The Cinderella Rules by Donna Kauffman

(398 pages)



THERE'S A LITTLE BIT OF CINDERELLA IN EVERY WOMAN . . .

. . . except Darby Landon, or so she thinks before meeting the three fairy godmothers of Glass Slipper, Inc. They guarantee they can bring out the princess in any woman. But they'll have their work cut out for them with Darby, who's more comfortable in jeans and cowboy boots than designer gowns. But when she's called from her Montana ranch to squire her impossible-to-please father's star client around the D.C. social scene, Darby has to turn into the queen of chic . . . and fast.
Between torture-chamber sessions of tweezing and teasing, and horrifying lessons on place settings, Darby finds herself drawn into a fairy-tale romance of the very adult variety with Shane Morgan, the devastatingly sexy (and reluctant) heir to one of the city's largest companies. But when another Prince Charming arrives on the scene, Darby‘s caught between the woman she is and the woman she's supposed to be, between two very different irresistible bad boys. Now Darby has to choose her own happy ending . . . and with the help of three very unusual fairy godmothers, this modern-day Cinderella is determined to stay dancing way past midnight—no pumpkins required.

i did enjoy this one, although i thought the ending was too abrupt...
I adored Darby and obviously Shane was fab.... but i wanted to see mre of the Godmothers, I loved what there was of them, but there just wasnt enough....
saomething there was plenty of though was sex!!!.... very steamy at times... especially in the department store...say no more lol!!

The Heartbreaker by Carly Phillips

(288 pages)



Carly Phillips, New York Times bestselling author of The Bachelor, makes her hardcover debut with the final title in her series of sexy contemporary romances. Chase Chandler is head of the town newspaper, a role he took over when his father died. In doing so he sacrificed any hopes and dreams he had for himself. Still, he gladly watched as his younger brothers found wives and started families. But when their mother falls seriously ill, Chase realizes how lonely he's become and that it's time to find a wife-and life-of his own. When he promises to look out for a family friend's daughter who is visiting, he is shocked to discover that this is the young woman with whom he shared one secret night of passion. Now this loner is determined to try again with a woman he fell in love with on first sight-and find out if a second chance might lead to forever...

a nice read but just seemed like a regurgitation of the other two in the trilogy....although it did manage to tie up the loose ends. i think they need to be read individually rather than as a series one after the other....

The Playboy by Carly Phillips

(384 pages)



Rick Chandler is a local cop in his small hometown. This so-called ladies man is at the point in his life where he needs to find a wife to settle down with-especially since his mother has taken ""ill,"" claiming grandchildren as her final wish. The only problem is that every woman in town is throwing themselves at Rick, and he's not interested in any of them. Or at least that's what he thinks, until he pulls over Kendall Sutton, caught speeding in a wedding dress. Kendall's world has crumbled since her aunt died, causing her to reevaluate life. She also has to deal with her troubled 12-year-old sister Hannah coming to live with her. Knowing Kendall's stay in town is temporary, Rick offers to help her with Hannah if she will pose as his ""fianc?e"" to get his mother off his back. As the two join forces in this hoax, Rick tries to resist falling for Kendall as he has a penchant for damsels-in-distress. But fall for her he does, overcoming his own relationship demons from the past, and the couple may just have a shot at a happy ending."

very cute, extremely fluffy, but very like The Bachelor.....

The Bachelor by Carly Phillips

(400 pages)



The small town of Yorkshire Falls and its colorful inhabitants including a mysterious panty-raider and a fun-loving but devious mother are a sturdy stage for Phillips's (Erotic Invitation) romantic romp. After news of his mother's weak heart summons him home, globetrotting journalist Roman Chandler loses a coin toss with his brothers that determines who will relinquish his bachelor status to give their mother a grandchild. Roman decides to "settle down" without giving up his travel-intensive job, and as one of the most handsome men in town, he can have his pick of the local women except for Charlotte Bronson, his high school crush. Thoughts of her parents' miserable long-distance marriage keep Charlotte from accepting Roman's proposal, despite the sexual sparks that fly at their every encounter. Mutual attraction eventually proves too powerful to resist, however, but first Roman must win her trust. Though Phillips gives sensual friction and emotional introspection equal attention, the emotional chemistry between Roman and Charlotte merely simmers while the sexual chemistry explodes. The first in a Chandler brothers trilogy, this entry will encourage readers who enjoy dining on passion to pick up the next book, but those who prefer more emotionally bonded characters may chose a different course.

Very sweet and fluffy with lots of fun characters..... the mother reminded me of someone close to home.... lol!!!

Asking For Trouble by Elizabeth Young

(404 pages)



Sophy's single and happy about it. She likes her life. She does, however, have an imaginary boyfriend, a little white lie whose sole purpose is to keep her mother off her back. Which is fine until his presence is demanded at a family wedding.

This was a really fun read, lots of enjoyable characters and scenarios.... fab!! I borrowed this from a friend to complete my authors reading challenge, and she wanted it back!! I can certainly understand why!!!!

Sky Burial by Xinran

(166 pages)



In the world of fiction reviewing, extraordinary is an over-used word. Yet there really is no other way to describe Chinese author Xinran's second book, Sky Burial. It is extraordinary in so many ways--the subject matter, the setting, the central character, but mostly its authenticity and the author's continuing search for the woman whose life is told here.

Sky Burial is the true story of a Chinese woman's 30-year search through Tibet for news of her lost, presumed dead, husband. Xinran is working as a radio journalist on a women's programme when a listener calls in to tell her about Shuwen. Xinran travels hundreds of miles across China to interview her and, over two days, Shuwen opens her heart and reveals her tragic, scarcely imaginable life story. Xinran returns to her life and spends the subsequent 10 years trying to find Shuwen again, researching her story and writing this book--a homage to an ordinary woman's extraordinary life-long search for the truth.
The story is a simple one: Shuwen meets her intelligent, idealistic husband-to-be while they are both training to be doctors. After less than 100 days of marriage, Kejun travels to Tibet as a Chinese army doctor and before long, Shuwen is notified that he has died in an "incident". Shuwen decides to join the army herself, travel to Tibet and find out if he really is dead, and if so, how and why he died.
And then, as if travelling to a closed country like Tibet as a young woman in the 1950s is not difficult enough, Shuwen quickly becomes separated from her unit and, close to death herself, is taken in by a family of Tibetan nomads. Her transformation from Chinese doctor to nomadic Buddhist is a long, painful and at many turns, deeply distressing one.
Sky Burial is a slight book--little more than an extended short story--and yet the ground it covers is immense, not just because of the fascinating glimpse it offers into a land and a people still largely unknown in the West. Despite its tragic themes of loss and survival in one of the world's harshest landscapes, it is an uplifting tale of unwavering loyalty and immeasurable inner strength.

The main reason I read this book was to complete a part of a reading challenge, - After all authors beginning with 'X' are pretty hard to find!!!
So as you can imagine, I was stunned to find mysels so gripped by the immensely touching story of Wen. As soon as I started reading, I had to carry on.... i needed to find out what happened next. It gave an insight into the life of Tibetans, especiall under the rule of the People's Liberation Army. It gave a sense of reality to the seemingly remote countries that we see documentaries about. The love story of Wen searching for her husbang was intense and it was essential to find out what exactly had happened. I am so glad that I read this book.

Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey

(254 pages)



The men who rode the dragons were a breed apart. Chosen when the dragons were first hatched, they became soulmates for life with the huge, magnificent beasts they controlled - the green, blue, brown and bronzes - beautiful - terrible - the only creatures who could defend the planet Pern from the blood-red star. But without the Queen, the dragons would become extinct. Only the gigantic, golden Queen could breed the new flights. And the Queen was fading...dying...leaving behind one last, huge, golden egg.

I did enjoy reading this, although it was hard going at times...I simply am not a fantasy novel type of girl. The story was good and the characters engagind, and it was very well written, just not really my tpe of thing.

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde

(384 pages)



Pirouetting on the boundaries between sci-fi, the crime thriller and intertextual whimsy, Jasper Fforde's outrageous The Eyre Affairputs you on the wrong footing even on its dedication page, which proudly announces that the book conforms to Crimean War economy standard.
Fforde's heroine, Thursday Next, lives in a world where time and reality are endlessly mutable--someone has ensured that the Crimean War never ended for example--a world policed by men like her disgraced father, whose name has been edited out of existence. She herself polices text--against men like the Moriarty-like Acheron Styx, whose current scam is to hold the minor characters of Dickens' novels to ransom, entering the manuscript and abducting them for execution and extinction one by one. When that caper goes sour, Styx moves on to the nation's most beloved novel--an oddly truncated version of Jane Eyre--and kidnaps its heroine. The phlegmatic and resourceful Thursday pursues Acheron across the border into a Leninist Wales and further to Mr Rochester's Thornfield Hall, where both books find their climax on the roof amid flames.
Fforde is endlessly inventive: his heroine's utter unconcern about the strangeness of the world she inhabits keeps the reader perpetually double-taking as minor certainties of history, literature and cuisine go soggy in the corner of our eye. The audacity of the premise and its working out provides sudden leaps of understanding, many of them accompanied by wild fits of the giggles. This is a peculiarly promising first novel.

this book drove me nuts!!!
I had such a hard time reading it, with all the clever plays on words and stupid names like "Braxton Hicks" and my personal favourite.... "Paige Turner".
Unfortunately I dont even think that the ending was worth the effort. The Idea was great, just not done in an especially good way :(

The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving

(53 A4 pages (EBook))



The chief part of the story, turned upon the favorite specter of Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman, who had been heard several times of late, patrolling the country; and, it was said, tethered his horse nightly among the graves in the churchyard. The story was immediately matched by a thrice marvelous adventure of Brom Bones, who made light of the Galloping Hessian as an arrant jockey. He affirmed that on returning one night from the neighboring village of Sing Sing, he had been overtaken by this midnight trooper; that he had offered to race with him for a bowl of punch, and should have won it too, for Daredevil beat the goblin horse all hollow, but just as they came to the church bridge, the Hessian bolted, and vanished in a flash of fire. All these tales, told in that drowsy undertone with which men talk in the dark, the countenances of the listeners only now and then receiving a casual gleam from the glare of a pipe, sank deep in the mind of Ichabod...

This was a really wonderful old fashioned ghost story of the legendary Headless Horseman... probably more famous for Johnny Depp's portrayal of Ichabod Crane than anything else :)

Taking A Chance by Janice Kay Johnson

(304 pages)



Jo Dubray doesn’t think much of marriage, and she certainly doesn’t plan to try it herself. But that doesn’t mean she isn’t interested in getting to know her new room-mate’s brother… After all, Ryan’s recently divorced and has two children living with their mother. He can’t be thinking of anything as serious and confining as remarrying.
But what will she do if he is?
Especially once his kids re-enter the picture. Three women, two children, one cat…and the three men who are about to change their lives. It’s the family you choose that counts.

Well written romance about the woman who wont and the man who needs to.... a wonderful supporting cast including a cat with an eyepatch provide some intrigue and need to follow up the story to tie up loose ends and unsolved problems...Very nice and sweet, with complex family life taking the fore.

A Baby Of Her Own by Brenda Novak

(296 pages)



What Delaney wants is a baby of her own. At thirty, she longs to break away from the constraints of her life. Longs to reach out for her heart’s desire. She’d prefer marriage as well, but there’s no man she’s interested in marrying.
Then one winter’s night she and her best friend, Rebecca, go out with the intent of finding a man for Delaney. She meets a handsome stranger named Conner, a man who might be able to provide her with the solution she needs…and the baby she wants!
Afterwards she thinks she must have been out of her mind. But it’s too late-she’s pregnant. And the stranger isn’t a stranger any more. Conner Armstrong is now her neighbour.

This was another typical cheesy fluffy thing, with an unfortunately ridiculous story with a predictable sickly sweet ending.. Fun to read but not classic literature!!!

X-Files: Ruins by Kevin Anderson

(256 pages)



An American archaeologist disappears while exploring the lost Mayan city of Xitaclan - and FBI agents Mulder and Scully are flown to the Yutucan jungles to investigate. Mulder decides there may be more to this case than simply a missing team of scientists.

Really enjoyable. Easy to read and believable. You can Imagine Mulder & Scully being there! I've just finished reading this again as part of my alphabet title challenge for 2005, and I enjoyed it even more than the first time!!

Want To Play? by P.J. Tracy

(454 pages)



Minneapolis, a brutally cold autumn. And a killer is at work. Two bodies are found, two slayings that the police treat as unrelated. But games-creator Grace MacBride knows different. The murders are exact copies of those in a game she’s designing – one that already has hundreds of eager players. As the copycat killings mount up, Grace knows that she is both suspect and potential victim. And with the serial killer getting closer, she is drawn into a murderous game of cat and mouse … want to play?

I couldn't put this down. Once I got into it (believe it or not after the THIRD murder) I was hooked. I loved the characters with the imaginitive names like "Roarunner" & "Harley Davidson" and I absolutely had to find out whodunnit, and I was not disappointed.... shocked but not disappointed!! I think this should be a must read for all those who love Sick Shit books!!!