This week at Smexy…

B+ review – Once Upon a Christmas Eve by Elizabeth Hoyt (historical novella/mandi)
B review – Roomies by Christina Lauren (contemporary/tori)
B review – So Over You by Kate Meader (contemporary/kini)
B review – Flame in the Dark by Faith Hunter (UF/tori)
C+ review – Heart Sight by Robin D. Owens (fantasy/tori)
D review – The Wicked Vampire by Kate Baxter (pnr/sheena)

Cover Reveal – Man Card by Sarina Bowen and Tanya Eby
Guest Author Jen Gilroy and her Favorite Holiday Moments
Guest Author Gina Conkle and How to Enjoy Georgian Mulled Wine at Christmas

News from Kini: 

Man Hands by Sarina Bowen and Tanya Eby– I didn’t love this rom-com. Full review to be posted soon.

Wrong to Need You by Alisha Rai– I was really excited about the heroine falling in love with her deceased husband’s brother, but this didn’t work as well for me as it did for everyone else. It still felt like there was too much going on with the rest of the family. It was good, but I didn’t think it was a great as everyone else did.

Constant Craving by Tamara Lush– I read this in preparation for an interview for my podcast. I was so good. Flawed characters with a second chance at love. It kept me late reading. It was thinky and emotional. The characters have angry sex that is filled with hurt, desire, need, and love. I highly recommend this book.

Right now I am reading Ready for Wild by Liora Blake. I’ve read the first two and it seems cute so far.

News from Mandi:

I had to DNF The Big Bad Billionaire by Jackie Ashenden. I think I’ve DNF’d her in the past and I’ve now come to terms with the fact I should probably pass on her books. I want to read them – I hear good things about them!! Just not for me. This one features a heroine whose financial guardianship is transferred to the hero – his doing – and he makes her date him or else he won’t give her money to go to dance school. Not cool dude. I didn’t make it very far so it all may work out – but I just couldn’t get past that.

The Coach by Thom Collins is a really short M/M romance about a journalist who falls for a rugby coach. It’s realllllllly short, but sweet and cute. I’ll throw in a short review in our December Mini review post coming out this week.

West Coast Love by Tif Marcelo had a strong first half but the heroine rubbed me the wrong way at times towards the end of the book. I don’t feel like she treated the hero fairly – or if roles had been reversed – she would have accepted that behavior from him. Otherwise I liked her and him and the book. Review coming.

I just started Cowboy Up by Harper Sloan. I think I’m on chapter three and it’s already hitting allllll the right buttons. A gruff, grumpy, lonely cowboy and a nerdy/bookish herione who comes back to her hometown. She has secrets which I haven’t discovered yet. He has already picked her up at a bar and they had stranger sex. It was hot. I’ll report back. I LOVED the first two in this series (features siblings but all stand alones). Highly rec them.