Book Review: Beautiful Bitch (Book #1.5 in the Beautiful series) by Christina Lauren

Right off the bat, I have to say that reading Beautiful Bitch was definitely somewhat of an unusual experience for me due to the fact that I hadn’t realized that it was considered #1.5 in the Beautiful series, and that Beautiful Stranger is labeled as #2 in the series until after I had finished listening to the audiobook version of Beautiful Stranger. Putting aside the fact that it was kind of weird for me to backtrack a little bit by reading this book after reading and reviewing Beautiful Stranger, I absolutely loved this book. One of the many things that I loved about Beautiful Bitch is that we got to see the next chapter in Chloe and Bennett’s relationship after they got back together at the end of Beautiful Bastard, and embarked on an actual committed relationship. I felt like the relatively immediate aftermath of Chloe and Bennett getting back together at the end of Beautiful Bastard that we got to see in flashbacks that were featured in this book was very true to how I would imagine things playing out between Chloe and Bennett; regardless of whether Christina Lauren had written Beautiful Bitch, or if they hadn’t, and it had been left up to the reader to imagine what next chapter of Chloe and Bennett’s relationship after the events of Beautiful Bastard would be like.

As much as I ultimately grew to love Bennett as a character by the end of Beautiful Bastard, and had thought that he had undergone some pretty great character development throughout Beautiful Bastard; he definitely didn’t come across as being the kind of guy who would immediately transform into a guy who would be worthy of receiving a “Boyfriend of the Year” award by the end of Beautiful Bastard. I imagined him experiencing some growing pains as he and Chloe embarked upon being in a committed relationship with each other, and that he would struggle with it a little bit; so I was absolutely thrilled to see that Christina Lauren wrote Bennett that way to a certain degree in this book. That being said, I did think that it was kind of odd that Chloe didn’t really struggle at all in terms of dealing with the way that their relationship had evolved over time like Bennett did. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not upset that Chloe didn’t really struggle in any way when it came to dealing with the two of them going from being in a rather casual workplace romance to being in a committed relationship, as well as the evolution of their relationship in the time that had passed between the end of Beautiful Bastard and the beginning of Beautiful Bitch. I just thought that it was a little odd that Chloe didn’t seem to really struggle at all with the shift in their relationship.

Despite the fact that Bennett did seem to struggle in some ways in terms of adjusting to being in a committed relationship with Chloe, I love that Christina Lauren really portrayed Bennett as being incredibly invested in his relationship with Chloe, and that they showed Bennett really making an effort to work on their relationship throughout the book. While I usually think that having a romance novel or any kind of book for that matter be low on conflict and angst can really make a book incredibly boring, I’m honestly really glad that Christina Lauren didn’t have anything too dramatic and angst-ridden happen between Chloe and Bennett in this book; such as have one of them cheat on the other, or have one of them almost cheat on the other. The fact that most of the problems that Chloe and Bennett had to deal with throughout the book basically had to do with their conflicting work schedules getting in the way of them being able to spend time together now that Chloe is no longer Bennett’s assistant, reminded me a lot of the simplicity of the problems that arose between Jake and Chelsea throughout Emma Chase’s Legal Briefs novella, Sidebarred. Pretty much all of the problems that Jake and Chelsea dealt with throughout Sidebarred had to do with them raising Chelsea’s nieces and nephews together, with Jake serving as a father figure to the kids now that he and Chelsea were married with a baby of their own on the way, but I digress.

Book Review: One with You (Book #5 in the Crossfire series) by Sylvia Day

I should probably start out this review by saying that I originally wasn’t planning to read and review One with You any time soon, but reading the second book in Christina Lauren’s Beautiful series, Beautiful Stranger, and writing my review for the book really got me thinking about the Crossfire series again quite a bit, so I decided that it would probably be very fitting for me to go ahead and read One with You now. That being said here are my thoughts on One with You.

Because I feel like I’ve been repeatedly disappointed by Sylvia Day, and the Crossfire series as a whole, I’ve definitely been putting off reading One with You ever since it was released back in April of this year. Since this is the last book in the series, I was really hoping that I would enjoy One with You, and that the Crossfire series would end on a good note. Sadly, that definitely didn’t happen. While One with You does have some elements that I enjoyed, I was ultimately extremely disappointed with the book, especially when it comes to the fact that this is the final book in the series. To me, One with You came across as being the book equivalent of a TV show having a season finale where the writers have the season end with multiple cliffhangers, leave storylines open to be continued in the following season, and introduce whole new storylines, because they’re confident, or at least fairly optimistic about the show’s chances to be renewed for another season, only to have the network cancel the show. However, the fact that this or any final book in a series would have that kind of vibe to it is absolutely infuriating to me, since an author has the luxury of knowing whether or not a book is actually going to be the final book in a series. If an author who’s writing a book series knows that a book is going to be the last book in the series, they can and should write it as such, which Sylvia Day unfortunately didn’t do when it comes to this book.

One of the many problems that I’ve had with the Crossfire series is a lot of the writing and character development for Gideon, or rather the lack of character development and growth for him throughout the series. As I’ve read each book in the series, I constantly found myself thinking that I didn’t fully understand why Gideon is the way he is. Sure, we were given some information throughout the series about his past and the abuse he suffered when he was younger, but the character development and growth for Gideon still always felt rather incomplete, in my opinion. I feel that way even more so after reading One with You, and the fact that the series ends without Gideon truly working through and overcoming all of his issues, particularly his sexual parasomnia. The lack of character development and answers regarding Gideon’s past is one of the reasons why I would liken One with You and the Crossfire series as a whole to a TV show that’s abruptly canceled, leaving various storylines unresolved. However, I’ll admit that there was one “revelation” that’s revealed in this book, which I’ll talk about later on in this review, that does make me feel a little more understanding when it comes to the fact that Gideon doesn’t truly work through all of his issues by the end of the series.

I’m confused, is this a romance novel, or some kind of Jane the Virgin reboot? (My thoughts on The CEO's Unexpected Child by Andrea Laurence from Harlequin Desire's Billionaires and Babies miniseries; Book #2431)

I’d like to start out this review by saying that something I’ve been interested in doing ever since I decided to start reviewing books for my blog on a regular basis is to review Harlequin romance novels. If you’ve visited my blog before, and you’ve read my other book reviews, then there’s a pretty good chance that you’re aware of the fact that despite me being a guy and subsequently not being the target demographic for the romance genre, I’m a huge fan of the genre. When I was in high school, Harlequin romance novels were definitely a major guilty pleasure for me. Admittedly, Andrea Laurence’s The CEO's Unexpected Child is the first Harlequin romance novel that I’ve read in years. However, I’ve continued to think about them quite a bit over the years since I was in high school, and I’m 29 years old now.

As I’ve thought about Harlequin romance novels over the years, I’ve definitely realized more and more just how silly and ridiculous they can be at times. One of the things that I thought about a lot when I was reading Emma Chase’s Tangled series and her Legal Briefs series, as well as Sylvia Day’s Crossfire series, and Lauren Blakely’s book, Big Rock is how cliché and unoriginal Harlequin romance novels can be. In a lot of ways the plot of Harlequin romance novels are a dime a dozen, so I went into reading The CEO's Unexpected Child with pretty low expectations. Honestly, I has half expecting to feel compelled to write an incredibly snarky review for The CEO's Unexpected Child about how ridiculous and I thought the book was once I was finished reading it.

Originally, I was planning to pretty much judge The CEO's Unexpected Child solely in comparison to all of the other Harlequin romance novels that I’ve read in the past; rather than have the same expectations for this book that I would have for pretty much every other book that I read when it comes to judging how character and plot development is handled in a book, as well as various other aspects of a book. That being said, I ended up being pleasantly surprised by how much I ended up liking this book. While I originally wasn’t going to hold The CEO's Unexpected Child to the same standards and expectations that I’ve had for the other books I’ve read and reviewed, I found myself thinking a lot about my thoughts on Sylvia Day’s Crossfire series, particularly my complaints regarding that series.

If I’m being honest, I ended up liking this book more than I like every book in the Crossfire series, with exception of the first book in the series, Bared to You. Personally, I think that Andrea Laurence did a much better job of not only providing good character development for the two main characters in The CEO's Unexpected Child, Claire Douglas and Luca Moretti, she also did a very good job of convincing me that there’s actually something special between Claire and Luca when it comes to their relationship in just this book alone; compared to how Sylvia Day has handled character and story development for the two main characters in the Crossfire series, Eva Tramell and Gideon Cross, as well as her ability to write their relationship in such a way that I can actually believe that there’s a genuine connection between them, and the reader is able to understand why they should root for their relationship to work out throughout the series. Personally, I think it’s quite an accomplishment that Andrea Laurence was able to do that considering the fact that not only is The CEO's Unexpected Child a standalone novel, it’s also significantly shorter than the books in the Crossfire series. Don’t get me wrong, The CEO's Unexpected Child is by no means perfect, but it’s still a pretty good book that exceeded the expectations that I had before I started reading it.

Beautiful Bastard: This book is seriously even better than I was expecting it to be (My thoughts on book #1 in the Beautiful series by Christina Lauren)

Before I get too far into discussing my thoughts on Beautiful Bastard, I definitely need to mention that this is actually a book that I’ve wanted to read for several years. The list of reasons for why I’ve wanted to read this book has definitely evolved over the years. I initially wanted to read Beautiful Bastard because I had heard that much like Fifty Shades of Grey, Beautiful Bastard was also originally a Twilight fan fic. Fifty Shades of Grey and Beautiful Bastard’s origins as Twilight fan fiction has definitely led to a lot of people that I’ve encountered online frequently comparing and contrasting the Fifty Shades series and the Beautiful series to each other, which naturally caused me to become interested in both series since I do like the Twilight books.

However, what ultimately served as my motivation to finally read Beautiful Bastard is the fact that I discovered that pretty much everybody who has been a narrator for the audiobook versions of Emma Chase’s books from her Tangled and Legal Briefs series have also served as narrators for various books and short stories from Christina Lauren’s Beautiful series, as well as their Wild Seasons series. I’ve loved all of the narrators for the audiobook versions of Emma Chase’s books, so that has definitely made me want to listen to the audiobook versions of Christina Lauren’s books even more than I already wanted to in the first place; that being said, here are my thoughts on Beautiful Bastard.

For the record, when I started reading Beautiful Bastard, I decided that I wasn’t going to spend the entire time that I was reading the book actively looking for similarities to Twilight and things about the book that might hint at or give away its origins as a Twilight fan fic; even though learning that Beautiful Bastard started out as a Twilight fan fic was one of the first things that got me interested in reading the Beautiful series. Based on what I’ve read of Fifty Shades of Grey so far, there’s no denying that it’s pretty obvious at certain points in the book that it originally started out as a Twilight fan fic. However, when it comes to Beautiful Bastard, there wasn’t really anything about it that I think screams, “Twilight!” Since I haven’t read the original Twilight fan fic version of Beautiful Bastard, which was called “The Office”, I obviously can’t do a comparison of Beautiful Bastard to the fan fic version of the story. That being said, I think that Christina Lauren did a great job of really distancing the story from Twilight and making Beautiful Bastard its own story. Honestly, if I hadn’t known about Beautiful Bastard’s origins as a Twilight fan fic before I started reading it, I’m pretty sure that I never would have guessed or believed that it ever had any connection to Twilight at all.

Cress: This sure isn’t your typical Rapunzel retelling (My thoughts on book #3 in The Lunar Chronicles series by Marissa Meyer)

Let me preface this review by saying that out of all the fairy tales that Marissa Meyer incorporated into The Lunar Chronicles, the story of Rapunzel is definitely the one that I know the least about. That being said, I feel like the fact that I wasn’t very familiar with the story of Rapunzel actually enhanced my enjoyment of Cress in a lot of ways. When I was reading Cinder and Scarlet, I found myself constantly thinking about the original stories of Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood and was frequently wondering how Marissa Meyer might or might not incorporate and reimagine various elements from those stories into the series. However, when I was reading Cress, I just enjoyed it as its own unique story without ever really comparing and contrasting it to the story of Rapunzel.

Before I go any further, I’d like to just go right ahead and say that Cress is definitely my favorite book in the series so far. If you’ve read my review for Scarlet, you may remember that one of the things that I talked about in my review is that the book wasn’t quite what I was expecting when it comes to it serving as a follow-up to Cinder and a continuation of the series. Cress, however, was much more in line with what I had originally been expecting the books that followed Cinder to be like prior to actually reading Scarlet. One of my biggest criticisms about Scarlet is that I felt like Cinder was kind of hogging the spotlight throughout the book, and when that wasn’t the case, the book felt like too much of an ensemble piece for my taste. I really feel like Marissa Meyer should have focused at least a little more on Scarlet and Wolf in Scarlet than she did. While Cress is also very much an ensemble piece, I think Meyer did a much better job of putting most of the focus of the book on Cress, as well as Thorne since he’s Cress’ love interest in the series.

One of things that I have to give this book a lot of praise for is the fact that the story had really great pacing, in my opinion. There was a lot of action and different things happening throughout the book, but the story never felt like it was moving too slow or too fast. Plus, all of the storylines that were going on throughout the book were very interesting and engaging, so I never found myself getting bored, or having trouble paying attention to the story as I was listening to the audiobook version of Cress.

Crescent “Cress” Moon Darnel is definitely a very likable and interesting character. In a story that’s full of fantasy elements, she really felt like a real person and a well-rounded character, especially when it came to her feelings for Thorne. Given the fact that Cress had lived a rather sheltered life, being stuck in a satellite in space for pretty much her entire life, it made a lot of sense to me that she would have somewhat of a naïve view of the world and the stories that she had read about Thorne in the news. She believed that Thorne had had noble reasons for the various questionable things that he had done over the years, often breaking various laws in the process, when in reality Thorne’s motives for his actions had typically been rather self-serving.

Captivated by You: Gee, I really wish I could say that I was “captivated” by this book, but… (My thoughts on book #4 in the Crossfire series by Sylvia Day)

Let me start out by saying that originally I wasn’t planning to read and review Captivated by You any time soon. However, I ultimately decided to go ahead and read it now because I wanted to have a book to read while I was working on my review for the second book in Marissa Meyer’s Lunar Chronicles series, Scarlet. Since my reviews for Bared to You, Reflected in You, and Entwined with You, have all gotten a lot of page views and the fifth and final book in the Crossfire series, One with You, will be coming out in a few weeks, I decided that now would be a good time to read and review Captivated by You; that being said, here are my thoughts on the book.

Right off the bat, I have to say that I unfortunately hated this book for the most part. If you’ve read my review for Emma Chase’s book Appealed, the main problem that I’ve had with this series as a whole, but especially when it comes to Entwined with You, is that it really feels like Sylvia Day is trying to cram as many sex scenes into the books as she possibly can, at the expense of having good character and story development in the books. I wish that I could say she did a better job of providing character and story development in this book, and to be fair, she did in some ways, which I’ll get to later; but for the most part, believe it or not, the whole issue of Day focusing more on having lots of sex scenes in the Crossfire series than she is on having good character and story development is even worse in Captivated by You.

Honestly, there are so many sex scenes throughout the book that the writing for Captivated by You as a whole felt extremely repetitive in the end. Despite the fact that the sex scenes are pretty steamy and well written, they actually become rather boring after a while due to the high number of sex scenes in the book. The way this book is written, it’s like Sylvia Day was thinking about the expression, “sex sells” as she was writing it, and she just went completely and totally overboard when it came to incorporating sex scenes into Captivated by You. If I had been reading a physical copy of the book instead of listening to the audiobook version like I did, there’s a really good chance that I would have started skimming through the sex scenes after a while. I think if I had done that, I might have been able to read this entire book in just a day or two, because that’s how many sex scenes there are in this book.

I’ll give Sylvia Day credit for not making Eva and Gideon’s relationship feel like one giant never ending angst fest in this book like I feel she has in the past, especially when it comes to Reflected in You. Eva and Gideon did seem happier together in this book compared to how they’ve been other times in the past. Plus, it was definitely interesting to see them deal with the fact that they’re secretly already married, while everybody else thinks that they’re currently just engaged and in the process of planning their wedding. However, the fact that Eva and Gideon are constantly having sex with each other really made me question how much depth their relationship actually has. The way Eva and Gideon act with each other most of the time makes it seem like they can’t be alone together for more than five minutes without them having sex. That really makes me wonder if their relationship really has what it takes to last for the rest of their lives. After all, once they’re old, their sex drive could quite possibly diminish, or it might become physically challenging for them to have sex with each other. If that were to happen, I honestly don’t know what they would do when they’re spending time together since sex has always been such a huge part of their relationship.

Appealed: It’s official! The Legal Briefs series is even better than the Tangled series! (My thoughts on Book #3 in the Legal Briefs series by Emma Chase)

As I said in my review for Sustained, while I thought that it was Emma Chase’s best book yet, I was still open to the possibility that I might end up thinking that she topped herself yet again with Appealed once I read it. Right off the bat, I have to say that I’m very glad that I kept my mind open to that possibility, because that’s exactly what ended up happening. As much as I loved Sustained, I definitely found myself loving this book even more than I loved Sustained in some ways.

One of the things that I’ve always loved about Emma Chase’s books, going all the way back to Tangled, is the fact that she often writes her books in such a way that it feels like the protagonists of her books are talking to the reader in the narrative and telling them a story. This particular aspect of Emma Chase’s writing style is definitely more noticeable at times than others, and it was definitely very noticeable in Appealed. The reason why I really love it when she has the protagonists of her books basically talk to the reader from time to time, is because it really helps to draw me into the story and become very invested in the characters and the story itself. This particular aspect of Chase’s writing style is definitely one of the many things that made me fall in love with the book Tangled when I read it, and it was one of the many things that has really made me fall in love with her writing in general. While I’ve always loved it when she has her protagonists basically talk to the reader, I especially love how she handled that particular aspect of her writing style for this book. It was something that really made me fall in love with the character Brent as I was reading Appealed.

I feel like I’ve made it pretty clear by this point that one of the biggest reasons why I love Emma Chase’s books so much is because all of her books are written partially, if not entirely, from the guy’s point of view. Brent is yet another great character, and I’d say that I love Brent about as much as I loved Jake in Sustained. Brent is an all around great character, and I loved Brent’s internal narrative, because I often times found the things that he was thinking rather amusing. However, the thing that I loved the most about Brent is how he acted towards Kennedy, especially at the beginning of the book before they really get together, his therapist, Dr. Waldo Bingingham, and his butler, Harrison. I found it rather amusing that Brent was so hung up on the fact that his therapist’s first name is Waldo. I could also kind relate to that, because I definitely have a tendency to get hung up on what a person’s name is sometimes, especially if it’s a name that’s kind of unique. I also really enjoyed the dynamic between Brent and Harrison, because I definitely saw a little bit of myself in Brent when it comes to how he acted towards Harrison as well.

Entwined with You: Oh, for the love of God! Do Eva and Gideon ever stop having sex? (My thoughts on Book #3 in the Crossfire book series by Sylvia Day)

Let me start off by saying that I really went back and forth on trying to decide when I would read and review Sylvia Day’s Entwined with You since it was a book that I was very interested in reviewing given the fact that I had already reviewed Bared to You and Reflected in You, I really enjoyed them, and my reviews for both of those books have gotten a lot of page views. Plus, it has been somewhat of a goal of mine to review both this book and the fourth book in the Crossfire series, Captivated by You, by the time the fifth and final book in the series, One with You, is released on April 5^th. That’s definitely going to be coming up before we know it, so I decided to go ahead and listen to the audiobook version of Entwined with You this past weekend; that being said, here are my thoughts on the book.

Right off the bat, I have to say that while my feelings about Reflected in You were definitely mixed, my feelings regarding Entwined with You are very, very, very mixed. One of the things that bothered me the most about Reflected in You is the fact that there was so much drama and angst going on between Eva and Gideon in that book, and the story itself was rather lacking when it came to there being truly happy and romantic moments between them, which really made me question whether or not I should actually be rooting for Eva and Gideon’s relationship to work out. Fortunately, I feel like Sylvia Day did a somewhat better job of including, or least trying to include, enough moments between Eva and Gideon in Entwined with You that showed me why I should root for them as a couple.

While I do think that Sylvia Day does a better job of showing why the reader should be rooting for Eva and Gideon in this book, reading this book makes me think that Day’s idea of including lots of happy moments between Eva and Gideon in the books is to have them have lots and lots and lots of sex with each other, all the time. Reading this book made me feel like when Day was writing this book, she must have thought about the expression “sex sells”, and decided to cram as many sex scenes into this book as she possibly could, and just went completely super duper ultra mega overboard with how much sex is featured in this book. I get that the Crossfire series is considered erotica, but I still think there needs to be an actual plot and some subplots as well in erotic novels. Sure, there were definitely quite a few sex scenes in Bared to You and Reflected in You, but there were still plenty of clearly defined plots and subplots in those books.

When it comes to Entwined with You, I feel like there are so many sex scenes in this book that it kind of feels like the concept of having a clearly defined plot for the book was sacrificed as a result of there being so much sex in this book. I’m kind of tempted to make jokes about how trying to describe the overall plot of this book is a lot like looking for a needle in a haystack, but I think that would be a bit of an exaggeration. If I had to say what the plot of this book is about, I’d say that this book mainly focuses on Eva and Gideon trying to move past what happened in Reflected in You, with Gideon killing Nathan so he wouldn’t be able to hurt Eva again. However, their entire plan for how they would gradually publicly get back together seemed awfully convoluted to me.

Hey, Everybody! Have you ever wondered what Jean Louise “Scout” Finch would be like as an adult? Well, you’re about to find out. (My thoughts on Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee)

Let me start of by saying that originally I was planning to wait a while before I was going to read and review Go Set a Watchman. However, much like J.R. Ward’s The Bourbon Kings, I was simply too excited to wait until I got to the point on my reading list/schedule where I had originally planned on reading and reviewing Go Set a Watchman to read it. Plus, I kept coming across other people who were talking about the book, especially my Facebook friends, and seeing them all talk about the book really made me want to know what they were talking about, so I decided to go ahead and read the book now.

I should probably mention that I decided to read To Kill a Mockingbird again in preparation for reading and reviewing Go Set a Watchman after reading a lot of comments from my Facebook friends where they talked about how they thought that Go Set a Watchman felt like a rough draft of To Kill a Mockingbird. I hadn’t read To Kill a Mockingbird since I was in the ninth grade, and I was either 15 or 16 years old at that time. I’m 28 now, so I definitely needed a refresher on the book. I’m really glad that I decided to do that because as I was reading To Kill a Mockingbird again, I realized that I remembered next to none of the details about the actual plot of To Kill a Mockingbird. What I remembered the most about To Kill a Mockingbird over the years were the themes and moral lessons that were explored in the book; that being said, here are my thoughts on Go Set a Watchman.

Right off the bat, I have to say that I have incredibly mixed feelings about Go Set a Watchman. On the one hand, when I was reading To Kill a Mockingbird again, I found myself constantly being annoyed by Jean-Louise “Scout” Finch, but I absolutely loved seeing the person that she had become as an adult in Go Set a Watchman. I’m going to go right ahead and say that I’ll be referring to her as Jean-Louise in this review, because I felt like the characters rarely called her “Scout” in the book, she’s an adult in this book, and “Scout” really does seem like a childhood nickname to me.

What I liked the most about Jean-Louise in Go Set a Watchman is that she really came across as being an incredibly strong-willed young woman, but she still had a vulnerable side to her, which is something that I really appreciate about this book. The way she was written in Go Set a Watchman felt very consistent with how she was written as a child in To Kill a Mockingbird, while also showing how she’s grown and matured now that she’s an adult. It would have felt rather disappointing if she was written in such a way that made her seem like a completely different person in this book. However, I’d be lying if I said that I hadn’t thought that Jean-Louise was rather annoying at times in To Kill a Mockingbird when I was reading it again. The thing that made Jean-Louise seem really annoying to me at times in To Kill a Mockingbird is that while I really liked that she was strong-willed child, her strong-willed and assertive nature often times made her come across as a major brat who was prone to throwing temper tantrums. I felt like that aspect of Jean-Louise’s personality was handled a lot better in Go Set a Watchman though.

Reflected in You: Get ready, everybody, because you’re about to board the Eva Tramell and Gideon Cross angst train (My thoughts on Book #2 in the Crossfire book series by Sylvia Day)

Since I really enjoyed the first book in Sylvia Day’s Crossfire series (Bared to You) and my review of the book appears to have been very popular with people, I decided to read and review the second book in the series, Reflected in You. Unfortunately, I have to say that while I did enjoy this book, I found it to be a pretty disappointing follow-up to Bared to You.

Right off the bat, my biggest problem with Reflected in You is that while I couldn’t help but root for Eva and Gideon’s relationship to work in Bared to You, this book really made me question whether or not their relationship was one that was worth rooting for. The story itself picks up almost immediately where Bared to You, which is something that I really liked about this book. Eva and Gideon are still very happy together, and Cary is dealing with the aftermath of Eva and Gideon walking in on his orgy.

However, that happiness seemed to end pretty suddenly and fairly early on in the book, and things just took a pretty angst-ridden and dramatic turn for Eva and Gideon’s relationship for essentially the rest of the book. While I usually think that having plenty of drama in a story is good thing when it comes to writing a relationship for a TV show or in this case, a book series, because it keeps things interesting; this book was so full of angst and drama that it honestly left me questioning whether or not I should be rooting for Eva and Gideon’s relationship to work out.

That being said, I’m really glad Eva and Gideon are both people who recognize that they have some major emotional baggage and issues, and that they are at least trying to deal with those issues instead of being completely blind and in total denial about their problems, both as a couple and as individuals. While they both see Dr. Petersen individually, I have to question how seriously they were taking couple’s therapy. After all, despite the fact that Dr. Petersen suggests that the role that sex plays in their relationship, mainly when they’re having some kind of argument, is doing more harm to their relationship than good; that didn’t even prompt them to consider that maybe they should take a break from having sex with each other.

It wasn’t until after they had broken up as far as Eva was concerned that she realized that taking a break from their relationship had been a good thing for her personally. However, I really have to question how seriously Gideon was taking therapy since he apparently didn’t show up for several of his appointments with Dr. Petersen. Sure, I suppose Gideon unexpectedly bailing on his sessions with Dr. Petersen could have possibly been a calculated move on his part when it came to his plan to kill Nathan, which involved making it look like he had broken up with Eva and gotten back together with his ex, Corrine, but I still have my doubts about how seriously Gideon was taking therapy. I’m really hoping that Sylvia Day will touch upon this in the third book in Crossfire series (Entwined in You).

Bared to You: Is it just me, or is everybody in this book fifty different kinds of screwed up? (My thoughts on Book #1 in the Crossfire book series by Sylvia Day)

Let me start out by saying that the main reason why I decided to read and review Bared to You is because I’ve encountered a lot of people who’ve compared the Crossfire book series to the Fifty Shades trilogy. In most cases, I’ve seen people say that the Crossfire series is significantly better than the Fifty Shades trilogy, which has mostly been attributed to Sylvia Day being a much more experienced writer compared to E.L. James. Although, I’ve also seen people say that they like the Fifty Shades trilogy more than they liked Bared to You. After reading Bared to You, I’m absolutely baffled by the fact that anybody would think that the Fifty Shades trilogy is better than the Crossfire series since it’s pretty clear to me that Sylvia Day’s writing ability is definitely completely superior to E.L. James’ writing.

That being said, I realize that everybody is entitled to their own opinion, and when I think about how there are some people who like the Fifty Shades trilogy more than the Crossfire series, I’m reminded of the fact that I like 90210 a lot more than Gossip Girl. While I do like both 90210 and Gossip Girl, I’m also not blinded by the fact that in terms of the quality of the writing for the two shows, the writing for Gossip Girl is definitely superior to the quality of the writing for 90210. At the risk of seeming like I’m going to far off topic, one of the main reasons why I like 90210 more is because anybody with even just a small shred of maturity can see that the relationship between Chuck and Blair, who are arguably the main romantic pairing on the show, is incredibly toxic and abusive. The sad thing about that is the way the producers always talked about Chuck and Blair’s relationship, it’s as if they view that relationship as some epic fairytale romance when it really did end up being a very toxic and abusive relationship. I feel I should mention that I was originally a major Chuck and Blair shipper, it was only when their relationship became truly abusive at some point during season three that I stopped being a fan of that relationship.

While 90210 didn’t have much of a clearly defined endgame couple, the closest 90210 had to an endgame couple was Liam and Annie. Liam and Annie’s relationship wasn’t necessarily handled all that well when it came to them frequently getting together only to almost immediately breakup with little to no buildup or development to them either getting together or breaking up. What I think made Liam and Annie’s relationship better is that at least it wasn’t sick and abusive with them constantly treating each other like crap or either of them trying to sabotage the other’s happiness when they weren’t together like Chuck and Blair constantly did. They definitely handled things between them with a lot more maturity, which is one of the reasons why I liked them as a couple as much as I did, but I digress.

Tamed: Hold on tight, Matthew! You've just boarded the crazy train (My thoughts on Book #3 in the Tangled book series by Emma Chase)

As I said in my review of Twisted (My thoughts on Twisted), I thought that it was a rather disappointing follow-up to Tangled, which I absolutely loved. Thankfully, Tamed is MUCH better than Twisted. One thing that I found myself thinking about a lot as I was reading this book was that I think both Drew and Matthew are much more interesting protagonists than I thought Kate was in Twisted. Personally, I find the fact that Drew and Matthew were both much more interesting protagonists than Kate was rather interesting given the fact that this book series was written by a woman.

Right off the bat, I have to say that I’m really curious as to why Emma Chase chose to take a slight detour from what I like to call “The Drew and Kate Show” to write a book from Matthew’s point of view for the third book in the Tangled series. Like I said, I loved this book, but if I were her, personally, I would have waited until after Holy Frigging Matrimony had been released to write a book from Matthew’s point of view. Since Emma Chase didn’t really do anything to indicate when exactly the events that took place in this book took place in relation to the events that took place in Tangled and Tamed, I found it a little jarring to read this book. The closest Chase came to specifying the timeline of this book at the beginning of the book was having Matthew tell the reader that while Drew and Kate were dealing with their drama, he had his own relationship drama that he was dealing with.

It wasn’t until towards the end of the book when I finally figured out that the events of this book took place during the same period of time that Tangled did since Matthew went to visit Drew when he was stuck in bed because he had “the flu” as Drew put it back in Tangled. I definitely think Chase should have put some kind of note at the beginning of the book specifying when the events of this book place, so the reader wouldn’t have to spend almost the entire book trying to figure it out for themselves. Honestly, based on the beginning of the book, I thought the events of the book took place at some point during the two years that had passed between Tangled and Twisted, but I was never absolutely certain, and I was still a little confused once it was established that the events took place at the same time that the events that happened in Tangled.

While I’m definitely very curious as to why Chase chose to take a slight detour from The Drew and Kate Show for the third book in the Tangled series instead of waiting until after she published Holy Frigging Matrimony, this book reminded me a lot of why I’ve enjoyed Emily Giffin’s books in the past. While they haven’t really been labeled a series by anyone, several of Giffin’s books do take place in the same world and characters from her books have often made brief cameos in the books that followed whatever book they were a main character in, which allows people like me who have read all of her books to get a brief glimpse of what’s happened in the characters’ lives after the book they were the focus of ended. That’s something I’ve always like Giffin’s books, so I really did like getting to see Matthew and Dee be the focus of Tamed. Admittedly, I found both Matthew and Dee to be very forgettable characters when I was reading Tangled and Twisted. When I discovered that Matthew and Dee were the focus of Tamed, I honestly really had to think hard to try and remember anything that Chase had said about Matthew or Dee in those books.