(Note:  Post image is also my expression when reading 99% of books)

I’ve come to the realization that the main reason people come to me and then rapidly avoid me is my honesty.  This is something I’m actually proud of.  I’m not a cruel person, but I am a harsh person, and when you give me free rein to be honest, I will be.

Crushingly so.

I bring this up because it is this honesty that makes me very uncomfortable with ARCs and the general culture around them.  No matter what anyone tells you, the unspoken opinion is:  like it, or don’t review it.

Authors will tell you that’s not the point.  They want honest reviews to help sales and for people to find their book.  But nobody really wants an honest review when their book is honestly shit.

I bring this up because I am currently struggling my way through my second Carmen DeSousa book, and it is filling me with an honest, unholy rage.  This, I’m sure, is the opposite of what was intended.

Antiquated ideas of masculinity and manhood coupled with some just god awful slut-shaming do not a good story make, especially not one written within the last years.  Add to that people panicking at the mere idea of ghosts for 25 pages (in a paranormal-romance series), and you have the makings of a dull and painful reading experience.

And do you know how badly I wanted to like these?

I’ve been trying my damndest to read books out of my general purview (including, *shudders* het romance), and I have to say, it’s books like these that drive me straight back to my bachelors-living-too-close-solving-mysteries-while-reciting-poetry-to-each-other roots.

If not for the fact I’m very angry at Goodreads telling me I’m “2 books behind schedule” for my reading goal (no, Goodreads, I guarantee you 69 books in 113 days is not a close number), I would stop reading this current book, The Pit Stop, right now.  I’ve already stopped listening to the audiobook of it because if how terrible it is (Hot tip:  You cannot read a paranormal/ghost story with ~dark, spooky~ emphasis on every fucking word.  It doesn’t create suspense; it makes me think you’ve never read aloud in your life.  And just watched really bad Lugosi impressions.)

As it is, I’m a quarter of the way through already, and of all the bad decisions I could make tonight, this is easily the least painful, so I’ll be churning along, growling in frustration, and making my cat watch me uneasily.

But, no, I’m not reading her longer novel The Library, or, likely, her fantasy (?) book Creatus.  I can only put myself through so much, and this ain’t worth it.

(Also:  I almost put out my full pretentiousness on display and nearly titled this with a quote from Hamlet, but, well, I refrained.  You lucky bastards.)