Hello there!

 Not that anyone ever comes here and reads what I put, I have a lot of catching up to do for myself so I don't lose track of things. Work has been killing me slowly but I just binged the heck out of some books the past couple of days with more on the way. 

Expect a lot from me over the next couple of weeks as I read to my hearts content on vacation!

Also, I feel like I've been apologizing a lot lately because my work schedule cut into my ARC time, but I'm working on the backlog. Hopefully this will be resolved when I will do nothing but sit on the beach and read.

1. Her Forbidden Flesh by Airika Phoenix

I wanted to see what the interest in Dark Romance was that I've been seeing lately. So, when the opportunity arose to ARC read this one, I jumped on it. I have no regrets. This book was spicy and made me wish I had a Rhys in my life cause ...damn. Reading these books makes a girl realize some things about herself she doesn't know beforehand, like how much she wants a stalker among other things. New kinks unlocked. 

Although I don't have much experience with books in this genre yet, I want to say this seemed like a unique story. I kept rooting for them and was rewarded at the end. No spoilers here but I definitely enjoyed and recommend this book. She's not a super main character, but I LOVED Paloma - and hope that maybe one day the author will write her and Oz's story because it seems like it would be an interesting and spicy one as well.

2. Midnight Kiss by Farahilda Winters

This was another ARC that I had on my backlog from the author, and I had read the first couple of chapters prior to signing up. It was a paranormal romance with a human librarian and a sexy, mysterious vampire. Although that seems like a common storyline, the author did turn it into something unique by tossing in a system of covens of "good" and very bad vampires, as well as a cursed book. 

At first I thought it was simply enjoyable of a read, nothing to write home about - but then things started happening and next thing I knew it was over with a cliffhanger. So now I'm over here checking when the next one is coming out so I can find out what happens (and by the looks of it, werewolves are coming into the mix - which gives me some serious nostalgia).

3. Wardens of the Mountains - Black Jones by Mia D. Saga

This is probably one of my lowkey favorites of the bunch. It was also an ARC on my backlog, and I had remembered that it was described as a robin hood retelling, which honestly - we all need more like that. I don't know about anyone else but I am a little tired of it either being Beauty and the Beast or Hades x Persephone. There's other classic tales that could be amazing. This was one of them. At first, the writing style was eh - but once the story started rolling I was hooked! Also, I have never been so mad about a cliffhanger!!! Just when it was starting to get good and our characters were starting to get feelings...BOOM! Still cursing you Mia for that, but it just means I will be trying to get in line for the next one.

This was a fantasy/romantasy with no spice, heck it wasn't until the last bit of the book that our characters realize they have feelings for the other - so it's super slow burn but I have a feeling the next book will be worth it all. 

4. Lights Out by Navessa Allen

Once again, I got pulled away from my Romantasy genre with a dark romance and OMG...I am pretty sure this book has me addicted to them now, if not from the first one I read this round. Again, I wish I had some super sexy stalker I could have THE BEST types of sex with, but here I sit with a beer writing this blog about it. I had joined the Probably Smut Book Club and this was the first SE of theirs I had received. 

If you love stalker, touch her and die, a badass FMC, cinnamon roll MMC, mask, knife play, tons of other kinky things - this book is for you. No shame here, I definitely needed a couple of cold showers while reading this book. I question so much when I read these books now and realize how vanilla sex is with guys in southwestern PA, like where are all these guys at? Are they indeed all fictional? Probably. 

I digress. I had started reading the first chapter one evening and that's all it took for me to know that this was a book I was going to have to section off time for because the author's writing style - the way she was just telling the story from Aly's POV - I sensed this was one I wasn't going to want to stop reading to sleep (and I can't not sleep during the week because work and bills). So I had to put it off to the side until I knew it wouldn't matter. No regrets. This book is definitely a new favorite and I really can't wait until the author releases the next one. 

5. Hurricane Wars and Monsoon Rising by Thea Guanzon

Hurricane wars had been on my TBR for so long, and I have so many regrets pushing it off after having read it. This is definitely a new favorite series and I love it. There are no words for how this made me feel. I was up until 4 am reading because I couldn't stop, I went straight from one into the other (I had the ARC of Monsoon rising - thank you NetGalley, love of my life). Even then, I passed out for two hours, went to work with my kindle and continued reading. Fortunately I can multitask like a psychopath and read while making some maps and running analyses. 

If you enjoy romantasy, a strong FMC, dark gray (he was definitely not morally gray) MMC, slow burn romance with spice that was worth the wait, and complex politics - this is a book for you. I'm sitting here with withdrawal still because of course, Monsoon Rising isn't even published yet so I have to wait months or more for the next one - but it will totally be worth it.