I have a very large soft spot for Asian based stories. I was very excited to read this book because although there are a great many books about the Holocaust and American and European accounts of World War II the stories of Japanese in America during the time of internment camps are few. Most people have forgotten that Japanese families were rounded up and spent years in camps with little to nothing as far as possessions in terrible, harsh conditions while many of the males were held and imprisoned on suspicion of sedition. It was a broad generalization of a nationality that punished and penalized thousands of AMERICANS who were innocent in every way but of having a heritage related to that of the Imperial Japanese Navy who had attacked the US Naval Base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. It was an unspeakable racial bias that has been swept under the rug while Americans keep alive the memory of prejudice of blacks, women and religious practices as something we have overcome.
Makin’ the Love Monday – Stay by Kelly Mooney
Makin’ this Lovin’ Twice as Nice… This is sort of like the mini-series of Monday book reviews since I’m doing two today. This is the second. I babbled in the first one so I can dive right into this one.
Stay by Kelly Mooney is a very depressing love story. I think I want to say I read it and it’s a bad book because it made me feel bad–but it is really really not a bad book, it’s a good book about a bad relationship. It’s horribly realistic and in being so it takes the shine and glory off of romance and love and makes you feel really uncomfortable because this isn’t the kind of love you dream about and want, it’s the kind of love story you have.
Makin’ the Love Monday – Passionate by Moonbeam by Cynthia Sax
What the hell? Does Monday always come after the weekend? How does that happen?
I read all the books for this week on Friday. No shi–poop. And because I wasn’t so hot on this review I plan to do two Hidin’ the Salami Monday reviews today. Waiting until seven at night to write them is probably not the best idea but I was watching Wicked Attraction all day and fighting an uphill battle with some hypomania that made me disassemble and reorganize all of the organized boxes I keep things in. I’m actually a terribly orderly person. Being bipolar means that when my house is a mess my entire mood is out of control. When I should have been writing reviews… I was scanning anything I might want to back up digitally (medical records, lawyer correspondence, love letters from when D and I first met), wrapping Christmas presents, cleaning out the patio storage closet, washing dishes, cleaning out my purse, cleaning out the fridge, going through college papers I wrote, looking at family photos to scan, filing away documents and making out my will and last testament–all at the same time. BIPOLAR MUCH? And yes, I was actually writing my will.
Any Day That Ends In YA – The Lost Girl Series by Airicka Phoenix
I was torn about just where to post a review for this series. Hell, I didn’t even initially plan to review the series. I was going to just do Finding Kia. And I wasn’t sure if I was going to do it as my Any Day That Ends In YA post or Tongue Wagger or Weekend Pick Me Up… This series is an all around good read and Adam Chaves is tasty man meat and he rated high for Book Boyfriend Report too! These two book showed potential of covering all my review categories–and they gave me major feels. So they are getting group love in a full on series review. Gimme more, Madame Phoenix. Gimme more!
Makin’ the Love Monday – Charred Heart by Lizzy Ford
I think I fell in love with Lizzy Ford about a chapter into Katie’s Hellion. I had downloaded the book for free (It’s still free–go NAO!) from Amazon after just finding out there were free books on Amazon in the early part of May, 2012. (Late Kindle bloomer). I bought every book she had after that and ate them up like they were chocolate and I needed a fix. I didn’t know what end was up from one book to the next as far as trying to pick a favorite character because I loved all of them… Rhyn, Decker and Darian eventually rose to the top. I guess I like the tortured anti-heroes the most.
Makin’ the Love Monday – True by Laurann Dohner
Wow.
I have to say that again.
Wow.
I’ve reviewed enough Laurann Dohner books to have established my fangirl status and I’ve waxed poetic about New Species Series often enough to show my bias to it as well. When Laura from Ellora’s Cave emailed me the synopsis for this book as an ARC that was available for review I sent her a reply that said, “Please! Please! Please!” I might have fallen in love with her a little when she sent me the book. ~Yes, I am one of those women who love you for what you can give me and not for who you are. =P
Any Day that Ends in YA – Lovely Vicious by Sara Wolf
OMG I am in LURVE and even if it might be skeevy AND even if it might mean serious legal issues I am going to say that I am all about asshat extraordinaire: Jack Hunter. He is the three magic things that make my tingly spots tingle in a book boyfriend. Number One: He’s a raging prick. Number Two: he’s devious. Number Three: under all the hardness and unapproachability something lives within that that tough shell that is worth a hundred Tom, Dick and whatever name is popular this year.
Makin’ the Love Monday – The Baby Bargain by Jennifer Apodaca
This is the first book in the Once a Marine series. I don’t know if it is the whole alpha thing that military men have going on or what it might be. But I have a big ol’ soft spot for these books where retired soldiers who knew untold grief and devastating trauma find some happy-happy. And that whole middle age crap that I have going on added to the not having any kids of my own–makes me love these books where people are pregnant or have hidden babies like the book equivalent of candy.
Makin’ the Love Monday – Saved by Venom by Lolita Lopez
I feel really lucky at times. For instance when I am at Target and the parking lot gods bless me with a parking spot under one of the trees so my black car with it’s black interior doesn’t become 150 degrees fahrenheit in the SoCal heat. That makes me feel pretty awesome. Or when I get on a plane and the person next me is a female. I have a super duper male species type neurosis and having to sit next to a strange male person can give me an anxiety attack. So female flight companions… blessed by higher beings. Or when Laura the Ellora’s Cave book review representative sent me the email for Lolita Lopez’s third Grabbed book, Saved by Venom, that there was like winning the book lottery for the week. That made me feel really, really lucky.
Book Boyfriend Report – Picture Perfect by Alessandra Thomas
There is nothing like a good book boyfriend after a long stressful weekend that leaves you sick, sore and sorry that your bounce back ability isn’t what it used to be. I feel every day of my age right now and I need a hunky hero to swoon over to self medicate with and Nate West is this week’s best of the best.
Alessandra Thomas’s first book in her Picturing Perfect series, Picture Perfect, deals with the touchy subject of body image and body dysmorphic disorder. Cat Mitchell was sexy, skinny and modelled clothes that made her feel beautiful before an accident eight months earlier left her with such a severely broken leg that even with surgery and physical therapy made it impossible for her to get back the body she had always known. Having gained sixty pounds and four sizes she feels like a stranger in her new body, her confidence is tanked and humiliated by how she feels she is now seen in the eyes of others, she doesn’t want to be seen by anyone–much worse, look at herself. Enter childhood summer camp pal and former chubby sixth grade seven minutes in heaven kiss mate, Nate West.