With Wings by Z. Allora

With Wings by Z. Allora

Pages: 278

Date: June 6, 2016

Details: No. 1 The Dark Angels

E-book

The blurb:

The lights go down and stage lights up. The Dark Angels have arrived. With his come-hither voice and body made for sin, lead singer Angel Luv draws lovers like a magnet. And when he caresses and taunts shy guitarist Darius Stone on stage, well…it’s an act, right? But every touch lights a fire, and every flirtatious glance chips away at Dare’s certainty that he’s straight. No one else has so captured his imagination.

Temptation beckons. It’s hard not to notice the want in Dare’s eyes, the way he stares when he thinks Angel’s not watching. One wrong move might scare him away, but a work trip to exotic Bali might be the perfect place to let Dare explore his sexuality, with none to be the wiser. But their “friends with benefits” pact has an expiration date, that just might sour their friendship.

My thoughts:

If I had to label this book I would probably say: a favourite among titles containing my pet peeve. J

It is no big secret that one thing to always get my reader’s hackles up is characters not communicating with each other when just a few words at the right time would have dealt with the issue at hand. Sure, I get that the story needs drama, and that the fact that the characters aren’t talking means the drama is high and mighty, but it infuriates me as much in books as it does in real life.

Having said that… (I bet you saw this coming) I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Even while I wanted to smash Angel and Dare’s heads together in order to make them see sense, I adored both of them and couldn’t help hurting with them as they ran into what they thought were obstacles.

In fact, apart from the lack of crucial communication, I loved everything in this book. Dare and Angel are sexy and charming main characters. The secondary characters surrounding them are as intriguing (and as potentially sexy), and I’m looking forward to reading their stories. Seriously though, what’s not to love: A rock band with sexy band members, a sweet yet torturous love story and a trip to Bali? If those ingredients don’t spell out wonderful read, I don’t know what else you might be looking for.

Sexy times play a huge role in this story. And when I say ‘sexy’ I mean ‘steaming hot’. Dare’s introduction to experiences and feelings he’d been denying himself for far too long was as beautiful as it was arousing. Angel sure knows how to turn on his seductive charms and over the course of this book he managed to hook both Dare and me. J

Overall this was a fast paced, fascinating and very hot read. I’ll have to read more books by Z. Allora in the not too distant future. Clearly I’ve been missing out.

SEX, WOLVES AND ROCK 'N ROLL

TITLE: SEX, WOLVES & ROCK ‘N ROLL

AUTHOR: MINA CARTER

Pages: 53

Date: 16/01/2014

Grade: 4+

Details: One Night Stand Series / Lyric Hound

              Received from Decadent Publishing

              Through Love Romances

Own / Kindle

The story:

Trent Savage, Sav, is the drummer in Lyric Hound, a very popular band, consisting of Werewolf musicians. For as long as he can remember he’s been attracted to Karlan Rixx, the band’s guitarist. What’s more, for years he has known that Karlan is his preordained mate. Karlan however is as straight as they come and, as far as Sav can tell, completely unaware of or ignoring Sav’s feelings as well as the bond between them.

After years of trying to deny his feelings just to hold on to Karlan’s friendship, Sav can’t take it anymore and leaves the band as well as the only life and family he’s ever known.

Karlan may be a womanizer, in his heart there is only one person he’s interested in. When Sav disappears Karlan feels lost. The band isn’t the same without Sav to drive the beat and Karlan’s life is incomplete without the man behind him on stage, next to him in life.

When he discovers that Sav has contacted Madame Eve to organize a one night stand, Karlan does what he can to be Sav’s date. There was a reason Karlan didn’t know he and Sav were mated. With Karlan’s problem solved both men are in for a few surprises when they meet again. But will it be enough for them to embrace their destiny?

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My thoughts:

Allow me to start with a few qualifiers. I’ve never read a One Night Stand or Lyric Hound story before. I don’t read a lot of supernatural stories, erotic or otherwise and, I very often find myself having issues with novellas. For all intents and purposes requesting this book for review seemed to be an exercise in setting myself up for failure.

Imagine how happily surprised I was to discover that being new to the One Night Stand series and Lyric Hound stories didn’t make a difference. I fell into and was captured by this story from the very first word and stayed hooked until I’d finished the last one. What’s not too like? We’re meeting Sav, a sexy and dominant werewolf rock star who, despite his rough exterior is breaking up inside because his mate appears to be rejecting him. And, not only do we get to enjoy this hunk, we’re also treated to Karlan, an equally hot werewolf. The reader is being spoiled.

Talking about werewolves; I’ve obviously been missing something while ignoring supernatural (erotic) stories. If this story sets the standard, this is a discrepancy I’ll be fixing in the not too distant future, very likely starting with the other Lyric Hound stories.

As far as the fact that this is a novella rather than a full novel is concerned all I can say is that I was very impressed. This was as complete a story as any reader can wish for. The characters are well described and fully fleshed, there’s enough back story to give the reader not only everything they need to know but also a real connection to the character’s feelings and actions. This story may only have counted 35 pages, it provided everything a good story needs: a beginning that puts the reader straight into the story, a middle that provided all the explanations needed without slowing the story down and a beautiful and very satisfying ending.

And did I mention this story is hot? Well, it is. But then, that’s exactly what you would expect when you pick up a story about two Alpha werewolves giving in to their feelings for each other after years of having to deny them.

This in short was about an hour’s worth of pure reading delight, leaving me with yet another author I have to add to my must-read list.

WICKED BEAT

TITLE: WICKED BEAT

AUTHOR: OLIVIA CUNNING

Pages: 399

Date: 15/09/2013

Grade:3.5

Details: no. 4 Sinners on Tour

            Received from Source Books

            Through NetGalley

Own / Kindle 

The Blurb:

From the moment he lays eyes on Sinners’ new front of house soundboard operator, drummer Eric Sticks knows he has to make Rebekah his. Unfortunately, she’s too busy trying to seduce guitarist Trey Mills to pay him much attention. Rebekah never planned to fall for the tall, goofy drummer with the weird sense of humor and a heart the size of the galaxy. But Eric makes her laugh and his constant attention makes her feel sexy and irresistible–exactly what she needs after the things her last lover said to her. A woman who gives as much as she takes, Rebekah makes Eric feel like a total stud–exactly what he needs after surviving a decade of watching the incredibly talented members of Sinners from the wings.

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This book, while I liked it, didn’t really grab me. It somehow missed the oomph “HotTicket” and “Double Time” had. Eric and Rebekah had enough issues between them to fill multiple books, but because there were so many of them, and seemed to follow each other with unrelenting insistency, none of them felt important.  And when I say there are a multitude of issues in this book I do mean a multitude; Eric’s childhood, his eagerness in the bedroom and the resulting insecurities as well as Rebekah’s health issues, her attraction to Trey, her former boyfriend, her mother’s problems, the list goes on and on. With so many issues competing for attention I feel none of them got the amount of time they deserved and that in turn made the story feel rushed; almost as if the author was in a bigger hurry to get to the end of the story than I was.

Now that I’ve got that out of the way, I can concentrate on what I did love about this book. With a musician, singer-songwriter daughter and a sound-technician husband these book always feel a little bit like coming home for me. Not that either of them is involved with a hot and famous rock band, but who knows what the future might bring. I love the interaction between the band members. The way they are constantly teasing each other but would do anything for the other members when necessary, is wonderful. The jokes the members of Sinners play on each other had me smiling on numerous occasions.

I loved the idea of Rebekah, a girl, getting the opportunity to work the sound for the band. Music is still a very male operated business and it was wonderful to see that stereotype well and truly destroyed in this book. 

I also loved the interactions between Rebecah and Eric. The playful interactions between these two were heartwarming and put grin on my face on numerous occasions. And talking about playful interactions; the role play these two get up to is highly imaginative, not to mention HOT! The way Rebecca and Eric tend to fall out of role play into straight lust was as enticing as it was realistic and wonderful to read. My favourite moments though came early in the story when Rebecah came up with her lessons for Eric. Those were as tender as they were hot and really made me fall for these two characters.

So, overall I have to say that this was a nice and exciting read that could probably have been a bit more if there had been less but more developed issues for the characters to deal with. On the other hand, if you ever find yourself in the mood for hot rockers, independent women, hot and imaginative sex and great fun you could do a lot worse than turn to Olivia Cunning for your next read. I know that I will be reading the remaining Sinners on Tour books in the not too distant future.

HOT TICKET

TITLE: HOT TICKET

AUTHOR: OLIVIA CUNNING

Pages: 400

Date: 03/02/2013

Grade: 4

Details: Original Sinners no. 3

            Received from Source Books

            Through NetGalley

Own

From the author’s website:

“He needs her to mask his pain…
When Jace walked through the doors of Aggie's dungeon, the last thing he expected was to find self-forgiveness and the love of a remarkable woman. But when a terrible accident sidelines Jace during the band's tour, the burdensome chains of his past wrap ferociously around his heart.

She needs him to forgive himself…
Determined to crack through Jace's armored shell, Aggie must go beyond her usual methods to mend his heart to love again.”

When Jace (never, ever call him Jason) first meets Mistress V all he wants is someone to hurt him so hard that it pushes the pain he always feels inside into the background, just for a little while.

Mistress V is good at what she does. Men may pay for twenty minutes on the other side of her floggers, she usually has them begging for mercy within a few minutes. Jace is something different though; it doesn’t matter what implement she uses or how hard she strikes him, Jace doesn’t beg for mercy, he begs for more instead. And Jace is special in a different way too. For the first time ever Mistress V wants to disappear into the background and allow Aggie, her day to day persona, to interact with what should be nothing more than a paying client.

Jace has a past filled with pain and despair. A past he refuses to talk about. A past that leaves him unable to believe that anybody could see him as good, never mind loveable. As the bassist in the Original Sinners hard-rock band he should be on top of the world. Instead he is insecure of his position in the band he joined late when their first bassist was kicked out, and always afraid that the other band members will get rid of him too. Aggie has had a turbulent past as well, and her mother still causes upheaval in her life on a regular basis. But while Aggie’s attitude is to let the past be the past and live in the present, Jace can’t distance himself from his hurtful memories and doesn’t trust the present, especially not when the here and now is actually good.

When Jace finds himself injured and unable to perform with the band he is temporarily replaced by the original Sinners’ bassist and all his insecurities come crashing down on him with a vengeance. It will take all of Aggie’s talents and love to show Jace that she wants to be with him regardless of his past and that she is not the only one who loves and needs him.

Before I start on my thoughts about this book I have to get something off my chest. Who, I’d like to know, is in charge of the order in which the books in this series are published? Why is it that I read and reviewed “Double Time”, which is quite obviously the last book in the series, last November and “Hot Ticket”, with a story that clearly takes place much earlier, is only being released now? And how did this book end up being number four in the series but number three in the reading order? Since I haven’t read any of the other books in this series it doesn’t bother me too much, although I do find it strange. I am sure though that for readers who want to read their series in order and not have stories “spoiled” for them, the way in which these books are released must be frustrating to say the least.

As for my thoughts on this book, leaving all of the above aside; I enjoyed it. Olivia Cunning tells a good story. She manages to draw her readers in with a smooth writing style, conversation that sparkles, interesting and life-like characters, humor and a gripping story-line. It is easy to fall a little bit in love with her flawed characters and it isn’t long before you find yourself rooting for them. There is a lot of rather dramatic action in this book but all of it served a purpose in the story. I loved the group dynamic as described in this story. The author portrait the interaction and banter between the band-members in a realistic and life-like way. The only thing I wasn’t entirely sure about was the role Aggie’s mother plays in the book. While she brings some comic relief, I do think that her role in the story could have been smaller without the book losing anything. As it was I found that her interruptions in Aggie’s life took the pace out of the story on one or two occasions.

And I haven’t even mentioned the sex yet. Well, let me tell you, this is one hot book. The reader is treated to a lot of corporal punishment, and I mean a lot, inflicted with every implement known to man. But we also witness a lot of tenderness; two characters determined to please each other in any way possible. The descriptions of both Jace and Aggie discovering pleasures they didn't know they were needing were wonderful. I loved watching Aggie discover that she doesn't always has to be in charge; that she enjoys submitting to the sensations Jace wants to bring her. The pleasure and frustration Aggie experiences when Jace continues to withhold her orgasm from her was very enticing. And it was equally beautiful to see Jace discover the pleasures love-making brought him even when pain wasn't involved. As far as the scenes in which Eric joins Jace and Aggie are concerned, they were steamy too even if I wasn’t entirely sure what purpose they served in the story except to push up the heat levels.

Overall I would classify this as a very steamy and at times heart-breaking love story that will keep the reader captivated from the very first page.