Heaven, Texas by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Rating: 5 ♥ ♥ ♥

Review: Gracie Snow is supposed to escort ex-football star Bobby Tom Denton to the set of the movie that he is very very late to film. Bobby Tom is bound and determined to drag his feet and take his time getting there, but he didn't count on a tenacious wallflower like Gracie. She will do whatever she needs to do to get his gorgeous butt there and save her job. And she will fall in love with her charge along the way....

There are so many things about this book I loved, I just don't know where to start. It's a little odd I loved it so much. What kind of name is Bobby Tom? What is WITH his fashion sense?? Yuck! Why does Gracie need to be plain to start?? And yet, I loved Bobby Tom so much I graciously overlooked his atrocious name and flashy apparel because how could you NOT love him? He's just so outrageous in the most adorable way. And Gracie! Poor dear! You really feel for her. She feels so boring and plain, but with the help of a makeover she starts to feel pretty for the first time ever! This book just had so much heart and emotion and it was just plain old fashioned FUN!! And I just adored the secondary romance between his mom and the town "bad guy". It was almost sweeter than the romance between Bobby Tom and Gracie. But not quite. I could just go on and on, but I'll stop now. Clearly I am keeping this one around!

Stranger in my Arms by Lisa Kleypas

Rating: 5 ♥

Back cover:

"Lady Hawksworth, your husband is not dead."

With those words, Lara's life turned upside down. Hunter, Earl of Hawksworth, had been lost at sea. Or so she'd been told. Their unhappy marriage—with its cold caresses and passionless kisses—was over. But now a powerful, virile man stood before her, telling secrets only a husband could know, and vowing she would once again be his wife in every way. While Lara couldn't deny that this man with smoldering dark eyes resembled Hunter, he was attentive and loving in ways he never was before. Soon she desperately wanted to believe, with every beat of her heart, that this stranger was truly her husband. But had this rake reformed—or was Lara being seduced by a cunning stranger?

Review: I LOOOVED this book. It was not quite like anything I have read before. I thought it was wonderful and romantic and I enjoyed seeing Lara grow her backbone back and learn to love her husband. But not her husband. How confusing. hahaha! I thought Hunter (but not Hunter) was really sweet and endearing. This is one of those books where as you're reading you think 'how sweet', but in the back of your mind you know that in real life it would actually be a little creepy that this guy who is clearly NOT her dead husband comes to take his place. Still, it's not hard to love this story. I do sort of wish we got to know more about the new Hunter, but the author just decided that we should only know him by his new identity. We learn just enough about who he was, but clearly we are meant to look forward and not behind. I do so love a Kleypas novel!

Wind Rider by Connie Mason

Rating: 4 ♥

Review: Hannah, an indentured servant from Ireland, escapes her abusive master running into the wilderness, and gets herself captured by Wind Rider, a white man raised by the Cheyenne. When she saves his life after he is injured, he decides to take her back to his camp. But this is a turbulent time for the indian nation, and the "white eyes" are looking to extinguish them all. Hannah falls in love with Wind Rider (aka Ryder, his birth name) and agrees to marry him, while also trying to convince him that he needs to return to the white world and try to help his Cheyenne people from that side.

I enjoyed this romp. It was a fun 90's style romance, which is really my favorite era for both books and music. It moved along at a good clip and kept my attention.

The Legend by Kathleen Givens

Rating: 4

From the author's site:

It's a time of portents, when a tree split by the fiery crack of lightning foretells the history of a land. And two lovers have been chosen by destiny to make the legend come true. She is Ellen Graham, a highborn lass who swears never to marry except for passion. He is James MacCurrie, the mysterious Highlander with dark blue eyes who rescues her from the point of a sword. But the very fate that has brought them together also contrives to keep them apart. For this is also an age of brother fighting brother, when a warrior's cold will can still the warmth of his own loving heart....

Review: I enjoyed this story and look forward to The Destiny. I expected a little more, but I found it pleasant, if not entirely exciting. The characters were enjoyable and endearing. I felt like the tree prophesy plot line needed to be fleshed out a bit more, but I would reccomend this book to anyone who enjoys a good Scottish romance!

It Had to be You by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Rating: 5 ♥

The Windy City isn't quite ready for Phoebe Somerville -- the outrageous, curvaceous New York knockout who has just inherited the Chicago Stars football team. And Phoebe is definitely not prepared for the Stars' head coach Dan Celebow, a sexist jock taskmaster with a one-track mind. Celebow is everything Phoebe abhors.

Review: I thought I didn't like SEP, having tried one of her oldies once up a time and hating it and never finishing it, so I read this book kicking and screaming. I stopped screaming soon into starting it. Wow!!!!! Lets just say that I wasn't half way through before I made a mad dash for my local UBS and bought out everything they had of hers. Talk about a turn around! I nearly got whiplash! Utterly fabulous. I found it funny, sexy (wowser), and it had a lot of heart. I have never read anything quite like it before. Phoebe was a wonderful heroine -- one of my favorite types. The type who has a public face that is so unlike who she really is, and the hero catches a glimpse of the real woman and stops at nothing to 'unmask' her and find out what makes her tick. I LOVED Dan. He's a wonderful hero and also one of my favs -- uncivilized. I do love me an uncivilized and rough around the edges hero. Yum.

The Prize by Brenda Joyce

Rating: 3

An infamous sea captain of the British Royal Navy, Devlin O'Neill is consumed with the need to destroy the man who brutally murdered his father. Having nearly ruined the Earl of Eastleigh financially, he is waiting to strike the final blow. And his opportunity comes in the form of a spirited young American woman, the earl's niece, who is about to set his cold, calculating world on fire.…

Born and raised on a tobacco plantation, orphan Virginia Hughes is determined to rebuild her beloved Sweet Briar. Daringly, she sails to England alone, hoping to convince her uncle to lend her the funds. Instead, she finds herself ruthlessly kidnapped by the notorious Devlin O'Neill, and will soon find her best-laid plans thwarted by a passion that could seal their fates forever.…

Review: I read the back cover and thought it might be like her book "The Game" which was just fabulous, but alas, it was sooooo not. I found it crushingly disappointing. It's one saving grace was the fact that the heroine liked sex. With a Joyce book you just never know if you're getting a heroine who thinks it's icky or not. *snicker* Seriously, I wound up skimming half of the book, never really caring about the characters or what happened to them. The hero was just too bitter and mean. Oh well. The cover is pretty.

Beast by Judith Ivory

Rating: 4

Synopsis: An exquisite American heiress, Louise Vandermeer is beautiful, brilliant. . . and bored-which is why she has agreed to a daring adventure: to travel across the ocean to marry an aristocrat abroad. Rumor has it her intended is a hideous cad-a grim prospect that propels her into a passionate, reckless affair with a compelling stranger she never sees in the light of day.

Though scarred by a childhood illness, Charles d'Harcourt has successfully wooed Europe's most sophisticated beauties. For a lark, he contrived to travel incognito on his own fiancee's ship-and seduce the young chit in utter darkness. But the rake's prank backfired. It was he who was smitten-while the hot-tempered Lulu, now his wife, loves only her shipboard lover, unaware it was d'Harcourt all the time! And Charles will never have her heart-unless he can open her eyes to the prince who hides within.

Review: This is one of those books that i have mixed feelings about. Love the writing, love the love scenes, love the hero, love the setting and beauty and the beast theme. It was very much like Woodiwiss's A Rose in Winter, which I just adored. The only thing that kept this book from being a 5 and favorite was that silly twit of a heroine. She's 18, and it shows. I felt her immaturity in every scene, and it just really detracted from the story for me. But I must say that I was really pleasantly surprised with this author. I have never read Judith Ivory before, and this will certainly not be my last, because she really is a fabulous writer! She is both easy to read and intelligent, which is harder to achieve than you might think. Over all I would definitely recommend this book -- the heroine wasn't bad enough for me to dislike it.

Duke of Shadows by Meredith Duran

Rating: 5 ♥

Sick of tragedy, done with rebellion, Emmaline Martin vows to settle quietly into British Indian society. But when the pillars of privilege topple, her fiancé's betrayal leaves Emma no choice. She must turn for help to the one man whom she should not trust, but cannot resist: Julian Sinclair, the dangerous and dazzling heir to the Duke of Auburn.

In London, they toast Sinclair with champagne. In India, they call him a traitor. Cynical and impatient with both worlds, Julian has never imagined that the place he might belong is in the embrace of a woman with a reluctant laugh and haunted eyes. But in a time of terrible darkness, he and Emma will discover that love itself can be perilous — and that a single decision can alter one's life forever.

A lifetime of grief later, in a cold London spring, Emma and Julian must finally confront the truth: no matter how hard one tries to deny it, some pasts cannot be disowned...and some passions never die.

Review: Loooove. Like the book in the previous post, this book is by a newby author, and was also a huge hit in the romance community. Unlike the previous book, I adored it. This book was a little dark, but I found I enjoyed that about it. I find my tastes are changing lately, and these darker more dramatic, less conventional books are appealing to me more and more. I found it totally engrossing, and quite amazing. The emotional journey and healing after so much tragedy and grief by both hero and heroine was really wonderful. Ahhh the scene where they are re-united was amazing. This is one of those book that will never fade into the woodwork of my mind -- it will stay with me for a very long time.

The Spymaster's Lady by Joanna Bourne

Rating: 3 1/2

She's braved battlefields. She's stolen dispatches from under the noses of heads of state. She's played the worldly courtesan, the naïve virgin, the refined British lady, even a Gypsy boy. But Annique Villiers, the elusive spy known as the Fox Cub, has finally met the one man she can't outwit...

British spymaster Robert Grey must enter France and bring back the brilliant, beautiful-and dangerous-Fox Cub. His duty is to capture her and her secrets for England. When the two natural enemies are thrown into prison, they forge an uneasy alliance to break free. But their pact is temporary and betrayal seems inevitable as the fates of nations hang in the balance.

Review: I feel pretty guilty about my rating of this book. I know it's been a huge hit in the romance reader community, but I had trouble with this one. First, the good things: it was well written, and very unusual -- never read a book with quite this kind of theme before. There were several parts that I thought were fabulous (on the stagecoach before separating, and when he saves her in England in the ally-- both parts were amazing), but a couple of fabulous portions do not a great book make. The heroine's speech patterns were distracting to me, and I got a little tired of her trying to kill the hero. By later half of the book I was starting to skim (which I hate to do), and I found all the details thrown at me in the conclusion too much too late. I wish we had had all those details doled out over the course of the book. Over all, I found it enjoyable, and since I have the second book on my shelf already I'll go ahead and read it, but I won't be dashing for it anytime soon or likely buying more.

The Magic of Ordinary Days by Ann Howard Creel

Rating: 5 ♥

Olivia Dunne, a studious minister's daughter who dreams of being an archaeologist, never thought that the drama of World War II would affect her quiet life in Denver. An exhilarating flirtation reshapes her life, though, and she finds herself banished to a rural Colorado outpost, married to a man she hardly knows. Overwhelmed by loneliness, Olivia tentatively tries to establish a new life, finding much-needed friendship and solace in two Japanese American sisters who are living at a nearby internment camp. When Olivia unwittingly becomes an accomplice to a crime and is faced with betrayal, she finally confronts her own desires.

Review: One Sunday evening I caught the movie form of this book on Hallmark. I loved it. A few days later my good friend emailed me very excited about a book and insisted I had to read it. She was already on her third reading of it. When it occurred to me that it was the same as the movie, I was intrigued!! I wasn't so sure I was going to like the book -- I thought it might be kind of Janette Oke-ish in book form, and I outgrew Janette Oke by my 16th birthday. But despite my misgivings, I checked it out from the library and dived in. It was one of those books that you're going along reading and thinking, 'hm it's good, but not great', and then before you know it your completely enamored.

It was amazing. There are so many layers and so much emotion and heart in this story, it just blew me away. Way better than the movie. I think the screenwriter for the movie missed the whole point of the book -- literally. Part of the story was totally different in the movie and was inconsistent with what the book is saying.

In life we make choices. Sometimes things work out better than we thought they ever could, and sometimes they don't. But not matter what choices we make there are ALWAYS consequences. We need to think about our choices and reactions and actions and think about what might happen as a result. And who we might hurt and effect with our actions.

I also appreciated the message that it's OK to live an ordinary life! There is NOTHING wrong with that! We can't all be destined to wander the globe and have adventures.

I just can't say enough good things about this book -- it's a must read and I am going to have to get a copy to keep.

The Red Diary by Toni Blake

Rating: 4

HE’S UNCOVERING HER SECRET DESIRES

TO FULFILL HER EVERY FANTASY

When Nick Armstrong finds the red diary, he’s shocked…and aroused. Here, in intimate detail, prim and proper Lauren Ash records her most secret fantasies. He knows he should never read it again, but the temptation is too hard to resist. Never before has he come across anything so private-or so sensual. Never before has he found such a potent weapon for righting an old wrong.

His strategy: seduce her, make her fall in love, then break her heart. He’ll be her dream lover in the flesh, weaving an erotic spell to free the passionate woman inside her. But Lauren is casting her own tantalizing magic, forcing him to let go of the past and surrender to her, body and soul.

Review: Fun, sexy and steamy! This isn't very heavy but it doesn't try to be -- just a fun easy read!! Enjoyed it.

Lover Revealed by J.R. Ward

Rating: 4 1/2 ♥

Butch O'Neal is a fighter by nature. A hard-living ex-homicide cop, he's the only human ever to be allowed in the inner circle of the Black Dagger Brotherhood. And he wants to go even deeper into the vampire world-to engage in the turf war with the lessers. His heart belongs to a female vampire, Marissa, an aristocratic beauty who's way out of his league. And if he can't have her, then at least he can fight side by side with the Brothers.

But fate curses him with the very thing he wants. When Butch sacrifices himself to save a civilian vampire from the slayers, he falls prey to the darkest force in the war. Left for dead, he's found by a miracle, and the Brotherhood calls on Marissa to bring him back, though even her love may not be enough to save him.

Review: I thought this book was amazing!! So many new developments in the story! I didn't really feel like this book was much about the romance though. Maybe because much of the romance was developed in previous books between the two, Ward felt freer to go into other aspects of the story -- and what stunning ones they are. The romance was there and it was good, but it took more of a backseat than it has in any of the other books so far. Very, very much looking forward to Vhishous's story next!

Through a Dark Mist by Marsha Canham

Rating: 5 ♥

In the dark forests of medieval England, En route to her wedding, Lady Servanne's party is attacked by notorious Black Wolf and his band. Her kingdom's future is changed forever when she and Black Wolf submit to their growing passion, and he claims to be the true heir to her future husband's title.

This book was amazing and wonderful. It was a sweeping epic ride from start to finish with lots of swash buckling, adventure, romance, and intrigue. Very much a re-telling sort of Robin Hood story, I was thoroughly swept up in the story from start to finish -- Marsha Canham is a masterful story teller!!

Then Came You by Lisa Kleypas

Rating: 4 1/2 ♥

She thought her heart was safe, but . . .

Reckless, wild, and beautiful, Lily Lawson delights in shocking proper London society — and now she is determined to rescue her sister from an unwanted impending marriage to the notorious Alex, Lord Raiford, by fair means or foul. But while she succeeds outrageously, Alex is a master gamesman who is not to be undone.

Alex has lost one bride, yet he is enchanted by this remarkable lady who is willing to break any rule to flaunt her independence. When Lily offers him only scorn, he counters with kindness, and he parries her blistering barbs with gentle words and a soft, tender touch. The spirited miss will pay dearly for her interference — with her body, her soul, and her stubborn, unyielding heart. But will Alex's own heart be the prize to be won in this sensuous game of love?

Review: Oh this was just lovely. I enjoyed this one immensely!!! Lily is a mass of contradictions -- I love heroines who have a public persona and a private one. I think it gives them real interest -- it makes the hero want to figure out what makes her tick, and I find that whole process enjoyable to 'watch'. Lily is a feisty heroine without being immature or shrewish. I love Alex and Lily.

Firestorm by Brenda Joyce

Rating: 3

Storm Bragg could outshoot and outride any man, but her family decided it was time she traded in her buckskins for a ballgown and made her debut in San Francisco society.Quickly pursued by every eligible gentleman in town, the young hellcat from Texas had eyes for only one, and he was no gentleman. Brett D'Archand was a self-made success -- arrogant, impossibly attractive, blatantly sensual -- and looking for a wife who would give him respectability.

Storm was completely bewitched by him, but she made him lose his head as well as his heart. And, threatened by scandal and ruin, they are forced to wed -- a tempestuous union of free spirits, shackled only by the irrepressible bonds of love.

Review: Oh for heavens sake. Storm made me just batty. What a shrew!! Their constant fighting was not only not sexy or romantic, it was boring as heck. If memory serves, they are still fighting in the last chapter of the book. It was just a little mentally exhausting. Why did I keep reading this book? I'm not really sure.

Highland Outlaw by Monica McCarty

Handsome and dangerous, Patrick MacGregor is a wanted man, possessing the tough, tenacious spirit of his outlawed clan. He will stop at nothing to save his people from destruction, even if it means marrying Elizabeth Campbell, the daughter of his worst enemy. Yet the flaxen-haired beauty disarms him from the start. Her sweet, unspoiled softness touches the cold depths of his ravaged soul–and makes him want much more than revenge.

Inside the shy and dutiful Lizzie is a passionate woman longing to emerge, a woman ready for love. So when the piercing emerald eyes and searing kiss of a stranger spark in her a desperate hunger, she surrenders to Patrick’s glorious seduction–unaware that his daring deception has just found its one and only chance for redemption: a love more powerful than hate.

Review: Good and enjoyable, but I found the plot somewhat forgettable.... For example: I read this 3 months ago and I am sitting here having trouble remembering what happened in the story that I loved. I thought their first meeting was fabulous and sweet, but over all I didn't find it a keeper.....

As You Desire by Connie Brockway

Rating: 4

He galloped across the midnight-shrouded landscape, racing toward her on his pure white steed. Her destiny...In her wildest fantasies Desdemona Carlisle could not have conjured a more dashing savior, and this was real. But an unlikelier hero was hard to find. Harry Braxton was a rouge, a scoundrel, and a born opportunist who had already broken her heart once. How could she ever trust a notorious rake who came with a warning: lover, beware...

With her bronze-gold hair and quicksilver grace, the sloe-eyed beauty was every man's desire and one man's sole passion. But the secret that had made Harry an exile also made it impossible for him to offer Desdemona more that friendship. Until his aristocratic cousin laid siege to Desdemona's heart and Harry, damning the consequences, vowed to do anything, give anything, to claim her for him own...

Review: I had high expectations for this book having adored "My Dearest Enemy", and while this was a good solid read, I wanted more. I was loving it until Harry seemed to lose his back bone. I felt like he didn't fight for Desdemona enough. The setting was unusual (India) and interesting, and the characters were good, they just didn't befriend me.