READ AND REVIEW

 

JUST SAY YES BY ALYSSA GOODNIGHT

 

Release Date:  August 24, 2015

 

SYNOPSIS

 

Turn up the heat with a bit of magic...only from Select Contemporary!

 

BUY LINKS

 

Amazon:  http://www.amazon.com/Just-Say-Entangled-Select-Contemporary-ebook/dp/B0105SAS1W/

 

Barnes and Noble:  http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/just-say-yes-alyssa-goodnight/1122187914?ean=9781633753037

 

Google Play Books: https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Alyssa_Goodnight

_Just_Say_Yes_Entangled_Select_Con?id=lwT2CQAAQBAJ&hl=en

 

Ibooks:  https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/just-say-yes-entangled-select/id1010592986?mt=11

 

Kobo:  https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/just-say-yes-entangled-select-contemporary

 

 

REVIEW:  JUST SAY YES BY ALYSSA GOODNIGHT

 

Just Say Yes by Alyssa Goodnight

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


With Just Say Yes, Alyssa Goodnight has created a bewitching tale that is refreshing, delightful and unpredictable. Full of heart and encompassing characters that are well written and entertaining I would recommend to any reader of feel good romance. This is a story taking chances, letting go and moving on. Stuck in a rut due to past hurts and parenting Jade is unprepared for Max and all he makes her feel. Max is equally feeling Jade and wants a chance. Can these two come to an understanding? Will they love in? I received an ARC of Just Say Yes and found it to be the type of story I never expected but really liked.



View all my reviews

My August Rewind (up late, but better late than pregnant... Err, never. Better late than never.

 

THE BOOKS:

The Fairest of Them All | Carolyn Turgeon [review]

Mansfield Park | Jane Austen (obvs)

Among the Janeites | Deborah Yaffe [review]

The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. | Adelle Waldman [review]

Austentatious | Alyssa Goodnight [review]

Nicola James is an engineer with an MBA whose life follows The Plan she made at age 13. Except she's got no life and no romance; she's too busy following The Plan.Enter a quaint-looking diary with a mysterious quote from Jane Austen inside:"...I dedicate to You the following Miscellaneous Morsels, convinced that if you seriously attend to them, You will derive from them very important Instructions, with regard to your Conduct in Life."Nicola buys it for a vintage-obsessed younger cousin, but while perusing the journal, she manages to spill her chai tea all over it. So the journal quickly becomes her journal. While she's not the sort to write in journals, usually, she IS a Jane Austen fan (who isnt'?). So Nicola takes a chance and writes in the journal... only to discover the next day that most of her words have disappeared; all that's left reads like a Jane Austen fortune cookie: "Miss Nicola James will be sensible and indulge in a little romance."Nicola's real-world mind goes a little bonkers. Trying to figure out what's going on drives her (and us, the readers) a little nuts until she finally confides in Beck (Rebecca), the gal she's mentoring. Beck, along with Nicola's friend Gabe and her next-door lesbian neighbors Leslie and Laura, have been trying to get Nicola to live a little. Gabe even called to invite her to see some hot bands at the South by Southwest annual concert. But Nicola turns him down to write in her journal and bake cupcakes. (She never met a cupcake she didn't like.)A few days later and 2 more Jane Austen fortune cookie sayings trying to get her to indulge in said romance later, Nicola finds herself at a wedding of a co-worker... where she manages to get a stuffed mushroom stuck in her cleavage! While trying to retrieve the mushroom, a sexy Scot discovers her, aids her (he says it's his "super hero powers" that told him she needed rescuing), and gives her the slow dance of her life. Flirting, yet scared, Nicola manages to run off.But sexy Scot Sean isn't so easily bowed. Neither is the spirit of Miss Jane Austen (or Fairy Jane, short for Fairy Godmother Jane), and with the help of Beck, Nicola tries some experimentation, only to find herself falling madly for the sexy Scot, who's the lead singer and guitarist of one of the bands in SXSW. Totally not her type! He rides a motorcycle for heavens' sake!Will Nicola indulge in romance or play it safe?===================Personally, I thought Nicola should ditch the engineering job and open her own cupcake shop. This gal's got a thing for sweets, but especially cupcakes!Nicola is a little irritating at first, but that's because she's so darned logical and has to overthink everything. The concept of magic or fate or whatever is beyond The Plan.Sean is almost too-good-to-be-true. I kept waiting for him to have fangs or something! But he's Mr. Darcy to Nicola's Elizabeth Bennet. And she's got to overcome her prejudices and pride to figure it all out.Beck is especially fun; she finds her own romance, which is great! And Leslie of Leslie and Laura is almost too acidic in her humor, but that venomous bite is what spurs Nicola on at times.Fun book! I've already read the 2nd book (read it 1st not realizing there was a 1st book). The two stories are only joined by the journal, so no worries about reading them in any special order.

4+ starsThis book surprised me in more ways than one. I wasn't quite sure what to make of it at first... it doesn't easily fit into a single genre, and the storyline is very creative, mixing Jane Austen, ghosts, Emma, Clueless, Hitchcock, big secrets, secret identities, and 3-letter government acronyms all in one story! It isn't boring, that's for sure!Cate is a likeable high school English teacher who lives in a converted garage in her mom's backyard. She's a huge Austen fan, and like many, pines for her own Darcy - a man's man who can sweep her off her feet into a lifelong romance. Problem is, as many of us have found out (either personally or from other books), Mr. Darcys aren't around every corner just waiting for us to stumble into them.One of Cate's best friends is Ethan. They have a standing Sunday Scrabble night + dinner. She tells him about every guy and every date, and he always finds something wrong with all of them. Cate feels as if she's become too predictable. So when she gets an invite to her friend's Halloween party (sort of a themed culinary rave for yuppies), she decides to go. The theme is Hitchcock, and Cate decides to take on a persona - Cat Kennedy, modeled after Eve Kendall in North by Northwest. But Cate doesn't want to tell her mom, Ethan, or even Courtney, her other bestie. She wants to try it on first. Besides, neither of them is going to the same party.BTW, this Pop-Up Culture party thing sounds fab! Wish there was something like it that I could go to - what fun!Of course, we find ourselves in a new-fangled Emma/Clueless plot... with a twist. See, Cate stumbled across a mysterious journal at a favorite eatery - it was just hidden underneath the parking lot picnic table. Turns out, this journal belonged to Jane Austen! Right? This is where the serious suspension of disbelief comes in... and it's where the book almost gets weird. Except it's still very entertaining. So go with it, like I did. See, when Cate decides to use it as her own journal and writes about her feelings and the party and Ethan, well... later the journal seems to erase all but a few word, leaving cryptic messages like "at times the answer is hidden in plain sight". Cate goes with it all, not asking too many questions; sure, she investigates a bit. But mostly, she decides that Jane Austen is speaking to her through the journal, dispensing advice. At first, Cate takes this to mean that she should become a matchmaker, like Emma. And she tries several matches, like her mom and a history teacher and Courtney and Ethan.But somehow, the messages always seem to come back to Ethan. On a ghost-hunting trek with Courtney at a local hotel (don't ask), Cate seems to encounter Jane Austen's ghost! Yep, while asking questions and writing down the answers, Cate notices that once again, a cryptic message is left behind - one that points to Ethan.During the course of this story, Cate also realizes that she doesn't know that much about Ethan. In the 2 years she's known him, she's never been to his house until now? Huh? And she's never noticed that he simply doesn't talk about himself? It's not until he tells her that he'll be away for an entire week and won't give an explanation that Cate gets curious. And tries to pin him down, still only getting cryptic answers. Yeah, I got a little tired of all the cryptic saying and answers, too. Poor Cate!But... you have to keep reading to figure out the happy ending, even if you know Emma and Clueless, it'll surprise you.And it's clean - while there are "encounters", they're always alluded to without details. Not prudishly, but simply private. It's up to your imagination.Fun, fluffy, fantasy, romance... with Jane Austen thrown in for good measure. What could possibly be back about that?Apparently, there's a "first" book, [b:Austentatious|11492228|Austentatious|Alyssa Goodnight|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1311713118s/11492228.jpg|16427655] that tells about the previous journal's owner. And that gal's more like me - she approaches the journal more scientifically... I'm going to check it out.

I mentioned at the end of my quirky little interview with Alyssa that this book is perfect for those looking for a good time.Um.That sounds like something you'd find written on a bathroom wall.* I don't mean that kind of good time. (Probably.) I mean, Austensibly Ordinary is super fun and engaging; the tone and voice were excellent, the main characters were lively, and Alyssa's writing was cheeky, flirty and hilarious. No matter the plot, no matter if the word "romance" makes you cringe, I think characters you connect with are what sell a book - people will put up with just about anything when the characters are lively and engaging, and Cate absolutely is. Exactly what you want when you're looking for a good-time book. And a romance that doesn't take itself too seriously is certainly something I look for, and it's rare that I find it, so that sorta makes me want to sing its praises.And speaking of things rarely found in romances that makes me want to dance around like a fool sing praises, this actually kept me guessing, which is INCREDIBLY rare for me in general, but especially in anything of the romance variety. It's almost unheard of. (I mean, a romance that actually surprised me on multiple occasions? WHAT IS THIS WITCHERY?)  Now, some of these surprises might stretch credibility a little too far for some readers, but really, for any absurdities or lack of believability in the story, I never - not once - cared. Like, for real, at all, couldn't have cared less because I was enjoying myself. This book is just too damn fun to be bothered by any plot points that might usually give me pause, or any obvious wish-fulfillment. And isn't that was this type of book is all about anyway? It's a Jane Austen adaptation, for god's sake - of course there's a healthy dose of wish-fulfillment. But this isn't the cheesy, eye-rolly kind; it's the mmmm, why didn't any of my teachers look like Ethan Chavez? kind - Cate's adventures as her alter-ego, Cat Kennedy,** are the pinnacle of conscious wish-fulfillment, and it was delightful.One of the things that surprised me was that this has a tinge of magical realism to it, but not in the traditionally weighty way. There's no grandoise meaning; I also hesitate to call it paranormal, or anything like that, though those elements are there. But Goodnight uses a soft touch with these elements; they're a means to an end and a way to enhance the fantasy of the story, but they're not the focus, and so the story doesn't get bogged down in them.  At its heart, this is just a good old fashioned romance, pulling in Jane Austen's Emma to great effect, but balancing it with a good dose of pop culture and - of all things - spy fic, and tying it together with a pretty magical realist bow. It's ridiculous how well it all works. (I mean, Jane Austen and Alfred Hitchcock? And it somehow makes sense together? Again, WHAT IS THIS WITCHERY?) All of this adds to the lighthearted, quirky tone of the story, but beyond that, it makes the book appeal to a broader audience, kind of pulling everyone in along the way, and I liked that.All in all, the book is peopled with interesting, fleshed-out characters, a good sense of place (Austin, TX), a fun mash-up of elements, and a fantastically fun voice. And the healthy dose of supah-sexah doesn't hurt, either... Highly recommended for fans of Austen adaptations, fun contemporary romance, or those in need of a good funk-breaker book.*For a good time, call Alyssa Goodnight. Or maybe call Cate-as-Cat? Definitely call Ethan; so say the ladyparts.** Yes, I know. It adds a whole other layer of hilarious to read about the sassy exploits of a character who shares a name with someone you know... Though I'm sure Kat would approve of Cat's sass.