DeborahJeanhttp://booklikes.com/photo/crop/50/50/upload/avatar/0/8/azure_0829b7f4a5fc9d83b495aa6f4ce538c6.jpgDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com2024-03-28T16:47:30+00:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/rssreview: Otherwise Occupied2013-08-18T00:00:00+01:002013-08-18T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587889/otherwise-occupiedDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com Evan Arden is all sorts of messed up. He’s not even a good guy, he’s a hit man for the mob, for Christ’s sake, but…… I STILL liked him. Oh wow, just the fact that I did must mean that I’m one sick, messed up puppy myself!!
Ever read a book that even after you finish it you just can’t stop thinking about it?? Yeah, this is one of those books. It’s that good!
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review: Wounded2013-08-03T00:00:00+01:002013-08-03T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587890/woundedDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com This is a story about an American soldier, Hunter, and an Iraqi prostitute, Rania, set during the war in Afghanistan.
Rania has been living on the street, after her family died and her younger brother left her to become a soldier, since she was fourteen, selling herself for food and money in order to survive.
Hunter is a American soldier sent to Afghanistan to fight in the war shortly after he found out that his long-time girlfriend, whom he had planned on asking to marry him, had been cheating on him for the past year.
Hunter is seriously wounded in a altercation with insurgents, in which his best friend and Rania’s brother are both killed or were they?
All Rania knows is that she can’t just leave the American soldier to die out in the street, so she decides to try and save him.
After Hunter regains consciousness to find the beautiful Iraqi girl caring for him he is instantly attracted to her, even after he figures out what it is that Rania does to survive. Rania is attracted to the handsome soldier as well even though she is terrified of him. All she knows is that men want to use her body for their own selfish needs and she is afraid that the soldier will be no different once he is well.
The first thing that they must do is overcome their language barrier. I was a little skeptical as to how fast they both learned the others languages, just seemed a little unbelievable, but maybe that’s just me.
There were a couple of ick fators for me Hunter kissing her after she had just performed oral sex on a client and then vomited and then when he “went downtown” on her. I mean, she’s a prostitute and mostly just “wipes up” after being with her clients. Kind of made me want to vomit, as well.
For the most part I did enjoy this book. It was well edited and had a HEA. Two things that I really appreciate in a book.
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review: First Temptation (A Covert Affairs Novella, Book 1.5)2013-08-02T00:00:00+01:002013-08-02T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587892/first-temptation-a-covert-affairs-novella-book-1-5DeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com This book was very well edited with a actual plot line. This could have been a great book had it been a full-length novel and the characters relationship had more time to develop. I’m not a big fan of “insta-love/lust” where the H and h are falling into bed mere hours after meeting.
Joan Swan continues to be one of my “must read” authors so I know I will look forward to reading future books by her.
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review: Intimate Enemies (Covert Affairs, #1)2013-08-01T00:00:00+01:002013-08-01T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587891/intimate-enemies-covert-affairs-1DeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com Cassie met Rio at her mother and step-brother’s funeral. He was her rock, her shoulder to cry on, her pillar of strength, yet she didn’t even know his name.
Cassie vowed to return to her mothers estate to try and learn the reason for their deaths and try and prove that her step-father was somehow involved.
Upon returning Cassie comes face to face with the man from the funeral, Rio. Only problem is, is that Rio works for her step-father, the man that Cassie plans to prove is involved in numerous criminal activities, ie drug dealing, arms dealing and possibly human trafficking.
Cassie must decide whom she can trust and who she can’t, because no one is really who they seem.
I really enjoyed this book. I felt that it had a great story line and Rio was just to HOT! I particularly liked that even though there was instant attraction between Cassie and Rio they did not immediately fall into bed. The author took the time to develop the relationship between them which I really liked.
Can’t wait to read future books in this series
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review2013-08-01T00:00:00+01:002013-08-01T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587905/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.comreview2013-08-01T00:00:00+01:002013-08-01T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587906/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com I felt this book was really hard to "get into" and the ending was terrible. Even after reading the book I still have no idea "who dunnit".
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review: Fear of Falling2013-07-18T00:00:00+01:002013-07-18T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587893/fear-of-fallingDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com
All I needed was this. Her warm, sweet breath fanned across my face as she sighed with anticipation. I could almost hear her heartbeat stutter over the music. Hooded, sultry eyelids blinked slowly, those emerald green retinas sparkling under the moonlight. This. This moment was the only one that mattered. This woman in front of me was the only one that existed. I wanted to make Kami mine in every way, shape, and form. I wanted to claim every moan, every whimper, every shudder. But for right now. I would settle for this. I would savor this. I would put every ounce of the concentrated desire exploding in every synapse like fireworks on the 4th into this. This. I couldn’t see anything beyond this. Beyond her. Beyond us. I just had to make her feel this too.
Blaine.....sigh....my new book boyfriend.
Kami has lived through some of the worst abuse anyone could possibly endure. Her father beat, tortured, terrorized & sexually abused her. He would tie her up and leave her in a dark closet for hours. He would also beat and raper her mother in front of her. She has some deep scars both physically and mentally. Shes afraid of the dark, of closed doors and terrified of water. Shes damaged and "unloveable". She will never be "normal".
Then she meets Blaine. He has had his fair share of heartache and been accused of seeking out "damsels in distress" so he can rescue them and "save" them. But Kami is convinced that she can't be "fixed" because she's to broken.
I absolutely loved this book. I would give it more then five stars if I could.
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review: Found (Lost & Found, #2)2013-07-16T00:00:00+01:002013-07-16T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587894/found-lost-found-2DeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com I really enjoyed these books. They told the story of Maia & Owen, who both had horrible things that happened to them in the past, which left them both terribly damaged and afraid to trust or love.
Found is the conclusion to their story. I found both Maria & Owen very like-able and I really like the fact that the books are told in alternating POVs (and the fact that the author starts each chapter with the heading stating which character's POV you will be reading).
The books also deal with some heavy issues such as rape & domestic violence which I thought were handled very nicely by the author. The author also didn't feel the need to go into the nitty-gritty details which I appreciated.
All in all I really liked this series.
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review: Fifteen Minutes: A Novel2013-07-16T00:00:00+01:002013-07-16T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587895/fifteen-minutes-a-novelDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com The Characters are very relate-able and the storyline keeps you interested.
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review2013-07-06T00:00:00+01:002013-07-06T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587907/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com I read this immediately after finishing On the Island simply because I wasn’t ready for the story to end yet.
This was a great short read. It answered the question about the skeleton in the cave that TJ and Anna found while on the island.
It also gave us a entirely different love story. A story about a love found and then lost. A story about finding yourself and separating yourself from the people in your life that are only out for what you can do for them. A story about keeping a promise, no matter how many years it might take.
Owen was a man who seemingly had it all. He was independently wealthy, thanks to the dot com business him and three friends started. He drove a nice BMW. He had a beautiful fiancé and attended all the best parties and social events. But, looks can be deceiving.
Owen hated his life. He hates that his business partners were more interested in spending money then in earning it. He hates the man his mother married, a man that would rather sit on his ass and do nothing while expecting a hand-out from Owen. He also hates his sister who thinks that she had a hand in his success and expect compensation for it. Owen hates all the people who just want something from him, but don’t actually care about him.
So, Owen has a plan. A plan to leave it all behind. A plan to get away from everybody and everything. A plan to live by himself on a deserted island until he decides what he wants to do with the rest of his life.
Owen found the perfect island and with the help of Captain Mick (whom we met in the previous book) he was able to leave everything and everyone behind and immerse himself into his self-imposed solitude. Life was good.
Then on a rare weekend off the island (again with the help of Captain Mick) Owen meets a girl named Calia. Owen invites her to come back to the island with him. Hoping she will but not really believing it, he is surprised when she shows up the next morning ready to board the sea plane with him. He’s even more surprised when she brings her brother, James, with her.
For the next month the three of them become close friends.
Then there’s a horrible accident. An accident that changes everything.
This is a great novella to [b:on the island|15505346|On the Island|Tracey Garvis-Graves|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1339162550s/15505346.jpg|18151286] . I love it and can’t say enough good things about it!
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review2013-07-05T00:00:00+01:002013-07-05T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587908/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com Seventeen year old T.J., didn’t want to go on a vacation for the entire summer with his family. He wanted to spend it at home so he could hang out with his best friend, Ben. He just wanted to feel and act like a normal seventeen year old. A seventeen year old who just happened to be recovering from cancer treatments.
Anna, a 31 year old teacher who’s in a relationship she feels is going no where, decides to take a summer job tutoring. She figures that it would give her time to decide what she wants out of life plus it’s in a tropical paradise. The perfect chance to get away and figure some things out, right?
Anna and T.J. meet at the airport where she will be accompanying him to their destination. All goes well until they get on Captain Mick’s seaplane because Captain Mick suffers a fatal heart attack and they crash into the ocean.
This is where it really starts getting good, or should I say bad? For Anna and T.J. Now they have to learn how to survive using or eating nothing except what they find on the island or whatever washes up on the beach. Everyday is a struggle just to stay alive.
They learn to live off of coconuts and breadfruit (sort of like I coconut, I’m guessing) and whatever rain water they can collect, to eventually learning how to catch fish and crabs and the chickens that somehow inhibit the island. They must also deal with sharing their home with rats, spiders, bats, mosquitoes and bugs, and the human skeleton they found in a cave. They suffer through broken bones, bat bites, malnutrition, dehydration and Dengue fever. But, hey, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right?? And these were two very strong people.
I loved sharing this journey with them. I also loved the alternating POV’s. Somehow it just makes a story that much better for me if I can be inside the heads of the characters in the story. I can know what they know, I can see what they see, I can feel what they feel.
Neither Anna or T.J. sat around feeling sorry for themselves. There were times when they broke down, like Thanksgiving or Christmas, when they would wonder how their families were handling their “deaths”, but for the most part they adapted and grew to love their island.
Anna and T.J. were on the island for two years before their relationship ever got physical. It happened so gradual that, for the most part, I didn’t even think about the age difference. By that time T.J. was 19 and Anna was 33, so it wasn’t like she was robbing the cradle or committing statutory rape. They were just a man and a woman, stranded on a deserted island with nobody but each other. It was only natural that they developed feelings for each other.
Another year goes by before they are finally rescued. Which is about half way into the book. I really liked that the story didn’t stop there. We got to see what happens after they return home to their lives and families. How they deal with the media storm of their survival and rescue and their relationship while on the island.
I loved this book. Very seldom do I read a book that stays with me after I’m finished with it. It’s usually read it and forget it. Not so with this book. I loved T.J. I loved Anna and I loved this book!!! I also had to immediately read [b:Uncharted|718907|Uncharted|Angela Elwell Hunt|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347713518s/718907.jpg|827178], the novella follow-up, just because I wasn’t ready for the story to end yet.
For anyone thinking about reading this book, I say you defiantly should. You wont regret it. I promise.
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review2013-06-08T00:00:00+01:002013-06-08T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587910/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com Every once in a while I find a book that after I read it, I find myself thinking about it for days afterward and have a hard time moving on to the next book.
This was one of those books. I loved Cole and I love Blake and I LOVED reading their story.
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review2013-06-05T00:00:00+01:002013-06-05T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587911/postDeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com
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review: Jet (Marked Men, #2)2013-06-04T00:00:00+01:002013-06-04T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587920/jet-marked-men-2DeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com I did especially like the parts where Jet would sing country songs to Ayden even though he hated country music. To me that was just incredibly sweet & sexy.
I do have to admit that I don't like the picture of the guy on the cover. He didn't do a thing for me. Give me a hot body to work with and I'll put my own idea of who's face I want to see on it.
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review: Being Me (Inside Out Trilogy, #2)2013-05-31T00:00:00+01:002013-05-31T00:00:00+01:00http://DeborahJean.booklikes.com/post/587921/being-me-inside-out-trilogy-2DeborahJeanhttp://DeborahJean.booklikes.com Being Me takes up exactly where the last book left off with Sara being shut in the storage unit when the lights went out. I appreciate that there was no time lost between books. I hate it when an author leaves you with a major cliff hanger and when the next book starts you've lost months or years and have to endure all those flash-backs.
While I didn't love this book the same way I did the first one, I really did like it a lot .
There was a lot of questions that the first book left you asking that this book provided the answers to.
While the first book mostly introduced you to the characters, this book gave them depth and personality so that you experienced their life, love and heartbreak right along with them.
It revealed insights into Sara's past and the secrets she was keeping from Chris. It touched upon some of the secrets that Chris was hiding from Sara. And, It explained in more detail the type of life that Mark was into. But most importantly we were able to find out about Rebecca and the secrets before, during, and after her disappearance. I didn't see that one coming.
IMO the steam factor in this book didn't equal what it was in the first book (the image of him taking her up against the glass wall in his apartment makes me ovulate just thinking about it!) but they were still very hot.
I will definitely be reading the next installment simply because I'm a little in love with Chris and I'm just dying to know all his deep-dark secrets.
[b:If I Were You|15717721|If I Were You (Inside Out Trilogy, #1)|Lisa Renee Jones|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1350167395s/15717721.jpg|21388692]
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