Books, Books, Books!

I've been reading some really excellent books lately and now I would like to take a moment to pimp them and pimp them hard. Brace yourself for the book pimpage. You braced? Okay.

1. Kristan Higgins rocks my world like the Shake Shack at the end of Grease. Contemporary romance with humor and heart and a sense of the real single girl (even that one heroine that I secretly found hella obnoxious, I still loved the verisimilitude). She has achieved Crusie-esq levels of adoration on my part. Have you read her? If so, you know. If not, what is your problem? Have you been living under a rock? Get thee to the bookstore!

2. Wolf Tracks by Vivian Arend is out today. And because I'm a suck-up... er, friend of Viv's, she let me read it early. It's TJ, you guys! My little heart went a pitter-pat at just the thought of this adorable hunk of werewolf-iness finally getting his own story. I just want to cuddle him forever. And the book? Yep. Pretty dang delightful. Fans of Miss Vivian's Wolfies will not be disappointed. Get thee to Samhain/Amazon/your ebook retailer of choice!

3. You know that book that everyone and their brother has been talking about? Butterfly Swords by Jeannie Lin? Okay, so I know Jeannie (yay, fellow Rubies!) and I was really psyched about this book when I first heard about it, but then it kept being talked about and talked about and talked about. And I got overexposed. I was all, "Yep, it's different. We know." "Yep, Tang Dynasty historical is awesome. We know." "Yay, China! We freaking know already!" I had pre-ordered my copy months ago, but when I got it, I actually glared at it resentfully, annoyed by all the people who had told me I was going to love the book. Because I hate being told I'm going to love something. I actually scream and plug my ears when people start talking about movies they think I'm going to like. (Not exaggerating. I really do this.) So with all these people spoilering this book, I couldn't imagine how I could possibly like it now. But... well... I really did want to read it.

So I did. Did it surpass all standards of awesomeness heretofore set down by the greatest goddesses of romance? I can't honestly say that it did. Was it really, really good and interesting and well-written and emotionally engaging? Abso-freaking-lutely. Hells yes. I refuse to overhype it, but if you like heroine-driven stories and seeing classic romance themes handled in new and interesting ways, then this is a book you should definitely read.

And those are the recs, folks! What about you? Read any good books lately?