Category: Publishers

A Stella Review: Patchwork Paradise by Indra Vaughn

RATING  5  out of 5 stars

PatchworkParadise_600x900Oliver and Samuel’s relationship is fairy-tale perfect. They share a gorgeous house in Antwerp, go out with their friends every weekend, and count down the days to their dream wedding. But their happy ending is shattered one late night, and just like that, Ollie is left bereft and alone.

The months that follow are long and dark, but slowly Ollie emerges from his grief. He even braves the waters of online dating, though deep down he doesn’t believe he can find that connection again. He doesn’t think to look for love right in front of him: his bisexual friend Thomas, the gentle giant with a kind heart and sad eyes who’s wanted him all along.

When Thomas suddenly discovers he has a son who needs him, he’s ill prepared. Ollie opens up his house—Sam’s house—and lets them in. Ollie doesn’t know what scares him more: the responsibility of caring for a baby, or the way Thomas is steadily winning his heart. It will take all the courage he has to discover whether or not fairy tales can happen for real.

Indra Vaughn continues to amazed me. After the christmas story, The Winter Spirit , I was curious about this new one. I’ll be honest and say I chose to read Patchwork Paradise because from the blurb it reminded me of one of my all time favorite mm book, Second Chance by TA Webb. In fact they have some elements in common, so it was really no surprise I loved this one so much too. From the blurb I understood it had all the things I need to have in a story.

This book is an emotional story, so heartbroken because the author let me meet and briefly fall in love with Sam, and then she took him away from Ollie and me.

I began following Ollie in the great pain that losing the person he shared his life for the last ten years can give. He needed to relearn the daily habits alone and start living again.  Also Ollie had to deal with the attachment to the house he shared with his Sam and the fear of losing it by  the persons he considered his family and are now acting like strangers.

He broke my heart but knowing there was going to be so much more to come, made me fully enjoy even the very bad times. At the end Patchwork Paradise is a second chance at love story and Ollie will heal with the support of amazing friends and an unexpected new love.

The words flew easily, it was a pleasure to read. I loved the story was focused not just on the MCs, it made easy to know the secondary ones pretty well too, even the not so likable ones. Moreover to me the timing was perfect, I think the author did great at balance everything at the right time, it’s a story with no pause, it kept me hooked from the start, still there was no rushing, the events were all very considerate of Ollie life and his grieving.

I really couldn’t find a reason to give Patchwork Paradise less than five stars. I liked all the characters, especially Ollie. I laughed and cried a lot with him. His was a beautiful journey among love, friendships, loss, hurt and love again.

Indra Vaughn wrote another success. Sweet, emotional, developed in time and characters, well written and simply complete in every detail. It’s one of that stories I don’t need to wonder what is going to happen at the end. It truly satisfied me and I’m sure my MCs are living their HEA beautifully.

The COVER ART by Lou Harper won me over in the lower half with the toys and the crib but there is something in the models, I don’t know, maybe the sweaters or their faces. With a story like this, the cover should have been so much better.

Sales Links:  Riptide Publishing | ARe | Amazon

Book Details:

ebook, 275 pages

Expected publication: March 28th 2016 by Riptide Publishing

ISBN 1626493804 (ISBN13: 9781626493803)

Edition Language English

Love Can Find Its Way Again with a Patchwork Paradise by Indra Vaughn (giveaway)

PatchworkParadise_600x900

Patchwork Paradise by Indra Vaughn
Riptide Publishing
Cover Art by Lou Harper

Read an Excerpt/Buy It Here At Riptide Publishing

About Patchwork Paradise

Oliver and Samuel’s relationship is fairy-tale perfect. They share a gorgeous house in Antwerp, go out with their friends every weekend, and count down the days to their dream wedding. But their happy ending is shattered one late night, and just like that, Ollie is left bereft and alone.

The months that follow are long and dark, but slowly Ollie emerges from his grief. He even braves the waters of online dating, though deep down he doesn’t believe he can find that connection again. He doesn’t think to look for love right in front of him: his bisexual friend Thomas, the gentle giant with a kind heart and sad eyes who’s wanted him all along.

When Thomas suddenly discovers he has a son who needs him, he’s ill prepared. Ollie opens up his house—Sam’s house—and lets them in. Ollie doesn’t know what scares him more: the responsibility of caring for a baby, or the way Thomas is steadily winning his heart. It will take all the courage he has to discover whether or not fairy tales can happen for real.

About Indra Vaughn

After living in Michigan, USA for seven wonderful years, Indra Vaughn returned back to her Belgian roots. There she will continue to consume herbal tea, do yoga wherever the mat fits, and devour books while single parenting a little boy and working as a nurse.

The stories of boys and their unrequited love will no doubt keep finding their way onto the page—and hopefully into readers hands—even if it takes a little more time.

And if she gleefully posts pictures of snow-free streets in winter, you’ll have to forgive her. Those Michigan blizzards won’t be forgotten in a hurry.

Connect with Indra:

PatchworkParadise_TourBanner

Giveaway

To celebrate, Indra is giving away an ebook from her backlist at EVERY BLOG STOP! She’ll also be giving out a grand prize of $25 in Riptide credit. Leave a comment to enter the contest. Entries close at midnight, Eastern time, on April 2, 2016. Contest is NOT restricted to U.S. entries. Thanks for following the tour, and don’t forget to leave your contact info!

Short and Sweet This Sunday. This Week at Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words

Short and Sweet This Sunday.  Its Spring, Its Eostre, Its Easter.

Happy Both To You All!

 

Its been a family sort of weekend here and with the sun shining and a gathering falling among us, there’s been little time to ponder thoughts of Eostre or Easter or other things I usually go on about on this date.

Instead its been filled with trying that Bon Appetite’s dill pickle brined fried chicken recipe to take with me (its divine), making  appetizers, joining with a neighbor as we purloined/rescued old azaleas bound for the trash heap, and then heading out for a long day of celebrating family and friends.

No time for thoughts of celebrating spring,  but perhaps just doing it.  Wine was drunk, fruit was involved, there was song, (iTunes or Amazon Music), a very mild, sexless of course bacchanalia of sorts.  We all said how happy we were that Spring was here and that the weather  was making us feel so much livelier, in tune with ourselves and the world around us.

Ok, so perhaps, the blog wrote itself.

But its still short, the weather, lovely inviting Spring weather makes it sweet. So now here is the upcoming week schedule.

☂☂☂☂☂☂☂☂☂

This Week at Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words

Sunday, March 27:

  • Short and Sweet This Sunday. This Week at Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words

Monday, March 28:

  • Waking Jamal by Amberly Smith –  Release Day Guest Author Blog
  • Patchwork Paradise blog tour with Indra Vaughn
  • A F.D. Review: The Prince’s Consort by Antonia Aquilante
  • A Jeri Review: Close to You by Skylar M Cates (release day review)
  • A Stella Review:  A Patchwork Paradise by Indra Vaughn

Tuesday, March 29:

  • LM Somerton ‘Elemental Love’ book blast and giveaway
  • In the Book Spotlight: VL Locey ‘Full Strength’ (excerpt and giveaway)
  • A F.D. Review: The Last Thing He Needs by J.H. Knight
  • A Paul B Review: Sealed with Honor by Caitlin Ricci and A J Marcus

Wednesday, March 30:

  • Tour: Will & Patrick Meet the Mob (Wake Up Married #5)by Leta Blake and Alice Griffiths
  • A Mika Review: Will & Patrick Meet the Mob by Leta Blake and Alice Griffiths
  • A Stella Review: Happy by Chris Scully
  • A MelanieM Review: Fish and Ghosts by Rhys Ford

Thursday, March 31:

  • Nicky James ‘Something From Nothing’ Tour and Giveaway
  • In Our Book Spotlight: Sinful Pleasure by Emmanual Lang (excerpt and giveaway)
  • A  Paul B Review: The Leprechaun’s Gamble by A J Marcus
  • A F.D. Review: Devil at the Crossroads by Cornelia Grey
  • A F.D. Review: Circus of the Damned by Cornelia Grey

Friday, April 1:

  • AC Katt ‘The Sarran Senator’ (M/M/F menage) tour and giveaway
  • Beneath The Surface by M.A. Church tour and giveaway
  • Fragments of a Unicorn’s Soul by J.R. Loveless
  • Release Day for Happy by Chris Scully – guest blog
  • A MelanieM Review: Forgive and Forget By Charlie Cochet (release day)
  • A Stella Review: Neon White E4 by Wulf Francu Godgluck

Saturday, April 2:

  • Its Release Day for House Hunt by Author: Jackie Keswick – guest blog
  • A Lila Review: House Hunt by Jackie Keswick

 

 

 

 

A Free Dreamer Review: The Empty Hourglass (Deal with a Devil) by Cornelia Grey

Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5

The Empty HourglassThomas Escott has always wanted to be a toymaker, yet just as he achieves his dream, an accident claims his right hand. He’s certain his life is over—until he hears about groundbreaking prosthetics being made by a reclusive inventor.

Jethro Hastings is perfectly content to live alone up in the mountains working on a secret masterpiece: a humanoid automaton that will change the scientific community forever. He’s behind schedule, and the date of the unveiling is fast approaching, so when Thomas shows up on his doorstep offering help in exchange for a mechanical hand, Jethro agrees. Time, after all, is running out on another deal he’s made: one with the devil.

The devil gives Jethro’s inventions life, but he can just as quickly take life away—Jethro’s, to be exact. As the sand in the devil’s hourglass falls, marking the time until the end of the deal, inventions go haywire, people get hurt, and Thomas realizes he needs Jethro just as much as his prosthetic. Now he must find a way to save Jethro’s soul, but negotiating with a devil is just as difficult as it sounds.

Review: First of all, while this is part of a series, “The Empty Hourglass” is a stand alone. Every book set in the “Deal with a Devil” universe can be read independently. They only have one minor character in common.

I was really looking forward to this book. I absolutely loved the first short story of this universe, “Devil at the Crossroads”, and “The Circus of the Damned” was pretty good too. And when there was a promise of a freaky, steampunky prosthetic, I was ecstatic. Apparently I have a real thing for that. Anyway, my expectations were very high and unfortunately the book couldn’t quite live up to them.

I liked that Thomas was a bit of an underdog. I would’ve liked to read more about his background, though. It’s not every day you meet somebody who grew up on the streets and then turned into a toy maker of all things in your M/M books. That could have made for a really interesting story, but unfortunately the author didn’t really use that potential.

Jethro is your typical eccentric inventor: Kind of grumpy and a bit of a weird loner, but with a good heart and a tragic past to boot. His characterization was a little shallow, leaving him with little depth and a lot of stereotypes.

One of the reasons why I loved the other two books in this universe is the sex. Cornelia Grey can write incredibly sensual, delightfully different sex scenes. Unfortunately, this time she chose to leave the sex non-explicit, which is a real shame. I usually don’t mind fade-to-black scenes, but I was really looking forward to how and if the author would incorporate the prosthetic. That unfortunately didn’t happen here and I was a little disappointed, to be honest.

I loved that Cornelia Grey actually decided to have a real ghost show up. I’ve never seen a similar take on ghosts and mysticism. That was really well done. But again, a little more detail would have been really nice.

The world building was unfortunately rather lacking. There’s talk about a big war that happened a few years back. Thomas was even recruited as an engineer and the experience seems to have left some deep impressions. There are also a lot of veterans who were injured during said war. However, we never do find out any details about the war. Who fought against whom? And why? For how long? And so on. I really expected more details since it played such an important role in the story.

The ending felt a little forced, as if the author realized she had to write a happy end of some sort and hastily came up with a magical solution for it all.

Overall, this was the weakest book of the series so far. It lacked in details and didn’t even have any of Grey’s usually sizzling hot sex scenes. It seems like the series gets weaker with every new book the author writes. A shame, because “Devil at the Crossroads” was simply amazing. But now I finally want a book solely about Farfarello, the devil everybody’s making deals with.

Cover: I don’t particularly like the cover by Jay Asher. It doesn’t really fit with the other two books, which have absolutely gorgeous covers. There’s just too much brown for my liking and the picture looks kind of blurry.

Sales Links:   Riptide Publishing | ARe | Amazon  other links to  come

Book details:

ebook, 264 pages
Expected publication: April 9th 2016 by Riptide Publishing
Original TitleThe Empty Hourglass
ISBN139781626493933
Edition LanguageEnglish
SeriesDeal with a Devil