Carries Book Reviews

Welcome to the world of Happily Ever Afters…

Each of the Hotel Ever After books is (very) loosely based on a fairy tale. Which means they’re all guaranteed to have a happily ever after. They’re also guaranteed to have a (very) sexy twist. My heroines aren’t literally princesses, but they are very much in control of their destiny–and they’re not afraid to take exactly what they want from their prince charmings!

This new series of novellas releases monthly. Each one is about 75 pages long—perfect for an afternoon tryst—and they promise happy endings for all 😉

Goodreads / Amazon

Bette & the Beast
Liza Penn
(Hotel Ever After, #1)
Publication date: September 13th 2016
Genres: New Adult, Romance

Bette owns Fairhaven’s only bookstore…but only barely. She’s struggling with bills, but she refuses to sell to the hotel mogul Richard Dickson because he only wants to tear down the beloved store and replace it with a hotel. Can these two find a compromise and save the bookstore?

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Richard’s eyebrow quirked up. His hands slid lower, lingering on the silk stocking covering her knees, then they slipped under her skirt, his fingers toying with the straps of her garter, sliding up and down, dipping under the top of her silk stockings, dancing higher and higher up toward the lace of her panties.

“You put these on for me to find,” he said.

It was not a question, but Bette still denied it. “I just prefer them to regular hose,” she said, tilting her head up. “They’re…”

“Sexier.”

“Nicer.”

Richard grinned wickedly. “Sexier,” he said. “And you know it.”

Bette didn’t deign to answer.

“And that’s why you wore them for me.” Richard said. His voice was getting lower.

“And what if I did?” Bette asked.

“Then,” Richard said, his hand sliding up Bette skirt, wrapping around her black-lace covered hips, “you deserve a reward.”

Author Bio:

Liza Penn is the pseudonym of an author living with her family in the piedmont of the Carolinas. She writes the Hotel Ever After books for fun and values her privacy.

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Hello, Goodbye, and Everything in Between by Jennifer E. Smith
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Clare and Aidan have always had their ups and downs with their relationship but the two have remained together. Now though on the night before they are to leave for college they know that they are going to be separated for the next few years, the question before them though is this going to be goodbye for now or for forever?

Over the next twelve hours before the pair are expected to pack up and go Clare and Aidan have a night planned to retrace their relationship. They will visit special places, familiar landmarks, friends and family. This night will decide for them whether they should try to hold on to their relationship or move on.

Hello, Goodbye, and Everything in Between is part romance but underlying the relationship in the book is the basics of young adults coming of age. The story really would relate to anyone at any age that is putting something behind them and moving on wards to something new in their lives just as this couple is heading off to college.

There were ups and downs and emotions all throughout the book. Also this was sort of like visiting the entire relationship this couple had in a fast forward type of situation since you know where they are now but you learn about what they had been through together during the book, a nice twist to a romance read.

Overall, enjoyed this sort of coming of age young adult romance.

Need by Joelle Charbonneau
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Kaylee Dunham only needs and wants one thing in life, for her brother to get the kidney he needs to survive. Kaylee was willing to donate herself but unfortunately she just wasn’t a match so she’s done everything she can to bring awareness to her brother’s health problems and try to find a donor.

When her friend shows Kaylee a new social networking site aimed at the students from her high school that claims to grant users what they need Kaylee can’t help but become curious. After signing up for NEED Kaylee makes the request that he brother would get the kidney he desperately needs but soon things take an unfortunate turn for the users of the site and it’s obvious that sometimes things are just too good to be true.

Need is another book that I really struggled with on how to rate this one. I actually enjoyed reading this one and thought it was rather well done and engaging all the way through. But that being said my main dilemma stood with the fact that this strongly reminded me of Nerve by Jeanne Ryan which I just read not too long ago. There are differences of course to the stories but if broken down it seemed they could really have followed the same outline.

Both books are centered around a anonymous site granting gifts for doing things. Need sort of separates itself making the main character get involved due to an actual need for her wish instead of just glamorous prizes. But both ramp up the intensity along the way with Need definitely being the darker of the two. There’s a bit of a twist in both that is very similar also but where Need also excelled was the ending, I found it much more satisfying in depth.

In the end I can’t deny that I still enjoyed reading this book even though it was so similar to another so I decided to go with four stars just based on my enjoyment with this one. The only thing I think Need had a bit off about it was the beginning starts off a bit confusing with multiple POVs but otherwise a really good fast paced read, just not overly original in my opinion.

The Billionaire Shifter’s Curvy Match
Diana Seere
(Billionaire Shifters Club #1)
Publication date: September 13th 2016
Genres: Adult, Paranormal

Welcome to the most exclusive club in the world. The Novo Club. Novo is Latin for “change.” Our members prefer the word “shift” though.

It’s the hottest club in town.

The price of membership is your heart and your secrecy.

All you need to do to join is to be loved beyond your wildest imagination by someone powerful with an…alpha side so primal it’s in their blood.

Are you ready?

Good. Then let’s begin.

The Billionaire Shifters Club is a new series featuring the five Stanton siblings, four brothers and one sister who are all part of an ancient shifter family living in modern America. The subterranean club-within-a-club beneath the streets of Boston, Massachusetts holds secrets only the Stantons and their fellow shifters know.

When Lilah Murphy started serving drinks at the exclusive Platinum Club, she never expected she would be on the menu.

Biotech billionaire Gavin Stanton had one taste of the new, curvy server and his craving could never be satisfied until he had her fully. Completely.

Eternally.

Fate brought them together, but a centuries-old secret could tear them apart, for the Stanton family holds a shifter legacy that no human has ever threatened.

Until now.

Gavin Stanton is the billionaire CEO of a Boston biotech firm. He’s also a werewolf, the son of a large, ancient family with roots in the British aristocracy. His work is his life. But then he feels the Beat—an irresistible urge to mate with Lilah, a beautiful human who inflames his passions like no other—and he abandons everything he thought he knew in his need to claim her.

Lilah Murphy is broke and desperate. All she wants is a job to support herself, her sister, and her ailing mother. The last thing she needs is to get involved with a rich, powerful guy who would discard her after a few hot nights together and get her fired at her new, high-paying job. But she, too, feels the Beat. She hears him in her mind, feels him in her soul, and the urge to answer the ancient call is undeniable. Is she strong enough to embrace his secrets—and her own?

The Billionaire Shifter’s Curvy Match is the first in an all-new series of hot (did we mention *hot*?) romances about the billionaire shifters and the women they’re fated to love

Goodreads / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / iBooks / Kobo / Google Play

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EXCERPT:

The sound of screeching rubber on asphalt drowned out the rest of her words. They both paused, expecting to hear cars colliding. Instead, there was eerie silence—and then the plaintive cry of a wounded animal.

A dog.

They both ran to the window. Outside, the usual neighborhood lowlifes loitered on their grubby street, where the most vibrant business was a check-cashing place. And a bar. Actually, a lot of bars.

And was that a limo? What the hell was one of those doing here?

The dog’s cries continued.

“Smoky!” Lilah gasped, turning away from the window, her heart pounding. “That bastard hit Smoky!”

Smoky was the neighborhood stray. He should’ve been ill-tempered, given his bad luck to live on the streets, but his was the friendliest face on the block, looking happy to see you, always eager for a pat, his tail wagging.

The limo might’ve killed the poor little guy. Taking three stairs at a time, Lilah flew down the stairwell to the stained security door and out the rusty gate to the sidewalk.

The usual drug dealer was standing on the corner, interrupted from talking to whoever was inside a parked silver Chevy. Under that car, only a few feet from him and still whimpering, was a huddled mass of pale fur.

Smoky.

Jess was right on her heels. “Oh, no.”

“We have to help him.” Lilah glanced up and down the street, preparing to cross, her long hair flying as she whipped her head back and forth to make sure it was safe.

Jess grabbed her arm. “You can’t! That’s the dealer who stabbed somebody last year, isn’t it?”

“Different guy,” Lilah said, although it wasn’t. She strode into the street just as the driver of the limo was getting out. She couldn’t leave Smoky to die in the street with those scumbags.

Then she saw the limo driver pull his arms back, hands on hips, revealing a barely-concealed gun on a holster around his chest. The window in the back of the limo

remained up, and why shouldn’t it? Why would some rich dude want to get dirty? Why would he care if he’d run over some poor homeless dog?

The tiny scar above Lilah’s left eyebrow began to throb. It jolted her, making the scene before her look shimmery. Unreal. She pressed her fingertips into the tiny divot and hoped the throbbing would go away. The last thing she needed now was a three-day blinding headache.

And she’d run out of her meds. No money.

“What’s wrong, Lilah?” Jess grabbed her elbow and pulled her out of the middle of the street. She’d just frozen there, staring at the back windows of the limo.

Lilah could hear Smoky’s whimpering and the city traffic, but it all came as background noise through the throbbing in her head. It wasn’t quite pain. The pulsing felt like it pierced her brain, a second heartbeat she couldn’t quite follow.

Her vision was fine, and that meant it wasn’t a migraine. Then what was this?

And why did it worsen when her eyes flickered toward the back windows of the limo?

“Let’s get Smoky,” Lilah said, though her mouth felt like it was filled with cotton.

Jess had an arm around her. “I’ll get him. You’re about to faint.”

“I’m fine.” Lilah forced herself to move, shooting an icy glance at the neighborhood felon before she squatted down to the car’s rear bumper.

“Lilah, you look really pale,” Jess insisted, frowning. She looked so much like their mom when she did that.

“Here, puppy,” Lilah cooed, reaching out a hand. She knew the biggest danger was if Smoky ran away again and hid where nobody could help him, so she grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and pulled him as gently as she could out from under the car. Luckily, Smoky was a small thing, barely fifteen pounds, and she got him bundled up in her arms without having to drag him far.

He relaxed in her arms, his shivering more from fear than any injury. Thank goodness.

But as soon as she stood, the throbbing, pulsing pain returned. Her gaze was pulled to the back window of the limo, now open. To the man sitting in the shadows.

Him. Her head felt like someone had dropped a brick on it, her body filling with heat and lava.

It’s him.

What was the matter with her? She had to get Smoky inside. She didn’t know anyone who rode around in a limo, so why did she feel like she did?

Him.

It didn’t matter. She had to get closer. She had to see him.

Holding Smoky in her arms, Lilah took a step toward the limo, then another.

Jess snagged her elbow. “Lilah, no! You can’t! That driver has a gun—”

Lilah was beyond reason, the pounding turning into a word, a word that had no sound, no form, no sense.

Him.

Him.

Him.

That voice. It pounded like a hammer forging steel. She continued to advance on the shining black limo, barely noticing when the driver climbed inside and slammed the

door. She was fearless in her uncontrollable need to see that face, to know he was real.

You’re real.

Jess was at her heels. “Lilah, please—”

The limo peeled out, its tires screeching as it drove past her only an arm’s-length away. Two bright blue eyes, glittering with otherworldly sharpness, met hers through the open window. Gold highlights tickled his hair, a honey brown that curved up at the neck, a little too long to be all business, with waves she wanted to sink her fingers into. A strong jaw, set firmly, and those wild, seductive eyes… oh.

Oh my.

And then the voice changed in an instant.

Mine.

Mine.

Mine.

Author Bio:

Diana Seere was raised by wolves in the forests outside Boston and San Francisco. The only time she spends in packs these days is at romance writing conventions. In truth, Diana is two New York Times and USA Today bestselling authors who decided to write shifter romance and have more fun. You can find “her” on Facebook at Diana Seere’s Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/dianaseere

Sign up for her New Releases and Sales email newsletter here: eepurl.com/beUZnr

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Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Ethan Wate lives in the small town of Gatlin, South Carolina with his dad and their long-time housekeeper, Amma after Ethan’s mother had died in a car accident recently. Ethan is a fairly normal sixteen year old, hanging out with his friend and other normal teenage activities other than he has been plagued by a dream of a mysterious girl and a random song keep appearing on his iPod.

When a new girl, Lena Duchannes, moves to town Ethan becomes curious to meet her. He and his friend Link see Lena’s arrival, in a hearse no less making Ethan one of the only ones suddenly excited to meet her. Soon Ethan discovers Lena is the girl of his dreams, literally. And this girl not only comes with her own secrets but also a family curse.

Beautiful Creatures is one of those books I’ve seen around forever and put off reading it being a bit concerned with the length. Unfortunately my worries were met when this one became one that the pace was absolutely killing me trying to get through this book. Such a slow one that could have easily been a lot shorter in length with the material contained within.

Don’t get me wrong I did enjoy the story buried within the pages of Beautiful Creatures but I couldn’t help but become bored trying to get to the better parts. The characters and story was interesting and it was nice to have a fantasy read of this nature from a male POV and there were a lot of good details added in here that were quite appealing. I just so wish this one went at a much quicker pace than it had. Perhaps the movie version would have been more my pace.