R1 TEAM THREAD: Team Red ~ Red Rum

[Lili]

I really reaaaaally don't think anything can be scarier than Moss... I'm sure they're ok, just went home to change their underwear.

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Yeah....scary!

[Vivian]

Lmao.

[Desperado]

o_O Who are these people & why have they taken over my team? Moss, get out the nunchucks! It's time to kick butt & take names!

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Would you care for a Margarita, or maybe a Bloody Mary??? The Jade Dragons are offering adult beverages to all adults in the game.

[Lili]

Holly crap!
Moss AND nunchucks???

Everybody RUUUUUN!!!
FULLBACK, RETREAT NOW!!!

[Desperado]

Moss, Lethal AND nunchucks! *Lethal takes off her earrings*

[Desperado]

Cindy (eclecticfirefly) wrote: "Would you care for a Margarita, or maybe a Bloody Mary??? The Jade Dragons are offering adult beverages to all adults in the game."

I already have my ice cold glass of Moscato, but I wouldn't mind a Margarita. Thanks. O_O

[[deleted user]]

hehehe. Lethal and me, Shaolin style, yo.

Oh you guys are gonna GET it.

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Did ya'll ever decide on a name???? Hmmmmm????

[[deleted user]]

Nah. I think Steph's going to have to pull a name out of a hat.

[Crystal S]

Whoa. I missed all the excitement? What up with all the trash talk? Meow. Those other teams need to back. off. LOL ok, that's all the trash talk I got...

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Merely attempting to pass the time with our fellow challenge participants.....

Want a Margarita????

[Crystal S]

Hmm. Ok. I've already had two today and seriously was beyond tipsy with just those. But they've worn off by now so I could use another to pass the time. LOL

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Our First Categories Are:
1. Author's (last) name that begins with: S
2. Cover Item: 1/2 nekked man

You may choose to pick a book using both or either category. Be sure to include you cover image, if using that category.

Game On! Happy Reading! :D

[Desperado]

Thank God for all of those Kindle freebies. I'll be reading ~½ Nekked Man.

[Crystal S]

I'm starting the game out with which I believe fulfills both categories. Cuz that's the way I roll. (Also it has a purple cover for the June monthly challenges. Score!)

[Desperado]

First Categories 4/4!!

√Crystal S: Slave to Sensation ("S" Last Name Author & ½ Nekked Man)~★★★★
√Moss: Archangel's Consort ("S" Last Name Author)~★★
√Steph: Eternal Rider (½ Nekked Man)~★★★½
√LethalLovely: Trey (½ Nekked Man)~★★★

[[deleted user]]

Are we allowed to double up on authors? I was thinking of but can find someone else if that's not allowed.

Also, what happens if it's a re-read and we've already written reviews for them? (I haven't for this one, but just in case it comes up later).

[Sandra, Kindle Operator Licence Required]

Moss, yes you can re-read books, you can read the same book as another player so of course you can read the same author. No Problemo.

[Steph, Serious series addict]

SON OF A !!! GR, you are seriously tryin' my patience, sweetheart. STOP blockin' my comments!

*setting up an electrified fence around our thread*

Ya'll did a great job of holding 'um off. Way to go all carnivore on their ass, Moss. And great idea on pullin' out the nun chucks, Lethal. Crystal, we'll turn that meow into a roar, don't you worry. ;) Sorry I missed all the fun!

Lethal, good point on the chip drop. It is 1st-come-1st-dropped. I'll think on it and come up with something before we all finish our 1st wk's read.

Quickly, what's our name?! LOL! We've got:
Really Evil Dominatrixes, Read Devils, Red Reading Hood and True Bloods.

I like Doms and True Bloods. Shows we'll keep those subs in their place and that we're out for blood. >:) But, I'm cool with whatever everyone likes. Just state your choice soon or we'll pick for ya. ;)

Think on it - I'm going to pick my book. BRB

[[deleted user]]

You pick it Steph/Lethal/Crystal, I'm useless when it comes to decisions like this.

Thanks Sandra, in that case:

it is.

[Crystal S]

I like True Bloods. There's a dragon team, so we need vampires (and as Team RED, I feel this comes naturally.) But it really doesn't matter to me.

And Goodreads is irritating the daylights outta me too.

[[deleted user]]

Yeah I keep getting notifications that don't exist. Comments are also not loading. Poo!

[Desperado]

Meh. GR is acting weird for me too.

I'm not a fan of True Bloods *Lethal kicks HBO* but it's better than "Rolling Out the Red Carpet" so I'm game!

[Steph, Serious series addict]

LMAO Lethal! From the looks of our kick-assness already, I'm guessing we'll be better than the show. ;)

So, everyone cool with True Bloods? Can choose something else, if you'd rather. Gotta be somethin' that empowers everyone.

I'm going to read

[Sandra, Kindle Operator Licence Required]

Miss Steph, I'd like to play too! Can you announce the categories on our thread too. I'm guessing GR stuffed it up.

[Steph, Serious series addict]

It should be there now, I posted it before this one on my team thread. :\ I'll double check. Blast you, GR! Ok, I take it back ... but only a little, 'cuz damn you're pissin' me off today ... here, take this pill and get your shit together, will ya?!?!

ETA: Yep, it's there now. :)

[Sandra, Kindle Operator Licence Required]

Thanks Miss Steph :)

[Desperado]

LOL! Being on such a great team empowers me, Steph. The name is inconsequential.

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Welcome, Sandra. I blame GR. LOL!

:D Ditto, Lethal! Sooooo, True Bloods? LOL!

[Steph, Serious series addict]

We could be called Red Rum - from The Shining.


*flippin' GR the big fat finger!*

ETA: I gotta say, Red Rum is growing on me. How's everyone else feel about it?

Going once ....

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Hmmmm.....still can't decide.....let me help!

How about Carnation Chicks? Or Rose Petals? You know, something sweet and non-threatening, kinda like your team! ROFLMAO!!!!!!!

Slowly drifting back to my lair....nothing to worry about here!

[Desperado]

Real funny, Cindy. And me over here allergic to flowers AND cursed with a flowery birth name.

I'm game for Red Rum, Steph! I'm game for anything that has to do with alcohol.

ETA: I took me TEN tries before this comment would go through. Hate GR long time right now.

[Crystal S]

Red Rum! Love it! Nice and threatening.

[Alyssa]

*strolls in casually* How's the reading going, Reds? I don't know about you all, but I'm really enjoying the book I picked.

*takes a look around* Nice little setup you got going on here. Very comfortable looking. *walks over to a wastebasket with some papers in it and breathes fire onto it*

Well, I really should be getting back to my book and my lair. Have a good day! *runs out*

(Gosh darn it! It's hard to effectively causing havoc when it takes 5 times to get the stupid thing to post. *sighs* My life is soo hard.....)

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Red Rum (murder backwards, for anyone who hasn't watched Jack in 'The Shining') it is! YAY!

WK1 book:
Finished: 6/6/11
Rating: 3.5★

Review: First, I'm bummed. I'm a mega Demonica fan and was hoping for more. But, that's not to say it wasn't a decent start to her Horsemen series.

What I liked:
* Demonica character's scattered throughout (view spoiler)[Ky and Gem had their baby! A girl, Dawn. (hide spoiler)], esp during UGH hospital visits and battle scene
* The good and bad angels working "with" the Horsemen
* Reseph, First Horseman (aka Pestilence) was a good baddie
* Halitosis Hal - fantastic name for a Hellhound
* Cara was a decent heroine (view spoiler)[she gave Ares crap all the time (hide spoiler)]
* Limos, female Horseman (aka Famine)

What didn't work:
* Ares (mostly/sadly) (view spoiler)[He's WAR and Pestilence was able to best him on more than one occasion. Really? Plus, the whole, "I've been hatin' and huntin' you Hellhounds for 4,000 yrs because you killed my family, but Cara called a truce, so ok, truce it is." did NOT work for me. Thankfully, Ares asked Chaos why he killed his family and, it turns out Ares murdered his mate and pups first. So, really Ares caused his family's death. Good to know. But, still - why so quick to give in? Nah. Didn't buy it. (hide spoiler)]

I will continue with the series in hopes that this one has 1st book syndrome. The world-building was good (history and all), plus had knowledge of it from the Demonica bks. But, the snippet for was good. Looking forward to Arik and Limos.

[Steph, Serious series addict]

{Team Stats Updated}

[Judithe, Soap Operas never end....]

Hmmm...will definitely give that a read now!

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Hope you like it. :)

[Daffodil]

Wow! Like the name, but sure glad we don't have to face off against you guys.

I'm out of here, I just hope you haven't gotten to the snowmobile yet.

[Desperado]

WTG finishing your book, Steph! I'm sorry to hear you didn't like it. =( I wasn't a fan of the 1st book in Ione's "Demonica" series. Looks like I might feel the same way about ER.

Team Red Rum (murder..hehehe), I started today. So far, it's really cheesy. Then again, I don't expect much plot from a book where the cover model has bigger boobs than I do.

[Judithe, Soap Operas never end....]

Steph wrote: "Hope you like it. :)"

I peeked at the spoilers...that first one is the "gotta-read-it" temptation...

@Lethal: LOL! Pics small...a B cup on him?

[[deleted user]]

Hokay, finished up with . I'm going to copy my review to here because I'm not sure what the rules are and this will cover my bases. In spoiler tags because of, well, spoilers.

(view spoiler)[
In the latest Guild Hunter installment, we meet our main protagonists Elena and Raphael again. Elena's growing into her role as a newly-made angel, and Raphael continues to strengthen his rule over Manhattan. Old faces from Raphael's Seven pop up, and Elena makes some tentative moves to resume her role as a Hunter, while juggling death threats against her family and the antagonism that continues to build between her and her father. There's a bigger problem in the mix as well-- an ancient Archangel is awakening, with possibly catastrophical consequences, and it may be Raphael alone who can avert impending disaster.

Attempting to dislike a Nalini Singh book is a bit like wanting to hate a small, soft, furry puppy that's chewed something important. You could do it if you completely steeled yourself, but you'd have to be the teensiest bit dead inside to feel it all the way through.

Nevertheless it has to be said that if ever there was a book that needed to be slashed, reworked into a slim, glossy pamphlet, and handed out freely at local chapter meetings of Histrionics Anonymous, this one would take the odds.

From the first page, where we're treated to lavish descriptions of Raphael's eyes, to the last page, that ends with lavish descriptions of Raphael's eyes, this book is a series of adjectives bound together by a flimsy web of plot and sex. I'm not kidding about the adjectives. There's not a single person in the book that has, in the parlance of the man and woman on the ground, hair. No, hair is either sun-kissed, or touched by honey, or shimmering with the fires of a thousand dragons. Eyes are never eyes, they're shimmering balls of cobalt flames, or blazing supernovae, or something equally overworked.

I did say earlier that there's plot and here, such as it is, it is: Lijuan's on the move again. Caliane, Raphael's sleeping mother, is waking up. Lijuan kills a few people, gets a few vampires worked up, all with a view to tricking people into believing it's Caliane's doing. She hopes to then kill Caliane, who's considerably more powerful than her, and stay the most powerful he-man in the uuuuuniverse. Raphael discovers the truth, hits her with new special powers, Caliane turns out to be as threatening as the Spanish Armada that never landed, and everyone goes home for a lie-down.

It's a plot that could have been explored in a book half the length of this one. Lacking any real material to keep the story going, the book collapses into endless sex scenes between the two protags. It's a very poor device to use to mask a lack of storyline, and a terrible waste of a book. I think, essentially, Raphael and Elena's story was more or less done by Archangel's Kiss, and this book needed to be a fresh start on a new set of characters. Or, at least, exploratory movements into a new storyline. What we get instead is a rehashing of an old, tired one (Lijuan rises. AGAIN.) and turns out to be a major threat (AGAIN), and lots of pointless sex.

Singh isn't giving me any reason to believe in Elena's uber Hunter powers, either. As far as I can see, her contribution to things seems to be all about smelling things out, which, I don't know, did dogs die out? Because a bloodhound would do much the same sort of job (I think), and we'd get less of this shit:

the scent of oranges overlaid with bitter chocolate
mint in a cinnamon breeze
fur rippling over diamonds in a pearl broth

and more of this:

woof. that way.

which, between you and me, would be a real fucking relief.

I like Singh. She does characterisations well, and her world-building is generally pretty good. She's very accomplished at building relationships. I think if this story hadn't been about Raphael and Elena she would have got a lot more mileage out of it, and it would have been a lot more convincing. As it was, it was a real let down, and a re-read just hammered home its flaws.

From my withered insides, to yours.

(hide spoiler)]

Date finished: 6 June 11
Rating: 2 stars

[Sandra, Kindle Operator Licence Required]

That's good Moss, just give the date and the rating and you're done :)

[[deleted user]]

Oh whoops sorry. Okay will go back and edit the post. Cheers!

[Sandra, Kindle Operator Licence Required]

No worries Moss :)

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Thanks, Daffodil. ;)

@Lethal ~ I liked it. But, I was hoping/expecting to like it a lot more. I'm also hoping #2 will be better. We'll see.

LOL @ Man boobies!

@Judithe ~ You're not supposed to peek at the spoilers, silly girl (although I do it all the time LOL)!

@Moss ~ Sorry you didn't like it as much 2nd time around.

[Steph, Serious series addict]

Crystal, how are you liking the first Psy-Changeling book?

I enjoyed it, but found I prefer her changeling pairings more than psy/chang or psy/human. I just love her world-building and the battles throughout the series. Can't wait for the next one ... wonder how long we'll have to wait.

[Cindy (eclecticfirefly)]

Time to play catch-up ladies.....if you can!