Quickie Book Reviews-Romance

I had a horrible migraine...not sure why to be honest but I went a bit ham since there wasn't much to do and read. A lot. I have a few cozy mysteries out from the library so I read those. I just don't like most cozy mysteries so it was more of a struggle than I wish. I just desperately want to love cozy mysteries. 

The migraine I had messed up my sleep schedule and pulling an all-nighter gives me another migraine. So, I tend to slowly get back by staying up in increments. I woke up at 11 PM and I'm going to try and stay awake until 5 PM (with the help of a lot of coffee). I'll be more in line after today. Unfortunately, this hurricane (while far away from me) is messing up the barometric pressure enough that I'm super congested. Hurricane season is NOT my friend. 

Migraine life suuuucks. 

I have done a lot of cleaning and book reading. I also discovered that my library lets me check out as many magazines as I want and it doesn't count against my "limit." So...I checked out every trashy gossipy magazine as possible. I'm about to be totally up to date on all sorts of drama. I love it! 

This book...woah. I love a dark hero but this one might be too dark. It seemed that he kidnapped her and slept with her and she wasn't even awake for it? I mostly sat confused. That's rape and is my least favorite thing to read about. It was written in the 1980s and the romance output has shifted on this a bunch. I've read other Victoria Holt's before and not remembered this issue so this is hopefully an outlier. It is a gothic type setting, which I do like. Holt is a good writer and the heroine isn't totally insipid. So...I guess just knowing that issue when reading the book is helpful. 

I don't think I talked about these too much. These are also "older" romances. I think I brought them back from my grandmother's house after she died. She had thousands of romance books in her house! These are set in Louisiana, my favorite state (not politically). It deals with a family of men who follow that "1990s alpha" trope. I don't know how else to describe it! There's also usually a "mystery" that leads to action. So, maybe I would classify them as romantic suspense? I will note that all these men live on plantations and have money from that. So if that's something that annoys you, it's in every book. I was mostly trying to figure out how many plantations this one family had. That's like...money. 

The first one (Kane) involves a foiled heist, a jewelry dealer, a lawyer, and a kidnapped child. It's a lot to be honest but it's all connected. There's a happy ending of course. The second book (Luke) follows a man who is trying to connect with a woman named April. They have a past history and April is now a successful romance writer. She has writer's block and a dangerous stalker so Luke (I can't remember if he has a job) decides to try and protect her. The other books in the series follow the same type of format (a woman is in trouble and a man protects her). I would say the writing is fine and makes a fun little escape. I did roll my eyes a few times (mostly later in the series) because the men are just that "1990s alpha trope" that is...annoying. 

While trying to stay awake, I read a bunch of cozy mysteries (none made me want to continue with a series), books on grief, historical mysteries, books on the brain, and micro-histories. I want to talk about the books on grief because I think they might be useful for me to go through them but I find grief books to be subjective. 

This hurricane/migraine week really did a wonderful thing for my TBR pile and book  goal. I'm about twenty books away. It's a lot. I think after I hit 240, I'll try and shoot for 300 but I probably won't reach that number again. I find value in pretty much every book I read, even if it isn't for me, but there are some books that are more intense. They tend to be nonfiction and science/history related. I haven't read many this year, which is why my number is so high this early on. Usually I'm much slower with those books. I think after Halloween I'm going to try and switch to more of those. I have read a few (including a heavy book on the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.) but not as much as I usually read.