Grade: B-

Here’s a Harlequin Blaze that features a heroine who has had many, many lovers. And a magic vagina! What, you think I’m joking? This book is actually the 1st of a trilogy about 3 sisters who have “sexual healing” abilities. The author herself makes the joke somewhere in the book, but it really is like Charmed except their magic comes courtesy of their coochies, instead of cheap, skanky outfits and low-budget CGI. Charmed: Now More Soft-Core Pornish and Still No Shannen Doherty! Boo. One sister has a vagina like a magnet—-all she has to do is have sex with a guy and he becomes her devoted follower FOREVAH. One sister apparently makes men physically ill after a romp in bed with her. Worst. Power. Ever. But that’s another book. This particular sister is special. She has magical sex with a dude, experiences a wonderful connection with him, and the next day—-well, she wakes up and he’s gone. Nothing magical about that. It just means YOU’RE EASY AND THAT IS WHY THEY DON’T WANT YOU ANYMORE THE SECOND THEY TAG THE POODY, you thick bint! Or she makes ‘em all better and feelin’ like they want to conquer the world after a roll in the hay with her. Whatev. I still had an okay time reading this book. It was filled with good-intentioned people who just don’t know how to sit down and talk, but the h/h were likable, which made it a pretty painless read. For the most part.

Nikki McClellan, a veterinarian (of course she is!), is used to dating men, having magnificent sex with them, and getting dumped right after. Most of the time, she doesn’t even get a thank-you. Her last lover left her a note thanking her for sharing her magic vagina and making him feel like he could conquer the world… but adios, muchacha! Well, Nikki is tired of it. TIRED OF IT. She doesn’t want to be like her flighty mother who moves from lover to lover, taking her three daughters with her. But her loony Aunt Sophie has an explanation for all of this: all of the McClellan were bestowed with a magic vagina, courtesy of the plot contrivance gods. Nikki doesn’t want to believe it at first, but the more she thinks about it, the more it makes sense to her. The men she has sex with really are happier, healthier, and heartier after the fact. Which is why Nikki is immediately wary when she meets the Über-sexy, Über-tortured Dylan Cain, the owner of the house that Nikki wants to buy. One look at Dylan’s soulful eyes and Nikki’s magic hooha is tingling (her spider sense is located inside her vagina, past the cervix… just kidding). Courtesy of the “sexual healing stuff,” Nikki also has powers of empathy and realizes that Dylan is in deep, deep pain, and therefore in need of… well, getting shagged to pieces. But Nikki also really, really likes Dylan who’s all brooding and dark and artsy and stuff and she’s afraid that the moment she “heals” him, he’ll leave her just like the others did. But even after one night of shag-a-licious, fuck-till-you-walk-funny passion, Nikki finds that Dylan still wants to hang out. Could it be that her powers are bullshit… or is there something else wrong with Dylan?

Dylan Cain is a lawyer for his father’s firm. AND HE HATES IT. He wants to design houses and tend to his garden and do all sorts of creative stuff… don’t his parents understand?!?! STUPID PARENTS! Now Dylan is in even more pain because Kathy, the love of his life, died in an accident and she was the only one who ever got him. Dylan decides he just needs to move on and the first step to doing that is selling the house he had built for Kathy with his own bare hands. Unfortunately, the buyer of the house is a hot, hot, hot, sexy lady named Nikki that instantly gets the juices flowing to the parts of Dylan’s anatomy he had long ago suspected to have atrophied. He wants to… like, do with her and stuff, but he’s afraid he’s all… broken inside and has nothing else to give her but his hot, hot manly sausage. The two of them decide to make a deal: they’re going to have a seckshual relationship ONLY and nothing else. No frills, no pretty words, no nothing. NADA POR THE SEX. Just sex.

Stupid assholes. Don’t they know that shit never works?

Nikki is afraid that her magic vagina will “heal” Dylan and he’ll go away just like the others and she really, really likes him, so she holds back a little part of herself when they do it because she’s afraid of falling in love with him and getting all devastated when he finally leaves. Dylan, on the other hand, believes no one could ever truly love him because he’s broken inside and has nothing left to give because his sucky-ass parents and dead girlfriend have taken it all out of him. Nikki is a little neurotic, which is understandable, because her mother was a SLUTBAG-WHORE who could never settle down with just one man and she’s afraid of turning out like her. She wants to find one man to settle down with, but is afraid her magic vagina won’t let her do that. She’s a little whiny sometimes, but I did enjoy her relationship with her sisters because they’re all a little nuts. I was actually more interested in her dynamic with her sisters than her scenes with Dylan… and the sex just got repetitive at times. I understand that the two of them made a deal that it’s going to be “sex only,” but it is LITERALLY all they do… frankly, it just got boring. Dylan, on the other hand, while a sexy, sexy guy, can be a little tiresome with his whining about his pain and his parents not understanding him. YOU’RE A GROWN-ASS MAN, you emo-baby, GROW SOME BALLS! EEEEDIOT! He acts like a fifteen year old boy sometimes when what he should have done in the first place is to tell his RIDICULOUSLY EEEEVIL parents to shove it and walked away. So his parents didn’t love him and they wouldn’t let him do what he wanted… there’s a club for that… it’s called EVERYBODY and we meet at the bar on Tuesdays. There’s even a creepy-stalker-rich-girl bitch who wants to get her claws into Dylan and predictably tries to ruin things for everybody. Sigh. I think at one point, she actually tosses her head back and laughs maniacally, but don’t quote me on that.

There’s a part in this story where Dylan unloads all of his drama on poor Nikki in one sitting after a particularly energetic lovemaking session, which I guess was supposed to be cathartic or something, but it seemed… I don’t know… out of character. Our Dylan is a brooder, a “silent but intense” guy… getting him to talk should have been like… pulling teeth. But maybe Nikki’s magic vagina worked its magic on him or something. These two kids are all right and I would have enjoyed this book more if he and Nikki had just sat down and talked about themselves instead of just… shagging. Instead Nikki talks to ONE AND ALL about her sex life with Dylan (even an elderly uncle who was a former suitor of her mother’s) when the one person she should have been talking to is Dylan. Nonetheless, the sex scenes are hot, even though they got repetitive at one point, and I wish I were more convinced that these two kids have more between them than just hot sex and Nikki’s magic vagina. I am, however, intrigued about the rest of the books in this series and will be reading the next two books about the sisters, Tess and Erin. Even though my teeth should have shattered at one point from excessive gritting, I did enjoy reading this book for the most part and will be on the look-out for this author’s Blaze offerings in the future.

You may buy this book here.

Peace, love, and snarkage,

[Warning label courtesy of L.E. Bryce]

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 15th, 2007 at 9:15 am and is filed under Books, Grade: B, Romance: Contempo. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.