Brittanie

I really enjoyed this book - the characters are all distinct and well written with an engaging plot. The idea is somewhat similar to X-Men but they call themselves Talents, each gifted with a different psychic or physical superhuman ability. However, it's a little more realistic in that Talents tend to go insane the stronger their ability is because the human mind isn't equipped to sustain the kind of strength or abuse it gets from the Talent use. The group this book centers around (hilariously nicknamed the Butterscotch Squad by Jin) are sheltered-in-place in central Paris and each have their own distinct past, usually rife with abuse, but work together to hide themselves from the ominous KGA, a shadow organisation that collects and uses Talents for nefarious purposes. However, as the action ramps up, who is actually working against the KGA becomes a little more muddled and it ends with them on the run.

This book has some qualities that's typical of middle books in trilogies in that it's setting up everything in the climax without answering a lot of questions, which can be frustrating, but because all these characters are so likeable and the plot is interesting and fast moving, it was still an exciting read. These books are all relatively short but do a lot more than many trilogies I've read with double or more page counts. I find myself wishing they were a lot longer.

I'm disappointed again because it didn't fall in line with what I'd expected from the character - but that's my own fault for having expectations.
The major problem I had was their voices - we finally get to see what's up with Winter and what his powers really entail but then the author gave him this clingy, needy personality that I couldn't have predicted from past books. I can't really relate to Evil Twink Energy so it just seemed off for this character - I definitely expected/wanted more dark, mysterious angst. He just instantly fell in love to this level that's not healthy just because he has a Weasley kink or something? On top of that, I found Fox very obnoxious. The plot itself is interesting though the traits given to witches was a weird choice and I can only assume it's just a MacGuffin because while Zelda is more in-line with what you'd expect from a witch, it just so happens all the other witches are murderous, cantankerous old assholes which leads Fox to be a squib? Weird choice.

This is an interesting use of English folklore and includes all my favourite bits - ghosts, real history, magic, and archeology.
In this book, the Green Man is more than just lore, and whose power is the crux of a spell that holds paranormal denizens from hell at bay. Randolph, a kind of mage with a long family history, and his fellow Green Men, which include a ghost hunter and two Government-created mutants, are tasked at protecting England from what most of its citizens don't even know exist. The Government looks to use them to their own ends but the Green Men only work for King and Country and the new establishment doesn't jive well with that. Saul Lazenby, an archeologist that made some bad decisions in the War that got him dishonorably discharged, jailed, and ultimately disowned by his family, finally finds work with an eccentric Lord with a taste for the occult that leads to him crossing paths (and more) with Randolph.

More great characters from K.J. Charles and a completely unique story makes this a really fun and interesting recommend.

I seem to find that the vampire/vampire pairings are the most interesting and “believable” as this is definitely my second favourite installment in the series (first fave being Rafe and Phillipe's story). Aiden seems like a genuinely interesting character and it was nice to finally get some real back story as well as see his power. I felt the power reveal was a bit anticlimactic however, possibly because we didn't get told why he really used it last time or how (thought he says it's been centuries). Maybe a flashback to when he first discovered what he could do, similar to when Winter's power was revealed in the last book. Making him at least 1,000 years old also seemed kind of unnecessary unless it was just for Drake to not to have to come up with any real history links. If it was in Scandinavia in the 1,000s, there were many fiefdoms and kings so it would be hard to trace Ronan in any real historical context. However, the names Aiden and Ronan aren't historically accurate at all for that area. I can only assume Drake didn't really know what she was going to do with Aidan's story when she gave him that name. I'd like a little more info from their origin story just clear all that up.
Overall, a fun series but not consistent enough for me.

This is a collection of short stories centering around Robert and Simon, the adoptive fathers of Sam and past residents of the house prominent in [b:Spectred Isle 35118935 Spectred Isle (Green Men, #1) K.J. Charles https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1498437700l/35118935.SX50.jpg 56433653]. They can be read in either order though, as I read Isle first. It opens with Robert having newly acquired a mansion from some relative that ends up being haunted. Simon, an occultist (see: ghost hunter but with powers rather than EMF receivers), is hired to help. The ghost ends up having some rather personal “unfinished business” that leads to Simon and Robert getting intimate. The rest of the stories take place with spans of time in between from Robert's, who was previously a journalist, point of view as chronicler. It's very [b:The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes 3590 The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Arthur Conan Doyle https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1164045516l/3590.SY75.jpg 1222101] and even takes place in the same London, as the Diogenes Club and “the fat man” are mentioned and interacted with. No appearance of Sherlock and Watson, unfortunately. I really enjoy this world and find that the first (and looking like only) Green Men book and this collection of short pre-qual stories aren't enough to satisfy. I hope the author hasn't completely dropped them.

I found this book to be really hard to follow and rather boring. No matter how many times I tried to sit and read it, it never caught my attention.

Absolutely ridiculous but highly entertaining. I've read much better, more sexually realistic fanfiction but if you're looking just for something fun and different to read and already are an adult fan of Wonderland, this isn't a book to avoid.

Picked this up because a book about witches from a male POV is a rare find and relevant to my interests. It does have a lot of Harry Potter parallels as mentioned in many reviews but it's unique enough that you can easily forget about that and is less similar the farther you read.
In this world, there are white and black witches with a lot of violence between them with the whites being the governing side and blacks mostly being independent and solitary. Upon turning 17, both types are bestowed 3 gifts and blood from a relative in order for their specific gift to appear, though they exhibit certain magical abilities before that (namely faster healing). The main character is half black and half white and is heavily discriminated against because of it to the point of outright abuse. As his 17th birthday approaches, he is ripped from his grandmother and half siblings, experimented upon by whites, isolated from society - but eventually is able to escape and goes to seek out one that can give him his gifts for fear that he'll slowly die without the ritual completed. There are a lot of different rules the witches have to live by both governed by The Whites and by magic itself (example: Nathan can't sleep inside without weird headaches because of his Black heritage and can also sense/feel electronic pulses from cell phones and TVs for some reason).
The biggest issue I had with the book is that it switches between 1st to 2nd person POV between chapters though it's all from Nathan's POV. Also some of the rules mentioned above don't make a lot of sense. In this world, being born into magic seems like an awful violence-filled short life.

DNF @ 56%. I love most of Klune's writing but knowing that this series is dropped and won't continue kind of sucked the motivation to read it when the story itself wasn't all that interesting anyway. The relationship between Felix and Seven has major Twilight vibes and was a big turn-off. Seven is very controlling yet na??ve and Felix is a total pushover with a bad personality. There wasn't any chemistry, just Seven stalking Felix for most of his life because he was told Felix was his soulmate. The action scenes I did read where well done and the world that could have been developed here was unique - just not enough to keep me engaged.

This is a collection of short stories that were originally sent in the author's email newsletter during October 2020, so I'd read most of them there. Most of these have monsters/cryptids I'd never seen before or thought of including in any kind of romance setting, which makes these very interesting and unique.

A short story set very soon after the end of Widdershins. Griffin has their first Valentine's Day all planned out, hoping to make a perfect impression on Whyborne but it gets waylaid when a member of one of the old Widdershins families comes to him with a very time-sensitive case.
The writing leaves much to be desired - the writer uses about 5 different variations of the phrase “stirred my cock” for Griffin in the 25 pages that said cock is practically its own character. The two characters still feel a bit flat and the “mystery” in this story isn't much of one and isn't really explored. Granted, it is a short story and only so much can be included, but then it's the writer's responsibility to come up with an idea that can be sussed out within the pages. After this, I can't see continuing with this series or the writer.

I really enjoyed this short story! But I'm very fond of Lord John as a character and can't wait to read the rest of his series (only in order now! I read this after The Private Matter).

This was disappointing. I was hoping for a bittersweet sordid romance with the tragedy of war as the backdrop but what this is is a group of young adults with no communication skills whining constantly about their post-war lives and finding solace in sleeping around with each other instead of actually talking. None of the characters had redeeming qualities and while this may be a pretty realistic view of 1910s small village Britain I just found it all rather boring.

While not as exciting as the first book (I don't care for France or French history, both of which is favoured heavily in this narrative), it was quite a page-turner and answered more than a few questions raised by the first novel in the series. I quite liked the shocking ending. The only main problems I had with this book is the weird Geillis Duncan sub-plot (Claire seems really obsessed by her and her death, though I can't imagine it's important except that it proved to Brianna that Claire was telling the truth?) that featured in the last part of the book, and Claire seemed a bit dull throughout the book - there were more than a few times I wanted to throw the book across the room because of something Claire said or did that was completely idiotic. Overall, a fun ride and I'll definitely be continuing on in the series, though it was hit or miss for a good chunk in the middle. Slug your way through that and the battle narrative back in Scotland for the last few parts of the book will key up your interest again.

This was a really unique take on fae and a version of their world. It's based more on the classic fairy tale format than most urban fantasy I've read. I'm not sure why there are so many 3 or less star reviews of this as I really enjoyed it. The most YA book genre I've read is probably faerie-based dark fantasy (as well as Alice in Wonderland being my favourite book), so maybe it's just more in my wheelhouse than a lot of other readers'.
I didn't find the writing poor or the plot hard to follow and while I didn't come to particularly care about any of the characters, the action kept me reading and I moved through the book fairly quickly.
The book starts out like a lot of urban fantasy where Alice (kind of on the nose but better than the usual eyeroll-inducing YA fantasy names) is being followed by some shady characters and more and more of the elements of her grandmother's hard-to-find-yet-famous published fairy tale collection bleed into her assumed-normal existence. However, once things kick off and she ends up going into the Hinterland (the world all the books' tales take place in) it's very similar to Alice in Wonderland but much more dark.
I definitely look forward to a sequel and seeing more into the Hinterland.

This book is bizarre and that's making it hard for me to shelve it. It takes place in an (albeit far-fetched) version of the “real world” but, due to a specific type of mental illness, there are a lot of fantastical elements.

August and Jack are lifelong friends but when Jack starts experiencing hallucinations that gradually get worse and more encompassing, August chooses to play along out of a grandiose sense of obligation, instead of thinking that Jack would instead benefit from some actual medical help. August ignoring all the signs that Jack is actually ill finally coalesce to them being sentenced to criminal psych ward separated by order, though while there Jack finally gets the treatment he needed.

I ended up really enjoying the story because of how weird it is but also really enjoyed August and Jack as characters as well as their own friendship. There were several moments where it seemed a little too far flung from reality but I think that added to the charm of the story as a whole. This book isn't going to be for everyone but it's one that I won't be forgetting soon.

Dropped at 27%. The world seems original but I couldn't connect with any of the characters, and the main one is obnoxious and self-centered. I just lost interest.

Fun quick and cute read from one of my favourite MM historical romance authors. This one is contemporary but it hits all my bakery AU buttons. And I really want that blueberry lemon curd fried croissant like GODDAMN.

I seem to be a bit of an outlier in that I didn't absolutely love this. I do agree that it's even better than the first book but I think that's more down to the characters already being developed so we can jump right into the action-packed plot. Michaelson is good with his character and plot development though I still find some of these characters are just being given powers without much explanation or reason and it leaves me with questions. The climax of this book was pretty powerful though and it'll be interesting to see how the author meets or tops that in the last installment of the series.

Charles is one of my favourite historical MM writers but this one left me a little disappointed.
It's an outlier in that both main characters are POC but the murder-mystery plot and even the relationship between the two just felt insipid. It either needed to be longer so as to develop the characters and their past a bit more, or needed to lose the mystery plot and just be a character-driven romance.
Since I'm neither from the late 1800s Britain or POC I found it hard to tell if this whole situation was realistic or not. Gil is a biracial man who was abandoned by his white brothers after their father dies, which we find out later is more due to greed and hypocrisy rather than his colouring. He's nonetheless picked himself up by the bootstraps and is now the owner and sole-operator of a bookstore in the seedier part of London that also has dealings with black-market pornography. Vikram is an old childhood friend and now lawyer-advocate for the disenfranchised and immigrant community who is looking for leads in the disappearance of a young Indian man. This takes him to Gil's bookshop and a reunion with his long lost best friend. Due to lack of a communication and misunderstanding, Gil had forgotten about Vikram after having felt completely abandoned by him. Where Vikram has never forgotten Gil and is shocked to find he's not only alive but well and an integral part of his mysterious case.

The relationship picks up like no time passed and there's some crime solving in between. The main thing that makes this a Charles book is the heartfelt dialogue between the two as well as a few well-written sexual scenes and a HFN ending. Read it to be a Charles completest but know that it's just not the best of their works.

This is a prequel story to [b:Malum Discordiae 60420033 Malum Discordiae (Tennebrose, #1) Ashlyn Drewek https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1644898091l/60420033.SX50.jpg 92565628] that gives a little more background on the old town in the forest mentioned a few times in that book. When Cash and Graeme end up there in the latter half of the book they make mention that a school archeological team was working there and were all brutally murdered but one, leaving all of their equipment behind. This gives more information on that survivor and what happened, though is still fairly open-ended. It's deliciously spooky though. I read this after Malum so I can't tell if it's better to read it before or not.

Great classic ghost story ideas but I felt the execution was a little wanting. Inaba has always been able to see spirits but has always tried to suppress his ability. His life is a bit tragic which doesn't help with his mental health.
The book starts with Inaba at his aunt and uncle's cremation ceremony where he's confronted with yakuza looking for money. He had no idea the couple who raised him was in debt as he's been living a seperate life in Tokyo. Despite the debts, his aunt leaves him with an abandoned cabin in the middle of the forest which he thinks he can clean and sell to make up for the cash. Turns out not only is the cabin haunted but the woods around it as well. He continues to try and pretend that he can't see them though they seem to be acting strange in comparison to most of the spirits he's encountered before. He hires a cleaning company and the owner comes out with him to the cabin for the inspection and quote. A freak storm hits and they're stuck there, where Inaba finds out this mysterious cleaning company owner is also one who dabbles in paranormal arts.
A few twists and turns and of course a bit of Stockholm Syndrome and a big bang (pun intended) of an ending.
For me, it was a bit too cliche. The setting of Japan doesn't add too much to it - it could have been set in New England or even Norway, anywhere with dense forests, and it wouldn't have been that different of a story, so I would have liked more of a cultural emphasis. The romance was also an insta-love kind of thing. One night stuck in snow and you're already cuddling? Hmm. But I'm a sucker for anything ghosts so it was worth the read.

I've been loving this series and Greene's writing. Each couple featured in this series have very different dynamics and, while they are all interlinked and inhabit the same space, each book feels separate enough that they can be read as a standalone. That can be a pro or con to the reader - there are times that I wish there was more interaction between past characters. In this book we do see the other two remaining Beasts that starred in the last two books but we don't see their companions and, besides the fire from the first novel being a major plot element here, past events are hardly mentioned. I kind of needed a recap to remember what exactly happened in the last books to not be lost in some parts.
The second book in the series remains my favourite, though this might take second place. Frakes is just much more interesting a character than Gabe, Edward, Will, or Josiah - and I missed August who made no appearance here at all.
Overall, a worthwhile series that I definitely recommend for lovers of historical MM romance.

Roehrig writes teenagers in a realistic and approachable way. This is geared towards YA and many of the characters are 16/17 but I didn't find them annoying or overly dramatic like I do with a lot of YAs now that I'm of a certain age.
It's also really well paced with a lot of action and drama and a huge exciting showdown fight at the end. Some of it is still eyeroll inducing but it fits in with the story and there's a lot of humour thrown in to keep the reader engaged.
I tagged it M/M romance but it's mostly crush-levels with some kissing. We get pretty close to a M/M/M scene not once but twice but then we're cockblocked by the end of the chapter, but this isn't surprising since it's still YA. I'd have liked to see maybe less characters and more interaction between Jude, Gunnar, and our MC but they're not quite central to the plot so they're just another on a long cast list.

Overall, a really fun book in a style I very much enjoyed. I'll be reading more of Roehrig's work, and I need more vampire books like this one.