Geared for Pleasure by Rachel Grace
My rating: 3/5 cats
oh, bodice-rippers, the things i have read for you. cowboy porn, medieval porn, twincest porn…
but guess what?? against all odds, i liked this one. like, i 3.5 star cat liked this one. is that weird? am i finally coming over to the darkside of steampunk loooove books? am i going to be one of the ladies elbowing others out of the way to get my hands on the monthly deliveries of harlequin extras? it could happen. i am greasing my elbows.
usually, reading the things we read for this group, i just have the “git-r-done” attitude, as the great philosopher would say. i read them so i can post a humorous review of them, and then i go on to read something that is more to my liking. but this one wasn’t bad. i have chosen to read books that were way worse than this.
a lot of my liking of it was the characters. not so much bodhan; he’s pretty stock: handsome, chiseled, knows how to give a woman pleasure, but not how to give her…his heart. a brothel-owner who protects the ladies in his employ and does not sully them with his magnificent body and allows them carte blanche to choose which lover will have the privilege of bedding and paying for them. but the ladies are more fun. dare is at once the wide-eyed virgin who has never felt anything stirring in her ladybits, but she is also a badass blue-haired fighter, and when those ladybits begin to stir, she is pretty enthusiastic about it. the other lady is part cat. ’nuff said.
another is the lack of ridiculous sexual euphemisms. manroot, honey-pot, love-stick…a cock by any other name does not smell as sweet. erm…but you know what i mean. this book contained sex-without-evasion. and as little as i am able to become aroused by the written word, i would objectively classify these sex scenes as “hot.”
although the hygiene-queen in me revolts at the sex-in-the bath scene that follows dare shed(ding) her grime-covered clothes before lowering herself into its soothing depths. after both of them have been fighting, and traveling, and becoming filthy, the last thing you want is to get all intimate in a tub full of floating leaves and washed-off blood and dirt etc. seriously—none of these novels ever take into account the pain of a UTI, do they?
but, so points for characters, points for straightforward intercourse terminology, and points for being two separate novellas progressing one storyline. that way, we had all the characters involved, but we didn’t have to become bored with one POV for 350+ pages. smart move. BUT YOU SHOULD KNOW that the story does not get resolved in this book. so i guess more is forthcoming. and if i were to continue this series, it would be on my own, without the filmy-gauze protection of saying i am reading it for the bodice-rippers group.
will i do it?? will i make that leap??
your guess is as good as mine.
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