Out Of The Box by Audra North

Out of the Box
by Audra North
Rating: 4 of 5 stars

My Review:
When you're looking for a little bit of dirty Matrix-style fun, this is the story for you. It's not that long, maybe an hour's worth of reading but it was raw and gritty and sexual. The setting was so well-done that I was completely transported into this world, with it's gray pods and colorless existence. We only hear the story from Juris' perspective and I felt like it didn't get into the romantic emotions at all. There was well-defined fear, confusion, vulnerability and lust which led to lots of sex and a quick connection to the female lead, but nothing that indicated to me they were in love. This is straight-up erotica at it's best. It pulls you into the story and makes your eyes bug out of your head, but doesn't turn gooshy and romantic. No kinky BDSM in this story, but also not exactly vanilla. There was lots of crazy sex and rampant hormones, plus some adventure and happy endings. I know I'll read this book again.

I received a complementary ARC of this book, with no expectation of a review. I reviewed anyway because I liked it a lot.

Excerpt: Telling Tales by Charlotte Stein

I'm so excited to host an except from Charlotte Stein's wonderful book, Telling Tales. This is the stuff dirty, filthy dreams are made of. How can you figure out if what you wanted then, is really what you want now? Are you older and wiser now? Can you see what's been right in front of you all along? Or do you stay stuck in the past and settle for a smidgen of good enough? In the world of Telling Tales, these questions involve a whole lot of sex.

Here we have Allie trying to figure out what she feels when she witnesses her college crush having sex with her best friend. It's gritty, emotional, and so full of shameful excitement, how can you pass up the opportunity to read the rest?! Check out the excerpt and then follow the links at the bottom of the post to buy the book. Don't leave Allie just hanging there in your mind!

"      God, I hate that he’s the object of my hopes and dreams. I hate Kitty for one bright, burning, selfish second, because she’s brave and I’m not, and she’s lovely and I’m not, and she doesn’t have to be a eunuch for the rest of her life, and I somehow do.  

     And then I get to the door with my mind this boiling cauldron of stupid ideas—-like how I’m going to barge in and accuse Wade of cheating on a girlfriend he doesn’t actually have, or accuse Kitty of betraying a friend over something she doesn’t even know about, or have some kind of ridiculous meltdown where I say words that aren’t even really English, just the blind tumbling result of my stupid heartache—-and I just can’t do any of it. I can see them through the crack in the door, and I have to simply stand there and watch my hero twisting into some pretty incredible shapes with a person who is not me. 

     I have to watch him lift both of her legs over his shoulders until she’s almost bent double on the bed, and then pound into her as though sex is going to disappear tomorrow. Whoever invented fucking is going to revoke everybody’s license, and from then on we have to spend our days shaking hands or violently waving.

     I wish I’d done more than that in the short window of sex we all had. For one far too long and not--quite--agonizing second, I find myself gazing at them with my mouth actually open. Heartache falls by the wayside in the face of this, because by God I’ve never seen a man flip a woman like that. He just gets hold of her hips and somehow she’s on her front, even though I’m sure such a move should have dislocated her hip.

     Of course, I’ve seen things like this in porn. I’m aware that most people have more athletic sex than I’ve ever had. But even so, it’s different when it’s close up. It’s different when it’s only inches away from me, and I can see the look on Kitty’s face when she turns it to one side and bites at her own arm.

     She looks like someone who realizes there’s going to be no more sex tomorrow. She looks desperate and blissed out and she’s making this noise—-this ah ah ah noise—-that I can hardly stand to hear. It forces unwanted feelings through my body, and I know they’re there because I just have to squeeze my legs together against them.God, what must it be like to feel that way? To have someone pounding into you over and over again, so hard I can see her little cupcake breasts bouncing beneath the curve of her body, and when I dare to flick my attention to Wade I can make out every muscle in his tensing stomach, all ab--tacular and hard as anything and fuck, fuck.

     This is too much. Did he look this way, before? He had a good, strong swimmer’s body, I know that much. But I can’t recall him being so hairy or having those ropey, muscular arms or those actual high, firm pecs. He looks so rippling, so hard--bodied—-though I suppose the overall effect is added to by the sheen of sweat all over him. It’s as though he slid out of the pages of Men’s Health only five seconds earlier, and I’m not ashamed to admit I can’t take my eyes off it.

     Though maybe it’s partly because I don’t want to look at the two most obvious eye--magnets: his cock, and his face. If I look at his cock or his face, I swear I’ll die. He’s saying some pretty dirty things—-Take it, take it, you little slut, among others—-and that’s enough all on its own. It’s enough to make me press my legs together tighter, tighter, and I can feel I’m sweating through my pajamas, I know I am, I know any second I’m going to touch myself like the guy in Wade’s story.

     And then I look up at his face—-just as Kitty says something disgusting like Ohhhh yeah, fuck my slick cunt—-and of course he’s staring right at me. Of course he is. He’s staring right at me as he fucks her, this look on his face like something the Devil would do on realizing he’s corrupted another innocent soul, and I back right up in a hurry until I crack my shoulder blades against the wall.

     I realize I’m breathing hard. Probably hard enough for Kitty to hear, if she takes a second in between ordering him to Fuck her pussy harder, goddammit. I almost laugh hearing my little pixie girl being such a bossy--boots in bed, but then my mind flashes on Wade’s grinning, mischief--lit face again and I’m too shocked to get the sound out. I think I’ll be too shocked to make a sound tomorrow, actually. In fact, I think I’m too shocked to ever make another sound from now until the end of time, because God I don’t know how I feel about any of this.

     I can’t even find bitterness, anymore, which seems very odd indeed. Instead I just seem all juiced up with too much sex, and when I try to walk back toward my room all I can manage is a kind of vague slide along the wall.

     Of course it’s only once I’m tucked back in my bed, staring at the ceiling like a ghost of myself, that I actually dare to admit what I wasn’t sure I’d seen before.  "

Pretty awesome, right? So, if you haven't purchased this book yet, here are the links for Amazon and B&N. Both places have very reasonable prices. If you've already read the book, it would be wonderful to rate it and/or review it on goodreads.

And thank you to the people at Sourcebooks for letting me host the excerpt. It's my first time and one of the most exciting things ever.

The Opposite of Nothing by Shari Slade

The Opposite of Nothing
by Shari Slade
Rating: 4 of 5 stars

My Review:
So, for anyone that follows Shari Slade on Twitter, you know there is much glitter and sparkle. I didn't see glitter in this book, but there was confetti within the first sentence! That started the awesomeness and it just kept going from there. This book was all about feelings and let me tell you, it gave me a lot of them. When I tried to start this review, all I could think about was how my shoulders were tingling and my chest felt tight through the whole story. Shari Slade has a delicious way with the emotional angst. Callie and Tayber are exquisitely tortured by their thoughts and feelings. Their journey to happily-ever-after doesn't involve pain or death; but insecurity, lack of trust, and plenty of unrequited lust.

Callie had a lot of trust issues; and along with being an introvert, that made her seem anxious and depressed most of the time. Ordinarily, I get too sad while reading depressed characters but Callie was able to open up to Tayber and she had a sort of optimistic, bright-eyed pessimism about her. Callie is so filled with wonder because Tayber pays attention to her and wants to be around her, but she'd really like to have more. So she creates an online persona to be a little sexy with him. She's so quiet and vulnerable that even online, she tends to get scared and shut down. Between her in-person persona and her on-line persona, Tayber was able to see all of who she was, even if that meant he thought he was interacting with two different people.

Tayber is more outgoing and has his pick of the college girls. But he's friends with Callie and in his mind, that's more sacred than hooking up. Because he didn't have a good home life, he tries to never want anything, but at the same time, he's sort-of narcissistic and feels like every decision someone makes is wrong if it negatively impacts him. I was glad to see him get over himself and learn to empathize. But even through the self-centeredness, he's wonderful and caring toward Callie.

Anyone who remembers what it's like to feel out of place will easily identify with these two and cheer for their relationship. This could have turned into a sad book with all the heavy feelings, but it's actually optimistic and hope-filled. Sort of a 'yes, people can be mean, but you are worthy and you can find a place to belong'. By the end of the book, both character have grown more emotionally intelligent – learning to trust people and accept that they're not the center of the universe.

There were times outside their relationship that I had trouble identifying with Callie and Tayber. I felt the getting-fall-down-drunk was a little gratuitous. I couldn't really be sure if these two were of age anyway. And seeing that I've never had a college party experience, I had trouble relating to the lure of drinking until you puke.

Also, it was hard for me to understand why neither of them thought about finding paid work before money got really tight. That probably comes from me working all through my college times, but it was hard to imagine letting yourself get to the point where you have nothing, before you start looking for a job.

But this wasn't really a find yourself story; not really a “coming of age” story like I might expect from the New Adult genre. We don't get a taste of what their goals are or even what degree they're pursuing. I look at this book as completely and totally a true-love story, which just happens to have characters in the New Adult age bracket. The sex scenes were hot and sexy, in line with what I'd expect from a modern contemporary, but not so abundant that you lose the emotional punch of these two discovering their love.

I won't lie, I really wanted more. I wanted to know more about them, more of their lives, more of what their plans were and how they were getting there. But I was also really satisfied with the story. They fit together wonderfully and you just knew how much they cared about each other. As an emotion-packed, grab-you-by-the-heart love story, this one is a must read.

I received a complementary ARC from the author in exchange for an honest review.


**This review is archived on my blog: The Theory of Lieto Fine

Blog Hop: My Writing Process

I'm so excited to jump on board this whole blog hop thing. I've never been on a blog hop! So, here's how it works: Last week, we had the cat-owned, amigurumist, Jody Wallace tell about her writing process by answering these four questions. Check out her blog at: http://blog.jodywallace.com. Now it's my turn. Check out the bottom of this post for the next set of victims. It's like an electronic chain letter! (Did you ever feel slightly rebellious with the real chain letters because you heard they were illegal? I did.) How cool is that?!

My Writing Process
1) What am I working on?
At the moment, I write approximately three book reviews a week. For the amount of time I have, that's a lot of reading and writing. Also, I have a super secret, maybe-it'll-turn-into-something, story that I'm working on. It may have some magic, music, sex, and geekiness. I keep up a family blog for the grandparents, so all in all, I write a couple thousand words a week.

2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?
I find that my reviews tend to focus almost totally on the heroine and her growth. Somehow I only take stock of the hero in terms of how he relates to the heroine. By himself, I don't think he's normally that interesting and I spend very little review words on how hot a hero might be.

For the story, well I have no idea. It's really, really rough at the moment and the characters talk in mono-syllabic words and grunts because I'm terrible at dialogue at this stage. I also think my characters are twisted and abnormal, but I hope they resolve themselves into a lovable abnormality.

3) Why do I write what I do?
I started writing reviews in order to gain back some word recall power after having kids. I felt like I was only talking in toddler vocabulary all day and I couldn't come up with adult words to say even when I could feel the words in my brain. As I kept writing, I found I enjoyed the process and wanted to get better at putting down my thoughts. It feels like it's getting easier to write and I'm coming up with more thoughts the further I go.

And the story is so complicated. I didn't write much growing up because I didn't have any writing autonomy. Any attempts I made at serious stories were rebuffed as not-that-good, so I never had a good feeling about it. I'm always talking to people in my head though, and I think it might be healthier to make up characters to talk to than it is to pretend I'm having conversations with actual people and then get upset that my real-life interactions didn't follow the script. I'm hoping the story itself is something that I would enjoy reading. I end up reading a lot of contemporary romance right now, but it's so hard to find magic and music stories that sound appealing to me. I figure I should try to piece together what it is I'm looking for and see what happens.

4) How does your writing process work?
I still have one pre-elementary age child, so he's in preschool three afternoons a week. I help out at the boys' schools one afternoon a week each, so that leaves me with one, two-hour period a week at my computer, writing. I also have a very encouraging husband who takes the boys out most weekends for a few hours so I can write. That gives me about four hours of writing a week. Mostly it seems like never enough time, especially when I have to spend a little bit of it working on home stuff too.

I've also found that I can plot a little during my boys' after school activities, but only if I already have an idea in my head (it's sooo noisy sitting at Tae Kwon Do). There are lots of plans and plots that get thought-time just as I'm falling asleep, but I have too much to do in the morning to get up and write late into the night. I have big plans for writing in the fall (when the Smaller Person starts Kindergarten). I'm hoping I can spend at least an hour or two writing most weekdays, but we'll see where life takes me. For now, I try to live in the moment and enjoy each bit of free time where I get to create something.

And for your hopping pleasure, next Monday (March 24th), visit the following blogs for more peeks into the writing process.

- Michelle Moore is the co-author of the Ylendrian Empire science fiction series that includes The Balance of Silence, The Slipstream Con, In Discretion, and Peripheral People (summer 2014).  Her solo projects tend towards the sweet paranormal romance side of things (Enchanted Grounds and If Wishes Were Coffee).  She can be found at http://www.michelleandreesawrite.com/.

Meatball Stew

It's hard to believe I ran out of chicken this week. I had it all planned that I'd make some more plain chicken and potatoes because they boys went so wild over them last time, but alas it was not in the cards. I found some teriyaki meatballs in the freezer from Costco, but they're a little on the spicy side for the boys so they don't care for them plain. I decided to try stew and it turned out really good. The boys gave it a 4ish star rating. They didn't really want to eat it a second time, but managed the first time just fine.

I modified according to our tastes from this recipe. It was simple, fast, and smelled fantastic in the crock pot.

Crock Pot Meatball Stew

About 1-1/2 packages of meatballs (I think I used about 36 oz of the teriyaki ones)
8 smaller size white potatoes, cut in one inch cubes
1 onion, diced as small or large as you like
1-1/2 packages of the really small baby carrots
1 can tomato sauce
2 tsp Better Than Bouillon Beef Flavor
1/2 cup red wine
2+ cups water
1 tsp minced garlic
2 Tbls flour

Put the meatballs, onion, potatoes, and carrots in the crock pot. In a separate bowl, combine the tomato sauce, Better Than Bouillon, wine, and garlic. Add enough water to make approximately 4 cups total. Stir until combined and then add to the crock pot. Cook on low for about 7-8 hours. During the last hour, mix the flour with about a 1/2 cup of water and stir it into the crock pot.

Quinoa Risotto with Roasted Cauliflower

I didn't even try to get my kids to eat this. But sometimes there's cauliflower in the house and you just want to do something with it. I've been thinking about risotto for a while and decided to experiment. I found a couple recipes, including one for the roasted cauliflower risotto (that I loved for the sliced almonds) and a different one for quinoa risotto with different veggies. Here's what my hands came up with. It turned out very yummy. I think it'll go on the 'make again' list.

Quinoa Risotto with Roasted Cauliflower

Doesn't it look so pretty?! Fair warning: red wine
makes the risotto sort-of brownish

1 head of cauliflower

1/2 an onion, diced

2 Tbls butter

1 Tbls Better Than Bouillon

1 cup wine

4 cups water

A little bit of oil

1 cup raw sliced almonds

1-1/2 cups uncooked quinoa, rinsed

1 cup parmesan cheese

1-1/2 cups shredded cheese

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Wash and dice the cauliflower. Make all the flower parts no larger than 1"x1", slice the stalk parts even smaller but in a separate pile. Put the florets on a cookie sheet, pour some oil over them and mix it around. Add salt and pepper. Cook on the top rack of the oven for 5 minutes, then sprinkle the almonds on top and cook for about 15 minutes. Take out of the oven and let cool while you work on the rest.

While the cauliflower is cooking, mix up the water with the Better Than Bouillon in a measuring bowl for later. Melt butter in a 4qt pot. With the heat around medium, add the onion and cauliflower stalk pieces. Cook until the onion is wimpy. Add the quinoa and cook for 3-5 minutes, stirring constantly.

Add the wine and cook for 3-5 minutes, until the wine is mostly dissolved. Pour in about a third of the water mixture and keep cooking. Cook about 5 minutes and then add another third. Stir pretty constantly and keep cooking. After you've added the last third, it'll take about 5-10 minutes for the mixture to get thicker, but it won't look like all the water is dissolved. The quinoa is cooked enough if it's pretty clear except for a little curl of grain.

Add both cheese and stir until they're well combined and melted. Dish up a bowlful and put a large scoop or two of the cauliflower and almonds on top. These amounts look like they'll make about 4-6 full sized main dish meals.

Calabacitas

A friend passed this recipe on to me ages ago during the time of Facebook notes. I don't know where she got it from. She says it's a traditional New Mexican dish. I'll post her original recipe at the bottom, but I make quite a few modifications to my recipe. My family doesn't really care for spicy, so I rarely add the green chilies listed in the original recipe. You can skip the bacon, but everything is better with bacon.

My version of Calabacitas

6-8 slices of bacon
2 Tbls butter
1 medium size onion, chopped
3-5 medium sized summer squash, diced to 1/2 inch cubes (I normally use zucchini and yellow squash) (I've also made this recipe with broccoli and carrots instead of squash)
2 cups frozen corn kernels
1 cup heavy cream
2 cups shredded cheese

Cook the bacon however you prefer. I have a microwave plate for bacon. Set it on a paper towel covered plate to cool and then crumble when it's cool enough.

While you're working on the bacon, melt the butter in a large pot/skillet. Add the onions and cook until it's almost translucent. Keep the heat around medium and add the squash and corn. Cook for about 8-10 minutes, covered, until the squash is slightly tender. Reduce heat to low and add the heavy cream. Simmer, covered, for 15-20 minutes to let the flavors combine and the sauce to thicken slightly. Stir in the cheese until it's melted then add the bacon. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve hot.

Calabacitas (Original recipe)

• Six slices of bacon, diced
• 2 Tablespoons butter
• One medium sized onion, chopped
• Three to four large summer squash, cubed into bite sized pieces (zucchini, pattypan, yellow squash, etc.) - about 5-6 cups of cut squash
• Two cups of whole kernel corn, for best results, cut straight from fresh corn (about 3 ears) however frozen is fine if it's not in season
• 3/4 cup roasted, peeled, mile to medium-heat green chilies (two Trader Joe's cans)
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 cup shredded cheese, cheddar or monterey jack or a mixture of both

In a large skillet over medium head, brown the bacon. Once browned, remove to a waiting paper towel, leaving the bacon grease in the pan. Add butter and onion. Wilt the onion until almost translucent before adding the squash, corn and chilies. Cook for about eight to ten minutes until the squash is almost tender. Add the heavy cream, reduce heat to low and simmer slowly for fifteen to twenty minutes to allow flavors to combine and to thicken slightly. After simmering, add cheese, stirring to melt, and bacon. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve hot.

Deep Blue by Jules Barnard

Deep Blue
by Jules Barnard
Rating: 4 of 5 stars

My Review:
My very first taste of New Adult romance was a winner. When I saw Deep Blue was set in Lake Tahoe, I just couldn't resist. It's so interesting to see novels written near where you live. I've found some that are a credit to the area and some that just don't work at all. This one was great; well researched, lots of places I could picture, and a good feel for the area experience.

I came into this new-to-me genre with some general ideas of what to expect: fresh out of college, trying to figure out where life is going, etc. This book lived up to that idea in an authentic way. It's written first person, so we only see what Cali is going through and it brought up all kinds of memories for me of what that age was like, the worry and stress and almost innocence to life. Also the thrill and anxiety of striking out on your own and supporting yourself. The heat level of this novel was very mild. Not exactly closed door, but not explicit or drawn out sexual situations. There's attraction and sexual tension, but most of the relationship lives as an emotional entity instead of raw lust.

Cali was a complex character who was trying to figure out what her next step is after college. She was going to head off to graduate school, but she just doesn't feel passionate about it. The story is told first person and you truly feel apart of her emotional angst and depth of feeling. Most of the time, she seemed very even and steady, not overly emotional, but very attached to her friends.

I read straight through the first half of the book with no breaks because I felt so emotionally tied to both Cali and Jaeger. That part of the book is their love story and it's filled with angst, misunderstandings, and attempts at emotional maturity. I respected Cali for having the wherewithal to concretely end things with her ex, and make sure her friend wasn't in love with Jaeger, before they started a relationship. I was thrilled that both characters were full of integrity and loyalty.

Now, that was the first fifty percent. Pretty soon after that, they both said I love you and I was wondering how the book could possibly hold my interest another fifty percent That's when the real drama and mystery started. The story was pretty much non-stop action through the second half. Cali gets dragged into all sorts of trouble, like she's being ricochetted around in a pinball machine, in addition to her continuing struggle with where she wants her life to go. Some of it happened a little too fast and furious for me. Like, how many things can truly happen to one person in a couple weeks.

It was a gripping adventure, but there were times I rolled my eyes at the shenanigans. The “evil woman” had no personality besides just being evil. And it was a creepy, skin crawling evil to me that made me feel distrustful of people in general. Cali is super trusting, which backfires many times. There were lots of plot threads coming from all different directions and they all coalesced into one answer that felt a little far fetched to me. There are also some loose ends that I assume will be worked out in the next book of the series.

In the end, everything wrapped up nice and tidy. We don't really see a huge cathartic finish. The problems are solved and everyone moves on with happy times. No fake happily-ever-after here, but a content and on-the-road-to-fulfilled ending. I was satisfied that neither character was committing to forever and ever, but I felt like I wanted a little more of their life before we left them.

All together, I thought the writing was fun and real. I liked the personalities inside the book. Cali and Jaeger were happy, well adjusted people, with fun foibles and accepting personalities. It was a good, solid introduction to the New Adult genre for me and I'll definitely look for more by this author.

I received a complementary ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Falling For Finn by Jackie Ashenden

Falling For Finn
by Jackie Ashenden
Rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

My Review:
This book was all kinds of awesome. There's something so fun about the passionate, soap opera books. These characters can change emotions on a dime. They finish having sex and one of them literally runs out of the room.

It tugged on my heart and I felt so much for Finn and Anna. They had a lot of issues to work through and the author did a great job of writing each character so passionately that you feel everything they're going through.

Anna was drugged and sexually assaulted six months before this book starts and she's just starting to come out from the cave of dealing with it. It feels like she's so innocent and naive: to believe that your best male friend would just automatically help you overcome the terror of being touched by having sex with you. You completely feel for her that she just can't even wrap her mind around what life is like apart from living with this fear. She can't see anything beyond “Finn helps me with everything, so obviously he'll help me with this”.

Finn is tough and physical but also really vulnerable. It's not very often you find a romance hero who's been pining for the heroine and pretty much the instance he has a chance, he's actually honest about it. He doesn't beat around the bush or pretend he's not in love. When they finally do have sex, you see how much he wants more and the anguish of not getting it right then.

And I loved how these two actually talked. No lack of communication keeping them apart. Their conflict is completely based on their emotional issues. By the end, they were both able to accept and own their ways of sabotaging themselves and deal with them. They took risks and owned up to their lack. I was really satisfied with how they worked through things and accepted each other.

There was a lot of yelling and anger and frustration, but never any angry sex. When they did have sex, it was hot and sweet. The emotions related to them having sex are huge and grandiose. Think starbursts and almost telepathic connections. I love reading books like that, with emotions that draw you so close to the moment.

This was nearly a single sitting book for me. I could barely put it down the first night and there was no way I was putting it down the second night. I will definitely look for more by this author.

He Watches Me by Cynthia Sax

He Watches Me
by Cynthia Sax
Rating: 4 of 5 stars

My Review:
I was pretty blown away by this book. First off, the only other Cynthia Sax book I've read is a crazy, silly, alien story, so I had no idea what to expect with this. This story is relatively short; the first book in a three part series. I'm just amazed by the ability to take a situation that would really just be strange and creepy in real life and pull out every nuance of how this exactly fits what the characters are feeling.

Anna is invisible. People don't care about her, don't touch her, and really don't even notice her. She attempts to keep it that way, but she's also lonely. Until she finds that one person that truly sees her. For this part of the story, he doesn't need to do anything else except see.

Gabriel Blaine is a billionaire. Possibly a recluse as well. But he sees Anna and accepts her for who she is. We don't really know much about him in this book, just a couple sprinkles of details here and there. But he seems rather trustworthy, in the fantasy way obviously, because in real life it would be pretty creepy.

Let's be clear that all of these situations revolve around sexuality. This is not a kinky-BDSM book, but it is voyeuristic and explicit. The things that Blaine watches are naked sexuality, not simply “I see you watering your plants” or something.

I can't wait to get the next book in this series. This one ends as they are both just starting to open up to one another. I loved how the emotions were presented in this book and it all felt very real and engrossing.


**This review is archived on my blog: The Theory of Lieto Fine

The Little Moose Who Couldn't Go To Sleep

The Little Moose Who Couldn't Go To Sleep
by Willy Claflin
Rating: 3 of 5 stars

My Review:
I read this book to my five year old. My son got a couple fun laughs from the book. It's fun to read, and you need to have a certain moose-voice to really get into it. A little deeper and slower than normal. The moose-kind talk a bit differently with some funny words (the book includes a handy-dandy dictionary) and a bit of “he say he hungry” improper English. I didn't mind it for moose-speak, but I would have preferred proper diction for the narration parts of the story.

This was like a little moose fairy tale. The importance of getting a good night's sleep to function well the next day, plus some silly interactions with a helpful sheep. My son was disturbed that the teachers at school said unkind things about the sheep, but he truly enjoyed the adventure, the words, and the different voices necessary for moose-speak.

Three to five years old seems about the perfect age for it, although some of the words are a little over the head of a five year old. Also, I have to downgrade a bit for throwing in the words dumb and stupid. My son knows those words by having an older brother, but those aren't words I want him repeating and they're unnecessary for a young children's book.

Overall, a fun, engaging story, but we probably won't read it often and if you're quicker than me, you'll probably change a couple words as you read to avoid exposing your young kids to more questionable language.

I received a complementary ARC of this book via netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

**This review is archived on my blog: The Theory of Lieto Fine.

Telling Tales by Charlotte Stein

Telling Tales
by Charlotte Stein
Rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

My Review:
This story was so engrossing. It's told first person and it's so full and intriguing. There's a lot of things happening inside the heroine's mind, she's so complex and confused. Although the romance is technically between two people, there are four individuals working through this single relationship. That makes for a lot of creative sexual exploration.

Allie was in love with Wade all through college, but hasn't seen him in five years. When their old college professor leaves his mansion to both of them, along with two other people from their old writing group, they all meet at the house to get things sorted out. Cameron, Kitty, Allie and Wade have to live at the house for a month. Allie has some work to do in her relationship with each of these people. Kitty and Allie were best friends but haven't been that close lately. Cameron could be harboring secrets that he's never shared. Wade is losing a bit of his luster to Allie even as she still finds him attractive.

They all used to write and share stories when they were in college. As they try to get comfortable staying in the mansion, they revisit those times and share some recent stories that just happen to be a lot filthier than the ones from college. I loved seeing the stories within this story. They describe so much about each character's personality and inner life and they give an extra layer of fantasy to the intense emotions.

Through her stories, Allie was able to be whoever she wanted and give herself the control she felt like she was lacking from her real life. In her stories she was powerful, in control and always in demand. For a long time, I was hoping that Allie would grow a little more backbone and take control for herself outside the stories. Not that she never did, but it seemed like most of the time she did whatever anyone else wanted. Even when she was directing things, she let herself be led around. I wanted her to be completely aggressive on her own sometimes, without someone telling her what to do, but I also realized that in writing her stories, she could live the lives of all of her characters, not just the one that she felt was her. She was finding a way to live out and integrate every part of her personality, divided out in the story into all different characters. I appreciated the complexity of that and I felt by the end of the book she had a good grasp of who she was.

I wasn't sure if I'd be able to like a book where the main relationship has sex with other people too, but the story was so well written it all seemed perfectly natural. These characters jump out of the page with their awkwardness, confusion and attempts to sort things out. I ended up completely in love with all of them. I'm hopeful that one day Kitty and Wade find their own emotional connections. They felt like such rich characters, I'd hate to never know what happens to them.

This story is really, really erotica, but still so fully a romance novel. I think it's probably the filthiest Charlotte Stein book I've read, which is saying a lot. I suspected some things at the start of the book, but was still shocked when they actually happened. And even more shocking that Charlotte Stein was able to take something that seems so outside the bound of romance and still make you care specifically about two of the people in the story so much more than the others.

There's angry sex and four-way action and all kinds of kinky stuff, but all positive and completely consensual. There is no pain, cruelty, or emotionally manipulative power plays involved in this kind of filthy sex. With all of the limbs, there were definitely times I stopped to figure out who's body was where. I'd have a certain picture in my head and then an arm would pop up in a place I didn't expect, but I know that's more the limits of my imagination vs a problem with the writing. On top of that, Charlotte Stein has the magical ability to take kinky stuff that would generally be more emotionally detached for me and make every situation about the characters inner lives. Every single kinky situation is backed up by reasons and emotions and a striving toward wholeness.

I loved how, while each of the characters had their issues, they didn't try to push their own emotions onto someone else. Everyone was in charge of their own feelings. Happy or sad, they never blamed someone else for the way they were feeling, or when things didn't work out the way they wanted. They were sweet and awkward and filthy, but lovely and so loveable I think I want one of each of them for my own. This book goes onto the re-read shelf for awesomeness, dirty sex, and emotional satisfaction.

I received a complementary ARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.