Don't Tell by Karen Rose

Don't Tell by Karen Rose

Year Published: 2003

My Rating: 5 stars

This is the first book in the series. It is also the first book I read for this author and will not be the last :)

Mary Grace Winters suffered terribly from her abusive cop husband and knew there is no way to survival for her and her son except by running away and staging her own death.
Now seven years later as Caroline Stewart, she started to feel safe and considers risking her heart to love with the new Dr. Max Hunter that enters her life as her new boss. Both of them having pasts they are running away from and scars in body and soul.

But her past creeps up on her when her husband gets suspicious of her disappearance after all this time when new evidence arises suggesting that she and his son are alive. Now he wants his family back and will stop to nothing to accomplish that.

This was my first read by Karen Rose, and I loved it. I was gripped from the first page, had extreme trouble putting the book down. Such a thriller.
The characters were very likable and it really discussed a very important topic which is spouse abuse. You could feel Caroline's emotions and reactions while reading.. Plus the romance that blossemed between her and Dr. Hunter was so romantic it left me starry eyed :)
I also loved David Hunter, Max's brother.. He is so full of humor and you could feel the brotherly love shared between the brothers.
Dana Dupinsky is Caroline's best friend, through good and bad she is there for her, wonderful character.

It's so hard to keep my mouth shut and not write any spoilers. But i highly recommend this book for all those romance/suspence/thriller lovers out there. Really, dont miss out on this!

I will soon start her second book in the series "Have You Seen Her"?

Quotes I enjoyed from the book:

It was still a sound that could make her shudder. But she didn't shudder. It was as unwritten law in rehab. You never showed pity or revulsion for those around you. It was a very strong ethic amongst the broken and recovering.

"Did he notice you, too?"
Caroline shrugged. "He looked at me."
Dana leaned back in her chair, her brown eyes alive with speculation. "How?"
Caroline closed her eyes. Like I was the only woman in the world, she thought. Like I was... desirable. Pretty. Like he wanted me. Little Miss Naive. Like you could tempt a man like Max Hunter. Right.
Dana whistled. "Wow. Did you blush like that when he looked at you?"
Caroline felt her stomach turn over. "Probably."

Anticipating the evening as he'd anticipated nothing in a very long time. Visualizing kissing her goodnight, hoping she'd be equally responsive to his kiss as she'd been to that simple touch on her lower lip.
God. He'd barely touched her and he'd been ready to come. She'd shivered every time he brushed her lip with his thumb, her eyes growing wider with each breath. She was a novice to whatever she was feeling, those eyes of hers radiating trepidation, then wonder.

"I know you're upset because you love me. I'm asking you to love me enough to trust me"

He'd backed away and she hadn't even asked him to. he'd backed away simply because he'd sensed her discomfort. He hadn't pushed. Hadn't yelled. He didn't even look angry. Her momentary fright had been just that. Momentary. Relief mixed with confidence. The combination was powerful and strange.

"Your mouth. Meant to be kissed." he kissed her tenderly. "By me. I've dreamed of you, every night. And every dream ends the same way. With your hair spread across my pillow."

He felt the muscles of her back again to relax and was stunned to find soothing her was as erotic as kissing her.

"Don't tell me you haven't dreamed about spending the rest of your life with me." He took her hands and put one on each side of his face. "Don't tell me you haven't dreamed of waking up with me. Don't tell me you haven't dreamed of the babies we'd make together."

"I love you, Caroline," he whispered fiercely, his voice shaky and watched her expression soften, her eyes fill. "I promise I'll only make you happy. I promise you'll never be afraid again." 

Four To Score by Janet Evanovich

Four To Score by Janet Evanovich

Year Published: 1998
My Rating: 5 stars
313 pages

This is the fourth book in the Stephanie Plum series.

Bounty hunter Stephanie Plum is after Maxine Nowicki for jumping bail on stealing her ex-boyfriends car. Little does Stephanie know, it gets deeper.. With the help of her backup ex-prostitute named Lula, a cross-dressing drag queen named Sally Sweet who is the puzzle solver, some help from Grandma Mazur and the dangerously handsome vice-cop Joe Morelli :)

As usual Stephanie gets into trouble, has some mishaps with her car and apartment and has someone looking forward to killing her.

More tension between Staphanie and Joe since she had to move in with him temporarly because she didn't have a place to stay. Then rumors run like fire around the Burg.

Really funny book that I enjoyed very much. Stephanie and Joe are starting to grow on me, Grandma Mazur is GREAT.. Lula is a bundle of fun, even the new Sally is interesting. And Ranger is the SHIT as Lula refers to him :)

Quotes I enjoyed from the book:

Vinnie was 5'7", looked like a weasel, thought like a weasel, smelled like a French whore and was once in love with a duck.

"You were trying to get in touch with me?"

"Yeah, I lost your card. I put it down somewhere and couldn't find it. so I looked you up in the phone book...only I got your parents. Good thing, too. Granny told me you're hard up for a man, and it turns out I'm between women right now, and I don't mind older cicks. so I guess this is your lucky day."

The chick made a valient effort not to stab her fork into Eddie Kuntz's eyeball.

"If Mickey Mouse could fly he'd be Donald Duck."

"I though there'd be wanted posters on the walls and gun racks filled with shotguns."

"This isn't dodge City," Lula said. "We got some class here. We keep the guns in the back room with the pervert."

I'd been replaced by a raspberry Popsicle, and Morelli didn't look all that unhappy. I, on the other hand, wanted to smash something. Morelli was right... I wanted him bad. He might have been right about the curtains too, but I didn't want to dwell on the curtains. Lust I could manage, but the very thought of wanting a relationship with Morelli made my blood run cold.

Sally's mascared lashes snapped open. "The Buick? Holy shit, is this your car? It's got portholes. Fucking portholes! What's under the hood."

"A V-eight."

"Yow! A W-eight! A fucking V-eight!"

"Good thing he don't have them tuck underpants on," Lula said. "He'd rupture himself."

"Day my make, punk," Grandma said.

I'm a firm believer in denial. My reasoning is why deal with uppleasantness today when you could get hit by a bus tomorrow. And if you procrastinate long enough, maybe the issue will go away.

It was a small bungalow. All on one floor. Easy to see Maxine wasn't there. "Looks like you're packing."

"Yeah, I'm cleaning out my Dior stuff. I decided I was only wearing Versace from now on."

My eye started to twitch, and I put my finger to it. you see? That's what Morelli does to me...gives me an eye twitch.

Better to live with my parents than Morelli. If I could just make it through a few weeks with my parents, I could move back into my own apartment, and then my life will get back to normal. And then my eye will stop twitching.

Three To Get Deadly by Janet Evanovich

Three To Get Deadly by Janet Evanovich

Year Published: 1997
My Rating: 5 stars
321 pages

This is the third book in the Stephanie Plum series.

Bounty hunter Stephanie Plum is on the hunt again. She becomes persona non grata for looking for the local candystore owner Uncle Mo who does nothing wrong according to everyone she asks, but has jumped bail. She then starts tumbling on dead bodies of drug dealers everywhere she seems to go looking!

She then gets threatened by guys with ski masks who want her to step away from all the action that is happening.

All this with the help of Lula the ex-ho that's working as a file clerk at Vinnie's office. She is hillarous!!!

I enjoyed this book even more than the one before, Stephanie and Joe seem to be getting closer and closer with so much tension in the air. Grandma Mazur is incredibly funny, plus she gets a man and invites him to dinner with the family.

I'm already reading the next book.. Don't know when I'll halt this series and go check other books, but for now I feel I need a bit of comedy and light reading so I'm sticking to this one.

Quotes I enjoyed from the book:

I glances over at Connie. "There isn't anything else I should know, is there? Like, was he armed when arrested?

"Nothing out of the ordinary," Connie said. "A forty-five, a twenty-two and a seven-inch blade."

My voice pitched to incredulity. "Two guns and a knife? Forget it! What do I look like, a suicide waiting to happen?"

He was six hours over on a five o'clock shadow. Even in the darkened barroom I could see the tiny network of lines that appeared around his eyes when he was tired. He slouched with one elbow on the bar and picked at my fries.

"If you had a decent sex life you wouldn't need to gratify yourself like this," he said, his mouth curved into a grin, his teeth white and even against the dark beard.

"My sex life is ok."

"Yeah," Morelli said. "But sometimes it's fun to have a partner."

Ranger stripped off his sweatshirt. "adequate is being able to run five miles. how are you going to catch the bad guys if you can't outrun them?"

"Connie gives the bad guys who can run to you. I get the fat, out-of-shape bad guys."

"You're a walking disaster. A man would have to be a total masochist to be interested in you."

Ranger did a lap and jogged by us without acknowledgment of our presence or lack of.
"So why are you really here?" I asked Lula.
Lula's eyes never left Ranger. "I'm here 'cause he's the shit."
"The shit?"
"Yeah, you know...the shit. The king. The cool."
"Do we know anyone else who's the shit?"
"John Travolta. He's the shit, too."
We watched Ranger some, and I could see her point about Ranger being the shit.
"I've been thinking," Lula said. "Suppose there really were superheroes?"
"Like Batman?"
"That's it. That's what I'm saying. It'd be someone who was the shit."

Two For The Dough by Janet Evanovich

Two For The Dough by Janet Evanovich

Year Published: 1996
My Rating: 5 stars
336 pages

This is the second book in the Stephanie Plum series.

Bounty hunter stephanie Plum is back and is assigned to catch an insane ex-Army Kenny Mancuso, after he jumped his bail. He has shot his best friend and seems to have turned wealthy all of a sudden.
While doing that she is assigned to look for missing caskets from a funeral parlor. With the help of Grandma Mazur who seems always ready to visit a funeral viewing any time of the day.
All this with vice-cop Joe Morelli watching over her shoulder while bumping in him every turn of the way.

She then starts receiving embaled missing body parts as a warning for her to mind her own business and stay away, threatening not only her but even the people she holds dear.

This book was a real page turner that was so much fun with a lot of laugh out loud moments. The tension between Stephanie and Joe is a lot of fun, having you wondering what might happen next.
Grandma Mazur is a bundle of laughs, with her quirky ideas and fun moves.
It's been a while since I read the first book but I fell into this one so fast that it made me wonder what kept me away from this series so long. I already started the next book in the series too!

Quotes I enjoyed from the book:

In the burg it is possible to be born into bumhood. The Morelli and Mancuso women are above reprouch, but the men are jerks. They drink, they cuss, they slap their kids around and cheat on their wives and girlfriends.

We had warm homemade apple pie for desert. The apples were tart and cinnamony. The crust was flaky and crisp with a sprinkling of sugar. I ate two pieces and almost had an orgasm. "You should open a bakery," I said to my mother. "You could make a fortune selling pies."

"Look at that skirt,: my mother said when she opened the door to me. "It's no wonder we have so much crime today what with these short skirts. How can you sit in a skirt like that? Everyone can see everything?"

"It's two inches above my knee. It's not that short."

"I haven't got all day to stand here talking about skirts," Grandma Mazur said. "I got to get to the funeral parlor. I gotta see how they laid this guy out. I hope they didn't smooth over those bullet holes too good."

"Don't get your hopes up," I told Grandma Mazur. "I think this will be closed coffin."

Morelli turned my suit collar up against the chill air. His knuckeles brushed my neck, and his gaze lingered on my mouth. "You have a nice family," he said.

I narrowed my eyes. "If you kiss me I'll scream, and then my father will come out and punch you in the nose." And before any of those things happened, I'd probably wet my pants.

"You know that new file clerk we just hired?"

"Sally Something."

"Yeah. Sally Who Knew the Alphabet."

I looked around the office. "she seems to be missing."

"You bet she's missing. Your cousin Vinnie caught her at a forty-five-degree angle in front of the D drawer and tried to play hide the salami."

Morelli gave me a boy, are you stupid or what look. "I understand they have positions available for makeover ladies at Macy's"

"Don't start with the makeover stuff again. So I made a mistake."

"Cookie, you're making a career out of making mistakes."

"It's my style. And don't call me Cookie."

Some people learn from books, some listen to the advice of others, some learn from mistakes. I fit into the last catgory. So sue me. At least I rarely made the same mistake twice... with the possible exception of Morelli. Morelli had this habit of periodically screwing up my life. And I had a habit of letting him do it.

"Going to be a threesome," I told him. "You and me and Morelli."

"He there now?" Ranger wanted to know.

"Yeah"

"You naked?"

"No."

"Still early," Ranger said.

I heard the disconnect, amd I hung up.

Connie was smiling ear to ear. "I figure she can handle Vinnie."

"Yeah," Lula said. "He try anything with me, and I'll stomp pn the little motherfucker. He mess with a big woman like me, and he be nothin' more than a smelly spot on the carpet."

The phone rang at seven. I squinted at the clock and then at the phone. There is no such thing as a good call at 7 A.M. It's been my experience that all calls between the hours of 11 P.M. and 9 A. M. are disaster calls.

What did a kiss on the forehead mean, anyway? Nothing, I told myself. It didn't mean anything at all. It meant that sometimes Morelli could be a nice guy. Okay, so why was I smiling like an idiot? Becasue I was deprived. My love life was nonexistent. I shared an apartment with a hamster. Well, I thought it could be worse.

Prolific Blogger Award

Thanks to my dear friend Yvonne for this wonderfully gorgeous award.. I'm truly honored..

A Prolific Blogger is one who is intellectually productive… keeping up an active blog that is filled with enjoyable content.

Every winner of the Prolific Blogger Award has to pass on this award to at least seven other deserving prolific bloggers. Spread some love!

Each Prolific Blogger must link to the blog from which he/she has received the award.

Every Prolific Blogger must link back to this post, which explains the origins and motivation for the award.

Every Prolific Blogger must visit this post and add his/her name in the Mr. Linky so that we all can get to know the other winners.

I'm gonna pass on passing this award but if you are reading this, consider yourself awarded :)

A Touch Of Dead by Charlaine Harris

A Touch Of Dead by Charlaine Harris

Year Published: 2009
My Rating: 5 stars
192 pages

This is a collection of Sookie Stackhouse short stories.. All the ones written until now.. They were a joy to read.. It included the following stories..

1. Fairy Dust
This is the story of Claudette, the third triplet of Claude and Claudine. She gets murdered and the surviving twins seek the help of sookie to find out who the killer is.

2. Dracula Night
I've read this one before, but that was so long ago. I read it after only reading the first book in the series and it gave me shock and spoiled something I didn't want spoiled.. But this time round it was great, it's supposed to be read after book 4.
Sookie is invited to Fangtasia by Eric because he is expecting a very special guest to attend, but when the guest of honor wants a bite of Sookie , trouble starts!

3. One Word Answer
Sookie learns of the death of her cousin Hadley and discovering a secret about her that she didn't know while she was alive. She then meets Mr. Cataliades and the Queen of Louisiana for the first time.

Bill as always runs to the rescue at the first sign of trouble with the help of Bubba.

4. Lucky
Sookie's insurance guy seems to have suck up all the luck in the area leading to others losing business.

5. Gift Wrap

Sookie is all alone on Christmas eve, then she engages in a no strings attatched night of passion that was the greatest Christmas gift she could receive.

A very enjoyable book for all those Sookie fans like me :)

Thaw Blogsplash - Read Thaw for free

Ruth's diary is the new novel by Fiona Robyn, called Thaw. She has decided to blog the novel in its entirety over the next few months, so you can read it for free.

Ruth's first entry is below, and you can continue reading tomorrow here.

*

These hands are ninety-three years old. They belong to Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. She was so frail that her grand-daughter had to carry her onto the set to take this photo. It’s a close-up. Her emaciated arms emerge from the top corners of the photo and the background is black, maybe velvet, as if we’re being protected from seeing the strings. One wrist rests on the other, and her fingers hang loose, close together, a pair of folded wings. And you can see her insides.

The bones of her knuckles bulge out of the skin, which sags like plastic that has melted in the sun and is dripping off her, wrinkling and folding. Her veins look as though they’re stuck to the outside of her hands. They’re a colour that’s difficult to describe: blue, but also silver, green; her blood runs through them, close to the surface. The book says she died shortly after they took this picture. Did she even get to see it? Maybe it was the last beautiful thing she left in the world.

I’m trying to decide whether or not I want to carry on living. I’m giving myself three months of this journal to decide. You might think that sounds melodramatic, but I don’t think I’m alone in wondering whether it’s all worth it. I’ve seen the look in people’s eyes. Stiff suits travelling to work, morning after morning, on the cramped and humid tube. Tarted-up girls and gangs of boys reeking of aftershave, reeling on the pavements on a Friday night, trying to mop up the dreariness of their week with one desperate, fake-happy night. I’ve heard the weary grief in my dad’s voice.

So where do I start with all this? What do you want to know about me? I’m Ruth White, thirty-two years old, going on a hundred. I live alone with no boyfriend and no cat in a tiny flat in central London. In fact, I had a non-relationship with a man at work, Dan, for seven years. I’m sitting in my bedroom-cum-living room right now, looking up every so often at the thin rain slanting across a flat grey sky. I work in a city hospital lab as a microbiologist. My dad is an accountant and lives with his sensible second wife Julie, in a sensible second home. Mother finished dying when I was fourteen, three years after her first diagnosis. What else? What else is there?

Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. I looked at her hands for twelve minutes. It was odd describing what I was seeing in words. Usually the picture just sits inside my head and I swish it around like tasting wine. I have huge books all over my flat; books you have to take in both hands to lift. I’ve had the photo habit for years. Mother bought me my first book, black and white landscapes by Ansel Adams. When she got really ill, I used to take it to bed with me and look at it for hours, concentrating on the huge trees, the still water, the never-ending skies. I suppose it helped me think about something other than what was happening. I learned to focus on one photo at a time rather than flicking from scene to scene in search of something to hold me. If I concentrate, then everything stands still. Although I use them to escape the world, I also think they bring me closer to it. I’ve still got that book. When I take it out, I handle the pages as though they might flake into dust.

Mother used to write a journal. When I was small, I sat by her bed in the early mornings on a hard chair and looked at her face as her pen spat out sentences in short bursts. I imagined what she might have been writing about; princesses dressed in star-patterned silk, talking horses, adventures with pirates. More likely she was writing about what she was going to cook for dinner and how irritating Dad’s snoring was.

I’ve always wanted to write my own journal, and this is my chance. Maybe my last chance. The idea is that every night for three months, I’ll take one of these heavy sheets of pure white paper, rough under my fingertips, and fill it up on both sides. If my suicide note is nearly a hundred pages long, then no-one can accuse me of not thinking it through. No-one can say; ‘It makes no sense; she was a polite, cheerful girl, had everything to live for’, before adding that I did keep myself to myself. It’ll all be here. I’m using a silver fountain pen with purple ink. A bit flamboyant for me, I know. I need these idiosyncratic rituals; they hold things in place. Like the way I make tea, squeezing the tea-bag three times, the exact amount of milk, seven stirs. My writing is small and neat; I’m striping the paper. I’m near the bottom of the page now. Only ninety-one more days to go before I’m allowed to make my decision. That’s it for today. It’s begun.

Continue reading tomorrow here...

(PS Thaw is out now if you can’t wait – find it at Amazon UK or The Book Depository if you’re in the US/elsewhere).