Tag: Romance

Following Chance – Baxter Brown

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Rating: 4 out of 5.
This was my first time reading Brown and I pleasantly surprised. Following Chance tells the story of Kate and Lauren and how they come together after 15 years apart. I found the story to be well written, with an interesting plot that made me want to continue reading even when I had other things to do. I’ll definitely be searching out Brown again in the future.

I didn’t enjoy the structure of the book at first – it’s written in alternating chapters between the past and the present for the majority of the book. However, this is very much a me thing – I found myself uncomfortable in the past chapters knowing that we were working towards the breakup of two people that in the present chapters are obviously meant to be together despite protestations. By the time we actually got to the breakup though I’d become much more comfortable with the structure and was actually beginning to enjoy it.

Kate in the present frustrated me for at least half of the book – her feelings for Lauren were clear and in typical me fashion I just wanted to shake this fictional character out of her own head. I did however love her sarcasm, her attitude towards parenting and her character in general. I loved the secondary characters of both daughters. Their sweet relationship and meddling in their mothers lives ended up making the story for me much more believable for me.

Whilst fairly predictable in its outcome, this is an enjoyable book that I would recommend reading when you’re looking for a well written, well paced romance with some attitude on the side.

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Sparks Like Ours (Seven Shores #3) – Melissa Brayden

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Rating: 4 out of 5.
It was really nice to go back to reading something light-hearted and pretty fun for a change of pace. I enjoyed this one more than the second instalment in the series, even though this is pretty predictable in it’s direction. I enjoyed catching up with the Seven Shores characters and thought this did a good job of covering the other characters lives as well as the MCs.

I’ve always enjoyed Gia’s character throughout the series – so it was nice to get her part of the story. Whilst I felt the direction of the book was predictable – it was at least interesting that the love story takes place between two major rivals. You don’t need to know or understand surfing to read this – there is barely any surfing terminology and any surfing scenes are brief – it concentrates far more on the characters. Elle’s journey is also written really well.

All in all this is a nice edition to the series, with the usual minor angst in places.

Consigned to Oblivion – B.C. Hedlund

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Rating: 4 out of 5.
It’s been a long time since I read a book like this, that forces you to read and digest every sentence, that doesn’t allow you to read quickly and skim. It was a welcome change. This is a beautifully written book, from a surprisingly young full length debut author. It’s definitely a coming of age story, but it will appeal to people of all ages.

The book is about Cassandra, a haunted teenager undertaking her senior year at high school, however it focusses a lot on her relationships with others in similar situations to her, that all have a reason to be drifting and how they exist in the world together. The book covers a number of difficult topics, death, suicide, family losses, self harm and mental health, and how all of these impact others. Hedlund describes the main character as blurring the lines between fiction and reality and this is definitely true – Cassandra is battling herself and others both internally and externally.

The path the book takes meant I really enjoyed the secondary characters of Rachel and Lily and Owen is well written. If you’re reading for the LBGTQ+ content – stick with it – it’s there.

Hedlund shows a lot of potential with this title and I hope to see more like this in the future.

I received a free copy of this book via Booksprout and am voluntarily leaving a review.

Sylver and Gold – Michelle Larkin

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Rating: 5 out of 5.
This was my first Michelle Larkin book and I wasn’t disappointed. I’d read a number of positive reviews for this book before I started and I have to say I agree with them all wholeheartedly – I loved reading this. I’m not normally one for anything to do with the paranormal in the books I read, but I found this to be a really good way of adding this element to a cop story in order to make it different.

I probably shouldn’t have made the decision to read this in the dark late at night – it is a bit creepy at times, but the thing that pleasantly surprised me was that although the book has lots of murder and other dark moments shared between the main characters, I was always left with a positive light feeling whilst reading.

I loved the interactions between Sylver and Gold, Mug the dog had real personality and I enjoyed the secondary characters. I thought the spirits were well written and meaningful and were used really effectively to continue the story moving forwards. I thought Sylver’s interactions with the spirits might get boring and repetitive but this wasn’t the case.

This one is definitely heading to my read again pile.

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Off Balance – L.E. Royal

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Rating: 4 out of 5.
I’m still struggling a little with how I feel about this book, even though I’ve sat on it for a while.

Firstly, it’s not quite a four star book – more of 3.75, so I’m rounding up. There are some parts of this book I really enjoyed and others that left me with a bit of a sour taste. I like a workplace romance, and an age-gap romance and I didn’t mind the power dynamic as such – I was uncomfortable with some of the conversations – however I can imagine someone saying these things – so they aren’t necessarily unrealistic.

I only know the basics of CP, so in order to review the work fairly I did a bit of reading. The depiction seems in line with the type of CP discussed in the book so whilst I’m not really qualified to discuss it in much more depth, I am disabled and relatively high functioning, so am comfortable talking about the feelings Elena displays, which to be fair, are mostly pretty much exactly how I’ve felt at times. Elena’s stubbornness and desire to ‘go it alone’ read very true, as does the impact of having a loving relationship on those feelings.

I loved the interactions with Maya’s daughter – Livvie – and Elena – in fact they were probably my favourite part of the book. I also really enjoyed the non-binary representation of Maya’s best friend, the use of pronouns and the discussion of introducing this to Livvie.

This is definitely worth a read – it just comes with a beware it isn’t a particularly light book.

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.