My rating: 5 of 5 stars If you’re a fan of old-school romantic suspense, then you cannot go wrong at all with Daphne du Maurier. Especially if you pick up Rebecca, which I was very pleased to finally do. Many of the elements in this book are classically Gothic: the innocent young new bride, the…

My rating: 3 of 5 stars If you like werewolves, and you like the Old West, then Cherie Priest’s short story collection Dreadful Skin is a decent way to spend your time. We’ve got three interconnected stories here, featuring the werewolf Jack Gabert and the woman who hunts him, Eileen Callaghan, an Irish ex-nun who’s…

My rating: 1 of 5 stars I heard about Silver Phoenix as yet another example of a trend that bothers the hell out of me: putting white faces on the covers of books that are not about white people. Thus, I wanted to give this book a bit of support. But, given that Cindy Pon…

My rating: 2 of 5 stars Nora Roberts, my main go-to author for formulaic but nonetheless entertaining romance and romantic suspense, holds that position for a few strong reasons. And among the strongest is that every so often, she does actually try to break out of formula. With Midnight Bayou, she delivers a rare oddity…

My rating: 3 of 5 stars My first book of 2012 is a good strong start: Mary Robinette Kowal’s Shades of Milk and Honey, which I’ve been meaning to read for some time. Much has been made over this novel being the “fantasy novel Jane Austen would have written”, and to an extent, I do…

My rating: 2 of 5 stars I’ve posted before about my affection for Elizabeth Lowell’s books, formulaic though they are. Whirlpool is no exception, though it’s an earlier example of a formula she’s used to better effect in more recent books: i.e., an independently operating agency out to recover a Valuable Shiny Thing, a hero…

It wasn’t until I actually started reading Margaret Atwood’s The Year of the Flood that I found out it was in fact a sequel to Oryx and Crake, which I am told is actually a better book. This I didn’t find a hardship, because I did actually like The Year of the Flood. And thankfully,…

Scoundrel, Book 2 of Zoe Archer’s Blades of the Rose series, came across my radar with a bang thanks to the Smart Bitches Trashy Books ladies and their current montly book club. As I mentioned in my review of Book 1, Warrior, I was very happy to see a cover with a hero who’s not…