Blogiversary Review+GIVEAWAY: Fashionably Dead Down Under by Robyn Peterman

 

MY SYNOPSIS

Imagine this: You’ve been a vampire for a while. You’ve experienced the perks and cons besides the amazing shags that seem ten times better (because you are doing the Prince of Vampires). But you find yourself in hell after killing your demon father and your de-mom. A few minutes in hell and you encounter talking walls and smooth floors. Whoever said all hell was ridden with fire?

Then allow yourself to trudge the floors of hell and find out the official soundtrack to hell is Journey, and you have a sweet cousin who’s a demon, and Satan your uncle. Fuck. The Prince of Darkness is your uncle? Consider yourself a freak of nature. And he wouldn’t let you leave hell until you get to know your family. Bam! Suddenly you find out you are a demon too.

But what the hell is everyone going on in hell about you being special, your grandfather, Mother Nature, the Seven Sins (who are also your cousins), and the Hell Hounds who talk with their eyebrows? When all you want to do is go home to your Prince of Vampires (because you are getting horny as your time extends in hell) and give birth to the child you are expecting on earth not some fucked-up place.

But Satan has an agenda besides ensuring Steve Perry finds his way to hell (so he’d stop doing Journey covers) and being the king of all trickery, it might not be in your favor.

MY REVIEW

I loved, loved this book. So you know I’ll be screaming at you to get it.

Off late, I feel reluctant to pick up Robyn Peterman’s titles. Why? Because I know if I do I’d have a blast. No uncertainty, I’m just so sure of this that it gets tiring sometimes. (Oh, no, another Peterman book again? *eyeroll, eyeroll*).

The story-line is ah-mazing! Very unique as with all other Peterman titles. I mean, we’ve all read books about hell, but have we one that confirms that Dante’s nine levels are really fiction-fiction? Or one that portray gives us more details about the music preferences and the level of aristocracy in hell (where there’s always a ball to attend?). Such creativity and not-done-before-ness is what I expect of a book. And Robyn nails it as always.

Having read and reviewed Fashionably Dead (the first installment), it’s no surprise to you who read that review that I loved Astrid. Humorous, warm and deep for a (half) vampire (half demon). Her voice is amazing and sticks to the chick-lit side of this story without making this all one big paranormal bore. A star to her. After all, what’s a sassy girl to do when she turns undead (in hell and finds out Satan is their uncle)? (It could happen to you).

The characters in this book made reading it absolutely wonderful. From Carl, the really buffed demon guy who’s pro-fur (alert PETA!) and has the speech deficit of speaking on his tongue that makes every sentence he attempts sound ridiculous.  Myrtle, the party waitress in hell who’s accustomed to bingeing on the treats for guests. Dante, Hemmingway (yes, all your real literary heroes) were really captured by Robyn in a way that would suit their personality if you new them in real life. Satan himself, had a charm no reader can resist and some sense of humor when he’d laugh back at all the insults hurled at him by Astrid. God was present, Mother Nature (who pole-dances), the Hell Hounds, the Seven Sins. Oh, they all made this book worth reading. So many others I cannot keep going on and on about.

One of Robyn’s main elements to keep readers glued is suspense through a series of anti-climaxes. When I say anti-climaxes I do not mean the ones that make you throw your book across the room or simply press the close button on your kindle. Robyn’s keeps you gingered for the final battle ahead even if there’s…. won’t give much out.

Humor checked. That’s like a requirement for all Robyn’s titles. If they are not then perhaps you can be imagining someone repeatedly banging her head against her writing desk and threatening her not to write anything amusing. (But even with that you can expect more ridiculous craziness to persist).

So I’m giving this book five stars (as usual).

You can get Robyn’s amazing Fashionably Dead Down Under on amazon. You do not need to read Fashionably Dead to pick up on the pace of this book. But both are a must-read and you can’t get a bra without getting some nice panties (what am I saying??) so go get that one too.

You can also win this book as part of five paperbacks going away in this rafflecopter.

I recommend this book to anyone who loves their chick-lit with a little paranormal adventure. Anyone who loves heroines hilarious. Anyone who loves authors that are hilarious. Anyone who wants to spend a few days of their summer in Robyn’s hell (Fuck Dante’s).

My work not done here. Off to post my review on Goodreads.

Birthday Review: Size Matters by Robyn Peterman

MY SYNOPSIS

Imagine this: You run a women’s shelter. Not really profitable, but wait, is anything for charity profitable? You take your women’s shelter seriously, the same for your knit shop inherited from your grandmother, your relationship with your best friend/flat mate, Rena, and the nonexistent kinda cop boyfriend you are kinda seeing, Ethan. But nothing ever goes smoothly. 

1. Maria Carey (I mean it) is always causing trouble at your shelter, breaking noses and spleens.

2. Your grandmother’s shop is run by two nasty, cantankerous old Lesbos who love to insult every customer and make big construction guys cry. 

3. Your best friend and flat mate always has her boyfriend lazying around in your apartment and fucking around with him on the couch you are supposed to make your own memories on watching shitty reality TV. 

4. As if all that isn’t enough, let’s add the tidbit about you not having sex for some months.

So when you take a bet with your best friend which results to you losing and escorting her Aunt Moon-Unit to her ridiculous Bigfoot meetings with totally ridiculous characters present discussing a mythical creature who they think might be alive, you know you’ve hit rock-bottom, really.

Your life is boring. And that includes your social life. Isn’t there a rule out there about this state being less interesting than death?

But what if after dumping your boyfriend for finding out he’s rather a Nathan, not an Ethan and some other mortifying stuff you wouldn’t want to think of (he’s a Dallas Cowboy fan!), you swear off cops only to tumble in the arms of another who you dump because you find out might just be in need of a booty call, and what if you get heartbroken?

Taking a vacation from summer, men, cops, and your whole deprived sex-life might be a fun idea. But do you have the money for it?

So when an offer comes out of your Bigfoot meetings to be a host of a TV reality show, which would make your shelter fifty thousand dollars richer, and serve as an escape from your pathetic life, but not an ideal vacation since you would be spending time with the world’s biggest cuckoos searching for a mythical creature that doesn’t exist, you take it! Ignoring the fact that the producers of the show are really sneaky and that really, who would want to watch reality TV with cuckoos searching for Bigfoot? Too bad for trashy reality TV.

But hey, there’s Jersey Shore! And this Bigfoot thingy might be a hit as well.

MY REVIEW

There’s no telling how much I love Robyn Peterman’s novels. Read three of her books, and even the first book that commenced the Happily Ever Afters and Handcuffs series, How Hard Can It Be. So reading the second, Size Matters, I really had hopes for this. And were they met? Let’s see.

As usual storyline isn’t something that comes difficult with Robyn Peterman. She always finds a way to come up with creative and never-been-done-before stuff that really gives you anticipation right after reading the blurb of her books. Size Matters was no different. Never have I read a book with characters shooting some TV series in the middle of nowhere, the aim? Searching for some mythical character who of course they weren’t going to find because this creature happens to be…. Non-existent.  A star to the storyline.── ★

I loved Kristy. I thought she was fab, funny, kooky yet amazing, someone I’d like to take out to lunch and envision tearing her clothes behind all the talk of her really huge, um, ‘badoinkies’. Robyn’s main characters are crafted in that light. And as much as I’d love to get to know the mains of every single book she creates, I sometimes find myself wondering how she, Robyn, would be. Alter-egos, ever heard of that?── ★★

Sure thing to love the mains in Robyn’s works. But frankly, it’s the supporting characters that make you feel like jumping off a cliff. So crazy to make you wonder with torture. So hilarious to keep you guffawing throughout the book. From Mariah Carey with her anger management issues, her love for odd hair coloring, and her voice usually equated to that of a quarterback on a football team. There’s also Hugh and Kim, the couple who lead the Bigfoot meetings with Kim doing the talking and Hugh offering the background music from his vast collection of songs. You would shit in your pants enduring the annoying, utterly ridiculous and cussing-loving old, cantankerous Lesbos who always, always, want to get in a fight with our lead for claiming her boobs are fake. For Stuey and Stan, the shady directors of the reality show you’d find yourself dying out of hilarity from their super-suspicious motives. Rena and Jack from How Hard Can It Be didn’t disappoint as usual, offering our lead some comfort whenever she felt she was done and over with cops. Now, Mitch. Really, I promise, I have loved all of Robyn’s male leads, but I really wasn’t connecting with this Mitch guy (except his creativity when it came to sex, of course). I don’t know, I felt he was dodgy and didn’t really love our lead. Or maybe I was just jealous and thought I was better off with Kristy (a fictional character that seemed so real, really?).── ★★★

The humor in this book is fantabulous! Does Robyn ever hold back at all? No, no, no. She really makes you laugh like she’s heard somewhere you had a bad day and are craving it. I really hate it when an author figures it all about her readers.── ★★★★

The suspense―mystery, I’d rather call it was discomforting. I mean, write a book about loads of kooky characters searching for some mythical creature, and people would still want to know what happens in the end? That’s some skillful shit. Other than that, I didn’t think Robyn handled her suspense well. That was the only feature that got me to thinking this book was nowhere as good as How Hard Can It Be? The suspense seemed rushed and I felt if there had been a little prolonging I would have been constantly reaching for my face towel and wiping the perspiration on my forehead (which was achieved from the mystery).── ★★★★*

So all in all, my rating would be a four-point five/five stars.

Size Matters is available on amazon.

Robyn Peterman is giving away Six e-copies. Enter rafflecopter to win:a Rafflecopter giveaway
 

I recommend this to anyone who wants to read something different this summer, that has nothing to do with taking off to the beach but the woods instead. Anyone who loves Robyn Peterman should grab this as she doesn’t disappoint. Anyone who loves their chick-lit sexified, hilarious and mysterious should grab this.

My work not done here. Off to post my review on Goodreads.

Review+Giveaway: Fashionably Dead by Robyn Peterman

Vampyres, Angels, De-moms,Fairies, Prada, all teamed up in this fangtastic chicklit! The one book that would get you baring your canines for excitement!

Blurb:

Vampyres don’t exist. They absolutely do not exist.

At least I didn’t think they did ‘til I tried to quit smoking and ended up Undead. Who in the hell did I screw over in a former life that my getting healthy equates with dead?

Now I’m a Vampyre. Yes, we exist whether we want to or not. However, I have to admit, the perks aren’t bad. My girls no longer jiggle, my ass is higher than a kite and the latest Prada keeps finding its way to my wardrobe. On the downside, I’m stuck with an obscenely profane Guardian Angel who looks like Oprah and a Fairy Fighting Coach who’s teaching me to annihilate like the Terminator.

To complicate matters, my libido has increased to Vampyric proportions and my attraction to a hotter than Satan’s underpants killer rogue Vampyre is not only dangerous . . . it’s possibly deadly. For real dead. Permanent death isn’t on my agenda. Avoiding him is my only option. Of course, since he thinks I’m his, it’s easier said than done. Like THAT’S not enough to deal with, all the other Vampyres think I’m some sort of Chosen One.

Holy Hell, if I’m in charge of saving an entire race of blood suckers, the Undead are in for one hell of a ride.

Astrid has given up smoking and has decided to take charge of her life before she blows it all away into thin air. Therapy seems like the answer to her unhealthy life. But does she know by admitting her problem to a 'therapist', and seeking help to quit, said 'therapist' would steal her breathe away, leaving her dead? Not as if that isn't the sure and fast way to get nicotine-free, but she'd expected better from this therapist than transforming her into a Vampyre (hence leaving her breathless).

Before she knows it, she has her own guardian Angel who happens to be an Oprah lookalike, and a trainer fairy who loves to bare it all.

Who knew the world of Vampyres comes with royalty, fierce sororities, Debutantes, princes, ferocious battles, amazing sex and killer undead orgasms!

Oh, and for some reason all the Vampyres think Astrid is sort of special, some chosen one... when she knows the only special in her life are the seniors she teaches art who are not shy to translate their sexual preferences into their pieces.

It's not as if she doesn't have her own share of drama when her mum announces her death date, her guardian angel keeps her telly on the Jerry Springer and a Vampyre rogue, or prince or whatever he really is wants to get into her pants! Playing hard-to-get seems like the best thing, but channeling your stubborn inner slut into doing something productive (like saving the world) only seems like the sure way to keep your panties on.

————————————————

FUNNIEST EXCERPT

It was so delicious, like rich dark chocolate, so smooth, so warm, so yummy. What was this? The pain subsided slowly and I realized I was curled up in I'm-Not-Oprah's lap with my teeth embedded in her neck. She was rocking me like a baby.

I removed what I'm fairly sure was my fangs from Oprah's neck. "What am I doing?" I calmly asked.

She looked down at me and smiled. Holy Cow, she looked like Oprah. "Drinking."

"Drinking what?" I inquired politely.

"O negative."

————————————————

IT DIDN'T WORK WITH ROBYN PETERMAN! Everyone who follows my 'kooky' blog, as people refer it, know when I'm taking on an author twice I do not read the blurb to their next book. I just jump into it and prepare to be entertained. But I could give no such treatment to Robyn. Why? Simple. Robyn's works are fantastic from BLURB to finish! She's the kind of writer who grabs you with her blurb, reels you in with Amazon's ten-percent excerpt and before you can stop yourself, it's ONE CLICK for you! You came in to be a snob over what author to purchase, and then, bam! Robyn puts you in a trance that gets you clicking the 'Add To Cart' button. I want to tell you all, you wouldn't be the only one. There's a whole Bigfoot community-like who you could relate your similar experience with.

Anyway, to my review!

Robyn is a master of brilliantly unique and complicated story-lines. While you may argue this is similar to Mary Janice's Undead series, taking a nose-dive into this proves you completely wrong. I admired Robyn's How Hard Can It Be plot, I was expecting her next book to be something that tows that line and she wowed my pants off me. I love it when authors do that ('cause most of my pants do not fit that well)—★

Now, again, people who know me and this blog, know I dread anything paranormal. It is beyond me that I really enjoyed something outta-normal. Dialogues are witty, humorous and sometimes bordering on plain wacky. I love that Robyn took my notion of Vampyres being so last season and threw it out the window by adding lots of classiness you would hardly find in Vampyre fiction. It's Vampyre (Diaries) with a hint of some Gossip Girl in there. This book didn't only have the wow factor, it did have the RAAR(!) factor too—★★

Astrid. I loved, loved her! Can you blame me? She might have put me in a trance too. But that's just it with all Robyn's leads (vampire or mortal). On their covers they look all sassy and have that I-Can-Do-It-All aura, but when you begin flipping the the pages, you'd realize they are scared shitless (like you! [sometimes]), they are Prada whores (who isn't?), their sense of humor is super-high-larious (most of us would love to think that about ourselves) and they haven't really made specific meaning with their lives and are not all sexy, successful moguls. Pure entertainment! —★★★

Speaking of entertainment, you wouldn't read this book without falling for all the other characters. Maybe you wouldn't be rolling all over, like I did, laughing your ass off. But you would love Gemma the bestie, another Prada whore who wouldn't want all vampyres on her doorstep (with their fav meals) just because her blood has the power to taste like the food she ingests. There's also Pam, the guardian angel who would get you flinching at most of her cusses (even when you aren't the flinching type) and loves Jerry Springer drama. The Kev, a fairy whose taste in fashion ranges from nudity to Tutus and Muumuus, despite the fact that guys stopped wearing that before the seventies (and nothing could go wrong than the seventies!). Venus—sorority sister and vampyre, Paris—gothic teenager and Vampyre, Charlie—assgrabbing senior citizen, Martha and Jane—old, cantankerous conservatives who for some reason think they deserve slots on American Idol and not seats doing art with wacky Astrid, Brad Pitt—the sleazy adultering solicitor whose arrival in Kentucky caused media from the world to gather only to find out he wasn't the famous one but the one who wouldn't hesitate dedicating a poem to Astrid's butt, Angelina Jenkins—battling with her husband so her family doesn't change their last name to Jolie, Petra—the mom who can show much affection towards the century's ugliest demon king, but why not the same for her daughter? Your favorite character would be Ethan, not because he shags like someone five hundred and two (the older the merrier), you'd probably be guffawing anytime he's seething about Astrid doing everything (with him) but bending to his will. All these characters and so, so much more made me really, really want this book! —★★★★

You shouldn't be told you would split your jaw through laughter when you pick up a Robyn Peterman title. You shouldn't also be told there are so many OMG moments that might make you create a gash on your forehead (mine is spotless, Thank you, all went well after a little knitting). There are much too many revelations that harness the plot together, sprout up relations you could never guess existed and made this book the star that it was—★★★★★

It's the one book that would get you believing just about anything to the point of questioning your sanity (thanks to the element of engaging that seems to be an attribute in all Robyn's writings). At a point, I had to shake myself back to reality to actually believe Sprites weren't such ass-grabbing pervs (based on my very limited encounter with them).

There are a few authors I hail 'My Kind Of Girl', Robyn happens to be one of them. Definitely can't wait to read Fashionably Dead Down Under!

My rating: Obviously...

Fashionably Dead is available on Amazon.

Hold your horses, just before you run out to get this and all Robyn's works (which you should), she's giving away...

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I recommend this title to anyone who wants Chicklit that's fangtastic! Anyone who wants something with a super-hilarious lead should get this! Anyone who'd just love a feel of what major Vampyre sex they are missing out on being mere mortal should also throw this into their cart!

My work not done. Off to post my review on Goodreads.

Book Review: How Hard Can It Be by Robyn Peterman

Available on Amazon in both paperback and kindle.

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 grandmotherly porno writers 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…

———————★—★———————

Herbie run to my table on his tiny little dentist legs. "He's gay." Herbie informed me triumphantly.

"Really?"

"Yep"—he sucked in his gut and stood up taller—"but I am not." He waggled his eyebrows and grabbed his package.

It was all I could do not to gag-laugh. I closed my eyes and sucked in an enormous breath "That's wonderful... that you're not gay. I'm sure you will make an unsuspecting girl very unsettled someday, but here's the thing... I'm a lesbian. So while I'm fluttered by your outstanding posture, your acrobatic eyebrows, and your crotch handling, I prefer vaginas."

"Really?" Herbie asked dejectedly.

"Really," I assured him.

———————★—★————————

OMG. With such an amazingly crazily, hilarious debut. How hard it would be for Robyn Peterman to fall off our Must-Read lists.

Have you ever hated your job so much you hang around your dream workplace for a week which you have no skills for and win yourself a restraining order in the process? Betcha haven't! Or you attended a writers' meeting hoping to meet up with a renowned author but encounter old, shriveled women who write hardcore porn employing all devices you haven't even thought to experiment with? Hmm... not sure I have been there. You think you have the craziest family on the planet? I'm sure you do. But does it consist of a mum who ogles your boyfriend, a dad who's seething to kill your aunt, the said aunt who's worried about little men in her TV and zombies running Wall Street, not forgetting a sister who won't hesitate to make you feel like a piece of elephant shit and above all, the longest and strangest surname fit for a King of every Piece of Shit with an actual 'shit' in it? Even you would run for your life. But Rena doesn't. Just a normal day in her life.

Well, when Rena attends the writers' meeting of porno-writing grannies, she makes an encounter with the boobickious Viper-Bitch From Hell, Evangeline O'Hara, who's known to steal all works of all the porno-writing women in the meeting. How exactly did she get herself writing a dumpsterpiece which should bring down this nutjob's career, getting every single member of her family threatened in the process, apprehended by the hottest cop who shags like a dashing hero in something historical and meeting the most sneakiest, dangerous characters she's ever met in her life who might flick a switch and win her a life sentence.

I choked on my food! The storyline of this book is so one-of-a-kind! You know, sometimes you read Harry Potter, and go like, I wish I had the idea to pen this first. Well, meet Robyn Peterman (and push J. K Rowling off a cliff). It's all you think a plot shouldn't be yet it is. They don't call this fiction, they call this amazing! I sat for hours wondering how this book was crafted, and the more I did the more I found myself hovering around one answer:Robyn Peterman is the real deal—A star to the storyline.

I missed three lectures! It was just exciting as well as distracting to read this book. I have a to-do list. This book showed the finger to it. Though I didn't eat it all up in one sitting (I was a bit selfish savoring every fiber slowly), this book made me make time where time wasn't only to go at a very slow pace!—A star to the suspense.

I peed in three pants! (Uh-oh, I now know why my laundry was twice it's usual size). This book is funny. Very very funny. And I've read the funniest books this year! On my list, it should emerge winner of the Most Pants Peed In award.—Star to the humor.

Oh the characters! I. Loved. Them. All the writer's in the porno group with the strangest secrets in the world to the family, to Rena(!), to the cop who shags like a hero out of a history lesson and even to the evil, Evangeline O'Hara. They were all just marvelous to read about. Ooh, and Vinnie the Vibrator too.—another star.

The one or two sex scenes in this book were eye-popping. Normally, I won't do books that shockingly go all the way there. But with humor in there, I just can't resist [Insert *wink* here].

This book was mind-blowing, fantastic, sextastic so much more, so much more. So...

5/5 stars.

How Hard Can It Be by Robyn Peterman a story of porno-writing grannies, crazy family members, plastic surgeries gone awful and shitty surnames is available on Amazon. Get your copy now. I am not surprised this book has the highest sales ranking I have seen from an indie author. It goes to show that with a power blurb and an excerpt no one can resist, you can write full-time—like Robyn does.

I recommend this book for anyone who doesn't mind getting admitted for multiple broken ribs. Anyone who wants something strangely different. Anyone who hates their job. Anyone who loves to read. Anyone who loves chick-lit that takes you all the way there. And anyone who's a die-hard fan of any porno writing grannies.

I loved this book. I will keep reminiscing about all the good times it brought me...

Can't wait to read Robyn's first book in her new, Hot Damned series.

My work not done here. Off to post my review on Goodreads as well as Amazon.

Shit. Screw Amazon in advance for cropping a chunk of this review!