DNF: Chosen for Power by Kathleen Brooks

Chosen for Power by Kathleen Brooks
Series: Woman of Power #1
Source: Free kindle copy
Publisher: Laurens Publishing
Publication Date: April 21st 2014
Age Genre: Adult

Somebody is out to destroy Elle Simpson and everything she’s worked hard to build. As the CEO of a corporate conglomerate, Elle is used to fighting off challengers. However, this new threat comes at a time when she finally lets her guard down to meet Prince Charming. And it’s unlike anything she’s been up against before.

Drake Charles’s work on mobile technology has made him a wealthy, powerful man.
But he quickly sheds the fame and publicity for a more private life, which earns him the label as a man of mystery. Drake adds to that mystery every year when he hosts a masquerade ball for charity. It’s also his best chance to find the one thing he really wants . . . true love.

Having met behind masks of anonymity, Elle and Drake enjoy a whirlwind night of romance that leaves them both wanting more. But Elle must question everything and everyone as she battles to save her life and career. Can Elle trust Drake to help get her life back or will she lose everything?

A le sigh. Another DNF review, mere week apart. I don't seem to be having too much luck with books this month. At least I got this one for free...

And yes, I'm rating this one. Just so you know, I rate about 50% of the books I don't finish. The ones I don't rate are those I acknowledge are good, for other people. Those I do rate are those I just couldn't stand. I'll you to figure out which one is this.

The premise for Chosen for Power sounds good enough - a female CEO fighting for her company, finding love along the way. It even started good - the book is readable. Fact is, I reached 27% even though the sheer ridiculousness of this book started at about 10%. So, it was good enough to make me give it another try... until I really, really couldn't.

Because this book is INSTA LOVE. All capital letters insta-love, which is doubly ridiculous considering both of them are hot-shot young billionaires who've been burned countless times before. They know each other five hours, give or take, before both of them are confessing love.

Yes, that's right - love. And they don't even know each other's names. All they know is that his boy part and her girl part fit nicely together... That's ridiculous enough, but the fact that after being separated he finds her, and she jumps into his arms happily... I don't know about you, but I'll be slightly wary if a guy I met yesterday managed to find where I live and meets my family. Which is, indecently, where I learn who he is. And I only learn that because my mother knows him.

Am I the only one seeing how stupid this entire scenario is? This is where I called quits.

Not to mention the actual fighting for my company plot has still not shown itself.

And this book tries very hard to say "these are not your normal CEOs! They're not ruthless, heartless human beings! They volunteer! they have tragic pasts! people are always trying to use them! they're just looking for someone to be themselves with! and I don't mind that, it's just that it tries too hard.

I mean, they should be a bit ruthless and tenacious to hold on to their companies at such a young age. Why is that wrong? Why must you show them in such a positive, sickeningly bright light? Maybe we'll see that farther into the story, but the way the book was being handled made me think not so much (just because a magazine says they're ruthless does not mean the book shows it...)

Nitzan★

DNF: The Alchemyst by Michael Scott

The Alchemyst by Michael Scott
Series: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel, #1
Source: bought paperback
Publisher: Corgi
Publication Date: August 5th 2010
Age Genre: MG-YA

The truth: Nicholas Flamel was born in Paris on September 28, 1330. Nearly seven hundred years later, he is acknowledged as the greatest Alchemyst of his day. It is said that he discovered the secret of eternal life.
The records show that he died in 1418.
But his tomb is empty.
The legend: Nicholas Flamel lives. But only because he has been making the elixir of life for centuries. The secret of eternal life is hidden within the book he protects — the Book of Abraham the Mage. It's the most powerful book that has ever existed. In the wrong hands, it will destroy the world.
That's exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he steals it. Humankind won't know what's happening until it's too late. And if the prophecy is right, Sophie and Josh Newman are the only ones with the power to save the world as we know it.
Sometimes legends are true.
And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves in the middle of the greatest legend of all time.

DNF

A part of me really wants to viciously rate this book one star, despite knowing how unfair that would be considering I only got to page 77 before calling it quits. And in all honesty, I know that would also be irrational because it's not like I can truly say this book is horrible.

It's just that I... I... I'm completely baffled. Why is this so popular? so loved? Why have most of my friends marked this three or higher? WHAT AM I MISSING, dammit?

I went into this expecting an awesome Riordan-ish adventure featuring the infinitely awesome Nicholas Flamel. What I got instead was just... one big mess. 

Let's start with the names - what's up with this book's tendency to call its character by their full names, all the time? Well, you're right. Not all the time. Occasionally it would use only the first name and you'd relax for a minute thinking it had finally stopped, but then it's back again to Josh Newman that, and Nicholas Flamel this, or Sophie Newman there...

We will not forget their last name that easily, Scott. Even if we did, they don't really matter that much. So you can relax and just call them by their first name. Especially considering that's a literature tactic to bring readers closer to the characters, while last names tend to do the opposite...

Speaking of all the above characters - I really couldn't discern any personality in them. I get it that maybe that would develop farther into the book, but I would like to point out that both Harry Potter and Percy Jackson were very clear, distinct characters by... well, by the end of the first chapter really. They kept developing throughout their stories, no doubt, but you already recognized them. That... was not the case here.

And the repetition! OMG, how much repetition can you have in seventy seven page!? I've heard they're twins more times than I can count. I heard that Nicholas is THE Alchemyst. I've seen scenes repeat from different povs without any additional info... enough is enough already.

And then there was the "action". The quotation marks are to indicate how I did not find it exciting. At all. Like, I was drifting away while there were fighting with Golems and rats and making floorboards into trees. That was the moment I decided to give up on this, really. If it couldn't peek my interest with that, there's really no hope for this book and I.

And, honestly, I have so many books to read that I've long gave up on forcing myself through mediocre, passable books that fail to grab me.

Especially ones where the writing fails to impress me on every possible level: 

"The rats meanwhile raced toward the open door at the end of the corridor. Most of them survived the scything blades..." 

anyone else finds this paragraph completely awkward and clumsy, or is it just me?... (that is the whole paragraph by the way. Including the three dots).

Maybe this is my fault, maybe I should've read this a few years ago. God knows I was less picky back then...

   Nitzan★

Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner

Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner
Series: Cannie Shapiro, #1
Source: Bought
Publisher: Washington Square Press
Publication Date: April 2, 2002

For twenty-eight years, things have been tripping along nicely for Cannie Shapiro. Sure, her mother has come charging out of the closet, and her father has long since dropped out of her world. But she loves her friends, her rat terrier, Nifkin, and her job as pop culture reporter for The Philadelphia Examiner. She's even made a tenuous peace with her plus-size body.

But the day she opens up a national women's magazine and sees the words "Loving a Larger Woman" above her ex-boyfriend's byline, Cannie is plunged into misery...and the most amazing year of her life. From Philadelphia to Hollywood and back home again, she charts a new course for herself: mourning her losses, facing her past, and figuring out who she is and who she can become.

I'm going to start off by saying that I've been in a chick lit mood lately - and Good in Bed didn't satisfy my needs. It just made me want to read more and more, because it was exactly the sweet, fluffy bit of literature that I was looking for. Cannie was the perfect heroine for me - I immediately identified with her. She's a larger girl, just going through life like the rest of us, and that made her very easy to like.

She was very sassy and sarcastic, which I just adored. But she didn't have that prickly outer shell that some main characters tend to have - she was still very sweet in my opinion. To be honest, I'd recommend this book to fans of Bridget Jones' Diary, because that's what it reminded me of. Cannie and Bridget have very similar personalities, and they live similarly. I loved Cannie's fight to lose weight, and her regular girl thoughts of lost love, paired with the horror of the magazine article, it was quite a wild (if sort of tame and fluffy) ride.

Good in Bed was written in a very humorous style, with several over-dramatizations and a lot of humorous hijinks - and some not so humorous as well. It has every level of drama, from not-that-bad to crazy-bad and it always kept me on my toes. At any point something could happen, and I didn't want to miss any of it.

Speaking of something happening - I just hoped and prayed for a love connection between Cannie and the doctor. There just had to be something there, you know? They seemed to have fabulous chemistry and I found him to be very kind and wise - the perfect traits for a women like Cannie. He was solid, something that I really felt that she needed.

But let me be clear here - a man did not save Cannie Shapiro.

Cannie Shapiro saved herself. I loved the feel-good empowerment of the ending. There was so much "love yourself" vibes coming from the end article that it could have only been a great ending. It may have been fluffy, and a little bit mushy, but I enjoyed Good in Bed immensely.