Gotta reCHARGE my batteries

I have been kicking butt and taking names at the gym...not really but I have been kicking my own butt. Yesterday I went to three classes that my gym offers. The first was at 10 and it was a Weights Bootcamp. The next two were back to back starting at 5, Pilates and Zumba. I woke up this morning and I don't think my butt has ever been that sore. But I planned on going to Cycle Bootcamp this morning, so I dragged my butt to the gym for that.  The stupid thing that happened half-way through bootcamp is that my Fitbit broke. It had been acting selfish and dying at random times. It would hold a charge worth a damn, soooooo I upgraded. Got me a Fitbit ChargeHR!! And since I got a new toy, I needed to ensure that it worked. That meant that I just had to go back to the gym to do a nice easy workout. Started reading a book and before I knew it, the book was done and I had ran 8 miles. Safe to say the Fitbit got all the data too.

Sins & Needles--Karina Halle

I have a really hard time seeing why people enjoy this book. To me it was a book based totally on lies and deception. These are two people who care about one another and yet there are double crossing, betraying and blackmailing. Seriously, not a “feel good book”.  It, to me, was depressing and just aggravating.

But Karina Halle knows how to write a book. Damn, does she know how to write a book. This story, had I not found it disconcerting, was enthralling and beautifully written. The pictures she painted were vivid and detailed. The relationship between Ellie and Camden is a tangled, twisted knot of glorious conflict.  I have read many of her books and most of them I feel the same about, I like the writing style but not the books themselves.

Yay for Karina Halle, but not so much for me.

Outlaw's Kiss: Grizzlies MC Romance-- Nicole Snow

Outlaw’s Kiss. The title says it all, the main character is an outlaw and he loves to kiss.  Okay, that’s totally true but not really the point of the story.

When a hunky dude breaks into your home and he and his accost you, then he takes you away with him—what are you to do? Well, Missy is put into this spot and she chooses to deny her deep rooted sexual attraction and hate Brass.

Brass only sort of understands why Missy and her sister hate him. I mean he did basically kidnap them. In reality it was for their own good, it was either Missy become his old lady or they were killed. It was rational then to save two young women especially when he was harboring a hard on for Missy.

Now that’s the story that I can tell you without any spoilers. As for the rest of the story I mainly kept thinking WHAT? Psh, Noooo… okay obviously not.  Maybe I have read too many biker books but this one was so lacking in the biker mentality. Well, it wasn’t necessarily that, I guess it was lacking the sense of brotherhood and that type of mentality. I don’t just mean in ways to draw the plot forward, I mean from Brass’s point of view I didn’t really see that there was anything besides fear and that was something that bugged me.

The writing style in my opinion was a little blasé, things happened but nothing really happened. When things did happen you seriously had to ask yourself if the characters were stupid or if the writer had no common sense. I think it was a little bit of both to be honest.

While I was reading the book, I didn’t hate but it was by no mean a good biker novel.

Make Me Over

I figured that if anyone was to trust my beauty tips, tricks and/or secrets, people should know that I sort of know what I am doing. I am a licensed cosmetologist in the state of Nevada. I graduated school in September of 2014. So while I am pretty new I have taken many classes and received many certifications. Including Airbrush Level 1 Certification, Bead-In/ Sew-In Hair Extensions, Eye Lash Extensions and multiple in make-up and hair cutting.

So here is a before and after of me my day to day make-up... albeit I don't wear falsies everyday but I do wear them at least 2-3 times a week.

  

 Here is a picture of me the very next day. Yes, I finally got my hair colored, thank god because my roots were driving me nuts! I have a more subtle eye and a bold lip, you can't tell but it is a rich purple color.  

 

So you may have noticed that my pictures look slightly green, that's because my bathroom is yellow with warm lighting. It is terrible for picture taking so unless I want to look at a jaundiced version of myself, I always "cool" down the temperature of it.

Feel the Burn!

So at work we are doing "The Biggest Loser", I am by no means overweight but I am also not healthy at all. I am what most like to dub as 'skinny fat'. I started off by weighing 138lbs about two weeks ago. I joined a gym solely for the purpose of taking their classes. Last Monday I came in to take one of classes, it said it was weights. It wasn't! It was a big 'ole bag of lies and body sculpting. Had I know that it was a body sculpting class I would not have run a mile for my warm up, cuz this class kicked my ass. I was sore until Thursday.

I was going to go back on Tuesday to do a class but NOPE! Luckily though, my husband has more than enough motivation for me. He knows I really do want to be back in shape but with working in the afternoon, I get tired. So he basically nags me, in the most loving way possible. But thanks to his "love" for the past week, I have gone to the gym almost every day and ran 5 miles. I don't do much else but cardio is important.

I also went into "The Biggest Loser" saying that I wasn't necessarily going to change how I eat because otherwise I would just gain everything back once I stopped eating that way. I did how ever decide to watch how much I ate. For example, do I really need to eat those ten mini-Milky Ways... probably not.

I am about 3lbs lighter and running my 5 miles about 8 minutes faster than I started with. So far so good.

Throne of Glass--Sarah J. Maas

Being Ardalan’s most notorious assassin is usually something that most people wouldn’t necessarily be proud of, but then again Celaena Sardothian is not most people. She is sassy and thinks above her station, especially since her station is a slave. 

This is a book I have read many times; I personally love the style of writing. It is written from multiple perspectives, mostly Chaol, Dorian and Celaena. Our story starts with Chaol retrieving Celaena from the salt mines of Endovier; a place where rebels and those convicted of crimes labor away their life. Celaena has been there for just about a year and has the marks to prove it.

Celaena is offered her freedom by the Prince of Ardalan, Dorian. But freedom comes at a price. The cost this time: competing to win a competition set up by the King, the same person who sentenced her to the salt mines. Celaena takes that information with a grain of salt (pun intended) knowing that if she stays another year in the mines she will die. She is prepared to do anything to win.

Sarah J. Maas writes with enough detail to help you vividly picture what is going on but not too much that it just bogs everything down. It’s clear to me that she has most of the series plan out if the not the whole thing. I say this because there are many seemingly small or innocuous things in this book that are important or defining for the future books. Even her vanity, which I know most people despise when it comes to Celaena. It makes her seem shallow and even a little stupid, but there is a point, I swear!

I love the interactions the characters have with one another; there are so many secrets, assumptions and half-truths flying around the castle that finding someone to trust is difficult. One thing I enjoy with this book is even through all the suspicion and doubt there are still strong bonds of friendship, i.e. Dorian and Chaol, Celaena and Nehemia, Dorian and Celaena. These relationships are beneficial to all and make the read quite enjoyable.

Then there is Chaol’s relationship with Celaena. It is always shrouded with mistrust because she’s an assassin and he’s the Captain of the Guard. His job is to protect from the potential threats. He expected her to be a vicious blood-driven maniac. Instead he is face with a vain, slightly conceited and yet incredibly talented young woman. However in the back of his mind he is always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Plus he is described as ruggedly handsome, not attractive at first glance but the more you stare the more attractive he becomes. (He may or may not be who I ship Celaena with, but I will let you decide who you like best.)

Oh and a side note is that my gel nails done by Nikki at Tres Image were based of this cover artwork. (Sorry if I look slightly jaundice-y, I used a flash.)

Last of the Bad Boys--Nora Flite

If there's someone strange in your neighborhood
Who ya gonna call?
(Huxton!)

If your stripper cancels an' it don't look good
Who ya gonna call?
(Huxton!)

I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy
I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy

If you’re in need of a good time,
Who can you call?
(Huxton!)

An ex decides to screw you over,
Oh who ya gonna call?
(Huxton!)

I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy
I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy

Who ya gonna call?
(Huxton!)

If you're all alone, pick up the phone
And call
(Huxton!)

I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy
I hear he likes the girls
I ain't afraid o' no bad-boy
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

But in all seriousness, Huxton is a jack of all traits who started off as security for and escort and worked his way up the ranks. He is now a man for hire. He will basically do whatever if the price is right. When one of his old friends needs a stripper, he gladly steps up. Little did he know that he would run into Zoe. She is a complicated girl and lets few people in; Huxton is determined to be one of those things—pun intended. Her situation goes form awkward to steamy to desperate in a few short chapters. Huxton is drawn to her and a part of him thrives on being needed by her.

Zoe’s past is one filled with hardship and despair. She is working off a debt to one of the mob bosses in town. He’s a total sleaze and is willing to take her debt away if she would offer up her body for his use and a few of his cronies. She declares that she would never stoop that low. 

Whoredom is something that is discussed at large in this book, not just the morality of it but how people view it as demeaning when in some cases the person may just enjoy getting their rocks off and likes to be paid for it. Zoe goes into the whole store slightly closed minded but as her relationship with Huxton expands so does her outlook on life. 

To me the writing was very simplistic and there were a few plot points that weren’t thought out very well or were a bit unclear to me. There were also some parts of the story that I wish had been in further detail, it just seemed that a majority of the book was skated over, made to look shiny when in reality it was just not.

Stepbrother Billionaire--Colleen Masters

 You ever read a book where you are in the first two chapters and you swear you have read it before. That’s how I felt reading Stepbrother Billionaire. It was so similar to Stepbrother Dearest that I was almost stumped and thought they were part of a step brother series.

That being said I read this book before I realized that there was hype about this exact issue. While there are many people that may disagree with the similarities, the basic plot structure is VERY similar.

Children forced to live together and become “step-siblings”
They “hate” each other but are really harboring deep romantic feelings

Boy and Girl get into relationship
Boy’s momma-drama pulls him away from the girl
~A few years later~

Boy and Girl run back into each other
They try to deny the return of feelings…

…And Fail.

Sure the details change, the characters are different and so are the situations that they are living in. But this plot line is the same in both books.

Now, away from the drama and back to the book. Where I found my issues was mainly in the adult storyline. Emerson is exactly that, an adult, while Abby is still acting like the teenager that she was all those years before. Emerson has found something he loves and has a passion while Abby is just sort of drifting. I think that the author wrote this this way to show that she has never really needed to take responsibility since she was living off of her grandparents wealth but I think it failed and just made her look almost selfish or naive. There is a fine line to what she was trying to attempt and I think it was just shy of doing so. It just made any character development that happened null and void.

Speaking of characters and not developing, Abby’s grandparents she had said were “rich but good people”.  That’s the biggest load of malarkey I have ever read. The wedding scene and after (can you say PLOT TWIST!) they were the most condescending and judgmental people in the entire book. So don’t even get me started on the later years when they are still the same closed off assholes that they were before. They just saw Emerson as a bad influence and a bad boy, even though he was now a hardworking, business “owning”, sexy billionaire. (I put owning in quotes because he runs a branch or division of a company but owning sounded better that ‘business running’.)

This book also seems like it was supposed to be a sexier book, but there wasn’t much that I would call sexy. The sex scenes weren’t that amazing—not that I read it for the sex scenes but when you have that hunk of a man on the cover I would expect something spicier than Ketchup. Okay, maybe it was like Mild Salsa spicy, but still not spicy enough for my liking.

I had high hopes but they were left dashed and that is not even because of the coincidences between the two Stepbrother books.  The characters here were hard for me to like making the book hard to get into and enjoy. Then there were the challenges that latter half of the book faced.