Review: Nice Girl (Girl Series) by Kate Baum

Graduate student Grace Locke moves from the Midwest to New York City to complete her Masters degree in Criminology. She longs to one day be a college professor. It is a field that is dominated by men. She is worried about succeeding in such an atmosphere. Past sexual relationships have caused her to feel intimidated. Her experiences with college men have left her jaded and unsatisfied. She gives herself a challenge. Time to toughen up or she won’t make it in a career she yearns for. She decides to surround herself with alpha males so that she can practice becoming what she sees as a strong confident woman. She finds power and defiance in her new attitude...until Vinnie. 

When Grace takes a part time secretarial job at a private investigator office, she assumes it will be interesting to watch how the cases unfold. It is close to her campus apartment and gives her the extra cash she needs as a struggling college student. Even more perfect is that the office is surrounded by street wise hardened males. Now, she can get the needed practice at increasing her confidence among men. She wasn’t prepared for Vinnie Lewis. A former hit man who decides to go straight, he is the ultimate “bad boy”. After growing up with a prostitute mother on the streets of New York City, he has no patience for nice girls like Grace. He is difficult to work with. She finds him just plain scary with his six foot four frame, bulging biceps, and a scar from a former knife fight that goes across his right ear to his chin. She shakes in his presence but then ……. is shocked when she can’t stop thinking of him.

*****Contains graphic sex scenes. For adults only *****

Kitten's Review:

I have to say that it is very rare that I find a book that I just can’t put down until I finish it.

Nice Girl was one of those books. It surprised me on many levels that I was so totally taken with this story. I think for the most part was I honestly liked all the characters. So much so that I yelled out when it was over! I didn’t want it to end and it was nearly 3 AM when I finished this book. I had to know from the moment she met Vinnie what was going to happen. He was hard, cold, alpha… and the romance was honest. Too many times we get the obvious formula. Characters meet in the first chapter, Characters have some sexual tension, characters hump by chapter four. That didn’t happen in the book.

It was honest.

Real.

I honestly felt the progression and the build up into first friendship, then them actually falling in love with one another. My heart broke for Grace and Vinnie more than once, but I got it. I was crying I was laughing I was rooting for Grace when she would get cheeky with Vinnie. And god I loved when he brought his flirt on with her. Because she was so totally not ready for flirt from the likes of Vinnie, but she sure pulled it off with ease. I don’t relate with Grace in many ways. However, in a lot I do. I want to be that strong confident woman first and foremost. However, I don’t think Anthony’s kink is perverted lol.

I’m gonna beg Kate for Anthony’s book, because I honestly think that he needs one. I feel bad for him, only because I relate with people thinking I’m ‘messed up’ because I’m a little kinky. Normally romances just don’t pull me in. I get bored and just let the book lie down. Something endeared me to this story though. I was totally lost and just couldn’t put it down. I wanted it to work, and it even ended on a note that a lot would need to be worked on.

I can’t wait for the rest of the series, but I have to say that Nice Girl was a book I would recommend to all my friends. Cheeky, fun, clever, and honest; what a great book!

**I received this book from the author in return for an honest review**

Review: The Beach House by R.L. Stine

It's 1956 and four kids are hanging out on the beach. Little do they know that a killer has begun to stalk them, one by one. Now, on the same golden sands nearly 40 years later, Ashley, Ross, Lucy and Kip are enjoying the same beach. Until history starts to repeat itself.


Kitten's Review:

This is the man that started it all…

The legend…

The Master…

The inspiration behind my need to write and the man that made me a book hoarder…

R.L. Stine…

This was the first book I ever read by him. I didn’t realize there were books out there that were for my age group that had some kissing, heavy petting, and a totally crazy psycho serial killer. Not to mention the beach house built on a time warp! Hello! For a twelve year old that was pretty amazing and graphic. In this story we follow two groups of teenagers. One group is in 1956, and the other is 40 years into the future. Basically, you are trying to figure out who the crazy one is, why he is crazy, and how can they stop him before he kills every teenager in this beach town.

R.L. Stine has a very simple way of making stuff scare the crap out of you. He doesn’t dose you with prose or over woven storylines. He’s basic, follows a formula, and makes her suck in a breath and itch for more. I like to call him the master of young adult fiction because at the moment it is so absorbed with paranormal romance love triangles. He gives the young adult section that edge for the readers that want a little bit of edgy slathered in death and gore. In a world where the bad guys are just the bad guys and the good guys do die, R.L. Stine will always hit a home run with me and this book! 

Review: The Training of Tess by Tessa Wanton

Tessa had always been fascinated with the Dominant submissive lifestyle, and she was – she felt, a very submissive person. In her real life people knew her as a feisty, headstrong and passionate woman, no one would ever have described her as submissive. But then she had learned over time that being submissive didn’t mean she had to be a doormat, it meant to her that she wanted to hand over her control, her welfare, her safety, to someone else. Throughout her life she had maintained an iron grip on her personal control, organized to the extreme in her work and home life, highly respected in her profession as a Personal Assistant, so used to controlling others to ensure success. But what she truly wanted deep down inside, was a man who could take her to that special place of freedom she had heard and read so much about, to experience true freedom within her mind.

She had signed up to a lifestyle website to learn more about what it was to attain this ‘sub-space’ she had heard about. Peppering her profile with photographs she felt were ‘artistic’, and writing a personal passage about who she was had attracted plenty of admirers, but no one she had particularly connected with. She wasn’t looking to find a soul mate, or even a playmate, just someone to discuss her thoughts and passions and desires with. It was out of the blue that a message had dropped into her inbox.

This intriguingly daring and fiery novella describes three encounters experienced by a young woman, who, whilst fascinated by BDSM throughout her life, had not had the courage or opportunity to experiment in the scene, until now...


Review: The Training of Tess by Tessa Wanton

Buy Links:

Amazon
NOOK

Reviews: The Sheikh's Redemption (Desert Nights #1) by Olivia Gates

Author: Olivia Gates
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Harlequin Desire
Length: 192 Pages
Purchase: Amazon and NOOK

Rating: 5 of 5 Kisses!

Blurb:

He would claim the throne. And her... "For Prince Haidar Aal Shalaan, taking the reins of a kingdom in chaos is a matter of honor. Not that his rivals to the throne would be defeated easily. And then there is Roxanne Gleeson, the one woman whose memory he cannot erase, the lover who once rejected him. Now she pretends a cold disdain for their once-and still-desperate passion. But he will not be denied either the throne of his motherland or Roxanne back in his bed. One is his birthright, the other his heart's desire. And together they are...his redemption.

Kitten's Review:

Hello, Olivia Gates!

Hello, Harlequin Presents series Desire!

I have a great many friends that read these books but the truck load. Always, I have been curious as to what draws them to the quick reads of Harlequin that seem to cookie cutter and perfect. So, I took a chance and requested for review a few books. Let me just say, that with Olivia Gates, I was not disappointed!

The Sheikh’s Redemption is the story about one hell of a sexy Alpha male—well three that we see actually. Gates is so kind as to introduce us to three in this first installment. All I can say is yum and let me count the ways this story sexed me up and made me cry. I was moved, I cried, I laughed, I fell to my knees and nearly begged for Haider to tie up Foxy Roxy. For a woman that has sworn off men and all the intimate details the woman is a boiling over pot of smexy. I loved her as heroine! She was a strong, yet vulnerable female, without being annoyingly vulnerable. Did they need to just talk it out sometimes—yes. But don’t all the H/h relationships in romance books?

Not only was this read well written, but it gave me a satisfying storyline that had me hunting down the next installment, which wasn’t written at the time, to the Desert Nights Series. I would love to read more by Olivia. She gives me the hot Alphas I want, in a vanilla relationship, but it is so totally satisfying! 

Review: Hear Me by Skye Warren

Author: Skye Warren
Genre: BDSM Erotica
Publisher: Self Published
Length: 96 Pages
Purchase: Amazon and NOOK

Rating: 5 of 5 Kisses!

Blurb:

She doesn’t remember her past, only her training. She can’t talk, not that a good slave should speak out of turn. None of that matters when she wakes up in the warm, rustic room. Her new master is distant but kind. There’s only one problem: he doesn’t want her.

Longing for the shackles of safety, she pulls from the last dregs of her will to prove her worth as a slave. It seems to be working. He responds first to her body and next to her submission. The secrets of his past haunt the cabin, fraying the tightening bond between Master and slave, but it is her own memories that may finally unravel it.

This book contains a bonus short story Escape, set in the same dark erotica world.

WARNING:
This book contains explicit scenes of sex, including dubious consent and captivity situations. The BDSM does not conform to literary conventions, making it sometimes more realistic, and other times not. This is a work of fiction not appropriate for anyone uncomfortable with these situations or anyone under the age of eighteen.

Kitten's Review:

Skye Warren is my new go to girl for Dark Erotica.

At this point, I have a few. But this story moved me, pushed me, and made me want more. I think there is something disturbing about the fact I found this book ridiculously romantic. Then again, I also found the last chapter of Anne Rice’s Sleeping Beauty Erotica series. This story was no different for me, and it was 200 pages less than that. Perhaps that type of situation moves me. My husband thinks I have a romantic idea of the subby being saved from the bad Dom, by the good Dom, yet he is still brutal and unyielding.

This story sucked me in from the moment I opened it up. I had a hard time stopping and even got grumpy every time someone tried to interrupt me. Skye is a writer. A real writer, that can weave a story with such intensity that you are thinking about months from now and find yourself going, “What ever happened with Melody and Sam?” You care, you connect, and you want to know more.

Just like Sam says, her submission was beautiful. This story was beautiful. It was dark, wicked, and sexy as all hell. I’m a woman with a desire for the dubious consent situation. And just when I thought I had it all figured out, Skye hit me with a sledge hammer and I was going, “What the--!”

I highly recommend this story to all lovers of dark, twisted, well written stories! This goes in my reread collection! I would just like to note that this is the second story I have read by Skye. I read her freebie retelling of Beauty and the Beast and loved it! I have her other books, all of them actually, and will be reading them asap.

Review: Submit to Desire (The Original Sinners .7) by Tiffany Reisz

Author: Tiffany Reisz
Genre: BDSM
Publisher: Harlequin Spice
Length: 60 Pages
Purchase: Amazon and NOOK

Rating: 5 of 5 Kisses!

Blurb:

Charlotte Brand is tired of dull boyfriends and boring sex. Kingsley Edge, who owns clubs rumored to supply more than just cocktails, seems just the man to revive her: intense, sophisticated...and looking for a submissive he can train for an elite client.

Charlotte is seduced by the offer...and by Kingsley himself. Soon they are engaged in a series of lessons that test her darkest desires. But when their training is over, will Charlotte be ready to let him go?

Kitten's Reviews:

I bet you are sick of hearing of Tiffany from me? Oh, come on, just admit it, you are going “Enough already!”

Well, too bad. This woman has ruined me right and proper as far as mainstream BDSM romance goes. I would have never thought that a book series would consume me since the Fever Series. Well, it looks like I am wrong.

In this wicked little installment we get more of a taste of Kingsley. Now, I know we pretty much know that Kingsley swings both ways. Which wouldn’t it be hot to see him with a guy? That is, until you see him with Charlotte. By God I don’t think I can see Kingsley with anyone one else. The submission is beautiful, moving, and emotional. They connection that the two have is something that I can’t even begin to explain. I am convinced that these characters are alive and well someone because of how well that Tiffany writes them. If I don’t see Charlotte in any more Original Sinners books, I’m going to be just as upset as if I don’t see Big Brad Wolf in another book. I can’t honestly imagine Kingsley with anyone but Charlotte. I connected with her on multiple levels. It worked, it moved, and it made me WANT MORE, which is the most important thing of all.

If you haven’t dove into Tiffany Reisz, then you aren’t living! 

Review: The Siren by Tiffany Reisz

Author: Tiffany Reisz
Genre: Erotica
Publisher: Harlequin
Length: 400 Pages
Purchase: Amazon

Rating: 5 of 5 Kisses!

Blurb: 

Notorious Nora Sutherlin is famous for her delicious works of erotica, each one more popular with readers than the last. But her latest manuscript is different—more serious, more personal—and she's sure it'll be her breakout book...if it ever sees the light of day.

Zachary Easton holds Nora's fate in his well-manicured hands. The demanding British editor agrees to handle the book on one condition: he wants complete control. Nora must rewrite the entire novel to his exacting standards—in six weeks—or it's no deal.

Nora's grueling writing sessions with Zach are draining…and shockingly arousing. And a dangerous former lover has her wondering which is more torturous—staying away from him...or returning to his bed?

Nora thought she knew everything about being pushed to your limits. But in a world where passion is pain, nothing is ever that simple.

Kitten's Review:

Oh, The Siren.

What can I say about The Siren that hasn’t already been said.

Well, everything!

I think I am in the minority here when I say that the fact that Soren is a Priest doesn’t bother me at all. Perhaps it is because I am an atheist and to me Soren isn’t about human emotions or compacity for love. Most people struggle with this and directly compare it to sacrilege and cheating on spouse. I found it the main entertainment driving point of the book for me. I gotta admit, my review partner figured it out first. When she broke it down for me I read even faster to catch up to where they outed it, not even realizing they had outed it in a previous short story of Tiffany’s.

I’m not going to give you a book report or break down of this book. I honestly think everyone else has already done that. This book deserves the passion of a reader that just loves the whole idea and impact that this book represents. This is writing at its best. A book is supposed to tear you apart and lift you up. Stomp you to the ground then lift you up and tend to your wounds. This book did exactly that. It pulled no punches. Yes, Tiffany does tell instead of show me a lot of her intimate moments. That doesn’t spoil the intensity for me. I can have her tell me how cruel of a Sadist that Soren is all she wants, the more she tells me, the more I want him to come over and dish out on me.

Not since Jericho Z. Barrons has a main male lead corrupted my soul as much as Soren has. He is the cats meow, and it will take another powerhouse like Reisz to move into that spot for me. I recommend this book to everyone that asks me “What should I read?!”