If you're looking for my reviews of a certain author or genre you can check my tags list. You can also see my list of book reads in 2007 & 2008 and 2009.

Book Title: Loving Jack
Author: Nora Roberts
Genre: chick lit
Rating: 2/5

Summary (from book cover): What was a man to do when he came home and found a strange woman in his hot tub wearing nothing but exotic jewelry? If he was conservative architect Nathan Powell, he suggested - politely - that she get dressed... and tried not to notice that Jackie M. MacNamara was the most alluring female he'd ever seen.

To "Jack" life was one mad, glorious adventure. And when the dashing hero of her romantic fiction suddenly materialized before her very eyes, she knew she'd found her greatest thrill. Falling for adorable Nathan was the easy part. The challenge would be to make sure that, come tomorrow, he was loving Jack right back!

My thoughts: I never read anything by Nora Roberts and bought this book by instinct, when in fact I was looking for books by Anne Stuart. I honestly don't know what was waiting for when I picked up this book. This month has been difficult and wanted something light but engaging and thrilling, but this book wasn't so. The story is predictable and the relationship seemed somewhat forced. The characters didn't captivate me, especially Jackie who made me roll my eyes constantly. However it is an easy and quick reading.

Being the first book I read this author, who seems to be so appreciated around the world, I confess I'm not that curious to read more books by her. But this kind of book seems more suitable for summer reading, at the beach, so I may not have appreciated as much for having read it while it was raining outside... I'd better let the other book I have by Nora, True Betrayals, for sunny days.

Book Title: The Jane Austen Book Club
Author: Karen Joy Fowler
Genre: chick lit
Rating: 2/5

Summary (from book cover): In California's Sacramento Valley, six people meet once a month to discuss Jane Austen's novels. They are ordinary people, neither happy nor unhappy, but all wounded in different ways, all mixed up about their lives and their relationships. Over the six months they meet, marriages are tested, affairs begin, unsuitable arrangements become suitable, and, under the guiding eye of Jane Austen, some of them even fall in love...

My thoughts: I've learned of this book as watching the trailers of the movie, which I haven't watched yet, and I really didn't knew what I was hoping for of this book. Maybe to be a light romance, as the ones I've been reading, or was hoping it to be something like The One You Really Want. Unfortunately, it wasn't like any of them.

Through six months we follow the life of six characters: Jocelyn, who breeds dogs for competitions; Sylvia and Allegra, mother and daughter who are passing through love problems during this period of time; Prudie, well married but who doesn't seem to see the luck she has; Bernadette, who lived through too many stories during her life; and Grigg, the only man of the group, fan of science fiction and who only read Austen for these meetings.

The character's stories are told through flashbacks and following the most recent developments of their lives, but due to the fact that there's a lot of characters for such a tiny book (it has no more than 250 pages, the other 50 something are summaries of books by Austen and what other people think of her *rolls eyes*), the reader can't create a bond with them. Also, the female characters were pretty uptight and seemed to have a really close mind for anything other than Austen, when it came to books, so it was easier to like Grigg, but still only to a certain extent. I didn't get the connection between the characters and the stories written by Austen. Better, I did get them, but you really need to be in a very good mood to see some of Emma in Jocelyn or Marianne in Allegra...

The book didn't convinced me. The stories and the characters aren't appealing, the discussions of Austen's books don't seduce either and it doesn't help to learn more of the characters, even though it leads to some flashbacks.

Book Title: The One You Really Want
Author: Jill Mansell
Genre: chick lit
Rating: 4/5

Summary (from book cover): Nancy can't quite believe it when her Christmas present from her husband turns out to be a lawnmower. She knows for a fact that Jonathan's been spending a lot on jewellery. So who's got the diamonds?

Nancy's best friend, Carmen, gave up on romance when she lost her adored husband. What Carmen really needs is a man to wake her up – but choosing the right one isn't going to be easy.

Mia's just arrived in London to live with her dad. Once she's met the potential stepmother-from-hell he's dating, she's determined to play Cupid – but her wayward arrows are just as likely to cause chaos as to ease the path of true love...

My thoughts: I learned about this book at a book fair but due to a certain fear of not liking the genre, since I haven't read chick lit before and some reviews on the internet aren't always favourable, I decided to ask it from BookMooch. I have to say myself surprised.

Well built characters, with interesting and credible relationships. It's easy to like the characters, take their side in sight of difficulties that appear. In spite of their love problems, the characters try to move on and don't lose their sense of humour. There are really fun moments, due to the characters interaction, such as those moments between Rennie and Rose.

As it seems to happen to almost every book I read, the end wasn't as good as I expected it to be. It was predictable; you can't stop thinking about how some relationships could be settled before. In my opinion, it was a bad move to let the various happy endings to the last chapters, as it gets boring to read something like five chapters with three female characters ending up on their lovers arms. Mia's relationship was what annoyed me the most, as it seems to come out of nowhere.

It still is a nice book to read on a rainy afternoon with a cup of tea. I think I'll keep a track of this author.