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Bev's Books » Entries tagged with "Stephanie Laurens"

She’s writing about the grandkids now?

A funny thing happens when one takes a break from reading for a period of time. A favorite author’s backlist can multiply like rabbits, especially when we’re talking about the romance genre. At least nowadays. Case in point, a couple of weeks ago, I go out to eat with my children and on the way home we stop do some shopping. Oddly enough, or not, we all three end up in the book aisle at about the same time and start jokingly picking out books for each other. Then things took a turn into the very funny when I pick up a new book by Stephanie Laurens, take one look at the back description and realize it’s a Cynster spin-off but I have no idea who the heck the main character … Read entire article »

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alpha heroines

(Editing note: I’ve been going through old posts and files doing some housekeeping to categorize and tag them and decided that it would be fun to periodically – probably every 5th Wednesday – pull one forward for a second look. The criteria I use to pick them could be research for a current topics of interest or a whim of something that catches my attention while browsing the bowels of the site. Heck, I may even dig up something I posted elsewhere and no one’s ever seen. Who knows. Today’s recycled post was originally posted here on Feb 2, 2006 and got picked because I was checked to see what I’d already said about Stephanie Laurens.I’ll explain why she’s on my mind in more detail very soon.)    Sandy’s post yesterday on … Read entire article »

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Ten Nights of Love: Stephanie Laurens

Over the twelve years since the Cynster series by Stephanie Laurens first debuted, I sometimes honestly believe I’ve spent more time defending her heroines to other romance readers online than I’ve spent reading the books. Her heroines, mind you, not her heroes. To me, that’s significant because I’m not sure what other author’s heroine’s I’d think deserved the defense. Not needed it, mind you, but deserved it. In the one and only review I ever wrote, I said this about Honoria, the heroine in Devil’s Bride, and in many ways I think it holds true for most of Laurens’ heroines to some degree or another: Poor Honoria, her fate is sealed, or so Devil keeps telling her. And, lest anyone think it’s as simple as that, Honoria is one of the most sensible … Read entire article »

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When the formula works ;-)

I finally finished What Price Love? and I liked it. Not loved it, mind you, but even with having to struggle through (okay downright skip) parts of it, I did enjoy the horse racing scandal storyline. The romance itself picked up considerably for me when I reached the “boy loses girl” point, too, and Dillon had to follow Pris to London. Of course, since this was Laurens, boy didn’t actually lose girl. With this author, it’s more a matter of boy laying siege to girl surrounded by the Cynster clan, and everyone else, mostly, giving him their full support. Which got me to thinking about that list of things that are always supposed to happen in romances. I can’t remember who came up with it off the top of my head but … Read entire article »

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Secrets – as plot devices they can be tricky

I’m still reading What Price Love? by Laurens, but I did finally give up on a section at the beginning of the book from about ch. 5 to roughly ch 10. Once I decided to give myself permission to do that, I figured out what the problem was. It isn’t the horse racing per se but the fact that they’re investigating a racing scandal and that was being held up by Pris keeping secrets from Dillon unnecessarily. Oh, she had her reasons and they’re probably pretty good ones, but I was impatient to get to the meat of the story. Now that they’re actually in the thick of things, so to speak, I’m reading along at a pretty good clip and will hopefully finish the book tonight if I don’t get … Read entire article »

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Well, that was a bust

I was in and out of the doctor’s office so fast I barely had time to get the book out of my bag, much less read anything. Truly amazing considering I as in for a yearly physical. OTOH, I think I’ve figured out part of the reason why I’m having so much difficulty reading this one. It’s the horse racing theme. Now normally something esoteric like that would grab my attention but I’m not a horse person and I just remembered I had problems getting into Demon’s book, too. So, I am seriously considering either pulling out another one of hers to reread – I’m leaning towards either Gerard’s or Michael’s stories – or going back to one of Jayne Castle’s Harmony stories. Yeah, that’s another binge I’ve been on lately. Related Posts:When the … Read entire article »

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Ever kept wading?

I have recently been on a binge of reading/rereading a bunch of books by old favorite authors. Apparently there are several that I have books by that I’ve never gotten around to reading. What Price Love? by Stephanie Laurens is a prime example and I think I’ve figured out why. Or maybe not. I love this author. I’m one of her main defenders within romance circles online but I have to say that reading this one is like wading through mush for some reason. My mind keeps wandering. I keep finding myself jumping ahead to read other parts of the story, which are not altogether bad. It’s not that I’m not interested in the story itself. It’s that I can’t seem to read it in a linear fashion starting at the beginning … Read entire article »

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