TBR Day: This Can't Be Love by Kasey Michaels

Woohooo! I made it for TBR Day this month! Go me! LOL. Hopefully, I'll have this review up in time ^_^; I've just spent the last couple of hours playing Bejeweled Blitz instead. Sigh.
Let see, I was looking for something to read last week-end. I opened one of my boxes and this was at the top of it. I simply picked it up and started reading :D


This Can't Be Love by Kasey Michaels
published by Zebra Kensington in March 2004

One Crazy Summer...

If Molly Applegate marches to the beat of a different drummer, it's probably a naked bongo player. Gorgeous and free-spirited, Molly's set for life – provided she stays employed ten months out of the year as stipulated in her parents' will. To keep the inheritance flowing, she works as a lingerie model, a mansion-sitter, a singing-slash-roller-skating carhop... you name it, Molly's done it. But a weekend gig babysitting her cousin Jane's daycare business might just lead to something permanent with would-be client Dom Longstreet. He's a Broadway producer who could make all her dreams come true... if only she'd let him...

Dom's idea of "summer vacation" is hosting a working retreat for the cast of his upcoming musical spectacular. Sure, he's also promised to babysit his niece and nephew for two weeks, but that's what the local daycare center is for, right? Unfortunately, the place will be closed just when he needs it, according to the beautiful – and exasperating – woman he finds in charge. In exchange for room and board on his estate, Molly Applegate agrees to watch the kids. But Dom can't stop watching Molly, who's fast becoming the unlikeliest of muses... and maybe – just maybe – his perfect leading lady...

Genre: Contemporary romance
Series: Sequel to This Must Be Love

The Story: Dominic Longstreet is a successful Broadway shows producer who works hard and plays hard. While his brother (the lyricist) is on his second honeymoon, Dominic is supposed to enjoy himself and take a break. Instead, he's scheduled practices and rehearsals and therefore, needs someone to keep an eye on his niece and nephew and out of his way... which is why he enrolled them in Preston Kiddy Kare. However, Preston Kiddy Kare is closing for its annual two weeks vacation and as a result, Dominic has a little problem on his hand.

Molly Applegate was helping out her cousin taking care of Preston Kiddy Kare. She's intrigued and interested by Dominic and therefore decides to play nanny for the next two weeks. Molly is an heiress and her parents will stipulates that she has to work 10 out of 12 months in order to access her trust fund. Being a nanny qualifies, so all is good :)

Quickly, Molly's joie de vivre becomes contagious and Dom realizes that he indeed really needs to relax... and also works on his relationships with his niece and nephew. Then, there's this wild attraction between Molly and Dom, but he's put out as Molly keeps warning him that she'll be gone as soon as the two weeks are over... Unfortunately, Dom cannot solely focus on winning Molly over as he has to deal with his diva stars.

My Opinion: This Can't Be Love was a mixed bag for me. On one hand, I really liked the characters and the storyline, but the romance was a bit so-so.

I was really surprised at how quickly I was engaged by this book. I really liked Molly's character. Her joie-de-vivre really reached me; she was simply so fun and everyone around her had fun. All the other characters were quite interesting as well. I liked our hero, Dom Longstreet. Dom works hard, is a bit arrogant and temperamental. All the characteristics you would find in a good and successful producer. He's not a stuff shirt, so it's not exactly the "happy-go-lucky heroine thaws stuff-shirt hero" trope, but close enough :) I thought the kids, Lizzie and Little Tony, were fun. Poor kids though, named after their own parents ^_^; They weren't too cutesy and they were really part of the storyline, so that I really enjoyed :) As for the rest of the cast, they were fun albeit a bit stereotypical :)

The story is pretty simple but it works :) I liked the fact that Molly's identity as an heiress wasn't the big secret, the big conflict. Even Molly's issues were okay with me, because they were believable. What I didn't like was that they mess the romance. Molly and Dom kept going back and forth - get together or not get together. Have sex, but does it mean more or not? I thought it made the whole book draggy in the middle. The romance was also very fast, so it was hard to keep track what Molly and Dom were feeling about the relationship :(

It's unfortunate, because I loved the rest of This Can't Be Love. There were some very fun scenes and I had a few LOL moments :) The proposal scene with the attorney as a witness was great LOL. However, I just feel that the romance was not up par with the rest of the book and it definitively dragged it down :(

My Grade: B. All in all, This Can't Be Love was a fun book with great characters :) It was very easy to get in, but the difficulty was staying in. It's really unfortunate the romance wasn't better. However, I'm very glad I read it, because it was a book focused on the characters and relationships and it reminded me of how much I enjoy Ms Michaels' contemporary romances :) I do have This Must Be Love somewhere in my TBR pile, so I'll try to dig that one out soon.

Review: Dial M for Mischief by Kasey Michaels

Dial M for Mischief by Kasey Michaels
published by HQN in May 2008

Meet the Sunshine girls — three mischievous sisters out to clear their father's name ... and maybe get a little romance on the side.

Hollywood darling Jolie Sunshine is accustomed to trashy headlines. But the shocking gossip surrounding her father's sudden demise has sent her over the edge ... right into the arms of millionaire Sam Becket.

Jolie and Sam once shared much more than a bed, till fame ended their escalating relationship. Now that very limelight is bringing them back together. With a murder to solve and a white-hot passion to quench, they're really about to give the paparazzi a field day.

Genre: contemporary romance
Series: The Sunshine Girls, book #1

The Story: Teddy Sunshine-father to Jade, Jolie and Jessica Sunshine-was a cop turned private investigator. The police and public believe that Teddy committed suicide after he killed the wife of a politician; however, the Sunshine girls know better and they are determined to clear his name. In order to do so, they re-visit some cold cases that their father has caught as a cop and kept investigating years after years after years.

My Opinion: Ms Michaels dabbles in a bit of everything: contemporary, mystery and historicals... I usually enjoy her contemporary romance books very, which is why I bought Dial M for Mischief... but not this one.

My main issue with Dial M for Mischief was the Sunshine girls. Ugh. They are all very strong women with strong personalities and somehow, it grated on my nerve, because they kept arguing between each other and against other people. They won't sit down, discuss things and listen to others' opinions. They just barged in, bulldozing whatever is in their way. All three of them. I don't mind one hard-headed heroine... but three is a bit too much to make a storyline enjoyable. Although their reasoning is correct, their attitude is just disagreable.

In this book, the romance is between Jolie Sunshine and Sam Becket. They were engaged 5 years ago, but suddenly, Jolie left to pursue her dreams in Hollywood and is now a superstar. Well good for her, but ugh for me. I don't like starlet characters... sometimes it works out, but most of the time, they just annoy me and Jolie is no exception. What frustrates me most with Jolie and Sam is that they were obviously in love, but they couldn't compromise. I mean, they could have work it out... but no, Sam was too proud and expected her coming home running and Jolie, well seriously... You don't just leave the way she did or else, don't accept the man's proposal. It was totally selfish on her part. Anyway, I usually enjoy past lovers relationship;however, in this case, it was meh.

Character-wise, well the focus was on Jolie and Sam. The sisters had some screen-time, but it was limited and their counterparts (future heroes) were introduced without too much dwellings. For some reason though, I liked the men better. I guess that I found the women too selfish and careless of the people around them. So, the main characters... I started out liking Sam a lot... He's a wealthy businessman, level-headed and a bit anal, LOL :P and I think he deserves better than Jolie. Towards the end though, I thought he was just too passive. It was like he didn't have any opinions at all and just followed and helped Jolie. Jolie, well she's a Sunshine girls and you know what I thought of them.

As for the mystery thread in this book, it was resolved a bit too easily and I'm not sure the sisters actually did any work. Sure, they interrogated a few people and look around, but for me, it's not enough to solve a case. It seems their father did most of the work and they simply had to follow his leads, but at the end, the resolution was way to easy and unrelated to Teddy's death... it almost felt like a filler.

Another issue I had was the book was too busy. There was too much going on... Teddy's death, the introduction of the characters, the setting-up for the trilogy, the romance between Sam & Jolie, the dynamics of the sisters, the cases and etc. Ms Michaels tried to put the romance as the focus, but it was just going back and forth with other elements. I guess that's why the mystery suffered so much. I think it have been better if less was going on.

My Grade: C-. Ms Michaels gives a good effort, but the characters are too irritating for this to be an enjoyable read.

Reads of the week-end

Hey everyone :D

So is everyone alive? It's been real quiet on blogland this week-end, but I guess that's because everyone's personal life is catching up + Thanksgiving. However, I do hope it comes back to normal soon. Oh and I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving :D and for non-US folks, I hope you had a nice week-end!

So guess what? Yeah, I finished my presentation! well at least the slides... now, I have to figure out what to say... and stupid as I am, I just realized that my results were the opposite of what I was expecting. Euh, really not fun!!! Anyway, I'm pretty proud of myself for the slides (I did very little powerpoint presentation)... So today, I have a practice... okay, that's not going to go well... The worst thing now is that my shoulders hurt as if there's a huge weight that sat on them, plus I'm always sighing... Another sign that I'm stressed. It's as if I need more air in my lungs and when I exhaled, it comes out as a sigh. Annoys my mom a lot :P Anyway, my torture is almost done! almost! Can't wait for it!

So, having to do my presentation didn't stop me from reading... Far from it. I finished two books over this week-end and here are the reviews:

Stuck in Shangri-La by Kasey Micheals: 3.5/5

Darcy Reed was once engaged to Cameron Pierce; however, all this is over. At least, that's what Darcy thinks... Until her uncle Horry dies. In his will, Horry leaves everything to Lucky, the 20 pounds bad-tempered cat that Darcy has given him 3 years ago, and stipulates that Darcy and Cameron have to co-habit in Shangri-La, his huge Victorian house, for a month if Darcy is to inherit the house or else, everything will be left to Uncle Edwin (who's never been part of the family). Of course, not everyone is happy, esp. Lily, Horry long-time housekeeper.

Okay, another synopsis that doesn't make sense. I think it's because my brain is tired. Basically, here is the break-down: Darcy is 26 y.o. and Cameron is 34. Cameron is ready to settle down and thought that Darcy wanted the same; however, Darcy just graduated from school and she wants to discover herself, see if she can do it on her own and stuff like that. So during an argument, Darcy blurts out that she has a 5 years career plans and only after that, will she settle down to have kids. This lead to an even bigger argument and when the next day, Darcy comes too Cameron's office to apologize, she sees him kissing his ex-gf. Of course, she blows up thing, break the engagement and moves to Pittsburg for her new job. Cameron wants to go after her, but Uncle Horry tells him to wait, that she needs space. Horry is an eccentric man and he changed his will as part of a plan to bring back Cameron and Darcy together... unfortunately, he never expected to really die. So now, he "haunts" his house and keeps Lucky company and see how all this mess is turning out.

So, so, so. Let's start with: I liked Cameron and I really wish I could meet a guy like him :P He really loves Darcy and he's making efforts to get to know her (because in Darcy's opinion, he doesn't) and he was going to make even more efforts to have a long-distance relationship once Darcy went back to Pittsburg and wait for her to be ready to settle-down. I mean, the guy is almost the dream guy... Okay, he does assume a lot of things and he's a guy, but if she talked to him instead of arguing, always jumping and taking everything as a criticism, I'm sure Darcy and Cameron could have work out something. Which brings me to Darcy. She's not bad, but she's annoying. She accuses Cameron of not listening, but she's not doing any efforts either. She says that she doesn't know herself and she needs to discover who she is... but in that case, how can you blame the guy for not knowing you? Also, I'm sure that she could have figured it out while still being engaged to Cameron. Man, I mean, they had a comfortable relationship. Anyway... I liked Uncle Horry and Lucky, Lucky was so damn sarcastic that it was funneh :D I gues this was meant to be a light comedy as the secondary characters are really exaggerated. Anyway, the story wasn't bad overall, but because I found the conflict avoidable and Darcy annoying, it did damper a bit the enjoyment. I also thought that some things were left unexplained: why was Cameron kissing his ex? Why did Uncle Horry not leave his house ever? Little details... So not a bad book, but Everything's coming up Rosie was better.

The Invisible Ring by Anne Bishop: 4/5

Jared is a Red-Jeweled Warlord that has become a pleasure slave. Because he has killed the Queen he was servicing, he is now sentenced to the salt mines where he will suffer and suffer and suffer. However, for some unfathomable reasons, the Gray Lady (who everyone fears) has bought him at the slave auction saving him from the salt mines... But Jared is afraid, because of the rumors he've heard. No slaves that the Gray Lady has bought have ever returned.

At the same time, Dorothea SaDiabolo wants the Gray Lady dead, because she is one of true Queen and standing in Dorothea's way. So she gives this mission to her new Master of Guard with the threat that if this mission isn't successful, he'll suffer a very very sad and bad and painful fate.

Well, well, well. This is not part of the Black Jewels trilogy; however, the story occurs in the same world. Only two characters from the Black Jewels trilogy makes an appearance tho: Dorothea (who cares about her) and Daemon! Youppi! It was kind of cool to see Daemon in this story, because by the way, the story happens before the Black Jewels. So Daemon is real suave and all. The nice thing is that you don't really get to know what Daemon is thinking, but you get to see how others see him. So that was cool. As for the story itself, well Jared and the Gray Lady were nice characters. Strong and all. It had an interesting secondary characters cast as well and I did enjoy the book :P It's in the same vain as the Black Jewels trilogy really. Basically, the Gray Lady is going back to her territory along with the slaves she bought; however, she knows that there is a certain wrongness in the group and so she is making detours and all to figure out what is the wrongness and at the same time, avoid whoever wants her dead. If you liked the Black Jewels trilogy, you'll certainly enjoy this book as well.

The only thing I'm still figuring out is what does The Invisible Ring mean really?


So I'll go back to figure what I'm going to say for my presentation :P See you all later!

Reads of the week

Hello :D

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone who celebrated it yesterday :D

nothing much to say, still working on my presentation... it's going slow-motion... extreme slow-motion :P

anyway, here are my reads of the week:

Good Girls Do by Cathie Linz: 2.75/5

My initial intention was to get Bad Girls Don't, but I didn't find it (would have had to go to another bookstore and I was lazy), so I got the first book of the "series" instead which is Good Girls Do.

Julia has been a librarian in the small-town Serenity's Falls for the past 3 years. She likes it there, actually love it as it provides her the stability that she lacked when she grew up with her New Age mom and little sister, always moving. However, her peaceful heaven turns into hell when the town bad boy, Luke Maguire, comes back after his father's death to settle family business and when Angel, Skye and Toni, respectively Julia's mother, sister and 4 y.o niece, show up at Julia's door. So in this little town where everyone knows everyone's secret, Julia and Luke have sparks, Julia's family is disrupting her life and in addition, Julia learns that her father is not dead.

Well the book wasn't bad per se, but I don't know... I found it a bit boring. Julia and Luke's characters were kind of bland... Luckily, Julia's family and the town's wackos kind of save the book with comedy relief. See, Julia has never fit in and she wants to fit in. Although she feels guilty about it, Julia can't help but think that her family is a disruption and that's pretty much the part I didn't like. The book pretty much focus on Julia and so, you don't really get to know Luke that much. I don't really know what to say... it wasn't bad, just bland. The book happens on a timeline of 6 months and too much things that aren't important happen and too little important things don't happen. I'm still planning to get Bad Girls Don't and I bet it'll be better, based on Sandie's review :P

Everything's Coming Up with Rosie by Kasey Micheals: 4.25/5

Douglas has enjoyed his bachelor life... a lot. However, now that he's just turned 40, he has some questions and some wonders. Does he really want to be nominated as Most Eligible Bachelor of Philadelphia again? Douglas is going to his second cousin's daugther's wedding... with the wedding party during a week. Already, he is dreading the matchmaking that his second cousin has in mind... However, the moment he shows up to the wedding, Rosie Kilgannon walks in his arms and asks him to kiss her like he means it. From here on, Douglas' life will never be the same.

When I read the synopsis of the book, I didn't realize that the wedding party would be a week-long... and so I was wondering, "yeah, Rosie is gonna kiss Douglas, they're going to feel an attraction for each other and what after? Go back to their regular life where they'll be pining for each other and then, call each other for dates and all" not that it would have been a bad book... but having the wedding party a week-long where Douglas and Rosie will spend almost every minute wit each other is a better idea. Basically, Rosie is just outrageous, but in a good way. She's 32 y.o. and very straightforward and honest. She tells what she thinks and likes to meddle in others' business. What I like about her is that she's very confident in herself and knows herself well. As for Douglas, well yeah, at 40 he's starting to ask himself some questions. It's time for him to change some things... Basically, I like Douglas and Rosie's interactions and their conversations :D

Aside from Rosie and Douglas discovering each other, what else is happening? Well plenty... to start with a groom that was bought to marry the bride... a bride that is not in love with the groom but goes on because if not, her mother will have a cow.... The mother who is obsessed with appearance and prestige... A father that at this point just doesn't care... Lots is happening and I doubt you'll find any of this boring :P

I got this book because of the great review at All About Romance and I agree with it (which I rarely do:P) Seriously, this book is worth it :D