Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

There are a few things that will compel you to pull over while driving on a highway and, as Dean Robillard- star quarterback for the Chicago Stars - finds out, a woman in a headless beaver costume is one of them. The woman turns out to be Blue Bailey who has just spotted her ex, the ex that convinced her to move from Seattle to Colorado before he dumped her, and wants revenge.

Before long, Dean finds himself driving from Colorado to his farmhouse in Tennessee with Blue tagging along because she doesn't really have anywhere else to go. Both Dean and Blue have their share of issues: Dean is recovering from a shoulder injury and he doesn't know if he will be as good as he was when he starts to play again, and he doesn't have the best relationship with either of his parents - his mother was a groupie/muse to various rocks stars, and his father is a rather famous rock star whom he barely knows. As for Blue, she has had to put up with her mother's restless campaign to protect everyone but her own daughter, and had to grow up going from one family to another over and over without much stability.

Blue and Dean are both very private for different reasons but, bottom line, neither of them wants to get hurt though they can't seem to stop arguing -and enjoying it, too - while they drive to Dean's farm, once there, who knows?

Well, I do... but if you want to find out you're going to have to read to find out but I can say that Natural Born Charmer is, in deed, a charmer of a book, full of quirky characters and family secrets.

Grade:

Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

Naomi and Ely have been best friends from the cradle, growing up together int he same building and surviving everything together - including an affair between Naomi's dad and one of Ely's Moms - and they have created a No Kiss List of people that are out of limits, trying to prevent the break up of the Naomi and Ely Institution (especially since they both like boys).

However, when Ely kisses Naomi's boyfriend Bruce the Second (who actually wasn't in the list) all hell breaks loose, with friends and neighbors taking sides as Ely and Naomi's shared world implodes on itself and changes into something completely different.

Naomi's character wasn't a particularly sympathetic one, she often came as selfish and petty to me, but you can understand her pain, it's not so much that she minds that Ely kissed her boyfriend, but she does hate the fact that she now has to let go of her fantasy where she and Ely got married and lived The Perfect Life (Ely's gayness aside).

Ely fared a little better with me, he's a gorgeous and proud gay boy who has been around the block a few times but, after hurting Naomi, he decides he doesn't want to hurt Bruce the Second as well, so he's taking it slowly for the first time in his life which both confuses and thrills him. The scene when both Ely and Bruce2 confess to each other that each of them thinks he's not good enough for the other was one of the sweetest scenes ever.

Now, the Bruces, Bruce the First (Bruce1) and Bruce the Second (Bruce2) both dated Naomi, and they where my favorite characters of the whole book. Bruce1 is an insomiac, a high school junior who once upon a time dated Naomi and who worships her even though he isn't that sure he loves her. Bruce2 is a quiet, plain college student who never thought he was gay until he found himself 'liking' Ely and then falling for him.

Over all, the book is a solid read though it didn't resonate with me quite as much as Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist but it does have it's good moments and it's worth reading.

Grade

Book Gossip (#10)

Book Gossip # 10
A short one this time.

Melissa de la Cruz confirmed yesterday in her blog that the release date for The Van Alen Legacy (forth book of the Blue Bloods Series) will be October 6, 2009

Match Me if You Can by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Anabelle Granger is the the underdog in her family, they love her but they also think she's a bit of a joke and a failure, mostly because, at the age of 31 she's running her Grandma Myrna's matchmaking business, while her successful older brothers are making it big one as an accountant and the other as a cardiologist. But, over all, Anabelle loves her life, she would like a little bit more stability, though, so she decides to take Myrna's business and make it big, and for that she needs a high profile bachelor to help her establish her reputation as a matchmaker.

Heath Champion is one of the best sports managers of the country, among his most important clients is Kevin Tucker (from This Heart of Mine), Heath is the ultimate overachiever, after climbing his way out of a trailer-park childhood and into professional success and lots of money; but he has decided he wants to get married soon (before he turns 35) so he decides to hire a matchmaking service to speed along the search, first he hires Portia Powers, of Power Matches, famous for her high profile clients but then Kevin's wife Molly asked him to interview Anabelle (who happens to be one of her best friends) and Heath ended up with two match makers competing to match him with the perfect woman for him.

Of course, nothing goes as planed and before long Heath finds himself enjoying Anabelle's company far more than what he enjoys his set up dates. And, in a secondary love story, Portia Powers finds herself attracted to Bodie - Heath's best friend and driver - while her Power Matches begins to crumble about her.

I had more than a few good laughs out of this book and I loved checking on some of the old characters from the Chicago Stars series like Molly and Kevin, Dan and Phoebe and a few of the others.

Loved the book

Grade:

1/2

In the Cards: Fame by Mariah Fredericks

In the previous book (In the cards: Love) we met Eve and her friends Anna and Sydney; and when Anna's elderly neighbor died she left Anna one of her cats (eventually Syd and Eve adopted the other two) and a deck of Tarot Cards which in In the Cards:Love turned Anna's life upside down. Here's the thing about the cards: they are spot-on accurate, but they only show you a fraction of what's going to happen.

Now, in Fame, it's Eve's turn to ask the cards and she was one question only: will she be a star? Because that's all she wants, to be famous - at the beginning her reasoning for it was kind of blah for me - but, and even though she thinks of herself as very brave, Eve doesn't dare to ask about the rest of her life because... what if the cards tell her she will be a nobody forever? Instead, she asks about her school's upcoming production of Cabaret.

The cards are talking but they are sending mixed signals. In the end, Eve gets a smallish part on Cabaret and, for various reasons, decides to stick to it even as she and pretty much everyone else in the cast resent Francesca, the girl who got the lead in the play and who also happens to be the daughter of an important music producer and judge of You Suck! (and American Idol type of show), thinking everything is SO easy for Francesca -even though she's almost cripplingly shy and no one is nice to her and she really does have a hard time with the play in general.

As the opening night draws near, the possibility that Francesca's insecurities will keep her from being the leading lady begins to loom, so the teacher in charge asks Eve and Evil-Alexa (another girl in the cast) to learn the part, but asks them no to tell Franscesca - so the girl doesn't have her confidence crushed - but, of course, Evil-Alexa has to live up to her name, right?

In the end... will Eve be the star of the show? or will her dreams of fame vanish into thin air?

Well, you'll have to read to find out.

I have to say that Eve is not a character I like, and more than once in the first fifty pages I thought of putting down the book and skipping to the next one. But in the end, I cared enough for Eve's friends Syd and Anna (and Anna's on-going possible love triangle, which came to a happy conclusion for me) to keep on reading and, by the end, I didn't dislike Eve so much.

She'll never be my favorite character but her story is worth reading.

Grade: