The Girl He Used To Know by Tracey Garvis Graves

Hello everyone.

I have a word for you...ready?  SEX!  Yes, sex. Okay, goodnight and have a safe drive home! No? Okay, then I'll go on. Sex is everywhere. It is getting checked out at the grocery store, in more ways than one, or being noticed while walking your dog. Sex is in movies, nature, tv, in books. I am assuming we are all adults here, if under 18 turn this off and go read a book. Back to being adults, being a few years out of my twenties, okay more than a few. No, not that many...okay maybe...let's get off my age. Let me just say, by now what I haven't done, I have ruled out or put in that side category of "maybe just once if I'm in a weird mood and have had a hell of a lot of wine." No matter where you are in your sex life journey, we all know what that attraction feels like. As with many things promoted for money, sex has been turned into a sales vehicle. Whether we like it or not sex sells. I remember being in a marketing class in college and being shocked when we were shown an ad for a certain kind of scotch. It was in a glass over ice. The teacher asked us to look very closely at the ice and sure enough the shape of the haze within the ice was that of a woman's body. Sex does sell, more than booze too, it sells books. No? Don't think so? Ask the author of Fifty Shades of Grey. It was a fan fiction version of Twilight but became SO popular, partly because of the sex. Result, book deal and well paid author.

Sex in a book is especially important in a romance novel. Perhaps not the sex act itself but definitely sexual tension. We root for the characters to get together, to fall in love, to have emotional as well as sexual chemistry. But frankly, if there is no physical spark it could end up like loving your brother not someone you have great passion with. This week I read The Girl He Used to Know by Tracey Garvis Graves. First, let me say, I was very fortunate to receive an advanced copy from the publisher (thank you most excellent St. Martin's Press). I know several other reviewers who also received copies. They ALL LOVED it. Adored. Best thing since sliced bread. When looking at the author on Amazon you will see she is highly rated, a NY Times best seller.  You know it's coming don't you?

For me, this book missed the mark. This is the story of a couple that falls in love in college,  separates then reconnects years later. The story is painfully slow, they don't go anywhere or do anything. That is fine, it drives me crazy when I read a bunch of books where all the activity and settings are over the top, but when you stay in one place the reader is relying on the author to really develop the characters and for some wonderful dialog. The conversations between characters in this story seemed somewhat forced. Not playful, fun, or enjoyable. Not that all discussions have to be light but they didn't seem particularly meaningful either. In this story the girl is on the autism spectrum, the third book with that theme that I've read in six months. Makes me wonder if that is the next trend like vampires were a few years ago (betting female French spies during WWII follow as next major book topic). I can't really explain it other than to say what others found charming, I found flat and uninteresting. The writing was slow and bland. There was a big event at the end but frankly by then it seemed awkward and out of place. I know the work that goes into a book. I really do. It hurts me to say something bad about any book, please remember I am one of the very few people that don't like this. I just thought this whole story, minus the ending, could have been told in 10 pages.

Now that I've depressed us all, time to go to the grocery story to get "checked out", one way or another.

Addicted to Love by Nicola Niemc

Hello everyone.

If you are in the US I hope you okay during our weekend of terrible weather. Tornados in the south and a blizzard in the north. In the middle, we are getting squeezed with a huge temperature and pressure change, going from a pleasant 65 degrees this morning to a teeth chattering 19 tonight, with 35 mph winds. It's basically a headache in the making!  I have been glued to the weather channel since I have family in the path of 24 inches of snow (yes, I am an evil person as I have an ever so slight grin as I type that). What I often see, but haven't in the last few days, is the weather around the world, I'm sure there are difficult patches of weather everywhere. I hope you are ALL safe and out of harms way. Now that I've given a meteorological rundown, feeling like I should be standing in front of a map gesturing wildly with my hands, I'll say this...lousy weather is a great time to read! Yep, you can't feel guilty about not painting the house, or pulling weeds in the garden, or all those uncompleted errands. It is as if those snow clouds parted and a beam of sun shone down on our pile-o-books, like part of an Indiana Jones movie, beckoning us to read. So I say "READ WE MUST!"

Tired of looking at your to be read list, feeling guilty about buying so many books and not knowing where to start? Not to be an enabler, but sometimes you need something new even though you have a ton to read already. I know that makes no sense and is just an example of how I buy way too many books and can attempt to justify anything, but sometimes my TBR piles have me running like a puppy. Each book surrounds me, calling my name. I feel like I am running back and forth between them "I'll read this next, no this...no this...wait maybe this should be first."  Pretty soon I'm gonna be like that little puppy and piddle right on the floor from complete confusion. So as I tiebreaker I'll get a new book. Shhhh, I know that just complicates the problem and is probably a clear sign of addiction, but YOU are supposed to be on my side! Anyway, I bought a new book a bit before Christmas, during one of these episodes. I read the beginning but had to put it down because of the holidays.

I've read several books lately, great ones, The Red Address Book, An Anonymous Girl, and The Silent Patient. To be honest, these books will likely all be huge blockbusters...HUGE. During all these, in the back of my mind, the book I'd read the first few pages of kept calling me. That book is Addicted to Love by Nicola Niemc. Now I'll let you in on a little secret, Nicola reads this blog. Yes, she does, and you'll often see her commenting! To have a blog less than a year old and have someone so kind as to read it often and take time to comment, well, I really appreciate it and count myself as very lucky and honored. So, when you see her comments, you know she is an author! You can purchase Addicted to Love on Amazon in both paperback and kindle. You know, with a kindle purchase, you don't even have to leave your house...you can hit that little buy and download button and, despite the blizzard we currently have outside, you could have this book in the nick of time.

Addicted to Love is the perfect bad weather read (course it would be a great beach read too). It is a romance between Lexi and Robert; she is in her early twenties and he his forties. Now you would think that Robert would be very mature and Lexi less so, but that doesn't hold true in all cases. Sometimes, things in our past require us to grow up more than we should have to. Sometimes this is visible, sometimes it remains hidden below the surface to be dealt with later. Both Lexi and Robert have their pasts to deal with in a physical and emotional way. This story follows these two people in their May-December romance as they uncover these issues and deal with them. Most romance novels follow a pattern where the characters meet, fall in love, have some kind of earth shattering problem, and get back together for a happy ending. This novel breaks with that a bit, with a more character driven story. Instead of someone literally hanging off a cliff, you keep reading because you want to know why Lexi acts like that or what Robert was thinking. One thing this book does, like a typical romance, and it does very well, is build the sexual tension between the two characters. The naughty bits might well keep you warm during the snow, another advantage of a purchase this weekend. Hell, it might melt the snow off your roof! One of the things that makes this book so completely enjoyable (besides the tension) is the writing. Nicola, you can write! Seriously! The dialog in this is so good. I've just read three books that are bound to be New York Times Bestsellers, yet this book, Addicted to Love still held my interest. Now that is saying something! It is due completely to the writing! It is quick witted, sometimes sarcastic, never drones on, never repeats and again, the dialog is excellent.

Now, hold on to your hats, this is after all a book review, I have to say something negative...I want more. Yes, I have to know the future of Lexi and Robert. So now that I'm addicted to Addicted to Love, I need more. While we are all reading during bad weather, maybe Nicola could start working on a sequel.