Two Months Hiatus!

So in Internet land being gone for months is the equivalent of dropping off the face of the earth. How do I explain myself? Well...

Life came at my door one night in April to give me a list of demands. If I did not follow these demands, life had no choice but ruin me.

The Nerd Girl will Return in August! New Books, New Time! New Attitude.

10.) The Buckled Bag by Mary Roberts Rinehart

Mary Roberts Rinehart is known for as the “American Agatha Christie,” even though her first mystery novel was published forty years before her brutish counterpart. Thusly I believe Christie had the advantage of the change in styling and times, as her mysteries are easier for this Nerdette to read through, yet Rinehart was painstakingly slow and dull. These are the only crimes against “The Buckled Bag,” with great attention to detail, a truly baffling mystery but can be and is dull. The details are finite on the background which lend little to the clues, and the pacing is slow made for readers who are ready to submerge themselves into the plot. To the story’s credit, it is short only 89 pages long.

Candid: Book Haul and Power Trip

Candid Nerdette: Book Haul!!!

With the tragedy in Boston, I am having trouble focusing on my reading and reviews. For this Nerdy girl, the attention and devastation is similar to the 9/11 attacks and it always blankets my moods in dark. So to uplift myself I spent the whole day with my mother doing what I was trained to do since childhood. SHOP! And of course, knowing your lovable Nerd-Girl I went to my local "Goodwill" shops, and "Salvation Army."

To expand my library and save money, I often peruse thrift shops for out of print, hard to find, or just neat additions. in the past I would come home with bags of finds of my favorite authors, yet as I had changed my promise to my husband to "go easy" on the books alas I only found three.

Johanna Lindsey - The Heir - Romance

I fell in love with Lindsey's romances in high school when I checked out a novel from my local library, (They were never in the school library due to the sex scenes, which had saddened me ) I can't remember the title of the book, but I do know that it was about a young woman who time travels to the Viking Age and meets her roguish Viking whom she gets to keep! Yummy! The Heir though is a little more sophisticated or at least I believe it is as the cover does not have a bare chested Adonis with a fragile damsel embracing him with a face of pure ecstasy. (As I was writing the sentence I googled the cover and DID find a bare chested man. I guess the publishers class up the hardcovers. Who knew?) The Heir though is the first in the Reid Series.

Nicholas Sparks - The Guardian - Literature/Love Story

He's not a romance writer, though he writes about love and a romance. He escapes being pigeonholed and is known for bringing his characters to a tragic end. I watched adaptation of his movies before I discovered he was a writer. He's not one of my favorites but something about his craftsmanship on the story inspires me as I write. I am determined to have his all of his published works. (Dear John and Last Song were better as a novel, but I cannot resist Channing's ...well everything.)

The Reef - Nora Roberts - Romance

I love this writer to death! I just cannot get enough of Nora Roberts or her stories. She makes her female leads with a strong character and does not ignore the fact that they are women as well. Her men are practical and realistic, not the white knight on the high horse, but a partner for their lover. So far she not disappointed me, yet I still have 400 books to go.

Current Fiction and Sneak Peak of what Nerdette is Reading : Power Trip by Jackie Collins

The Raunchy Moralist has returned with another story about the Rich and Powerful and what happens when you are to naughty. POWER TRIP follows the passengers of a yacht, The Russian Billionaire and his Super Model Mistress, A Cheating Congress man and his Doll like unhappy wife, A former soccer star and his interior designer wife, A famous Latin Singer and his bitchy British Boyfriend, and a journalist and his Asian Human Activist date. As they all sail the seas, waves of drama erupt on board as everyone is somehow connected to each other. The story is comes to a head as pirates show up with revenge on their mind. I'm enjoying the novel as I usually do of Collin's works.

 

 

 

 

9.) The Tycoon's Revenge by Melody Anne (I'm BACK!)

                Romance the genre has guidelines to plot development. The first is for the story to be centered on the heroine, often the protagonist, and the hero, her love interest and the relationship that blossoms in the story. Secondly and most important is for the couple to meet a happy and satisfying ending. The second of the requirements is what keeps Nicholas Spark’s novels out of the romance genre and mainly viewed as a love story which is a part of general literature. So with only two guidelines an author or authoress has free range to incorporate them. J.R. Ward a paranormal romance writer has even made her one of her main hero in her series bisexual and getting over his past love with a man by being with a woman. It is something different that usually captures readers new and young, but traditional like Nora Roberts creating strong sensible males and females but twist a different plot can still be effective. However with Melody Anne’s “The Tycoon’s Revenge” follows the formula so much so that leaves the plot predictable, and the juvenile antics of her characters caused them to be one note. Though I am not sure whether I am just jaded by all the romance I have read over the years, where I can see the plot’s destination within three chapters or it is just plain predictable.

            The story centers on Derek Titan, a self-made Billionaire who is plotting revenge for his spurned affections and bruised pride. He successfully in chapter one gains control over the company of his ex-girlfriend’s father. Jasmine Freeman, our heroine is too bitter but not out for revenge for Derek leaving her at the altar without a word from him for years, all she wants is to keep her job in order to take care of her home. She bites her tongue and works with Derek to rebuild the company and along the way rekindle the romance they had once had in their youth.

            Good premise, yet a bad execution. The plot is rushed, with the reader finding out the cause on both sides to leave our main characters feeling betrayed. In first couple of chapters we find out how Derek was betrayed and before that we already learned of Jasmine being abandoned at the altar. This leaves the reader to watch as Derek and Jasmine fall back in love for the rest of the three fourths of the book. For two people who had been betrayed and wounded so deeply they seem to fall back in love and in bed with each other. This has to do with the plot already correcting our villain so early.

            What could have helped the story along would have been a convincing and layered antagonist. Yet his reasons are typical and overplayed with no personal depth. He put a ruse in the young lovers tryst for the reasons that have been done and way better. To add to the injury he is only in the story as foil to our characters romance, which would have been fine if there had been something deeper to the story.

            Our hero is to scale. Derek is perceived by the authoress as a cruel and ruthless business man who only looks forward and never back. (The business of what he does is a little sketchy as it is never really explained what the company does, though that could be overlooked as the main focus is on the romance). His need for revenge is fueled by the pain left on him by Jasmine as well as his prejudices toward the wealthy born. However in the flashback of how she had spurned him, the reader has to question his own character. He did not hear such words from his lover, instead from an informant who has questionable traits even to Derek. Yet with the information he damns all wealthy born women and flees off to plot his revenge. It seems cowardice that he could not wait to confront her, and lazy as a writer to not expand on other possibilities to justify his anger. The unjustifiable rage only cheapens the inevitable reunion and romance which quickly follows, leaving most readers annoyed and tired of his incompetence.

            However Derek’s actions does give Jasmine just cause to be bitter and resentful towards him. In her defense she was left at the altar with no call, letter or message. He disappeared for a long time, yet she knew he was alive not dead from an accident or kidnapped. She cuts her losses and moves on with her life yet retains a secrets which sours her character. The secret though to the reader is not discreet at all. A reader is then left to questions the ethics of Jasmine. She is our protagonist and sure she is susceptible to human flaws but with her moral high ground and her integrity to better that of her lover why would she keep this secret. It makes her seem childish and less developed as to no real explanation is given. Instead the reader and Derek are left with, “You weren’t around, so there seemed no reason to tell you.” Bullshit! If a character, a person claims to love someone and has no idea why he left but their own imaginings would at least make some vain attempt to give him the news!

            At which point I had to calm myself before breaking my iPad. I did not cover the sex scenes which are usually my favorite parts of a romance novel, because they were as formulaic as the plot though they tried to hint of eroticism. Anne had a good premise and popular idea with a Billionaire trying to enact some type of revenge and yet falling into his own trap. The execution though was just rushed and underdeveloped.

            The Tycoon’s Revenge eBook can be found on amazon.com for the kindle and on itunes for apple products. It is fairly inexpensive (unless you don’t have a kindle or apple products then go freely into sweet sweet ignorance) and for a short little romp with not much use in brain power could be enjoyable.

8.) The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

            South Carolina 1964 is the beginning of Sue Monk Kidd’s debut novel, “The Secret Life of Bees” during the ever uncomfortable segregation period of America. Lily Owens is a fourteen year old girl living with her dower and somewhat sadist father whom she affectionately refers to as T. Ray rather than father. Haunted and confused about the death of her mother, Lily has no friends other than her surrogate mother, nanny and black woman, Rosaleen. All is quiet and normal in their town until politics and the rights of people are put into questions, Lily decides to change her fate and runaway with Rosaleen, who is targeted by racists to the town Lily believes might connect them to her mother’s misty past. Sue Monk Kidd paints a vivid picture of the horrors of the south and it’s prejudices against African Americans and is the precursor to another famous book about black and white relations, “The Help,” by Kathyrn Stockett. And like the other, Kidd is white. Is this the product of white guilt or is this story one that stands alone as just any other regardless of the authoress skin color.

            The first thing to look at is the major characters; Lily Owens, Rosaleen, August, June, May, and Zach. Lily seems no more than our observer into the African American world as she is a guest in August’s home. Lily and Rosaleen wander into an African American town where white people are scarce and for once Lily is in the minority. She too though has her own prejudices, assumptions but they are changed as she watches the three women and keeping of the bees and business. To Lily, August shows the supreme of wisdom knowing more than her years and shames Lily’s own thoughts on the intelligence of African Americans.  June is equally sophisticated but brings about another part of racism that neither Lily nor most readers would consider. May is the life and laughter of the three and holds the most sorrow but barely as her feeble mind is able. Though simple and kind she not completely ignorant to the world, it is just the opposite. She knows it all and feels it all but like a pitcher with small holes she cannot hold it all in. Zack’s introduction is late but he keeps presence on the page. He befriends Lily regardless of her color and holds some admiration to her. Even less on page but still present is T.Ray, Lily’s bitter father who is still desperately looking for her. He holds the biggest secrets and yet we only see so little of him.

            Neither the characters are written or perceived as stereotypical, at least not in the time period it was written. I could be said that August is like the “Magical Black Woman/Man” who sprinkle wisdom on the poor little white girl as she struggles through her inner conflict. It would be no different than Will Smith’s role in “The Legend of Vance,” where he mentors a white golfer. Whereas Will was figment, August is real but still mentoring Lily as she come of age. Yet June does not warm up to Lily, she is skeptical and downright rude to Lily because of what her skin represents to June and her kind. So does it balance it out?

            I saw the sprinkled subtext and however I was not offended by it. To someone who believed that African American to be limited in intellect and primal, the Calendar Sisters would be at first a shock and later the highest admiration would follow. And for Sue Monk Kidd who had grown up in the south during this troubled period and feeling guilty later as an adult for not engaging in African Americans until her college years, I could see how she would too raise their stature far from the ill conceived sterotype of that era. I enjoyed it for what it was worth…

            I wonder what the movie is like?

7.) Brazen Behavior by Saskia Walker

            After a little hiatus and some well needed rest, this Nerdette is back and ready to finish her reading library, we start right where we left off with Saskia Walker.

            Where “Their Private Arrangement” is more erotic in style and character profile, “Brazen Behavior” is Walker’s more Romance Genre themed and styled in this novella. We are introduced to a head strong heroine who believes she is fully capable of taking on the world without a man, and the traditional man that comes around with his mighty sexual “presence” who shatters her beliefs and also has an enlightened opinion of women of his own. Is this good?

            Eleanor Argyle is of woman of means in the Victorian century and with a modern mind. Though she maybe alone with money, she is still woman enough to travel alone and without a male escort. During the 1800’s being alone on a journey and of the fairer sex was not only dangerous, as it is today, but unseemly. Society is not the only one who believe it improper for Ms. Argyle to be alone, Mr. Gregory Munroe the family’s assistant, friend and employee is sent to escort the young heiress safely to her Aunt and Uncle’s home. Yet our headstrong heroine has her own agenda and will not bend to her beguiling escort. As they out wit each other on this short journey from London to Scotland, Eleanor finds that love does not mean total absolve to a man, and for Gregory that erotic imaginings can happen to those who least expect it.

            Eleanor holds the same traits that I look for in a strong woman character, independent, crafty, and adventurous. She also isn’t a virgin which is also a plus. Like Morag she is used to sex. However the problems I have with her come from the fact that the novella is more of a romance and with the over arching plot. She makes decisions and assumptions too quickly, where the romance has to be threatened by poor communication. When she is disappointed Eleanor turns into the same arch type of the Victorian woman, a creature prone to her moods. Rather than have Gregory explain himself she turns on him with woman irrationality.

            Gregory is not completely faultless in character. Enlightened only to a small degree, he represents all that society believes is right. In the beginning he does not like the fact that Eleanor is alone in her travels, nor is he charmed by her believing she can do whatever she pleases. However he does grow to admire her independent spirit and that is the amount of growth you are going to receive. I will say, because it is a novella We as reader shouldn’t expect much growth or the shortness of time it happens.
               The story is simple with only the conflict of miscommunication and naiveté. It is was not a romance of substance but it was entertaining. But for this little Nerd, she is leaning on Saskia Walker’s more erotic driven heavy plots.

Not Forgotten!

It has been a couple of crazy weeks. Sick and house problems have given me excuses but none of them are good enough. I should have still put something out even if I was tired, or scared, I should have, but that was then and this is now. Starting March 1st I will resume my original schedule and for the entire month there will not be a day off, from Monday to Friday, every day all the time. And the few who are still reading, please keep on. Your support is important and dear to me.

LOVE YOUR LOBSTERS

Nerdette

Argh timing!

Sorry about the delays, will resume to normal schedule on Monday. Until then, I LOVE YOUR LOBSTER

Nerdette!

6.) Their Private Arrangement by Saskia Walker

Saskia Walker’s novella “Their Private Arrangement” is a very small taste of the world and what readers are to expect in her novel, “The Harlot.” Set in the same period, 1715, and the same place, Scotland, the story follows the romantic intrigue of a forbidden homosexual couple and the woman who is attracted to them. Morag is a maidservant and wench in the local tavern and is forced with the other servers to keep secret the amorous congress of two men which is forbidden by the Catholic religion which is ever present in Scotland. Morag is attracted to Duggan Moore, a tradesman and most recently the lover of the noble aristocratic James Grant. To keep his lovers attention James invites Morag into their relationship and is surprised at his own desire for her as well. However the tryst cannot continue as an angry mob following an accused witch comes into town and disrupts everything. Can the ménage a trios stay discreet or will they burn for their forbidden and blasphemous affair?

As an avid reader of erotica, starting at a young age, I find Saskia Walker’s work rather intriguing. Instead of having the sweet virginal female character who is brought into a dark and kinky world by the devious male hero, her women have fully realized of their sexuality and are searching for the next love or lust affair with open eyes and wet genitalia. This, I feel is an improvement against the doe eyed patron saint. I have to confess that this is the first erotica that delved into male homosexuality paired with a heterosexual woman, so often it is the woman who bends her sexuality, finding herself inside of another woman. (No Pun intended) Where “Their Private Arrangement,” is well written and interesting, it is not great, it just leaves me intrigued and looking forward to reading, “The Harlot.”

Looking for more goodies? Not fully invested on my word alone here is her website:

http://saskiawalker.com/

Have you read any erotica lately?

Have you ever been intrigued? Leave Comment !

 

 

5.) My Hot Betime Stories by Laura B Cooper

Here is something embarrassing about this little gem. I was reading this book while getting my hair done at my salon. Yes it will always be called a salon to me! I am under the dryer with my iPad tightly in my hand when out of my peripheral vision I notice a little girl, five or six, leaning over to see what I was reading. I quickly exited out and started playing angry birds with my cheeks hot. The girl was none the wiser and kept watching me as I pretended to be interested in destroying  constructions with no help of physics, while thanking the heavens she didn’t ask me what “Fuck!” meant.

            Anyway “My Hot Bedtime Stories,” is a collections of Vignette stories centering on the swinger lifestyle that the protagonist and the author Laura B. Cooper. Cooper publicly states she is a swinger with her husband and share a relationship with him and others like her in her community. The naughty night time book details raunchy gang bangs and salivating sensual exploits in voyeurism. It’s about sex and coming out during the 2012 when Erotica hit the fans, this is a nice little collection to have if you dream about many lovers on the side.

            Hide it in your nightstands, boudoir table drawers, or like me on your iPad and away from nosey nibblers!

 

Question time? Have you ever read anything you were embarrassed about? Comments please

 

If this book strikes the inner kink in you here is her website!

            http://laurabcooper.blogspot.com/?zx=c203431955966e01

4.) Anything He Wants: The Meeting by Sara Fawkes

Short one today, mother is extremely sick and I'm playing nurse!

The book was good! Really! Though it is one of the other Eroticas that came out on the coat tails of "Fifty Shades," but as  the first part in the mini series, it surpasses E.L. James!

If you read it please comment and tell me what you liked and did not like!

Do you read Erotica?

Love you!

3.) Detective John Saunders by Adrianna White

                I knew I would come across bad stories and bad writing eventually. I am not a picky reader and almost give books a first try before I decide if it is not for me. Genevieve, was book that had good writing, but the story did not capture me, and nor did I like any of the characters. Therefore I would technically call it a bad book. Yet “Detective John Saunders’: Erotic Noir” is a perfect example of bad writing and bad story.

                The plot takes place in the underbelly of L.A. when a young girl’s body is found in the parking lot, stabbed to death. Detective John Saunders, described by the author and some of his employees as a drunkard and womanizer. The story continues to tell the reader how much of a drunk John is but does not actually showing him consuming alcohol or why. We are just to assume that John has seen rough things and like most detectives in the early 1900s of America, drowned his sorrow and unease in liquor. John is also stated to be a hopeless womanizer as was the norm of all detectives, I am not sure if this is supposed to titillate the reader. Personally a cheating old man that is constantly drunk does not get my loins a flamed even if he has the very descriptive “body of a thirty year old man.” Yet I might not be the audience the book was trying to capture. As the reader follows John on the case the plot becomes predictable. There are only two suspects and the climactic twist at the end is contrived and paint by numbers of story telling. I am very disappointed. No. I’m livid that this short story somehow was published.

                I do not know the difference between the book and the eBook other than one is electrical. Therefore I hold eBooks standards as I would any other novel. When a story is to be published it goes through editors to make sure the grammatical mistakes are corrected as well as spelling. In White’s books there seems to be no middle man. The grammar is horrible, and this is coming from someone that overlooks and curses the English language almost every day as I am writing this blog. Grammar often alludes me but if it is so horrible that it effects the pacing of the story and I am drawn out of a sex scene  to turn to my husband and ask, “Is ‘cummed’ a word?” I cannot get fully invested in where the story is going.

                The other gripe I have is, “Erotic Noir.” One; Erotica does not have to have sex dripping from page to page, yet there has to be a sense of sensuality in the characters, and more than one sex scene in the entire book.  Detective John Saunders is not sexy at all! Two; Noir in French means “Dark,” literature and Hollywood used this term to describe mystery stories that were gritty and solved and involving characters that WERE NOT apart of the police force. Usually a private eye would be hired, or a young heroine would find herself the victim of false accusations and has to rely on herself to prove her innocence. Detective John Saunders is not discharged from the force or retired, he is still active which would make this a crime novel or short story, I’m not sure it’s only 25 pages long. Even if White was using “Noir” to describe the erotica, the terminology still does not hold. With only one sex scene and nothing unusual than the two characters are having sex, no ropes, no gags, no spanking or any other naughty fetishism it is hardly dark.

                The worse factor of this eBook is that I cannot sell it back.

                Ugh.

2.) Initial Kiss by Jillian Holmes

Kayla Jones needs some extra money for a down payment on a house and rather than be reduced to stripping she applies for an add to be a “Professional” girlfriend. James Madison is a work-a-holic wealthy business man with little time to properly woo a young woman for his family reunion. Madison is relying on Kayla or “Ms. Jones,” to be professional while Kayla is hoping Madison is not a creep. What they both do not expect is the passionate mutual attraction. Forced to be somewhat chase due to their contractual agreement Kayla and James must sequester their attraction in Jillian Holmes “Initial Kiss,” the first in the Kiss Trilogy.

With the popularity of E.L. James “Fifty Shades,” Trilogy, a naughty romance tale with tie me up, spank, and gag me situations and themes, other authors in the same genre of erotica have surfaced. However where most recycle the same plot with different names, Holmes’ story only has few elements of her predecessor in her own tale. James is a wealthy business man looking for a contractual partner rather than an actual relationship and that is where the similarities end. Kayla is not naïve nor is virginal as Anastasia, yet since “Initial Kiss,” the first novella in the series Kayla suffers with having little to no personality what so ever. It mainly has to  do with the lack of conflict in her situation as she has only made one big decision so far.

“Initial Kiss,” only give you a taste of what erotic delights are to come and is worth getting the next chapter.

1.) Genevieve by Eric Jerome Dickey

Can a person give love unconditionally, especially knowing a dark secret about you and your past? Could you ever look at that person in the same light after revealing a hauntingly abusing background? Can you forgive as though the action has never happened? These are questions author Eric Jerome Dickey asks in his 11th novel, "Genevieve."


Dickey is a self made author, having graduated from The Universuuty of Memphis with a Computer System Technology degree and moving to L.A. to pursue an acting and comedian career. He found his love of writing while constructing scripts for comedy. What was supposed to be a short story turned into a three hundred page novel. He took many workshops in creative writing and had even had a couple of short stories published before embarking on finishing his novel.The drive to be make something of oneself is evident not only in Dickey's life but in his novel as he paints the picture of our somewhat absent character, Genevieve.

An undergraduate at Spelman, to UCLA and then a Ph.D in Finances at Pepperdine University, Genevieve has come a long way from her roots in Odenville, Alabama. Her husband who remains nameless through out the book narrates his admiration and intimidation of his wife even though he is an Aids Reseach Doctor. He is our guide into his marriage, and his inner turmoil with "too much" love for his wife and feeling that it is unreturned as she refuses to reveal her past. In keeping this from her husband his resentment for her grows as well as put distance between them. Th rift in their marriage is tested when Genevieve is summoned back to Odenville for a funeral, forcing her to relive her past and unearth demons she had so desperately been trying to bury. For her husband, he is introduced for the first time to her relatives including the freespirited younger sister Kenya who encompasses the attributes Genevieve had left behind years ago.

Where the novel is trying to convey the sense of mystery and intrigue mixed with an illicited love affair, the end result seems to be a mess. The nameless husband, our protagonist tries to justify his actions as a result of an unloving family structure, his wife suncess, and their stagnent sexlife. Genevieve almost has no character what so ever other than a neurotic. While Kenya seems to embody more of a hoodrat than than the taudry mistress that lures him away from his wife.

Personally not one of my favorite....

A Howdy Doo for 2013

                I have been in love with books since I was in the sixth grade. The very first book I had chosen for leisure was, “Goddess of the Night,” by Lynne Ewing.

                Goddess of the Moon was unlike any other book I had read so far. Greek mythology and descendants of Gods woven into the modern times and placed on the shoulders of teenage girls who were bequeath mystical powers. The only popular books around my age time was either between “Goosebumps” or  some selections of poems by Shel Silverstone.

                Thirteen years later, married and moving into my new house, my spouse watched as boxes upon boxes labeled “Books” were brought inside. He stared in dismay as I filled our living room library with my collection with not much room for his own books. I stood tall as five feet could as I gazed proudly like a peacock at my masterwork. Addison stood beside me as well, slack jawed and bewildered.

                “So how many are there…?”

                “How many what?”

                “Books, honey, how many books do you have?”

                “Oh… um…” I paused to calculate off the top of my head. “I think about 560 at least…not including the manga and the comics.”

                “560 at least?!”

                “Not including the manga and the comics.” I added softly.

                “And you’ve read all of them?”

                “No,” I laughed at the notion, “I think I stopped reading about the time I got into college. You know, school and work, and then you proposed and then I got married…” Addison held up his hands to stop my ramblings.

                “So you are telling me that you have been buying books and not reading them?”

                “Yep!”

                “Isn’t that a little strange?”

                “Um…no?” He smirked and I sighed in defeat of his logic. “Yes, it is a little.”

                So my husband and I decided with the New Year to try something new. I would not buy anymore new books until I read all my unread novels, biographies and what nots in our library. I thought it would help with my journaling to also review them as well and choose whether or not to keep the book in my collection. Quality over Quantity. I will post Monday-Friday, reading a book a day with the exception of Sunday.

                Here’s crossing my fingers for good luck!

 

LOVE YOUR LOBSTERS,

                Truffles