Girl in the Mirror by Alix B. Golden (Aug. 2012 Pick of the Month)

Publisher/Date:  I Bleed Ink Publishing, Aug. 2012
Genre:  Romance
Pages:   204
Website:  http://www.alixbgolden.com

Rating: ★★★★½ 

You can’t run from your past, and you certainly can’t run from the GIRL IN THE MIRROR.

While the prequel to this novel, Girl, Shattered, is available now, Mirror is its full-length story from blogger turned book author Alix B. Golden with many layers – a surprise love, suspense, drama, parental woes – yet the center of them is Christen Calhoun. The by-day bank teller is uninspired by her job and only finds comfort in her camera; it doesn’t pay the bills, and it doesn’t suit her father’s dreams for her.

Neither does dating women. Especially the ones Christen involves herself with. Still reeling from her last burn with thieving ass Alicia, she decides a no-strings attached relationship is exactly what she needs in Kam, a writer she meets online with a girlfriend. Christen sees nothing wrong with the two having a fling. At least that’s how it begins. It ends just as badly.

*girl in the mirror shakes her head*

Christen could never tell her Pops about these dead-end hookups. Since a young girl, it’s always been just the two of them after her mother’s passing. He never understood her decisions – staying in Savannah after graduation instead of returning to Atlanta, why she couldn’t find a man and make him a “Grandpappy” – nevertheless he did want to see her happy.

The problem is Christen can’t please herself. She suits her personality to the women she dates, and every bad romance she gets her further away from whom she is. When she looks in the mirror, the truth stares back, but then loneliness sets in and fools her heart into thinking it’s love.

It’s only when the worst imaginable happens that Christen returns home to find the love she needs – and makes the girl in mirror finally smile back.

Golden’s Girl in the Mirror shines. What I liked most about Mirror is its dimensionality. The storyline took several twists and turns, tying nicely to make an enjoyable novel. In Christen, you see a woman with so much potential go from settling to avoid being alone to realizing her true reflection is what’s important.

Reviewed August 2012

Fantasies, Sex, Lies, & Love… Chronicles of the Heart and Mind by Harmonie Reigns

Publisher/Date:  CreateSpace, Feb. 2012
Genre(s):  Romance, Erotica, Poetry, Short Story
Pages:  212
Website:  http://harmoniereigns.wix.com/harmonie#!info

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 

The Plot: In most cases, relationships usually include FANTASIES, SEX, LIES & LOVE…CHRONICLES OF THE HEART AND MIND in some fashion. That’s what Harmonie Reigns asserts in her collection of dramatic short stories and corresponding poems. Love can be reunited in (“The Encounter”) or reassuring (“In the Blink of an Eye”) or life-changing (“The Librarian”). On the other hand, it can also be deceitful (“The Office”) or simply about the panties (“The Truck Stop”). With Reigns, you never know what you’re gonna get.

The Good: Reigns delves into hearty plots with each tale. She draws you into the characters, allowing you to care about the two (or sometimes three) people in the relationship that matter the most. And the sex found between the pages is scorching.

The Bad: Although the stories were hot, the excessive grammatical errors were not. It did slow me down at times. Also, some of her poems I couldn’t quite get into.

The Bottom Line: Read Fantasies for the love and the lust, and you won’t be disappointed.

Reviewed August 2012

Fantasies, Sex, Lies, & Love… Chronicles of the Heart and Mind by Harmonie Reigns
CreateSpace, Feb. 2012
212 pages
Contemporary Romance/Erotica/Poetry/Short Story
http://harmoniereigns.wix.com/harmonie#!infoRating: 3 out of 5

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 

The Plot: In most cases, relationships usually include FANTASIES, SEX, LIES & LOVE…CHRONICLES OF THE HEART AND MIND in some fashion. That’s what Harmonie Reigns asserts in her collection of dramatic short stories and corresponding poems. Love can be reunited in (“The Encounter”) or reassuring (“In the Blink of an Eye”) or life-changing (“The Librarian”). On the other hand, it can also be deceitful (“The Office”) or simply about the panties (“The Truck Stop”). With Reigns, you never know what you’re gonna get.

The Good: Reigns delves into hearty plots with each tale. She draws you into the characters, allowing you to care about the two (or sometimes three) people in the relationship that matter the most. And the sex found between the pages is scorching.

The Bad: Although the stories were hot, the excessive grammatical errors were not. It did slow me down at times. Also, some of her poems I couldn’t quite get into.

The Bottom Line: Read Fantasies for the love and the lust, and you won’t be disappointed.

Reviewed August 2012

The Other Side of Joy by April Joy Bowden

Publisher/Date:  AuthorHouse, May 2012
Genre(s): Poetry, Romance
Pages: 100
Website:  http://www.apriljoybowden.com

Rating: ★★★★☆ 

Since elementary school, April Joy Bowden has nurtured her love of poetry. It was her release, her connection to the world, her first love.

Bowden’s long-time courtship with verses birthed THE OTHER SIDE OF JOY, a moving work of poems about the emotions and passions manifested by love.

The North Carolina resident and full-time photographer breaks her book into four sections: joy, pain, intimacy and ecstasy. With each, she supplies the rules, and the words she utilizes to describe each facet are truthful and familiar. It’s evident she’s lived it.

The glass remains shattered on the floor
Life’s little remainder that this was the last time the Storm would walk through my door
The broken pieces of my soul, my life, my heart
A subtle hint, a blatant call that we are truly apart
No time, no reason
To mend, fix or repair
Four long years to love, to laugh, to care

What’s also interesting about Joy is the storytelling found in her poems. Bowden is vivid in her depiction of desire.

I awake prior to the sunrise
As my eyes open
Behold the beautiful caramel kissed woman who lay beside me
In the moonlight
Her bosom glistens
And every curve has a story to tell
A story that because I’ve listened
I know so well

In a small amount of pages, Bowden says and expresses a lot in The Other Side of Joy. You can also check out Bowden’s co-authored memoir, High: On Love & Addiction, revealing the ordeals in loving a woman consumed by drugs, which is just as genuine and heartfelt as Joy.

Reviewed August 2012

She Say, She Say by Olivia Renee Wallace

Publisher/Date:  Olivia Renee Wallace, May 2012
Genre:  Romance
Pages:  215

Rating: ★★★½☆ 

It’s amazing how two women in love can see their relationship so differently, as in the alternating narration of SHE SAY, SHE SAY by Olivia Renee Wallace.

Coeds Shanelle Carter and J.B. Donovan, by all appearances, seem to be total opposites. Shanelle is the big woman on campus: sorority president, hottie with a body and all-around good girl.

J.B., in her own words, is a “big ol’ studdin’-ass mofo,” but don’t let that fool you. She’s editor of the campus newspaper, a conscientious student, and a hard worker.

Shanelle has always kept her distance from J.B., yet feels as if she knows the writer through her articles and editorials. The gap between them is narrowed one day when J.B. catches “Miss Popularity” staring at her, and they hit it off from there.

Both J.B. and Shanelle slowly let their guards down, but Shanelle is the one who figures she has more to lose by dating someone so different from her well-to-do family, friends and sorors. Though their passion is unlike any she’s ever experienced, she can’t – or won’t – allow herself to be seen with J.B.

J.B. has too much pride to take occupancy in Shanelle’s closet. Though it’s the hardest thing to let Shanelle go, she has to. She’s not ashamed of who she is. If only Shanelle could be the same way.

Through a series of missteps and second chances, who’s to say these two won’t finally see eye to eye?

Wallace’s She Say, She Say has a great connection in Shanelle and J.B. These two were fire together, both out the bedroom, but most especially when they touch. When reading, it’s as if they’re in their own cocoon, blissfully oblivious everyone but each other. With that being said, it’s a shame that most other details – like the name of the school, what the women’s majors are – are completely left out. If Wallace had expanded the background of the characters and the world around them, it could have made a much better book.

As it stands, though, She Say, She Say is speaking pretty well for itself.

Reviewed August 2012