Review: Rock Hard by Olivia Cunning

Rock Hard by Olivia Cunning

An ultimatum can break your heart....

Every night lead singer, Sed Lionheart whips thousands of women into a frenzy with his voice alone. But the stage is the only place Sed feels any passion since he lost Jessica...

If you’re not willing to break all the rules...

It shattered her heart, but law student Jessica broke off her engagement to Sed, determined to be successful on her own terms. But no other man can ever hold a candle to Sed...

Then a chance meeting and tortuously close quarters lead to uncontrollable flares of passion and rediscovery of their unique penchant for public encounters. Now, in addition to the risk of mutual heartbreak every time they get together, they’re in danger of truly scandalous public exposure...
(Description from Goodreads)

Genre: Erotic Romance

Series: Sinners on Tour #2
Does the series need to be read in order? No

Review

Liked
• I enjoyed catching up with the band. Despite this being a romance book that focuses on one couple, the other members of the band play a big role. It's nice to catch up with everyone from the previous book.
• One of the (many) plotlines dealt with addiction to painkillers. It's a big issue and it's good to see a book addressing it.
• The heroine, Jessica, is striving to be independent. Sometimes she approaches it in annoying ways but I understand her reasons.

Liked Less
• The plotline where Jessica can't succeed in law school because she's too beautiful and can't get no respect made me roll my eyes so often that I now know every spot that I need to dust on my ceiling. I'm not buying it.
• Sed was a controlling jerk.
• While I respected Jessica's need for independence, I didn't really like her most of the time.
• Why was everybody in the band so mad at Jessica? I understand that they're being loyal to their bandmate but as adults they should recognize that there are 2 sides to every story. Also, knowing Sed, I'm sure they wouldn't have to take too far of a leap of faith to see how he could be a controlling jerk in a relationship.
• The sex scenes were repetitive and very vanilla.

TL; DR

After immensely enjoying the first book in this series, a dislike of the hero and heroine made this book a difficult read for me.

Rating

Page of Swords
Has some good points that are unfortunately overwhelmed by bad points/flaws. I will probably continue with the series because I enjoyed the first book so much.

Disclosure: I purchased this book.

Amazon | B & N

Review: Until There Was You by Jessica Scott

Book Description

From the author of Because of You comes an all-new contemporary eBook romance. Though he plays by the rules, she’s not afraid to break them. Now these two strong-willed military leaders will prove that opposites attract . . . even under fire.

A by-the-book captain with a West Point background, Evan Loehr refuses to mix business with pleasure—except for an unguarded instance years ago when he succumbed to the deep sensuality of redheaded beauty Claire Montoya. Since that brief lapse in judgment, Evan has been at odds with her. But when he is asked to train a combat team alongside Claire, battle-hardened Evan is in for the fight of his life.

Strong, gutsy, and loyal, Captain Claire Montoya has worked hard to achieve her high military rank. In Evan Loehr, Claire sees a spoiled commander who puts the rules before everything else—including his people. Army orders force them together and Claire soon discovers that there is more to Evan than meets the eye. He too has dark secrets and deep longings. For all their differences, Evan and Claire share two crucial passions: their country and each other.
(Description from Goodreads)

Genre: Contemporary Romance, Military Romance

Series: Coming Home #2
Does the series need to be read in order? No

Quick Synopsis

Evan follows the rules; Claire doesn't. They argue a lot and lust after each other a lot, all while trying to ready other soldiers for deployment. They also deal with their friend and fellow soldier, Reza, being a raging alcoholic.

Review

Liked
• I enjoyed the glimpse of military life from a woman's perspective. I wanted to see more of it.
• Claire's friendship with Reza was solid and interesting. I also liked her changing interactions with Engle. At first Claire wants nothing to do with Engle but their relationship evolves as Engle tries to step up to the plate and get her unit ready in time for deployment.

Liked Less
• So much lusting. It all started with insta-lust and would not die. I'm ok with lusting, really. I do expect it in my romance novels, but there was way too much in this book. It actually interrupted good conversations and plot developments and made me roll my eyes.
• The hero and heroine were very one-dimensional. We get told that Claire is some kind of maverick who breaks the rules all the time and Evan is the rule follower. We get told that they discovered this about each other when they were deployed. Then the lusting and arguing start. It feels like I got dropped right into the middle of something with no preparation. I wanted more backstory about their interactions when they were deployed. I wanted more actual interaction instead of lust, lust, lust. I also wanted to know more about Claire's damage than just "oh, everybody leaves me so I can't connect." I was the one who couldn't connect.
• The sexy scenes were ok but there were too many in a row with too little plot development between them toward the end of the book. I found myself skimming.

Rating

Page of Swords
Has some good points that are unfortunately overwhelmed by bad points/flaws.

Disclosure: I won an ARC of this book in a contest. My opinions are, as always, 100% my own.

Amazon | B & N

Review: Dying Bites by D.D. Barant

Book Description

Her job description is the “tracking and apprehension of mentally-fractured killers.” What this really means in FBI profiler Jace Valchek’s brave new world—one in which only one percent of the population is human—is that a woman’s work is never done. And real is getting stranger every day…

Jace has been ripped from her reality by David Cassius, the vampire head of the NSA. He knows that she’s the best there in the business, and David needs her help in solving a series of gruesome murders of vampires and werewolves. David’s world—one that also includes lycanthropes and golems—is one with little knowledge of mental illness. An insane serial killer is a threat the NSA has no experience with. But Jace does. Stranded in a reality where Bela Lugosi is a bigger box office draw than Bruce Willis and every full moon is Mardi Gras, Jace must now hunt down a fellow human before he brings the entire planet to the brink of madness. Or she may never see her own world again…

(Description from Goodreads)

Genre: Paranormal Fantasy

Series: Bloodhound Files #1

Review

Dying Bites has your standard urban fantasy helping of vampires and werewolves, but there's a unique twist. These creatures exist in a parallel universe where humans are in the minority. Jace Valchek is a (human) FBI profiler from our world who gets pulled into the alternate universe by their NSA. They need help tracking a human who's killing vampires and werewolves.

The alternate world that Jace is pulled into is pretty neat. It's a lot like our world but a step to the side. There are vampires and werewolves, and golems, the animated sand/clay of Jewish legend. I found the golems to be a refreshing addition because they're not seen often in stories. As mentioned previously, there are humans as well though considerably less of them than the other races. The history of this universe is explained to Jace (and the reader) as she acclimates to her new situation. I was really enjoying my tour of this world at Jace's shoulder until I thought about it a little more. That's when I noticed the logic problems.

As a reader of paranormal fantasy, I have no problems suspending disbelief to a point, but Dying Bites lacked the internal consistency that makes other urban fantasy worlds easier to swallow. The entire premise for bringing Jace to the other universe is flawed. Apparently, in that world, vampires and werewolves are immune to mental disorders so humans are the only ones who can be insane. I could buy this if vampires and werewolves were distinct races, but alternate universe humans can be turned into either one. So does the mind change so completely during the transformation that they're no longer like humans at all? I saw no evidence of that. In fact, the author seems to go to a lot of trouble to show that vampires and werewolves can be pretty "normal." So why is it that they can feel emotions and interact like humans but not be crazy? I don't get it. Not to mention, a werewolf does some weird stalkery things toward Jace but nobody thinks that's maybe a little nuts, especially Jace who's supposed to be an expert? And that's not the only sign of Jace's apparent lack of skill. It seemed to me like every conclusion that she drew was due more to detective work than to any special insight into the criminal mind. I was expecting decent psychiatric analysis, but instead I was told that the killer is insane. Well, duh. That's why you were brought to this world in the first place, Jace. This is not a character that I can respect.

Perhaps I would have like Jace more if I'd been able to understand why she acted the way she did. Unfortunately, this book is full of tell instead of show so I never really got a feel for her. For example, we're told that Jace likes Gretchen and that she's probably the closest to a friend that Jace has in this world, but there's no real evidence of that. The friendship isn't actually shown developing or existing. There are also several times where she notes that a man is attracted to her that left me scratching my head. Once again, there are no signs of this attraction other than Jace just telling us it's there. She doesn't even really elaborate on her own feelings/attractions. This disconnect leads to many of Jace's conclusions looking like stunning leaps of non-logic.

Overall, I liked the idea of an alternate universe with supernatural creatures but the logic holes and the distant heroine left me wanting.

Rating

Page of Swords

Has some good points that are unfortunately overwhelmed by bad points/flaws.
I will not be continuing with the series.

Disclosure: I purchased this book.

Amazon | B & N