Her Mother's Killer by Melissa Schroeder

TITLE: Her Mother’s Killer
AUTHOR: Melissa Schroeder
PUBLISHER: Whiskey Creek Press
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 60k)
GENRE: Romantic erotic suspense
COST: $6.49

The murder of her mother has haunted Thea Warren’s life, driving her from the small town of Crocker where she grew up and into the arms of a man who never truly appreciated or loved her. Now, with her divorce final, she’s returned to Crocker to try and start over, running from hints that someone is stalking her. Duncan Perry, her older brother’s best friend, grew up with Thea, and now, as Crocker’s sheriff, finds himself thrust into the position of protecting her from what is an obvious threat. But Thea isn’t the kid he remembers. She’s a beautiful, grown woman, and if he’s going to keep his head clear to catch her stalker, he’s going to have to figure out how to keep his hands off her…

Though I read a lot of romance, the other genres that probably most proliferate my shelves are anything suspense-related. Mystery, thriller, true crime…I like solving puzzles and getting involved in the thrill of the chase as much as I like getting embroiled in relationships and emotions. I tend not to buy a lot of romantic suspense, though, because I rarely find a good balance between the two. Most romance authors want to focus on the love story, often to the detriment of the actual plot. Invariably, that means I’m rarely truly satisfied by the suspense angles of these books.

Schroeder’s short novel never really finds that right balance, though it ended up being a satisfying read. The story started out weakly for me. I didn’t like Thea. Yes, things were tense for her, as she’s returning to Crocker after her divorce and an attempt on her life. But her first contacts with people made her seem overly fragile, and yet, other perspectives tried telling me she was strong and spunky. This dichotomous presentation took over half of the book to resolve itself for me, and while I never really believed Thea was as independent as others in the book would want me to think, I definitely liked her by the end of the story.

My feelings for Duncan worked in reverse. I liked him a lot in the beginning, his honor and drive especially, but as time progressed, that interest waned. He goes back and forth on what he’s going to do with Thea constantly. He lost the last woman he was supposed to protect because of his interest in her, and he’s reluctant to have it happen again, but he can’t keep his thoughts regarding Thea pure. His flipflopping wears thin, irritatingly so. I was relieved that I actually liked Thea more at that point, because if my opinion of both of them had disintegrated to that degree, I probably wouldn’t have finished the book.

The suspense spins from the murder of Thea’s mother when she was young. Over the years, Thea has received the occasional letter from an unknown admirer, and they’ve followed her all the way back to Crocker. Her ex-husband never took them seriously, even saying Thea needed professional help since he thought she was making them up to get attention. Duncan takes it all far more seriously, especially since women matching Thea’s description have been showing up dead for several months. The action is fairly constant, tightening in growing suspense, but I was disappointed that I deduced who the killer was almost immediately. I wanted to be wrong. It would have been nice to be surprised. But at least the action kept me intrigued, and my growing need to see Thea get what she wanted and have a happy life invested me in the romance. I was particularly glad to see her stand up for herself to her jerk of an ex-husband. The spine she showed there went a long way.

Readers who don’t read as much suspense might not have the problems with predictability I had. By the time the story ended, the only thing that mattered to me was the happy ending. I got it. More, I was pleased with it. When it comes to romance, it’s hard to ask for much more.

Readability	7/10 – A pedantic start, and I guessed the killer almost immediately, but picked up steam as the story progressed
Hero	6/10 – The back and forth of want her/can’t have her got old
Heroine	7/10 – I thought her annoyingly fragile at first, like I was being told she was spunky rather than shown, but she grew on me by the end of the story
Entertainment value	7/10 – The action is fairly constant, and there was no mystery to me at all about who the killer was, but in spite of a rocky start, I came to need these two to work out their problems
World building	6/10 – Surprisingly thin, considering it’s supposed to be suspense
TOTAL:	33/50

Mitch by Dakota Rebel

TITLE: Mitch
AUTHOR: Dakota Rebel
PUBLISHER: Total-e-bound
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 63k)
GENRE: Gay paranormal erotic romance
COST: ₤3.49

Federal Marshal Mitch Baine gets his first assignment since getting seriously hurt in a vamp hunt, only to discover the serial killer vampire he’s supposed to take out is none other than the stranger who gave him the best blow job of his life in a one-night stand the night before. Jarrod Axlerod is lead singer for a band called Heartstrings, and now, the government wants him dead, for crimes Mitch isn’t so sure he committed…

I bought this book before I read the last story I reviewed by this author, which is why it has sat on my TBR pile ever since. I wasn’t sure it was going to be worth it, and when my TBR is already so big, I don’t like to waste time on authors I know aren't going to work for me. But I decided to give it a go, and while I’m still not a fan of this author by any means, this was at least a better story than the first.

The story starts out with a recuperated Mitch hitting the annual Masked Ball at Torque, a gay bar in Detroit. Usually, he sits on the sidelines, but this year, he’s determined to get into the action. Quickly, he hones in on this gorgeous man, though he knows right away the stranger is a vampire. But since he’s throwing caution to the wind, he indulges, and thus comes some of the most amazing sex he’s ever had. He’s shocked to discover the man’s identity the next day – Jarrod Axlerod, the lead singer in his seventeen-year-old sister’s favorite band. Jarrod is implicated in a string of murders, but something seems off to Mitch, and he starts to drag his feet about the assignment. He goes through the motions with recon, but try as he might to keep some distance from Jarrod, he just can’t seem to do it.

Though there’s nothing very original about either lead character, I was actually mildly engaged with their romance. The sex was on the hot side, and it wasn’t nearly as repetitive as the first story I read by this author. I also really liked the sibling relationship between Mitch and his little sister Reagan. Their banter and back-and-forth were the most realistic aspects of the entire story, and helped to carry me through portions that felt like it was stretching credibility.

But then, the whole serial killer plotline came to a head. Suspensefully so, I might add. Which would have been good if the story had ended shortly afterward. Instead, there was a whole third of the book to occur after that got resolved. The pacing that had been set ground to a halt as everything happened around Mitch, and the final straws to the romance were dragged out, page after page. Any sense of tempo was lost, and my goodwill toward the characters disintegrated as it felt like I was being dragged through more and more stuff that felt completely extraneous. That’s not due to the subject matter. I can see why the author wanted it in there for purposes of the romance. But in regards to pacing and flow, it never felt like it fit. The plotline about the serial killer was the central thread tightening its way through the first two-thirds of the book. Once it was resolved, the lack of its presence was an acute problem. It left the book feeling very disjointed, and ultimately disappointing what could have been a satisfactory read.

Readability	7/10 – Awkward pacing with a final third that felt like a brand new story dragged this down
Hero #1	6/10 – For a marshal, never felt like he was actually very good at his job
Hero #2	4/10 – Too perfect to seem very real
Entertainment value	5/10 – I was enjoying this more on a completely superficial level until the last third
World building	6/10 – Every time I started getting some nice details to flesh out the world, the story slipped back into the sex again
TOTAL:	28/50

Time Currents by Brenna Lyons

TITLE: Time Currents
AUTHOR: Brenna Lyons
PUBLISHER: Logical-Lust Publications
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 17k)
GENRE: Futuristic fantasy erotic romance
COST: $2.99

Lord Sevryn doesn’t expect to find his soulmate in the form of one of his female servants, but unlike the rest of his family, he doesn’t care about the difference in their status. Except it’s not as different as Bettina would have him think…

If I had known this book was the second in a series, I wouldn’t have bought it. It suffers from exactly what bothers me the most coming into the middle of a series – an assumption on the part of the author that I know and understand the world he/she’s created. I knew nothing going into this but the blurb, and while I didn’t hate it, I can’t help but think that knowing more would have made it a much more enjoyable read.

The world seems to have strict social strata, with highborn and lowborn. Characters also have the ability to heal, see the future, read the past, move things with their minds, and so on, but none of it is explained. Bettina has the ability to read time currents, but it’s an ability she stifles, working as a maid in an attempt to pretend she isn’t what she is. Sev is telekinetic, though I learned that almost offhandedly. Everything comes across that way, and it stands in the way of really getting very much but the most superficial of reactions from the story.

The writing is clean and intelligent (though I will never understand why authors find the need to specify nipples as male; it always seems to imply to me that the male owner has a female nipple somewhere else), but my constant stream of questions seemed to make this story last far longer than it should have. The characters are charming and appropriately noble, but again, questions of why they are the way they are keeps them from coming fully to life. There are a plethora of interesting ideas behind everything, but without sufficient detail or explanations, that’s all they are. Ideas. And that’s just not enough for me to care about pursuing the rest of the stories.

Readability	8/10 – Clean and swift, but occasional word choices and my constant questions slowed me down
Hero	6/10 – Charming and noble, but it always felt like there was more there than what I got
Heroine	6/10 – The issues of her past seemed overly simplistic and not fully explored to merit her strong reactions
Entertainment value	6/10 – Some fascinating concepts, but it always felt like there was something being left out
World building	6/10 – I liked the ideas behind it, but I never felt immersed
TOTAL:	32/50

The Sun Sword by Lexxie Couper

TITLE: The Sun Sword
AUTHOR: Lexxie Couper
PUBLISHER: Samhain
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 50k)
GENRE: Futuristic erotic romance
COST: $4.50

Torin Kerridon has one mission – to find The One Who Burns. As the last Sol warrior, it’s his responsibility to train The One Who Burns to wield the Sun Sword, the weapon destined to fulfill an age-old prophecy. He just never expected The One Who Burns to be a woman. Or that his desire for her would eclipse all the power of the suns…

As much as I love finding original voices, sometimes prose tries too hard and ends up distracting from the story itself. This novel had a lot going for it, but it fell short, mired in overdescription. I still enjoyed it, but I can’t help but think how phenomenal it would have been if I hadn’t fought with the prose as much as I did.

The action starts immediately, with Torin searching a dangerous Earth for The One Who Burns, and is shocked to discover it’s a small scrap of a woman. Jump forward six months, six months of intensive training and few answers. Kala Rei is burning all right, with lust for Torin, with desire for answers, with anger and hatred and emotions she can barely keep in check. The chemistry between the two is combustible, and it doesn’t take long at all for it to ignite. It does backslide – though the circumstances felt so contrived, it annoyed me – but there’s enough there to build a passionate relationship on. Unfortunately, they’re caught up in the circumstances of the prophecy, and the dark danger that takes over their lives also takes over the plot.

In some ways, it’s good. The suspense that gets built with the cutaway scenes to the antagonists is gruesome and intense. There is no mollycoddling here. The bad guy uses the blood of women for his nefarious deeds, and his sidekick gets the privilege of using and abusing those women first. For readers who are sensitive to that kind of violence, it’s very likely too much. However, for me, it added an intriguing layer to the situation with the Sun Sword, and sucked me in to wanting to know more.

Where it fails is in the florid prose. As unique as it is, it always seemed very overwritten. Paragraphs like this proliferate the entire story:

An acrid chill slithered through her. Someone he needed to save when she shouldn’t need saving, that was who. Someone to be defended when she shouldn’t be defenseless. He was every woman’s fantasy—a hero, a rescuer, a man of smoldering passion and incomparable strength, and she was not worthy of him. She was damaged goods. Soiled by a life she’d never wanted. After six months of being molded by him, trained by him, forged to become the savior of the worlds of man, she was nothing he believed her to be.

On its own, it wouldn’t be so bad. But it’s throughout the whole novel, with no reprieve. This unrelenting description just overloaded me until I was blurring right past it. It ended up losing its impact as a result. The author also loved this particular construct: True pleasure in physical connection. True connection in physical pleasure. I did, too, the first time I noticed it. By the third, it, just like with the overwriting, had lost its power.

Between the strong characters and taut suspense, this story does manage to succeed at entertaining. It simply falls short of fulfilling the tantalizing promise it offers.

Readability	7/10 – The prose tries too hard, but at least it’s descriptive
Hero	7/10 – A rough beginning smoothes out into a hero I could really root for
Heroine	8/10 – Gutsy, sharp, and admirable
Entertainment value	7/10 – Overwriting holds this back from being phenomenal
World building	8/10 – A ton of original ideas, not always very well conveyed
TOTAL:	37/50

Breakfast at Tiffany's by Lynn Lorenz

TITLE: Breakfast at Tiffany’s
AUTHOR: Lynn Lorenz
PUBLISHER: Amber Allure
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 21k)
GENRE: Gay contemporary erotic romance
COST: $5.00

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans isn’t the only thing struggling to survive. Nineteen-year-old Scott has been on his own for years, lives at a shelter, and works as a busboy/waiter in an attempt to keep his head above water. When he is mugged on the way to work, he gets rescued by Tony, another man fighting just to stay alive. The connection between them strikes deeper than the physical, but how can it work out when each day presents its own difficulties to overcome?

I have never been to New Orleans. I don’t have family in the south, and nobody I knew was affected by the devastating Hurricane Katrina. None of that matters when it comes to enjoying this heartwrenchingly different novella from author Lynn Lorenz.

Lorenz ignores traditional romance stereotypes to put two homeless men at the center of her moving story. Scott is a high school dropout, an orphan who survives by living in a shelter and working early morning shifts at a restaurant called Tiffany’s Waffles and Wings. Tony is the product of a prostitute mother who disappeared before the hurricane, squatting in a deserted part of the city, robbing people in order to have money to buy food. These two meet when Tony is contemplating mugging Scott, only to let him pass and then watch somebody else get the drop on the skinny young white boy. Tony intervenes, then takes Scott’s money for himself, but guilt overrides his needs, and he seeks Scott out again to return it.

This starts one of the more unusual m/m romances I’ve had the pleasure of reading in a while. Lorenz bypasses the maudlin and writes straight to the unrepentant core of these men’s situations. It’s never heavy-handed or overtly graphic, but there’s never any doubt about the tenuous circumstances these men navigate on a daily basis. Each is only trying to survive and hold on to what little self-respect they still have, and that, in and of itself, is honorable. Scott is the more fully fleshed of the two, with his sweet, deceptively innocent demeanor, but while Tony’s backstory is held back until almost the end of the story, there is still enough of a core there to respond positively to him. His greater physical strength conceals his inner struggles with self-identity and worth, and even is offered to tantalize the reader into falling for him.

The story’s brevity worked against Tony’s characterization in the long run, however, just like it weakened my commitment to believing the swiftness of their coming together. As much as I liked both guys, I didn’t wholly buy into just how fast Scott was willing to trust Tony. He’s not a stupid kid. He’s lived by his wits for a long time. I was taken a little aback at how quickly he was willing to forget all that for Tony. If I hadn’t liked both of them as much as I did, I probably would have been more cynical about the outcome (though the pragmatist in me still finds it very difficult to believe that two guys who struggle over every dollar would waste ten bucks on a box of condoms – yes, I know they’re responsible guys, and yes, I would prefer them to be safe, but come on, these are two guys who live dollar to dollar and boxes of condoms are not cheap).

These niggles aside, it’s hard to go wrong with this sensitively written novella. I’m not convinced these two will be together forever, but in this moment, at this point in their lives, I whole-heartedly believe they are exactly what the other needs. That’s all anyone can ever ask for.

Readability	8/10 – Simplistic, but heartbreaking
Hero #1	8/10 – Sweet and adorable
Hero #2	7/10 – His outer strength hides inner turmoil well
Entertainment value	8/10 – A slice of real life that proves romance doesn’t need fancy packages
World building	8/10 – Some great touches painting the underbelly of Katrina’s aftermath
TOTAL:	39/50

Crux by Moira Rogers

TITLE: Crux
AUTHOR: Moira Rogers
PUBLISHER: Samhain
LENGTH: Novel (roughly 84k)
GENRE: Contemporary paranormal erotic romance
COST: $5.50

Mackenzie Brooks is on the run, but no matter where she goes, the man claiming to be her destined mate always manages to find her. Her new boss in New Orleans thinks there’s more to her than meets the eye, but when she sets her PI friend, Jackson Holt, on the case, the last thing either one of them expect is to stumble on a decades-old plan that turns Mackenzie into the savior of her race…

Shapeshifters are not my first choice when it comes to paranormal creatures. I often find the reliance on mate tropes lazy and uninspiring. This book has sat on my TBR pile for a long time for that very reason. I bought it because of the well-paced excerpt, but every time it came to pick something new, I passed on by. What a nice surprise, then, to find the mate trope that drives me so insane turned on its ear.

Mackenzie is working at a bar in New Orleans, ready to run at the slightest hint of danger. Marcus, the man after her, always seems to find her no matter where she is. Her skittish behavior doesn’t go unnoticed by her well-meaning boss, who enlists the aid of Jackson, a PI with magical skills, to get the scoop on her. Mackenzie sets off all Jackson’s alerts, and soon, they’ve figured out she’s a cougar shapeshifter, a heritage she’s completely ignorant of. It’s not so foreign to Jackson. His partner Alec is a wolf shapeshifter, as is Nick, the bar owner. When Marcus’ men show up in New Orleans, Jackson takes her to the most powerful spellcaster he knows in search of answers. That starts their long, action-filled journey throughout the story.

The action pivots on one simple fact. Mackenzie is destined to bear a cougar child that is capable of turning humans, thus saving the cougar species. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? It’s the magical vagina story, the “we must have sex to save the world/planet/species” trope. It’s overused and annoying. But the authors have turned this on its ear. Mackenzie doesn’t embrace her destiny. In fact, she wants nothing to do with it, and fights it every step of the way. It gives her an added strength that sets her above standard shapeshifter heroine fare, and makes it easier for me to invest in the overall outcome of the story.

While Jackson is charming and appropriately determined to help Mackenzie, his characterization isn’t as solid as hers. There is more than one allusion to Jackson’s darker side, but this is never explored, and leaves the reader not only with multiple questions but also fears that the HEA just might not take. If he was any less likeable, this might have proven detrimental to the story, but as it stands, is a minor quibble in the grand scope of things. Because the action in this is unrelenting, the pace steady and swift. The constant forward momentum refuses to let the reader go. Only the predictability of its ending holds it back.

While I might not have invested in the romance as heavily as the plot, I’m curious enough to try the second book in the series. The host of secondary characters in this provides fodder for many stories to come, though the ones I think might prove most interesting (Marcus, in particular) are probably not the ones I’m likely to get.

Readability	8/10 – Swiftly paced and clean if not entirely inspiring
Hero	7/10 – Charming and likeable, but there always felt like there was more to him than what got shown or explained
Heroine	8/10 – Strong and resourceful
Entertainment value	8/10 – Nothing original about the conflict, and the romance felt rushed, but the action and pacing more than made up for it
World building	8/10 – Rich and well realized, if not that original
TOTAL:	39/50

Tempting Tori by N.J. Walters

TITLE: Tempting Tori
AUTHOR: N.J. Walters
PUBLISHER: Ellora’s Cave
LENGTH: Short story (roughly 14k)
GENRE: Contemporary erotic romance
COST: $2.49

Tori has been the housekeeper for the Courage brothers for a year now, but now that two of them are moving on, she doesn’t know how she’s going to hide the love she has for the one remaining. J.T. is finally ready to share his life with the woman he loves, but when he finds out Tori is leaving, the last thing he is going to do is let her go…

Last week, I reviewed a novella from EC that lacked context for me to care about the characters. While this one is shorter and doesn’t have the suspense element, it’s similar enough for me to feel safe drawing comparisons. Because, on the surface, I shouldn’t have liked this book at all, since I didn’t like the other one. While it will never be a re-read, it manages to engage me long enough to get involved in what was going on, something the other story lacked.

There’s not much of a set-up here. Tori is in love with J.T., without his knowledge, while J.T. is in love with Tori, without hers. Tori can’t hide it anymore at about the same time J.T. is ready to make his move, and voila, sex and an HEA ensue. End of story. The focus is definitely on the sex, and in typical Walters fashion, it’s steady and emotion-filled. The reason it works – where the other one didn’t – is because I have a short period at the front of the story to not only get to know Tori a little bit, but to empathize with her. She’s very much an everywoman – average weight, a little insecure – and it’s easy for the female reader to put herself in her shoes. J.T. also gets a few paragraphs of backstory that make him a highly attractive hero. Getting involved with their passion is almost a done deal.

That being said, it’s an EC quickie. There’s not a lot of story there, and what there is, is there to serve in function with the sex. Walters is also one of the few authors I openly tolerate headhopping from. With her contemporaries, I find myself so wrapped up in her passionate and emotional scenes, I’m willing to overlook the distraction of abrupt POV switches. I won’t remember this story in a month’s time, but in the short time it took me to read it, I got exactly what I wanted – to believe in two likeable characters long enough to tumble with them into their passion. There’s not much more I can ask for.

Readability	8/10 – Walters is one of the few authors I’m willing to ignore headhopping for
Hero	6/10 – Charming and determined
Heroine	6/10 – An everywoman vibe adds to the sexual fantasy
Entertainment value	6/10 – Hot, but pure fantasy and sex
World building	6/10 – Enough to keep it from feeling it happens in a vacuum
TOTAL:	32/50

Out of the Blue by Josh Lanyon

TITLE: Out of the Blue
AUTHOR: Josh Lanyon
PUBLISHER: Liquid Silver Books
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 25k)
GENRE: Gay historical erotic romance
COST: $4.50

Captain Bat Bryant is an ace pilot in WWI France, knowing that every time he goes up, it just might be his last time. When his lover and fellow pilot is killed, the last thing he wants to deal with in his grief is blackmail. He lashes out, but the deadly consequences threaten his position as flight leader…until Cowboy, the brash American newcomer to the Squadron, offers to take care of the body. For a price…

This story had so many things going for it before I ever read a word, I’m not sure where even to start. Josh Lanyon. WWI fighter pilots. A fantastic April Martinez cover. I had high expectations going in, and thankfully, wasn’t disappointed.

The story opens with Bat, a British pilot stationed in France, getting blackmailed by a fellow pilot, a man who claims to have knowledge of Bat’s romantic relationship with a recently deceased member of his squadron. In a moment of impulse, Bat decks him, but when the blackmailer hits his head as he falls, a simple fight turns into murder. The entire scene is witnessed by Cowboy, an American in the squadron, who volunteers to take care of the body so Bat won’t get in trouble for what was obviously an accident. Bat gives in, and opens the door for Cowboy to later collect on the favor in other ways.

Bat’s fascinating. His relationship with Gene was romantic, and slightly sexual, but their physicality was limited, so he’s unprepared for just how much Cowboy really wants. His grief is kept in tight rein, but as it starts to break through his brittle control, his behavior grows increasingly erratic. He recognizes it, but doesn’t really care about doing anything about it. In fact, it’s Cowboy who provides the strength and support Bat needs to get past it, taking control while Bat learns how to survive without the man he loved. Cowboy’s behavior is more than a little pushy, and I can see how some people might be incredibly turned off by it. Taken at face value, he pretty much blackmails Bat, too, using the fact that they’re tied together now to get sex. He doesn’t give Bat much of a chance to say no.

However, I never saw malice in anything Cowboy did. His attitude and demeanor toward Bat before anything sexual happened felt like genuine interest and affection. He recognized Bat’s weakness in the face of his lover’s death, and did everything he could to keep the man who interested him from falling apart. Though he’s firm with Bat, he cares what Bat thinks. He tells him so, and he shows him on a daily basis in a myriad of ways. Bat’s emotional turmoil was more obvious, but Cowboy was the one who really got to me. He risked as much, if not more, with his actions. I wanted desperately for it all to work out.

The story’s greatest strength lies in the verisimilitude of its setting, though. Lanyon has done his research. Every word feels authentic, and the action is tight and densely packed. In fact, the prose itself feels far denser than standard Lanyon fare. It rolls and weaves in complicated measures, forcing a careful reader to slow down and truly savor each word. Reading it was a joy. I liked that the fight scenes were as essential to the romance as the sex scenes. As much, if not more, attention was paid to the military aspects as it was to the men, but that’s vital to understanding and appreciating the arc of their relationship.

This was one of the richest Lanyon stories I’ve read in a long while – thought-provoking, with complicated men at its heart. Or rather, as its heart.

Readability	8/10 – Some minor editorial issues pulled me out a couple times, but otherwise, dense and active
Hero #1	7/10 – His brittle control is often heartbreaking
Hero #2	8/10 – The buttress Bat needs
Entertainment value	8/10 – Action, both internal and external, makes it taut and emotion-filled
World building	10/10 – Fine detail, precise action, truly excellent
TOTAL:	41/50

All Chained Up by Brynn Paulin

TITLE: All Chained Up
AUTHOR: Brynn Paulin
PUBLISHER: Ellora’s Cave
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 28k)
GENRE: BDSM erotic romantic suspense
COST: $4.45

Keera has been on the run from her psychotic stepbrother for years. When he finds her – again – and threatens her lover of five hours, she decides to make another run for it. The problem is, her new lover is also her Master. And her boss. And Theo isn’t willing to just let her disappear without an explanation, and better, a punishment…

Going into backlist when I discover an author I enjoyed is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, if it’s an older story, it might not exhibit the same skill I admired in the current work. On the other, I could find more gems. E-publishing offers an entirely different set of mines to try and work around, since a lot of romance authors publish with more than one house. Anybody who reads more than a few titles knows right away different publishers have different reader bases and expectations, and that sometimes, authors hop from style to style, genre to genre, because of this freedom.

I loathed the first story I read by this author. The second turned out to be my favorite in an anthology, one I loved so much I decided to write off the first story as a fluke and went looking through her backlist. After reading a novella earlier this week by an author I’d previously read, I decided to pick this one up, and have come to a conclusion. I don’t care for Paulin’s sex-focused stories, which will mean anything from EC in the future.

The biggest problem in this novella – fast-paced as it is – is the lack of context. The book opens with these lines:

“How are you feeling about this?”

Keera Thornton snuggled into the arms of her lover of five hours and looked up into his gray eyes, captured by her devotion to him. Theo Cress. He owned every part of her and didn’t even know it.

The reader is thrust into a relationship that has already been consummated, with absolutely no build-up on who they might be or what they might be to each other. We are flying blind in these opening pages, with Keera already wearing Theo’s collar and Theo telling her it’s “wedding ring serious.” They have one more quickie (and I do mean quickie, 350 words from Keera offering herself to orgasms), Theo goes off to run a bath, Keera gets a threatening phone call, and then she’s gone. Just over 1400 words. I have no investment in the characters, no reason to be afraid except the author tells me to, no knowledge of what makes Theo special or why Keera is worth being collared.

I kept waiting for it to come. And waited. While I got a little more background, they were just facts, and not very satisfactory ones at that. The impact of the suspense was completely disintegrated because of the lack of emotional involvement I had with any of the characters. It felt too much like a reason for Theo to chase her down, to give him a reason for punishing her, and to isolate them so they could have even more sex. It never got better. At all. I should have clued in, since it was an Ellora’s Cave release, but the excerpt on the site was all about the suspense. That’s misleading to say the least. The characters were cardboard, the suspense a waste of time. However, I did learn what type of story to steer clear of in the future. Because Paulin proved she can write a compelling, rich romance with “In the Dark.” I know I can absolutely love her work. Just not this type.

Readability	7/10 – Incredibly fast-paced but that’s because it foregoes anything like character development or build-up to get to the sex
Hero	4/10 – I might have liked him more if I actually knew him as anything other than Dom
Heroine	3/10 – Idiotic and unbelievable
Entertainment value	3/10 – Sheer wish fulfillment with no lead-in to make any of the characters actually individuals
World building	5/10 – All the attention is paid to the BDSM…which is probably my own fault since this is EC we’re talking about here
TOTAL:	22/50

Weaving Words by Kim Knox

TITLE: Weaving Words
AUTHOR: Kim Knox
PUBLISHER: Samhain
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 20k)
GENRE: Fantasy romance
COST: $3.50

Kaede is a witch, bound to the House of Sang. If he ever displeases Lord Tarou, his life will be forfeit, just by the uttering of Seven Words. He has no choice, really, when Tarou commands he resurrect the Lady Annaliese, but when he realizes the soul he puts back into her body isn’t actually hers, he knows his time is numbered. For her part, one moment Vara was getting eaten by wolves, the next she was waking up on an altar in a dark cavern. Her survival – as well as that of the witch who fascinates her – depends on convincing Tarou she is actually his wife…

I passed by this the first time it came out, but after reading Knox’s Lost Gods, I went to her backlist and picked out a few more to read. The first story I read after didn’t quite live up to the potential, but this, an older, shorter novella, ends up rating somewhere in between. I’ve learned one thing about this author, however. Explanations are not her forte.

Kaede is not your typical hero. In status terms, he’s like an omega, the bottom of the heap, enslaved without any recourse of escape lest he wish to die. At the story’s start, he comes across as quite frightened and skittish, though the circumstances certainly dictate and explain his behavior. He is aware from the start of the mistake he has made, and while he’s terrified of what might happen, he finds the strength to do everything he can to save his hide.

Vara was a warrior from the north before getting sucked into this Lady’s body, and is completely unaccustomed to being so docile or subservient. Her attraction to Kaede is immediate, though it’s unclear for the longest time whether that’s due to the magic or something else. She’s very spunky, with a much more modern, liberated attitude than Kaede or anyone else connected to the House, and it makes a good contrast with the more staid, mystical environment. My one problem with Vara is that she is never really given opportunity to exhibit the strengths she had in her previous incarnation. Much of the story’s advancement comes from Kaede or elsewhere. I desperately wanted to see more of her in action.

This story is an example of a story I liked more than the sum of its parts. Each taken on their own, they certainly scored above average, but when I consider it as a whole, I find myself more excited than with any specific aspect. That’s because it seemed to present such a less traveled road. Its magical aspects happen through the necromantic powers of an omega male, and the author doesn’t shy away from certain details, like saying that he can cast seeing spells using powdered eyeballs. It lends a slight gruesome quality to the narrative, but at the same time, completely fitting and engrossing. I spent so much of the story, on the edge of my seat, waiting for more. I did get some, enough to make this a satisfying read, but it’s become obvious to me over the past three stories I’ve read by this author that she does not excel in providing explanations or clarifying chains of events for the reader to best understand what’s going on. This one suffers from that flaw, just as the others did, and it’s this sense of incompletion that holds it back from being something truly astounding. The last couple chapters seem unnecessarily convoluted, and ultimately fail to adequately explain everything that has occurred. There are more questions left unanswered than there are resolved, and frankly, begs for a longer story to come afterward.

The issue then becomes, is it worth it to continue reading this author, knowing I’m not likely to get the explanations I invariably always crave when the story is done? I think so, yes. The set-up and potential of this novella was provocative and intriguing, and I don’t regret reading it for a moment. The worlds the author creates always suck me in. As long as I know what to expect on the other side, I have no qualms following her into more.

Readability	7/10 – Fast-paced and fascinating, I just wanted more explanation
Hero	7/10 – Tremendous potential that doesn’t get fully realized
Heroine	7/10 – I really liked her, but felt for as strong as she was purported to be, she didn’t get to do much
Entertainment value	8/10 – Intriguing and different, though it could have been absolutely astounding with better explanation/world-building
World building	7/10 – Points for doing something unusual and provocative, but there isn’t enough depth for whys and hows to make this truly spectacular
TOTAL:	36/50

Written in Blood by Luisa Prieto

TITLE: Written in Blood
AUTHOR: Luisa Prieto
PUBLISHER: Amber Allure
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 30k)
GENRE: Gay historical paranormal erotic romance
COST: $6.00

Reporter Collin Foster wants to turn his London into a better place, ferreting out stories he hopes will save lives. His latest has turned into scandal headlines, as men who frequented male brothels were outed to the public. The matter leaves a bitter taste in his mouth, as it strikes a little too close to home, and when his best friends attempt to take him out to get his mind off it, he slips away, only to find himself sharing a carriage with the enigmatic Eduard de Sonnac. An attraction brings an invitation, but very quickly, Collin discovers Eduard is not what he seems, and his business in London touches Collin’s very life…

For some reason, while I don’t jump to read historicals, I find myself excited when I find paranormal historicals. I can’t figure out why. The elements that often drive me crazy in regular historicals are still likely to be there. But I spy one, and I always, always look twice.

This novella takes the reader to Victorian London, to the world of Dracula and Varney. Collin has no knowledge of vampires outside of his reading, but takes it surprisingly in stride once the truth comes out. The author’s notions of vampirism tend to coincide with Varney as well. For instance, it’s still possible for them to go out in sunlight, though the light hurts their eyes and gives them headaches, and while the notion of a gentler vampire is hardly new to romances, the fact that de Sonnac is in town to avenge an old friend – and is himself a turned Templar Knight – fits neatly into the Varney image. It’s a fun correlation to be drawn, though artfully subtle.

While there is a definite sense of period to the entire story, the lack of a specific year niggles more than once. It detracts only when a detail crops up and I’m left wondering, Is that appropriate to the time? It’s not a lot, but it happened more than once, so merited mentioning. However, the author’s elegant prose smoothes a lot of those rough spots over. It’s actually quite spare, and most definitely technically competent, with a slightly florid touch to help give an even stronger impression of the era. In a contemporary setting, it might be viewed as more purple, but here, it works, and does so effectively well.

While I liked Collin, and appreciated the sensual heat between the two men, I was far more intrigued and interested in the technical aspects of the story than its emotional merits. I like the story, not because I got embroiled in their romance (because I didn’t), but because it offered something different, and did so technically well. It doesn’t shy away from more gruesome details, for instance, another way it typifies the era. It also doesn’t take the easy way out on the ending, which ends up being a potential HFN rather than an HEA. The one part I didn’t buy was the shift in de Sonnac’s decision in the last quarter of the book. I never understood the reasoning, if one was really offered in the first place. It left the last third feeling very underdeveloped, like it needed another 10-15k to fully tell the story.

I do recommend this story, however, to anyone who enjoys the paranormal. The romance might not have leapt off the page for me, but the author’s elegant prose as well as the risks she’s so clearly willing to take made it more than worth it.

Readability	8/10 – A definite elegance in its spareness
Hero #1	7/10 – Oddly naïve considering what he’s seen, and his lack of self-awareness grates a little bit
Hero #2	6/10 – I didn’t believe his later shift from, though he was appropriately enigmatic and charming for the seduction
Entertainment value	7/10 – I enjoyed this more for what it did differently, especially the ending, rather than the characters or romance
World building	7/10 – There’s definitely a period feel to it, but it felt difficult to grasp exactly when
TOTAL:	35/50

Summer-set by Karalynn Lee

TITLE: Summer-set
AUTHOR: Karalynn Lee
PUBLISHER: Samhain
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 21k)
GENRE: Fantasy erotic romance
COST: $3.50

Ryuan is the prince’s hunter, a wolf-born in a land where sorcery is outlawed. The time has come for him to take down a sorcerer who has escaped his punishment, but in his quest, he hopes to find the woman who distracted him from capturing the sorcerer the first time, the woman he has not been able to stop thinking about in all the time since…

I fell in love with this author’s voice from the very first words:

Monsoons filled that summer, and she filled his heart. Later, during evening storms, he thought of the sudden shadows her breasts made with every flash of lightning. Thought of how the rain would seep into her and give her its wetness, until she was fluid all around him, her skin slick with it, her cries dissolving. They moved with the same steady rhythm of the drumming of the water. And when he called her name in that last desperate delving for her innermost secrets, the thunder drowned his voice.

In the autumn, she slipped out of his hold like the rain.

The imagery and lyricism is just gorgeous. I didn’t even read the whole excerpt when I bought the book. I read those first two paragraphs, and knew it was going to be something special.

And it was, for the most part. The author maintains her voice throughout the story, creating an atmosphere and mood that absolutely swept me away. This is how I like my fantasy best – with such a light touch that I don’t feel clobbered over my head by the differences. There is just enough detail to suck me in, without bogging me down. Sometimes, it gets a little lost to leave room for the romance, but I’m mostly okay with that within the context of the story.

The one part that lets down this novella is the pacing. It’s strong throughout the first half, but as soon as Ryuan finds Calanthe again, it starts to fall apart. Part of that is due to plot developments the author has chosen. I won’t spoil to specifics, but I will say that not allowing your hero to be heroic weakens both him and the story. I thought the entire last third fell apart in this regard. If I didn’t love the prose as much as I do, I would have scored this a lot lower as a result.

The lyricism of the author’s voice bolsters her characterizations. Calanthe falters due to the role she plays in the story (so much of the first third/half is Ryuan’s longing/frustration for her), but Ryuan shines. I did feel a little cheated in regards to his arc, because of the story directions the author chose, but he is strong, honorable, and just lost enough to make me yearn for him to get his closure. He is the story’s heart, and strengthened by the author’s voice, provided all I needed.

Readability	9/10 – Some absolutely gorgeous prose only gets held back by the pacing
Hero	8/10 – In spite of feeling cheated on his arc, I adored him
Heroine	6/10 – The focus on Ryuan for much of the story keeps her at a distance from the reader
Entertainment value	8/10 – Love the author’s voice, just wish the pacing held up to the rest of it
World building	7/10 – An interesting world with enough details to keep it focused and clear, but I had a lot of questions I wanted answers to
TOTAL:	38/50

Blindsided by Kate Watterson

TITLE: Blindsided
AUTHOR: Kate Watterson
PUBLISHER: Siren
LENGTH: Novella (roughly 40k)
GENRE: Contemporary erotic romantic suspense
COST: $4.50

Desperate to clear her head and escape, Dr. Kerin Burke drives north, hoping for a day of peace. What she drives into is a snowstorm, and if it wasn’t for good Samaritan Jesse McCutcheon saving her from her stalled car, she just might have frozen to death for her efforts. Her vacation turns into a forced stay with Jesse at his cabin retreat, where their immediate attraction flares into something more. Eventually, however, she has to go back to Indianapolis, and to whoever it is she thinks is watching her…

Siren Publishing is one of the publishers I often wonder why I bother looking at. Their covers are mostly atrocious. When they aren’t poorly Photoshopped, they’re tacky and demeaning as hell. In a genre that has more than its fair share of demeaning covers, that says a lot. Beyond that, their seeming determination to be the ménage center for the e-romance world has produced some very bizarre, and sometimes creepy, blurbs and products. They do have their occasional couple story, but they get lost amongst all their ménages (though maybe that’ll change with the recent addition of the Menage Everlasting line). However, I did discover Emma Wildes had published through there when I discovered her a couple years ago, and this is one of her titles she writes under her romantic suspense pseudonym.

This starts out as your standard stranded romance. Kerin is a professional, panicked and on the run for some unknown reason, who finds her car dying in the middle of nowhere Wisconsin during a snowstorm. Along comes Jesse, who takes her back to his cabin, but the storm is bad enough to keep them stuck for more than a few days. Kerin is appropriately wary of being in a strange man’s house, and Jesse does everything he can to put her at ease. They’re attracted to each other, have sex, get to know each other, etc. Through it all, the question of why Kerin is so afraid gets raised and only eventually addressed.

There’s a slight schizophrenic quality to this story. The romance and the suspense never fit well together. The way it starts out – the clichéd set-up, the UST, the sex – reads like your everyday romance. It’s solidly written, even if it’s not earth-shatteringly original. Kerin’s tension adds a nice flavor to it, so I was well prepared to get into the suspense portion of the story. Then, at the start of chapter four, nearly a third into the story, the narrative jumps place and character. The woman is a stranger, watching two men (also strangers to the reader) meet. She seems pleased to have figured out that they’re working together, probably for something related to murder. Now, I’ll be honest. My first reaction was that somebody at the publisher screwed up and two stories got mixed together. I was that jarred by the scene. There is literally nothing in the scene to indicate it has anything to do with Kerin, and the fact that it starts at the beginning of a chapter only jolted me more. When it cut back to the cabin, I was prepared to explain it away as the woman being a friend of Kerin’s, helping out some way, especially when there’s a similar scene at the top of the next chapter (though at least this one shows a tie to Kerin). The story never manages to find a capable rhythm balancing the two aspects, though at least Kerin gets involved with the suspense portion when she returns to Indianapolis. The ultimate explanation was disappointing, though the climax of the story was well written. For all the attempts to foreshadow, the reasons behind Kerin’s tension felt very dropped in.

It’s a shame, because I quite liked Kerin and Jesse. Both are normal, hard-working people, with a decent set of values, and they have obvious chemistry, even while Kerin is so understandably nervous around him. Their scenes in the cabin, while definitely not as graphic or scorching as I’ve read elsewhere, still provide a cozy comfort, and I’m ready to believe these two really could fall in love this quickly. I only wish the last third of the book wasn’t so rushed and slipshod. I think the author is probably better at the historicals that I’ve read by her, rather than contemporary suspense. I’m likely to stick to those in the future.

Readability	8/10 – Cleaner and more serviceable than I expect from this publisher, quite honestly
Hero	7/10 – For a modern knight, another pleasant surprise
Heroine	7/10 – I appreciated she wasn’t nearly as helpless as she could have been, but it seemed for somebody as smart as she was, she would have figured more out before Jesse got involved
Entertainment value	7/10 – A nice escape, but for the romance, not the suspense
World building	7/10 – The snowbound details were very striking, the rest of it…not so much
TOTAL:	36/50