooks when driving, and this book is not suited to that at all because of the volume changes, but even when parked I was still uncomfortable with the significant changes in volume.

The other issue I had was with the piano accompaniment, which to me was an annoyance. The author's voice is a fine one and it felt like gilding the lily to add a rather monotonous piano accompaniment to it. I'd rather it was just me and the author. I'm a big advocate of an author reading their own work although I understand that there are often valid reasons why an author will not or cannot do this. It seemed a shame to me, therefore, that I went into this with a joyous 'play Ball!' in my mind only to have my expectations sometimes overshadowed or diminished by the rather tuneless piano playing.

But that could not hide the inherent power, inventiveness, and strength of these words, which is why I consider this a worthy read despite the distractions. I commend it fully. Tank Ball is a poet to watch - and to listen to!

The Silver Witch by Paula Brackston

Rating: WARTY!

I love the Welsh accent and I enjoyed listening to the reader, Marisa Calin's understated voice in this audiobook, but no matter how sweet her voice was, and it was honeyed, it couldn't make up for a ponderous plot that seemed to be going nowhere even during those rare times when it was actually moving. I was quite engrossed in the story to begin with, but by the time I got halfway through and still nothing really interesting was happening, I couldn't stand the lethargy and inertia anymore, and I ditched the book in favor of something that actually interested me.

So, the story! Tilda Fordwells is an albino woman (why, we never get to learn - maybe just to make her stand out?) who is somehow tied to another albino witch and seer who lived in this same area of Wales in the tenth(?) century. The story is told in two pieces - third person present: Tilda Fordwells, and first person present, but in the past: Seren Arianaidd. To me this is annoying, although for the sake of enjoying this story I let it slide, but to me it seems wrong. I am not a fan of first person at all, but the Tilda story, if the author had to do this, should have been the first person present, and the Seren part should have been in third person past. It made no sense, ass-backwards as it was.

Tilda moves into a home she was going to share with her husband, but he died in a vehicle accident a year prior to the story beginning. Tilda starts having visions of an ancient people and a ghoulish presence. Meanwhile, there's an archaeological dig going on over on this island in the middle of the lake nearby where she lives, and a grave is uncovered with two bodies. It seems obvious who the bodies are: Seren's rival for the Prince's love, named Wenna (spelling uncertain - audiobook!) and her scheming brother, and Princess Wenna who is now out for revenge on Seren's modern ancestor, which was a bit unoriginal and pathetic, and the haunting part of the story made little sense.

The real problem though, was the Quaalude pacing of the story and the endless repetitive detail. We were treated to Tilda and Seren's every random thought and mundane action like it was some miraculous event worth witnessing and deliberating over repeatedly. No, it wasn't, and what was a minor irritation to begin with became a serious impediment to focusing on the story.

After listening to half of this novel, carried largely by Calin's voice and barely at all by the story, I reached a point where I simply didn't care what became of any of these people and ditched it. I could listen to Calin forever, but not if she's reading this stuff! I started re-watching Torchwood for my Welsh accent fix and the truth is I like Gwen Cooper far more than ever I could like Seren or Tilda!

Dating Nashville by Ann Maree Craven, Michelle MacQueen

Rating: WARTY!

Erratum: "Some things were bound to change, but others never did not." What the hell does that mean, exactly?!

Is this Dating Him #1 or Discovering Me #1? Who knows. Maybe it's discovering me dating him? This story, which borrows heavily from MTV's Faking it 'comes out' as one about a huge rarity: a gay country singer, but the truth is that there's a score of gay and lesbian country performers already out, so this isn't exactly a hen's teeth situation.

It was a huge fail for me not because of that though, but because so much is telegraphed all the time that it feels like déjà vu all over again reading it. It's not so much telling instead of showing as broadcasting instead of showing! On top of that, the behaviors described for assorted people in the story were not remotely realistic, and worse, the main relationship was thoroughly inauthentic and the two main characters essentially, were dicks. Which I guess is appropriate!

The story is set in a bewildering world of people. I assume each of these gets their own story that has been or will be told in other novels which the publisher and authors clearly want you to spend your hard-earned money on. Not me. I'm done and I managed only about 25% of this before I tired of the nonsensical story. The idea is that rising country star "Becks" is an older friend of a guy named Nikki who is having a rough time with his bi boyfriend. Well, deal with it Nikki! He's bi and he's young. It's going to be a while before he settles on anyone - assuming he ever does. The thing is that the two of them (B&N, not N & boyfriend) have never had a relationship other than as distant friends and Becks has had virtually no contact in two years since his career began taking off.

So neither one of this pair has even thought about any sort of intimacy with the other, yet one night when playing a concert, Becks sees Nikki in the audience looking upset while confronting his boyfriend who is with a girl. This is the boyfriend that Nikki already has given up on, so we're told, so the upset seems fake at best. Becks's behavior is even more so since he jumps off the stage in the middle of his concert and kisses Nikki, thereby exposing him to publicity, which is the last thing the younger man craves.

Despite Becks not being that big of a star (which was why he was playing that venue rather than a large, packed stadium), we're expected to believe that the media world explodes, that paparazzi are everywhere demanding answers, and his recording company is demanding he run with this gay aspect because it's trending. I'm sorry but this is horseshit. None of it makes any sense. If Becks is such a huge star, his recording company can hardly hold him to ransom over this, and if Becks is such a rebel, why does he so meekly fall into line? He's not even that big of a star, so who cares about his domestic trivia, really? The story is all over the place and it doesn't gel.

For the most part it was written decently in terms of good English, although the story wasn't where it needed to be. One oddball thing I read stuck with me: "And you know as well as I that gay is just a label." Um... I'm not sure what the authors are trying to say here, but I am sure they could have worded it a lot better! So all in all - or all in one quarter anyway, I can't commend this.

Starlight Wishes by ME Montgomery

Rating: WARTY!

Continuing my look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which trust me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This book starts out with a prologue which I naturally skipped, but the prologue apparently begins with a bunch of 12 year olds chanting the 'starlight star-bright' nonsense about wishes coming true and that pre-adolescent mentality pervades the whole story unfortunately. It's first person, too, which makes it ten times worse. Jen is sneaking out of the room after an apparently drunken encounter after a wedding reception, with your trope ripped, chiseled guy she doesn't feel she deserves because she's only a weak and worthless woman, you know, not fit to kiss his tight glutes and all.

The story then screeches to a halt as we backtrack 12 hours to the reception - like we don't already know what happened there, how she got tipsy and had no ride home so he very generously" offered to ride her...so to speak. Rather than just drop her off and see she gets safely indoors he perpetrates a home invasion, and next he's going through her drawers - and holding up her drawers (or in this case a thong) on his middle finger; wait, no it was his index finger because he was indexing her wardrobe, that was it. I quit reading right there.

Barf.

Coral Hearts by Avery Gale

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This was a truly pathetic maiden in distress needing a strong guy to rescue her because as you know all women are useless without a studly man. The names in this book are utterly ridiculous. The girl is Coral. This is inevitably part of a series about the five Morgan brothers - because why come up with something original when you can continue draining an old teat? The Morgans are called Brandt, Colt, Kip, Phoenix, and Sage. Why not just go the whole hog and call 'em Sage, Basil, Rue, Tarragon and Dill? And have them come from Oregano?

These boys, we're assured, have vastly different interests - but they're all doms. I guess their interests aren't that different, huh? So Coral is already running from an ex and her car breaks down. Her car is probably named Herb-ie. So naturally, she "literally falls into" this guy's arms and he no doubt offers her some Sage advice....

Seriously the barf factor here is high and so too, probably, are the Morgan bros. I'll pass. Wind.

The Fix by Sylvie Stewart

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This was multi-first person PoV, which is at least three times worse than single fp. It jumped around so much that it did nothing but confuse me as to who was doing what, and when, and to whom. I gave up on it before any romance even began. I didn't miss it. It definitely needs a fix. Or something.

Once Written Twice Shy by Carey Decevito

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

I skipped the prologue on this one. Chapter one begins "Just a short year later..." - that ellipsis doesn't end the sentence, which is therefore missing a period. If it's intended to be a sort of a cliffhanger sentence, then three dots is fine, but there ought to be spaces between the dots. But moving along, I skimmed chapter one which was about two people meeting at an airport after being in touch online for some time. They can't keep their hands off each other.

At first I had assumed that they had leapt into bed asap. I assumed in this case we're meant to understand they're already exchanged information about their sexual histories, so I granted the safe sex part here, but after, there was this weird issue of taking a shower, and there's quite some debate about who goes first and which shower. I'd thought, they want to jump each other's bones but now they won't shower together? It just felt unrealistic given the premises for the story, but when I back-tracked to see if it really happened as I thought, I realized the wording was a bit ambiguous and it looked like all they'd done was kiss, but he phrase "wrapped in each other like a pair of randy teenagers" had been used, so I was confused.

Do randy teenagers not start physically touching each other apart from locking lips? I guess not. Do randy teenagers not jump into the shower together? I guess not, because it got weird when the guy realizes he has no clothes to put on after his shower and she's showering in his room for reasons unknown. He goes in without knocking, and she's topless of course. Inexplicably, she freaks, and covers up her breasts. Even if they didn't just have sex - and I think they didn't, this felt way too coy to be realistic given their animal passion - and in public at the airport as well as in the kitchen at home.

Is it sad that this story was the best of the ones I'd read to this point, and it almost made a positive impression on me? It was far too coy for its own good though, making it sound unrealistic which is bad for a writer who claims she strives for realism. This lack of authenticity didn't work for me. Can't commend it, but at least I'd consider reading something else by this author.

Bleacke's Geek by Lesli Richardson

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This one is a classic example of how cheap these stories are. It's a wolf shifter story which I avoid like the plague because even when the prime focus is the shifter aspect, it seems to be always about alpha males and sex. Granted that this one is marginally different in that the alpha is the female wolf, but ultimately it's really the same. She's an assassin supposed to be taking down a guy at this bar, yet she's so distracted by a human male she must have that she abandons her prime directive and all-but drags this guy back into the women's restroom to 'claim him' - which is wolf-speak for unsafe sex.

I guess shifters are immune to STIs, huh? But this is rape no matter how much the guy is in denial. He had no choice in what happened, nor does he when he's kidnapped and taken by her as a sex-slave after she finally shoots the guy she's after. That's when I ditched this travesty. As of this writing, the author claims on her website that it's not "forumlaic," and I believe her.

Maybe Mandy by Chris Genovese

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This was yet another disaster - this time written by a guy. Amanda is out of a relationship and despite having a string of bad ones in a row isn't smart enough to realize the problem isn't the guys - it's her and the poor choices she makes. But that isn't going to stop her making yet one more. She now wants to dive into unsafe sex with her married friends, none of whom seem to have a problem not knowing each other's sexual history. This isn't love. It's not romance. It's not real. It's raunch and that's all it is. There's no relationship to see here. Move long.

Royal Protection by Amy Briggs

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust. No relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

This was the usual exercise in inappropriate so-called 'romance' writing. There's a fictional band called little Queens - supposedly giving new birth to rock and roll which rather dates the author a bit - which is comprised of sisters Miranda and Carmen. Their father - another in a long line of super controlling males in these stories - hires an ex-Army Ranger named Ryan King to go undercover as their 'protection' - posing as a journalist. The idiot girls just let this stranger saunter right on into their lives no questions asked, no vetting, nothing. This is after Miranda, the singer-song-writer of the duo has been receiving threatening letters. They're morons.

The guy's name is Ryan King, of course, because he's going to be ruling over them. Yawn. And Barf. Ryan has to fight 'his overwhelming attraction to" Miranda. Well, of course he does, poor soul! How horrible life must be for him. The book description asks, "Will one wrong move cause everything the Little Queens have worked for to come crashing down?" I dearly hope so because this top-heavy edifice is unsustainable. It sucked from the off.

Missing beats by KL Shandwick

Rating: WARTY!

Time to take a quick look at volume 2 of this trilogy of sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - of the kind I never read for good reason. Fortunately I was able to skip some authors in this one because I'd read their efforts in volume one and was not about to subject myself to more of their work. Each sample has only an opening chapter or two. Most of them seem to be first person and kinky. There is no romance here, only lust: no relationship that's greater than skin-depth.

As in the first volume, I review these based solely on these sample chapters, which believe me are more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own mind! It's all about studly guys and frustrated women, and unsafe-sex. Some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point big time.

I don't read prologues, but I couldn't help but notice as I was about to bypass it and swipe to the first chapter of this novel that the name of one of the main characters was Kane Exeter. That name is so bad that it's a joke right up front there and it almost made me quit reading at that point, four words in, which would be some sort of a record, but I pressed on. The idea is that these two childhood friends: Kane and Jo, go their separate ways, and one of them (I'll give you only one guess as to who it is), becomes a "wealthy playboy rock star." Who talks about rock stars anymore?

That ought to give you all you need to know about the mentality and age-mindset of the author right there. If it doesn't, this from her website bio will do it: "Her characters have flaws and she hopes this helps the connection between them and her readers." Because all her readers are like Kane Exeter: rich, successful, chiseled, tattooed, etc. Either that or they have flaws. What a thing to say about your readers! Maybe they do but it's not up to an author to throw them in your face. Ultimately this is yet another novel where an authority figure (Kane by dint of his wealth and success) preys on a subjugate woman who of course needs rescuing. Barf.

Just For You, Sir by Laylah Roberts

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

This was yet another dom book but disguised as a purportedly concerned family chasing after a stray young girl they'd adopted. The girl was weak and petite and the boys were all strutting turkey cocks. She had run away from them, but they tracked her down and dragged her back with threats, and she meekly went with them. Frankly this was sick and I condemn, not commend it.

The Playground by Phoebe Alexander

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

This one has a swinging schoolteacher. I quit reading when the writer wrote 'forte' with an accent on the 'e'. That's not a word. The word isn't from Italian, where the 'e' is sounded, but from the French where it's not, although both words mean 'strong'. It's pronounced 'fort' not 'fortay'. A writer should know this.

Though the 'e' is sounded in Italian, there's no accent on it. So even if the author was trying to claim it's from the Italian, what she actually wrote is a nonsense word. That and this business with the primary school-teacher swinger was just too much for me. The writing was boiler-plate boring anyway, so I saw no reason to continue. It's not that a teacher's private life - as long as it's kept separate from school (and isn't illegal!) - is anything to do with her professional life, but this felt like the author was just trying to damned hard. I can;t commend this one.

Indiscretion by DD Lorenzo

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

The first female mentioned is Corilla Delford! Seriously? That name sounds far too much like Gorilla. The story starts out with the main male character apparently having been punched in the face during the inevitable trope bullying (predictably jock versus intellectual) that's an irremovable fixture of YA stories that are set in high-schools. Immediately following the punch is a tedious first person introductory info-dump which made me yawn. Seriously, does this author think they can draw a reader immediately into the story with a punch and then keep them reading with a yawn-inducing info-dump? It looks like somebody went to creative-writing school. Or maybe not!

Info-dumps are second only to flashbacks when it comes to ways to turn me off reading your work. Too many authors don't seem to get that you can deftly interleave history with present action so it's not an info-dump. I guess this author didn't get the memo. That was enough to turn me off this story, but even so I gamely pressed-on, only to discover this was yet another dual first person voice story and I stopped right there. Barf. Seriously? Get a clue, get an imagination, try something original.

Off Duty by Lucas X Black and Ellie Masters

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

I'm sure they thought it would be cute, each writing their own alternating chapters in a dual first person voice story. The female is named Laura Peters and a peter is all she can think of. The leading male can't stand her and she sure as hell hates him, we're told. Yet they somehow overcome this hatred in their need to over...come. Laura is a trauma doctor and she's just had a very young child die after a fall which caused internal bleeding in the head. The kid is basically written-off and consigned to organ donation without even any attempt to save him.

Naturally an ER doctor never gets laid because they're always working in the ER with no time off! No, she's not an intern doing a rotation, she's a regular doctor, and still she has no free time. Even after a child dies right in front of her, or rather is given up on, the first thing the Peters thinks about is sex with the medic who brought the kid in - the one she hates but wants inexplicably wants to jump his bones. She doesn't think if there's anything she could have done differently, or what else might be done or might have been done to save the child. And this is despite chewing out one of her underlings earlier, specifically for not thinking everything through! She's a do as I say not as I do sort of a hypocrite.

As soon as chapter 2 came up and it was obvious it was going to be alternating dual first person, I wanted to quit, but I read a couple of paras just to see how this perspective went. It was no better. The transition from one paragraph where he's thinking about her to a second paragraph begins like this: "My thoughts returned again to Doctor Laura Peters." The thing is that they had never been anywhere else! This dude has an unhealthy and potentially dangerous obsession with her. Maybe they really are meant for each other. But not for me. This is trash and I quit right there.

Dual first person is twice as bad as single first person which is worst person, and this story was just stupid, unoriginal and unrealistic. There are no shades of gray here - not that that novel would have been any better. I can't commend garbage like this. I'm definitely done with Ellie Masters.

Changing Roles by Ellie Masters

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

Kate Summers is a privates investigator with a tragic past (which PI doesn't have one?!). She's also a dom who is - surprise! - forced to go undercover as a submissive - and she likes it. Ri-ight. Not only is her story suspect, her dom is her suspect. In other works the whole thing is messed up.

Another problem here is this author's antiquity - and I'm not talking about her chronological age, which is irrelevant, I'm talking about her antique view of life. She starts out her story in the inevitable first person because god forbid there should ever be a private dick story in third person. The world would end! So she's rambling on about hunting men during the day - like women never commit crimes. She insists that she delivers "men to justice one criminal at a time". Sexist pap.

As if that's not bad enough she gets a couple coming into her office with a crime to solve, and these are the same people who got her fired from the police force. So they're villains, get it? How do we know they're villains? Well, they're overweight! Yep! Jewels encircled "her fat neck" and "His fat jowls shifted to and fro". Fat=villainy. That's when I quit reading this trash. I didn't even need a whole sample chapter. WARTY. Case closed.

Double Down & Dirty by Samantha A Cole

Rating: WARTY!

I got this freebie which offers sample chapters of a bunch of "romance" novels - that sort of thing I never read, so I decided to take a look at this limited sample - each book had only an opening chapter or two - and to see if they were truly as bad as I think they are. It turns out - they are! Who knew? I decided to review these based solely on the sample chapters, which believe me is more than enough to judge this trash. None of these books would remotely pass the Bechdel-Wallace test because they can't even pass it within one female character's own head! It's all about guys and sex all the time and some might argue that this is okay because that's the whole purpose of the book, but I'd argue that people who say that sort of thing are missing the point - and by some serious margin, too. Actually it's not even a margin, it's more like a burgeon.

This novel is about this mousey secretary (yes, 'secretary' is how she's described) who works for fraternal twins (frat boys works too) named Grayson and Remington Mann, who are the joint CEOs of Black Diamond Records. They are renowned for dating the same woman at the same time in a ménage à twat - and it's always high-flying artist types, never the 'lowly secretary'. Nonetheless, apparently they've "been craving the woman they see every day at the office, but their strict policy of not dating employees puts a huge crimp in things." I guess they're not so dominant after all, huh?! LOL! But of course they over..come this and the description goes on to assure us that they "set out to show her how they can both love her and she can love them in return."

The thing is that there's no love here, only pure carnal lust, which is fine if that's what they're all into, but let's not pretend there's any romance here or that the woman has any integrity or agency. She's a sex toy and that's it. Worse, they're authority figures taking advantage of a woman in an inferior position with regard to who has the power here. I refuse to even remotely commend trash like this. WARTY!

Sky Noise by Ernie Lindsey

Rating: WARTY!

I made it almost 40% through this before giving up. The stupid is great with this one. There was no time travel at all in the portion I read so I didn't get the fixation with it on the book cover. There was increasing talk about it when I quit, but nothing happening at all.

It seems to me if you're going to emblazon your book cover with something, then you really need to deliver on it somewhere quite early on in the novel even if only a tease. If it's all tease and no delivery, then you're just blue-balling your reader. So, if there's one type of story above all others I hate, and it's not the one that has an endless lead-in with little or no payoff, then it's the one where there's a stupid female main character. It's worse if she's given to piercing bouts of screaming, so I was glad at least, that this was not a problem here.

Usually the stupid women are found in YA novels, but not exclusively so. A disturbing number of those are written by women too, but in this story, the main protagonist is a writer who is in her late thirties - hardly YA. Her ridiculous name is Helen Weils. The equally ridiculous name of her co-protagonist is Chip Sledd. The book should have been titled "Kitchen Sink" because the author tries to jam every ridiculous conspiracy theory into his purported time-travel nonsense, whether it fits or not, and let's face it, which conspiracy theory isn't ridiculous in the extreme?

The problem was that it was boring, hence my DNF-ing it. You could make a story like this one work - the conspiracy guy and the skeptical woman (it's X-Files rip-off after all) - but you'd have to do a lot better job than this author did. It would help immensely if you didn't make both of these characters dumb and unappealing.

The problem is that they are profoundly stupid and have no saving graces. Sledd claims he's been avoiding the Men in Black (yes, they're in it, too) for years, yet for the first forty percent of the book I listened to, these two are quite literally constantly on the run from those guys, unable to avoid them because Sledd led them right to his meeting with Weils! It's moronic, and tedious rather than smart and gripping.

Weils is a writer of fiction, which is what attracted Sledd to her, because she'd been researching a book on the Roanoke colonists who disappeared. Yes, they're in it too. Could the author not find a new original mystery to go with? He has to drag out every trope and cliché he can find? For someone who is supposed to be an author who researches and writes great stories, Weils is appallingly slow to grasp what she's being told and worse, she's completely passive - at least in that numbing forty percent I experienced. She's acted on, She is not an actor. It's annoying.

The sad frosting on the sunken cake of this novel is that the plot behaves like there's no Internet and no media, such that these guys could go and blab the whole story and end the problem! Of course that would end the novel, but for an author to fail to even address that as an option purely for the purpose of somehow ruling it out is just poor writing.

He seems to think that just because his characters can't go to the police (the Men in Black would simply extract them on some farcical pretense, presumably) then there are literally no options available to them other than to keep running. So Sledd is responsible for dragging Weils into all this, yet not once is she pissed-off with him for upending her life. It's completely inauthentic. And he doesn't even really apologize for what he's done to her, but the problem here is that he somehow thinks she can help him expose the conspiracy! Why her? Why not the Internet or a well-known investigative reporter in the media? It makes no sense.

The other question is what, precisely, do the Men in Black want with Weils and Sledd? What, exactly, would they do with them if they caught them? If the men in Black have the smarts and technology they're purported to have, they would know that she knows nothing, so why are they remotely interested in her? Why push her into Sledd's camp by clamping down on him right then? It makes no sense, and I call bullshit on these amateur theatrics. I ditched the book and cannot commend it.