With these twelve books, I finally met my goal!

The Two Princesses of Bamarre was a book I forgot to list last time. I liked it; it had the shy, quiet princess having to go on adventures and save her more boisterous sister.

The Last Unicorn was even better than the movie, almost. It didn’t have music, of course, but there were heartwarming details about the spider that wasn’t Arachne, and the details about Schmendrick and Molly Grue, and the ending was even more heart-wrenching.

Peter S. Beagle wrote an anthology of various stories, which I read because it included the mini-sequel of The Last Unicorn. They were all very different, but he wrote that he was going to write a full-fledged sequel, and after reading this short story, I can’t wait. There were sad stories about mermaids, and hopeful ones about dancing cats, and all of them were wonderful in their own way.

The Stone Faye was a shorter book by one of my favorite fairy tale authors, but lovely all the same.

A Knot in the Grain was by that same author, and was an anthology of five fairy tales, some old and rewritten, and some new. I liked nearly all of them a great deal, though I must confess to thinking that the title story was going to be a rewrite of Rumplestiltskin with a knot in the grain of wheat that she had to spin, and being surprised when it was a new story set in the modern day.

Coming To Past was a great SV/DCU fic. Tim/Kon, with Clark/Lex, it basically rewrote the movie Back to the Future in the DC ‘verse – and did it wonderfully. All the parts were played to perfection, and fit so well together.

Jane On Her Own was the last book in the Catwings series, and one I’d never read before. It’s a children’s book, and it’s short, but it’s coming up on crunch time and I never would have met my goal if I didn’t count it. Also, I love the Catwings. :)

I originally read Sam the Cat Detective when I was really young. A few years ago, the author wrote two sequels. These sequels were great additions to the now-series. I love cats, I like detective stories, and these two were great. I couldn’t figure out who did it, but I didn’t mind; Sam is in a class all his own. Like Batman, only not broody.

I thought that since Angels and Elves was part of the ‘Baby Bet’ books, it would have had more to do with babies, but it wasn’t much besides a story getting the two people together. Okay, but I’m not keeping it.

To Kiss A Frog was really interesting. Fun, with cool, fully-fleshed characters, and hot sex, and the hero being a frog for half the book.

Five Kids, One Christmas had two people whose exes ended up marrying each other, then dying in a card crash, end up inheriting their kids. Both the kids the first two couples had had together, and the kids the third couple had adopted. It was interesting to see how they all blended together, especially since the woman was a Colonel in the Navy, and the man was a blind former photographer.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: relieved
Current Music: Pink - Who Knew?

Last count was twenty-six. This makes it thirty-eight. I'm also close to being done with two more books. Maybe I'll make my goal yet!


I read four romance novellas in a ‘series’. The author never named them as a series, but they are meant to be read together. They’re about one sister and three brothers (brother number four is already married to sister’s best friend) and how they find love, of course. They were pretty good, interesting characters in semi-unusual situations. This ‘series’ also somewhat ties in with another book the author wrote, Kissed By Cat, set in the same town and featuring two minor characters from all the books, and another character from the fourth.

I real Love’s Nine Lives, which almost had more from the cat’s POV than the couple’s, but that made it funny and light-hearted.

The Heart of the Raven was about a PI hired by a guy to find a missing baby, who wasn't really missing, and might not be the guy's baby. It was pretty good, but it lacked…something. I’m not keeping it, but it was an enjoyable read.

I read two more of the Princess Tales books, which were good in that funny fairy tale way, but they’re really short, so I feel guilty about counting them as two books instead of one. But some of the other books I read were really long, so it evens out in the long run.

The Door in the Hedge and Rose Daughter were both nice rewrites of fairy tales. Door had four short stories - I especially liked the Frog Prince and Golden Hind ones - and Rose Daughter was the second rewrite of Beauty and the Beast by Robin McKinley.

Once Upon A Tangled Tale was a trio of fairy tale based romances (with a real fairy godmother watching over them all) all set after (I think) another book the author wrote about Cindy Ella Jones and Princeton Chalmers. They were a bit contrived, but enjoyable, and I'm going to try and get the book about Cindy and Prince and read it, too.

I read the first half of two other books which were so awful I couldn’t finish them.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: discontent
Current Music: Laura Branigan - Self-Control

Last count was twenty, and with these, I've hit twenty-six. Past the halfway mark, yay! :)

To Kiss In The Shadows was really short, but pretty good. I liked the progression of the heroine, how she didn't become kickass all of a sudden, but did gain some confidence in herself. I also liked how she became friends with the brother of the hero first; the friendship leant some deapth to their eventual relationship.

Considering Kate was fair as romances went. Nice cast of characters, cute kid.

Cinderellis And The Glass Hill was also short, but it had illustrations, and was written in the author's usual lovely, quirky style.

The Comfort Of Adversity by kantayra
One of those DCU/SV fusions that has Kon in it, so you know I loved it.

Jane's Warlord
Normally I'm not one to complain about too much sex, but it happened too early and too often, especially considering the plot revolved around a time-traveling Jack the Ripper. They fell in love in less than a week, for crying out loud! Still, the book has a certain charm, most notably the pets.

Another two books I only got halfway through before I gave up. *sigh* It's so hard to find good reading material these days...

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: busy
Current Music: The Beatles - I've Just Seen A Face

Last count was fifteen; this brings me up to twenty.

Enchanted, Inc, Once Upon Stilletos, and Damsel Under Stress are the first three in what looks to be an ongoing series of books. They are light paranormal romances centering around Katie Chandler, who finds out that magic is real - she's just immune to it. It's surprising realistic - for certain values of 'real' - and the characters are engaging and interesting. I'm immensely pleased with these books, and I hope the author writes lots more in this series. She's got to write at least one more book; Katie and her SO have to get back together and finish saving the world.

Stork Naked, the thirtieth in the Xanth novels series. I didn't quite like this story as much as some others in the series; for one thing, there almost seemed to be too many side plots. Almost. For another, there were a few plot threads left unresolved at the end of the book. It's obvious the author is setting up the next book, but I'm worried about the herione and the fate of the universe, dammit! :)

An Uncertain Magic was okay, but not a keeper. It definitely would have been better as a novella; the story dragged on and on only to finally come to a conclusion that was way too short.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: lazy
Current Music: Joseph LoDuca - The Ballad Of Joxer The Mighty

Last count was nine, and here are six more, bringing my total for the year to fifteen. Only thirty-five more to go, but I think it will be hard, since I mostly read romance novels, and most of the ones I've found lately have been awful.

Over The Moon was okay. I bought it because one of the stories was supposed to tie into another book I really liked. It didn't; it tied into two different series (one about werewolves, one about vampires) that the author wrote. It was okay, I liked it and it wasn't hard to follow, but it was short! There was another werewolf story that was pretty good, but I think it should have been expanded into a full-fledged novel. There was another story that was a sequel to another novella in a previous anthology; it wasn't hard to follow because it focused on the daughter of the couple in the previous story, but I didn't really like it because there was absolutely no reason for the characters to care about each other at all. The last story in the book I couldn't even finish; it was the third part of something the author wrote, and while I could understand the plot with the bit of backstory she gave in the beginning, I didn't like the story at all, or the writing style.

Sheer Pleasure collects three stories by Maggie Shayne that she included in seperate anthologies. The first was mostly about the sex leading to romance; it was pretty good. It was the other two that should have gotten the book a different title. The second was about a cryptozoologist falling in love with a werewolf and saving his life, and the third was about a psychic breaking the curse on a guy who she'd seen in her dreams since she was twelve. The second one had plenty of sex, but that didn't seem to be the focus of the book as an entirety; it was more about looking beneath the surface to me. Still, it was a pretty good; I consider it a keeper.

Emerald Enchantment was another anothology. This one I bought mostly because the very first story was a prequel to a trilogy I really enjoy. It felt a little rushed, but only in that 'falling in love at first sight' way; really, they were together for a few weeks. The second story had a queen of a small community finding love with her second husband. The third involved a mail order bride and seemed to fit the times well. The guy's (no real heroes in this story) obstinate stance against her religion (believing in fairies) stuck in my craw, but it was pretty good. The final story involved the 'widowed father' meeting up with the 'old childhood friend' in a pretty different way; they weren't really friends, but knew each other from the neighborhood and his parents. It was okay; nice characterization and great sex scenes, but I would have liked to know whether she was really a leprechaun. How else did she fit two shamrock plants in her luggage?

Kissed By Cat was very good, even if it did fall prey to a few cliches. They have to fall in love in six days to break her curse, he's scarred (literally), she's wary of relationships, and they're almost too late to keep her from turning into a cat forever. Still, it had its charms, and I liked it.

A Sudden Wild Magic is one I bought mostly because I had enjoyed the author's other works - and I was promised kamikaze sex. I should have remembered that her idea of humor is rather restrained and there are always so many side-plots it's hard to keep up. The sex was only really mentioned in passing. It was okay, and I liked it enough to finish it, but I'm selling my copy on Amazon because it wasn't very engaging.

Rainsinger wasn't much better. The two people fall in love with little provocation and the only reason I finished it was because it was only another twenty pages. It was okay, I guess, but I'm not keeping this one, either.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: content
Current Music: Kim Chandler - Forever Blue

Last count was four, and here are five more, bringing my total up to nine.

The Slade 'Verse by merfilly, with JLU Black Canary ending up in an alternate world where villains are heroes, and falling in love with Slade Wilson.

Teen Titans/Outsiders: The Insiders TPB, Teen Titans: Life And Death TPB, and Teen Titans: Titans Around The World TPB. Heartwrenching, heartbreaking, and heartnumbing, but oh, so good. Except for the characterization, which, as always, leaves something to be desired (more than) occasionally.

Sex On The Beach I bought this book because one of the novellas was supposed to be a prequel to some of the shorts in Bewitched, Bothered And Bevampyred. There were four short stories in here. The editing, as always with this press, is atrocious, but I've overlooked worse. The first story, the werewolf one, was pretty good. The second story, the vampire one, was so-so. The third story, the immortal one, was...not entirely my cup of tea, but the premise was mostly unique, and the characters were nicely fleshed out. The last story, I one I bought the book for? *sigh* The entire thing was written in the quirky satiric style of the author, and I like that style. The beginning was pretty good, the middle even better, the ending...well, I thought the climactic climax was...well... Ugh. Yeah. Also, since it was subtitled How Janice Got That Way I was expecting more of an explanation about...well...how Janice got that way. I got it, but it didn't really seem to fit.

Mysteria I bought this book because it was supposed to expand on some of the shorts included in B, B & B, and include a new story. It did. Also, since this was a different press, the editing was much better. The first expansion was wonderfully done, and the new story was very reminiscent of the kitschy style of BBB. The second expansion was fantastic, since the short it expanded upon was really expanded. The last story was pretty good...not as great as the others, but it wasn't expanded as much. The new story relied a bit too much on the love at first sight thing, but it was very good too.

Also, I read halfway through two books that were so bad I couldn't finish them. Ugh. When did the trend in romance novels become for the guys to be complete jerks and bordeline sexual harassers/rapists? And the women are in love with them anyway, despite knowing nothing about the men beyond that they are jerks.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: curious
Current Music: Laura Branigan - Shattered Glass

Inspired by 50bookchallenge, I'm going to try and read fifty novel-length literary-type things by the end of the year.

'Literary-type things' means I can include fanfiction. :)

So far, I've read:

Pet Peeve, latest in the Xanth series by Peirs Anthony. Wonderfully funny and romantic as always.

Bewitched, Bothered and Bevampyred, an anthology of fantasy fics set in Brokenoggin Falls. Funny and sexy and actually worth the 30+ bucks I had to pay to get it off Ebay (since the original print run ran out; it was $15 back then).

Sleeping With The Fishes by Mary Janice Davidson, a paranormal romance about a mermaid named Fred, her wacky parents and her journey to keep the Undersea Prince with the Roman hands away from her while also fending off a water fellow and trying to clean up the harbor. I probably wouldn't have bought this if I realized it was going to be a series; the side-pairing plot got resolved rather well, but Fred is still trying to choose between her suitors.

Drake by Esse, a DCU/X-Men crossover, mainly set in YJ with a very unusual take on Tim Drake. Tim/Kon, Bobby/Remy. I've reread this over a dozen times, I love it that much.

Tags: 50 book challenge
Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Desiree - You Gotta Be