Monthly Archives: October 2021

5 star reads, Action, Erotic Sex Scenes, Paranormal, Review

No Rest for the Wicked (Immortals After Dark Book 3) – Kresley Cole

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  • 2006
  • 2011
2015

Rating: 5 out of 5.

No Rest for the Wicked
(Immortals After Dark Book 3)
Kresley Cole

Fast-paced adventure peppered with wit and steam and not dark

Blurb:

Centuries ago, Sebastian Wroth was turned into a vampire against his will. Burdened with hatred and alone for ages, he sees little reason to live. Until an exquisite, fey creature comes to kill him, inadvertently saving him instead.

When Kaderin the Cold Hearted lost her two beloved sisters to a vampire attack long ago, a benevolent force deadened her sorrow—accidentally extinguishing all of her emotions. Yet whenever Kaderin encounters Sebastian, her feelings—particularly lust—emerge multiplied. For the first time, she’s unable to complete a kill.

And when the prize of a legendary month-long contest is powerful enough to change history, Kaderin will do anything to win it for her sisters. Wanting only to win her, forever, Sebastian competes as well, taking every opportunity—as they travel to ancient tombs and through catacombs, seeking relics around the world—to use her new feelings to seduce her. But when Kaderin is forced to choose between the vampire she’s falling for and reuniting her family, how can she live without either?

Woosh! This is a fast-paced adventure peppered with wit and steam. It isn’t dark like many of the others in this series. There are no triggers, no non-consent, no captivity. Sebastian is shy and inexperienced with women. He grows in confidence as he is able to arouse Kaderin’s passion again and again. He is hot, strong, and a skilled warrior. But he doesn’t have the alpha male attitude of our previous heroes, Nikolai and Lachlain. Sebastian quickly realizes that Kaderin is not like the women he knew in the 1700’s, and he likes it.

Kaderin had been in Scotland with other Valkyrie when they’d received the call about a “vampire haunting a castle and terrorizing a village in Russia.” She had gladly volunteered to destroy the leech. She was her Valkyrie coven’s most prolific killer, her life given over to ridding the earth of vampires.

Kaderin finds Sebastian in a crumbling castle in Russia, and she can’t kill him. This baffles her.

As if this were a matter of conscience! It wasn’t. It couldn’t be. She had no conscience. No real feelings, no raw emotions. She was coldhearted. After the tragedy, she’d prayed for oblivion, prayed for the sorrow and guilt to be numbed.

Some mysterious entity had answered her and made her heart like ash. Kaderin didn’t suffer from sorrow, from lust, from anger, or from joy. Nothing got in the way of her killing.

She was a perfect killer. She had been for one thousand years, half of her interminable life.

Emotions strike Kaderin in rapid succession as she remembers incidents from her past. Pain, sorrow, joy, humor, and lust hit like bombshells. The lust consumes her, and she has an indiscretion with Sebastian. Afterwards, she comes to her senses.

“Not a Bride to one of your kind. Never—”

“But you’ve made my heart beat.”

She hissed back, “You’ve made me feel.”

Kaderin is in danger of losing her hard-won reputation among the Lore.

When Myst had been in a Horde prison, the Forbearer rebels took the castle, and one of their generals had freed her to make love to her. Before the Valkyrie could rescue her, things had gotten out of hand in a dank cell. Myst’s status among the Lore—which she’d built over lifetimes—was ruined. She was shunned, an outcast. Even the nymphs ridiculed her. There was no ignominy worse than that—

Kaderin runs away from Sebastian and starts the Talisman’s Hie, a contest held every 250 years. Competitors travel the world searching for mystical objects, gaining points towards a final race to the last object. So there is some tomb raider action, which is written very well.

I love these characters. They both deal with issues from their past that have stunted their emotional growth. They feed off each other, evolving together as they get to know each other and themselves. They are always equal in this process. And the sex scenes are scorching hot.

Contains graphic sex scenes, several more than in the first book.

Occasional foul language.

3rd person past tense from Sebastian and Kaderin.

I found no errors in this. Fabulous!

384 pages.

$7.99 at Amazon.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000MGATUI/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B000MGATUI&linkCode=as2&tag=vblawnola-20&linkId=646891844af2a94b05322003a3c13907″>No Rest for the Wicked (Immortals After Dark Book 3)
5 star reads, Dark Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Hate To Love, Paranormal, Review, Shifters

A Hunger Like No Other (Immortals After Dark Book 2) – Kresley Cole

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  • 2006
  • 2012
2017

A Hunger Like No Other
(Immortals After Dark Book 2)
Kresley Cole

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Lykae imprisoned and tortured for over a century by vampires discovers his mate is a vampire – or is she?

Blurb:

A mythic warrior who’ll stop at nothing to possess her . . .

After enduring years of torture from the vampire horde, Lachlain MacRieve, leader of the Lykae Clan, is enraged to find the predestined mate he’s waited millennia for is a vampire. Or partly one. This Emmaline is a small, ethereal half Valkyrie/half vampire, who somehow begins to soothe the fury burning within him.

A vampire captured by her wildest fantasy . . .

Sheltered Emmaline Troy finally sets out to uncover the truth about her deceased parents — until a powerful Lykae claims her as his mate and forces her back to his ancestral Scottish castle. There, her fear of the Lykae — and their notorious dark desires — ebbs as he begins a slow, wicked seduction to sate her own dark cravings.

An all-consuming desire . . .

Yet when an ancient evil from her past resurfaces, will their desire deepen into a love that can bring a proud warrior to his knees and turn a gentle beauty into the fighter she was born to be?

The Valkyrie:

Millennia ago, Wóden and Freya were awakened from a decade of sleep by a maiden warrior’s scream as she died in valiant battle. Freya had marveled at the maiden’s courage and wanted to preserve it, so she and Wóden struck the human with their lightning. The maiden woke in their great hall, healed but untouched—still mortal—and pregnant with an immortal Valkyrie daughter.

In the years that followed, their lightning would strike dying women warriors from all species of the Lore—Valkyries like Furie were truly part Fury. Freya and Wóden gave the daughters Freya’s fey beauty and his cunning, combining these traits with the mother’s valor and individual ancestry. Though the daughters were half sisters, they were all unique. But according to the Lore, one could recognize a Valkyrie if her eyes fired silver with strong emotion.

Lykae, or werewolves, in the “Lore” do not shapeshift into wolves. They get a little more muscular, their face changes to slightly more lupine, and they get a shadowy spirit-like halo of the werewolf-type monster we might expect. They each have a fated mate.

Lachlain, the king of the Lykae, had been imprisoned and tortured by Horde vampires for over a century when Emma’s scent from the Paris streets above gave him the will to free himself through excruciating pain. Emma is his Mate. But then he discovers Emma is a vampire and hates her. This is a dark romance with non-consensual sexual situations.

He took her by the wrist and forced her hand to his naked shaft. “You feel me hard. Know that the only reason I’m no’ inside you right now is because I’m weak. No’ because of any concern for you.”

Face flushed with embarrassment, she tugged at her hand until he let it go. “You would hurt me that way?”

“Without a second thought.” His lips curled. His gaze seemed intent on her face, but his eyes were still vacant. “And that’s just the beginning of the things I’ll do to you, vampire.”

She simply wasn’t the type of person who could give it up without some kind of bond or commitment. She didn’t think of herself as old-fashioned about sex—there was a reason for her familiarity with Skinemax—and she had a very healthy attitude about the whole subject, for all that she’d never had an orgasm. But she knew deep down that she would need something lasting—and that it could never be with him.

She narrowed her eyes, realizing what this was. Stockholm syndrome. Identifying with your bullying captor? Check. Forming an attachment to him? Check.

But in all fairness to herself, how many captors—actively acquiring—were six-and-a-half-foot-tall gods with delicious, sun-darkened skin, the coolest accent, and the warmest, hardest body she’d ever dreamed of? All this and he liked to wrap that body around her? All this and he thought she was beautiful.

But Emma grows strong facing this situation. She used to be known as Emma The Meek, but she is a Valkyrie and starts acting like one.

In the past, she would’ve meekly accepted this as yet another time her wishes and feelings were ignored. Now she refused. Lachlain needed to learn a lesson. He needed to learn that in the last seven days, she’d become a creature with which one did not fuck.

Lachlain learns that Emma is a unique creature in the Lore, half-Valkyrie and half-vampire. And eventually things are good.

“Lachlain! I’m not walking around willy-nilly naked. Okay?”

His lips curled as if he found her modesty endearing. “Then go put on the silk I’ll soon be ripping from you. You’ve no respect for your clothing.”

But Emma has another thing to face – the question of who her vampire father is.

The fantastic lore is matched with fantastic writing. The pacing makes me fly through and keeps me up way too late at night. The sex scenes are scorching hot. The action scenes are riveting. I just can’t gush enough about these books, which I don’t often do.

The Warlord Wants Forever is the first in the series. This novel has some spoilers for TWWF, but we all know that these have happily-ever-after endings anyway. So I really recommend reading A Hunger Like No Other first. AHLNO is the first full-length novel. TWWF is a novella. You get hints about the lore, but you get so much more detail in AHLNO. I think it’s a better primer. Other reviews recommend reading TWWF after the third full-length novel, Wicked Deeds On A Winter’s Night. There have been 19 books so far, counting the forthcoming Munro, so there is lots of delectable lore to eat up.

I love how the stories from each novel intersect with each other. We won’t know what is going on with a little snippet appearance of a new character until many books later. It goes hand in hand with the complexity of the unique paranormal lore in this series – spectacular!

Contains graphic sex scenes. Their first full sex scene was graphic. Subsequent ones are just mentioned.

Occasional foul language.

Prologue is in 3rd person present tense. The main body is in 3rd person past tense from Emma and Lachlan.

Errors: 8 – mostly formatting issues where there is a space missing between sentences.

This is 357 Kindle pages long. It contains previews of other books at the end.

$7.99 at Amazon.

5 star reads, Dark Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Paranormal, Review

The Warlord Wants Forever (Immortals After Dark Book 1) – Kresley Cole

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  • 2006
  • 2011
2017

The Warlord Wants Forever
(Immortals After Dark Book 1)
Kresley Cole

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Vampire finds his Bride, but she wants nothing to do with him, in this series opening novella

Blurb:

The Warlord
Nikolai Wroth, a ruthless Vampire general, will stop at nothing to find his Bride, the one woman who can “blood” him, making his heart beat and filling him with strength. Coldly interested only in the power his Bride will bring, he can hardly believe when Myst the Coveted awakens him body—and soul.

The Seductress
Famed throughout the world as the most beautiful Valkyrie, Myst has devoted her life to protecting a magical jewel and to fighting the vampires. Wroth provides her with the perfect opportunity to torment her sworn enemy—for with his new heartbeat comes a consuming sexual desire that can only be slaked by her. Denying him, she flees, struggling to forget his searing, possessive kiss.

The Hunt is on…
She eludes him for five years, but he has finally chased her to ground and stolen her enchanted jewel, giving him absolute power over her. Now that she’s his for the taking, he intends to make her experience first-hand the agonizing, unending lust she subjected him to for half a decade. Yet when Nikolai realizes he wants far more than vengeance from Myst and frees her, will she come back to him?

Vampires in Kresley Cole’s world, called the “Lore”, drink blood, are immortal, and can be killed by the sun. But they also have some unique traits.

He was the walking dead. No respiration, no heartbeat, no sexual need—or ability. Not until he found his predestined Bride and she “blooded” him fully. With his blooding, something inside him, some essence—maybe even his soul—would recognize her as his. He would see her as the one he was meant to spend eternity with, the woman he could love without measure, if one believed in that, and his body would wake for her.

Myst is a Valkyrie, the immortal child of Norse gods and a female warrior who showed extreme bravery in battle. That warrior could be human or another creature from the Lore. Each Valkyrie has her own unique traits, but they are all badasses – “creatures with which one does not fuck”.

Before he’d come, Myst had been powerless here. She could handle weapons as well as most in the coven, though a sword and bow were not her strengths. Her preferred weapon was men. She manipulated them, played them, made them believe she lived for them alone in order to have them do her bidding. That was her m.o.

Myst is Nikolai’s Bride. She brings his body to life but wants nothing to do with him. A vampire must at least be touching his Bride to “finish” after he becomes sexually excited for the first time by her. If he can’t do this, he is stuck “excited” until he can. Poor Nikolai doesn’t get to finish and is stuck in this state for years!

For just the merest second he imagined he saw compassion in her eyes, but when she shrugged, his hazy mind finally grasped that she was going to leave him here with nothing but a body knotted with lust for her and a taste of blood that he would go to his knees for. “You’re the most malicious bitch I’ve ever known.”

“I will find you,” he bit out. “I will find you and make you pay for this a thousand times.”

I love how funny the Valkyrie are! So snarky, witty, and just damn cool.

“But Vampire Bride just sounds so B-movie. He just dragged you down to B-moviedom.”

Nikolai is definitely a dominate alpha male. And Myst likes it. If you don’t like that, these books aren’t for you. There is a scene that can definitely be read as rape. Because we are in Myst’s head, we know she wants it. She wants to be overpowered. But he doesn’t know that. After Myst has been “defeated” she becomes a willing participant. If you are bothered by non-consent in your fiction, then steer clear.

I love that Cole’s characters aren’t promiscuous before meeting. Either because of lore, like un-blooded vampires can’t physically have sex, or by choice, this is lovely to read.

I absolutely love the intricate world-building and lore that Kresley Cole has written in the Immortals After Dark series. They have dominant alpha males and sassy strong women to meet them toe to toe. The Valkyrie are equally funny and kickass. There are monsters and darkness. But there is hot sex and humor to combat it. The writing is wonderful, so fast paced that I’m kept up way too late because I can’t put the book down.

The Warlord Wants Forever is a novella. It’s a nice introduction to the Lore and the type of dark romance this series abounds in. These aren’t for people with triggers. It’s fantasy, fiction, and we can enjoy things in our minds that we would never abide in reality. So if you’re with me on that, then delve into the world and see if you aren’t one-clicking the next book a few hours later. Once this vampire turns you, there is no going back 😂

Contains graphic sex scenes.

Occasional foul language.

3rd person past tense from Myst and Nikolai.

Errors: 4

This is only 112 Kindle pages long. It contains previews of other books at the end.

$2.99 at Amazon.

5 star reads, Article, Dark Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Hate To Love, Paranormal

Kresley Cole Is Back!

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The Immortals After Dark series at Amazon

In the summer of 2019, Kresley Cole went silent on the interwebs. These days that likely means death, right? Highly anticipated new book release dates came and went. These dates were changed to generalities like Summer 2020, and those came and went. No clues were given, and we still don’t know what happened. But she’s back! Kresley sent a newsletter out giving “proof of life” and followed that with a specific release date for “Munro” of January 15, 2022.

Do you know who Kresley Cole is and why you should care?

“Munro” is #19 in the Immortals After Dark series, #17 in the main series as there are 2 Dacian novels—a parallel series. These are among my favorite books ever written!

Kresley Cole has crafted a paranormal world called the “Lore” that is far and beyond the best I have ever seen. Forget everything you thought you knew about vampires, werewolves, witches, gods, demons, and so on. It’s all wrong anyway, just PR those among the Lore want you to believe.

Here you will find the truth!

By that, I mean you will find details, explanations, and histories that are so good you can easily suspend your disbelief. Fly through these fast-paced stories going, “Uh huh”, “Yeah”, “I follow”, “That makes total sense”, “I remember this”, and “This is so cool!”

I don’t read series that haven’t been completely published. I’m spoiled by technology. I binge-watch and binge-read. I want the entire story available before I begin it. This series isn’t finished, but I can read it. I’m not left with cliffhanger questions. Each story is intertwined with the others, but they can all be read as standalones! Major characters see very minor characters doing things in Book 2 that make little sense. In Book 12, that minor character is now major, and we see that scene from Book 2 as an important part of a bigger picture. This means a detailed outline of Book 12 had to exist when Book 2 was written. That is craft!

Or it’s all true.

Some of this is set in New Orleans. I live near there, hence the “NOLA” in my web address. And I have seen some very spooky things around here!

Now this series is dark romance, but that’s true only part of the way through each book. We always get a HEA. It contains nonconsensual sexual scenes, so it isn’t for those with trigger issues. There is unwanted touching, confinement, and bullying, but no actual rape. If these things don’t bother you, then you are blessed because these books are awesome. Part of what makes the darkness, the lack of consent, palatable is that none of the characters are human. In most of the paranormal books I’ve read, the couple consists of one paranormal and one human. But here, neither are human. They are older, sometimes centuries older, so we can more easily forgive them for their archaic “lock the women up and control them” ways. Plus, those women are badasses who aren’t going to take that for too long before they rise up and prove they are that man’s equal.

The Arcana Chronicles is another series, pitched to YA/NA audiences. This is a completely separate world, but one that has also been very finely crafted. I read “Poison Princess” and “Endless Knight” years ago but stopped reading the series because each book can’t be read as a standalone. I’m glad I stopped because Kresley Cole’s disappearance delayed the last book’s arrival massively. I will be very happy when the last and 7th book, “From The Grave”, comes out in 2022 and will read the series from the beginning.

In the meantime, I’m reading the Immortals After Dark series from the start right now and will be giving reviews on each individually. I hope you take the journey with me and love it as much as I do.

We are still left of the mystery of Kresley’s disappearance. Writer’s block? Personal tragedy? I don’t think so. You see, in order for a human to be changed into a creature of the Lore, they have to die and come back to life. Maybe she’s been turned. A vampire perhaps? Being turned Lykae wouldn’t have happened this fast. A ghoul wouldn’t be able to write anymore. So yeah.

Vampire Kresley, welcome back! 😀

Congrats on the immortality. I look forward to reading new books in this series for the rest of my life.

The Immortals After Dark series at Amazon

5 star reads, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, New Adult, Review

Aflame: A Fall Away Novel (4) – Penelope Douglas

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The Fall Away Series:
1. Bully
1.5 Until You
2. Rival
3. Falling Away
4. Aflame

Aflame
A Fall Away Novel (4)
Penelope Douglas

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Continuation of Jared and Tate’s story – hot second chance romance

Blurb:

The tables have turned. Now I have the power—and it’s his turn to beg…

Everyone wants to be me.

Maybe it’s the sway of my skirt or the way I flip my hair, but I don’t care. Even though their attention is the last thing I crave, I just can’t stop. I dominate the track, the speed rattles my bones, and the wind and the crowd screams my name.

I’m her. The girl driver. The queen of the race. And I’m surviving—something he thought I’d never do.

They all still talk about him. Did you see Jared Trent on T.V? What did you think of his last race, Tate? When is he coming back to town, Tate?

But I refuse to care too much. Because when Jared does come home, I won’t be here.

Tatum Brandt is gone. I’m someone new.

As the book opens, we find out that Jared and Tate broke up shortly after the events in “Falling Away”. WTF? I was not happy! I was pissed off that they broke up after all they went through before. And I read on reluctantly. I’m not a fan of restart romances in general. They often feel like the author couldn’t let go of the characters they loved. The characters themselves often behave in ways uncharacteristic of them in order to fit to a new story line. Thankfully, that was not the case here!

As I read on, I understood Jared’s reason for leaving. He needed to grow up and discover what he wanted out of life, what would make him happy, and who he was outside of his relationship to Tate. He was going through the motions of life, heading into a career he didn’t want. Tate was his only focus and happiness. He didn’t want to end up resenting her. He always intended to return to her.

Tate only saw abandonment and thought she lost Jared forever. She tried to move on. Jared thought she had moved on and stayed away longer. He returns to town for family reasons, and his friends knock some sense into him. It’s a collective effort from all our favorite characters with some very funny moments.

They were very young at the end of Bully/Until You. They had to grow up and figure themselves out before they could come together as mature adults and make it stick. The usual cliches aren’t found here, which I’m grateful for. This was very fast paced and enjoyable. The sex scenes are very hot. And the grammar has gotten much better!

1st person past tense from both Tate and Jared.

Contains graphic sex scenes – hot ones, including some very good sexting.

Occasional foul language.

HEA. We finally get the epilogue(s) I’ve been wanting and find out some things about the future for all the couples.

8 errors. Very good editing.

$3.99 on Amazon.

237 pages.

Favorite Quote:

Jared and Tate are talking about the kids from all the couples being in high school together later on. Jared: “Relax.” He grabbed his jacket and slipped it on. “I don’t think anyone can get in as much trouble as we did.”

5 star reads, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, New Adult, Review

Falling Away (Fall Away Book 3) – Penelope Douglas

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The Fall Away Series:
1. Bully
1.5 Until You
2. Rival
3. Falling Away
4. Aflame

Falling Away
(Fall Away Book 3)
Penelope Douglas

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Two victims of abuse become survivors and break the cycle by learning to love each other

Blurb:

Jaxon is the guy she’s supposed to avoid.

K.C. is the girl he won’t let get away….

K.C. Carter has always followed the rules—until this year, when a mistake leaves her the talk of her college campus and her carefully arranged life comes crashing to a halt. Now she’s stuck in her small hometown for the summer to complete her court-ordered community service, and to make matters worse, trouble is living right next door.

Jaxon Trent is the worst kind of temptation and exactly what K.C. was supposed to stay away from in high school. But he never forgot her. She was the one girl who wouldn’t give him the time of day and the only one to ever say no. Fate has brought K.C. back into his life—except what he thought was a great twist of luck turns out to be too close for comfort. As the bond between them grows, he discovers that convincing K.C. to get out from her mother’s shadow is hard, but revealing the darkest parts of his soul is nearly impossible.…

K.C. has another truly messed up wicked mother. She has been enduring abuse and conforming to her mother’s wishes in most things to lessen that abuse. Jax bullies her a little bit, telling her she is gutless, in order to spark her defiance and get her to be herself, to figure out who that really is. Jax has to do the same thing, moving past his own history and learning to accept love.

The sex with OP scenes at the beginning really skeeved me out. But I pushed past it and did enjoy this very much. The sex scenes with the main characters together were very hot. The story is good. I was happy to get to know both Jax and K.C. a lot better. They both grew tremendously and got better from interacting with each other.

This was another fast paced and enjoyable read with a lot of emotion.

Graphic sex scenes.

Occasional foul language.

HFN verging on HEA

8 errors. Very good editing.

!Start Rant!
I really hate reading detailed sex scenes with Other People. I don’t care if the main characters aren’t in a relationship yet. I don’t care that it isn’t cheating. I don’t like characters to be promiscuous, male or female. It’s a hurdle I have to get past, something I have to actively try to ignore, in order to enjoy the book. I wish authors would stop with this! I don’t need to be shown that a character is attractive and popular by them having sex with OP!
!End Rant!

$5.99 on Amazon.

434 pages.

Favorite Quotes:

K.C.: If only life could be edited like a story, I’d rock.

K.C.:

We want a house, a car, a fancy fucking vacation, and prestige, so what do we do? We go to school, and we get jobs we hate to pay for the things we want. We deal with people we don’t like and waste years of our lives sitting in stark, fluorescent-lit rooms and listening to coworkers who bore us so we can pay for a small amount of precious time to enjoy what makes us happy. To achieve a fraction of our lives just feeling as if it was all worth it.

We sacrifice to earn.

Ciaron, Fallon’s father, to Jax: He shook his head. “Son, women are easy. They simply want everything. It’s not difficult.”

5 star reads, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Hate To Love, New Adult, Review

Rival (Fall Away Book 2) – Penelope Douglas

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The Fall Away Series:
1. Bully
1.5 Until You
2. Rival
3. Falling Away
4. Aflame

Rival
(Fall Away Book 2)
Penelope Douglas

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Angst, drama, humor, and hot sex scenes

Blurb:

Madoc and Fallon. Two estranged teenagers playing games that push the boundaries between love and war…

She’s back.

For the two years she’s been away at boarding school, there was no word from her. Back when we lived in the same house, she used to cut me down during the day and then leave her door open for me at night.

I was stupid then, but now I’m ready to beat her at her own game…

I’m back.

Two years and I can tell he still wants me, even if he acts like he’s better than me.

But I won’t be scared away. Or pushed down. I’ll call his bluff and fight back. That’s what he wants, right? As long as I keep my guard up, he’ll never know how much he affects me….

Fallon and Madoc have another love to hate to love story filled with secrets and misunderstandings. I loved Tate’s dad, and Jared’s mother was getting there, working on it. But Fallon has a queen bitch evil mother. There is a lot of drama from her.

I loved the witty verbal sparring between Madoc and Fallon. They have fun together, and I got their connection. Madoc is loveable, sweet, and funny. Fallon is grittier, darker, and more damaged. But Madoc brings out the spunk and humor in her.

This is a re-read, so it must be 5 stars. Fast paced, fantastic writing.

You have to read the dedication! It’s a hilarious and cute poem, “To Hubs”. Don’t miss it!

Again, I had a big problem with having to read detailed sex scenes with Other People! Ewwww!

Contains graphic sex scenes. Other than the OP ones, they are very hot! Characters are 18 and in their summer before starting college.

Occasional foul language.

HFN verging on HEA

1st person past tense from Fallon and Madoc. I was very happy to get chapters from each of them this time.

14 errors. So the editing has gotten much better with this one.

$11.99 on Amazon.

366 pages.

Favorite Quotes:

Fallon: One thing I knew right then and there. I might hate Madoc, but I loved his friends.

Madoc: Sometimes I wondered if the angels talked to get me to behave or to entice the devil to come out to play.

Fallon:
I wished I didn’t feel the invisible cord pulling me to him, wanting to touch him again, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t. We always want what’s bad for us.

Madoc was hot. He knew it. And he knew everyone else knew it.

Madoc: Her white bikini was just that. A bikini. In every possible definition of the word, it was evil and temptation in its worst form.

Fallon: Who was I kidding? I’d have better success trying to jam a tree branch up my ass than convince myself I didn’t want him.

Fallon: “Madoc?” she whimpered, sounding pained. “I’m not a piano. Stop playing me.”

5 star reads, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Hate To Love, New Adult, Review, Young Adult

Until You (Fall Away Series) 1.5 – Penelope Douglas

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The Fall Away Series:
1. Bully
1.5 Until You
2. Rival
3. Falling Away
4. Aflame

Until You
Fall Away Series 1.5
Penelope Douglas

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Jared and Tate’s story told from Jared’s POV – Not just a rehash!

Blurb:

Have you ever been so angry that hitting things felt good? Or so numb that you actually felt high? The past few years have been like that for me. Traveling between fury and indifference with no stops in between.

Some people hate me for it, while others are scared of me. But none of them can hurt me, because I don’t care about anything or anyone.

Except Tatum.

I love her so much that I hate her. We used to be friends, but I found out that I couldn’t trust her or anyone else.

So I hurt her. I pushed her away.

But I still need her. The sight of her centers me, and I can pool all of my anger into her. Engaging her, challenging her, bullying her…they are my food, my air, and the last part of me that feels anything human.

But she left. She went to France for a year, and came back a different girl.

Now, when I push, she pushes back.

I love “Until You” more than “Bully”. Maybe it’s being a woman and seeing into the mind of a man? I know I like novels from the man’s POV, so yes. But “Until You” is better beyond that difference. In “Bully”, I didn’t totally get the connection between Jared and Tate. Because I didn’t get inside his mind, I didn’t completely believe his swift turn around. But here I get it. I’m so glad that Penelope Douglas wrote this story! It’s not the same story from a different POV, so you won’t get bored. You don’t need to make choice on which one to read. There are lots of extra things in each of them. But if you only want to read one, I recommend “Until You”. It had more feels for me. Plus there is an extra sex scene 😂.

As I said in my review of “Bully”, I like bully stories. I especially like this one because the bullying doesn’t go too far. There is no sexual harassment or physical violence. The girl isn’t depressed or brought to suicidal thoughts. Both Tate and Jared are strong. Jared gets stronger, grows, throughout this novel.

My one big problem with this was the parts in the beginning where Jared was with Other People. They were much too detailed! I don’t like it when the main characters are promiscuous before the relationship. I don’t care that it isn’t cheating. And I definitely don’t want to have to read the details of it. Nasty! I wanted it to stop! If you are with me, I hope you can push past it as I did.

1st person past tense all from Jared.

Contains graphic sex scenes, hot ones.

Occasional foul language.

HFN (Happy For Now)

There are many errors (25). That I love it anyway is a testament to how good it is!

$4.99 on Amazon.

406 pages.

Favorite Quotes:

I used to keep her up late watching scary movies, and after all this time, nothing had really changed.

Her ass still wasn’t getting any sleep tonight.

“I never touched their bodies like that or held them. I never cared about them enjoying it. They didn’t get any part of me worth having, Tate. Especially, K.C. I never touched her like this.” I stroked her hair. “You own me body and soul, and everyone is going to know it. Sometimes I’m going to go slow with you, and sometimes I’m going to fuck you. But it will always be love, Tate.”

Always has been. And always will.

Tate, we are climbing out of this fucking mess one way or another, because no one ruins us.

“You made me mean. And now I pummel poor, defenseless girls… and guys,” she added, and I wanted to laugh again, thinking of the damage she’d done to Madoc.

“You might say that I turned metal into steel.”

5 star reads, Contemporary Romance, Erotic Sex Scenes, Hate To Love, New Adult, Review, Young Adult

Bully (Fall Away Series Book 1) – Penelope Douglas

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The Fall Away Series:
1. Bully
1.5 Until You
2. Rival
3. Falling Away
4. Aflame

Bully
Fall Away Series Book 1
Penelope Douglas

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Very steamy love to hate to love YA/NA romance

Blurb:

My name is Tate. He doesn’t call me that, though. He would never refer to me so informally, if he referred to me at all.

We’re neighbors, and once, we were best friends. But then, one summer, he turned on me and has made it his mission to screw up my life at every opportunity. I’ve been humiliated, shut out, and gossiped about all through high school. His pranks and rumors got more sadistic as time wore on, and I made myself sick trying to hide from him. I worried about what was around every corner and behind every door.

So I left.

I spent a year studying abroad and bathed in the freedom of life without Jared. Now I’m back to finish up high school and get the hell out of here forever. I’m hoping that after a year of breathing room, he’s moved on and forgotten all about me.

But even if he hasn’t changed, I have. I’m not interested in avoiding him or turning the other cheek anymore. We’re going to go head to head, because neither of us wants to back down.

I love this book. I read it in 2014 and was surprised how much I still remembered from it. I’ve read hundreds of books since then! So this is very memorable. I like bully books. This is definitely one of the best. The bullying wasn’t that bad. There were no sexual assaults or threats of it and no physical abuse. Jared didn’t make Tate’s life miserable, and she never became depressed or suicidal.

Tate is strong, which I love. Jared bullied her before she went to France for a year, but she comes back a badass. The way Tate became the bully was handled brilliantly. “This is how bullies are made.” I also liked how that didn’t go on too long, how Tate pulled herself back from that abyss.

Jared and Tate had a history of love, and Jared had a great excuse. He just needed to grow up and figure himself out after the trauma he went through. I didn’t completely believe Jared’s swift turn around at first, but by the end I got it. I believed how Tate could take Jared back into her heart as quickly as she did, which wasn’t overnight quick (a cliche I hate in bully books).

The story isn’t perfect. I hate that Jared was sleeping around but Tate is a virgin, and he even says how he loves that, that this makes her really his. Thumbs down on that cliche. I’m also not a fan of the cliche bitchy slut revenge for stealing her man bit. But I forgive these things because of all the rest. I love this book.

Oh! And the sex scenes were very hot.

1st person past tense all from Tate. I didn’t feel that Jared’s character was completely fleshed out because I only got Tate’s POV. For this reason, I like “Until You” better. More on that in the next review.

Contains graphic sex scenes. The characters are 18 when they get down to business.

Occasional foul language.

HFN (Happy For Now)

Alright is not a word. It’s two words: all right. Beyond that, there were 50 errors. That’s a lot. That I look past this speaks to how great the story is! Note: I may be reading an earlier version of the book because I bought in 2014. Amazon thinks I don’t own it when I go to its current webpage.

$4.99 on Amazon.

333 pages.

Favorite Quotes:

As I faced Madoc, who had raised himself to meet my gaze, I grabbed him by the shoulders and lifted my knee into his groin. Hard. The amount of pressure must’ve been a lot, because he yelped and fell to his knees, moaning while holding his crotch.

I’d been called a bitch before, and it didn’t hurt the way being called a slut did. Being a bitch could be a survival technique. They get respect. There was no honor in people thinking you were a slut.