Hachette Book Group

She's Gone Country

brittany — Sat, 16 Oct 2010 00:00:00 +0000

When I received Jane Porter’s second novel, I’d been sick in bed for nearly two weeks. Though the book helped pass the time, it did little to hold my interest. From this reviewer’s perspective, a true test of a novel’s worth can be answered with one simple question: Would I buy this book? As it pertains to She’s Gone Country, the answer is no, even if I were to set aside my general dislike of “chick lit.”

She’s Gone Country tells the story of Shey Lynne, a model who had a seemingly perfect marriage to a successful photographer. Essentially, she was one half of a glamorous New York City power couple—and then it all went to hell when her husband came out of the closet (a surprising twist, I’ll admit). Shey Lynne hightails it to Parkfield, the small Texas town where she grew up. It’s here that we’re introduced to her controlling Southern Baptist mother, rough and tumble brother Brick, uppity brother Blue, and the memory of her deceased brother Cody, a bi-polar schizophrenic drug addict who died too young and whose death haunts the family like a ghost.

It’s in this environment that Shey Lynne is raising her three sons, who are trying desperately to adjust to life in the sticks after enjoying a private school education and a privileged life in the city. Though much family drama ensues, the meat of the story is Shey Lynne’s relationship with Dane Kelly, a former bull riding champion and wealthy cattle rancher that Shey Lynne dated briefly but intensely as a teenager. At sixteen, Dane was her world, so her parents sent her off to boarding school to keep her from doing something stupid like getting pregnant or running off with Kelly while he rode the circuit. Fast forward twenty years and it’s immediately apparent that Dane still has the power to make Shey weak in the knees when they run into each other at a popular restaurant in their small town.

Shey’s constant, almost obsessive references to Dane’s masculinity; his strength; his big this and strong that; his virility; his tight jeans; his smell; his every goddamn thing becomes too much to bear a few pages into their rekindled romance—let alone 340 pages later. It’s the thing I hate about flowery love stories; they’re always flirting with sex and alluding to certain female feelings. I’d have nothing but respect for Porter’s work if somewhere in She’s Gone Country she included the sentence “Dane made Shey Lynne’s pussy wet.” That’s what we’re talking about; that’s the funny feeling Shey Lynne experiences “down there” every time Dane walks into the room.

She’s Gone Country aims to provide a snapshot of a family in transition and perhaps even feed the myth that everything happens for a reason. It supposes that even after a lifetime of heartbreak, some women get their storybook ending, and this is precisely why I disliked the novel. I prefer a bit more depth in my books, and I want writing that more closely adheres to reality.

Written by: Tina Vasquez, October 15th 2010

One Scream Away

admin — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 01:00:00 +0000

By Kate Brady

Hachette Book Group

One Scream Away is the book equivalent of a CBS crime drama: barely dangerous, slightly obscene, with an expected level of crazy for the villain and a suitable amount of romance to balance the ugliness. The book is edgy only to the level that is appropriate, which, of course, is the point. It skirts the line of being nice.

The plot is simple: after surviving an attack seven years earlier, Beth Denison is stalked by her attacker, now a serial killer. Former FBI agent Neil Sheridan, fighting his own demons (naturally), is brought in on the case—one he thought was closed. Sparks fly, as do a few bullets. Yada yada yada. If you’ve watched a crime drama in the last twenty years, you know the story.

That being said, the book is not a bad read. Kate Brady is a talented writer, even if she’s not stretching herself, and the book offers some well written, if unoriginal, moments. The characters—Neil and Beth in particular—are well developed. Their relationship moves in a natural way, even if it seems too fast for comfort. While I never thought anyone was in real danger, I was interested to know what route she would take.

Of course, this being both a romance novel and a crime story, no one acts anywhere near logically. Rules are thrown out the window in favor of hunches; cops are inept at best, downright stupid at worst. When was the last time a person was kidnapped from protective custody with fifteen guards around them? No one bats an eye when Neil and Beth begin a relationship, despite all sorts of conflicts that would result from a lead investigator sleeping with the main witness, especially one who was briefly the main suspect.

Never mind that being stalked and threatened with death might not make it the best time to begin a new relationship; sex is the cure all for all of Beth's ills, particularly that pesky post-traumatic stress disorder that simply disappears after Beth finally has the love of a good man. Yeah, it’s that kind of book.

I haven’t even gotten to Chevy Banks, the stalker, who is a big ball of Norman Bates-style momma-hating issues that is a cross-dressing habit short of being created entirely by googling “serial killer” and using the key words. Fortunately, these problems don’t keep the book from being a beach read. Unfortunately, they do keep it from being a book you remember five minutes after you put it down. If you can’t watch Law and Order for a couple of days, there are worse ways to spend your time.

Written by: Taylor Rhodes, November 18th 2009

Stakes and Stilettos

admin — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 23:34:00 +0000

By Michelle Rowen

Hachette Book Group

I had never read one of Rowen’s previous books from the Immortality Bites series, but the idea of vampire chick lit was one that I couldn’t pass up. And I’m glad I didn’t! For the first time in a long time, I read the book cover to cover without putting it down.

For those who haven’t read one of the books from the Immortality Bites series, the story follows Sarah Dearly, a young woman who was bitten by a vampire on a blind date, and then is saved by a 600-year-old master vampire named Thierry de Bennicoeur. In the previous stories, Sarah had a rough time adjusting to her new life as a vampire, lost her job and her belongings, and was constantly sought after by vampire hunters after gaining the title “Slayer of Slayers.”

However, in an attempt to live a “normal” life, Sarah returns to her hometown with Thierry for her high school reunion, only to have a witch whom Sarah slighted in high school curse her to be a nightwalker. A nightwalker is a combination of the well-known vampire stereotypes: burned by daylight, lust for blood, superhuman strength, and the thrall—the ability to control a human’s mind. To add to her problems, Thierry is still in a marriage of convenience with Veronique, and she’s not willing to end the marriage, even though she and Thierry have outside relationships. Rowen does a great job of creating a complicated romance without falling into clichés.

Besides being a fun read, Stakes & Stilettos has some steamy scenes, especially when Sarah and Thierry are both driven by their bloodlust. The love scenes are tastefully done and move seamlessly into the next scene. Despite all of the misfortunes that Sarah endures, there is quite a bit of humor, lightening the mood so the novel doesn’t have a depressive tone. Rowen writes an excellent romance novel that is intriguing and a pleasure—without being a guilty one.

Written by: Elizabeth Stannard Gromisch, July 1st 2009

Be Strong and Curvaceous

admin — Sun, 10 May 2009 23:49:00 +0000

By Shelley Adina

FaithWords, Hachette Book Group

It is not easy to like Be Strong & Curvaceous, especially if you are not a Christian and die-hard fashionista. In this novel, believing in a Christian god is as usual as fancying the latest Chanel dress or a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes. Don’t let the title fool you either. It is some sort of wordplay culled from the Book of Deuteronomy that contains the line “Be strong and courageous.”

It is the story of a bunch of trend-setting young women and their triumphs and travails in an elite boarding school in San Francisco. The girls are quite religious but, hey, they are normal teenagers too. While they are busy with their schooling they go to parties, attend prayer meetings, are well-versed with the latest happenings in the fashion world, and experience boy-troubles.

Okay, okay, if this sounds like a banal storyline, it doesn’t mean that Shelley Adina’s new novel doesn’t have any redeeming qualities. It promotes sisterhood and the attitude of being true to one’s self no matter what. Hence be strong and curvaceous—self-satisfaction. It also discusses the pitfalls of peer pressure and the clique system.

The novel is the third installment of the All About Us YA Series, the tale of four BFFs—the blonde Lissa Mansfield, Asian American Gillian Chang, the Hispanic American Carly Aragon, and the African American Shani Hanna—and their lives in the posh Spencer Academy. If Adina’s first book, It's All About Us, is the story of Lissa and her status as a popular and pretty all-American girl in the middle of the rich and the beautiful, the second book The Fruit of My Lipstick, is Gillian’s tale, who fell for the wrong boy.

This time, it centers on Carly, a young woman who has got into the exclusive academy through scholarship set by the school’s minority quota system, a way to show the diversity of the student population. As she struggles to fit in, her oligarch friends don’t know her bourgeois secrets. They only know that every weekend a limo fetches her on a Sunday night. Truth is, her family used to be rich until her father’s business crashed and her parents got divorced. Carly’s mother realized that she had to find herself, discovered art and left for Mexico, where Carly’s grandparents still live.

Once in Mexico where she spends her spring break, she finally confronts her faith. Excitedly coming back to the academy, she discovers that she has a new roommate, a snooty Scottish noble lady, Lady Lindsay MacPhail, aka Mac. The queen bee-like red-haired daughter of the Earl of Strathcain has everything Carly wants—designer clothes, the guts to face the mean-spirited Heathers in the school headed by Vanessa Talbot, and most of all, the attention of Carly’s crush, the handsome Brett Loyola, Vanessa’s ex-boyfriend.

Apart from dealing with her newly found Christian-ness, she longs to be a part of the “in” crowd ready to conquer with her sewing and designing abilities, her charm and wit. The moment comes in as the nasty Heathers use her as a bridge to commit Mac to the Charity Ball. The twist begins when Mac receives odd threatening email messages coming from a stalker. Determined not to forsake her desperate roommate, she and her friends ask God to help them. Soon enough, everything is resolved with a series of divine intervention.

Sure, Adina wants to send the message: It is okay to be a Christian and have fun. I am afraid it might not sit well with the hardliner Christians, who heavily suspect the use of popular form to spread the word of God. On the other hand, the secular readers might overlook her aim and instead, point out the excess materialism and vanity sending a wrong signal to the young audience that would rather watch MTV.

Perhaps, Adina’s works would entice them into the “cumbersome chore” that is reading. But, then again, the question is: are her novels the right ones to lead the way?

Written by: Elen P. Farkas, May 10th 2009