Author Archives: Dee

Broken Rules by Jade Buchanan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Book reviewed for The Romance Reviews – original review can be found here – The Romance Reviews – Broken Rules

Can your first love be your true love?

Returning home after ten years of being away, Jonah is unsure of what he will find following the death of his mother. His best friend growing up, Neil, is there to provide him with support through the tough time he is going through, but could there possibly be something more between the two of them? Jonah has always felt something for Neil, but is unsure whether it is reciprocated. But now he is going to find out.

This was the first book that I have read by Jade Buchanan and it definitely won’t be the last. I was intrigued about the premise from just reading the description. I have to admit that I’m always a sucker for the first time love, returning home type story…I guess it’s that fairytale dream of always finding your true love, or in the words of one of my favorite movies, “Twu Wuv” (The Princess Bride).

Jonah was a character that I felt like I could connect with. While I am not in the same situation that he found himself in, I did leave home at about the same age as him and have only been back once in the last twelve years and he is returning home for the first time in ten years. Then there is Neil, Jonah’s best friend growing up, they were the kind of friend that you wish your son or daughter could have in life, until Jonah left town. Now he is back, a Police diver and looking to re-establish his friendship and maybe more with Jonah.

But like with all romance novels, there has to be a source of conflict, for Jonah and Neil, it is the fact that they’re on the opposite side of Canada to each other. Jonah has his work as a social worker and Neil is limited in his location by where there are diving units. It’s a good thing that this is the first book in a trilogy because I can’t wait to see what happens between the two of them in later books.

I’d give this book 4 out of 5 stars, but will be on the look-out for more books by Ms. Buchanan in the future.

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Almost A Spinster by Jenna Petersen
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I wasn’t sure i was going to write a review of this until someone just left me a comment asking what I thought and it gave me a chance to sit down and thing. I liked the stories to an extent don’t get me wrong. But I had a hard time with the believability of them – yeah, you laugh, because i do read a lot of romance, but these ones just seemed to be missing something. I never really got the feeling that each couple fell in love with the other – I think if the author had broken them up into 3 longer stories and developed the characters and situations a bit more they would have been better reads. That isn’t however going to stop me from reading stuff by Ms. Petersen in the future – I’m intrigued enough by her writing style to do just that.

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Sandpipers’ Secrets by Jade Archer
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I have to admit, i’m normally not a fan of books where a couple is adding a third into an already established relationship because I always feel like I am missing something. And I felt the same way through the beginning of Sandpiper’s Secrets – but about halfway through the story picked up and I really enjoyed it. Will definately interested in reading another in the series – maybe with Raven (the guy at the end), hopefully he will find his HEA 😉

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Body Surfing by Anita Shreve
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

more like one and a half…if it hadn’t been a challenge book I probably would have DNF’d it…thankfully, it only cost me $4 on the hardback sale shelf at borders vice full prince…

I had many issues with it – the first being that there was wayyy to much about the authors political views showing through…I really hate it when I start to read a book and there is a section complaining about a certain section or person in the government…it seemed obvious that she also hadn’t done a lot of research about certain aspects. While some might think its not a big deal, there is one part where she makes the statement about someone deciding the run the Boston marathon on a whim (umm, yeah, right…its a competative race to get into and you have to have a certain time in a previous marathon to qualify) and then like 15 pages later, she makes a comment that the same person is barely a runner…say huh?? did I miss something somewhere…

aside from that, the prose just seemed really awkwardly written like it jumped back and forth between first and third person…a good editor was definately needed…

this was my first by Ms Shreve and it will probably be my last

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Color Me Grey by J.C. Phelps

I received a copy of this book from the author as part of a group that I belong to on Goodreads.com. When I first started it, the premise quickly drew my attention and I was looking forward to an exciting read, until chapter three.

Now, this is probably just me, but being in the Navy, I have an extremely hard time with books that feature military characters, when the author apparently has not done their research. In the space of less than half a page, there were three glaring military errors, and because of this, I completely got distracted from reading and couldn’t back into it. For example, error number 1 – a Master Chief in the Navy isn’t one rank below a commissioned officer, there are also Warrant Officers (who were previously enlisted and then applied for a specific program), or the fact that (error 2) a Master Chief can’t just take a test and become an officer – in fact, there is an age limit on when individuals can apply for commissioning programs. Aside from these two issues, there were a couple of other military mistakes that just continued with my distraction.

From then on, I tried to keep reading, but was continually distracted by small bits and pieces that just made the plot seem even more implausible than it already was. I finally decided to give up on it around the middle of Chapter 4, less than 50 pages into it. While I think the author has potential in the future, I advise her to find someone in the military that can critique her work for accuracies, and a good editor to help with tightening up the prose, and turn her telling into showing with the writing. I have refrained from giving this book a star rating her on GR because I didn’t finish reading it and it didn’t seem fair to do that.

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Matched by Ally Condie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

i have to admit that I normally find YA books to not be all that interesting, however, I found this one while trolling a friends bookshelf and since it sounded intriguing I picked it up. Wow. Normally, when I’m reading, I set myself a page goal and I rarely exceed that, to try and savor books, but i couldn’t stop reading this one and so I ended up finishing it it a day. The premise was basically that of The Giver with some tweaks.

Similar to the Giver, society has removed all choices from the individuals lives. They have the same clothes to wear every day, their meals are provided to them, they are match with their future wife/husband according to a program, and even how old they are when they die is controlled. Then you meet Cassia, the heroine. She has just been matched with her best friend, Xander, and yet, she also sees the image of another boy she knows…so what happens when she realizes she is falling in love with the other boy (Ky). I saw some comments on other reviews that commented on how easily they "fell in love," but as I was reading, it seemed as though, their love had been developing over the years, from a friendship into more, they just couldn’t acknowledge it or even understand it.

Unfortunately, the book came too quickly to an end and now i’m stuck in the waiting game until the second book comes out in November. But I can’t wait to see what happens

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