Grade: B+

The horror of reading Bedded, or Wedded? last week sent me running back to the safety of my keeper shelf and the first thing I reached for was an old beloved comfort read, Obsession, by my favourite ever Mills and Boon author, Charlotte Lamb. I fucking love this book. *Sighs happily*.

The Cover

The UK cover is one of the classic ‘black rose’ covers of the late 70s/early 80s. Love these black rose covers - so kitsch with their garish colours and the piss-poor paintings on the covers. Every time I look at one, I feel nostalgic fondness.

In 1980, when Obsession was first published, I was seven. My mum was a big Mills & Boon fan and she kept her stash hidden away in my wardrobe. Me and my friends used to get piles of them out and lay them out on my bedroom floor, trying to decide who was the prettiest heroine or the handsomest hero (and because I was seven, I always picked out a Violet Winspear one with a h/h that looked like Ken and Barbie).

The cover of Obsession has a perfect 1980 aesthetic. With that haircut and outfit and the very perky boobies, the heroine is totally channelling Jane Fonda in Nine to Five, which is kind of appropriate seeing as this is one of those boss/secretary romances. And can I just say that I love the title? I hate the long tabloidy headlines Mills & Boon use now. This is just one word, and it’s relevant to the story. Nice.

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[Bam’s Note: Ann read these books one after the other. In ONE sitting. That’s dedication. Oh, and here be spoilers. Lots of ‘em.]

Okay, first, I cannot keep the titles straight. If Bam wants to fix this she can, but otherwise, whatever. Y’all will know what I’m talking about. Oh, and I’m not worried about spoilers. I figure everyone else in the known world has read these so big deal, right? But you have been warned.

Book 1 - Hello, wildly oscillating POV. I usually can’t stand books that open in the POV of someone who’s gonna die. Or hell, someone who isn’t a protagonist. JR Ward writes well enough that it minimizes my distaste, but still, not an auspicious start. If I hadn’t been so damn determined to wade through these books, I probably would’ve put it down before page 5 and never picked it up again.

Bam told me, “Stick with it. It gets better.”

So I did.

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This review is riddled with spoilers. No, really. In fact, we reveal EVERYTHING. The ending, the twists, the identity of the villain… [Shuzluva Note: You have been warned, so bitch to us about some other shit.] It’s also really long and a little self-indulgent, but man, we had a blast. If you wanna hang out with us and read on, please do so. If not, feel free to skip this one (I won’t mind) and read this one, which is well-thought out and more eloquent than I could ever hope to be. Boo! Shuzluva and I have been waiting for this book to come out for a long time, so we hope you understand why we feel so passionate (so passionate in fact that we might have crossed some lines and in the process, cussed a helluva lot) about it and decided to share our thoughts with you in this format.

Bam: I’m here, homie. What’s doin’?
Shuzluva: I was just wondering if you were going to show up.
Bam: shaddup. I said 7:30. it’s 7:30. Damn, beeyatch, you know I ain’t functional without my morning Red Bull.
Shuzluva: Well, it’s 10:30 here.
Bam: Whatevz. Let’s start this thing.
Shuzluva: Okay.
Bam: For starters, what the hell is up with—

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[REPOST!]

Grade: B+

Sharon Cullars is awesome. Her first book Again was both scary and sexy and after reading it, I found myself looking for more to read by this lady. I was psyched beyond belief when I checked out Amazon and found this book available for pre-order. It releases on April 24, but I couldn’t possibly wait that long, so I emailed the lady and begged her for an ARC. She was kind enough to send me this copy and kids, let me tell you, the very moment I had this book in my hand, I shoved everything aside and read it from cover to cover in one sitting. You can’t tell from the man-titty on the cover, but what’s inside is actually plenty creepy, yet sexy at the same time. There’s really two stories in this book: one is about a grieving woman who had just lost her twenty-one year old son in a senseless accident and takes solace in the arms of her son’s twenty-one year old best friend. The other is about an angry, angry ghost who can’t seem to let go because he sees his mother being seduced by his former best friend and wants to make sure that the two of them never ever end up together even if he has to resort to murder. Individually, the stories work quite well without the other, but don’t blend as well together. It is not seamless. They don’t flow together, which is why in some places, the supernatural aspect feels slapped on. But more on that later. The romantic aspect of the story doesn’t quite work for me, either, but the two leads do have some sizzling sexual tension between them and the fact that they’re such flawed, damaged characters trying to reach out to each other made for a compelling read. (more…)

[Ed. Note: This is fourth from the last of Annie’s reviews. *sad face* Enjoy it!]

Grade: B-

Payback Is A Bitch
by LA Banks

This story opens with a bang. Two sexy sluts are going at it with some dude, and my first reaction, “Woohoo! Finally, a threeway that doesn’t involve two dicks.” Then I read on to discover that this dude is, in fact, the villain of the story, and I hate shit written from the villain’s point of view. It almost always come across as so evil it’s just a caricature, and doesn’t enrich the story. This scene is no exception because they’re licking drugs off each other’s body parts, and while he’s fucking these fine ladies, Douglass is thinking about how he’s getting even with his frigid wife by being such a manwhore. That’s a helluva handicap to overcome. I woulda cut that scene so fast it’d make your head spin.

Nonetheless, I read on, hoping the story would improve. Lemme set up the plot a bit for you. Sidney Coleburn-West is married to a dickhead named Douglass. He’s doing his best to catch the clap all over town, but he’s refusing to give her a divorce because he wants her money. She’s fed up with his mess and hires an enforcer named Mitchell Brickland, Brick to his friends, probably named for the giant man-tool he keeps in his BVDs. Sid is willing to pay a cool 20K to him in exchange for him getting the dirty info on Douglass so she can wash that man right out of her hair.

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