Why they changed it I can't say, people just liked it better that way.
Went to the Beaverton Borders for my first reader group — and it was awesome. I really wish I’d known about it before, but it wasn’t until Tammie at nightowlromance.com gave me a heads up that I found out about it. I met Marcy Dodge, who was RWA’s Bookseller of the Year a couple of years ago, who was fantastic, and who was very nice when I mumbled that I sent her an ARC of DEMON MOON on Friday, and that if she hated it, it was okay. I’m not quite over my “I’m sorry I’m sending you an ARC” guilt, but I’m getting there. I could have totally slunk out without mentioning it, but I didn’t.
I looked at a bunch of bookmarks that were better designed than mine, including Jennifer Estep’s KARMA GIRL. And I picked up a couple of books that I might not have otherwise (or even heard of otherwise), because they were part of the bookclub:
NO REGRETS
Shannon K. Butcher
Renowned cryptologist Noelle Blanche refuses to have blood on her hands. So when the military asks for her help in a covert operation, she refuses–until masked gunmen raid her home and threaten her life. Suddenly it’s all too clear that any blood spilled may be her own. Noelle has no choice but to trust the dangerous stranger sent by the military to safeguard her. A stranger who is everything she detests, everything she fears…and everything she desires.
Former Delta Force operative David Wolfe thought he had left it all behind–the horror, the hurt, the guilt. But now the men who savagely murdered his wife have set their sights on a brilliant cryptologist who can lead them to the cache of weapons they prize. As passion ignites between David and the woman he’s sworn to protect, what began as just a mission escalates into the fight of his life. But can he prevent history from repeating itself?
The general consensus was that it was good, although the spread of opinion on how good ran the gamut of “couldn’t put it down” to “it was okay” (and a few people were DNF). Which, I guess, is always how reviews go. *g* One comment was that it sounded like a man’s voice; I’m interested in seeing if I agree, or if I can even tell why that comment came up. I probably won’t get to this one right away, though. Instead, I’ll be making certain that I read the pick for next month:
KNIGHT’S PRIZE
Sarah McKerrigan
She certainly seems meek and soft-spoken, unlike her warrior sisters. But once the sun goes down, Miriel of Rivenloch becomes “The Shadow,” the bold, mysterious renegade who robs the rich to give to the poor. But can she outwit the devil-may-care mercenary Sir Rand la Nuit, who has been hired to unmask The Shadow? Miriel doesn’t know Rand’s mission-only that his sudden, amorous courtship is hiding something. Rand doesn’t know who The Shadow is-only that the lovely woman in his arms heats his blood. Touch by silky touch, kiss by sizzling kiss, the stakes-and their passions-mount. And once Rand and Miriel disrobe in his bedchamber, both can lose everything they live for-including their oh-so-vulnerable hearts.
And then for those of you who want historicals set outside of England, I saw a cover flat for SILK DREAMS, set in Constantinople ** and will be published in July:
SILK DREAMS
Diana Groe
In a strange land of flashing swords and swirling silks, spicy aromas and hot breezes that feel like a lover’s breath, Valdis is utterly lost. Constantinople is so vastly different from her homeland in Scandinavia. And the harem she’s forced to enter so very treacherous.
Her family cast her away for seeing portents of the future, and now her visions are turning even more ominous: They foretell the death of the one man who could help her escape, an exiled Viking who braves the wrath of a kingdom to awaken her passion one sinful pleasure at a time. To save him, Valdis must play a high-stakes game of power and seduction that will either get her killed or finally allow her and her love to live their…SILK DREAMS.
** Does anyone else have a hard time NOT singing, “Istanbul was Constantinople / now it’s Istanbul not Constantinople / Been a long time gone, Constantinople / Why did Constantinople get the works? / That’s nobody’s business but the Turk’s” when they hear the word “Constantinople”?
