Monday, November 17, 2014

My Haunted Blender's Gay Love Affair, and Other Twisted Tales by Abigail Roux, Andrea Speed & Anne Tenino

Anthologies are a certain bet I guess especially if you don't know the authors of most of the authors but here I felt like this is a bet I'm REALLY ready to make - two great authors - Abigail Roux of Cut & Run which was the first MM Romance series I've ever read and Anne Tenino which I just recently read two books by her (in the Romancelandia series) the other author - Andrea Speed - I didn't know. For me she was the bet I guess and yet her story was the best of the three IMO. 

I didn't bother read the synopsis of the Anthology , figured, they are short anyway.. so I totally missed the fact that this one is a Paranormal MM Romance. Was trying REAL hard to think of how to explain the weird things that were happening in the first one I picked hehe. It was a nice Anthology but not very engaging, the three stories were quite slow going. 

I expected much more from Abigail and Anne and was honestly quite disappointed with their part in this one. Andrea's novella, which was also the shortest, was refreshing, funny and had a total different vibe since it was mainly a Fantasy novella (not really romantic and having a very weak gay feel to it).  

The Bone Orchard By Abigail Roux  (~ 94 Pages)  ★ ★ ★
Somewhere in the 1800s Ambrose have been hunting down Jennings - a brutal serial killer. When he realizes that the best way to catch him and hold unto him is to just shoot him and screw a fair trial his plan backfires - It seems Jennnings is a better shot.. Yet he DID wound Jennings meaning the authorities got him. Ezra, a witness and law enforcer himself, marches into town to make Jennings hang at last for his crimes. 
Things doesn't really go according to plan but at least an alliance is formed between Ezra and Ambrose.  
I really enjoyed the love story between Ezra and Ambrose, really enjoyed most of the story actually. Had my problems with the pace though, was a little slow going and not engaging enough, mainly in the beginning. 
When I finished the chapter before last I was willing to let this one go with a smile. Not a solid 4 star read but very close to it. Yet there WAS another chapter, a chapter that reminded me of how ANGRY I was after I finished my last read by Abigail. It seems that right now, the most important thing is to mention the "new couple" and making them appear wherever possible (I'm talking Nick & Kelly and I guess the Sidewinder in general). So if you are familiar with the Sidewinders just know they make a small appearance in the last chapter. I honestly think that this chapter could just be avoided. Nothing of interest happens there and it dragged out like the beginning of this story. 
So yeah, it could have been an almost solid 4 star read but I'm giving it 3 for dragging on and for making an unnecessary effort to bring into the pictures characters from her new series. 

City of Monsters By Andrea Speed  (~64 Pages)  ★ ★ ★ ★
This one was funny and strange (in a good way). The world and world building were really good. The MC, Hunter, isn't a very "hero-y" type, he struggles with the place he now lives in after being becoming a shifter (though he doesn't know to what exactly..). He is somewhat alcoholic, loves to gamble and can't always pay his debts, he is not a courageous guy yet he survives somehow maybe mostly on instinct and luck. On his way to investigate the disappearance of a reverse tooth fairy he meets Sakari - another guy who, like him, magically came to this place full of monsters after he became a shifter himself. The good looking Sakari interests Hunter on the sexual basis though he doesn't even know if Sakari is gay.. so he takes him along on his mission and finds out Sakari is more than good looking he can be useful!  
It's not a real romance story and don't expect any explicit sexual scenes. Yet it was nice as a sort of fantasy story of someone trying not very successfully to manage in a world that he wasn't born in. The gay concept could be totally ignored here. 
Don't miss out on the short epilogue after the acknowledgments! As the name of this novel imply there is a haunted blender involved! It's as strange as could be expected but I LOVED how it ended :D

Horny By Anne Tenino  (~113 Pages)  ★ ★ DNF
I started with the third novella by Anne after recently reading "Too Stupid to live" and "Billionaire With Benefits" and loving them both to pieces. Sadly this was a disappointment and I read about half (Chapter 6) before I let this one go. 
It's basically about warriors from the Greek legends being real and coming to Ryan a local human owning a bar to help them look for Zeus who has been breaking the law by somehow making the gods that aren't suppose to have sex with humans (because of prior "misbehavior") be able to. Confused? yeah, I was confused most of the time.. Couldn't remember who is who, what's their deal and why (As usual) when it comes to MM novels when there are gay couples it seems EVERYONE around them are gay. 
I think I let this one go when Ryan and Leander (one of the warriors) are FINALLY going to get some action (after 3 boring chapters of them basically looking at each other longingly). I was so annoyed and mostly bored I couldn't be bothered reading more about them which is the exact point I decided to go ahead and read the next one, meaning the previous one.. 



Additional Details: Kindle Ebook, 276 pages, 13-17 November 2014 / On GoodReads

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