Friday Booktalk (yep, on a Saturday!)
Sep
8
2007

First up – Boundless, a brand spanking new anthology from Annie Dean, Bonnie Dee and Dionne Galace

I have to say how much I love Annie Dean’s voice. I find her stories quirky and unique and her heroines are unlikely and that makes me love them even more. I’ve read some snippets of Grimspace, her upcoming release from

Seven Days is compelling in a nearly disturbing way. Dean’s writing is excellent, immersive, her details are vivid and suck you in immediately. Teresa is not the heroine you’ve read nine hundred times and yet, you know her anyway. There’s a lovely fairy tale quality to Seven Days. Beautiful and in some parts achingly sad. This is not your average romance. It’s bigger in scope and yet smaller and more intimate than most too.

Bonnie Dee’s The Straw Man is up next – I quite liked the story where we’ve got a woman bemoaning her fate and lack of a perfect man to a scarecrow who then shows up, quite alive to be that perfect lover for just one night. The sex is really hot! It’s a quick, entertaining read.

Lastly, Dionne Galace’s Waking Kitty – I gotta say, I loved how irreverent and young this story is. Funny, sexy, well written and the characterization was excellent. I gotta say, what I often hate about authors trying so hard to sound hip is that well, it comes off as trying too hard. But Galace’s Kitty and Jack are fun, funky, real and flawed and provide heat, sexy tension and a really enjoyable read.

Anne Stuart’s Devil’s Waltz – dooood! Okay so I love Anne Stuart and this book was no exception. I don’t often read historical romances but I do love a well done one and Devil’s Waltz qualifies.

Christian isn’t quite as hard as some of Stuart’s other heroes but he’s deliciously morally gray. He’s shallow and selfish and a pretty pain in the butt. But at the same time, he’s not a lost cause. His back and forth with Annelise is quirky and fast paced and the heat wrenches up with each new encounter.

Thing is, Stuart does what she always does, she draws you into liking her hero even though you know you shouldn’t but at the end you, and the heroine aren’t sorry you gave him a chance.

Annelise is not your typical regency heroine. She’s not a peerless beauty with golden blonde ringlets and a rosebud mouth. She’s a spinster with a great background and no money. She’s essentially doing the regency era version of couch hopping because work is beneath her. And well, whatever, I get that was the attitude at the time and I think it was a great way of not making her perfect.

Christian is not a big romantic. He is a killer when he has to be. He’s dark. He’s relentlessly selfish at times and yet, Annelise is his match in a way that humanizes him and the way Stuart writes them both – it works.

I read a few more books but I’m on deadline and we have a visitor so I’m gonna break off for now and finish later~

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