Missing in Mudbug (Ghost-in-Law Mystery #5) by Jana DeLeon

(I purchased this book.)

Blurb:
From New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Jana DeLeon, a new release in the Ghost-in-Law series.
After an eventful first week on the job, Game Warden Jadyn St. James is happy the small bayou town of Mudbug, Louisiana, seems to have fallen back into its normal routine. But when FBI agent Raissa Bordeaux is kidnapped, Jadyn is certain the short-lived peace has come to an abrupt end. Statistics don’t lie, and Jadyn knows that the longer Raissa remains missing, the less likely she’ll be found alive.
Sheriff Colt Bertrand knows the FBI won’t let him participate in their investigation, but is certain the federal agents aren’t as qualified as he is to locate someone missing in the swamps surrounding Mudbug. And although he’s been avoiding the beautiful game warden, Colt is sure that teaming up with Jadyn gives him the best chance of finding Raissa.
With the clock ticking, Colt and Jadyn defy FBI orders and launch their search, but can they find Raissa before it’s too late?

Review:
Have you read Jana DeLeon's Mudbug series yet? If not, why not? They are fast, funny and fabulous!
Missing in Mudbug is the latest in the series, and it continues the adventures (and desperately ignored sexual attraction) of Jadyn and Colt as they search for the missing Raissa.  Although they keep it completely professional, the whole town can see these two have the hots for each other.  But that's on the backburner as the Mudbug gang of Luc, Maryse, Mildred, Helena and the usual delightful cast of characters from the town concentrate on finding Raissa.  Although they did manage to share one very romantic, very sexy kiss........
The tone of this book was a little more serious than previous ones, which worked with the slightly grittier plot, but there were still several laugh-out-loud moments, and I was up until midnight hanging out with my friends from Mudbug!


AMAZON
BARNES & NOBLE

Check out Jana's website HERE.

Jana DeLeon's books NEVER disappoint - check out my reviews of these books by clicking the Jana DeLeon label to the right!

       

How Hard Can It Be? by Robyn Peterman

                                                     
(I won this book in a dirty recipe contest.  I'm very proud of that.)


BLURB:
What happens when an accountant decides to grab life by the horns and try something new? Apparently a pirate named Dave, a lot of pastel fleece, and blackmail—just to start with…
Visualize and succeed, Oprah said. I was sure as hell trying, even if my campaign to score a job as the local weather girl had ended in a restraining order. Okay, TV was not my strength. But a lack of talent has never stopped me before. Which is why I’ve embarked on a writing career. I mean, how hard can it be to come up with a sexy romance?
Leave it to me to wind up in a group of porno writing grannies who discuss sex toys and apple cobbler in the same breath. Also leave it to me to leak an outlandish plot idea to a bestselling author with the morals of a rabid squirrel. And only I could get arrested for a jewelry heist I didn’t commit—by a hunky cop whose handcuffs just might tempt me to sign up for a life of crime. Maybe I’ve found my calling after all…

REVIEW:
After reading (and reviewing HERE) the novella Pirate Dave and His Randy Adventures, I was pretty excited to read another book by the delightfully wacky Robyn Peterman.  How Hard Can It Be? is the novel that spawned/begat/birthed Pirate Dave. And it's a delightfully screwy trip through the world of Rena, a CPA who's decided a career-change is in order.  After trying to be the new local weather girl, and ending up with a restraining order for her troubles, Rena joins a romance author's writing group.  But she soon realizes that the seemingly benign and sweet-looking ladies are really a seething group of porno-writing grannies with a serious axe to grind.  And that axe is being sharpened for the freakishly deluded, surgically enhanced and slutty-outfit wearing Evangeline O'Hara, evil best-selling novelist extraordinaire.  Turns out Evangeline is blackmailing all the women in the group into ghost-writing her popular novels, and Rena is her next victim.  This is in spite of the fact that Rena's proposed plot is none other than the randy adventures of Pirate Dave.
Pretty soon Rena and the other ladies are spewing out the most ridiculous, bawdy, crappy writing of their lives in the hopes of ruining the creepy Evangeline.
Reading about Rena's poorly planned and ill-fated adventures is funny and entertaining.  Lutheran speed-dating, anyone?  Cat-house interior decorating ideas with a million-dollar budget? 
If you love tongue-in-cheek snark, surgically sarcastic skewering of hateful characters, a lovely romance blossoming in spite of Rena's nutty family, and some really lovely revenge, you'll love this book.  I sure did.



Click here for Robyn Peterman's website

Buy on Amazon.

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Pirate Dave and His Randy Adventures (Career Ending Romance Spoof) by Robyn Peterman

(I downloaded this during a free Amazon offer, it is currently still free on Barnes & Noble and Amazon.)

**This book and review is for readers over the age of 18**

Back of the Book Blurb:
After all was said and done, the disgusting novella meant to destroy a story stealing New York Time’s best-selling author’s career was successful. Rena, an accountant with no discernible literary talent, and her band of adorable porno writing grannies came up with the worst piece of literature, (and I use that word loosely), that was ever written. Amazingly enough, it became a cult classic. Who in the hell knew there was an underground need to know and love a Time-Traveling Vampire Warlock with erectile dysfunction and his conjoined lady loves, Laverne and Shirley?
Apparently the need is there and now so is the full version of their story . . .

** Special Note from Author Robyn Peterman **
This is a spoof. A profane romance spoof not meant for anyone under 18. I was threatened lovingly and repeatedly by my readers to write the full version of Pirate Dave. He was born of the need to create a horrific career ending romance novel to destroy a really bad, nasty villainess . . . and Thank you Buddha in a tube top, it worked! I laughed my way through writing this and I hope you will enjoy this small slice of my warped brain. NO, this is not what I normally write, but I certainly had a good time penning it! If you want to read the real romance story, you’ll have to peruse HOW HARD CAN IT BE? You’ll find the first three chapters at the end of the hot mess you’re about to read . . . And now, I give you the career ending novella, (hopefully not mine) otherwise known as PIRATE DAVE AND HIS RANDY ADVENTURES.


Review:
Published in May 2013, this was delightfully silly, raunchy and dirty.  I learned more creative euphemisms for the male genitalia and swear words in this one novella than I've acquired in the last 10+ years. 

This is the story of Pirate Dave, a narcissistic time-traveling vampire warlock with a permanent erection, a crew of scurvy, smelly, and terrified pirates, and a long-term Scrabble war via cellphone with Poseidon.  As the story opens, Pirate Dave is braving an earthquake to locate his ultimate concubine, who actually turns out to be a two-fer, as she's one half of conjoined twins named Laverne and Shirley. 

Thankfully the story mainly takes place in 1492, because Laverne and Shirley do not seem to mind Dave's lice-infested chest hair, or his "manly" body odor.  Personal hygiene is not a primary concern for pirates, thank you very much.  In between accidentally slaughtering his crew, boinking Shirley, screaming insults at Poseidon (who responds with well-placed lightning bolts), and time-traveling for antibiotics and shopping binges, Dave manages to cross paths with a blind troll, a surgical team at Johns Hopkins Medical Center, and an immortal hag with giant fake boobs.
Truly a renaissance man!
This novella had me laughing, snickering, giggling and constantly yelling to my bemused husband, "Hey Honey, have you ever heard this one?" Even my manly stud of a mate learned a few things from Pirate Dave, my friends.
Everyone needs a little Pirate Dave in their life.  Bawdy smut with laugh-out-loud humor is a rare combination.  Go download this little gem!




Thank you, Ms. Peterman, you are obviously one cool, intelligent woman and a broad I would love to hang out with.


For more information, visit Robyn Peterman's website.
Click on the images below to go to Amazon.

   

Lethal Bayou Beauty (Miss Fortune Mystery #2) by JanaDeLeon

(I purchased this book.)

Book Synopsis from Goodreads:
No one in Sinful liked Pansy Arceneaux, but who hated her enough to kill her?When aspiring actress Pansy Arceneaux returns to Sinful, Louisiana, to head up the beauty pageant portion of the Summer Festival, CIA assassin Fortune Redding knows she’s in for trouble. Her undercover identity as a former beauty queen makes Fortune the perfect choice to chair the event with Pansy, but Pansy’s abrasive personality makes it impossible to get through a single rehearsal without a fight.When Pansy turns up dead, Fortune is the prime suspect. Armed with only her wits and two conniving seniors referred to locally as The Geritol Mafia, Fortune launches an investigation to find the real killer before her cover is blown.

Review:
I can't believe I forgot to review this book! I loved the first one so much I bought this as soon as it came out and read it right away.  Of all Jana DeLeon's books, I like this new series the most - and that is saying something, because sometimes I feel like this blog is in danger of becoming a Jana DeLeon tribute/fangirl site.  However, if I actually start to type the equivalent of "squee" I promise to back away from the computer immediately.
Fortune is a practical, highly-trained CIA operative/assassin who is undercover in the little town of Sinful, Louisiana because a really bad guy has put a price on her head.  Ironically, the little backwater town is a hotbed of intrigue, murder and weapons-toting citizens, and keeping a low profile is harder than it should be for Fortune.
Fortune can kick some serious ass, but has spent her entire adult life in training or on missions, and as a result is somewhat socially inept and almost entirely naive of pop culture.  The fact that she is posing as a former small-town beauty queen has created several Sandra Bullock/Miss Congeniality style moments, as Fortune had to get hair extensions, and is expected to own a dress and know the difference between eyeliner and mascara.  The latter skill set is put to the test when Pansy assigns Fortune to apply makeup to children for a local beauty pageant.  Fortune may not know makeup, but she knows how to improvise and those pages had me in tears from laughing so hard.
When Pansy is murdered, the small town goes all vigilante-gang mentality and blames Fortune.  Luckily she has Gertie and Ida Belle on her side, and these women are more dangerous than any killer.  Pretty soon they are hot on the trail of Pansy's killer, much to the incredible frustration of the hot deputy Carter.   Carter tries to restrict the women to the town limits, but pretty soon they are cruising the countryside and the bayou investigating Pansy's death and trying to save Fortune's ass.
If you like laugh-out-loud humor, a solid mystery, and small town characters oozing with personality you will love this book.  Top it off with DeLeon's unique brand of crazy-sauce and this is one fabulous read!


For more information check out the author's website at http://janadeleon.com/.

The Helena Diaries by Jana DeLeon

(I purchased this book)

Back of the Book Blurb:
WARNING: This novella is a companion book to TROUBLE IN MUDBUG. You should not read this novella prior to completing Trouble in Mudbug. The novella contains major spoilers for the novel and would not make sense if read beforehand.

Do you love Helena Henry?

Did you wonder what she was thinking during Trouble in Mudbug, or what she was up to when she was off-page in the novel?

If so, then this novella is for you. All of Helena’s thoughts and actions during Trouble in Mudbug, compiled in a diary for you to enjoy.


Review:
The warning listed above is 100% accurate - if you have not read Trouble in Mudbug you will be clueless and lost.  I am positive that some half-wit will do just that and post a negative review about The Helena Diaries being obtuse and hard to follow, because they did not read the instructions.  (Probably the same population that necessitated the huge increase in warning labels on basic household items.  We should really let Darwinism's theory be put to the test and cull the herd.  But I digress.)

Now that I've had my little rant and consumed more coffee, I would label this as a Trouble in Mudbug companion because it provides a new perspective on the events of that book, as told by the recently deceased and still opinionated Helena Henry.  Helena figures out pretty quickly that she is now dead, and probably murdered.  But by who?  Helena has a seriously thick skin, because it's very apparent that her death elicited no sympathy in her hometown, a fact she learns by hanging out in the local beauty parlor to get the gossip on her passing and the reading of her will.  She is only momentarily bothered by the constant harsh assessments of her personality, and remains focused on finding out who killed her and who is now trying to kill Maryse.
Fans of Helena will enjoy this little book, because it opens a window into her motivations and character.  She really does respect and like Maryse, and has no illusions about her loser husband and loser son.  With characteristic bitchy snark (is that redundant?), she explains her justification for her actions in life as she tries to adjust to her new status as a ghost.  Helena is stubborn, willful, funny, focused, and surprisingly compassionate - she just doesn't always let compassion guide her actions.  Helena is old school.
I laughed out loud several times reading this book, and look forward to more glimpses into Helena's mind!


Check out my other reviews of Jana DeLeon's book by clicking on her label to the right of this screen - I am such a fan of her writing!

The author's website is at http://janadeleon.com/.

Jane Austen Mash-Ups: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies / Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

                     



A few years ago, when all things Jane Austen seemed to reach the height of craziness, the novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies came out, and I HAD to have it. Two of my favorite things in one pretty little package!   As far as I know, sheltered girl that I am,  it was the first book of its kind, mixing most of the original text with carefully added sections to create a whole new spin on a long-treasured novel.  I absolutely loved it, and the thing I loved most was the really well-crafted blending of the original story with the insertion of a zombie thread running through the ENTIRE plot.  I would guess about 80% of Austen's text is perfectly intact, and Grahame-Smith managed, by adding a sentence here and tweaking a paragraph there, to create a whole new meaning to the nuances of Austen's delightful and insightful prose.  It was still the book I loved, and the zombies felt like a natural addition to the story, not the clumsy insertion they easily could have been.  Elizabeth and Darcy's smart and witty dance of manners, emotions, and societal requirements was actually enhanced as they dealt with bothersome zombies with the same sparkling and practical finesse.

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters was also very good, but I found it to have more of the Sea Monster story and less of Austen's Sense and Sensibility.  I would guesstimate that 60-65% of the original text was there and that made it less enjoyable to read, at least for me.  Instead of getting lost in Austen's slightly altered world, I felt like I was reading a whole new story with a familiar plot.  Traveling to the bottom of the sea to mingle with society in SubStation Beta, the steadfast, love-sick Colonel, and encounters with the fickle Willoughby, were all intact.  But the sub-plot involving Margaret and her discovery of a mysterious group of chanting, teeth-filing sea-monster worshipping humanoids felt awkward and strange, and was never fully resolved.



Back of the Book Blurb Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters (published in 2009) :
From the publisher of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies comes a new tale of romance, heartbreak, and tentacled mayhem.

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters expands the original text of the beloved Jane Austen novel with all-new scenes of giant lobsters, rampaging octopi, two-headed sea serpents, and other biological monstrosities. As our story opens, the Dashwood sisters are evicted from their childhood home and sent to live on a mysterious island full of savage creatures and dark secrets. While sensible Elinor falls in love with Edward Ferrars, her romantic sister Marianne is courted by both the handsome Willoughby and the hideous man-monster Colonel Brandon. Can the Dashwood sisters triumph over meddlesome matriarchs and unscrupulous rogues to find true love? Or will they fall prey to the tentacles that are forever snapping at their heels? This masterful portrait of Regency England blends Jane Austen’s biting social commentary with ultraviolent depictions of sea monsters biting. It’s survival of the fittest—and only the swiftest swimmers will find true love!

Back of the Book Blurb Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (published in 2009):

 “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.”
So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie mayhem. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton—and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she’s soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr. Darcy. What ensues is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers—and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield. Can Elizabeth vanquish the spawn of Satan? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed gentry? Complete with romance, heartbreak, swordfights, cannibalism, and thousands of rotting corpses, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies transforms a masterpiece of world literature into something you’d actually want to read.





Here are some more:

       

The Stupidest Angel (A Heartwarming Tale of Christmas Terror) by Christopher Moore

Back of the Book Blurb:  Christmas crept into Pine Cove like a creeping Christmas thing: dragging garland, ribbon, and sleigh bells, oozing eggnog, reeking of pine, and threatening festive doom like a cold sore under the mistletoe.

'Twas the night (okay, more like the week) before Christmas, and all through the tiny community of Pine Cove, California, people are busy buying, wrapping, packing, and generally getting into the holiday spirit. It is the hap-hap-happiest time of the year, after all.

But not everybody is feeling the joy. Little Joshua Barker is in desperate need of a holiday miracle. No, he's not on his deathbed; no, his dog hasn't run away from home. But Josh is sure that he saw Santa take a shovel to the head, and now the seven-year-old has only one prayer: Please, Santa, come back from the dead.

But hold on! There's an angel waiting in the wings. (Wings, get it?) It's none other than the Archangel Raziel come to Earth seeking a small child with a wish that needs granting. Unfortunately, our angel's not sporting the brightest halo in the bunch, and before you can say "Kris Kringle," he's botched his sacred mission and sent the residents of Pine Cove headlong into Christmas chaos, culminating in the most hilarious and horrifying holiday party the town has ever seen.

Only Christopher Moore, the man who brought you the outrageous lost gospel Lamb and the hysterical fish tale Fluke could have devised a new holiday classic that tugs at the heartstrings and serves up a healthy slice of fruitcake to boot.

Move over, Charles Dickens—it's Christopher Moore time.

Review: 
I discovered Christopher Moore some 15 (gasp!) years ago, when I picked up a copy of Practical Demonkeeping and fell in love.  Snarkiness, sarcasm, wit, a nutty story and great writing made a perfectly entertaining book.  Published in 2004, I somehow missed this little gem.  The Stupidest Angel is classic Moore - it's deliciously twisted satire blended with literary lushness.  I mean, who else writes about dumbass angels, redneck Santas, horny pilots, giant talking Micronesian fruit bats and zombies using the most descriptive combination of cusswords and multi-syllabic vocabulary words?  It warms my heart and tickles my funny bone.
The book begins with the following:
"Author's Warning - If you're buying this book as a gift for your grandma or a kid, you should be aware that it contains cusswords as well as tasteful depictions of cannibalism and people in their forties having sex.  Don't blame me.  I told you."
Ha!  And the fun begins.  The Stupidest Angel is a lovely little reunion for many of Moore's characters, but the two I love best are Molly Michon, the currently off-her-meds psychopath/warrior babe and her loving husband, Theophilus Crowe, town constable and recovering pothead supreme.  The nod to O. Henry's classic Gift of the Magi is evident in their storyline, and much appreciated.  The way Moore writes about these two characters is a perfect example of loving satire.  There's a lot of respect for Molly and Theo (and most of the others, with the exception of the occasional complete moron), so even as we're entertained by Molly going off her rocker, she is depicted with such a core of decency, bravery, and matter-of-fact love for her husband.  She is crazy with dignity.  And that respect is what keeps the book from being mean-spirited or bitchy.
Another great section is when Tucker Case, pilot and horndog extraordinaire, comes upon Lena right after she has accidentally killed her homicidal Santa-suited ex-husband.  In a haze of lust and loneliness, Tuck doggedly and with total focus talks Lena into going out with him after they bury the body, which he considers to be a necessary nuisance akin to, say, fixing a flat tire.
I realize this is not so much a review as a list of reasons why I love Christopher Moore's writing.  But if it convinces you to check out one of his books that's a good thing.  Because you will laugh.  Unless there's something wrong with you.


For more information visit the author's website at http://www.chrismoore.com/.