Mary Behre

Mourning the death of his fellow Marines, the hero meets a stunning kind hearted bartender one night in Chicago. The heroine can see visions via metal objects and when she sees how desperately the hansom quiet man needs her, she brings him home. They spend one night together before the hero leaves to go back to Virginia. She left him with her phone number but then the hero is hurt to realizes it's a wrong number. They think to never see each other again. Then fate intervenes. The heroine is show more in Virginia to find her estranged sisters when she takes up a job as a waitress in a local restaurant. There, much to her surprise, she finds out that her boss is the one night stand. She's giddy with the idea of rekindling their relationship but is hurt when he makes it clear that they're to be nothing but employer and employee. But their chemistry is enough to make that idea less than impossible. On top of that, the heroine keeps suffering from visions showing her a murder and a woman serial killer activating in the small town. I think this was nice but nothing special. I really loved the hero. He was trained to be a gentleman who apologized when he swore in front of a woman and who was stern and literal to the heroine's carefree hippy attitude. They were so difference but opposites attract and they certainly attracted to each other. I thought the plot was okay but nothing marvelous or unexpected. I did like the idea of a female villain- it was a change from other suspense romance novels. But it had a very level pace without many spikes in intensity or intrigue. The rekindling of the hero and heroine was hot and probably the only 'passionate' scene in the book besides their original meeting. I found myself complacent with the story-neither in love or in hate. show less

This is a paranormal romance novel about a woman who can see ghosts and gets accidentally wrapped up with a murder case (as well as with the attractive cop who's trying to solve it). I'm not a regular romance reader, but I actually really enjoyed this novel. The mystery aspect was very well-written, and I didn't see the ending coming until shortly before it was revealed.

Most of my complaints about this story were honestly things that rubbed me the wrong way but that I think are normal for show more the romance genre (hence why I don't usually partake in it). I didn't like the obviously contrived ways that the main characters were forced into close physical contact in the early scenes, before the relationship had developed properly between them. The author's hand was very noticeable there. The connection between them and the initiation of the physical aspects of their relationship also seemed a little too immediate to be realistic, but that just may be a personal difference between me and the characters.

Finally, there were a few minor aspects about the love interest that I found more a turn-off than anything else. One of them was that he called the main character "precious" before any kind of romantic relationship had begun between them. It wouldn't have bothered me if he had waited until they had started showing more direct interest in each other, but when guys try to use pet names on women they're not involved with, it just comes across as sleazy to me. Another was that he was worried about her safety at one point, so he stole her keys so she couldn't go home alone, where she would be in potential danger. I see the logic behind that decision, but it still really bothered me. He could have just as easily woken her up and told her he didn't feel it was safe for her to be home alone, but his actions were much more controlling and took away her agency. That kind of decision doesn't fly with me.

All in all, though, the book was enjoyable. These complaints were truly minor issues when taken with the work as a whole, and I am definitely interested in continuing the series. show less

Though I did greatly enjoy the first book in the series, I liked Guarded even more. Dev, the love interest, didn't give off as much of a macho vibe as Seth, and he didn't give Shelley, our female MC, any presumptuous nicknames like Seth did with Jules. I also thought that the romance built much more naturally in this book, where the situations that brought Jules and Seth into contact felt very contrived.

Much like the first book, the mystery of this one was good and I didn't foresee the show more ending (though in all fairness, I don't think the author really gave us enough information to figure it out in advance to being told). I did think it was kind of strange that Dev seemed to have very little inner conflict about whether or not to handle things by the book when Shelley ended up involved in the crime; that being said, different people would handle that situation with varying degrees of hesitance, so I suppose this could be realistic.

One complaint that I had was that, even though several scenes take place in Shelley's veterinary clinic, no real veterinary medicine happens on screen at all. The book never pretends to be any kind of medical drama, but I felt like Jules did several florist-y things in her book, and as a vet student myself, I was excited to see veterinary medicine in a novel. The fact that I didn't disappointed me, and probably only me.

Aside from that, my only real complaints were minor inconsistencies or other brief, strange moments. One that particularly sticks out to me is at the very beginning of the book, where the main character, who has the ability to communicate with animals, recalls that she hadn't communicated with a dog since the day her childhood one died. Immediately afterward, she communicates with a dog with no problems. Later, it was mentioned conveniently that this dog was the only one who didn't seem to have a problem with communicating with her, but I thought that should have been mentioned from the getgo. Also, no reason was ever given for that one individual dog to communicate with her when no other ones did. After his role in the opening of the story, I don't remember him ever coming up again.

In general, though, this book was very enjoyable and I definitely intend to get my hands on the third one eventually and find out how the sisters' story ends. show less

Review courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales

Quick & Dirty: Although there were humorous and sexy moments, Spirited ultimately fell short of its potential thanks to an inconsistent plot, poor character development and bad dialogue.

Opening Sentence: Juliana Scott looped the strap of her black Prada clutch over her wrist and imagined scaling her apartment building in five-inch stiletto boots.

The Review:

Juliana “Jules” Scott is a spunky 27-year-old with a tendency for getting into trouble thanks to show more her so-called “crift” – a term she uses to describe her “cursed gift” that allows her to communicate with ghosts. Of course it makes sense that she’s wary to tell people that she talks to dead people; a childhood spent bouncing between foster homes and a disastrous marriage have proven that she can’t tell anyone unless she wants a visit to a psychiatric ward. (Except for her adoptive parents who seem to take everything incredibly well.)

So what is Jules supposed to say when an overzealous ghost manipulates her senses and climb through Seth English’s open window as 2 am? The fact that the ghost has done something no ghost has ever done before fades in comparison to the fact that Jules has suddenly developed the ability to read the X-rated mind of the Greek Adonis staring back at her. Which makes the fact that he’s also a policeman intent on arresting her and her new next-door neighbor all the more fun.

Seth is more of the love-‘em-and leave-‘em type of guy. He’s in the middle of an investigation that could make his career and his new next-door neighbor has become a big distraction. But he has no choice when Jules gets literally pulled into a murder investigation and becomes a target. It quickly becomes apparent that Jules holds the answer to the growing string of mysterious deaths and that their meeting was anything but coincidence.

Let me preface my review by saying that I really wanted to like this book. And I’m pretty forgiving when it comes to what I think of as a “tabloid read” –– the kind of lighthearted story that can be repeatedly picked up, read for a few minutes and put down again over a span of time without feeling like you’ve lost anything. Insta-love is almost always a component of these types of stories because there isn’t enough character development to make a reader believe in or care about anything else. Some factors may vary, but what it really boils down to is a literary equivalent of a stick figure drawing; an attractive man, an attractive woman, some inciting incident that causes friction and voila! It’s not meant to be a cerebral exercise and I keep that in mind when it comes to my expectations.

But even “tabloid reads” need to meet some baseline expectations with dialogue, character and plot and Spirited fell pretty short of mine. There were so many “WTF?” moments in this story that I started to think Behre had cut-and-pasted the manuscript for another story over this one.

A ghost that speaks in medieval prose? Random and not even done well.

Jules continually developing new powers with no explanation? Annoyingly convenient.

Seth’s insistent usage of “precious” when talking to (or about) Jules? Creepy as hell because all I could think of was Gollum, the detestable creature in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

Ultimately, the number of issues I had with the story outweighed the lighthearted fun that it promised. Though I’ve never read any of Behre’s other work, she seems to be a fairly prolific and well-liked author. Perhaps Spirited is just a one-off, a singular black spot in an otherwise shining career, but it’s conclusion is also the end of my interest in this series.

Notable Scene:

“Use your key next time, precious,” the cop growled in her ear, spinning her around. Then the cuffs were blessedly off. “You could have climbed into the window of a psycho. Good thing for you it was me. You got lucky.”

Jules rubbed her sore wrists. “Gee, I never knew getting lucky could be so disappointing.”

FTC Advisory: Berkley/Penguin provided me with a copy of Spirited. No goody bags, sponsorships, “material connections,” or bribes were exchanged for my review. show less