MyTiredBrain

A sweet way to end the year. It took me a while to get into it, but once I did, I really loved it. I’m not big on anything paranormal typically, but this was a fun read. Nolan is a Ghost of Christmas Past, sent to show Harriet York the error of her ways. But Harriet is a genuinely good person, so as they revisit the past, they’re both confused. Then they start revisiting his past, and it gets even murkier.  I liked that others could see him too, and the description of his magic. I liked how he helped people-pleasing Harriet gain enough confidence to stand up to her cold family. I enjoyed watching them fall for each other, and I would have happily kept reading if the book was longer. (9)

I wouldn’t recommend his book unless you love over-wrought drama. Everything except the very end felt exaggerated to me, and I found myself slogging through just to get it over with. Belmont Clarkson lives for Sage Alexander. So when she ditches him to return to her abusive home, he has to follow her. Sage must help her parents, who are indebted to the town villain. To save her father, she has to work in a dangerous mine. Belmont can’t stand Sage being in danger, so he makes his own deal to take her place. So she was taking her father’s place, and now Belmont is taking her place, and the town supervillain is pulling the strings. Sage’s parents are codependent and blind to anything but each other, and Sage and Belmont don’t want to follow in their footsteps. They spend a lot of time trying to learn to talk about their feelings instead of using touch to soothe each other. Belmont had a traumatic childhood experience being trapped underground, so working in the mine is his version of hell...

Kind of a forgettable novella. It was ok. I finished it two days ago and had to reread the description to remember what it was about. Kyler finishes college and is drafted into the NFL, but his excitement is dulled because his high school girlfriend isn’t by his side. Bree dumped Kyler at the end of high school because she didn’t want the spotlight on her, and she needed to stay home to help her father’s veterinary practice. Kyler returns to their hometown to win back Bree. He has to win over her father (which was impressively easy), and convince her to move to LA with him. (6.5)

This is a sequel to Today Tonight Tomorrow, with Rowan and Neil moving on to separate colleges after finally getting together just as high school ended. I liked the book ok, but wasn’t blown away. Part of me felt like I wasn’t the target audience (I’m too old), but I loved the first book, so I’m not sure that’s it. It’s probably more of a challenge to write a staying-in-love book than a falling-in-love book. It’s also tough to write a love story where the two main characters are barely around each other. I felt the first two thirds of the book were just so-so, and they dragged a little to me. Neil pushing everyone away after getting let’s from his incarcerated father was tough to watch. I liked the last third, when Neil was making more active decisions and Rowan had settled into school a little more. I liked Neil’s roommate and his golden retriever personality. (7.75)

Margot is a wildly successful romance writer who doesn’t believe in Happlily Ever Afters. As a way to vent her frustrations with love, she keeps a Happliy Never After file on her computer, where her literary couples get sexually transmitted diseases and divorced. She’s hacked and this file gets released into the world, and Margot is cancelled by the romance community and her publisher. Ok, this is a little hard to believe, since I love romance novels, and I wouldn’t care if an author created something like this. In fact, I’d probably read it and laugh. Anyway, I’ll suspend disbelief.  Margot’s sister, who suffers from a debilitating autoimmune disease, sends Margot on a six-week trip from LA to Alaska, where Margot can lick her wounds and begin a manuscript in a new genre. There Margot meets Forrest, who helps run the lodge. He’s a ruggedly handsome doctor who is back home to help his father, who recently had a stroke. The author pokes fun at romance tropes, and Margot frequently a...

Kate is an actress, hired to play the role of romance author for a newly published book. Charlie is the talent agent managing Kate, as she steps into her new role. The actual author doesn’t want to be known, so she needs to dupe the world to protect his identity. I like how she immediately asked Charlie if he wrote the book, and the mystery of the author helped drive the book forward. The romance between Kate and Charlie was lacking a little - I wanted more interactions between them. I still like Josie Silver’s writing style.  (7.75)

Can a book be too quirky? I love quirk, but this was almost too much for me in parts. In a small town in California, every day is on a loop. Unfortunately for Carly, it means she has to relive her father’s funeral every day. Unfortunately for the funeral director, Adam, not only does he have to deal with a grieving Carly, he also starts the day off in mid-argument with his cheating ex wife.  Adam and Carly go from enemies to lovers, and I like a lot of their interactions. The chemistry was ok for me, but not off-the-charts. By the fifth time Carly describes Adam as smelling buttery during a supposedly sexy scene, I was rolling my eyes.  The whole town is caught up in the loop, and they go a bit crazy. Zany characters abound. It was too over-the-top for me. The technicalities of the loop are a little confusing. The day starts over in the same way and people remember what happens each day, but cell phones don’t work, and if someone writes something down it disappears the next da...

Both Justin and Emma have one thing in common - each person they date finds their soulmate right after they break up. He posts about it on Reddit, and she messages him. They decide to date each other to break the curse. Emma has a lot of baggage. Like a shipping container’s worth. Her mom is an abusive, abandoning train wreck, and Emma has a massive fear of attachment. The only person she trusts is her best friend, Maddy, and they both flutter through life as travel nurses. Emma plans to just be near Justin for her short contract, and then she’s taking off to the next adventure. Justin is instalove, and wants her to stay, which creates quite the imbalance. Justin would travel with Emma, but he’s trapped in his small town, saddled with being the primary caregiver for his three siblings because his mom’s in jail. And his dad died in a car accident. It’s heavy for a romance, and at times I felt the burden of reading it. There were touching parts, and overall I liked it, but it wasn’t the ...