Iron & Velvet by Alexis Hall is a paranormal F/F romance mystery. I’m always up for anything paranormal with a broody detective, so this was right up my alley. Kate Kane is a private investigator for the supernatural underworld of London. Even though she has a fairy mother, she lives her life as a human, only calling on her untested powers for emergencies. The book opens with a werewolf’s murder outside an elite vampire club. Kate’s called onto the case by her ex-boyfriend Patrick who basically […]
Love: a perpetual state of semideranged partiality
For Real by Alexis Hall is not my normal sort of romance novel (I tend to favor quasi-historical romps). But I kept seeing people recommend it in various different places and I finally picked it up out of curiosity (the list that tipped me over was Slytherin/Hufflepuff pairings). I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. It is contemporary BDSM m/m erotica but it has a compelling romance to ground it all. Laurie is a trauma doctor who is pushing 40. He sees 19 […]
A Well-Written Romance Novel But Not Quite for Me
I immensely enjoyed For Real, and for some reason thought it made sense to me to follow it up with the next novel in the series even though publishing order really has no bearing on reading order for romance novels, in general. Usually, I don’t even look at romance novel covers because they have nothing to do with the book, but the Pansies cover has two men in a flower shop so it’s actually completely relevant to what is happening in the novel. I think […]
Much More Of Everything Than I Was Expecting
I picked this up after Julia in Austin reviewed and raved about another novel by Alexis Hall and mentioned For Real as a favorite. This is actually the first M/M romance I’ve read, and it also has a BDSM focus. I think I assumed the structure would be like most of the romance novels I am familiar with but with the sex having a BDSM spin. As someone has since pointed out to me, when a novel markets itself as being BDSM or focused on […]