Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James

Death Comes to Pemberley (2011) (Faber & Faber)
P.D. James
Grade: B-
Genre: crime / historical fiction / Austen-inspired
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A crime novel 

Six years have passed since we left Pride and Prejudice and all is well: Elizabeth has transitioned into her role as the new mistress of Pemberley perfectly and she and Darcy dote on their two young sons, Fitzwilliam and Charles. She’s revived the annual Lady Anne’s ball, traditionally held to celebrate the birthday of Darcy’s mother, but which had been dormant since her death. Preparations are well into the final touches on the eve of the ball in 1803, when death comes suddenly and shockingly to Pemberley … It is Lydia Wickham, Elizabeth’s younger, unreliable sister who brings the news in her usual state of hysteria, believing that her husband, George Wickham, is dead. And so follows an investigation that threatens to rock the Darcy family to its core …

Tribute by Nora Roberts

Tribute (2008) (Piatkus)
Nora Roberts
Grade: B-
Genre: romantic suspense
Sex scenes: mild
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A book by Nora Roberts 

A third generation actress and granddaughter of one of Hollywood’s greats, Cilla McGowan has very deliberately cast off her child actress persona and made a very successful business of renovating houses. Her latest project is a house that’s very dear to her heart: the house of her grandmother, the glamorous and notorious Janet Hardy. Left to ruin after her death by apparent suicide, Cilla plans to restore the house to its former glory. With the whole town invested in her project and Ford, her very hot neighbour and his dog, Spock, just next door looking on, this is the biggest project of Cilla’s career. But there’s someone in the community who wants Janet’s secrets to stay that way and they’re determined to keep Cilla from finishing the house, whatever it takes …

Angelfall by Susan Ee

Angelfall (2012) (Hodder & Stoughton)
Susan Ee
Grade: B-
Genre: young adult / supernatural
Source: bookbridgr
Penryn & the End of Days: (1) Angelfall

TBR RBC 2015: A bookbridgr title 

Six weeks ago, angels came to Earth and destroyed humanity as we know it. The streets are deserted, houses are ransacked and for those lucky enough to still be alive, it’s a fierce survival of the fittest. Seventeen-year-old Penryn is left distraught when an angel flies away with her wheelchair-bound younger sister, Paige. Enlisting the reluctant help of Raffe, an injured angel she finds on the streets, who’s been cast out by his own kind, the unlikely pair make their way across the devastated landscape with individual missions in mind: Penryn will do absolutely anything to get her sister back and Raffe will put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies in order to be made whole again.

For the Roses by Julie Garwood

For the Roses (1995) (Pocket Books)
Julie Garwood
Grade: A
Genre: American historical
Sex scenes: hot
Source: own
Claybornes' Brides: (1) For the Roses

TBR RBC 2015: A book by Julie Garwood 

When four young street urchins in New York find a tiny, perfect baby girl thrown in a dumpster, their lives change forever. Though they’re little more than children themselves, Adam, Cole, Douglas and Travis shoulder the responsibility of bringing up the little girl they call Mary Rose Clayborne. All four have pasts they’re trying to escape from and so they head west, in the hope that they can find a place where they can erase the past and build the future that Mary Rose deserves.

Fast forward nineteen years and the Claybornes are well-respected in the tiny town of Blue Belle, Montana. Bringing up Mary Rose by themselves was a challenge and a learning curve, but the Clayborne brothers have strived to provide her with every opportunity as befitting a young woman of genteel upbringing. Enter Harrison Stanford MacDonald, a Scottish lawyer who’s worked in England for many years. He arrives in Blue Belle with a secret agenda and befriends Mary Rose, who adopts him for her own, much to the confusion and annoyance of her brothers. When Harrison’s news is revealed, it’s sure to turn this tight-knit family upside-down …

Night Moves by Nora Roberts

Night Moves (1985) (Silhouette Books)
Nora Roberts
Grade: C+
Genre: romantic suspense
Sex scenes: mild
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A romance novel 

When award-winning Hollywood composer and golden child Maggie Fitzgerald leaves her comfortable life in L.A. for a rundown and abandoned house in the tiny town of Morganville, population 142, no one believes she’ll last. Least of all, Cliff Delaney, the local landscaper Maggie’s hired to tackle her overgrown garden. Their chemistry is instantaneous and explosive, yet both parties try to deny and suppress their feelings based on a mutual dislike of the other. When Cliff’s crew dig up a body where Maggie envisages her new pond, a ten-year-old mystery is dredged up that somebody wants to keep a secret …

Something Rotten by Jasper Fforde

Something Rotten (2004) (Hodder)
Jasper Fforde
Grade: A-
Genre: fiction / crime / alternate reality
Source: own
Thursday Next: (1) The Eyre Affair, (2) Lost in a Good Book, (3) The Well of Lost Plots, (4) Something Rotten

TBR RBC 2015: A book by Jasper Fforde 

After two years as the ‘Bellman’, head of Jurisfiction in The Well of Lost Plots (the place where all fiction is written), Thursday has decided that she’s had enough. While the work keeps her busy and certainly keeps her busy, she needs to get back to the real world to get her husband, Landen, uneradicated by the mammoth Goliath corporation and let her son grow up in a world out of books. Tasked with acclimatising Hamlet to the real world, evading both her official stalker and the assassin trying to kill her, stopping a coup against President George Formby, trying to save all Danish books from a terrible fate and preventing the end of the world with an awesome game of Superhoop, will Thursday ever have time to fix her own troubles?

Me and Mr J by Rachel McIntyre

Me and Mr J (2015) (Electric Monkey, Egmont)
Rachel McIntyre
Grade: B++
Genre: young adult
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A book on Egmont's frontlist 

Lara Titliss (Worst. Surname. Ever.) has recently found salvation in her new diary – an unexpected and unwanted gift from her grandmother. It is in these pages that Lara documents the bullying and torment she suffers from her peers as a result of being a tall, gangly red-head and the least popular girl at school, yet also her discovery of her soulmate. One problem – he’s her teacher. Mr Jagger is the best thing that has ever happened to her school. All the girls in Lara’s class unashamedly throw themselves at him, but she’s the one who he praises in class and asks for help with a special project. He’s the first person who takes her seriously and takes the time to listen to her problems; it’s no wonder that she falls helplessly over heels in love with him. Surely he can’t love her back …

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld

Prep (2005) (Quality Paperbacks Direct, by arrangement with Picador)
Curtis Sittenfeld
Grade: A-
Genre: young adult
Sex scenes: mild
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A classic YA novel 

When 15-year-old Lee Fiora is offered a scholarship at prestigious boarding school Ault, her parents, though puzzled about why she would choose this education, reluctantly allows their eldest child to move away. But boarding school isn’t quite what Lee envisaged after the glossy brochures and her preconceived ideas about what life and classes would be like. Very much an outsider for her four years at Ault, Prep follows Lee as she establishes a tenuous position in the school’s hierarchy, until one thoughtless mistake throws her life into the balance …

Story of a Girl by Sara Zarr

Story of a Girl (2007) (Little Brown)
Sara Zarr
Grade: C
Genre: young adult
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A prize-winning novel 

After being found by her father in the back of Tommy Webber’s Buick aged 13, Deanna Lambert became that girl overnight. Never mind the fact that Tommy was 17 and her brother’s supposed friend. Three years later and Deanna is still known as the ‘school slut’, her father has barely spoken to her since that night and tensions in their house might explode any minute. Deanna wants nothing but a life where one mistake when she was 13 doesn’t precede her. Through confronting the perceptions of the people around her, Deanna begins to realise that starting afresh begins within …

Prom Nights from Hell by various (anthology)

Prom Nights from Hell (2007) (HC Children's Books) (anthology)
Meg Cabot / Lauren Myracle / Kim Harrison / Michele Jaffe / Stephenie Meyer
Grade: C
Genre: anthology / young adult / paranormal
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A book on HarperCollins' backlist 

In this collection by five best-selling young adult authors, prom nights take on a whole different meaning … in Meg Cabot’s The Executioner’s Daughter, Mary is on a mission to take out a vampire who has bewitched her best friend and destroyed her family … in Lauren Myracle’s The Corsage, Frankie takes desperate measures to bring back the one she loves … in Kim Harrison’s Madison Avery and the Grim Reaper, Madison’s prom night takes a turn for the worse when she accepts a ride home from a beautiful stranger … in Michele Jaffe’s Kiss and Tell, one of Miranda’s clients turns out to be a Very Wanted Person … and lastly in Stephenie Meyer’s Hell on Earth, one minor demon is intent on ruining prom night for everyone … these short stories take prom nights to a different paranormal level …

Twelve Days of Christmas by Trisha Ashley

Twelve Days of Christmas (2010) (Avon)
Trisha Ashley
Grade: C
Genre: chick lit
Sex scenes: super mild
Source: own
Lancashire: (1) Sweet Nothings, (2) A Winter's Tale, (3) Wedding Tiers, (4) Chocolate Wishes, (5) Twelve Days of Christmas

TBR RBC 2015: Free Square 

Brought up by her Strange Baptist grandmother, Holly didn’t celebrate Christmas in its modern, commercial sense until she married her husband, Alan. When he died in a tragic accident not long before the festive holidays, Holly reverted to her old ways. Now, she’s a chef in the summer months, catering for week-long house parties, and a house sitter in the winter, choosing to spend her holidays in solitude caring for other peoples’ houses instead of forcing a smile with her family-in-law. This Christmas, Holly is faced with just that depressing prospect until a last-minute house-sitting job falls in her lap. But what starts as a straightforward task in looking after a house and its resident dog, horse and goat, turns into a fully-fledged family-orientated house party with its requisite unwanted guests alongside the bosom of the family as Holly takes on the responsibility for catering to a family she barely knows, but quickly comes to love as her own …

Dash & Lily's Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan

300th post!!! What a milestone - it feels like only yesterday that I started this blog, but it was in fact just over 3 years ago. Boy has it flown by. Here's to the next 300 posts and 3 years ...

Dash & Lily's Book of Dares (2011) (MIRA Ink)
Rachel Cohn & David Levithan
Grade: C+
Genre: young adult
Source: own / NetGalley

TBR RBC 2015: A NetGalley title 

When Dash leads his separated parents to believe that he’ll be spending Christmas with the other, they each plan holidays with their new partners and leave Dash to his own devices in New York City. He despises Christmas, but when he finds a notebook in his favourite bookshop filled with clues and dares left by a stranger, this is the perfect thing to keep him occupied. The notebook is Lily’s project, as directed by her brother, in a bid to keep her busy while their parents take a second honeymoon in Fiji over Christmas. As the pair lead each other in a scavenger’s hunt over New York, recruiting friends and relatives to help keep their identities secret in the process, they begin falling for each other on paper. Meeting in person will be their biggest dare yet …

Ransom My Heart by Meg Cabot

Ransom My Heart (2008) (Macmillan)
Meg Cabot
Grade: B--
Genre: medieval romance
Sex scenes: mild
Source: own

TBR RBC 2015: A book by Meg Cabot 

Finnula Craig is the youngest of five sisters and their long-suffering brother, and quite the handful. After their parents died several years ago, Robert has been the head of this family of millers and Finn has only grown more difficult to deal with. A talented archer and hunter, she is a thorn in the local sheriff’s side as she continues to flaunt the law and poach upon the local Earl’s game.

When Finn’s only other unmarried sister lands in trouble, Finn reluctantly agrees to help her out. The local women have taken to ambushing young men and demanding ransom from their families in order to fund local beer-making activities. Finn has no other choice but to take a hostage and hope he’s from a rich family. What Finn doesn’t expect is for her captive to be none other than Hugo Fitzwilliam, the new Earl of Stephensgate. Having just returned from the Holy Land, fighting for King and country, Hugo is sorely tempted by this feisty and audacious slip of a girl who isn’t afraid to sass him. For her part, Finn is just as afraid of losing her freedom as losing her heart …

Reading Bingo Challenges for 2015

I might not have completed my trio of reading bingo challenges in 2014, but before the year was out, I'd already started planning a new set for 2015. Since that day browsing on Pinterest, these have been a true revelation that have really made my reading like a game - as if reading wasn't fun enough already.

I've undergone a much-needed down-size for 2015; while there are still three challenges, these are all 5x5 grids with 25 challenges a piece. Coupled with my overarching goal to read 100 books this year, I'm hoping this will be a slightly more achievable year, reading-wise.

The Challenges:

1. Romance RBC 2015
This one has seen the most radical transformation: reduced from 48 challenges to a mere 25. Included are all of the 12 challenges that I didn't complete in 2014, as well as a random mix of AAR Top 100 challenges, romance sub-genres, books by decade of publication and romance tropes - perfectly eclectic. I have a tendency to read a lot of historicals with a sprinkling of a few romantic suspenses on the side, but hopefully this will help me open up genre-wise. Fingers crossed that this will be a little more straightforward than 2014 with a lot less complaining about trying to fit everything in ...