stephanie_inman's Reviews (228)

This one started off so strong, but the further I got into it, the more I just lost interest.

At first I liked both characters. Their meet cute was good. They definitely had chemistry and I was rooting for them. But the more I got to know Dagny the more I just couldn't get behind her. She drove me bananas. She was just such a pitiful-woe-is-me character. She brings up the fact that she's an "orphan" quite a bit. While technically this is true, her parents are dead, she was not orphaned as a child. She was an adult when her parents died. As someone who has actually lost a parent as an adult, I'll be the first to say this changes you as a person. But it seemed here it was just used to make everyone feel sorry for Dagny. I also thought it took her way to long to stand on her own to feet. This isn't a new adult romance, Dagny is in her early thirties, I believe. Not only was she fine letting her boyfriend take care of literally everything for her when they were together (which, sure he's wealthy and their lifestyle pretty much did dictate that he take care of everything then) but when they break up, she's still allowing him to take care of her. As soon as they break up, she's already thinking he has someone else, but she still uses his money, stays in their apartment with him and just generally allows him to provide for her. I wish she would have been a stronger character. I get that she wanted to live in New York, but I would have rather seen her move somewhere cheaper and learn how to depend on herself.

The New York and London thing also drove me bananas. I get it. They are great cities. But it was like neither of these women would consider life anywhere else. it was just odd to have both cities mentioned so often, and in the way that they were (as in they were just overly praised. Yes, the fact that they lived in different locations is part of the story, but I thought the "love letters" to both cities just read weird)

I did like Allison. My only issue with her was her storyline. She's a reporter and she's working on a big story (because of course she is). I thought the secrecy was a little over the top, but I could deal with that. What bothered me was that Allison's career plays such a big part of the book, and we're told that she is interviewing people and working on this career-making, top secret, dangerous story, only to never find out what her assignment/story was about.

While they started off, as I mentioned with good chemistry, I found myself not caring so much about that the further we got into their stories because I just didn't see that Allison would fall so hard for Dagny. I just didn't think Dagny brought much to the relationship, other than really good sex. I didn't see them as a couple with any real staying power.

The book felt much longer than it was. It seemed to drag on. I don't know if it was because the author focused on so much in the way of Allison's career, Dagny's break-up, or what, but I ended up bored before I was halfway through the book. This was a hard one for me to finish. I felt like a lot of the content was put in just to make the book longer and wasn't at all necessary to the story.

I actually went back and tried to do a re-read. I must have been feeling generous with my first read, because while I didn’t give a full review, I did give it three stars. And I cannot figure out why. I even remember having some issues with it, which is one of the reasons I tried this re-read. I don’t like to give full reviews on books I haven’t read in a while.

I couldn’t make it past the first few chapters. I remember the first time I read this I absolutely hated that Theo is touted as a virgin hero, but he loses his virginity in the beginning of the book. And to some random, not seen again character. I just didn’t like getting an actual virgin hero and then he’s treated as most “manwhore” characters are. All he’s thinking about at the beginning of the book is getting laid. Then the author oddly makes his first time pretty non-consensual, as Theo is blackout drunk. And Theo’s slut shaming also started super early in this book. He’s on an app looking for a hookup, but is hella judgmental when a girl actually wants to hook up. He mentions that he “doesn’t want to get herpes” and that maybe hooking up with guys on this app is the girls “usual MO). Dude. You’re doing the same thing!

I’m cool with casual sex. And had Theo not kept saying how great he was, I think I might not have cared so much about the randomness of the losing of his virginity.

He also talks about how he waited for his ex girlfriend to have sex with him, and then after he “puts in his time” or “pays his dues” (some ridiculous phrase like that) his gf ended up having sex with some other guy she just met. The way he acted like his ex owed him sex because he waited was toxic as hell.

The sexism, his slut shaming girls and “nice guy” of Theo is just too much.

The “heroine” of our story “isn’t like other girls”. Like that is legit said more than once. I feel like that speaks for itself.

There’s also ableism and racism in this one, if you’re wanting to take notes.

Basically this is just a hot mess of things that I’d rather not read in my romance.

I had a hard time liking the heroine here. First, let’s maybe not, even when it’s a character referring to herself, use the term “r*t*red”. And the fat shaming? Size 12 isn’t even plus size, first of all (if it is, it’s barely. So it’s pushing to that everyone would think she was huge). Also she hated her plain looks, but did absolutely nothing to make herself feel better about herself? It actually seemed like she looked down on anyone who cared about their appearance, because she was just “too smart” and had so much going on in her brain that she couldn’t care about those things. She was way too “not like other girls”.

As for the fact that she needed Michael to “force” her to have sex? I don’t kink shame, if this were just a thing they were into, then cool. But she made it seem like she wouldn’t feel desired or just plain wouldn’t be able to “let go” unless he forced her. It was just weird and not at all sexy.

I also just didn’t feel the chemistry with Michael and Sophia. I felt he had better chemistry with Justice, tbh.

I still landed on two stars, though because I loved Micheal. He’s been a favorite of mine throughout this series. I’ve liked his loyalty, I loved how he was with Justice and he’s a virgin hero! I appreciate that so much! And he also made it clear that Sophia was his priority, not Shane. If you’ve read my reviews for the rest of the books, then you know that is a huge issue I’ve had with this series.

Overall, I’m glad I finished this series. I’ve enjoyed most of the heroes (Aiden, not so much. Gabe, my guy, I’m still back and forth with). I absolutely loved Justice. And I will continue to praise this series for having heroes who weren’t the same as so many other books.

This is the first book in this series and introduces us to the Librarians of Sugar Hill. The stories are super short. It’s easy to read all four in one evening. I love Liz Fox for quick, fun reads that have no real angst.

This is Violet’s and Grant’s story. It’s a brother’s best friend romance.

The story is decent. I didn’t feel a huge connection between the characters. Out of the four books in this series, I feel like I got to know the characters in all of the other books much better than I got to know Violet and Grant. I really wasn’t very invested in their story because I didn’t see much of a personality with either of them.

It’s still not a bad read. I liked the following books a lot more than this one. As a whole, I’d recommend this series.

Was it the Star Trek references? Was it the adorable kiddo? Was it that I just really liked Hope?

I don’t know.

What I do know is that this is by far my favorite book in this series.

Hope and Ryan both had me when it comes to their characters. I liked how he was with his daughter. He made mistakes, but he was trying. Hope was strong and refused to be taken for granted.

For a short story, this one packed a good amount of content in it. Possibly my favorite of all Liz Fox’s books.

Maggie and Hunter just may be the hottest couple at this library.

I liked everything about this story.

Read on KU, but will be purchasing this and the second one in this series. Both are great for when I just want to read a short, swoon-inducing, HEA providing, little bit sexy story.

This is the final book in this particular Liz Fox series. After reading all four of them, I definitely recommend checking this series out.

Three stars for the heroine, Harper. Lance gets zero. Seriously, he started off amazing. And I had been waiting for his book! I wanted to love him. But about halfway in he becomes insufferable. Even further in and his words and actions are pretty much emotional abuse.

Also, I get that they spent two years apart, but for the love of everything, stop having the heroines wait around, not even thinking of sex with someone else, but the man is back to getting laid, even if he “hated himself after”. Then we find out he slept with the girl who cheated on him in high school, even though she’s in a committed relationship with Lance’s old high school bully. This really took Lance down a notch for me.

This book had so much potential. If the angst had been dialed back just a bit. Or if Lance wasn’t such a huge jerk turning Harper into a doormat. She needed to leave and he needed to spend some time groveling. I also would have liked it since Harper was too in love to have sex with anyone else during their breakup, then Lance should have been written the same way. I just hate the stupid standards that authors seem to hold their female characters to. They both were supposedly heartbroken. It would have made just as much sense for Harper to also find comfort in that way.

Edit: I am re-reading books in this series (for other reviews) and why in the hell didn’t I mention the blatant racism and the playing of stereotypes before? I know that the characterization of Rene bothered me then. (He’s both the gay BFF stereotype and the way the author writes about him being Latinx? Oof)

Also, it’s ridiculous how often the author mentions that Harper is “unattractive”. Apparently her legs and butt are good, but gotta diss everything else. Another oof.

I’m still pissed about the sexism.

Upon re-read (dnf this time) I’m changing this one to a two star. I still liked Harper.

TW/CW: Grief, death of a loved one.
Sexual harassment and assault (isn’t main character and isn’t on page, but there are a few mentions of this)
Questionable consent

Yikes.

I had this on my Kindle (it was a freebie) for a few years. I’m trying to do a Kindle “cleanup” this year and read ones that have been on there for a while rather than keep buying new books.

I liked the premise of this one. Audra is a widow, her husband dies. Her kid gets sick. So, lotta heartbreak for Audra here. Okay, that I’m cool with. We find out that Audra had been in love with her husband’s brother, who is now the doctor treating her kid. (We all know where this is going, right?). I didn’t feel much build up because it was so obvious what was coming up. There’s another “twist” about Audra that we also see coming a mile away.

So, I just couldn’t get into the story, but that wasn’t even my main issue. Like I rolled my eyes so freaking hard at this one. Jack is Kara’s (the kid) doctor? He’s related to her, but a hospital is like “nah, go ahead and perform SURGERY ON A CHILD YOU ARE RELATED TO?! Really?

Audra works as a head writer on a soap opera, but she writes it anonymously? This book was published in 2014. There is the issue that a) why would an employer think that Audra is so indispensable that they allow her to write for a show and be all “no one can know who I am” and b) again, this is 2014. People barely gave a fuck about soap operas then, yet alone care enough that when her identify is reveled the paparazzi heads to the state she’s in with her in-laws (Audra was living in California. Her in laws lived somewhere else. This is brought up a lot because her late husband’s parents blame her for their son moving to California)

I’ve never known anyone to be so into the writers of a TV show that the writers are hounded by paparazzi. This was just beyond ridiculous, imo.

Also the fact that this book was published in 2014 is astounding. It reads like one of those old paperbacks my grandma might have read. Everything about it seems outdated.

We have a heaping pile of misogyny and slut shaming.

Some reviewers didn’t like the sex, which is fair if you’re into cleaner reads. However, if you don’t mind or even like your books on the sexier side of things, the scenes here are probably not going to interest you. Very bland. Very tame. Again, think old paperback with Fabio on the cover.

Jack is a cheater. And in my opinion there’s some questionable consent. There’s a scene were Audra is on pills that help her relax/sleep and Jack goes into her room and has sex with her. Ick.

I ended up skimming this one when I got about midway through. Not only was I just not enjoying the story, but the writing was too jumbled for me. There was too much back and forth of Audra with side characters. While we had the main story, we also had Audra looking for her dad and the story of her mom’s past. It just wasn’t all necessary.

I hated pretty much every character in this book. Both the hero and heroine were insufferable. The mother in law and her friends were mean and petty. The hero’s fiancé was vapid. The fiancé’s brother was written as a “nice guy”. The father in law was the only one I didn’t hate. He should have taken the kid and left the rest of this crew.

I had three other books in this series on my Kindle. While I’m sure there is an audience for them, I realize that this author just isn’t for me. Maybe it’s that they are more chick-lit and that often doesn’t work for me. Maybe it’s because of how dated everything in it felt to me. Whatever the reason, I deleted them and am moving on.