Team 5: Factory Five

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Zoë you still need to post a selection post for your free space book.

[Zoë]

SELECTION POST
Shelf: Free space
Book: Spoonbenders
Pages: 399 pages
Qualification: got from library

Oops! Here it is!

[Zoë]

Completion Post:
Shelf: Fantasy/UF/Paranormal
Book: The Red Scrolls of Magic by Cassandra Clare
Pages: 350
Qualification: tagged fantasy many many times
Read: 6/20-6/21
Rating: 4 stars
Review: being a lover of all things shadowhunters for many years I am reading through the short stories and side stories now and am so happy there’s a series for Magnus and Alec. The story was fun and their relationship is always a favorite. Probably not a stand alone novel necessarily but it could be done.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Completion Post:
Shelf: Fantasy/UF/Paranormal

Book: An Easy Death
Author: Charlaine Harris
Read: 6/21/19
Rated: 4 stars
Review: Lizbeth Rose aka Gunnie Rose was young for a gunslinger in Texoma with magic as part of it. Gunnie only trust those people she knows and when she takes a job she is commited all the way. She crosses so many obstacles and she toughs it out but wow when she comes across the Russian wizards everything turns upside when there are secrets she'd like to keep secret. This was a really good start and so want to continue the fun.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

[Jamie]

COMPLETION Post Week 3
Shelf: Fantasy/UF/Paranormal
Book: The Magician's Land by Lev Grossman
Pages: 402 pgs / GR
Qualification: Shelved as Fantasy>Magic by 241 users
Finished: 6/23/2019
Rating: 4 stars

I started this trilogy ages ago because I was intrigued by the whole play on Narnia & Hogwarts. Book 1 was good but had a pretty bleak ending and the characters are not particularly likeable. I really didn't like book 2 but I wanted to see how the series ended so I read this and I'm so glad I did. While the series wraps up with perhaps a happier ending than the original premise would have suggested I thought it was successful. Quentin has finally grown up and is less whiny and there is some point to Janet's attitude. There is plenty of snark and a lot of good world building. I liked Plum, the new character, and thought she fit in to the story while also giving it some life. I thought the magical escapades were well done, particularly the whale part.



[*book:The Magician's Land|19103097]

[Jamie]

Selection Post Week 4
Shelf: Suspense & Thriller
Book: The Boy with the Painful Tattoo by Josh Lanyon
Pages: 228
Qualification: Shelved as Suspense by 27 users



[*book:The Boy with the Painful Tattoo|16219338]

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Tuesday June 25, 2019 SHELF #4:

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Completion Post
Shelf: Disablity

Read: 6/28/19
Rated : 4 stars
Review: We can't help who we fall in love with no matter the situation and that was what happened in this story. Ridge was the music writer who was deaf and Sydney was the girl across the way listening and adding her own song to the music he played. After Sydney finds out what has been going on with her friend and boyfriend. Both MCs become a sort of partner in trying to get the music together but while doing so more becomes of their relationship.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

I've requested stamps for both disability and fantasy spots ☺

[Carrie]

Selection Post Week 4
Shelf: Suspense & Thriller

391 pages
tagged suspense 62 times (pages 3 of tags)

[Jamie]

COMPLETION Post Week 4
Shelf: Suspense & Thriller
Book: The Boy with the Painful Tattoo by Josh Lanyon
Pages: 228
Qualification: Shelved as Suspense by 27 users
Finished: 06/30/2019
Rating: 3 stars

This was sort of a slog. It's the 3rd installment of a series about 2 writers, the main POV is Christopher (Kit) Holmes and he's just very whiny & insecure in this one and it's hard to see why JX Moriarity is with him. They mystery was very secondary and they don't do much solving until the very end when it gets wrapped up sort of quickly. I think that's the problem when the MCs are two writers, granted JX has a background in law enforcement but they're not really supposed to be out there asking questions of people. There are parts that are funny and the writing is smooth but I kept getting bored and stopped reading. I see there is a 4th in the series and I'm torn about reading it but since I'm a completist I probably will :-)



[*book:The Boy with the Painful Tattoo|16219338]

[Jenn]

Selection Post Week 4
Shelf: Suspense & Thriller
Book: What Lies Beneath
Pages: 172 pages
Qualification: tagged thriller by 10 people

[Zoë]

Hi all - so I’ve been traveling and then got sick so I am behind in my suspense/thriller category. I should be able to finish something in the next few days though I’m hoping. And will choose a shorter one for the next book. Hah. But I’m here!

[Jamie]

Zoë wrote: "Hi all - so I’ve been traveling and then got sick so I am behind in my suspense/thriller category. I should be able to finish something in the next few days though I’m hoping. And will choose a sho..."

Glad you're feeling better!

[Jamie]

Selection Post Week 5
Shelf: Animals / Pets
Book: The Hookup by Kristen Ashley
Pages: 360
Qualification: Shelved as Pets by 5 users




[*book:The Hookup|36408499]

[Zoë]

SELECTION POST
Shelf: Suspense/Thriller
Book: Beyond the Pale Motel by Francesca Lia Block
Pages: 224 pages
Qualification: Tagged as mystery thriller/thriller here on GR and on amazon, Apple Books etc.

[Zoë]

SELECTION POST
Shelf: Animals/Pets
Book: Blood and Chocolate by Annette Klaus
Pages: 264 pages
Qualification: someone turns into a wolf - does that count?

[Jenn]

I just wanted to heads up I'm behind on my suspense. I'm going to change books. I'm hallway through The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I'm going away for a long weekend, effective tomorrow and spending my days by the pool so I will have lots of time to finish and start my next book for this week as well.

[Jenn]

SELECTION POST
Shelf: Pet/Animal
Book: A Familiar Tail
Pages: 324
Qualification: Tagged cats by 15 people and animals by 11 people

[Jenn]

SELECTION POST:
Shelf: Suspense/Thriller
Book:The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Pages: 644
Qualification: Tagged Thriller by 5701 people

[Zoë]

Completion Post:
Shelf: Suspense/Thriller
Book: Beyond the Pale Motel by Francesca Lia Block
Pages: 224
Qualification: tagged thriller and suspense. Is labeled an erotic thriller apparently
Read: 7/5 finished
Rating: 3 stars
Review: I love Francesca lia Block. Weetzie Bat books were my saviors as a child. I loved everything about her books. I’m not sure where this one went wrong but it just wasn’t great. I was bothered by the main characters constant negative self talk and how she constantly thought about sex. I mean, yes I think about sex and have had negative self talk days but this was running her whole life. I dunno. It wasn’t terrible because it’s francesca. But it was not great either.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Tuesday July 2 2019 SHELF #5:

[Jamie]

☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎ wrote: "Tuesday July 2 2019 SHELF #5:

"

Aw.. cute picture!

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Jamie wrote: "☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎ wrote: "Tuesday July 2 2019 SHELF #5:

"

Aw.. cute picture!"

LOL it is a cutie :)

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

SELECTION POST:
Shelf 4: Suspense/Thriller
Book: The Woman in Cabin 10
Pages: 340
Qualification: Tagged thriller by 1602 people and tagged suspense by 668 people

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

SELECTION POST:
Shelf 5: Animal/Pet
Book: Curiosity Killed the Cat Sitter
Pages: 272
Qualification: Tagged animals by 25 people

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

[Zoë]

Completion Post:
Shelf: Animals/Pets
Book: Blood and Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klaus
Pages: 264
Qualification: All main characters are wolves/werewolves. Tahged wolves 45 times and werewolves 400 something times.
Read: 7/5-7/7
Rating: 3 stars rated
Review: This is a 3.5.
This is both better and worse than what I remember from reading this as a teenager. I think the prose is actually really nice and it’s definitely very sexy in parts. BUT content warning - there are sexual assault threats that are not taken as being anything but boys being boys or as like part of the culture. I totally get it to an extent because of the connection to their animal side and how animals take mates but it felt dated in its ideas of men vs women and how they are “supposed” so act and how men inherently have violence around sexual acts etc. Especially the fact that the one woman who actually dared to defy the rules ends up being the “crazy” one. If you can look past those things and take it for what it is - a YA sexy thriller written at the end of the 90s - then it’s really fun and quite good. But if you have any sensitivities for the above subjects it might be a bit of a struggle.

[Jamie]

COMPLETION Post Week 5
Shelf: Animals / Pets
Book: The Hookup by Kristen Ashley
Pages: 360
Qualification: Shelved as Pets by 5 users
Finished: 7/5/2019
Rating: 3.5 stars

Eliza (Izzy) doesn't do hookups and has seen what men can do to women, her mother & her sister are the most prominent examples... but somehow she wakes up in Johnny Gamble's bed one day. She feels a connection but also feels he's holding something back so she is cautious. Then she finds out she has reason to be cautious (Johnny's great love walked out on him and he hasn't been interested in a relationship since then). So we're in for another round of Kristen Ashley's wacky dialogue and stream of consciousness narration, with her manly but respectful alpha heroes and the cute but not doormat heroines... I haven't read KA in awhile and it was fun to pick up a new one but... this was basically kind of boring once it got past the mid point. It is fun to read the lives of KA's characters, it's like reading about people in the ads of magazine pages :-) So... fun but I'm not going to read the 2nd installment although I considered it.




[*book:The Hookup|36408499]

[Jenn]

COMPLETION Post
Shelf: Thriller Suspense
Book: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Pages: 644
Qualification: Shelved as thriller by 5702 people
Finished: 7/7/19
Rating: 3 stars

It was hard to get into this book at first. I eventually got into the mystery but it's not a series I plan to continue. I guess maybe I'm over thrillers....the really sick violence isn't something I want to read about, and there was plenty in this book - including the murder and mutilation of a cat. Sorry, I don't want to read stuff like that. The pacing was also very slow. I'm not sure that I really cared about the characters all that much either. Lisbeth Salander is the most interesting but not enough to keep me reading the rest of the books.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Completion Post
Shelf 4: Suspense/Thriller
Book: The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware
Read: 7/6/19
Rated: 4 stars
Review: When I started this book I wasn’t sure what was going on. At first I thought it was going to be another girl on the train story but I was happy it wasn’t. I really didn’t enjoy that book. LOL
I can understand the issues people face when they have anxiety. Even though Lo had anxiety she still tried to function everyday and do her job but when she goes on a ship to do a story about the Aurora and sees something she wasn’t supposed to everything goes haywire. No one believes her. They believe she was hallucinating but as the story progresses more of what’s going on in the ship becomes known.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Tuesday July 9, 2019 SHELF #6:

[Zoë]

SELECTION POST:
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book:The Gentlemen’s Guide to Vice and Virtue
Pages: 513
Qualification: tagged humor a hundred times and funny a hundred times

[Jamie]

Selection Post Week 6
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book: The Suffragette Scandal by Courtney Milan
Pages: 260
Qualification: Shelved as Humor by 5 users / Funny by 12 users




[*book:The Suffragette Scandal|17343236]

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Selection Post
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book: Hot Stuff by Carly Phillips
Pages: 300
Qualifies: tagged humor 7 times

[Carrie]

ELECTION POST:
Shelf 5: Animal/Pet
Book: Cry Wolf by Patricia Briggs
Pages: 294
Qualification: werewolves

[Carrie]

Selection Post
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book: 29 Dates by Melissa de la Cruz
Pages: 395
Qualifies: tagged humor 1 time page 3 of tags

[Jenn]

Selection Post
Shelf: humor/satire
Book: When Dimple Met Rishi
Pages: 380 pages
Qualifies: tagged humor 54 times

[Jenn]

Completion Post
Shelf 4: humor/satire
Book: When Dimple Met Rishi
Read: 7/11/19
qualification: tagged humor 54 times
Rated: 4 stars
Review: I really enjoyed this story. This is my second book by this author. I enjoy her characters and learning about their culture. I love that Dimple is a strong female and has goals for her future. In the beginning she is unwilling to bend. Her mom wants her to have an arranged marriage and she wants nothing like her parents life. She gets them to agree to let her go to a summer program where she meets the guy her parents want her to marry. He knows about it, she doesn't, so as you can imagine the first time they meet is rather awkward. They end up spending time together and developing a relationship. I love how much Dimple and Rishi both grow and develop throughout the book. The book was humorous, but her other book From Twinkle with Love was funnier (I actually laughed out loud and cried when reading that one.)

[Zoë]

Completion Post:
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book: The Gentlemen’s Guide to Vice and Virtue
Pages: 513
Qualification: tagged humor/funny hundreds of times
Read: 7/9-7/11
Rating: 3 stars
Review: This was fun. I’ve been seeing this around for a while but wasn’t super interested in it at first. I thought it looked...immature, maybe? Pandering to superficialities? Anyway, I read it. A friend loved it and with this friend I knew I’d have to give it a try. I’m glad I did! It’s a super fun foray into a time when lgbtq issues weren’t really talked about and it even brings up race in a way that didn’t make me cringe even if it all felt a bit forced sometimes. I’d recommend as a good summer read!

[Jamie]

COMPLETION Post Week 6
Shelf: Humor/Satire
Book: The Suffragette Scandal by Courtney Milan
Pages: 260
Qualification: Shelved as Humor by 5 users / Funny by 12 users
Finished: 7/13/2019
Rating: 4 stars

Frederika (Free) Marshall is a suffragette and owns and runs a small by women / for women newspaper. Edward Clark is a self-proclaimed scoundrel who has returned to England only to disrupt a potential scheme against a childhood friend. Turns out the bigger goal of that scheme is to ruin Free and Edward finds himself unable to allow that to happen. There is a lot of great dialogue in this since Free is not about to be taken in by a charming rogue, no matter how attracted she is to him. I would say my one complaint is that the sensibility and language in most of the books of this series is just a little bit too modern but it's not enough to really detract from the story. I appreciated the opportunity to catch up with some other characters from the series, too. I would also highlight that the basic plotline does have elements of the "I'm too much of a scoundrel" trope but it's well handled here, that's not always the case.




[*book:The Suffragette Scandal|17343236

[Jenn]

COMPLETION POST:
Shelf: Animal/Pet
Book: A Familiar Tail
Pages: 351 pages
Read: 7/15
Rating: 4 Stars
Review: I really enjoyed this cozy mystery about witches in Portsmouth. The animal involved is a cat, a familiar, named Alastair. He is adorable and I really feel for him that he lost his owner. He is very sad she died. Anna is a good new mom for him and they seem to hit it off. The mystery is good, and I had some trouble figuring out parts of it, though I had my suspicions on who the criminal was. I enjoyed it enough that I will read the rest of the series.

[Zoë]

Question - goodreads choice nominee - I’m assuming this is a nominee at any time not just from the nominations from last year. Just wanted to make sure though. :) thanks!

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Completion Post

Shelf #6: Humor/Satire
Book: Hot Stuff
Author: Carly Phillips
Read: 7/16/19
Rated: 3.5 stars
Review:
It was a well written story. I enjoyed how both Annabelle and Brandon are strong characters but each have a vulnerable side that they seem to show each other. Both also have had their lives turned upside due to things that's happened to them between family and people they believe loved them. There's moments in this story everyone can understand. A good story

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Zoë wrote: "Question - goodreads choice nominee - I’m assuming this is a nominee at any time not just from the nominations from last year. Just wanted to make sure though. :) thanks!"

I'm going to say yes since I don't see any specific year posted.

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

[☼♎ Carmen the Bootyshaker Temptress ☼♎]

Tuesday July 16, 2019 SHELF #7: