The Man from Primrose Lane by James Renner

5 Stars

 

“Are these things usually this complicated? They only appear to be. The explanation is always elegantly simple. I guarantee that when we find this man, we’ll smack ourselves for not seeing him sooner . . . Truth is always simple but it’s never that boring.”

Let’s get the things I didn’t like out of the way real quick. To begin with? The title. If it weren’t for my friend Trudi’s review, I would have never given this one a second glance. My other problem? The cover art. It’s not good and I am a Judgey McJudgerson who passes up ugly books. The good news is, those are the only two things I didn’t like. Once I started reading, the tabbing of the pages started happening . . .



The Man from Primrose Lane is the story of David Neff, a bestselling author whose one-hit-wonder was a true-crime novel that outed a serial killer . . . after someone else had already been executed for the crimes. Now David finds himself being recruited to solve one more coldcase crime . . .

“'Who Was the Man from Primrose Lane?’ the above-the-fold article demanded to know. ‘And who wanted him dead?’ went the subhead.”

What a gooooooooood mystery this was. And then I got to the 60% mark and something kinda like this happened . . .



“You ever get that feeling when you meet someone that your life is about to take a strange detour that maybe you’d be better off avoiding?”



When attempting to describe my reaction to this book to a friend, I summed it up that it’s like the author was plugging along just fine and got a case of writer’s block or sudden onset amnesia that caused him to leave the project unfinished . . . and then a few weeks or months or years later he picked it up again and said “you know, a lot of people write decent mystery novels. I’mma flip the script and make it one huge mindf*&^ instead.” I’m not giving away a diddly dang thing on this one. Let me just say this baby is so intricately woven it’s insane . . .



Or maybe more like this . . .



A giant Rube Goldberg machine that gets put into action once you read the first line. And using the term “episodes” instead of chapters??? Brilliant. It’s been a long time since a book played out like a movie in my head. This one gets all the stars.

“I hope, if nothing else, you come to believe that what we call the present is nothing more than perception and the concepts of cause and effect are mostly pointless. So say it with me: “FUCK IT.” Now let’s get back to it.”

Buzz Books 2015 - Young Adult Spring

3 Stars

 

Preach, Colbert. PREACH!

I always get a little worried when my to-read list falls below INFINITY. Lucky for me, my gal Shelby gave me a head's up about this book filled with little sneaky-peakies of upcoming YA releases.

Buzz Books 2015: Young Adult Spring contains synopses for various YA selections that helps you easily weed out the ones you don't want to read (*cough* yet another dystopian YA series with a girl who is supposed to be wicked kick-ass and yet forgets all her plans when she meets some handsome penis *cough*) and contains a chapter or two excerpt for ones you might want to check out. It also offers a handy-dandy little link to request an ARC of almost every book.

If you're a grown-up who hasn't yet discovered the wonderful world of YA, I highly recommend giving this genre a chance. Trust me when I say these ain't yo momma's kids' books. I've found myself many a day looking something kinda like this while reading a "children's book" . . .



I've been lucky and scored copies of 99 Days and Seed super early, but after glancing through this little book last night I also added the following to my wish-list:

















IT'S NATIONAL READATHON DAY - GO FIND SOMETHING TO READ!



P.S. Apparently giving this a 3 Star rating could lead to being contacted by the publisher of this book . . .



This isn't a "real" book - 3 Stars is a more than fair rating.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you, NetGalley!

The Girl in 6E by A.R. Torre

4 Stars

 

“To the people I cam with, I am JessReilly19, a bubbly nineteen-year-old college student – a hospitality major – who enjoys pop music, underage drinking, and shopping. None of them really know the true me. I am who they want me to be, and they like it like that. So do I. Knowing the real me would be a bit of a buzzkill. The real me is Deanna Madden, whose mother killed her entire family, then committed suicide.”

^^^^Gets its hooks in you straight from the jump, right? You get all strapped in and ready to ride the roller coaster to crazytown and then????? Jessica/Deanna has a webcam session . . .



and I, the biggest self-proclaimed prude on the planet, was forced to read it in order to get on with the story. So I did. At first I was all . . .



and then I was all . . .



and then??????



Web cammy sexy times are sexy. I have a shame : (



After Deanna . . . ahem . . . finishes off her client, if you know what I mean, the book does proceed to thrillsville when we find out she works as a webcam girl due to the fact that she never leaves her apartment. Ever. Deanna has an obsession with death . . . she fantasizes about murdering anyone she comes into contact with, ergo she never allows herself to come into contact with others.

“I don’t mind being killer-crazy, but I don’t want to be loony-bin-crazy. That would probably be bad for business – a bit of a turnoff.”

Thanks to services such as free shipping from Amazon Prime (all hail almighty Amazon!) and prepackaged meals from Jenny Craig, Deanna can get anything she wants delivered straight to her door by her UPS man, Jeremy (who wishes she’d open the door for him just one time).

The poop really hits the fan when one of Jessica/Deanna’s cam clients starts getting a little too obsessed with having Jessica roleplaying the part of a young girl and she has to decide whether or not it’s time for her to finally open her door for the first time in three years . . .

That’s all you get. I’m not spoiling this one. If you dig dark reads and are looking for a serious psych thriller with some f*&^%d-up kinky romance thrown in to the mix, pick this one up. My local Book Pusher told me to and he didn’t steer me wrong.

Adverbs by Daniel Handler

1 Star

 

It’s time for my library’s annual Winter Reading Challenge. The challenge, should I choose to accept it (duh, of course I do) is to read five books between January 20th and March 20th. Once completed I can earn myself yet another bragalicious mug for my collection . . .



Oooops, wrong mug . . .



Easy peasy lemon squeazy, right? Well, the kicker this year is the theme is “Love on the Rocks.”



Romance is not my forté. The extra kick in the pants is out of the 25 suggested selections, I’ve already read 10. Although reading what the librarians suggest isn’t a requirement, I like to choose my 5 from their list whenever possible. That’s what led me to Adverbs. Uhhhhhh . . . .



Yeah. Daniel Handler might possibly be the biggest hit or miss author I’ve ever come across. Being a mom I loved the world that Lemony Snicket built, and as a grown-up I was floored by Handler’s ability to flip the switch and write something like The Basic Eight . . . But then I read Why We Broke Up and it was so “meh” that I didn’t quite know what to expect. Well, I should’ve expected zilch ‘cause this book was a real turd.

Handler describes Adverbs as a “novel about love – a bunch of different people in and out of different kinds of love.” What it really turned out to be was a series of unfortunate events (Ha! See what I did there?) – little vignettes that had characters, San Francisco, and yellow-billed magpies as repeating items that would tie them together. What it lacked? Any kind of depth or ability to entertain me. Wait, I take that back. The story “Clearly” was brilliant (but it was also creepy instead of “romantic,” so you should probably take that statement with a grain of salt). Sadly, one snippet of a whole book is not enough to bump my rating up to 2 Stars. The schizy, rambling style aside, when Handler opted to break the fourth wall at the 68% mark, I knew this book had officially jumped the shark. However, I don’t have the ability to “DNF” so I trudged through to the end, growing ever more bored and questioning how I could have ever enjoyed someone who wrote such pompous drivel. Let’s hope the next four books in the challenge aren’t such stinkers.

Alright, enough with the bad stuff. Now I’m going to bore you with the awesomeness that is my public library. First, I work two blocks away from it, so whenever I need to escape from my crappy job it’s super easy. And what an escape it is . . .



That’s just the parking garage. When you get inside it’s sooooooooo purrrrrrty . . .



With features like the old bank vault that has been turned into a “film vault” where movies are played . . . .



And the children’s library that literally has you stepping into a book . . .



Or the rooftop, where you can enjoy a game of chess Alice In Wonderland style . . .



I’m forever grateful to my beautiful library. It’s the only way I could ever be able to read 200+ books a year, so one stinker of a recommendation is easily forgiven : )

The Portlandia Cookbook by Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein

4 Stars

 

Don’t worry. You’ll soon find out : )



YES WE CAN! Well, we can with the help of The Portlandia Cookbook. Seriously, it does teach you how to pickle things. I lucked out and scored a free copy of this cookbook, but I had been planning on spending some of my Christmas cash on purchasing it for myself. (Santa apparently thought I didn’t deserve a copy under my tree on Christmas morning. Well, F*&% YOU, SANTA! I got one anyway.)

I love Portlandia and I love fun cookbooks. Let’s all get real here – if you need to look up a recipe it takes but a button click on your smartphone to find whatever your heart desires. If I’m going to drop $25 on a cookbook, it either better make the dinner for me or at least make me chuckle. This one has the added bonus of making me think of the deliciousness which is the “Pullout King” . . . .



Ermahgerd I lurv Jerff Goldblurm!!!!!!



So I was expecting a giggle or two (yes, giggles - no matter what karen says to the contrary), but what I wasn’t expecting was edible food . . .



Like REALLY edible food . . .



I mean, look at this thing . . .



Serve it up with 3 pounds of French fries and it could be the star of an episode of Man vs. Food!

When you’re done with dinner, they even teach you how to make a gorgeous apple pie . . .



That’s almost too pretty to eat . . . I said almost. Now slap a couple scoops of French vanilla on that bitch and watch me nom nom nom.

And if everything else fails, you know what to do . . .



That’s right! Put a bird on that mother*&^%$ . . .



Recommended to the three other people who watch Portlandia : )

ARC provided by Blogging for Books in exchange for an honest review

I'll Meet You There by Heather Demetrios

5 Stars

 

Seriously. I just gave a romance novel all 5 Stars. I think that’s a first. I need a second to recover.



Now before anyone gets all up-in-arms, please note that I rate books for their specific genre and don’t attempt to compare apples to orangutans. And this little apple? Well, it was bright and shiny and without a flaw when it comes to my idea of a nice little romantic story.



Skylar Evans has had one goal her entire life – to get out of her small, rundown hometown of Creek View, California and start her life. With high school graduation behind her, Skylar is only three months away from her big escape . . . but when her mother loses her job and begins drinking, Skylar realizes she may have no choice but to stay. There’s also the added complication of Josh Mitchell. Once co-workers and friendly acquaintances, Josh is now back from the military – minus a leg but with a much better personality, and Skylar finds herself doing the thing she swore she’d never do . . . fall for a Mitchell.

^^^That’s a terrible synopsis. It makes this book sound so hokey and unreadable. Just trust me when I say it’s not. I’ll Meet You There was such a pleasant surprise. I’m not a big romance reader to begin with, so I have really high expectations for stories like these if they hope to receive more than 3 Stars from me. Skylar and Josh were such great characters and the plotline was completely believable. It was so easy to route for them and fall in love along with them. I’ll Meet You There was heavy on story and light on the smexy times. It was a book that pretty much promised a HEA and it did it so well. There was no lag time, at no point did I wish I could just hurry up and finish. And while the writing occasionally ventured into the typical sickeningly-sweet romance variety, it made me awwwwwwwww instead of hurl . . .

"I ran my fingers along the raised letters on the dog tags that spelled out all the pertinent information the military needed about Josh. But the important stuff – how he watched out for me, how good he was at chess, the way he always hit his knee when laughed – they weren’t the sort of things you could stamp onto a thin piece of metal.”

Skylar and Josh also share a love for the magic and wonderment which is Top Gun. For that, I am eternally grateful ‘cause it gives me an excuse to do this . . .



and this . . .



and this . . .



and this . . .



Using Archer gifs in a romance review. Ha! Who’d a thunk it?