Love in Bloom by Sheila Roberts- review

I stumbled upon this author accidentally on the web. She was having a contest and was blogging about it on someone else's blog (don't remember whose). I've entered the contest and won this lovely tote bag full of small gardening tools.

I was intrigued by the story of her new book called Love in Bloom and decided to order it. And I wasn't disappointed.
Here goes the blurb:
Hope Walker survived early breast cancer at just thirty-years-old, but a mastectomy left her with a lot of scarring—and some serious fears about dating. Hope owns Changing Seasons, Heart Lake’s most popular flower shop. When it comes to love and relationships, she’s able to work magic through her expert flower arranging…for everyone but herself. Then one day a handsome contractor starts coming into her shop, but Hope knows he’d rather have a whole woman than someone like her.
When Hope stakes a plot of ground at Heart Lake’s community garden, she finds that a woman can grow all sorts of things there: flowers, herbs, vegetables and even friendship. As she gets to know the two women who share neighbouring plots, they discover that they can learn a lot from each other—not just about gardening, but about life. And Hope realizes that in order to live life to the fullest, sometimes you have to take a chance on love.

Sure, this is a romance story, no doubt about it, but also this is a story about value of friendship. Even when you have family, health, self-confidence, money or any other problems, friends are the ones who will cheer you up and help you. I loved the main character Hope. She had a breast cancer and feels incomplete. Her best friend is her gorgeous sister Bobbi who helped her through chemotherapy. That is a reason why Hope helps Bobbi to win over handsome and so good contractor Jason in spite of being in love with him herself.
There are other characters whose stories take a great part of the book. They are also love stories; one about seventy-seven year old Millie and the other about young wife and mother Amber whose chef husband lost their restaurant business.
All three of them met at the community garden where they reserved their own parcels for totally different reasons. But although they have different background, ages and motivations for gardening, they become very good friends. Sheila describes all kinds of different loves: sister love, marriage love, love between mother and daughter, romance love and love at the old age; very interesting and profound.
The book is divided by different helpful gardening tips.

I liked this book and enjoyed different stories but the end feels too rushed, like there wasn't enough pages to finish the story in a way its first 2/3 were written.
That's the reason I'll give it 4 feathers but I recommend it as a very good emotional read (I did drop a tear or two at the end)- heart-warming.

Book details
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin (March 31, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0312384815
ISBN-13: 978-0312384814

For more information about the author and her other books please visit http://www.sheilasplace.com/

Weekend pictures

As I mentioned before, I had busy weekend. The house was full of children and adults. I don't want to brag (OK I do :)) but I am a favourite aunt. It's interesting that I am also the strictest adult. I don't like spoiled children and I like order and discipline. But I also enjoy playing with children and don't mind getting all muddy :) They are always running after me like three ducklings. This picture was taken on Sunday while I was feeling ill and was reading in my swinging chair in my bedroom. My sister said that they were playing in the living room and next thing they got up and went to my room. They entered without a word, sat on my bed and each took a book/magazine and set reading. They were adorable! They knew I needed peace and quiet and didn't say a word. They just started reading - and do I have to say that only one of them knows how to read and she picked up Cosmo :) because it was the only thing in Croatian.On Saturday I had a cycling race in the afternoon and my nephew wanted to try on my helmet (before going for a walk to town) and I had to wear my niece's. So here is a picture of us (he's very ticklish, you mustn't touch him, he's all giggles immediately)

Fun weekend

Well not as fun as good :)
From Wednesday till Sunday I had a full house of guests. We had a birthday celebration for my nice and my sister, that doesn't live in the same town as I do, came to visit us with her husband and son. Naturally they stayed in my house and I had an opportunity to hang out with my lovely nephew (and at the same time decided not to have children for another 2 or 3 years - I'm bad I know:))
Three years ago I joined local cycling club (for the size-of-my-butt and health reasons) and I've been involved in organisation of big cycling race. For the last two years I did all promotional and administrative work, but this year I've decided to join as an escort driver for the short race. Mostly children drove the short race (13 km) and my job was to take care of them. It was fun and who knew that children were so fast. I mean, I'm in a good condition (I drive every second day for 20 - 30 km mostly uphill), but those guys were adrenaline bombs! I did keep up with them (despite my boyfriend's claims I'm in no shape to follow those guys - I did prove him wrong!!!!) and had very funny day driving with children.
You can see me in this picture (from back I'm afraid, there were no pictures of me from front - I think because I was too FAST :)))

I caught some kind of stomach flu and was lying through whole Sunday. I'm better today, thank God.
How was your weekend?

Cyber party with great prizes!!!

Go over to the Nalini Singh’s blog. She's giving away lots of goodies in celebration of her upcoming release Branded By Fire on July 7, 2009.

You are still here? GO, GO, GO!!!


This was just a quick post, I'm in a hurry. Lots of good stuff happened over the weekend and as soon as I get some free time I'll post about it :)

Am I Moody?

Last evening I was driving in a car feeling like a sh** (pardon my French). Why? I don't know. It was a busy day. It was a national holiday and we had a big birthday celebration for my niece at my house. We had a barbecue and birthday cake. All in all 20 grownups and kids. Everything was fine, I was happy and we all got along. After all the cleanup I took a shower and went to some book signing (boring stuff, work - related). And that went fine, too. Afterwards I went for a drink with my boyfriend and then my mood snapped. I became cranky and went to bed angry. Nothing happened, one minute I was perfectly content and the next all hell broke loose :)

This happens to me on a regular basis (twice a month at least). It's not PMS related :), it just is.

Do you have these mood swings? Please say you do or I'll think I'm getting into premature menopauses :) Wait a minute; I do have hot flashes...

New Moon & some happy news

I saw this at Cecile's blog and I just had to put it on mine :) Thanks Cecile!

It looks great, doesn't it?

Also, I have happy news. Although it's not about me it did made my day. Him (being my other half :)) has won the first place in a cycling race. This is very happy news because he had a tough season and this was a major breakthrough!
My weekend consisted of lot of rain, reading and nail biting while I was waiting for news from the tracks.
Oh, another happy announcement - my older sister is pregnant and she'll make me an aunt for the fourth time (it's her second son, and my other sister has two girls). I can't wait for this little boy!
Hope you all had a great weekend (I'm sorry to ask this on Wednesday, but it's been a crazy week so far :)).

Fantasy Lover by Sherrilyn Kenyon - a review

Fantasy Lover is the first book in Dark Hunter Series by Sherrilyn Kenyon. This is series about Greek gods, demons, vampires, were-people but most of all about love and redemption. I started reading this series in the middle when I found a free e-book a year from now. It was a confusing way of entering a completely new world. I don't recommend it. But I was curious, and I started buying sequels. Yesterday I finally finished it. And what an irony - with the first book in the series.
Fantasy Lover kept me awake through the whole night. But I don't regret a minute of the lost sleep. It was great. It was heart wrenching and I cried a few times but I smiled too. It’s a book about lost youth and hard childhood. It asks the question about what we are prepared to do to earn love from other persons. It has a strong message about self-respect and a price of love.
S. Kenyon was an abused child and I think that's the reason why she can describe so well a suffering of unwanted child or even a grownup. Through all Dark Hunter series this theme is present. But that's the reason I just LOVE IT.

Here is the blurb:

Dear Reader, Being trapped in a bedroom with a woman is a grand thing. Being trapped in hundreds of bedrooms over two thousand years isn't. And being cursed into a book as a love-slave for eternity can ruin even a Spartan warrior's day.As a love-slave, I know everything about women. How to touch them, how to savor them, and most of all, how to pleasure them. But when I was summoned to fulfill Grace Alexander's sexual fantasies, I found the first woman in history who saw me as a man with a tormented past. She alone bothered to take me out of the bedroom and onto the world. She taught me to love again.But I was not born to love. I was cursed to walk eternity alone. As a general, I had long ago accepted my sentence. Yet now I have found Grace--the one thing my wounded heart cannot survive without. Sure, love can heal all wounds, but can it break a two-thousand-year-old curse?—Julian of Macedon

Although this is the beginning of Dark Hunter series, Dark Hunters themselves aren't mentioned yet. I loved Julian and all his good and bad qualities. I was a little suspicious about love-slave theme at first (hence the reason this was the last book in series I read), but there was no reason for suspicion - Kenyon is a great storyteller and she did it great, again. Grace is a great person who won't succumb to their mutual sex appeal just like that. She wants it to mean something. And it will mean a lot more then you or they expect at the beginning. This is the book that you read with your heart not your mind.
All in all - great read.

I give it 5 feathers:

There is another series called Dream Hunters which takes place in the same world as Dark Hunters and many of the characters appear in both. I strongly recommend both.

Here are all books in the both series (minus anthologies and free read that you can download on S. Kenyon’s web) - from my own bookshelf.

For more information about the book, other series and author please visit:
http://www.officialsanctuary.com/ or http://www.myspace.com/officialdarkhunter.

The new redesigned webpage is expected soon.
The next book in the series is called Bad Moon Rising and it will be available on August 4, 2009.

The first ROMANCE review

Ok, this is my first review in ROMANCE review contest. I like short and informative reviews myself so this is going to be one of them.

As a first, I read Elisabeth Naughton's book called Stolen Fury. I won this book in a contest. Ms Naughton not only sent the book to me in a very short time but also included mouse pad and some promo materials in the package. She also signed the book form me. Don't you just love when authors and people in general are generous? I was very happy to receive this presents. And I must confess that this had made me like the book more before I even started to read it. It's a first book in a new trilogy. Elisabeth was a new author for me, a discovery really!
Here goes the blurb:

"Oh, is he handsome. And charming. And sexy as all get out. Dr. Lisa Maxwell isn’t the type to go home with a guy she barely knows. But, hey, this is Italy and the red-blooded Rafe Sullivan seems much more enticing than cataloging a bunch of dusty artifacts.After being fully seduced, Lisa wakes to an empty bed and, worse yet, an empty safe. She’s staked her career as an archaeologist on collecting the three Furies, a priceless set of ancient Greek reliefs. Now the one she had is gone. But Lisa won’t just get mad. She’ll get even.She tracks Rafe to Florida, and finds the sparks between them blaze hotter than the Miami sun. He may still have her relic, but he’ll never find all three without her. And they’re not the only ones on the hunt. To beat the other treasure seekers, they’ll have to partner up—because suddenly Lisa and Rafe are in a race just to stay alive"

This is a fast paced book. The main characters, Lisa and Rafe, are very lovable from the start. You can really relate to them. I don't want to post spoilers here, so I'm sorry if this sounds wage. The issues both characters fight with are real and very common nowadays. But although Lisa is tough scientific woman with one goal in front of here, she's underneath very real. She's not soft and that's what I like about her. Although she's been through a lot, she's still strong and independent. It's such a relief to find a strong female character in romance book. Because, this is exactly that - a romance book. Rafe seems like a crook at first, but after you find out what are the reasons behind he's behaviour you just have to like him. There are a bunch of side characters, that aren't shallow but well written and developed, and if you are bad with remembering names (as I am) you will have to be concentrated while you read. I don't recommend reading it in bed because it will keep you wake till early morning hours. It's not one dimensional book, it has layers and the romance part is not in focus the whole time. At the same time, you are not bombarded with scientific stuff but only with necessary things to understand why things happen the way they do and why characters do them. Another thing I like is, although the fire between Lisa and Rafe burns from the beginning it still takes it's time. Nothing feels rushed but on the contrary very natural. The dialogs are well written and there aren't too many sex scenes. I would say this book has a right amount of everything; not too much of anything :) If you like adventurous stories with romance elements, this is the book for you. I recommend it highly.

I give it 5 feathers

The second book in the series is called Stolen Heath and it' comes out on July 28, 2009 and the third book is Stolen Seduction and it comes out in January 2010.
For more information and excerpts here's the link to Elisabeth's web site: http://elisabethnaughton.com/

P.S. You have probably already noticed that English is not my mother tongue, so I apologise for any and every mistake I made.