Personal Best

Title: Personal Best: A Going for the Gold Novel
Author: Sean Michael
Series: Going for the Gold
Rating: 2/5 stars
Review:

Wow... where to start....

Let's start with a basic plot summary. Jessy is a swim coach and is called by another coach about a possible job opportunity. That opportunity turns out to be Mike Gauliet. A natural swimmer whose parents were legends before they died. Jessy has Mike move in with him, and coaches Mike to reach his full potential.

Next let's go over the names. It was really annoying to have Michael switching up names for Jessy. One minute he's called Jessy and the next minute he's being called Coach. It was also confusing during the scenes where there were more than one coach. I kept having to reread to figure out who was talking.

Now let's talk about Michael's grammar. I really think this guy needs to go back to high school and learn the basics of writing. "Jessy didn't, hand working him, mouth stealing his breath." That is NOT a sentence! Neither is "He never had, but he wanted, he would let Jessy in."

Okay, let's move on to the sex/plot ratio. Way out of proportion. Now, I know a lot of people like their romance novels crammed with sex, but I like to have some plot sprinkled in there. It started out decently, with a good strong plot, but then the M/Cs get together and the plot is pretty much forgotten. It just turns into sex, sex, sex with about two or three scenes of plot thrown in as an afterthought.

Overall? I do not recommend this book unless you're looking for crappy smut. If you're like me and poor grammar and punctuation make you wanna get out a red pen, I'd stay far, far away from this novel. Ugh. Someone get this guy an editor. =[

** Warning ** This novel contains sex scenes and may not be appropriate for readers under than age of 18.

Kim Dare and Voracious Vamps!

M/M Romance author, Kim Dare is featured this week as the Author of the Week on Total e-bound! And to celebrate, she's giving readers and chance to win one of her e-books for free! Check out here website here for more information!

Total e-bound is also doing their own contest for Halloween! It's called Voracious Vamps Contest! Enter to win one of 5 £10 e-bound vouchers. Enter here.

The Nanny Diaries

Title: The Nanny Diaries
Author: Emma McLaughlin and Nicola Kraus
Series: N/A
Rating: 2/5 stars
Review:

The Nanny Diaries follows the tale of a woman named Nanny as she works for a family called the Xes. Nanny spends her time working for the Xes babysitting their son Grayer while attending NYU. Everything is going pretty well at the start, then the Xes become the family from hell.

Okay, I've had this book on my to-read shelf for a while and I finally got around to reading it. Well, it was very disappointing. The first thing I didn't like was the names. Her name is Nanny, the parents are Mr. X and Mrs. X, the child is Grayer and she calls her crush H.H. which stands for Harvard Hottie. To me, this showed a horrible lack of imagination and it felt like the authors were too lazy to come up with names.

The second thing that I didn't like was Nanny. She spent most of the novel whining and crying. She cried to her parents, to her grandmother, her friends and H.H. Instead of doing something about her problems, she just complains about her crappy life.

The only thing I really liked about this book was little Grayer. He just sounded so cute and I felt really bad for him. His parents really need to be smacked and told to grow the hell up. It's pretty bad when a four-year-old is more mature than his parents.

Overall, I was very disappointed in the book. It was hard to get into, and once I started reading I couldn't wait for it to end. I probably wouldn't ever recommend it to anyone.

Chance to win!

Misfit Salon is celebrating its three month blogiversary with a giveaway. You can enter for your chance to win
A) a $25 Amazon giftcard
or
B) An AUTOGRAPHED hardcover copy of Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Wiener, The Story Sisters by Alice Hoffman, or The Last Dickens by Matthew Pearl.

This giveaway will end on October 5, 2009 so hurry!

Click here to visit Misfit Salon!

The Martian Child

Title: The Martian Child
Author: David Gerrold
Series: N/A
Rating: 3/5 stars
Review:

David Gerrold is a single gay man who wants to have a family. After searching for the perfect child to adopt, he stumbles upon a picture of Dennis. After looking into adopting Dennis, he begins to have second thoughts. Dennis is a hyperactive child who has a habit of getting into trouble. Oh yeah, and he thinks he's a Martian.

I enjoyed this book for the first half. I like how neither David nor Dennis were perfect - each one had his own flaws. Dennis is hyperactive and can't help but get into trouble and David is constantly worrying that he'll make a mistake and ruin Dennis's life - he desperately wants to help his son.

Like I said, I enjoyed the first half. I wish I could give this book two ratings - one for the first half and one for the second half. (WARNING! Possible spoilers!) In the second half of the novel, Dennis is still insisting that he's a Martian and can make things come true with Martian Wishes. Instead of trying to help Dennis understand himself, and try and help him fit in in the world, David starts to believe his son really is a Martian. I swear, this author started doing drugs while writing this. The dude sits there and starts watching his son closely and comes to the conclusion that his son is an alien that was implanted into a human's womb. The whole Martian thing was a cute subplot about Dennis trying to find himself and explain why he doesn't fit in. It got way out of hand when David started believing that his son really was a Martian.

I still recommend this book. It's a cute story about a man who wants to adopt a son. It shows the feelings that both man and son are going through. Most books will focus on the impact of one or the other, but this novel gives us both sides of the story.

Win a free book!

Everybody loves a free book! (Okay, maybe not everyone, but I sure do!)
Lynne's Letters is currently having a giveaway! You can enter at her blog to win a copy of either The Help or The Weight of Silence! Head on over to her blog today and enter for a chance to win one of these awesome books. =) http://www.lynnesletters.com/2009/09/book-giveaway-910-917.html

Trickster's Choice

Title: Trickster's Choice
Author: Tamora Pierce
Series: Daughter of the Lioness
Rating: 5/5 stars
Review:

What do you do when you’re the daughter of two extraordinary people? Alainne of Pirates Swoop is the daughter of George Cooper, the former King of Thieves and now second in command of Tortall's spy network, and Alanna the Lioness, the King's Champion to Jonathan of Conte. Her older brother Thom has followed after his name sake and left to study magic and her twin brother has followed their mother and has set off to become a Knight of Tortall, so where does that leave Alainne? Alainne wishes to follow in her fathers footsteps and become a spy, but he has forbidden it. Eager to prove herself, she sets off on her own only to be kidnapped and forced into slavery. Not long into her slavery a god appear - Kyrpioth the Trickster god and he offers here a wager. If she can keep two girls alive through the summer, he will send her home.

I really enjoyed this book. I liked the theme of a confused teen trying to find their way. It's always hard on a person to try and live up to someone else's reputation - whether it's a parent or an older sibling. Tamora Pierce did an excellent job with this novel, just like all of her other ones. The characters are deep, and interesting and her plot is well thought out.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who has liked Pierce's earlier novels. Even if you haven't read her novels before, but you enjoy fantasy, you should read this book.