{Review} of I Married a Billionaire by Melanie Marchande

I Married a Billionaire by Melanie Marchande
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

GENRE: Romance
THEME: Mature, Romance, And Contemporary
RECEIVED: Bought

BLURB:
Maddy Wainright has given up on marriage - and men. After dating way too many losers who aren't capable of appreciating her for who she is, she's about ready to resign herself to a life of spinsterhood. Until her insanely rich boss Daniel Thorne comes along with an offer she simply can't refuse.

He proposes a marriage of convenience - one that would allow Maddy to live in the lap of luxury for a year, and Mr. Thorne to stay in the country that has become his home. At the end of their arrangement, Maddy will walk away with a cool two million dollars. All she has to do is move into his mansion, put on a convincing show in public, and endure a few INS interviews, for which she will be thoroughly prepped. It's a big risk, but one Maddy might just be willing to take, considering the payoff.

At first, it's all business. But when the gentle touches, passionate kisses, and lingering looks they have to give each other in public start spilling over into their private life, Daniel and his devious mind take Maddy to heights of pleasure she's never experienced. And the more she gets to know him, the more she feels that wistful tug in her chest every time he puts his arm around her in public. Before long, she finds herself wishing it were real.

As time goes on, Maddy finds herself wondering if two million dollars will be enough to cover the cost of repairing a broken heart. But Mr. Thorne may have yet another secret in store...

REVIEW:

While I’m in the middle of a fifty shades of grey kick, finishing the third book, I spotted the first installment of I Married a Billionaire. BDSM wasn’t really a huge focus like fifty was, but it had the similar setting of a very wealthy man that starts a relationship with a woman through a contract.

I Married a Billionaire follows Maddy Wainright who has dated too many losers in her life that she has given up hope of finding Mr. Right. But everything changes when her very attractive and very handsome boss Daniel Thorne asks her for the biggest favor. He needs to marry someone to stay in the country and believes Maddy to be the perfect fit, since she isn’t looking for a relationship. In the end it will earn her two million dollars and relief from her financial troubles. But Daniel and Maddy are not prepared for the connection the starts to grow and the possibility that many cant buy everything.

Maddy and Daniel are an interesting couple, their relationship has to move quickly so that they can get to know each other. Daniel and Maddy have to create a story and learn about each other’s past to make their relationship seem real. It reminded me a lot of the movie with Sandra Bullock called The Proposal, which I adored so I was super excited to see how this panned out. Maddy is the average Jane who thought she wouldn’t fall for her boss, but he’s a hard man not to fall for. While Daniel who seems like a successful and well put together man, is a bit of a mess in the relationship side of things. In the end it was hard to see how these two would actually end up together, as well as I feel the author could of lengthened some of the time they spent together to make it more believable.

Overall I enjoyed Daniel and Maddy learning about one and other as well as Daniels sister who connected to Maddy. But I felt everything was too rushed and the random dominance of Daniel was a little too forced. The romance was built and their connection does hit an interesting spark, but I still needed more from them. I may try the second one as I see a lot of potential with this couple.

RECOMMENDATION:

This is a adult novel with sexual content suited for mature readers 18 and up. Fans of Love, In English by Karina Halle and Wallbanger by Alice Clayton will enjoy I married a billionaire by Melanie Marchande.

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Review of Croak by Gina Damico

 Croak by Gina Damico

Rating: 2 stars
Received: borrowed
Genres & themes: YA, death, friendship, urban fantasy, mystery.

SYNOPSIS: 
Fed up with her wild behavior, sixteen-year-old Lex's parents ship her off to upstate New York to live with her Uncle Mort for the summer, hoping that a few months of dirty farm work will whip her back into shape.

But Uncle Mort's true occupation is much dirtier than shoveling manure. He's a Grim Reaper. And he's going to teach Lex the family business.

She quickly assimilates into the peculiar world of Croak, a town populated by reapers who deliver souls from this life to the next. But Lex can't stop her desire for justice - or is it vengeance? - whenever she encounters a murder victim, craving to stop the attackers before they can strike again.

Will she ditch Croak and go rogue with her reaper skills?

REVIEW:   

I thought this book was so boring that, for the first time in my entire life, I feel asleep while reading a book. I never slept in class or in a plane but succeeded to fall asleep while reading Croak. There are first times for everything, right? Still, I feel pretty lazy in a way and somehow…surprised. Guess this book can be surprising in a certain way.

I had multiple problems with it. First, I didn’t dislike the principal characters but they weren’t how I thought they would be. Lex is supposed to be wild and all but I didn’t feel it. I mean, she says some not very nice things to people but we can see, from the beginning of the story, that she has a heart and that she’s not that bad. She cares about not hurting her sister and putting in danger her new friends, uncle and the community in general. And, of course, she changes throughout the entire story which isn’t bad itself but there wasn’t that much to change apart from her attitude and maybe some other small things. I had in mind that she was going to be similar to Meda from Cracked.

Driggs didn’t impress me. He’s one of the principal characters but, to be honest, I wouldn’t mind him not being one. I have no connection or any normal positive feelings to have for a masculine character towards him. Now what really confused me is the big amount of secondary characters. It reminded me of the book  Nightshade. The problem is that the author presents them when we first meet those characters but then, if I forget who one of those  really are and what purpose that character has, I’m done. I may never know her/his ‘title’ again, if I can’t deduct by myself and what connection she/him has with the others.

The romance…was not very present. There is this kind of love/hate relationship and, even if I usually love those, this one was the usual kind:

Girl meets boy.

Boy wants nothing to do with girl.

Girl wants to ‘kill’ boy.

Girl and boy partner for ‘work.’

Girl and boy learn to know each other.

And you know the rest; girl and boy begin to like one another. It wasn’t exciting because, as I said earlier, Driggs is too immature for his age and he didn’t quite have a ‘charm’ or fun sense of humour that made me like him or ‘fall for him.’ One character I enjoyed reading about though is Uncle Mort because he’s fun and I would love to meet him in real life to see how he truly looks like and, maybe, be charmed by his personality.

The writing wasn’t bad, pleasant enough actually so that’s why I can’t bring myself to give it only one star. I remember reading a book with a story different but with a similar subject and that’s the the Madison Avery Trilogy by Kim Harrion and, even if that story is slow-paced with long chapters, I appreciated the characters and the story more. It was pretty original in fact. So, if you want to read this kind of story, I would recommend Kim Harrison’s trilogy for YA instead of this Croak one. 

Review of Fire by Kristin Cashore

 Fire by Kristin Cashore

Rating: 2 stars (4.11 on Goodreads)
Genres & themes: Young Adult, fantasy, adventure, family, friendship, magic.
Received: borrowed

Synopsis:

It is not a peaceful time in the Dells. The young King Nash clings to his throne while rebel lords in the north and south build armies to unseat him. The mountains and forests are filled with spies and thieves and lawless men.

This is where Fire lives. With a wild, irresistible appearance and hair the color of flame, Fire is the last remaining human monster. Equally hated and adored, she had the unique ability to control minds, but she guards her power, unwilling to steal the secrets of innocent people. Especially when she has so many of her own.

Then Prince Brigan comes to bring her to King City, The royal family needs her help to uncover the plot against the king. Far away from home, Fire begins to realize there's more to her power than she ever dreamed. Her power could save the kingdom.

If only she weren't afraid of becoming the monster her father was.

Review:

Yes, 2 stars (one star for ''I didn't like it'' and another star because it was truly well-written.)

First of all, you shall know that I really really enjoyed the first book in this series, Graceling. I adored it actually. I thought I was discovering another great author knowing how to write great fantasy/adventure books.

Kristin Cashore got on my nerves.

She played with them.
She played with me.
She played with my emotions.

Ok, first of all, we have a dark and intense prologue of 16 pages. The number of pages is not important but sure is a lot more than usual books I read. So, in that prologue, we meet two characters, one of them being a boy who really got my attention. Leck (not called like that at that moment.) Anyway, so Leck is able to control minds as Fire. I thought ''oh my my, what a great love story that'll make. They'll meet and fall in love with each other because probably they won't be able to control each others minds and they'll be relieved.''

Like hell.

I don't even know if they finally met. (Ok, I do because I read some last pages but, while I was reading, I did not know.)  All I know is that I wanted Fire and Leck to meet and fall in love. Because duh, doesn't Leck redeeming himelf, because of Fire, seem exciting? For me, it did. But, that's not what happened.

Oh la la, I just have so much anger in me right now. Must say that it sure doesn't happen often because of a book. At least, it'll be a memorable one for a special reason. *Sigh.*

I didn't have a direct problem with Fire. She was nice enough, for a fantasy/adventure book MC. I liked when she got all angry and on defense but she mostly was calm and one-dimensional, as many other characters. I didn't know that much about her. I knew things only when the narrator told us memories of her and her father (which is a badass!) Shame shame shame because she could've been such an interesting character.

Damn.

Fire and Archer have a ''relation'' at the beginning of the story of what I understand. But, seriously, I have no idea what kind of relation it was. It was much of:

''Would you marry me, Fire, if I slept in no one's bed but yours?''
He knew the answer to that, but it didn't hurt to remind him. ''No, and I should find my bed quite cramped.''

Oooook.

Also, in this book, there was a war setting. I hate war settings. I don't like when a book gets that serious. The only books I tolerated (and REALLY enjoyed) with war settings were Captive Prince: Volume One and Captive Prince: Volume Two and probably Captive Prince: Volume Three, but it hasn't been realeased yet so I haven't read it. I must admit that I'm a bit scared I won't love Days of Blood & Starlight, because of that.

The writing was splendid (due the 2rd star as I said.) I wansn't expecting and I didn't get less. The pacing was SLOW. So SLOW. Not much was actually hapenning up to where I got (and DNFed.) That's kind of why I DNFed this book (along with the fact that Fire and Leck weren't already a couple as I was hoping for.) The author created a good world building with many descriptions. In one page, there was usually 1 small (very small) dialogue and the rest were descriptions. A lot of them. Most were boring.

I bet this book would've been so much better and I may've liked it more if it was directed to adults. More interesting, exciting and yes, some sex scenes would've been welcomed as in my opinion. 

That's it. I could say more, but I feel calmer now.


Recommendation:
 
Technically, I wouldn't recommend this companion novel. I didn't like it and I wouldn't probably read Bitterblue. Maybe I'll finish this book if I ever feel like to but that could also never happen and I won't be sad. Yes, technically I wouldn't recommend this book but, since I saw that I'm in the minority here, why would you not read it because of what I said about it? Maybe what I was expecting isn't what you want in a fantasy/adventure book. So, go ahead, see for yourself. Maybe you're going to really like it. 

                                   

{Review} Back to You by Natalie Nicole Bates

Back to You by Natalie-Nicole Bates
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

GENRE: Contemporary Fiction
THEME: Romance/Drama
RECEIVED: For Review for CBLS


BLURB:

Twenty years ago, Nick Lincoln broke teenager Lynsey Reznor’s heart when he decided to marry another. Now she is back, along with a chance to reclaim her love. But Lynsey wants answers from him that he may never be able to give out of duty and guilt.

REVIEW:
Back to You is a book about past loves that are reunited many years later. I liked the concept of past loves meeting up again and trying to see if they have that spark again. But I felt that the story fell short and I couldn’t get into the book or it’s characters.

Lynsey is a successful writer but can’t seem to find that lasting relationship, especially like the one man she fell for when she was sixteen. But after a failed relationship she decides to move back to her hometown, where she faces her past love and the realization that they still belong together.
Lynsey had a lot of potential as a character but I just couldn’t connect to her with the details in the book. I wanted to know more about her writing and why she was determined to get married so quickly. I enjoyed her interaction with her best friend Suzy, I wished I got more detail with their friendship instead of just having Suzy push her brother at Lysney.

Nick, I liked his character the most. I feel it was because there was more detail about his life as a cop, his marriage that fell apart and is love for Lysney that never faded. I really pulled for this guy to open up to Lysney and accept that he needed her and still cares for her.

Overall this is a short novel, I felt it was rushed and I wanted more from both the plot and characters. There were characters, which I wanted to get to know more about and it would of added more depth to the storyline.. I did enjoy the relationship between Nick and Lysney, it was a sweet romance and held a lot of emotions for both of them. In the end this is just my opinion of this novel and all reviewers have different thoughts on novels.

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