Love & Other Disasters by Anita KellyContemporary RomanceJanuary 18, 2022, by Forever Review by Melinda I've raved about Anita Kelly's first two books and have been really anticipating her debut with Forever. And I loved everything about this book from beginning to end. Dahlia and London are competitors on a cooking show and one of the things I loved so much is that there is no antagonism between them at all. Just encouragement and laughter and love of the craft. I felt like the Continue Reading
Melinda’s Favorites of 2021
I loved so many of the books I read this year so I barely tried to narrow it down. Life's too short for all of that! I did stop reading nearly as much as usual around October so if I'm lacking new releases after that, that would be why. Continue Reading
Review: And They Lived Happily Ever After by Therese Beharrie
And They Lived Happily Ever After by Therese BeharrieContemporary RomanceNovember 30, 2021, by Zebra BooksReview by Melinda I love Therese Beharrie's voice and the plot here is imaginative and creative, but I’m not sure if the execution of everything worked. The concept of this book is that a romance author dreams the plots of her books...relatively simple, right? Well, these dreams are magically written into her books. I thought that the setup and idea of going back and forth Continue Reading
Review: All the Feels by Olivia Dade
All the Feels by Olivia DadeSpoiler Alert #2Contemporary RomanceNovember 16, 2021, by AvonARC Reviewer: Melinda Before I begin my full-on squeeing over this book, I need to add a disclaimer that Olivia is a complete auto-buy author for me. Once I read her self-published book, Teach Me, a few years ago I was all in and have never looked back. And beyond that, I consider Olivia a friend so you can consider that when reading this review for sure. Okay, but moving on to this actual Continue Reading
Review: Love, Comment, Subscribe by Cathy Yardley
Love, Comment, Subscribe by Cathy YardleyContemporary RomanceOctober 1, 2021, by MontlakeARC Reviewer: Melinda Lily Wang and Tobin Hui went to High School together 10 years ago, but they weren’t exactly friends...or enemies either one. Frenemy is definitely the better term to describe what they were to each other. We open the book with a brief scene in high school and Lily ditching her Nerd Herd friends to try to sit with the popular group in the cafeteria but icily getting brushed off Continue Reading
Review: The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun
The Charm Offensive by Allison Cochrun Contemporary Romance September 7, 2021 by Atria Reviewed by Melinda This book completely snuck up on me, I hadn’t really heard much about it, but I’m so glad that I picked it up randomly because it’s going on my favorites of 2021 list for sure! The premise of the book is simple enough - man goes on a reality dating show to make his image better for business purposes, will he find love? But what follows is the star of the show falling for his producer Continue Reading
Review: Lights on Knockbridge Lane by Roan Parrish
Lights on Knckbridge Lane by Roan ParrishContemporary Romance9/28/2021 by HarlequinARC Review by Melinda I love almost every book Roan Parrish writes, and this book is no exception with a few quibbles here and there. There’s a lot to like about this couple, Adam’s daughter Gus, and the town. But it didn’t work everywhere for me, As the third book in the Garnet Run series, I did feel like it would be easy to read this as a standalone, which is always important from a new reader POV. But Continue Reading
Review: Heavy by Cate C. Wells
Heavy by Cate C. Wells Contemporary Romance September 15th, 2021, Self Published Reviewed by Melinda Cate C. Wells has this weird magic about her that makes me love a motorcycle club romance every single time and honestly, it confuses me, but I don’t question it at this point! One of the things I think she does so well is take at least one aspect of each book and make it slightly unusual for an MC romance and focus on it. I’ve read all of her books and each one does this so well. In Heavy, Continue Reading
Melinda’s Mini-Reviews: Breaking Badger by Shelly Laurenston and With You Forever by Chloe Liese
Breaking Badger by Shelly LaurenstonHoney Badger Chronicles #4Paranormal RomanceAugust 31, 2021KensingtonARC Breaking Badger is the 4th in Shelly Laurenston’s Honey Badger series that I absolutely have loved. They’ve all been books that make me literally laugh out loud to the point that I can’t listen to these books in public because I always get awkward stares. Laurenston’s humor is definitely hit or miss, if you look up her reviews they are filled with either ‘what the hell is this’ or Continue Reading
Review: Witch, Please by Ann Aguirre
Witch, Please by Ann AguirreFix-It Witches #1PNRSeptember 7, 2021, by SourcebooksARCReviewed by Melinda I love the concept of this book so much. Contemporary paranormal small town romantic comedy with a magical electronical repair woman and and a bisexual baker. All of that just screams please read me! But the actual execution in the book was a little lacking in areas for me. Things I loved about the book: Danica’s magical ability. Danica is a technomancer, which I love. She’s able to Continue Reading