REALLY good reads over the past year

Sometimes a book or an author resonates with me so well I simply must ‘yell it to the rooftops’.  Anyone who has followed this blog for a while and wandered back to discover that ‘hey! She’s back. will know this.  Carian Cole is such an author.  I discovered her last year and since I wasn’t blogging at the time I didn’t get a chance to do my thing.  But now I can.  I have read some of her books multiple times since I read them the first time and now here I am, sharing what I’ve loved so much yet again.

 
The first few books are about a rock band, Ember and Ashes and while I’ve read and really enjoyed some rock singer books, for me these are on another level altogether.  I reviewed most of them on GoodReads (I think) so I’m reposting them here, starting with the first book.  I should note that since first doing this review, I've read the book twice more.

Storm by Carian Cole


I don’t read a whole lot of rock star books, though there are a few authors that have written in this trope that I’ve read. So when this one popped up, despite the rather scary looking cover model, I thought ‘what the heck? It’s cheap (read FREE) so why not give it a try?’ Sometimes those are good spontaneous decisions and sometimes not. In this case it was a Very Good Decision.

This book written in present tense, first person POV stars Evelyn as our heroine and Storm as our hero. Only a few years ago I wouldn’t touch this POV for anything but so many of the books I seem to be reading are written like this, when I read a 3rd person POV book. And the 1st person works very well. Evelyn and Storm meet under unusual circumstances. Evelyn is on her way to a conference in a blizzard and she is lost. While trying to figure out what to do, she manages to do damage to her car. Someone comes to help her and after giving him a hard time, she gets in his car and then he does something to his truck. It’s a long hike for help and the snow comes down like crazy so they are forced to spend the next two days in close company in his truck. Evelyn is a hoot and makes things very frustrating for Storm, but Storm is more amused than anything else. Though Evelyn has no idea who he is, turns out he’s a famous rock star. He’s hawt, long haired, tattooed and can get anything/anyone he wants so it’s rather refreshing to have someone treat him the way Evelyn does.

They develop a deep attraction to each other but Evelyn refuses to acknowledge or act on it. She’s been in a 12 year relationship and even though it’s clear to Storm as well as the reader that it’s a dead end road, Evelyn refuses to give up.

I enjoyed this book SO much. It’s funny and it’s cute and quite a joy to read. Evelyn is on the prickly side but it’s a good prickly and once you read about her history, we understand why she is the way she is. And Storm!! My goodness what a swoon worthy hero. He’s one of the better ones, that’s for sure.

One of the reasons for this review since the book is on the older side is this is the first in a series of books about all the members of Ashes & Embers, their band. This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I was delighted to see she has quite a nice backlist. I’ve already purchased the next two in this series. I look forward to reading and will be reviewing more of her books. So listen to this here reviewer, get this book and give it a read. It's well worth the time.
Grade: 5 out of 5