Review: At Last by Jill Shalvis

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

I admit that when I was reading Lucky in Love, the previous book in this new trilogy, I was very intrigued every time Amy and Matt had an interaction. There was something going on between them, and now we finally get to find out what. But before I begin the review, you should know that there’s no need to read any of the previous books in order to enjoy this one, so you can jump right in if you want.

Amy is a waitress with an attitude. But behind her tough exterior hides a wounded woman desperately searching for hope, peace and heart. Those three words were written by her grandmother on her diary and Amy came all the way to Lucky Harbor in order to find the same happiness and calm her grandmother claimed to have found. So far she hasn’t been successful and it will take some external help to finally find what she’s looking for.

Review: Unraveling the Past by Beth Andrews

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

I have read and enjoyed most of Ms. Andrews’ books, so when I saw this one on NetGalley I was pleasantly surprised and didn’t hesitate to request it.

Ross Taylor is the new Chief of Police in a small town. He got the job over one of the locals, Captain Layne Sullivan. She isn’t happy than a hot-shot city detective took the position she was aiming for, so their relationship is quite strained. But Ross has enough to worry as it is, because the reason he moved to the small town was to give his troubled niece a better environment. But the niece is having none of that so he’s struggling. And now he also has to deal with Layne.

The book opens whit the niece at a party getting drunk and having sex, when the police arrives –Ross and Layne included– she ends up getting a reprimand and also finding human skull. Next to the skull is a necklace that Layne recognizes as belonging to her mother, the same mother who abandoned her family years ago, leaving Layne in charge of her sisters. But when the remains are identified as her mother, Layne and Ross must leave their differences aside and work together.

Review: Can't Buy Me Love by Molly O'Keefe

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

This is Ms. O’Keefe single title debut and I was very excited to read it because I’ve enjoyed her books before. Can’t Buy Me Love isn’t much of a departure from her usual stories, which means that it is a slightly angsty story that focuses on the characters and their journey both personal and as a couple. It’s also book one in a series, so the secondary characters feature prominently in it.

Tara Jean Sweet is a girl from the wrong side of the tracks to whom life has dealt bad hand after bad hand. But her luck changes when she meets Lyle Baker, an elderly –and wealthy– Texas rancher. He puts her in charge of one of his business and gives her life a new meaning. But he also asks something in return: he’s dying and he wants her to fake an engagement to lure his son back. Lyle isn't a good person – he was an abusive father and a terrible husband. He has two kids: Luc, product of his marriage, and Tori, product of his affair. But he only wants Luc, so he demands that Tara acts like a gold-digger bimbo who’s about to take all his money, to anger Luc and provoke him into coming back to the ranch. To Tara, Lyle means redemption, help and friendship, so she’s willing to do anything for him, not to mention that her job is tied to Lyle and she doesn't want to lose it.

Interview & Giveaway: Tigris Eden

Today, author Tigris Eden is joining us a part of her Enslaved in Shadows Blog Tour. She’s a fellow blogger as well, so I'm really happy she’s visiting with us today. Also, 50% of the book’s first week proceeds will be donated to Domestic Violence Awareness, so if you buy the book during that week you will also be helping this fantastic cause. Let’s give her a warm welcome.

Hello Tigris, welcome to Romance Around the Corner! Thank you for joining us.

Q. For all of our readers that may not be familiar with you and your work, could you tell us a bit about yourself?

TE: There isn’t really much to tell. I’m pretty boring actually. LOL I like to write and read and hang out with my doode Belinda Bullock and discuss the latest and greatest hottie. And brainstorm about what kind of books I want to write.  Oh and I’m sassy or Ms. Eden if you’re nicety :-) (Total jokester see!)

Winner! About Last Night by Ruthie Knox

The winner of About Last Night by Ruthie Knox is: Kaetrin

Congratulations! 

I've sent you an email, if you didn't get it check the spam folder or contact me directly.

Thanks to everyone who participated and thanks to Ruthie and Random House for making the giveaway possible.

See you next time!

Guest Post: Anatomy of a Co-written Scene by Heidi Belleau

I'm pleased to welcome author Heidi Belleau to the blog. Heidi, along with her partner in crime, Violetta Vane, writes M/M Romance stories that are often gritty an very real. Since they work as a team, I asked them to tell me a bit about how they work and their experience as co-writers. The result is this interesting and insightful post that gives us a glimpse into the creation of a co-written scene. Enjoy!

Anatomy of a Co-written Scene 

by Heidi Belleau 

Violetta and I are often asked about how we co-write. Do we trade-off scenes, do we roleplay, do we email back and forth, do we each take a chapter? Our reply is always the same: we write simultaneously in google docs, even down to working on the same sentence at the same time. It's a hard thing to visualize, I imagine, so we've come up with a little exercise to try and show you what we mean. The following is a short scene fromHawaiian Gothic. The green areas are Violetta's writing, the purple are mine. This is also an edited version, so there's input from our Loose Id editor, Venessa Giunta, here as well, but we haven't colour-coded what she influenced. Hopefully this gives you a sense of our process! 

Review: My Life Next Door by Huntley Fitzpatrick

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

I’ve been on a YA binge for the past few months and this was a book I couldn’t wait to read. It’s one of those stories that sound like the perfect mix between YA and Contemporary Romance. I loved the idea of a girl longing to belong to the messy family next door, I also wanted to know what was going on with that “impossible decision” that may break them apart. So I got it and while I didn’t think it was bad, I thought the overall story was disappointing.

Samantha Reed’s family consists of a sister and their mother. Their life is orderly and perfect, as long as you don’t look too closely. Their mother is a snob and criticizes everything but herself, because if she saw how flawed she was, she would have kept her mouth shut about everyone else. In order to please her mother, Samantha behaves and does everything she’s told. But she longs for a different life, a life that closely resembles that of her next door neighbors.

Review: Something Like Normal by Trish Doller

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

The reason I read this book was because the main character and narrator is a guy, something I seldom see in YA. It also seemed like a different type of story and I was intrigued. So I requested it months ago and read it, which turned out to be a mistake because I’ve been dying to talk about it since March.

Something Like Normal tells the story of Travis. He’s back home for a short stay before he has to go back to Afghanistan. It’s not the ideal situation because things at home are far from perfect. His girlfriend dumped him and is now with his brother, he has a poor relationship with his dad, and even if he doesn’t want to admit it, he’s suffering from PTSD. He has two choices: he can either ignore all his issues, or he can confront them. To be honest, all he wants to do is get away, it was the reason he enlisted in the first place, but his issues are hard to ignore so confront them he will.

Interview and Giveaway: Ruthie Knox

I’m happy to welcome author Ruthie Knox to our little corner of the blogosphere. If you’re a fan of contemporary romance you should be reading her books, they have great characters, funny banter, lots of emotion and steamy sex scenes. It doesn't get better than that.

Hello Ruthie, welcome to Romance Around the Corner. We are so happy you could join us today!

RK: Thank you! So happy to be here.

Winners: Shameless Summer Giveaway Hop

First, I would like to thank everyone who took the time to enter the giveaway and to all the other participant blogs and authors. You’re the reason why the Hop was a success and I can’t wait to do it again. Especial thanks to Michelle and Jen for being the best co-hosts ever! 

The winner of The Reluctant Nude by Meg Maguire is Maggie Wells. 

The winner of Ride with Me by Ruthie Knox is Book Savvy Babe. 

Congratulations ladies, emails are on their way. See you next time!

Review: Deadlocked by Charlaine Harris

Note: this is more of a rant than a review. It won’t make sense unless you have read the books. If you loved this one, you better skip it because you won’t like what I have to say. And there are spoilers.

I’m considering this –writing the review- my random act of kindness of the day, you don’t deserve to blindly get this book without a warning first. If my review can save you the time and money I’ll consider my sacrifice to be worthy. I almost  DNF’d it, but I kept reading it as my punishment for no listening to myself; last year I said I would quit the series, and yet, here I am again, so I guess I deserve the pain.

Deadlocked has no plot, none whatsoever. Nor does it have anything else going for it that may keep the reader’s attention. There’s a party where certain powerful vampires are supposed to be, but nothing happens except that a girl’s body is found nearby. No one knows who the dead girl is; she has no connection to the characters or plot (but there’s no plot so that’s okay); and there’s no motive. It just looks like a random vampire killing. Unfortunately, there’s more to it, and I say unfortunately, because when you learn the real reason behind the whole murder and what I guess is the book’s plot, you will feel like killing someone. It’s that stupid.

Review: Unexpected Family Molly O’Keefe

I discovered Ms. O’Keefe’s books last year when I read book one in the series. The books can be out of order, in fact, I didn’t realize they were connected until I was well into the story

When Lucy Alatore was young, all she wanted to do was design jewelry and leave home. Her dream came true and she moved to Los Angeles, but after a bad business decision she’s back to her hometown with nothing but failure. 

Jeremiah Stone was a rodeo super star but he had to quit because of injure.  He didn’t have much time to grief the loss of his career because his sister died leaving him in charge of his three young orphaned nephews. So he’s been back in town for the past year struggling with his new responsibility and barely managing.

Review: About Last Night by Ruthie Knox

Source: we received an e-ARC of the book through NetGalley for review purposes.

Given the amount of Contemporary Romance I review, it’s quite obvious that I’m partial to it. But in a genre that can get quite repetitive, finding great new authors can be difficult. When I read Ms. Knox’s debut novel, Ride with Me, I was over the moon because is not often that I read a book so compelling. After having read About Last Night, I’m happy to tell that Ride with Me wasn’t a one-hit wonder, and that Ms. Knox is a truly wonderful author.

Mary Catherine Talarico is a wild child in the process of reforming herself. In order to do so, she has removed herself from everything and everyone. She moved to London, doesn’t really have friends, she works, she works and she works. Basically she wants to be a dull girl and things that all work and no play will help her achieve that goal. 

Review: Skin Deep by Pamela Clare

In my very humble opinion, I think Pamela Clare is one of the best Romantic Suspense authors out there. I may be blinded by her awesome sex scenes and dreamy heroes, but that’s what I believe. And hey, if dreamy heroes and sex scenes aren’t part of what makes a romance great, then I don’t know what is. 

Skin Deep is the latest installment in her I-Team series about a bunch of investigative reporters and the alpha males who love them. This time we get a novella and none of the leads are reporters, instead we get to see a former secondary character fall in love.

Megan Hunter has had a very difficult life. I won’t go into details but it’s been an odyssey of tragedy after tragedy. She’s finally putting the pieces back together, she has a job and a nice home. The only problem is that her ex is after her and her money.

Giveaway: Shameless Summer Giveaway Hop

Welcome to the Shameless Summer Giveaway Hop! I can’t believe it’s finally here. Actually, I can’t even believe we’re already in June!

Michelle, Jen and I, are so happy to, once again, team up to host this hop. We wanted to celebrate summer with all our readers and fellow bloggers, and what better way to do it than with some steamy reads? So today I’ve chosen a couple of wonderful, sexy stories, to give away.

Review: Her Best Worst Mistake by Sarah Mayberry

Source: I received a copy of the book from the author when she emailed a free copy to every fan who ever contacted her. The fact that I loved the book was in no way influenced by that. Had the book sucked sweaty balls, I would have said so in the review.

I’ve been a fan of Sarah Mayberry for years now, and although I prefer the stories she writes for the Super Romance line, her Blaze books are just as good. Her Best Worst Mistake manages to mix the best of both worlds and the result is a steamy story full of heart. 

This is a sequel to a 2010 Blaze book called Hot Island Nights. Both stories happen simultaneously so they can be read out of order, but if you read this one first, part of the plot of HIN will be spoiled. And since they are both great stories, why not read them in order?

Ginger Heroes, Hops and Not-So-New Adults

Don't mess with the gingers! (source)

My newest post on Heroes & Heartbreakers is about redheaded heroes. This was quite a difficult list to make because there aren’t that many. And when they do show up, they are either Scotsmen or don’t look like a redhead at all (no freckles, no pale skin). But I think I found a few good examples to show you how appealing redheads can be. I also want to say thanks to everyone on Twitter who recommended books to me.

Review: The Reluctant Nude by Meg Maguire

I’ve been a fan of Ms. Maguire’s alter ego, Cara McKenna, for a while now. So I finally decided to try her Meg Maguire books, and boy was I missing out. 

Fallon Frost is, quite literally, between a rock and a hard place. The rock is the sculpture she’s been forced to pose nude for, and the hard place, is, well, keep reading to find out. There’s this bad guy who’s obsessed with her and since he can’t have her, the next best thing is a sculpture, which, if you ask me, makes total sense. 

The artist commissioned to make the sculpture is Max Emery. This guy’s level of hotness is off the charts. I’ll make a list to better illustrate what I mean:

Armchair BEA: Q&A Session

Wonderful logo designed by Nina

As you guys probably know, this week the BookExpo America (BEA) and BEA Bloggers Conference are taking place in New York. And for all of us unable to attend, there’s Armchair BEA, a virtual convention that’s an incredible opportunity for book bloggers and readers to connect.

Today Armchair BEA is kicking off with a Q&A designed to get to know the participant bloggers. Before I leave you to it, make sure to visit the official site to get the more information, find out which other blogs are participating and take note of all the upcoming events and giveaways.