The Professional: Game Maker Part 1

The Professional: Part 1 by Kresley Cole

Published December 16th 2013 by Simon & Schuster Audio
Narrated by: Kimberly Alexis
Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Joke him if he can't take a fuck."

Natalie Porter lives a simple life in Lincoln Nebraska. Her ability to 'manalyze' is something she takes pride in and for that matter the reason she's still a virgin. At 24 she still hasn't found the right one. Adopted at an early age , now a College student looking to get her masters degree and find her biological parents, she hires a private investigator from Russia named Zironoff . She never hears from him and he never answers her emails.

While out drinking with her friend Jess, Mafiya enforcer Aleksei Sevastyan catches her eyes. Although Natalie may be good at analyzing men , she has a hard time assessing this guy and fails at coming on to him. Sevastyan didn't play by her games because he makes the rules.

Natalie didn't know he had been 'watching over her' for the past month and was hired by her real father, head of The Bratva (Russian Mafia) Pavel Kovalev, to be her bodyguard.

Rejected, alone and frustrated Natalie goes back to her house admitting there was something about that man. Thinking about him touching her while she takes a bath, suddenly is he standing in her bathroom doorway and she screams. He tells her to get dressed, pack a suitcase, cause he's taking her on a plane to Russia and those were his orders. I imagine Natalie wanted to call the cops because a strange man had broken into her house and was going to kidnap her but she doesn't do that. All she wants are answers and as soon as he mentions her father I guess that opened the channels of curiosity. She does get the wrong impression of her father though, but she was going to see for herself soon enough even if Sevastyan had to haul her over his shoulder. Being close to him like that was just one of the many perks she would enjoy besides being lavished with expensive clothes and jewelry.

When she runs from the car, he warns her that "If you run, I will catch you. It's what I do". On the plane she discovers how dominating Sevastyan is and how much it turns her on. Of course Sevastyan is very good at dishing out punishment but he doesn't want to hurt her .
I already knew Kresley Cole could write hot sexy romance novels but in The Professional we see the very dark and hard kind of erotic romance not intended for younger minds. I truly am lovin this series.

The Professional: Part 2

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About the Author:

Kresley Cole is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the electrifying Immortals After Dark paranormal series and the young adult Arcana Chronicles. Since her first novel was released in 2003, Kresley has published twenty-one books with Simon & Schuster and has seen her releases translated into seventeen foreign languages. She has traveled over much of the world and draws from those experiences to create her memorable characters and settings. Two of her favorite places to visit include the rain forests of Central America and the Queensland area of Australia. Cole’s trademark action, sensuality, and humor are exemplified in her popular Immortals After Dark Series, which revolves around the Lore, a secret stratum of hundreds of immortal creatures–ranging from Vampires to Lykae, Furies to Shifters, and Fey to Valkyrie–that each have their strengths, weaknesses, and age old prejudices against the others. Though they secretly live among humans, they constantly war among themselves, which gives her a lot of material. In 2007, Kresley won the prestigious Romance Writers of America RITA award for best paranormal for her novel A Hunger Like No Other, and in January 2009, she became a #1 New York Times and Publishers Weekly bestseller with her sixth IAD installment, Kiss of a Demon King. In 2010, Kiss of a Demon King earned Kresley her second RITA award. 2011 brought Cole her second #1 NYT bestseller with Dreams of a Dark Warrior. In 2013, Kresley won a third RITA for Shadow’s Claim and was inducted as only the 14th member of the RWA Hall of Fame. She lives in Florida with her husband and far too many animals. She spends any free time traveling and enjoys all things related to boats and water.

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The Professional : Part 2 (The Game Maker, #1.2)

The Professional: Part 2 by Kresley Cole
My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Part 2 of The Game Maker begins at Chapter 18. I said to myself "They jipped me of the first 17 chapters!" then I understood.

Sevastyan and Natalie have hot steamy kinky sex of the dominance and submission variety, in the banya (sauna house) - if you remember they took shelter there from the rainstorm - and Natalya is amazingly still a virgin, but we know Sevastyan wants her in a forever way and he promises he'll work on it. But why isn't she happy about it? What the f*** is her problem? I thought she wanted him if not loved him . Geez woman.

After Natalie basically kicks Sevastyan to the curb out of his own house she is left "looking like a bucket of f***" and her cousin Filip is furious over her rejecting him. Only after tragedy strikes it forces them Natalie and Sevastyan together.

Fighting for Natalie's safety to protect her from any more danger, they stow away on a yacht that takes them to Paris where they spend most of their time in bed apparently. But Natalie feels disappointed with their relationship ever since (the tragedy that I have neglected to mention) and Sevastyan had claimed sole responsibility for her safety. The sex is no longer about dominance and submission but codling and he treats her like a porcelain doll. She wants Sevastyan to be 'emotionally available' but that is asking a lot from him because he doesn't like to talk about himself. There is some dark hidden secret about Sevastyan and whatever it is, Natalie wants to know. Badly. She prefers rough and tough sex.

Sevastyan holds Natalie to her wish about wanting the bdsm and arranges a night out assuming he's going to ....torture her good, but we don't know that because that is when the story ends abruptly.

I was frustrated with how this episode ended. I guess I'm not used to it, like bloody soap operas. Right before the big reveal!! Like Natalie, I felt like a bucket of f***. And because of that I don't think I could give this a 5 star rating.

I can't even imagine what is behind those curtains......

Favorite Quotes

And when I surrendered utterly, he consumed me like he’d been suffocating and I was the sweetest air.

Then he reached forward to unbutton my blouse with those tattooed fingers. I was still considering a retreat—until I caught his masculine scent. Game over. I’d been drugged.

So we were heading outside of the mansion, and I looked like Jessica Rabbit. Oh, well. See me, love me, motherfleckers.

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It's Monday! What Are You Reading?!

Hosted by Sheila @bookjourney

I'm a little late posting because I finished editing my review today on my First Book of The Year which took me 5 days to read and because I plumb forgot but at least it still Monday! So. What are you reading?

Last week I finished and reviewed

First Drop of Crimson by Jeaniene Frost

Eternal Kiss of Darkness by Jeaniene Frost

11.22.63 by Stephen King

 

I am currently reading

The Professional: Game Maker #2 by Kresley Cole

What I Plan to read

Finish My Soul To Save (soul screamers #2) by Rachel Vincent

Review: Stephen King's 11.22.63

11/22/63 by Stephen King

Hardcover: 849 pages

Audiobook

Narrated by: Craig Wasson
Length: 30 hrs and 44 mins 

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I don't know what I was thinking when I picked this book up because I strongly detest politics and the size of the book would be a challenge for any reader, however despite the amount of words, I was surprised to find out it was about time travel and a bit of romance. Lucky for me Stephen King knows how to write and I didn't have to read it myself because I had the audiobook.

I admit to thinking Jake Epping was very stubborn when he should've listened to the green card man. Initially all he wanted to do was to go back in time to save a student who'd wrote an impressing A+ paper. The day that changed Harry Dunning's life was on a Halloween night long ago when his dad came home drunk, and killed his whole family with a sledgehammer. Also at the request of a friend who was dying, Al Templeton sent him on a mission to prevent JFK from being assassinated.

After 5 grueling years as George Amberson in the land of ago (the past), he finally kills Lee Harvey Oswald BEFORE he could kill JFK, thereby saving the presidents life and nullifying the past as we know it. BUT he also changed the future in ways he could not have imagined. Now, he had to reset the past by going through the porthole again which would fix the future from the nuclear disaster he'd stepped back into after the president fiasco. Making it a total of 5 times he had to go through the rabbithole.

"You need to go back now, Jake." He spoke gently. "You need to go back and see exactly what you've done. What all your hard and no doubt well-meaning work has accomplished"

George Amberson thought he'd created the nuclear disaster and he was right, but I was glad the green card man didn't pass judgement on him and told George what he'd have to do AND how to fix things. But noooo he wanted to save Sadie, again, (stubborn bastard) because he loved her and couldn't let her die. It bothered me that he would risk fucking up the world and everybody in it, including Sadie's. He didn't know if he would even save her when all was said and done cuz the world would never be the same and like the green card man had told him "Reality itself" would be destroyed.

Thanks to this book I probably never would've known about the real events leading up to 11/22/63 or about Lee Harvey Oswald and it was sad to know these events ever happened. It made for a strange experience to read in a fiction novel

I am glad I read it though.

Favorite quote 

If there is love, smallpox scars are as pretty as dimples.

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Eternal Kiss of Darkness (Night Huntress World #2)

Eternal Kiss of Darkness by Jeaniene Frost
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Recently Mencheres had lost his power of visions and hasn't been feeling himself . In fact he's suicidal. Bones is a little worried about him as is Vlad. When Kira(a human cop) stumbles upon him, he looks like he's being attacked and she ends up foiling his 'death-by-Ghoul' plan and almost gets herself killed. So, Mencheres has to rescue her, but learns he cannot see into her mind to erase her memories. After a week or so he is resigned to letting her go but intends to help her sister who is dying from cystic fibrosis.

Kira goes back to work as a private investigator but is desperate to see Mencheres again so she does something really stupid and goes looking for him . That night her whole life changes and she becomes a vampire. *golf claps* . Well she gets into a bit of trouble anyway by trying to steal somebody she recognizes who belongs to another vampire and that's a big no-no. So Mencheres had to be called in and shit got stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Some of you know about Mencheres and how he is older than dirt and being a Master Vampire but we find out a lot more about his background which was pretty interesting. In fact I like the relationship he had with that bad guardian what's his face? Anyway the scene in Mexico is pretty cool.

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Night Huntress World #1(Spade & Denise)

First Drop of Crimson
Night Huntress World #1
by Jeaniene Frost
Main Characters: Spade & Denise
Other Characters: Raum, Nathaniel, Web,
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

After her husband Randy's murdered, Denise wants to leave all things paranormal behind, but thanks to an ancestor who made a pact with a demon and then ran off, she's forced back into the vampire world. Spade, a.k.a. Charles, is the powerful Master vampire Denise turns to for help trying to find her demon-dodging relative Nathaniel. If she doesn't succeed, the demonice essence she's been branded with will be permanent. After he lost the woman he loved to a mortal death, Spade has no intention of caring for a human again, especially one who wants nothing more than to return to a normal life. But as the demon brands gain strength inside Denise, She's unable to suppress her attraction for Spade, and his cool detachment toward humans is put to the test.

I rather like Denise more than Cat who got on my nerves everytime she spoke, which was ALL the time! Denise is way smarter, calmer and more of a woman with a good mind to know when to be quiet. In fact I feel the same about Spade compared to Bones. With that said, is it any surprise I like the spinoff better than the first 4 Night Huntress novels?

I also really enjoy reading about demons. From the Immortals after dark series to Sabina Kane they are quite fascinating.

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First Book Of The Year 2014

My first book of 2014 will be ...............

Awhile ago I was watching Stephen King on Youtube,(linked to the video), and someone in that audience had mentioned he read 11/22/63 over 3 days when his power went out and he spoke about it like it was a lifesaver. If you skip to the part I'm talking about, which is about one hour and 22 minutes into the video (1:22:04) you will see. I liked his enthusiasm so I purchased the book at a second hand store and I was saving it for the right time. I had never read any other review about the book and as intimidating as it is, I just hope I too will get lost in it and forget about all my problems just like that guy in the video. I wish I can say it is my first Stephen King novel but this past year I read Doctor Sleep and I just had to read something else by this great author that isn't a horror.

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