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Book 1,031: Speak of the Devil – Rose Wilding

OMFG. I can’t believe I waited as long as I did to read this. I accepted an ARC ages ago from the publisher, but then school and life got in the way and I blew past the publication date.* Then there were so many MM Holiday Romances I just had to read, and this is where we ended up me reading it in January 2024, six months after publication, and then finally getting the review posted almost a year to the date after publication (six months after I read it but back-scheduling). OH, THE SHAME.

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Book 948: Patricia Wants to Cuddle – Samantha Allen

What a wonderfully weird novel. When this landed in my inbox from the publisher I first thought WTF is that because the cover art screams pulp fiction and as much as I find those hilarious I’m not usually drawn to them. However, I’d decided I wanted to expand my LGBT novel repertoire, and knowing this featured lesbian/bisexual female protagonists I said sure why not.*

Billed as a satire of The BachelorPatricia Wants to Cuddle takes place in the final two weeks of The Catch‘s season with four female finalists and the catch going to the San Juan islands off the coast of Washington state. While it is that, it’s also a final girl thriller novel with murder and mystery and urban legends aplenty to keep the reader engaged.

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Book 947: Hot Pursuit (The Hot Cannolis #3) – Eli Easton

It was a little surprising to see that this one was only written by Eli Easton but I found out that what I  believe will be the final book in the series, Hot Lips, will be authored by Tara Lain. That being said, it didn’t stop me from requesting this one when it landed in my inbox!* I knew Rick’s story would be good and it was definitely good.

Hot Pursuit is the story of Rick and John. Rick is Mike (from Hot Seat) and Donny’s (from Hot Wings) uncle and is a homicide detective and recently came out to some of his family in support of Donny. He’s assigned a new partner, John, who has a chip on his shoulder for some reason and caught Rick’s attention even before he was assigned as his partner.

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Book 929: Portrait of a Thief – Grace D. Li

I’m punching myself for not reading this book earlier AND for goofing off (aka knitting and Minecrafting) while reading it instead of blazing through it as it deserved. I’ve been sitting on this since November of LAST YEAR when someone in marketing at the publisher reached out with it.* I forced myself to wait until late March/early April to read it because I had a feeling I would really enjoy it and that barely covers my enthusiasm for it.

The premise was fascinating to me even if I was a bit wary of the Boston setting (I have bad experience with books being set where I live/have lived), but international art theft by college students, critiques on colonialism, BIPOC author, and characters, discussion of diaspora, ummm obviously I was going to say yes to it. I found out while reading the acknowledgments, that this has already been optioned by Netflix and I cannot tell you how much I’m ready for that!

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Book 921: Remembrance Lost (Tasier #3) – Arian Williams

When this one came in from Gay Romance Reviews I signed up for it since I’d read the first two books in the series (Dream Bound and Souls Aligned).* I wasn’t sure how this one would be after my mediocre response to Souls Aligned, but I grabbed it anyway.

This series is full of secret societies, aliens (I think?!), individuals with supernatural abilities, lots of gay relationships and sex, and really diverse locations/settings. Remembrance Lost definitely picked up on the action front, but in the end, I’m still sort of meh about where the series is.

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