lollylovesbooks's reviews
711 reviews

 Sapphic fake dating perfection.
I had incredibly high expectations for this book and it exceeded all of them.

Iris has been burned badly by relationships and lost faith in anything that's not a one-night stand she can sneak out of. Which makes being a romance author slightly difficult. Stevie, on the other hand, misses being in a relationship and is getting pressure from her friends to get back in the game. Unfortunately, her anxiety makes that very difficult.

After a disastrous attempted hook-up, the fates align for the two to meet again, and a fake relationship is just what Stevie needs to stop her friends nagging her.

Fake dating is a favourite trope of mine, which means I've read so many books with it that I need them to be written well. This was portrayed beautifully. Both women had realistic reasons for the fake relationship, and their different backgrounds showed in the transition from fake to not-so-fake.

Iris and Stevie are such beautiful characters - so raw and real. I loved seeing them develop and become more comfortable in who they were.

I have to mention the steam factor. This book was HOT. The sex scenes were so well written and definitely part of the story - each encounter had meaning as well as high heat, which is rare to see.

And I have to give mention to Iris's amazing friend group. Delilah, Claire and Astrid all have their roles to play in this story, and it was great being back with them. Amazing end to an amazing series. 

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the free digital review copy. All thoughts are my own.

Supernatural enemies-to-loves in a Scottish castle setting.

I adored Rosie Danan's Shameless books, and so was excited to see where she'd take this paranormal offering.

Riley is a curse-breaker who is trying to turn the family hobby into a career. This has taken her from her home in the US to a small town in Scotland, where a construction company wants an old curse removing from a castle. Then we have Clark, a sceptic and disgraced archaeologist, who is working to learn more about that same castle.

When the pair meet as strangers their chemistry is off the charts, but their first professional encounter is an entirely different story - making the two start to work completely against each other.

Unlike a lot of enemies-to-lovers books, Riley and Clark stay enemies for a decent length of time. Even with the growing physical attraction, any time they start to accept each other something sets things back. If you don't like characters with a mean streak then you're going to struggle here.

The steamy scenes in this book are incredible, as I've come to expect from Rosie Danan. All of the scenes, including a solo session for Clark, were spicy perfection.

I enjoyed the castle setting and the concept of its curse and history. At times it did feel a little bit like stepping through levels of a computer game - we've solved this puzzle so onto the next one. And that's the only thing I can really put my finger on as to why I wasn't as obsessed with it as I expected to be.

Overall I really liked this one, and would recommend it to anyone who likes a steamy MF romance with a supernatural twist.

Thank you to Piatkus and NetGalley for the free digital review copy. All thoughts are my own.

Paranormal romance is a great setting for fairy tale retellings, particularly when it comes to something like Little Red Riding Hood.

Ruby has had some weird things go on in her life, and now she's convinced someone is stalking her as she walks through the woods at night. That stalker is Rafe, a wolf shifter who split from his pack a few years before. Both end up in danger from other nearby wolves and have to work together to find out what's going on. All while deciding what to do about the fierce attraction they share.

I really enjoyed the glimpses into Ruby's day-to-day life, particularly as Rafe tried to worm his way into it. It was kind of funny seeing her learn how many supernatural people were in her life, even if it did start to feel overdone by the end.

 As the blurb says, there are definitely some scenes in here that were written for smuttok, so if that's your thing then maybe give it a go. 

I wasn't really interested in what was going on in the wider world - possibly because the world-building felt a little forced. So while I had an enjoyable enough time reading this, I'm unlikely to continue with the series.

Thank you NetGalley for the free review copy. All thoughts are my own.

This book was exactly what I was looking for in a ghost romance novella.

One of our heroines, Andrea, is a witch who's been hired to get rid of the ghosts in a haunted house so that it can be developed. But one ghost in particular just isn't budging - Cecilia, a ghost in a flapper dress who knows she died at a party in that house but doesn't know how.

I loved the setup - Andrea is literally being paid to move Cecilia on from being a ghost, but falls for her. There's a nice bit of intrigue with the house's history, and a little jeopardy too in the form of whether Andrea will manage to keep her finances afloat.

I'm always fascinated by the different ways that ghost romances manage steamy scenes, and this didn't disappoint on that front at all.

There were areas of the story and character development that could have been fleshed out more, but for a novella that's not surprising.

If you're looking for a short, steamy sapphic paranormal romance that's a little different then definitely give this one a try.

Thank you BookSirens for the free review copy. All thoughts are my own.