While only in her mid-20s, Gemma is bored with sex. She’s yet to find a partner to truly satisfy her. While meeting potential new clients, she believes her sexual fantasies have been answered. Now she needs to convince him she’s not as naive as he thinks. It just so happens that her oldest best friend, Walker, was in town and Gemma believes he’d be perfect to help her gain experience.

So, this book was much better than I thought it would be. My favorite person in the book was Walker. His character saved this book from being another gawd awful version of FSOG! I think the one thing that bugged me was when Walker is catching Gemma up on her roommate. I felt like it was a super long summary of another book that I should’ve read before this book.

**I voluntarily read and reviewed this book

 

I'm all in favor of strong women, Gemma came across as neurotic. She's a boss in business, but a disappointment in love. Her need for control has left her in a dire romantic drought. Will her thirst ever be quenched? Renegade has a Sex in the City vibe with a splash of mystery thrown in. More funny than sexy, Declan and Gemma encourage getting your feet wet, before diving in to romance. Cute meets tempting.
(3.5 stars)

 

 

 

 

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Phoenix Rising (The Kindred, #1) - Madis... I want to start off by saying I really enjoyed Madison Granger's book. Anyone that enjoys paranormal romance and shifter books will love Phoenix Rising. Actually I'm under playing this . I absolutely loved this book without any thoughts of it could have been different!!! Phoenix Rising is book one of the The Kindred series.
This book is a little different then most shifter romances in my eyes. In a good way of course, I look forward to seeing different in this genre. Our heroine, Tori, is considered curvy which in my mind transferred into an image of a full figured but gorgeous woman. She is also older, she has children and grandchildren, has been divorced and so needs this exciting love in her life in my opinion. So this gives us a different start from the normal young ,thin, single heroines we are used to seeing.
We then have our man candy. Lots of man candy in this book. What good is a paranormal romance book without our leading man candy? Quinn is the Liege Lord to a centuries old clan of shapeshifters. The Godess has a Promised Soul destined for him. He has all but given up on finding this so called Promised Soul of his when he meets Tori.
The love story told between Tori and Quinn is one of the greater love stories I have read. You feel the connection between them. There is so much love and respect and all the right elements that a real true love should hold. Of course the world never can let that be ....
We then have the drama that tries to tear them apart, an evil uncle with hidden agendas. This book will keep you locked in reading through twists and turns biting nails finding out what happens next. I was completely hooked you could not tear this book from my hands until I was done reading it. You could try but I may bite lol.
There is so much more to read and see Tori coming into her own. This book gives us a wonderful story on it's own, but also sets up an amazing plarform for the books to come in this series, which I can not wait to get my hands on.
I am giving this book full stars. I could not find a single reason to deduct any points from it. It has everything a good book should have in my opinion. If you are reading this trying to decide if you want to purchase this or borrow it or get it from the library even lol DO IT!! You will not regret it.

Mr Ceridwen and I have been listening to audiobooks on our (somewhat long) drive up to the cabin, which has been generally enjoyable. We got through the entire "Fall of the Gas-Lit Empire" series, which was absolutely a great time. Good narrators, very interesting alt-history, a semi-twist ending I didn't see coming, very astute observations about gender, and on. Well recommended all around. So then we cased around for the next steampunkery to fill the hours. 

 

I downloaded A Conspiracy of Alchemists first, but holy God was the narrator bad. We just couldn't stop laughing at her hiccoughing reading style. Then we moved on to Phoenix Rising, which opens with a relatively fun rescue sequence, and then settles into ... a whole lot of not so very clever bickering. The main characters, named Books & Braun (gag), are a fussy librarian and a stabby brute, but, get this, the DUDE is the fussy pepperpot and the LADY loves explosives. Oh ho, I bet you thought the lady was the librarian, but you would be wrong! See our fascinating gender reversal! 

 

I actually fell asleep while listening. 

 

Which, look, I generally think whether I like this sort of pulp mid-list disposable reading is more dependent on the angle of the sun or the barometric pressure than, say, actual merit. Because this stuff is all more or less the same -- somewhat formulaic, dependent on action, sometimes quippy, little bit of romance for the ladies, etc -- so I wonder sometimes why I bother reading (or writing) reviews. Something called Conspiracy of Alchemists is going to be a three-star outing, shitty narrators notwithstanding, and that I thought Phoenix Rising boring and trite might because I ate something like all the doughnuts when I stopped in Hinckley and hit Toby's bakery. Noms.