Tear by Rachel Van Dyken

1 Star

 

When I finished this book, the first thought that came to my head was . . .



Sadly, Tear was about the most vapid waste of time I’ve spent in recent memory. HOWEVER, with that being said let me tell you this cost zero dollars and is so far the only Rachel Van Dyken I haven’t enjoyed. Okay, “enjoyed” might be a bit of an understatement. I had dabbled unsuccessfully in NA a bit before stumbling across The Consequence of Loving Colton. That book made me ask . . .



I’ve since read a couple other Van Dyken stories with nearly the same reaction, but this one? This was nothing but a baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad Twilight knock-off. Tear is the story of Natalee – 18 years old and never been kissed. All that changes when brothers (and members of the band One Direction AD2) Alec and Dimitri transfer “far away from their homeland” (*cough Canada cough*) to her school (in Oregon) and she experiences an “intense exchange” when one of them retrieves her fallen pen . . . .



Yeah.

It doesn’t take long for the other brother to single her out as well and then???? Well, what’s a girl to do? I mean really who could blame her? These fellas fell straight out of a Men At Work song – all 6’4” and full of muscle. They also apparently doused themselves in some form of pheromone-containing cologne “probably Abercrombie” (which must mean they smelled like baby prostitutes) and Natalee got all . . .



The story then evolved into a very not healthy AT ALL tale about their bizarro love triangle and it was at that point I told my husband . . . .



Now, I’m not opposed to stories with love triangles and I’m not even opposed to a bit of unhealthy obsession in my romance (I freely admit I enjoyed Twilight just fine). I do, however, have a BIG problem with the female lead going from not being allowed to wear make-up (by 100% absentee parents, no less) – to being allowed to sleep over at the rockstars’ house, to being unsure if she would be able to say NO when necessary because “every time I was in his arms I felt wanted.” Just no. Not to mention Brother 1 was a rapey über creep. In MY OPINION Natalee should have had a couple of dates with him until his true personality was exposed and then jumped ship into the arms of Brother 2 without all of the back-and-forth drama llama bullshit. Instead, the entire story had me saying . . .



Sorry Ms. Van Dyken that I had to 1 Star your book. Good news is I’m still anxiously awaiting the release of The Consequence of Seduction. Hopefully this didn’t put me on the naughty list. And just in case the big guy is reading this . . . .

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk

2 Stars

 

“Six hundred dudes. One porn queen. A world record for the ages. A must-have movie for every discerning collector of things erotic. Didn’t one of us on purpose set out to make a snuff movie.”


You’re probably reading a Chuck Palahniuk sex story.

The premise of Snuff is simple enough – a world record is about to broken. This is the story of the day in the life of 600 dudes, including an aging porn star . . .



a boy with a secret . . .



and a bunch of other randos . . .



Each of these shank-shuckers/baby-barfers/tadpole-tossers or whatever you want to call them anxiously awaits their turn at a bang session with the queen of the adult film scene, Cassie Wright. While waiting in the wings the jizz-juicers/sock-soakers/bone-beaters or whatever you want to call them will kill time popping little blue pills, watching some classic films for inspiration such as Sperms of Endearment, Angels with Dirty Places, Lay Misty for Me and the ever-popular The Handmaid’s Tale . . .



It’s okay Kanye. That was funny – and the public flogging you’ll receive by the members of Goodreads for laughing at that will only hurt until the bruises fade. The ceiling-spacklers/weasel-teasers/willy-wankers or whatever you want to call them will also let some skeletons come tumbling out of their respective closets . . . .



No, I mean big secrets . . .



Okay, HUGE secrets . . .



which all leads up to a patented Palahniuk ending.

My sincerest apologies, Chuck, but you really . . .



with this one. It almost makes me want to go raise my rating for Beautiful You. Almost. If you have nothing better to do and want to say you read something by Palahniuk since he’s soooooo edgy, don’t let this review stop you. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, though. Oh, and if you think I read everything wrong (and spend all day talking about how I’m related to Lucifer and/or trolling), go read Kemper or Ed or Bill’s reviews instead since they all found it to be equally “meh” as I did.

November 9 by Colleen Hoover

2 Stars

Yep. 2 Stars. Barely . . . .



I read the first 100 pages of this book in like 17.2 seconds. That's not to say those pages weren’t perfect. There were plenty of things that can ONLY happen in a romance novel and be okay. Some examples are the Fallon/Ben meet cute was him overhearing a father being a real dickwad to his daughter at lunch, infiltrating said lunch as her “boyfriend” and then spending the rest of the day together. In real life the girl would probably have both the 9 and the 1 pressed on her phone before dude even sat down and NOT be like . . .



There’s also the “convenience” aspect. Both MCs meet at 18, but are financially stable. Let me get my time machine and figure out how to make THAT happen. Again, it’s a romance novel so I forgive.

I also had to forgive Fallon being soooooooooooooooooo insecure, but after only a few hours with Ben being able to begin seeing herself in a whole new light. Never underestimate the power of . . . .



All those things aside, I thought for sure I would end up giving this 4 Stars. Why? Because out of all the tired tropes in the world, November 9 picked THE. BEST. ONE. . . . .



Oh Sweet Baby Jesus how I love the “we’ll meet on this date every year” storyline. I become the girliest of girly-girls whenever Sleepless in Seattle or An Affair to Remember comes on and generally resemble something kinda like this . . .


(But with shittier curls.)

And then there was the sex. Ewww . . . .



"“‘It may not be book-worthy, but it'll have to do.’ He takes two quick steps toward me until his hands are in my hair and his mouth is on mine.”

Yeah. I mean #sploosh. Hoover doesn’t write a lot of sexybusiness in her stories, but when she does????



So you’re probably wondering what happened to reduce my rating so drastically. I’ll tell you . . .



We’re talking about mommy issues and daddy issues and baby momma drama and are they or aren’t they and break up and make up and oh no he didn’t and oh yes he did and who the hell DOES that ANY of that . . . .



And Ben? Apparently there is a fine line between the type of fictional alpha male that makes my panties self-destruct and the non-alpha who starts as (probably a creeper if it was real life, but since it was not) the perfect dreamboat boyfriend who ends up being someone I kind of wanted to check for a vagina . . . .



By the end of it all I wasn’t sure if I had read a book or listened to Taylor Swift songs on a loop for several hours. Many thanks to Mo and Rose and Liz for keeping me company over here in the shame corner . . .




ORIGINAL "REVIEW":

So I ask myself, "Self: A couple of reviewers who I REALLY respect have already said this one is notsagood. Why are you still insisting we read it?"

To which my Self answered . . .



(Also, after being on hold at the library for infinity I have to see this through.)

You might wanna go ahead and preemptively unfriend me just in case things don't go well.

The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith

4 Stars

 

I read this book MONTHS ago and never got around to writing a review . . .



Thanks for the reminder. Now that all of my friends are reading/have already read Book #3 I figured it was time to get off my butt.

The Silkworm is the follow up to “Robert Galbraith’s” bestseller The Cuckoo’s Calling. The difference this time around is everyone knows the author is really J.K. Rowling. The leading male, Cormoran Strike, is a little different too. Rather than getting by on a wish and a prayer that he’ll be able to pay the bills on time, Strike has more clients than he can handle and . . .



When novelist Owen Quine’s wife contacts Strike, he thinks there isn’t much to the mystery but decides to take the case purely for curiosity’s sake. Once Strike starts digging in to the potential whereabouts of the missing author he discovers an unpublished “fictional” tell-all that dishes so much even Kitty Kelley would cringe has been written and that the author is most definitely not missing at all . . . .



We also get a bit of a sidestory with Robin, who although hired as a receptionist is ready to start proving she’s capable of so much more and is getting just a wee bit ticked at Strike for underutilizing her . . . .



Lucky for Robin she’s woman enough to speak up for herself rather than simply filling out one of Shelby’s trademarked “Butthurt Forms” and that this mystery becomes big enough her help is needed.

And that’s that. I can’t tell you if you’ll like this book or not. Just because you loved (or hated) Harry Potter doesn’t mean you’ll love (or hate) this because they are sooooooo not the same type of book. And just because you loooooooove mysteries doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll love this one because it doesn’t follow the formula of most bestselling mystery books today. There aren’t a lot of twists in the road, or shock and awe, and there are LOTS of pages. But I found the pages to be filled with nearly 100% good stuff. The only thing I’m not on board with is the potential developing relationship between Strike and Robin. Dear J.K. Rowling . . .



Please don’t. I’m begging. You’re better than that.

Don’t want to take my word on this one? I don’t blame you. Go check out Ashley the Hufflepuff Kitten or Mairéad (is exploring a floating city) or Steve or Stephanie or Becky or Casey or Stepheny’s reviews (or thousands of others) instead . . .



I’d like to throw in a dissenting opinion, but seriously were NONE from my friends.

Suicide Notes From Beautiful Girls by Lynn Weingarten

3 Stars

 

“Pitched as Gone Girl meets Thirteen Reasons Why”

Suicide Notes From Beautiful Girls was one of the pop-up recommendations on my library homepage. I had heard zilch about this book before requesting it and only did so because I liked the title. (Deep, I know.) Then I saw that sales pitch contained in the blurb and had the following reaction . . .



However, since I have no ability to not read a book once it is downloaded, I had no choice but to grin and bear it. And you know what? This was kinda like Gone Girl. Now if I were Jay Asher I’d probably want to kick someone’s ass for trivializing my suicide book (as contrived as I found it to be), but if you’re looking for YA with some mindf*&^ery this one might be a winner.

“Having secrets together makes you real friends. Secrets tie you together.”

Delia had plenty of secrets. Secrets about her boyfriend and her stepfather and her best friend June and maybe even June’s boyfriend. But all of those secrets died along with Delia . . .



Or did they?

June and Delia had drifted apart, as friends sometimes do. When June hears that Delia committed suicide she feels guilty for not answering Delia’s call. Guilt soon morphs into suspicion when she listens to the voice mail left by Delia right before her death and after she meets Delia’s ex-boyfriend. Did Delia really kill herself or was she murdered?

I was a little concerned when I guessed a potential major plot point at the 5% mark and then had it confirmed by 20% . . .



I also figured something more than that had to be up because there was too much book left and since I had read . . . . some another book (not Gone Girl) which shall remain nameless in order to avoid spoilage . . . . it was pretty easy to figure out the second twist in the story as well. Buuuuuuuuut, even though I saw most of the things coming, I didn’t see them all . . .



and I never wanted to stop turning pages. I would obviously ruin the fun if I told anything about the twists and turns the story took. All I’ll say is (a) I read a poopton of mystery/thrillers so when it comes to guessing what’s going to happen next I’m fairly good at it and (b) a lot can be forgiven if the author sticks the landing ending. I seriously dug the end of this one.

“Sometimes the kindest thing you can do for a person is to shield them from that which will not help them. Make the decision and then carry the burden yourself, bear that weight so that they don’t have to.”

4-Ever Theirs by Jayne Rylon

2 Stars

 

“One woman. Three dudes. No regrets.”

Okay, so it might really only be Tuesday, but for Andi it is most definitely HUMP DAAAAAAAAAAY (or week even).

I requested this because some jerk who shall remain nameless likes to do drive-by shootings on reviews, leaving links to titles like these in her wake. Then said person somehow DOESN’T get approved for the book while I do. Probably because of karma. Even my husband was shocked when I told him what this was about. He was like “uhhhhhh, aren’t you like TOTALLY FUCKING a little too vanilla for that?!?!?!?!” And I was like . . .



I also have an awesome friend named Lono who was willing to lend me some protective outerwear in case things got a little too squicky . . . .



That thing was awesome! I feel like I sweated out 10 pounds and even though it had a convenient pouch up front for me to store a roll of quarters it was impossible to access so I couldn’t buy myself treats from the vending machine while I was reading this on my break.

I’ll be the first to admit I am turrrrrrrible when it comes to the sexytimes books – but please believe me when I say I don’t actively seek them out in order to hate on them. Occasionally (*cough* Ugly Love *cough*) things work out well . . .



and I thought that might be the case with 4-Ever Theirs (I was even willing to ignore the flashing warning sign which was the use of text speak in the title). I also had to ignore the absolutely ridiculous and completely overplayed “girl almost gets raped and the only cure for what ails her is a massive amount of dong.” Dear Authors (especially women authors) – Using this trope is pretty much a dick move. Stop doing it. Gals like me have a limited amount of free time as it is. I just want to get to the splooshy stuff and stuff like this makes my ladybits go from . . .



to . . .



But I digress. The basic synopsis is that Andi has lived with Cooper, Simon and Reed throughout college. It’s the week before graduation and Andi is ready to let her freak flag fly. After saving Andi from Bill Cosby rando strange at a sex club, Andi lets the boys in on her sexual bucketlist. Being the best roommates imaginable, the boys are 100% in and confess that they have all fantasized about the same thing. It’s hard not to when you live with a dreamgirl like Andi . . .



Everyone agrees they will have one night each with Andi culminating in the grand shebang (hehehehehe) the night before graduation where they will all . . .


With no intentional …… uhhhhhhhh . . . .



swordplay (just in case you were concerned because that isn’t your thing).

And there you have it. This gets 2 Stars (which from me on erotica is pretty damn decent) because of the aforementioned contrived drama which led to the sex happening in the first place and then for the sexytimes themselves. Right when I was …… uhhhhhh getting interested in my research project again something would happen to impede my progress. The use of the term “channel” has been discussed by me (and others) before. Not good imagery. Neither is the “back passage.” Seriously? And I don’t ever want my mouth to be devoured . . .



Just ewwwwww.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you, NetGalley!


ORIGINAL "REVIEW":

Dear Bookpushing A$$hole (oh you KNOW who you are):



You better have received your approval for this too. Good Christ the things I let myself get talked into. Anyone got any nice oceanfront property in the middle of the Sahara they'd like to sell me?