Tag: @taralain

Review: Hot Wings (The Hot Cannolis #2) by Eli Easton and Tara Lain

Rating: 5 🌈

Hot is right. I’ve been anxiously waiting for this story since the author’s announced it was Donny’s story with a newly transferred gay fire pilot.

Donato “Donny” Cannoli is a mess of a man, something of a norm actually for the men of the enormous Italian family where the ideals of manhood run adjacent to those of toxic masculinity. Where they , actually everyone, are expected to go into careers of service, dangerous service. Firefighters, law enforcement…nothing less. Marry, produce another generation to do the exact same, and carry on the Cannoli name and reputation.

No matter the personal cost.

Hot Seat, Mike’s story was a dramatic representation of exactly how high that cost could be when the stress and denial became too great.

And it caused an emotional, heartbreaking,sea change in attitude in Donny. Prior to the shattering event towards the end of that story, Donny , like his older brother, Gabe, was a homophobic machismo sneering bully. But afterwards?

A changed man who had his brother’s back and started standing up for Mike and against those uttering homophobic slurs.

That’s where we find him now. A man who’s foundation has been shaken, the cracks appearing… when out and proud Dell Murphy arrives , to further the job of disassembling the man Donny always thought himself to be.

Lain and Easton do an absolutely superlative job here with Donny’s emotionally profound and painful journey, with himself and Dell, to his truth. He’s bisexual, he’s never going to fit within his father’s ideals, and he’s got a new better future if he’s brave enough to accept it and himself.

It’s a path you’re on with Donny that’s at times raw, sexually hot, and heartwarming, and also so deeply complicated that you just hurt for him as he unravels all those familial issues that have him trussed up so tightly in old ideals that have never fit him.

Dell Murphy has his complications. All just as well executed and emotional. And like Donny’s, they stem from family. His issues with his father has driven home certain areas of behavior and trust that Donny’s triggering. He’s also the one who’s the security for his Mam and sister , Gala. Those characters too are just amazing.

There’s so many great elements here. Dell is a realistic pilot and the research into the plane, flying, fire intensity…. It’s all here. And it makes for some incredibly high suspense action. Awesome co- pilot too.

The truth is this book is so fantastic I could babble on about all the great things the authors have put into this story that enrich the storylines and support the characters growing relationship, but why not just pick it up and read it? It’s fabulous!

I will say you should read Hot Seat first to get an indication of the events that happened previously and how far Donny’s characters has changed.

I’m highly recommending this and the series to date.

Now an interesting note on the next two stories. Due to unexpected complications (author Tara Alain’s surgery and recovery), Lain and Easton aren’t co-writing the next books. Instead each will write a single novel.

I’m wondering how that will effect the sort of edgy balance they’ve achieved here in the series to date between raw , deeply emotional issues each character has had to process and overcome and the romantic relationship element. It’s been a delicate maneuver. In Mike’s novel, it was really more about his journey towards self acceptance, and then it was his romance.

Here in Hot Wings, I thought it was equally important. Beautifully crafted.

Now to see how and who is next.

The Hot Cannolis series:

◦ Fireman’s Carry (The Hot Cannolis #0.5) by Eli Easton

✓ Hot Seat #1

✓ Hot Wings #2

◦ Hot Pursuit #3 by Eli Easton date TBD

◦ Hot Lips #4 by Tara Lain, date TBD

https://www.goodreads.com › showHot Wings (The Hot Cannolis #2) by Eli Easton – Goodreads

Synopsis:

The alpha meets his match.

Most macho of all the super-alpha Canali brothers and proud of it, Donny’s famous for his gorgeous face, his firefighter prowess, and for going through girls his family doesn’t approve of as fast as he changes jeans.

Donny’s biggest hero is his fire captain dad, until his life gets saved from the skies by fire pilot Dell Murphy.

Dell’s certain about most things. He’s been proud to be gay since he was ten, handled a helicopter in Afghanistan like it was part of his body, and can fly a fire bomber in the worst conflagration. And he’s absolutely certain that Donny Canali belongs to him.
Dell also knows how to show a lover he’s in charge.

Donny’s shocked to discover how much he’s turned on by dominant Dell, but Donny’s not gay. He’s not. He can’t be. It would break his father’s heart.

Leaving Dell will break Donny’s.

HOT WINGS is a battle of the alphas, hot firefighters, two crazy families, dominant lover, HEA romance with a helping of laughter and even more feels.

Review: Hot Seat (The Hot Cannolis #1) by Eli Easton and Tara Lain

Rating: 4.5 🌈

I hadn’t read Fireman’s Carry (The Hot Cannolis #0.5) by Eli Easton that was the source and inspiration for this series by Easton and Lain. I will certainly go ahead and do that now that I’ve read this book and the romance of those characters.

What is started there , a major fire and rescue of over 60 people by firefighter Mike Canali and civilian Shane Bower is where this novel’s storylines begins. With the aftermath of those events,weeks later, in everyone’s lives.

The events in that story are recounted somewhat so it’s not necessary to have read it to step into the people and their situations here.

One important detail, however, that’s not mentioned anywhere, either in the descriptions or authors note. There is a on page attempt at suicide, although it’s never actually termed that out loud. Also character depression. If any of this is a trigger for a reader, please know this in advance so you be the best judge about whether to read the story or not.

There are so many terrific elements here. The characters are very well done. Shane Bower and his Pops are amazing. From the moment Shane makes his appearance on the page with his book club (who I also adored hugely) I was immediately engaged. He was believable, likable, vulnerable, just everything you knew would end up pulling at your heart strings. Then I met his grandfather, Pops. And I was all in. Pops is another great character. Throughly realistic and wonderful.

I think most readers will have mixed feelings about the Cannolis, the enormous Italian firefighter clan that Mike Cannoli belongs to. I feel they are pretty realistic myself in the way they are portrayed. I’ve know a family very similar to them and while some may argue they may seem too black and white in their characteristics, I can argue that those personality traits are also very believable and true .

The men , father and brothers, were very homophobic and followed that old hard core machismo that impacted every part of their lives from childhood up. For Mike, having to live up to their ideals and endure their rigid idea of masculinity made the stress upon his daily life an ever increasing pressure he wasn’t even aware of. Until he was. When the very out Shane Bower enters his and his family’s life.

The authors accurately portrayed what happens when the status quo is upset within a traditional Italian family, with the women on one side and the men on the other.

The majority of the story deals with Mike and his coming to grips first with his sexuality, then with the idea of a relationship, then the overwhelming fear of being known as gay to his family. This is really his story and it’s a realistic, painful one.

Shane is just as much a part of it as a out and proud gay man in love with someone who can’t accept himself. That’s another element and equally hurtful. To Shane and Mike.

The support characters, from the wonderful women of the Cannoli family to Shane’s friends to a surprise in the form of Donny, give this story extra depth. I love them all.

Mike’s depression and the events that follow feel accurate but deserve a trigger warning. FYI.

I am recommending this story. I wouldn’t call this a romantic comedy however. There’s humor but the focus is serious and dramatic while still including the romance.

I liked that the authors recognizes that not everyone would be able to come around and accept Mike’s new sexuality completely. That’s just not realistic given his family. Thanks for keeping it real!

I’m really looking forward to the next in the series. It’s Donny’s story, Hot Winds. Can’t wait.

Until then pick this up and enjoy!

The Hot Cannolis series:

◦ Fireman’s Carry (The Hot Cannolis #0.5) by Eli Easton

✓ Hot Seat #1

◦ Hot Wings #2 – March 29, 2022

https://www.goodreads.com › showHot Seat (The Hot Cannolis #1) by Eli Easton – Goodreads

Synopsis:

Wait. Can a Canali be gay?

Hero firefighter, youngest of six macho Italian brothers and—in love with Shane Bower, who never met a unicorn T-shirt he didn’t love? How does that even work?

When Mike Canali meets Shane Bower, his attraction to the guy is off the charts. But then his huge family and intense job full of rules and expectations intrude and he never calls.

Until they both get a medal—
and his mom falls in love with Shane at the ceremony—
and all of a sudden Shane’s all over his life, whether Mike likes it or not.

The butch Canali family face-to-face with sparkly Shane Bower? This is a wildfire of its own.

Shane worked damned hard to be who he is—fantastic, femme and in-your-face. He won’t compromise that, even to have the super-hot man of his dreams. But can he really ask Mike to give up his family and future just to have his fabulous self? Especially when he’s falling in love with the Canali family too?

HOT SEAT is a hot firefighter, big crazy family, coming out, opposites attract, forced proximity, romantic comedy—with all the feels.

☃️❄️❄️Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words Favored Holiday Reads this 2021!❄️❄️☃️

12 Days of Christmas (or Whatever you Celebrate) Reading List!

❄️Tis the season for holiday stories and I’ve read some outstanding ones so far, one’s that made me roar with laughter, some that had me reaching for the tissues, and so many that had me shaking my head at the mad writing skills and imagination of the authors represented on the list here.

⛸❄️Here’s my list of Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words 12 Days of the Holidays 2021 Favorites to Read!🎄⛄️

⭐️Merry Measure by Lily Morton

❄️Cosy & Chill by Jackie Keswick

❄️Christmas Wish List (Hartbridge Christmas #2) by N.R. Walker*

❄️A Very Genre Christmas by Kim Fielding

❄️The Christmas Tenor (Laurel Holidays #3) by V. L. Locey

❄️Dreidels & Do Overs by Kim Fielding

❄️Snowed (Boston Rebels #3) by R.J. Scott and V.L. Locey

❄️The Geek Who Saved Christmas by Annabeth Albert

❄️Merry Elf-ing Christmas by Beth Bolden

❄️Gingerbread Mistletoe (Lighthouse Bay #2) by Amy Aislin*

❄️Holigay by K.M. Neuhold

❄️The Wishing Tree by R.J. Scott

⛄️❄️Just Missed the 12 Days of Christmas list…barely…mostly because I wanted 12….

✓ Dearest Malachi Keogh (Dearest Milton James #1.5) by N.R. Walker

✓ Ethan and Jag Destroy the World by Maz Maddox

✓ The Fairy Dance by Tara Lain

✓ The Holiday List (Script Club #4) by Lane Hayes

✓ Tic-Tac Mistletoe Christmas by NR Walker

✓ Christmas Lane (Lighthouse Bay #1) by Amy Aislin

There were a couple of Christmas series above that I loved. They are indicated by a *, so gather up all the books there.

Honestly many authors are listed multiple times because they just rocked the holiday tales! That includes a review to come on the wonderful On A Midnight Clear by Lily Morton so it will be on an updated and expanded End of Year list

Have I left out some of your favorites this season? Let me know! I’m always on the hunt for new authors and stories. Or just plain out stuff I missed.

It’s just me now, and since I’m buying the books I’m reading , I actually have a TBR list that’s growing. 😂🤷‍♀️Help me add to it. **

Happy Holidays whatever you may celebrate from myself and my blog, Scattered Thoughts and Rogue Words.

** (No DSP or related businesses pls, Ty).

Review: The Fairy Dance by Tara Lain

Rating: 4 🌈⛄️

The Fairy Dance by Tara Lain is a sweet Christmas romance. Running at the size of a novella, this is a very quick read which works as it’s one of this author’s love at first sight stories.

She does a great job of making us believe in the instant connection between Henri the dancer and Jed, the head of his own building maintenance business .

Yes, that whole “maintenance man’ thing is a bit of a misdirection in a way as Jed is a very successful business man who’s company just happens to include maintenance as well as electrical work etc among its many services.

That aside, Jed is a wonderful character, with a found family of interesting employees to like and an adorable Lab to throw heart eyes at. Instantly relatable!

So too is Henri, especially the more we learn of his circumstances, his boss, and the pressures he’s under.

He’s beautiful, both a man of personal grace and strength while demonstrating great emotional fragility. I love him.

This is an instant where I thought it worked so well. The characters, the plot, and the length of story. It’s a HFN, as it should be.

I thought the “I love you’s” came about a tad quick but that’s just me.

Otherwise The Fairy Dance by Tara Lain is a lovely Christmas story to add to your holiday reading list. I’m definitely recommending it!

https://www.goodreads.com › showThe Fairy Dance by Tara Lain – Goodreads

Synopsis:

What if the man of your dreams dances into your life—and he’s a nutcracker?

Maintenance man, Jed, might yearn for an alpha-femme guy, but where’s he going to find him in his small Oregon town?

New York ballet rising star, Henri, just wants to dance, but his desire for top roles only leads him into the pervy artistic director’s bed.

The chances of these two meeting are less likely than a grand jete. But then they do, one pre-holiday evening in a less-than-one-night stand that leaves them both yearning. Still, one short hookup on a kitchen floor doesn’t turn Jed and Henri into a match made in heaven. Not when all the world sees is a janitor and the ballet boss’s potential boy toy.

Sounds like a job for the Sugarplum Fairy.

The Fairy Dance is an opposites-attract, big city vs small town, holiday MM romance—in tights.

Tara Lain on Odes to Ashland and her new release Home Improvement by Tara Lain (guest blog,excerpt and giveaway)

Home Improvement
by Tara Lain
 

Odes to Ashland

Hi. I’m so happy to be here to celebrate the release of my new romance, HOME IMPROVEMENT – -A LOVE STORY, my first book set in Ashland, Oregon.

You might know that for most of my writing career (first published in 2011) I’ve been associated with southern California. Heck, I have two series plus additional books totaling around 17 or 18 books set in Laguna Beach alone. Then almost exactly a year ago, I moved. Yes, it was a huge deal. My hubby was a native Californian and aside from a couple years in his teens, had never lived outside of California. But SoCal, while grand, has more traffic than practically anywhere on earth. Even in charming, ocean-side Laguna Beach, you can sit in traffic for hours just trying to get home. My honey, who drove everyday, was done. In search of less cars and more trees, we went looking for a new home.

We had been to Ashland, Oregon a few times to attend the famous Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF). Far from a “summer theater”, OSF operates four theaters nine months a year doing a repertory of eleven plays. It has one of the largest budgets of any theater in America. It’s an industry  — and an artistic triumph! I adore theater (my degree is in theater) so the idea of being able to go any time I wanted was amazing. OSF presents more than 780 performances annually with attendance of over 410,000 people. Because of all the tourists, Ashland has tons of 5-star restaurants. Other artistic endeavors like an art museum, a symphony, a cabaret theater and many of the trappings of an upscale artsy metropolis. It also is a college ton, so there a mass of young people.

BUT, the permanent population of Ashland is only 21,000. There’s a town square that could be in a movie next to a flowing creek with restaurants beside it. There are parades for July 4th, Halloween, Christmas, Hannukah celebrations on the square, Pride parades and more super picturesque stuff. No chain stores are allowed in Ashland, so the totally walkable downtown is also shippable because all the stores are adorable, unique boutiques. And yet, there’s an airport 20 minutes away.

I have a friend who’d been sending me photos from Ashland for over a year. My honey and I took a serious trip to consider the town as a place to live and we lost our hearts. We sold our California house and moved north. While the move was super hard, the outcome was super happy. I’ll still be writing books in California. I still love it. But expect to make a lot of visits to my hometown, Ashland.

I hope you love your first visit in HOME IMPROVEMENT – A LOVE STORY.

Blurb:

Romance on Aisle Sixteen—opposites attract amid the hammers and screws of the home improvement store.
 
Gabe Mason became a father at seventeen, and his daughter, Ellie, is the most important thing in his life. But being the parent the courts demand means Gabe has given up most of his dreams—education, making furniture, a gay social life—to be a model dad with a steady, reliable job in a home improvement store. Life’s predictable until Jerry, a shy, eccentric guy in a hat and sunglasses, begs Gabe to oversee the renovation of his run-down mansion.
 
Gabe loves the house and the work, and Jerry’s pretty lovable too, but when Gabe discovers Jerry’s secret identity, he fears their passion could overturn both their lives forever. 

Excerpt  – Home Improvement – A Love Story

Jerry pretty much smiled all the way through the unloading, which was damned hard and took an hour of trying to maneuver the huge pieces of furniture across the lawn and up the stairs to the nearest door. Once inside, they placed the credenza at one end of the dining room that looked over the pool. The gleaming wood of the cabinet glowed against the Saltillo tile floors and gave the room—which still needed paint, rugs, and a table—some promise.

When they’d wrangled the coffee table into place in the middle of the huge great room, Gabe laughed. “I guess we can call it a start.”

Jerry threw his arms out and spun. “But it’s sooooo beautiful.” He kept swooping and twirling around the room until his head spun and the floor of the room and the wood ceiling far above kind of blended together. He threw his head back and laughed, his foot hit one of the rough places on the tile, and he staggered. “Whoa!” He slid and teetered toward the floor.

Before he could hit, Gabe snatched him into a full-body grab. “Hang on.”

Jerry took him at his word. Wrapping his arms tightly around Gabe’s neck, he hung on like crazy. Truthfully, he was too dizzy to stand up—

—and the Captain America arms didn’t help that dizziness one bit.

Before he could really analyze his situation, he’d pressed himself full length against Gabe’s tall, sturdy body, laughing tipsily.

Yes, the contact was pretty wriggly, and if he’d asked himself a hundred times whether Gabe might, just might, like guys since he seemed to look at Jerry like an hors d’oeuvre sometimes, he now got his answer. One formidable protuberance rose in the middle of the embrace and seemed to be matched in his own pants. Gabe’s heartbeat pounded against Jerry’s chest.

Oh fuck! Just one taste. Jerry slid the arm that was tightly wrapped around Gabe’s neck up a couple inches and yanked Gabe’s head down so he could lock their lips together.

The first touch produced an electric spark that slammed straight to Jerry’s balls so hard, for a second he had to hold his breath to keep from embarrassing himself with wet sweats. As the first gasp came under control, a tsunami of heat washed through him, and he slid his fingers tightly into Gabe’s shaggy, silken hair, as he pressed closer from lips to hips.

Gabe had been holding Jerry around the waist. His strong hands slid down and grasped Jerry’s butt and squeezed. Jerry gasped at the amazing pressure, and everything in him wanted to climb Gabe like a tree and then plant that evergreen where it would do the most good.

Before Jerry could anchor a leg around Gabe’s hips, he was gone, and Jerry was staggering backward to keep from falling.

Gabe gasped, “Oh God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I hope you enjoy the furniture. Let me know if you change your mind about the other pieces. Otherwise I’ll make sure they get here while you’re gone.” With that he turned, hurried from the house, and before Jerry even made it to the front door, had disappeared out of sight.

Jerry slammed the front door, leaned against it, then slowly collapsed to the floor. Fuck-a-doodle-doo. Good job, asshole. Find somebody you actually like and enjoy being around and screw it up by being you.

He dropped his head onto his bent knees.

Available for purchase at 
Kindle | Amazon Paperback | iTunes | Kobo | Nook | Dreamspinner Press
Excerpt
 
 
About the Author

Tara Lain believes in happy ever afters – and magic. Same thing. In fact, she says, she doesn’t believe, she knows. Tara shares this passion in her best-selling stories that star her unique, charismatic heroes — the beautiful boys of romance —  and adventurous heroines. Quarterbacks and cops, werewolves and witches, blue collar or billionaires, Tara’s characters, readers say, love deeply, resolve seemingly insurmountable differences, and ultimately live their lives authentically. After many years living in southern California, Tara, her soulmate honey and her soulmate dog decided they wanted less cars and more trees, prompting a move to Ashland, Oregon where Tara’s creating new stories and loving living in a small town with big culture. Likely a Gryffindor but possessed of Parseltongue, Tara loves animals of all kinds, diversity, open minds, coconut crunch ice cream from Zoeys, and her readers. She also loves to hear from you.

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