In Bed with Her Italian Boss by Kate Hardy, a Harlequin Presents that seems to have started life as a Mills & Boon called Breakfast at Giovanni’s, wasn’t what I would have expected given that title. That title conjures visions of a dubiously-appropriate workplace romance with a hot-blooded man. This book is not that. Not
It’s books like Flight of Magpies by K.J. Charles that make my heart hurt every time someone says that romance novels are dumb. Because this book, even more than the two that preceded it (and those were pretty damn good), is absolutely brilliant. And it’s brilliant in, like, three separate genres, somehow doing justice
Laura Kinsale never disappoints me. In For My Lady’s Heart, she has written a masterpiece, not just of romance, but of universal literary merit. It’s one of the most subversive works of literature I’ve read. Well, listened to actually. My husband and I got the audio book and played it in the car on road
Jane O’Reilly has been a favorite of mine since picking up her Indecent… trilogy last year. She’s got a completely matter of fact feminism and sex-positivity to her books that appeals to me on a visceral level even if the particular kink or sexual dynamic she’s exploring isn’t one I’m especially interested in. The Pleasure
An opinion piece from the New York Times popped up in my Twitter feed today that preempted today’s planned review post. It was ostensibly about 50 Shades of Grey, but really, it wasn’t. What it was about was the relationship of fandom to criticism, exploring the concept of whether critics are out of touch or
The TBR Challenge this month was a “Recommended Read” and E from Bookpushers had been steadily insisting that I read Nalini Singh for…oh…roughly forever? I’d purchased a used paperback copy of Angels’ Blood a while ago, but I have a tendency not to read paperbacks now that I have a Kindle. I mostly read in
I’m at All About Romance today with Alexis Hall discussing Judith Ivory’s 1997 historical romance Beast. One fun romance-is-a-small-place intersection that occurred to me after Alexis and I chatted was that Laura Florand’s new series starting with Once Upon a Rose, takes places in and around the same region of France as Beast and also
Planning your Valentine’s Day menu? I have a guest post up at the Romantic Times Book Reviews blog today with some ideas for an elegant, romantic meal. Including a cocktail that has never appeared on the blog. Enjoy!
A too-zoomed-in, oddly-angled, cluttered shot of Thai Beef Tacos from my first recipe review. Well, guys, as it turns out, doing hard things is actually…uh…HARD. I spent a good portion of January feeling frustrated, discouraged and overwhelmed. But I also had a lot of good things happen. And the good news is that despite what
Under His Touch by Jeffe Kennedy is a May-December boss-subordinate office romance, a setup that is complete catnip for me that nevertheless has epic potential to go really far wrong. I love huge age gaps in my romance (my husband and I are ten years apart) and I love the realism of office romances. But
