Book Goals for 2016

As a member of good reads there's a place where you can make reading goals for the year. 

Last year I had a goal of 100 books which I exceeded. This year I've chosen to try for 120 books. 

As of right now I'm on book nine so I guess I have some writing to catch up on. 

Maybe I'll see some of you there if you're interested in joining 😊

Falling Behind Again by Three Books

Yes, I know that I made a promise and I'm falling horribly behind on it. See my computer crashed and I had to get it fixed. In the day and a half that I didn't have my computer I went through three books.

Totally involved in the Night Prince Series, I finished them in record time for me. I also started writing again so I put some energy into that as well.

Needless to say I have some catching up to do.

This is the first book in the Night Prince Series by Jeaniene Frost. I posted the synopsis from the back of the book, I believe last Thursday or so. I re-shared it though so feel free to look at it. 

Since I'm done with the book however, this is not a synopsis. 

Leila just wants to live out the rest of her life as normal as possible. It's not that easy to begin with since when she was 13 she touched a live wire behind her house. Now she can electrocute people with the slightest touch and glean psychic impressions with her right hand. With one touch of her right hand she can tell you your darkest sin as well as find your past, find you in the present and sometimes your future. 

She had made herself a decent life working with her vampire friend Marty in a carnival. Then one accident changed all of that. 

While she was out looking for Marty one day, Leila accidentally caught a guy that was going to murder his wife because she had wanted a divorce. That one touch of her hand gave her a status she would live to be thankful for....but the thankful feeling comes later. Much later. 

First she has to get through being kidnapped by, I think, four crazy vampires that kidnap her to try and find the vampire that killed their friend. Weird right, revenge? Anyway, that wasn't the real gold mine. 

The whole point of them finding her and her finding this vamp was for another vampire. Yes, there was one behind the creepy four puling their strings. 

And the vampire Leila had to find....none other than Vlad Tepesh, THE Vlad Tepesh, the vampire behind the Dracula stories but to save your own life, never call him Dracula. 

There's something that burns bright between those two and Leila refuses to accept it at first. She's lived a very jaded life because of her accident and she is not enthused with Vlad's demeanor. 

He's brutal and violent.....and she can't deny that she wants him like she's never wanted anyone before. 

This whole book lays the ground work for a relationship between Leila and Vlad plus it flushes out that Vlad's enemy is one that he's had for centuries. It just took him a while to gather the strength to fight against Vlad. 

This book is a must read in my opinion. I dare not say too much more for I wouldn't want to give anything away.

Enjoy :)

Being Me- Lisa Renee Jones....DONE!!!!!

Good afternoon everybody. I hope that you have all been enjoying my blog so far this year. I am making a better effort to be on here more. This series though has me enthralled.

As of this afternoon, before my family had even gotten home from grocery shopping today, I finished Being Me. I think this is a record for me, even when it comes to the first time I read Fifty Shades of Grey. I started it at around 8:30 last night and finished around maybe 1;30 or 2 this afternoon.

The ups and downs and twists and turns really got to me to keep reading. Can you see why I love my husband so much now? I totally shut him out for a book lol.

Everything at this time seems fine in Sara and Chris' relationship and things are even ok with her and Mark. Lines have been drawn and Mark swore he won't cross them.

Sara even gets Mark's blessing to go to Los Angeles with Chris to his charity function for cancer. It's there that she meets the little boy that has captured Chris' heart. Dylan has leukemia and there is no doubt that he is dying. The most they can do is make him comfortable and keep his spirits up.

Usually I wouldn't mention sad facts like that except this is a turning point for both Chris and Sara. At the gala function, Sara runs into her ex, Michael. The things he says to her are awful and he tries to blackmail Chris to get Sara to go home with him. It's the past that she wasn't ready to share yet rearing it's ugly head.

Of course Chris sees more than he should when it comes to Sara, so when she runs off to the bathroom he follows her and has two of his female friends keep a look out for him while he tries to talk to her. Bawling her eyes out on the floor of the bathroom she tell Chris. Two years ago she was feeling weak and Michael was being kind and she let him in her door. From that point he forced himself on her. She had said no but then ultimately gave into him and did exactly what he was asking her to do. Sara thought for sure that Chris would hate her after that confession but no, he actually confessed that he loves her.

I was so shocked lol. It's a good thing that I don't really read in public because all eyes would have been on me when I started squealing and laughing. It was a point that you shouldn't laugh and be happy but the moment itself was so sweet that you just can't help it.

Chris took care of her that night and the information didn't change how he thought of her. As he put it, one night doesn't dictate a lifetime. That night had made love to her like never before and it was so sweet.

The next turning point was Chris' turn. It was only a few days after they had returned home that Sara received a call from Dylan's mother. Dylan had just passed away but she was worried about Chris because when she told him, he didn't take the news too well.

Now here, this is where we see the side of Chris that Sara was never supposed to see. The dark side of this protective man. Unlike Fifty Shades of Grey and even the Crossfire Series, Chris does not revel in giving pain. He's not the dominant that we are all used to seeing in other series or even in this one. Chris likes pain.

Mark to her to his club to try and pull Chris back from the edge of the abyss. He honestly thought that Sara was the only one that could and it needed to be done because Chris was pushing limits that were way past safe. When Sara walked into the room and saw that Chris was chained up to some poles and being beaten she was shocked.

That would be enough to shock anyone but she got him to stop....at a price. Broken inside and bleeding on the out, Chris was in agonizing pain that she saw him like that and told her it was over. Chris was trying to protect her from himself and forced her away.

It was a week, I think, that she had just stopped eating. Sara wasn't even sleeping. Mark gave her some more to do in her new client's apartment building that was being built. Seeing as the owner, Ryan, and Mark were friends it was easy to convince Ryan to let her do the work. However it was after the opening night that Sara figured things out. Mark and Ryan offered her a way out of the pain she was drowning in. Master and submissive. Sharing. Everything that Rebecca had done with no feeling whatsoever.

Sara never wanted that life. Not even the pain she felt over Chris could make her choose that life and she ran out. To her surprise, Chris was waiting outside for her. Not one word from him and now all of a sudden he shows up. It's funny. Chris pushed her away and yet drove himself insane without her. Two broken people that NEED each other to pull out of the darkness. Now that is something that doesn't seem to change in any book.

It was that night that they decide to try and work through this and figure it out more. No more secrets, no more shutting each other out. Then there's one other little secret that Sara finds out. Packing to go see Chris' god parents, Sara finds Chris' paint brushes.....that match the one that Rebecca had kept.

That leads to a fight that takes Sara to Mark's house. At the time she knew that she was interrupting something but didn't know what. That is until Ava, the girl she thought that she made friends with and owned the coffee house next to the gallery, came stomping out in only a shirt and with Ryan in tow.

Ava threatened that Mark wasn't going to do the same thing with Sara that he did with Rebecca. She would kill her first before that happened again. Which she did try to do.

In that moment everything happened so fast. Ava had a gun on her and Chris was riding his Harley down the street to get there for her not even knowing what he was walking into. Ava fired a shot that sent Chris crashing and somehow the police got called. Thankfully they arrested her but it put Sar and Chris' relationship on rocky ground.

Chris hated that she turned to Mark for the facts instead of trusting him but even though he vowed it would be over if he found her here, he was giving her another chance. It was that evening that Ava confessed. She had killed Rebecca before she could take Mark back again. Very nearly killed Sara for the same reason except that's never been the relationship between her and Mark.

Ella is still missing and there's a gaping void in Sara's heart at the distance that Chris has put between them. Sara spent that night in Ella's empty apartment. Chris showed up for all of five minutes with another one of his little tests. He's leaving for Paris in the morning and he wants her to go with him.

There were no fluttery words, no romance just a simple if you want to know all of me then this is where you'll find it. Just leaving her there and the book in an emotional turmoil.

Does she go and risk her heart again for this man or does she stay and try to make a life for herself again?

If I Were You by Lisa Renee Jones

This is my first book of the new year and I have to say I picked a good one. I'm about 44% of the way through it according to GoodReads, in my terms I'm on chapter 15 lol.

So far we have Sara McMillan, a poor high school teacher with a dream of working in the art field. Her best friend, Ella, buys a storage container as her latest venture that has many hidden secrets. Ella rushes off in the middle of the night to get married, leaving the storage container in Sara's hands.

In this storage container lies journals of a woman named Rebecca. Rebecca's journals are very erotic and for a school teacher that has a scarred past and no current life, reading them was exciting. Until Sara came upon more troubling entries.

These entries lead her to look for Rebecca. Sara just wants to know that she is alright and to return her things to her. This path leads her to her dream.

Sara has always wanted to work around art, however she knew that dreams don't pay the bills. When she finds out that Rebecca works at one of the more prestigious art galleries, Sara gets immediately fascinated.

Every time Sara calls to talk to Rebecca, every person says that she is on a type of vacation. The gallery hosted an Alverez art show for charity that week, giving Sara the PERFECT excuse for her to indulge herself and also to go and physically seek out Rebecca.

That night changed her life.....

Feel free to contemplate on those changes and I'll be back with more later on today because that's just the beginning.

Good Reads Goal for the Year

Good Reads remains ever so diligent this year. When we had gotten back from Maryland this year I found an email waiting from me asking me about my reading goal this year.

I have always strived for what seems at the time inconceivable so I decided to keep with that tradition lol. The goal I have set for myself this year is the same as it was last year and didn't reach.

By the end of this year my goal is to read 100 books. No re-reading any of the same books this year.

That's part of what makes the challenge hard. I love to re-read my books even though I have so many that I could easily read a book a day and never repeat the same one.

The book that I am on now I technically started in December but I knew that I wasn't going to be able to read much from the time I started it till after I got back from Maryland the first week in January.

I'll be back to post on what I have on that book so far in a few :)

Who else has a reading goal this year? Or even in a month? Short term goals are good as well.