Your Fierce Love by Layla Hagen

Clara Abernathy grew up in foster and group homes. She's not anxious to lose the ties she has to the Bennett family through her best friend and former boss, Nate. Even if Blake Bennett is the hottest guy she knows. But she is also reluctant because her new boss is looking for any gossip he can get about the family and he's pressuring her.
Blake is reluctant to date, especially after one of his exes blabbed about his sister's divorce. But he can't stay away from Clara.
I really appreciated that the Big Misunderstanding wasn't the obvious one. Actually, that got cleared up pretty quickly though it did create a bunny trail in the story that didn't really need to be there. An okay book in the series but not my favorite.

Three stars
Follows Your Alluring Love
Followed by Your One True Love
This book came out July 29th, 2017; published by CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
Opinions are my own

Your Alluring Love by Layla Hagen

In previous books, it's been noted that Alice Bennett has a crush on one of her brother's friends. In this story, we get to meet the man, Nate. She's felt that she won't have a chance because his life's goal is a job that will take him to England. But when his job doesn't come through as a result of nepotism, he realizes that maybe the woman he's never been able to consider is suddenly more available to him.
The two strike up a relationship but will it last the test of time?
If you liked the other books in the series, you will still like this one. But you don't necessarily have to have read the other books in the series to like this one.

Three stars
Follows Your Tempting Love
Followed by Your Fierce Love
This book came out May 1st, 2017
Opinions are my own

Moon Called by Patricia Briggs

Mercedes "Mercy" Thompson might have been raised in a town of werewolves but she is not one of them. Instead, she shifts into a coyote and may have some magic as well. Unfortunately, her ability comes from her father's side, a man who was killed before she was even born and his family wasn't interested. Her mother is nice but flighty so Mercy ended up with foster parents who were better able to understand a child who sometimes changed into a canine.
Her life has been fairly quiet lately. She bought a mechanics shop from a goblin and has been making a living. But a teen boy turns up in her shop. He's a recently turned werewolf and accidentally brings trouble to her door. Trouble that has her killing two werewolves and then fighting to save the Alpha of the pack next door as well as his kidnapped teenage daughter.
There was a lot of world building in this that kept us from getting to know Mercy and there were very few well-developed women but I'm hoping later books in the series will correct that oversight.

Three stars
Followed by Blood Bound

This book came out January 31st, 2006

Opinions are my own

This Christmas Rivalry by Beverly Jenkins

Tasha Bloom is one of the few people who mourns her grandfather when he dies. And those who are faking leave pretty quickly during the reading of the will because her grandfather minces no words about who he is leaving his assets to. Almost all of them are going to Tasha.
Drew Davis is upset because he was hoping to get the semipro football team that has been left to Tasha. Instead, she wants to run the team herself, something that, as the GM,he is not excited to hear. The more they work together though, the more he appreciates not only her outer beauty but also her sharp mind.
A fun little story that could have been longer.

Three stars
This story originally came out in 2012
Opinions are my own

Venezia by Lewis Trondheim, Fabrice Parme

Two people are running to hire a boat. The man and the woman are in immediate dislike of each other and rather childish about it. The woman gets the boat but at a price. Then they discover they are renting rooms in the same house. What they don't realize? They are both masters of disguise, spying on the same meeting. When they run into each other as their alter egos, they are able to work together.
The artwork is fabulous and the storyline is fun. There is a little bit of gap in some of the story lines but I wonder if that is translation. Overall a fun book.

Four stars
This book came out November 20
ARC kindly provided by Europe Comics and NetGalley
Opinions are my own

The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition but neither does anyone expect the Herdmans to want to get involved with the Second Presbyterian Christmas pageant. The Herdmans are a group of children that are known for running wild doing things like smoking cigars, blackmailing other kids, bringing their one-eyed cat to school, etc. Not exactly the students who you'd expect to volunteer to be the living nativity. Would it have happened if the regular director hadn't broken her leg? Maybe. But her insinuation that it wouldn't've is what sets the narrator's mother (the fill-in) to declare that this is going to be the best Christmas pageant ever.

With an adult's eye, you understand why the Herdmans run so wild and it might break  your heart just a little but at least one of them seems to have a heart by the end of the story.

Four stars

This book came out in 1972

Book from library

Opinions are my own

Spontaneous by Brenda Jackson

Kimani Cannon has been attracted to the brother of her best friend's fiancé for awhile. She was going

to act on it at the engagement party but he had to leave. At the wedding, she goes for it. And Duan Jeffries is not going to turn it down. But he also isn't sure that he wants it to be a one-time thing. When Kim gets a phone call that her mother is getting married for the fifth time, she's worried; none of the other husbands were particularly good and Kim's mom hasn't known this man for long.
Duan hears the man's name and is immediately on alert. He recognizes it from when he was in the Atlanta police department as being a man whose two wives disappeared under mysterious circumstances when he had an airtight alibi.
It was a fun and fluffy story. As a category romance, there's not a lot of room for development in the relationship but I did see how Kim and Duan fit together.

Three stars
This book came out April 27th, 2010
Borrowed as ebook from library
Opinions are my own