Book Review: Crush by Tracy Wolff

Crush (Crave #2) by Tracy Wolff
Genre: Young Adult (Paranormal Romance)
Date Published: September 29, 2020
Publisher: Entangled: Teen

Everything feels off—especially me. I’ve returned to Katmere Academy, but I’m haunted by fragments of days I have no recollection of living and struggling to understand who, or what, I really am.

Just when I start to feel safe again, Hudson is back with a vengeance. He insists there are secrets I don’t know about, threatening to drive a wedge between Jaxon and me forever. But far worse enemies are at our doorstep.

The Circle is caught in a power play and the Vampire Court is trying to drag me out of my world and into theirs. The only thing Hudson and Jaxon agree on is that leaving Katmere would mean my certain death.

And not only am I fighting for my life, but now everyone else’s is at stake—unless we can defeat an unspeakable evil. All I know is that saving the people I love is going to require sacrifice.

Maybe more than I’m able to give.

Crush is the second book in the Crave series by Tracy Wolff. I am soooo loving this series. I always worry about the 'book 2's', because most of the time they can't live up to the greatness of book one, but this one definitely does. I don't know if it's better per say, but it's definitely just as good. I'm completely hooked. I wasn't expecting a love triangle, but I have to say... I'm digging it. Team Hudson for this girl. Oh, and don't judge me or the book on that until you read it.

Woke Up Like This

Being the lone human in a school for paranormals is precarious at the best of times.

At the worst of times, it’s a little like being the last chew toy in a room full of rabid dogs.

And at average times…well, at average times, it’s honestly pretty cool.

Too bad today is most definitely not an average day.

I don’t know why, but everything feels a little off as I walk down the hall toward my Brit Lit class, the strap of my backpack clutched in my hand like a lifeline.

Maybe it’s the fact that I’m freezing, my whole body trembling with a cold that has seeped all the way to my bones.

Maybe it’s the fact that the hand clutching my backpack is bruised and sore, like I got into a fight with a wall—and most definitely lost.

Or maybe it’s the fact that everyone, and I mean everyone, is staring at me—and it’s not in that “best of times” kind of way.

Then again, when is it ever?

You’d think I’d have gotten used to the staring by now, since it kind of comes with the territory when you’re a vampire prince’s girlfriend. But nope. And definitely not okay when every vampire, witch, dragon, and werewolf in the place is stopping to stare at you with their eyes wide and their mouths gaping even wider—like today.

Which, to be honest, really isn’t a very good look for any of them. I mean, come on. Aren’t I supposed to be the one weirded out in this equation? They’ve known all along that humans exist. It’s only been about a week since I found out the monster in my closet is real. As are the ones in my dorm room, my classes…and sometimes in my arms. So shouldn’t I be the one walking around with my mouth wide open as I stare at them?

“Grace?” I recognize the voice and turn with a smile, only to find Mekhi gawking at me, his normally warm brown complexion more waxy than I’ve ever seen it.

“Hey, there you are.” I shoot him a grin. “I thought I was going to have to read Hamlet all by myself today.”

“Hamlet?” His voice is hoarse, and the hands that fumble the phone out of his front pocket are anything but steady.

“Yeah, Hamlet. The play we’ve been reading for Brit Lit since I got here?” I shuffle my feet a little, suddenly uncomfortable as he continues to stare at me like he’s seen a ghost…or worse. This definitely isn’t typical Mekhi behavior. “We’re performing a scene today, remember?”

“We’re not rea—” He breaks off mid-word, thumbs flying over his phone as he sends what his face says is the most important text of his life.

“Are you okay?” I ask, stepping closer. “You don’t look so good.”

“I don’t look so good?” He barks out a laugh, shoves a trembling hand through his long, dark locks. “Grace, you’re—”

“Miss Foster?”

Mekhi breaks off as a voice I don’t recognize all but booms through the hallway.

“Are you all right?”

I shoot Mekhi a “what the fuck?” look as we both turn to find Mr. Badar, the Lunar Astronomy teacher, striding down the hall.

“I’m fine,” I answer, taking a startled step back. “I’m just trying to get to class before the bell rings.” I blink up at him when he stops directly in front of us. He’s looking a lot more freaked out than an early-morning hallway exchange warrants. Especially since all I’m doing is talking to a friend.

“We need to find your uncle,” he tells me as he places a hand under my elbow in an effort to turn me around and guide me back in the direction I just came from.

There’s something in his voice, less than a warning but more than a request, that gets me walking through the long, lancet-arched hallway without complaint. Well, that and because the normally unfazed Mekhi scrambles to get out of our way.

But with each step I take, the feeling that something isn’t right intensifies. Especially when people literally stop in their tracks to watch us go by, a reaction that only seems to make Mr. Badar more nervous.

“Can you please tell me what’s going on?” I ask as the crowd parts right in front of us. It’s not the first time I’ve seen the phenomenon—once again, I do date Jaxon Vega—but it is the first time I’ve seen it happen when my boyfriend is nowhere around. It’s beyond weird.

Mr. Badar looks at me like I’ve grown a second head, then asks, “You don’t know?” The fact that he sounds a little frantic, his deep voice taking on an incredulous edge, ratchets up my anxiety. Especially since it reminds me of the look on Mekhi’s face when he reached for his phone a couple of minutes ago.

It’s the same look I see on Cam’s face as we sweep by him standing in the doorway of one of the Chem classrooms. And Gwen’s. And Flint’s.

“Grace!” Flint calls to me, bounding out of the classroom so he can walk alongside Mr. Badar and me. “Oh my God, Grace! You’re back!”

“Not now, Mr. Montgomery,” the teacher snaps, his teeth clicking together sharply with each word.

So definitely a werewolf, then…at least judging by the size of that canine I see peeking from beneath his lip. Then again, I guess I should have figured it out by the subject he teaches—who’s more interested in the astronomy of the moon than the creatures who occasionally like to howl at it?

For the first time, I wonder if something happened this morning that I don’t know about. Did Jaxon and Cole, the alpha werewolf, get into it again? Or Jaxon and another wolf this time—maybe Quinn or Marc? It doesn’t seem likely, since everyone has been giving us a wide berth lately, but why else would a werewolf teacher I’ve never met before be so panicked and single-minded in his determination to get me to my uncle?

“Wait, Grace—” Flint reaches out for me, but Mr. Badar blocks his hand from connecting.

“I said not now, Flint! Go to class!” The words, little more than a snarl, come from low in his throat.

Flint looks like he wants to argue, his own teeth suddenly gleaming sharply in the soft chandelier lighting of the hallway. He must decide it’s not worth it—despite his clenched fists—because in the end, he doesn’t say anything. He just kind of stops in his tracks and watches us walk by instead…just like everyone else in the corridor.

Several people look like they want to approach—Macy’s friend Gwen, for example—but a low, warning growl from the teacher, who’s pretty much marching me down the hallway now, and the whole group of them decides to keep their distance.

“Hold on, Grace. We’re almost there.”

“Almost where?” I want to demand an answer, but my voice comes out sounding raspy.

“Your uncle’s office, of course. He’s been waiting on you for a long time.”

That makes no sense. I just saw Uncle Finn yesterday.

Unease slides across the back of my neck and down my spine, sharp as a razor, causing the hairs on my arms to tingle.

None of this feels okay.

None of this feels right.

As we turn another corner, this time into the tapestry-lined hallway that runs in front of Uncle Finn’s office, it’s my turn to reach into my pocket for my phone. I want to talk to Jaxon. He’ll tell me what’s going on.

I mean, this can’t all be about Cole, right? Or about Lia. Or about—I yelp as my thoughts crash into what feels like a giant wall. One that has huge metal barbs sticking out of it that poke directly into my head.

Even though the wall isn’t tangible, mentally running into it hurts an astonishing amount. For a moment, I just freeze, a little shell-shocked. Once I get over the surprise—and the pain—of it, I try even harder to move past the obstruction, straining my mind in an effort to get my thoughts together. To force them to go down this mental path that is suddenly completely closed off to me.

That’s when I realize—I can’t remember waking up this morning. I can’t remember breakfast. Or getting dressed. Or talking to Macy. I can’t remember anything that’s happened today at all.

“What the hell is going on?”

I don’t realize I’ve said the words out loud until the teacher answers, rather grimly, “I’m pretty sure Foster was hoping you could fill him in on that.”

It’s not the answer I’m looking for, and I reach into my pocket for my phone again, determined not to get distracted this time. I want Jaxon.

Except my phone isn’t in the pocket where I always keep it, and it isn’t in any of my other pockets, either. How is that possible? I never forget my phone.

Uneasiness moves into fear and fear into an insidious panic that has question after question bombarding me. I try to stay calm, try not to show the two dozen or so people watching me at this very instant just how rattled I really am. It’s hard to keep cool, though, when I don’t have a clue what’s going on.

Mr. Badar nudges my elbow to get moving again, and I follow him on autopilot.

We make one more turn and end up at the door leading into the front office of Katmere’s headmaster, also known as my uncle Finn. I expect Mr. Badar to knock, but he just throws the door open and propels us into the office’s antechamber, where Uncle Finn’s assistant is at her desk, typing away on her laptop.

“I’ll be right with you,” Mrs. Haversham says. “I just need one—”

She glances up at us—over the top of her computer screen and her purple half-moon glasses—and breaks off mid-sentence the second her gaze meets mine. All of a sudden, she’s jumping up from her desk, her chair clattering back against the wall behind her as she shouts for my uncle.

“Finn, come quick!” She circles out from behind her desk and throws her arms around me. “Grace, it’s so good to see you! I’m so glad you’re here!”

I have no idea what she means, just like I have no idea why she’s hugging me. I mean, Mrs. Haversham is a nice-enough lady, but I had no idea our relationship had progressed from formal greetings to spontaneous and apparently ecstatic embraces.

Still, I return the hug. I even pat her on her back—a little gingerly, but I figure it’s the thought that counts. On the plus side, her soft white curls smell like honey.

“It’s good to see you, too,” I respond as I start to ease back a little, hoping a five-second hug is all that’s necessary in this already bizarre situation.

But Mrs. Haversham is hanging on for the long haul, her arms wrapped around me so tightly that it’s growing a little hard to breathe. Not to mention awkward.

“Finn!” she shouts again, paying no attention to the fact that, thanks to the hug, her red-lipsticked mouth is right next to my ear. “Finn! It’s—”

The door to Uncle Finn’s office flies open. “Gladys, we have an intercom—” He, too, breaks off mid-sentence, his eyes going wide as they find my face.

“Hey, Uncle Finn.” I smile at him as Mrs. Haversham finally releases me from her honeysuckle-scented death grip. “I’m sorry to bother you.”

My uncle doesn’t answer. Instead, he just keeps staring at me, mouth working but absolutely no sound coming out.

And my stomach suddenly feels like it’s full of broken glass.I may not know what I had for breakfast, but I know one thing for sure… Something is very, very wrong.

Have you read the other books in this series?

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Tracy Wolff is a lover of vampires, dragons, and all things that go bump in the night. A onetime English professor, she now devotes all her time to writing dark and romantic stories with tortured heroes and kick-butt heroines. She has written all her sixty-plus novels from her home in Austin, Texas, which she shares with her family.

To learn more about Tracy Wolff and her books, visit her website. You can also find her on Goodreads, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

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Book Review: Daring and the Duke by Sarah MacLean

Daring and the Duke (The Bareknuckle Bastards #3) by Sarah MacLean 
Genre: Adult Fiction (Historical Romance)
Date Published: June 30, 2020
Publisher: Avon

Grace Condry has spent a lifetime running from her past. Betrayed as a child by her only love and raised on the streets, she now hides in plain sight as queen of London’s darkest corners. Grace has a sharp mind and a powerful right hook and has never met an enemy she could not best, until the man she once loved returns.

Single-minded and ruthless, Ewan, Duke of Marwick, has spent a decade searching for the woman he never stopped loving. A long-ago gamble may have lost her forever, but Ewan will go to any lengths to win Grace back… and make her his duchess.

Reconciliation is the last thing Grace desires. Unable to forgive the past, she vows to take her revenge. But revenge requires keeping Ewan close, and soon her enemy seems to be something else altogether—something she can’t resist, even as he threatens the world she's built, the life she's claimed…and the heart she swore he'd never steal again.

Daring and the Duke is the third book in The Bareknuckle Bastards series by Sarah MacLean. If you're like me, then you've been waiting for Ewen and Grace's story for a while. The previous two books have really built up towards this moment, and I'm a bit torn, because from only her point of view, she went a bit easy on him. But, on the other hand, this tells me a part of her always knew there was more to the story. I mean, we all did, right? 

From his point of view, why oh why didn't he just tell her already?! That would have changed everything. I know some are mad at Ewan for all the damage, deaths, and near deaths that occurred previously in the series, but here's my take. He thought they let Grace die. If I thought that happened to my loved one, I'd go pretty atomic too. Does it excuse the behavior? Probably not... not entirely anyway. But grief is a powerful force.

Burghsey House
Seat of the Dukedom of Marwick
The Past

There was nothing in the wide world like his laugh.

It didn’t matter that she was unqualified to speak of the wide world. She’d never strayed far from this enormous manor house, tucked into the quiet Essex countryside two days’ walk northeast of London, where rolling green hills turned to wheat as autumn crept across the land.

It didn’t matter that she didn’t know the sounds of the city or the smell of the ocean. Or that she’d never heard a language other than English, or seen a play, or listened to an orchestra.

It didn’t matter that her world had been limited to the three thousand acres of fertile land boasting fluffy white sheep and massive hay bales and a community of people with whom she was not allowed to speak—to whom she was virtually invisible—because she was a secret that was to be kept at all costs.

A girl, baptized the heir to the Dukedom of Marwick. Swaddled in the rich lace reserved for a long line of dukes, anointed with oils reserved for the most privileged of Burghsey House residents. Given a boy’s name and title before God even as the man who was not her father paid servants and priests for silence and falsified documents and laid plans to replace her mother’s bastard daughter with one of his own bastard sons, born on the same day as she—to women who were not his duchess—offering him a single path to a ducal legacy . . . theft.

Offering that useless girl, the mewling babe in nurse’s arms, nothing more than a half life, full of the aching loneliness that came from a world so large and so small, all at once.

And then he’d arrived, one year earlier. Twelve years old and full of fire and strength and the world beyond. Tall and lean and already so clever and cunning and the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen, blond hair too long over bright amber eyes that held a thousand secrets, and a quiet, barely ever heard laugh—so rare that when it came, it felt like a gift.

No, there was nothing in the wide world like his laugh. She knew it, even if the wide world was so far beyond her reach she couldn’t even imagine where it began.

He could.

He loved to tell her about it. Which was what he did that afternoon, one of their precious, stolen moments between the duke’s machinations and manipulations—a thieved day before a night when the man who held their future might return to revel in tormenting his three sons. But today, in that quiet afternoon, while the duke was away in London, doing whatever it was that dukes did, the quartet took happiness where they could find it—out on the wild, meandering land that made up the estate.

Her favorite place was on the western edge of the land, far enough away from the manor house that it might be forgotten before it could be remembered. A magnificent copse of trees soaring into the sky, lined on one side with a small, bubbling stream, less stream than brook, if a body were honest, but one that had given her hours, days, weeks of chattering company when she’d been younger and conversation with the water had been all she could hope for.

But here, now, she was not lonely. She was inside the trees, where dappled sunshine flooded the ground where she lay on her back—collapsed after racing across the land, taking great breaths of air heavy with the scent of wild thyme.

He sat next to her, his hip to hers, his own chest rising and falling with heavy breath as he stared down into her face, his ever-lengthening legs stretched past her head. “Why do we always come here?”

“I like it here,” she said simply, turning her face up to the sunlight, the tattoo of her heartbeat calming as she stared through the canopy to the sky playing hide-and-seek beyond. “And so would you if you weren’t so serious all the time.”

The air in the quiet place shifted, thickening with the truth—that they were not ordinary children, thirteen and without care. Care was how they survived. Seriousness was how they survived.

She didn’t want that now. Not while the last of the summer butterflies danced in rays of light above, filling the whole place with magic that kept the worst at bay. So she changed the subject.

“Tell me about it.”

He didn’t ask her to clarify. He didn’t need to. “Again?”

“Again.”

He swiveled around, and she moved her skirts so he could lie next to her, as he had dozens of times before. Hundreds of them. Once he was settled on his back, his hands stacked behind his head, he spoke to the canopy. “It’s never quiet there.”

“Because of the carts on the cobblestones.”

He nodded. “The wooden wheels make a racket, but it’s more than that. It’s the shouts from the taverns and the hawkers in the market square. The dogs barking in the warehouses. The brawls in the streets. I used to stand on the roof of the place I lived and bet on the brawls.”

“That’s why you’re so good at fighting.”

He lifted a shoulder in a tiny shrug. “I always thought it would be the best way to help my ma. Until . . .”

He trailed off, but she heard the rest. Until she’d taken ill, and the duke had dangled a title and a fortune in front of a son who would have done anything to help. She turned to look at him, his face drawn tight, resolutely staring up at the sky, jaw set.

“Tell me about the cursing,” she prodded.

He let out a little surprised laugh. “A riot of foul language. You like that bit.”

“I didn’t even know cursing existed before you three.” Boys who came into her life like a riot themselves, rough and tumble and foul-mouthed and wonderful.

“Before Devil, you mean.” Devil, christened Devon—one of his two half brothers—raised in a boys’ orphanage and with the mouth to prove it. “He’s proved very useful.”

“Yes. The cursing. Especially on the docks. No one swears like a sailor.”

“Tell me the best one you’ve ever heard.”

He cut her a sly look. “No.”

She’d ask Devil later. “Tell me about the rain.”

“It’s London. It rains all the time.”

She nudged him with her shoulder. “Tell me the good bit.”

He smiled, and she matched it, loving the way he humored her. “The rain turns the stones on the street slick and shiny.”

“And at night, it turns them gold, because of the lights from the taverns,” she filled in.

“Not just the taverns. The theaters on Drury Lane. The lamps that hang outside the bawdy houses.” Bawdy houses where his mother had landed after the duke had refused to keep her when she’d chosen to have his son. Where that son had been born.

“To keep the dark at bay,” she said softly.

“The dark ain’t so bad,” he said. “It’s just that the people in it haven’t a choice but to fight for what they need.”

“And do they get it? What they need?”

“No. They don’t get what they need, and not what they deserve, neither.” He paused, then whispered to the canopy, like it really was magic. “But we’re going to change all that.”

She didn’t miss the we. Not just him. All of them. A foursome that had made a pact when the boys had been brought here for this mad competition—whoever won would keep them all safe. And then they’d escape this place that had imprisoned them all in a battle of wits and weapons that would give his father what the older man wanted: an heir worthy of a dukedom.

“Once you’re duke,” she said, softly.

He turned to look at her. “Once one of us is duke.”

She shook her head, meeting his glittering amber gaze, so like his brothers’. So like his father’s. “You’re going to win.”

He watched her for a long moment and said, “How do you know?”

She pressed her lips together. “I just know.” The old duke’s machinations grew more challenging by the day. Devil was like his name, too much fire and fury. And Whit—he was too small. Too kind.

“And if I don’t want it?”

A preposterous idea. “Of course you want it.”

“It should be yours.”

She couldn’t help the little, wild laugh. “Girls don’t get to be dukes.”

“And here you are, an heir, nonetheless.”

But she wasn’t. Not really. She was the product of her mother’s extramarital affair, a gamble designed to deliver a bastard heir to a monstrous husband, forever tainting his precious familial line—the only thing he’d ever cared for. But instead of a boy, the duchess had produced a girl, and so she was not heir. She was a placeholder. A bookmark in an ancient copy of Burke’s Peerage. And they all knew it.

She ignored the words and said, “It doesn’t matter.”

And it didn’t. Ewan would win. He would become duke. And it would change everything.

“When I am duke, then.” The words were a whisper, as though if he spoke them in truth, he’d curse them all. “When I am duke, I shall keep us all safe. Us and all of the Garden. I shall take his money. His power. His name. And I shall walk away and never look back.” The words circled around them, reverberating off the trees for a long moment before he corrected himself. “Not his name,” he whispered. “Yours.”

Robert Matthew Carrick, Earl Sumner, heir to the Dukedom of Marwick.

She ignored the thread of emotion winding through her and lightened her tone. “You might as well have the name. It’s proper new. I’ve never used it.” She might have been baptized the heir, but she didn’t have access to the name.

“Over the years, when she’d been anything at all, she’d been girl, the girl, or young lady. Once, for a heartbeat when she was eight, there was a housemaid who called her luv, and she’d rather enjoyed that. But the maid had left after a few months, and the girl had been back to being nobody.

Until they’d arrived—a trio of boys who saw her—and this one, who seemed not only to see her, but also to understand her. And they called her a hundred things, Run for the way she tore across the fields, and Red for the flame in her hair, and Riot for the way she fumed at their father. And she answered to all of them, knowing that none was her name, but not caring so much once they’d arrived. Because maybe they were enough.

Because to them, she was not nobody.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. He meant it.

To him, she was somebody.

They stayed that way for a heartbeat, gazes locked, truth like a blanket around them, until he cleared his throat and looked away, breaking the connection and rolling onto his back, returning his attention to the trees above, and saying, “Anyway, my mum used to say she loved the rain, because it was the only time she ever saw jewels in Covent Garden.”

“Promise to take me when you leave,” she whispered into the quiet.

His lips set into a firm line, his promise written in the lines of his face, older than it should be. Younger than it would have to become. He nodded once. Firm. Certain. “And I’ll make sure you have jewels.”

She rolled onto her own back, her skirts haphazard in the grass. “See that you do,” she jested. “And gold thread for all my gowns.”

“I shall keep you in spools of it.”

“Yes, please,” she said. “And a lady’s maid with a particular skill for hair.”

“You’re very demanding for a country girl,” he teased.

She turned a grin on him. “I’ve had a lifetime to prepare my requirements.”

“Do you think you’re ready for London, country girl?”

The smile faded into a mock scowl. “I think I shall do just fine, city boy.”

He laughed, and the rare sound filled the space around them, warming her. And in that moment, something happened. Something strange and unsettling and wonderful and weird. That sound, like nothing in the wide world, unlocked her.

Suddenly, she could feel him. Not simply the warmth of him along her side, where they touched from shoulder to hip. Not only the place where his elbow rested beside her ear. Not just the feel of his touch in her curls as he extracted a leaf from them. All of him. The even rise and fall of his breath. His sure stillness. And that laugh . . . his laugh.

“Whatever happens, promise you won’t forget me,” she said quietly.

“I shan’t be able to. We’ll be together.”

She shook her head. “People leave.”

His brow furrowed and she could hear the force in his words. “I don’t. I won’t.”

She nodded. But still, “Sometimes you don’t choose it. Sometimes people just . . .”

His gaze softened with understanding and he heard the reference to her mother in the trail of her words. He rolled toward her, and they were facing each other now, cheeks on their bent arms, close enough for secrets. “She would have stayed if she could,” he said, firmly.

“You don’t know that,” she whispered, hating the sting of the words behind the bridge of her nose. “I was born and she died, and she left me with a man who was not my father, who gave me a name that is not my own, and I’ll never know what would have happened if she’d lived. I’ll never know if . . .”

He waited. Ever patient, as though he would wait for her for a lifetime.

“I’ll never know if she would have loved me.”

“She would have loved you.” The answer was instant.

She shook her head, closing her eyes. Wanting to believe him. “She didn’t even name me.”

“She would have. She would have named you, and it would have been something beautiful.”

The certainty in his words had her meeting his gaze, sure and unyielding. “Not Robert, then?”

He didn’t smile. Didn’t laugh. “She would have named you for what you were. For what you deserved. She would have given you the title.”

Understanding dawned.

And then he whispered, “Just as I would do.”

Everything stopped. The rustle of leaves in the canopy, the shouts of his brothers in the stream beyond, the slow creep of the afternoon, and she knew, in that moment, that he was about to give her a gift that she’d never imagined she’d receive.

She smiled at him, her heart pounding in her chest. “Tell me.”

She wanted it on his lips, in his voice, in her ears. She wanted it from him, knowing it would make it impossible for her to ever forget him, even after he left her behind.

He gave it to her. “Grace.”

Check out my reviews of more books by this author!

Sarah MacLean grew up in Rhode Island, obsessed with historical romance and bemoaning the fact that she was born far too late for her own season. Her love of all things historical helped to earn her degrees from Smith College and Harvard University before she finally set pen to paper and wrote her first book.

Sarah now lives in New York City with her husband, baby daughter, their dog, and a ridiculously large collection of romance novels. She loves to hear from readers. Please visit her at www.macleanspace.com

To learn more about Sarah MacLean and her books, visit her website. You can also find her on Goodreads, Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and Twitter.

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Book Review: Maid in England by Brenda St. John Brown

Maid in England (The I Do Crew #1) by Brenda St. John Brown
Genre: Adult Fiction (Contemporary Romance)
Date Published: February 5, 2019
Publisher: Self

Telling my wannabe rock star ex I’m his new PR person is easy. What's hard - besides his abs? The fact that he's way hotter than he was 12 years ago.

Not that I'm noticing. Nope. I'm 150,000% over him.

As far as I’m concerned, my relationship with Alastair Wells is strictly professional. Despite that brooding regret he has when he looks at me. And that smile that tells me he has ideas of his own and they definitely include me. But not in any kind of professional sense.

Did I mention I’m 150,000% over this guy?

Maybe make that 149,000%... 

Maid in England is the first book in the I Do Crew series by Brenda St. John Brown. This was super cute,  and fun, and the chemistry between Alistair and Remi just seeped off the pages in a crazy way. These two have a history, and watching them get to know each other again as well as being too know a couple of the spring characters was a lot of fun. This little book was a lot more entertaining than I expected, making our a great weekend read, and it was free. You can't beat that.

Check out another book by this author!

Brenda is a USA Today bestselling author living in the English countryside. Originally from New York, she's lived in the UK long enough to gain dual citizenship, but still doesn’t understand Celsius. However, she has learned the appropriate use of the word “pants”. And how to order a proper bacon bap/barm/buttie. Because, well, bacon.

Brenda writes contemporary romance to make you giggle and swoon. When she’s not writing, she enjoys hiking, running and reading. In theory, she also enjoys cooking, but it’s more that she enjoys eating and, try as she might, she can’t live on Doritos alone.

To learn more about Brenda St. John Brown and her books, visit her website. You can also find her on Goodreads, Facebook, Instagram, BookBub, and Twitter.

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Book Review: Abandon by Meg Cabot

Abandon (Abandon #1) by Meg Cabot
Genre: Young Adult (Mythology / Romance)
Date Published: April 26, 2011
Publisher: Point

Though she tries returning to the life she knew before the accident, Pierce can't help but feel at once a part of this world, and apart from it. Yet she's never alone . . . because someone is always watching her. Escape from the realm of the dead is impossible when someone there wants you back.

But now she's moved to a new town. Maybe at her new school, she can start fresh. Maybe she can stop feeling so afraid.

Only she can't. Because even here, he finds her. That's how desperately he wants her back. She knows he's no guardian angel, and his dark world isn't exactly heaven, yet she can't stay away . . . especially since he always appears when she least expects it, but exactly when she needs him most.

But if she lets herself fall any further, she may just find herself back in the one place she most fears: the Underworld.

Abandon is the first book in the Abandon series by Meg Cabot. This is a Hades and Persephone story with a twist. For one, neither Hades nor Persephone are in this story. Instead, you have Pierce who has had some close encounters with death, and lived to tell about it. Well... sorta. There's also John, whose life is about death. I expected more of a romance, but we got so much more. The author flawlessly kept the essence of the original myth with all the darkness and foreboding, and she brought it to modern day. I feel like there is so much coming in the next books. I have to get my hands on them! 

Check out my reviews of other books by Meg Cabot!

Meg Cabot was born on February 1, 1967, during the Chinese astrological year of the Fire Horse, a notoriously unlucky sign. Fortunately she grew up in Bloomington, Indiana, where few people were aware of the stigma of being a fire horse -- at least until Meg became a teenager, when she flunked freshman Algebra twice, then decided to cut her own bangs. After six years as an undergrad at Indiana University, Meg moved to New York City (in the middle of a sanitation worker strike) to pursue a career as an illustrator, at which she failed miserably, forcing her to turn to her favorite hobby--writing novels--for emotional succor. She worked various jobs to pay the rent, including a decade-long stint as the assistant manager of a 700 bed freshmen dormitory at NYU, a position she still occasionally misses.

She is now the author of nearly fifty books for both adults and teens, selling fifteen million copies worldwide, many of which have been #1 New York Times bestsellers, most notably The Princess Diaries series, which is currently being published in over 38 countries, and was made into two hit movies by Disney. In addition, Meg wrote the Mediator and 1-800-Where-R-You? series (on which the television series, Missing, was based), two All-American Girl books, Teen Idol, Avalon High, How to Be Popular, Pants on Fire, Jinx, a series of novels written entirely in email format (Boy Next Door, Boy Meets Girl, and Every Boy's Got One), a mystery series (Size 12 Is Not Fat/ Size 14 Is Not Fat Either/Big Boned), and a chick-lit series called Queen of Babble.

Meg is now writing a new children's series called Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls. Her new paranormal series, Abandon, debuts in Summer of 2011.

Meg currently divides her time between Key West, Indiana, and New York City with a primary cat (one-eyed Henrietta), various back-up cats, and her husband, who doesn't know he married a fire horse. Please don't tell him.

To learn more about Meg Cabot and her books, visit her website. You can also find her on Goodreads, Facebook, and Twitter.

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