Book Review: Succubus Heat

Succubus Heat
by Richelle Mead
Publisher: Kensington
MSRP: $15.00
Available at: Amazon and Barnes and Noble

Succubus Heat is book four in the Georgina Kincade series. If you're a fan of Kim Harrison and Kresley Cole, I highly recommend this series. It's filled with demons, vampires, angels, imps, nephelim, and of course, succubi, running around Seattle and Canada trying to find some happiness here on Earth. The characters are well thought out, and this volume contains some very poignant moments. If you haven't read Succubus Blues, Succubus on Top and Succubus Dreams, I suggest that you stop reading here because the following contains some spoilers.


Georgina isn't your typical succubus. She's tried to be good and limit the amount of truly good men that she seduces, but lately things have not been going well. Since her break-up with famous author Seth Mortensen (yes, you do need to read Succubus Dreams), Georgina hasn't been coping well with her raging emotions. Seth is now seeing Maddie, her co-worker at Emerald City Books. Out of loneliness, Georgina has taken up with Dante, who all of her friends despise. To top it all off her demon boss, Jerome, is NOT happy with her bad attidude of late, and decides to 'lend' her to Cedric, a Canadian archdemon, to help him get rid of a Satanist cult that has been creating havoc in his city.

Of the four books in the series, I enjoyed this book the most. There are some very sad moments, and there are a lot of unresolved issues that I hope will be explored further in future volumes. After I finished reading this book, it left me wanting more. Unfortunately, the next book in this series isn't due out until April 2010. Booo!!! I'll definitely want to re-read the first four books again before I read the next book.

~Allie

Read more!

Book Review: Succubus on Top

Succubus on Top
by Richelle Mead
Publisher: Kensington
MSRP: $15.00
Available from: Amazon and Barnes and Noble

I'm WAAAYYY behind on my reading. Too many books, not enough time! I was fortunate to be able to meet Richelle Mead at last year's BEA and get an autographed copy of her book, Succubus on Top. This book has been in my "to read" pile for a year, and I'm finally getting to it. :D

What's a succubus to do? Georgina Kincaid is not your typical immortal. She has a day job as an assistant manager in a Seattle bookstore, she spends a few nights a week luring unsuspecting men into her seductive clutches and then sucking the life force from them, and, oh, she's madly in love with a human male. Unfortunately, they can't have sex because each time she has sex with a man, she sucks out his life force and takes a few years off his life. To add to all this turmoil, Georgina's co-worker and fellow assistant manager, Doug, has been acting really weird. Well, weirder than he normally acts. Doug is in a band, and his behavior changes from bizzare to out of control, and Georgina must find out what's behind the change in Doug, or risk losing her friend.


Succubus on Top is actually the second novel in Richelle Mead's Georgina Kincaid series, and is fast paced and intruiging with many twists and turns that I wasn't expecting. I finished the book in one night. Although I was expecting far more sex scenes (she is a succubus after all), there were a few and they really made you empathize with what a "demon-whore" has to do to get what she wants. She's supposed to be on evil's side -- corrupting men, stealing their life force, leading married men astray -- but underneath it all, Georgina really does have a heart of gold. I'm really looking forward to reading the first, third, and fourth books in this series.

This first book in this series is Succubus Blues, the third is Succubus Dreams, and the most recent volume, Succubus Heat, was just released on May 26, 2009.

~Allie

Read more!

Book Review: Nights in Black Lace by Noelle Mack

Book Information
Publisher: Kensington Publishing
Publication Date: October 2008
ISBN-13: 978-0758221902
MSRP: $12.95
Format: Trade Paperback
Available from Amazon, Borders, Barnes and Noble, and Powell's

Odette Gaillard, CEO and founder of Oh! Oh! Odette lingerie, is looking for some excitement in her life. At her annual runway show, she finds herself oddly distracted by the young American obviously out of place in the front row. Bryan Bachman is a freewheeling athlete who is backpacking through Europe while waiting to hear back from graduate schools. Bryan spends his last euro on a charity raffle and ends up with front row seats at the sexiest fashion show of the year. But if Odette has her way, Bryan will end up with a few more prizes by the end of the night.

Nights in Black Lace was a disappointment. The story line had a lot of potential, but was squandered by focusing on the wrong aspects. As a backdrop to the story, Odette's new designs get stolen. However, the issue is never really resolved. While a suspect is identified, the subplot is simply dropped in the next to last chapter of the book. It is disappointing because the thefts are the reason Bryan chooses to remain in Paris despite having no money, no place to stay, etc. For such a key aspect of the story to be left unresolved is simply disappointing.

Another disappointment was the flatness of the entire cast. Bryan is portrayed as a very weak character throughout the story. He has no job, no prospects, no money and doesn't really save the heroine of the story from any disaster physical or emotional. He comes across as really being a kept man, which is not sexy at all. But seriously, if Odette can and does do everything on her own, what is the point of having a man around?

Other characters in the story come and go at the drop of the hat. Leaving you wondering why the author chose to introduce them at all. One of Odette's models, we come to find, is transgendered and strips at a nightclub that Bryan happens to end up at one night. That is interesting, but since the model is neither seen nor heard of after that single mention, it leaves the reader wondering why she was mentioned in the first place.

For sexy reads and contemporary romance, you are much better off checking out Carly Phillips, MJ Rose or Shayla Black.

xoxo,

Tissie

Read more!

Book Review: Coyote's Mate: A Novel of the Breeds by Lora Leigh

Book Information
Publisher: Berkley Sensation
Publication Date: February 2009
ISBN-13: 978-0425226339
MSRP:$7.99
Format: Mass market paperback
Available from Amazon, Borders, Barnes and Noble and Powell's

Del-Ray Delgado is a genetically altered rebel known as Coyote Ghost. Created in a lab, Coyote breeds are manipulating, cunning and a little on the paranoid side. The ultimate killers, the Coyotes have decided to take their fate into their own hands and escape their creators.

Anya Korbin is only 16 years old when she pleads with Del-Ray to help free the Coyote women trapped in her father's lab. For 6 years, she and Del-Ray plot the escape with Anya's only plea that her family not be harmed. But Coyotes can't be trusted and Del Ray is no exception. He has plans for Anya. Plans that include claiming her as his mate whether she agrees or not!

I am normally a big fan of romance novels and picked up Lora Leigh on the recommendation from my local book seller. Leigh is definitely an imaginative and popular writer - she makes it on the New York Times Bestseller's List pretty often; however, Coyote's Mate wasn't my cup of tea. Instead of Anya coming off as a smart, independent woman in her own right, she came of as a selfish, whinny brat to me.

The majority of the book deals with Del-Ray forcing Anya in a sense to marry him. Since the breeds are a mixture of human and animal, mating is more of a hormonal exchange instead of an exchange of vowels. But Anya petitions the Breeds council to basically get a restraining order against her mate for 1 year. The whole situation is just a bit too far-fetched to me. Del-Ray is in essence the King of the Coyotes and he is kicked out of his own home for the better part of a year!

I guess I wanted Anya to deal with the situation instead of running away from it. I much prefer heroines who use their brains to get what they want, not tears. So that being said, if you go for the angst filled romantic stories where the heroine wants to be swept off her feet but feels like giving into her desires makes her a weak person, this is the book for you. If you prefer characters who end up in sticky situations and must use their own brains and wiles to get out of them, you might want to pick up one of Leigh's other series.

xoxo,

Tissie

Read more!

Book Review: A Red Hot Valentine's Day by Danes, Hart, Kessler and Michaels

Book Information

Authors: Lacy Danes, Megan Hart, Jackie Kessler and Jess Michaels
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication Date: January 2009
ISBN-13: 978-0061689390
MSRP: $13.99
Format: Trade Paperback
Available from Amazon.com, Borders, Barnes and Noble, and Powell's

I normally don't buy anthologies because I feel 80 pages isn't enough flush out a really good story. However, I am huge Megan Hart fan. So I figured I would give this book a try while I wait for her next full length novel. A Red Hot Valentine's Day is a mixed bag with a few good stories and a few that were just okay.

In Get There, by Megan Hart, Edie and Ty are long distance lovers who will finally be together on Valentine's Day. To pass the time until their reunion, they swap love letters detailing erotic journeys of parted lovers.

Eternal damnation has never been so sweet as in Hell Is Where the Heart Is by Jackie Kessler. The succubus Jezebel is about to get a very special Valentine's Day gift from her demon lover.

In Torn Desires, by Lacy Danes, Lady Sophia finds that her neighbor and lover Lord Quinton has been toying with her affections when he hires a matchmaker. But to Lord Quniton's displeasure, it is Lady Sophia who is introduced to her dream lover.

Finally, the Earl of Atleigh has less than one week to prevent the woman he loves from marrying another man. The name of the game is seduction in Jess Michaels's regency romance By Valentine's Day.

By far, Hart and Michaels have the strongest stories of the bunch. Danes's Torn Desire was a little too light on the plot and too heavy on the sex for me to really enjoy it. And Kessler's story was gruesome and strange to say the least.

This is definitely a book to buy from a used bookstore or check out from the library. If, like me, you are a fan of one of the individual creators, the 80 page novellas are a nice read while you are waiting for the next full length book. But overall, this one isn't a keeper for the shelves. Or if you are looking for new authors to read, this one might be a great preview of their styles before you commit to reading a 400+ page paperback . I am definitely going to look up other works by Jess Michaels.

xoxo,

Tissie

Read more!

Book Review: Mortal Temptations by Allyson James

Mortal Temptations
by Allyson James

Patrica Lake's world is turned upside down when she finds a winged, demi-god unconscious on the floor of her antique store. Her unexpected visitor is Nico, a powerful deity cursed by Hera to be a slave to female sexual desire. As punishment for chasing after one of Hera's priestesses, he is sentenced to an eternity of heartbreak as he is used by one female after another and tossed aside along with his partner in crime and demi-god Andreas. Patrica, of course, holds the key to ending their enchantment...

I really wanted to like this book. Yes, the story is pretty cookie-cutter - our tortured and cursed hero must commit some great act of sacrifice to save himself and his one true love. Mortal Temptations had all the potential to really be an unique, yet heartwarming story; but it totally fell flat almost from the beginning.

Patrica is psychic and can read the auras off of people and objects, hence her profession as an antiques dealer. You would think her abilities would be almost vital to Andreas and Nico's quest for clues on how to break the curse. But her psychic abilities are introduced in the beginning and then are almost forgotten over the course of the story.

Nico and Andreas are described as essentially high class gigolos who are tortured by their fate. However, throughout the story, they honestly don't seem more than slightly annoyed by the whole situation. Andreas seems almost giddy to have a new toy to play with. And Nico doesn't seem plagued by bouts of depression or melancholy over being a god reduced to a sex slave.

The ending was also nothing special with Nico's final "test" incredibly uneventful and really not that difficult. Happily ever after was attained a little too easily for me to really feel any emotion for the characters.

Overall this book was a bust. If you are looking for a good tragic hero type, you are better off checking out Sherrilyn Kenyon's Dark-Hunter's series.


Book Information

Publisher: Berkley Trade
Publication Date: January 6, 2009
ISBN-13: 978-0425223697
MSRP: $15.00
Format: Trade Paperback
Available from Amazon, Borders, and Barnes and Noble

Read more!