Monique S.'s Blog, page 13

wickedly funny

Southern Fried Murder by Tegan Maher

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I thought I wasn't into witchy tales, because Harry Potter didn't do anything for me but a lazy yawn. Then I read the first of Tegan's books "Sweet Murder" and I was hooked. I absolutely love all the chracters and their cowgirl/cowboy charm, especially Noelles, as well as the witty and often funny dialogues that arise, when the "living impaired" appear, the whole setup is just too good!

Then there is the mystery and suspense and all is so well worked out. I have read all the books of the serie up to this one and was distracted for a while, but now I will break my reading for the IHL challenge every once in a while with the next volumes. There has been not one of the books that disappointed and I greatly admire Tegan for the consistent high quality of her work.



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I just could not resist

The Forgotten Realms by Silvia Shaw

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Rand is an epic tale of two parallel worlds, our earth and Rand, with magic, Monsters, female warriors, winged horses, witches and demons. There are not one, but two lesbian romances here, that of the main heroine, Savannah, who’s been promised her dream woman by a vision, that saved her from certain death in a sandstorm in the Sahara, and that of the warrior woman, who comes to find her and take her “home” to Rand, Tamasin and her wife.

In volume 2 we even get treated to a third lesbian romance, as Savannah truly takes charge of her role as the chosen one and her romance with Pela moves to a new level, on her way to recruit soldiers and find new allies she meets another “bookworm”/historian, Princess Fern, the cousin of Luna.

As more dark forces plot their own schemes in Arcadia, the new protector of the queen to be, a siren, and Princess Fern fall in love. Beginning to unravel the mysteries of the past Savannah gets herself in more trouble than she expects, while Tamasin and Pela both struggle to organise the defence against the enemy they don’t even know yet.

The epic tale of Rand continues along the same lines as volume one and the plot thickens. Don’t read this one without volume one, you won’t have a clue of what they’re dealing with without it. As a volume two it is as gripping and and fantastic as volume one and the romances spice the action/adventure bits up nicely. I enjoyed this continuation of the tale very much.



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a satisfying, gripping read

Rand by Silvia Shaw

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Rand is an epic tale of two parallel worlds, our earth and Rand, with magic, Monsters, female warriors, winged horses, witches and demons. There are not one, but two lesbian romances here, that of the main heroine, Savannah, who’s been promised her dream woman by a vision, that saved her from certain death in a sandstorm in the Sahara, and that of the warrior woman, who comes to find her and take her “home” to Rand, Tamasin and her wife.

Savannah is thrown into a world she hardly understands as the saviour of said world and has to learn about herself and what she really is almost without help. Tamasin becomes her friend, but due to their different ancestry and the differences of the worlds they grew up in respectively, it is very difficult to truly understand each other. The fact that Tamasin’s wife is the queen of the whole of Rand and jealous of Savannah without any real reason doesn’t help either.

Even though Rand is clearly labelled as volume one, this could also be read as a stand alone and would remain a satisfying, gripping read nevertheless.



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Almost a five star.

American Superstar: Set the Stage by Shay Paris

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Set the stage is an interesting, well written tale about two young musicians involved in a “reality TV” program called American Superstar.

Lennon is serious about her music, her streaming channel is pretty successful and she has a faithful following on social media. What she wants is a record company to sign her on. Her best friend and “manager”, Jesse, persuades her to enter into American Superstar.

Camila has been made a star by her fame and money hungry mother, but at some point the expectations, the fame and the money have got into her head and she went off the track and on drugs. Working on the revival of her career with a new manager her record label has promised her artistic freedom for her come-back, if she successfully finishes a stint as judge on the show.

Both are lesbian, but Camila is out and Lennon is not and afraid of her parents judgment, who are members of a new “conservative” sect, and was subjected to reformations camps, disguised as summer camps, run by her uncle.

From the beginning there is a strong attraction between the two. The romance is well credible and beautifully written, but what I was missing was more information on the two as to their musical background. Did Camila write her own music or her own texts or was it her ex, Helena, who wrote their music or both? Did they perform music someone else wrote (or partially as in someone’s music but their own lyrics or vice versa)? The same question bugged me the whole time about Lennon’s stream. She comes across as an excellent full blooded musician and there are so many songs on her stream, are they all just interpretations? Hard to believe given her talent.

Being an old roadie and equipment designer for Rock shows those questions bugged more and more towards the end of this first volume of the series, hence only 4 stars.



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Lovestruck ...

Coup de foudre by Maude Perrier

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I'll say some things in English and then will struggle to find the French to make clear what I feel.
I have not read a book yet, that had a main chracter, that annoyed me soo much, that I wanted to either take her shoulders to shake some sense into her or stop reading, yet I could not stop! In the end I deciced, that it might be the most realistic romance I have ever read, but I am still moved too much and also torn between wanting to write this in French and frustrated by not finding the appropriate words...

Spoiler alert > [...]
OK, so in 1983 Paul Watzlawick, a psychologist/communication scientist wrote the book “Anleitung zum Unglücklichsein” (A guide to unhappiness /Faites vous-même votre malheur, ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-2757841877 ) that I discovered 6 years later, when I started my counselling. The character of Laure in this book would definitely be a textbook example for a French version of it. She has suffered an emotional trauma as a teen and although it is not explicitly described, hates herself instead of her mother. Yeah, yeah, I know that might seem a cliché, but I have seen too many real life cases of the same syndrome. The thing is, that the habit of denying oneself the possibility of realising the feelings involved in the original drama in the end leads to a mechanism of self-destruction and once the original personality is destroyed the body is next, hence Laure’s habit of being obsessed with work, that has brought her close to a burn-out.

[Spoiler]Enter Emma, who despite the tragic loss of the woman she well and truly loved, still manages to be a sunshine, slightly dimmed, but a sunshine nevertheless. Her arrival at Laure’s place of work hits Laure like lightening, instantly triggering her denial. What follows is us watching Laure more and more destroying herself despite her deep feelings and almost dragging Emma with herself into unhappiness and new loss.[End spoiler]

I have always thought French to be the language of love, yet this is the third “lesbian romance” in French I read, in which a character wallows in her mind’s denial of happiness, the only difference here is, that it doesn’t end in total disaster.

In spite of having said all that, the writing was so compelling, that I even resisted the temptation to read the last chapter, before throwing away the book in frustration, and I am glad I didn’t, because short as it is by comparison to the rest, there is a resolution with a positive outcome. So, Yes, this tale gets a full five star rating.



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crash love

Hold Me Tight by Anna Cove

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Hold me tight is a nicely worked slow burn romance between two strong women of colour. Joy, who has made her idea of an ethic social platform (no data sales) into a multi million dollars enterprise, is in trouble with her partners about the funding and gets sent away to find something new to make money for her company. She goes home to Love Falls and her supportive family still living in the town she grew up in.

Skylar, on the other hand, has started “The Snuggery”, an electronics free cafe and restaurant. She isn’t at all keen on that ”new” kind of world and has bet on personal encounters and an ambiance of art and culture, that she has made a success.

When Joy runs her fathers Mustang into the back of Skylar’s stationary car two worlds collide in more than just one sense … but opposites attract, don’t they?
Still, neither of the two has a successful track record in love, so there is quite some reluctance (not to say fear) to fall in love to overcome on both sides.

What then goes on between the two and the meddling friends or family members leads to funny situations and occasionally hilarious dialogues, as well as emotional troubles on both sides and the two have to abandon comfy habits of denial or self preservation. How they finally find a way to be together I’ll leave you to find out yourselves. I promise it is a great read!



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A second chance?

My rating five stars.
Attention, spoiler! [...]

I am not sure if I can class a second chance romance as slow burn, especially not if the separation isn’t really that long ago. The slow development is more due to the reluctance of Avery to let got of the mechanisms she has got entrenched in to try and protect her heart, than to the fact, that she doesn’t love Ellie any more, as she still does and is very much aware of that.

Ellie on the other hand knows how badly she has handled her side of the breakup, but she also still loves Avery and is very much afraid of this time loosing her again because Avery might not love her any more. The fact, that Avery must protect her from a toxic, dangerous fan who knows where Ellie lives, throws them together in Avery’s apartment and that is where the "main" character, Bennie the dog, comes into play.

[Spoiler]While Elli and Avery slowly inch closer to revealing their still stellar attraction to one another, the stalker seems to have disappeared, even though he has been under a temporary restriction order … until more threatening letters arrive. When the resolution and the base for a new relationship is found and Ellie and Avery are about to celebrate he strikes … and Bennie saves the day![end Spoiler]

The writing is flowing well, the two ladies try to be as honest and trusting as they can with one another and the dialogues are witty, sometimes even funny. I had expected a bit more action around the whole increasingly creepy stalking thing, but here all of the tension is concentrated in the show down, that is hair raising, to be honest. A good entertaining read with some hot sex thrown in.

Wow, just WOW!

Moon Over Old Hollywood by Renn Loraine

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a wonderfully engaging mix of romance, making movies, Hollywood, acting and being “normal” as well as female sleuthing/reporting. All characters are nicely crafted and the two main ladies’ romance is very sweet and the sex scenes are hot! On top of that the suspense part of the plot is really good, too. I could not have found a more relaxing or more satisfying read than this.

What an incredibly good debut as an author, I wish I had that kind of talent!



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Refreshingly funny

The Missus by Natasha West

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I am going to list this under fake relationship, but I really expreienced this as a romatic comedy, as most of the dialogues really are a hoot! What a funny refreshing take on the trope!



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A great read!

Tell Me How You Really Feel by Aminah Mae Safi

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This book fits so many categories of the challenge, young adult, enemies to lovers, person of colour, Muslim main character, Jewish main character … quite a list. But the really important topic here is coming off age, becoming yourself.

Both Sana and Rachel have known for a while that they are lesbian and it has made both feel outcasts, each of them choosing a different camouflage, though. Their backgrounds could not be more different and their origins more controversial. The one thing they have in common is that they don’t really practise their supposed religion and feel restricted, not to say trapped by it.

When they get thrown together by Rachel’s film project Sana has to fight not to show the crush she’s had on Rachel since a while, as Rachel quite obviously despises her for being beautiful, well liked and the cheerleader captain. The journey of discovering each other through their forced collaboration is as gripping for the reader as it is full of tension for the characters.

The writing is excellent. Even though the late teens are fifty years ago for me now, I felt like a classmate watching in fascination how the two developed. Sana’s friend Diesel was a lovely side character and Sana’s mum … she was my favourite character in the story. Every girl should have a non-conformist strong and independent woman for a mother to learn assertiveness from.

The book is unusual in that it has a somewhat promising if kind of open end, which I found surprisingly satisfactory nevertheless. It could have, but doesn’t really need a sequel. It is in itself a great read.



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