Princess in Love by Julianne MacLean

I picked up “princess in love” at the local library because it was in the romance section and it had a princess on the cover. I’ve been reading Game of Thrones for a whole year and I just needed a quickie to get it out of my system.

I don’t think I need to defend romance novels here. Romance novels are the workhorse of the publishing industry. Romance novels are, from a pure numbers standpoint, porn for women. Every trade-in bookstore eventually devolves into a used romance novel store, and I think those business owners are fine with that.

There are good romance novels out there. This is not one of them. Sure there is a busty princess on the cover, but that is as steamy as this gets.

I normally describe the plot somewhere in the first three paragraphs. I can’t really say there is a plot. I mean, stuff happens, but I think it takes more than that to make a plot. Rose and Leopold have some kind of previous romance. Maybe that was described in the previous book? Well, anyway, Leopold can’t let it go and decides to keep on messing with Rose’s head even though she has a chance at a happy healthy relationship with the future king of Austria. When Rose realizes how manipulative Leopold is, she goes ahead and marries the Austrian. When the Austrian dies, Rose runs back to Leopold because she wasn’t doing anything else I guess.

There is only one instance of sex in the whole book. Everyone had all of their clothes on.

I am going to have a hard time giving this book a fair shake because I did not enjoy it. Sure it was easy to read and I finished the book, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t feel like I wasted my time.

The characterizations are poor. Leopold goes from a spoiled heir indifferent about his father’s political beliefs into a raging emotional maniac. He ignores everyone around him until the crucial moment when he gets in everyone’s business. I don’t know what to expect from him. He is not one person with a rational train of thought and motivations. That is more than I can say about Rose, though. Rose doesn’t have a personality at all, not even an inconsistent one. Stuff just happens to her.

The best character was Leopold’s Mother. She had about two lines and Leopold thought of her three times. Each of these vignettes mentioned that she liked flowers. That’s one thing I can hang my hat on for crying out loud.

Don’t expect any descriptions of scenery, clothing, pomp, or circumstance. I mean, its not like it’s a historical fiction about a royalty or anything.

The last thing that bothered me about this novel was the pacing. It runs uncomfortably hot and stiff for 2/3rds of the book. When something mildly interesting happens to the Austrian prince, the book wraps up like a cafeteria burrito.  Its like the author hit her page limit or something.  Seriously.  The Austrian prince drama occurs, then, fast forward 10 years to when Rose as a child and a dead husband and she is ready to see Leopold again. That’s the last chapter of the book.

Don’t read this book. It won’t deliver.

Honeymoon by James Patterson

I have no idea why this novel is called Honeymoon. There wasn't even a honeymoon in the story. I guess after you become the most prolific author in the world, titles don't mean so much.

The story is about the stunningly beautiful brunette Nora who happens to kill the men in her life for money. She raises a few red flags when she transfers a huge sum of money from her most recently dead beaus account into her own, and an investigation begins. An insurance agent named John O'Hara poses as an insurance salesman who steps into her life and makes the near fatal mistake of sleeping with her. They go through a small period of cat and mouse and eventually justice is served.

There is a B story about a briefcase and some offshore accounts. It was supposed to tie the story together and I think may have tried to make some sweeping commentary on american politics, but it was too little too late. You couldn't add weight to this book even if you put an anvil on it.

This book is complicated, recommendation-wise. Although I can't say that I recommend this book, I could definitely use this opportunity to recommend James Patterson novels in general, especially this one (know what I mean?). It is an extremely fast addicting read. I can't say I'm better for it. The chapters are short, the women are beautiful. The plot is sparse, as if it just a backdrop for the antics of the glossy magazine characters. Its complicated, but you can't say the same about the story

You've Been Warned by James Patterson and Howard Roughan

This book has two stars on amazon. I didn't think it was so bad. I mean, it isn't something I would read again but it was quick and served its purpose as a one-chapter-before-bed novel. Well, it wasn't so great at that because I have to admit that I had a nightmare over it once. Just once though. 

This book is a first person point of view about a young nanny/photographer in New York City. (It seems everyone is a something-slash-something in New York City, but thats neither here nor there). She starts having peculiar things happen to her which makes the audience thinks she is crazy, but she accepts them in a dreamlike way. The peculiar things are very crazyperson-like like hearing music in her head or seeing cockroaches on her skin but it turns out she is in hell. You would think hell is slightly scarier than a bad trip, but no, it turns out that the big reveal is that she is in full-on serious hell. I know. I KNOW.

The second kick in the pants is why she is in hell. It turns out that she is in hell for sleeping with a married man, not taking part in the murders that lie central to the story. At the end of the story you get the same feeling you got when it turned out that the book your parents gave you in middle school had a lesson.

About half way through I felt as though the story was just a nice exposition on what it might feel like to be a crazy person. In that way the book excelled. I understood some of her actions as strange as they might have looked from a street observer.

It probably got two stars because it felt like a particularly bad Sunday school lesson by the final chapter. Be even the most innocent of mistresses and you'll end up in hell. Even if you are in love, even if your a photographer. You will end up in the helliest hell you've ever helled. Its like when you are watching a cooking documentary and it turned out it was sponsored by PETA. It turned out that the moral of this book was Jesus.

Well played James Patterson.

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Runners

I'm glad I read Born to Run already, because if this was the first running book I'd read I would quit altogether. Maybe I'd quit running too. This book wasn't inspirational. I know that people can write more inspirational stories about running, every issue of Runner's World Magazine has something honestly inspirational in it.


Going into this you know that its going to be hit or miss. There are 31 stories, 31 individual contributors, and at least one of them is going to just downright suck. It just wish there was at least one great one.

Some of the short stories were memorable. One was about this guy that started running because he started seeing an obese neighbor running past his house twice every single day. He starts running because he is fat-shamed into thinking he is less fit than an obese person. After his marathon, he talks to her and finds that she had just been running to Mcdonalds to read the paper every morning. That one made me laugh out loud. Then there was this other one about a girl that proclaims that she used to be fat and unhappy. Now that she runs every single day and spends hours at the gym and never eats, she, at 18 years old, is the happiest she has ever been. I laughed out loud at that one too.

It just didn't feel like they dug very deep. Sure runners are supposed to be healthier, thinner, happier, more beautiful people that statistically will make more money in thier lives, but geez, it seemed like the only thing they ever talked about was how thin and happy they were.

Over-the-top Ultramarathoner Dean Karnazes' story was billed to be the biggest draw. He is on the cover and the same photo is used inbetween sections. That's a dozen instances of Dean Karnazes. His story wasn't particularly moving is the thing. His story was about how his daughter wanted to do a street race with him and showed a particular amount of courage by pushing through the pain. His contribution wasn't about him, it was about his daughter. I understand how that could be one of the most memorable moments of his life, but it just wasn't particularly moving since the whole world doesn't idolize his daughter. We wanted to read about Dean Karnazes for goodness sake. I wanted to know why he ran that first time, why he ever ran a single mile over a marathon, and why he chose this to be his whole life, his lasting contribution. Certainly it wasn't so once he was known the world over for running, he can see his daughter show a precocious amount of grit on race day. Sure its nice to have a story by Dean Karnazes in this book, but I don't know if his contribution was worth a cover.

Then there were the cancer survivor stories. Cancer survivor stories are intrinsically motivational. No one can fathom just how painful that brush with mortality is until it actually happens. Too bad that the tales of cancer survival played out like lifetime original movies. Most of the stories were also written by friends of cancer survivors, which had almost no depth at all. It makes me wonder if there was a stack of cancer survivor stories that they rejected because they were too real.

The triathlon stories were neither here nor there. And they were all the same. There I said it.

Would I recommend this book? Hell no. Take your $11.99 and go buy Born to Run.