ARC, Books

Book 928: Going Public (Jade Capital #2) – Hudson Lin

I requested an ARC of this one from the publisher after I saw it in their upcoming titles email that I get monthly.* The fact that there was not just one non-white man on the cover of this MM Romance novel, but TWO of them was a definite ‘okay let’s give this Hudson Lin person a try.’

Totally on me, but I also thought it was written by a man (damn you pseudonyms!), but that didn’t change my opinion or reading of the novel, I was just excited that there were BIPOC protagonists AND they were on the cover. Add in that I don’t think I’ve read many with Asian protagonists and it caught my attention.

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Book 858: Heated Rivalry (Game Changers #2) – Rachel Reid

What’s better than one enemies-to-lovers MM Sports Romance? TWO BACK-TO-BACK!!!! 😀

I hadn’t planned it this way, but I put this one on hold after finishing Game Changer and enjoying the preview, so when it popped up so quickly from my local library and I had a gap to read it in I went for it.

In Game Changer we meet one of the two protagonists, Ilya, an unlovable Russian jackass who’s been leading the Boston Bears (I see what you did there) to the championship multiple years in a row. But we never met Shane, Ilya’s biggest rival since the draft and their rookie year, who has led the Montreal team to success.

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Book 853: Game Changer (Game Changers #1) – Rachel Reid

Now THIS is a hockey novel. Everything the last one I read (Keeping Hope) did wrong, this one did right (especially the epilogues!). And to make it even better, this was kind of like the adult version of Ukazu’s Check, Please! series, with quite a few parallels that I thoroughly enjoyed.

Just like It Takes Two to Tumble, I found this one because Annabeth Albert (always, yes) highly recommended the newest release from Reid’s Game Changers series, Role Model, so of COURSE I was going to read it, because if Albert loves it, it is 100% worth checking out.

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Book 846: The Lavender Menace – Tom Cardamone (Ed.)

UGH. I wanted to like this so much more than I did. I remember the excitement when I stumbled across it seven years ago at PAX East in the LGBT lounge. I guess I either forgot the premise or didn’t really read the full premise of the book so ended up slightly disappointed.

Don’t get me wrong there were definitely a few stories I very much enjoyed (more the redemptive ones) and there was some great writing throughout the novel, but there were some larger issues with the collection that may reflect when it was originally published (2013) and how far we’ve come as a society, and also the background of the editor (cis white gay man).

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ARC, Books

Book 844: An Unexpected Kind of Love – Hayden Stone

I grabbed a copy of this from NetGalley when I was looking for books to fill in between other upcoming deadlines.* It had a cute premise and reminded me a lot of Notting Hill so of course I was going to want to read it!

Aubrey has taken over his family’s bookstore and is struggling to keep it afloat after he was unceremoniously dumped by his first (and only long term) boyfriend for their mutual friend, when he meets Blake, an up-and-coming American movie star who’s filming a movie up the street and encourages the film to approach Aubrey about using his store as a set.

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