Sunday Soup - April 24

In The Soup This Week... SM Reine, Pepper Winters, Amber Belldene, Alexa Riley, Rachel Aaron/Bach, Jeffe Kennedy.

Soup Dish:  on my mind/good links

✽The Word Whores are seeking a new blog name, plus a link to the snarkiest review that never made it to Amazon.

✽Book Riot's debrief of RT16: less sex, more Vikings?

✽Really liked this blog post on character development - it's a great framework for reviewing too.

What I'm reading
The great irony of going to the big RT Convention is that there is zero time to read. I didn't even read on the plane on the way, because it was a short flight and early! But I have finished a few books since the last time I wrote a Soup post.

✽I kept seeing Facebook ads for books by Alexa Riley, so I downloaded a freebie. I got about 2/3s through it and stopped, but when I went looking to find the correct name for the blogger I'd hung with in NOLA, I discovered that her blog was gone and she is now one half of the Alexa Riley writing team. I have to say, I didn't love this title, and several of them look even less appealing. The team has landed on a new-to-me trope: the hero is SO dominant and SO possessive that he needs to impregnate the heroine so she can never be free of him; Romlandia is calling this a "breeder" trope (ugh). Well, everyone's line between alpha and alph-hole is a little different, but that's way over for me. I read Guarding His Obsession, which only included that trope as a side note in the secondary romance. The heroine in this book is apparently on the Asberger/Autism spectrum, although this is never called out by name.  Her dialog reads a little bit like a kindergartner in the body of a 24-year-old-woman discovering sex for the first time. So while I adore Melissa K and her snark, these books are not for me.

✽Not A Mistake, by Amber Belldene. I do plan a full review, but I confess that I didn't realize the release date was in March. Short answer -- liked it a lot, really wonderful heroine, angsty hero, and church politics. Christian but not inspy.

✽Debt Inheritance, by Pepper Winters. This one is a super-dark captive/slave fantasy. I did finish it, but it's a serial and I won't be continuing. Competently written and emotional, but much too dark for me; it's a tale of a 5-century family feud that involves some incident so heinous back in the 1600s that king granted one family "the life of the firstborn female" of each generation of the other family to do with as they wish, up to and including murder -- which this heroic family has availed themselves of right up to the hero's father killing the heroine's mother. Includes a scene of non-consensual violation of the heroine by ~20 men including the hero. Not for me.

✽Cast in Angelfire, by SM Reine. This is one of those authors that I mentioned, that was at RT but I didn't realize until too late. I enjoyed this book quite a lot, as the beginning of a UF series about an extremely powerful woman who has been mysteriously stripped of her memory. The romantic interest is reclusive and powerful, but secretive and reclusive. The worldbuilding is intriguing, borrowing equally from biblical references and popular fae, were-beast and witchy mythology. Currently 99 cents, give it a shot.

2016 Book Goals
My physical-book stash keeps growing! My stash reading is not keeping up. I guess it will stop when I die or my house explodes, whichever comes first. I got some advice from Jeffe Kennedy about tracking my TBR inventory in a spreadsheet, which I might try. Because you know I love a good spreadsheet.

I am sadly behind on my non-fiction goals. I'm consistently running at about half-goal: instead of 1 per month, I've read 2 and here we are at the end of April.

That's it for this week. Happy reading!

RT16 Debrief - part 1

What DID happen in Vegas?

Just so you know, it's mandatory for all posts about RT16 to include that line somehow, somewhere.  It was in the rules. Sorry about that, but it couldn't be helped.

What do you think of my debut as a cover model? They're going to photoshop in the sunset, galloping horses, and misty floral overlay later. Also, I think I'll be getting more hair. 

It's become a bit of a tradition (if 3x makes a tradition!) to write up my RT Convention experiences. Every time I go, I use a little bit different strategy and it's been kind of interesting to see how it pans out.

Things I did right this year

Look Ma, no blisters!
I consider my shoe choice to be "pretty fancy" if it doesn't involve athletic socks. I rotated between Sketchers with thin socks, cute but comfy sandals, and yes, non-fancy sneakers for one day in the middle and the very last day because my feet and legs just needed it.  Most days I took an hour break in my room with my feet up and the room quiet. For the really dressed up party, I wore some blinged-out flat sandals with zero support for about 2 hours, and not one minute more.

Stayed hydrated.
I carried a water bottle and kept it filled, mostly from the tap. I'll be honest, the price of the drinks in Vegas made me less inclined to overindulge (I'm kind of a cheapskate, it seems) but this definitely helped keep tiredness and possibly conference crud at bay. I also used hand sanitizer much more liberally than I do at home - I don't really believe in it for everyday use, but in this situation, every bit of immunity-bolstering helps.

Planned an outing.
It was a bit small but I planned ahead, and gathered some like-minded friends and headed to a pub with recommended beer flights. I definitely enjoyed that evening very much and hope to make it a tradition at the RTs that I attend. I would like to grow it just a little, to maybe 8 or 10 people. The beer was very tasty, too. We went The Pub at The Monte Carlo, on the advice mainly of this article. I was hoping for a bit more extensive menu, but the food was very tasty.  (Normally I love pub food, but by the time we went, I was a little tired of sandwiches, even very delicious ones.)  I think "Cali' Creamin'" was my favorite, not surprisingly since it was sweet and vanilla-y. They were all very good, actually, and wisely, poured into cute little 5 oz glasses.  Amber had the Dragon Stout, highly rec'd by her husband, and JPBasquill had a flight similar to mine. Non-beer-lover Elisabeth Staab got talked into coming along, drank wine, and provided delightful company.

l-r: Brookly Lager, Cali Creamin, Wasatch Devastator Double Bock, Coconut Porter

Got out of my comfort zone.
My usual conference buddies didn't make it this year, so I made some new friends, one of whom loves to dance. So one night, we spent an hour or two on the rooftop dance floor -- I would say "raising the roof," only a) it sounds really stupid when I say things like that; and b) oops, no roof!  I can't say I loved the music but the view was amazing and the fresh air was very welcome. I returned the favor by corrupting, er, I mean, introducing several new friends to Cards Against Humanity.

The question card states, "I never really understood ____, until I encountered _____."

Things that maybe didn't work as well

Last time, I had such a great time going with the flow, spending significant time in the bar, and just hanging around with whoever showed up, that I really wanted that again. But the Rio wasn't set up for that very well. There were several bars in the hotel, including an over-priced and under-selective cash bar dedicated to the con (not a fan, in case you couldn't tell). There was a fairly central one that seemed to have a lot of RTers in it at any given time, but it wasn't the Grand Central Station effect that we got in NOLA. So not having much in the way of plans meant that a couple of my evenings turned out a little slow.

In the theme of failing to plan, I didn't pay as much attention to the authors and bloggers who were attending and I realized too late that I had missed at least half a dozen people that I really would have liked to meet. I did better at that at NOLA.

More to come

I do want to talk a little bit about the panels and parties, so I'm going to do a two-parter this year. Come back soon for the second installment of What Happened in Vegas.

Overall, I had a wonderful (and exhausting) time at the conference, strengthened my ties to the community of bloggers, reviewers, authors, and others, and I'm really glad I went.

One Sinful Night in Sau Paulo, by Amber Belldene - Review

Information
Title: One Sinful Night in Sao Paulo
Series: N/A
Author: Amber Belldene
Publisher:  Entangled/MacMillan
Release Date: January 5, 2015 
Reviewing: Commercial Kindle edition
Reason for reading: Friendly with author, and also this blog post at Wonkomance. I purchased my copy at retail price.

Tease:
Amber Belldene was my biggest nightmare.

The Blurb (from Belldene's website)

Cassie Wilson has traveled to Brazil for her brother’s wedding; yet she’s the one with cold feet. She’s all set to begin seminary, but she’s sick and tired of being treated like a saint, especially by the best man. What she really needs is one sexy night with him to ease her jitters and give her a taste of normal life.

Adam Forrester crashed and burned at his dream job, screwing up all his hopes for a better life. Now he’s moved home to start over, but first he must confront the irresistible Cass, apologize for whatever happened on that drunken night he can’t remember, and make damn sure it doesn’t happen again. Only she has other plans. He has typecast her as the good girl in his heart. Can she force him to see her as a real woman, desires and all?

Blogger, Explain Thyself
There are all kinds of bloggers and reviewers, and although I indulge in some occasional snark, for the most part I'm a NICE one.  I don't say this in an especially complimentary or superior way.  Mostly I'm not brave enough to post negative reviews, and mostly I don't enjoy posting negative reviews, and mostly I don't enjoy WRITING negative reviews.  If I really dislike a book, I mostly just don't post about it.  I really admire bloggers who are able to be more objective and more courageous.  But as for me, I yam what I yam.

When I ran into Amber online, we clicked pretty well.  I think it was about beer, to begin with.  I find her take on religion in romance fascinating. And she has an amazing brain.  And we had really good beer and really really good conversation last May at RT.

The nightmare is... I didn't like her first book.  There were vampires and wine, and it felt... kind of unoriginal and tl;dr I DNF'd and didn't mention it at that delightful pub in New Orleans. Really, this is my idea of a nightmare.  I know authors are not their books, and I know there are reviewers/bloggers out there who have no trouble at all separating them--but this is just an uncomfortable position for me.

When I saw that she had a non-paranormal contemp story out, I totally jumped on it.  AND IT IS TERRIFIC.

Seriously, Can We Just Talk About This Novella Now?
Right, enough with the angst.

Well, my angst anyway.  The characters do have a bit of that going on.  Although this is a short piece, less than 100 pages, it feels like a complete story, and there is enough character complexity and relationship twistiness to be fully satisfying.  It has a bit of an NA feel, with Cassie getting ready to start seminary school, and the setup is not uncommon for an NA, with a classic big-brother's-best-friend setup. 

But anyway, I liked Cassie a lot.  She has her head on straight, and she knows what she wants.  She's not sure she's going to get it, and doesn't assume she's entitled to it, but she's composed, and level.  She leans a little bit Mary Sue, but in a meta way, that's kind of what the story is about.  Real-life Mary Sues are out there, and they deserve love too.  Not people who never make mistakes, but people who are genuinely motivated to make the world a better place.

One of the things I love about Nora Roberts and Jayne Ann Krentz is the way they write about careers, for both the heroes and heroines.  It's been said that they write the same characters over and over again, which might be true from a trope point of view. And maybe it's that I cut my fiction-reading-teeth on Nancy Drew and they way they embedded educational material* in each book, but I love how I see the world with the context of a photographer, or architect, or decorator, or librarian, or {choose from dozens}.  Ms. Belldene gave me that with this story: an idea of how the world looks to a woman choosing to enter the seminary.  Since it's a romance, it's not surprising that this choice contributes to the conflict.

The hero is a bit muddier to me, but adequate.  He has his backstory and some not-too-OTT demons. Adam (should I assume that's a biblical reference? Hmm... no apples in sight, although Cassie is a bit of a forbidden fruit in his mind...) He's got enough romantic mojo to keep the story going-- but it's clearly Cassie's story.

In perfect doses for a novella, the secondary characters and the exotic locale make a great backdrop.  Cassie's soon-to-be sister-in-law Gabriella, her mother Raquel, as well as Cassie's parents and brother feel real and three-dimensional, without a ton of sequel-baiting (although a Gabriella-Justin prequel might not go amiss).  And the small amounts of scene-setting, from the smog to a visit to the shopping district, gave it a nice texture.

Downside?
I'm not sure I loved what Belldene did with Cassie's sexuality. I loved that Cassie was unapologetic about what she wanted and not inexperienced. I did have a little twinge of "trying too hard" to make her sooo sexually sophisticated.  Which is not a complaint I usually have about romance.  I liked the concept.  I think it mostly worked.  But just not quite perfect-pitch for me.

Bottom Line
All in all, I really loved One Sinful Night, and I hope to see more contemporary work from Amber!

Around the Blogosphere:
Geeks in Highschool (what a cool blog!)
Read Love Blog
You? (as always, if you have reviewed this story, feel free to leave a link in comments and I will edit it in!)


Bonus:
I don't think I managed a photo of Ms. Belldene and myself, but here is what a list of some seriously tasty beverages looks like:

____________
*I don't see reference to the educational material, but I read an article long ago about the Stratemeyer Syndicate that mentioned that each book contained a bit of interesting background on a particular topic, which usually led to clues that solved the mystery.