The Witness-a quick disparaging cry.

The Witness by Sandra Brown


My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Skimming was the only way I could get through this book. The characters were flat and more like caricatures and none of them likeable. The "mystery" of the author not revealing any of what was really going on went on for FAR, FAR, FAR too long. And amnesia, despite being an awful plot device, also needed to be researched a whole lot more before Sandra Brown decided to use it in ways that make no sense. I could not suspend my disbelief for even the events of the first page, and it all got harder and harder to swallow as the book went on.

Ugh.

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Dark Lover

Ugh, I started this book months ago but ended up skimming through the end last night. I just couldn't take another description of the forced and contrived tension between the main characters. I feel like my feelings about Twilight and this book are going to give people the impression that I hate Vampires, especially romantical ones, but that is simply untrue! I <3 Gail Carriger's "Soulless" delievered all the things this book tried for but failed to achieve.

Dark Lover by J.R. Ward


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Wrath, Rhage, Tohrment, even these character's NAMES make them sound like pro-wrestlers and the descriptions in the book "giant, towering, intimidating, scary, scarred, muscled, mountainous" don't help much. In fact, I kept picturing all of the Brotherhood as the pro-wrestler "The Undertaker" and all of the "lessers" as that kid in "Powder." That isn't even the worst problem with this book, but it certainly didn't help me get into the story at all.

So, basically Darius, an important Vampire/member of the Brotherhood (protectors of vampires from some arbitrary war with the vampire hunters known as "lessers") is killed by the lessers. As luck would have it, he'd just asked the leader of the Brotherhood/future king of Vamps, Wrath, to watch out for his half-human daughter, Beth. Darius never bothered to introduce himself to Beth, but we are supposed to believe he's always watched out for her and cared for her. Evidently daddy dearest watched her from afar as she went from foster home to foster home like a creepy stalker. In Ward's world vampires don't mature until their 20s when they become vampires...a transition which they may not survive. Her world building is pretty intricate and even involves a glossary at the front of the book (thank goodness.)

Things are complicated by the fact that Vampires only really get much nutrition from feeding from the opposite sex of their own species (which must be unpleasantly intimate for the gay vamps.) Most vamps have some sort of relationship with their feeding partner, but our kingy, Wrath, he just has never been much interested in his partner Marissa. Of course, his disinterest means Marissa is totes in lurve with his beefy self. But, Wrath meets Beth, Darius's neglected urchin of an intrepid reporter (of course) and he's instantly all hot in the pants for her. She's instantly all hot in the pants for him. They basically explode from overwrought metaphor. It is pretty gross and not sexy. Also the fact that Wrath is so damn intimidating that scariness roils off of him like tangible waves in all directions scaring Beth to bits just before they hit the sack the first time makes me cringe. And I'm not really sure why, but the Vamps are kind of wussy and die easily so why am I supposed to be all gushy about them in the first place? Way to ruin the appeal, J.R.

For some reason though I really liked the servant character Fritz though. I guess because he kept trying to help Beth make sense of the crazy-storm around her, which not a whole lot of anyone else did.

Seriously, do yourself a favor, skip this book and read "Soulless" by Gail Carriger or anything by Kelley Armstrong or early"Anita Blake" stuff by Hamilton instead.

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Dealbreakers.

Reading a Romance (or any other kind of book but especially Romance) is kind of like entering into a relationship for the space of a novel. And just like entering into a relationship there can be red flags or worse, dealbreakers. I mentioned a couple of these in my post the other other day, if your memory is as short as mine the two rules were The Bechdel Test and The ladyprotag must show up by the end of Chapter 2. I decided to add to this list of things that just mean that this book and I aren't going to work out.

Other rules:
1) Consent. No explicit sexytime moves should be pulled by either male or female protagonist without consent of other protagonist. Some of my favorite authors have failed at this (I'm looking at you Susan Elizabeth Phillips, with the Molly Sommerville plotline, b/c it is Rape, not "if she were the man and he were the woman it would be Rape", non-consentual sex=Rape, the end.) The rule, for a Romance, should be simple; the characters don't touch each other without express permission, no matter what dazzling desires you have to plant to make that happen. As a side note, I don't mind if there is so much barely contained passion that a character doesn't think they can hold back, but then somehow miraculously they do hold back.

2) The conflict that keeps the couple from the HEA* must be more involved than the couple just refusing to talk to each other. There is nothing more annoying than two characters going on and on about how they think the other person feels and therefore they would NEVER tell them how they are really feeling.

3) 3rd person, or at least pov switching, I needs it. Maybe a year ago, before I really knew what I was doing I would have been okay with first person from the female protag's pov. No longer, it seems. My relationship to the female protag is way, way more important how I feel about the male protag. HOWEVER, first person leads to the tendency for the male protag to be fairly invisible with all the other things going on in her life. The balance is important, and the focus. And even if I don't have to love the male lead as much as the female, I do at least need to get to know him. I may not need to spend all day in his head, but a scene or two every once in a while doesn't hurt anything. Plus this helps me know what kind of conflict is really going on here. Is it just a miscommunication? How does he really feel about her? And so on.

4) Muscles do not need to pile on top of muscles. Actually let's just call this one the "cool it on the hyper-masculinity already." J.R. Ward did a lot of world building for her Black Dagger Brotherhood series, and I applaud that. Every times she describes a Black Dagger Brotherhood brother I picture The Undertaker from pro wrestling. I don't mean just for one of the characters. I mean for all of them, just with different haircolor or whatever. I'm sorry, but when you hypermasculinize dudes and go on and on about their muscles and maleness than that is what you get. I understand that while the Undertaker is not my cup of tea he might just do it for someone else. But, he is so aggressive and masculine to be a caricature of the alpha male. So, there's that. Also, please see my review of Dark Lover where I get into this book a little deeper.

Obviously this is all very personal to me, but I think it could be expanded out to other readers. What are your likes and dislikes and absolute dealbreakers when you read Romance?