So Into You

By Sandra Hill
#11 Title with an S word for Summer
Rated 4 Stars

Authors Synopsis:

Angel Sabato was an ex-poker champ, bayou treasure hunter, and Playgirl centerfold.

Grace O'Brien is an ex-poker playing nun, folk healer with a secret.

When Grace rejects Angel's love, he hightails it out of Louisiana, but neither of them take into account the wacky Cajun matchmaker Tante Lulu who has them in her crosshairs. They don't stand a chance, nor do the precious orphans being rescued by the new Jude's Angels Foundation.
My Thoughts:

I've been a fan of The Cajun Books and the Jinx Books by Ms Hill for some time. We met Angel and Grace in Pink Jinx. We are reintroduced to them in wild Jinx. I came to like them very much. I enjoyed that they were fun. For example Angel was always cracking Nun jokes with a dirty twist to Grace.

I liked So Into You, but found that the interactions were less....witty than I'd come to expect. We don't see the banter between Grace and Angel that I'd have liked. Yes, Tanta Lulu is there and she brings all the hilarity that you'd expect from her. We also catch up with the LeDeux men including Dan and Aaron. I have a feeling we'll get to know Dan more very soon.

Anyway, Grace is keeping a big secret and just knows that telling Angel (who has been her best friend for years) the truth will ruin their friendship. Really!!! Her big bad secret is that she got pregnant at the age of 16 and gave the baby up for adoption. Ooooooo! I know! Listen, in this day and age, that's the least problematic secret. I mean, if she's fessed up to being born male or something....Now that would have been a real problem. Geez!

I liked it better than Pink Jinx, but it is not my favorite. I'm hoping for a return to the books I know and love with her next book.

A Tale of Two Vikings by Sandra Hill

Two Vikings, Toste and Vagn Ivarsson, twins so identical that only a tiny birthmark differentiates them, find themselves in a battle to the death on their way to pillage a convent. Each brother believes the other to be dead, but each has been saved by a very different angel of mercy. Toste is under the care of Esme, a novice who doesn't trust men. After all, her own father and brothers keep trying to kill her for her inheritance. Vagn finds himself at the mercy of "Helga the Homely," who suffered years of teasing because of the nickname Toste gave her, and she's not real fond of Vagn, either.

I liked this book pretty well. I didn't Loooooove it! I did love how, Vagn and Toste could still hear each other in their heads. I felt more, the connection with Helga and Vagn. They seemed to have a more natural progression. I felt like Esme and Toste's story was a little reaching with the Kidnappings. It was a stretch and I didn't feel warm and Toasty. I felt like he used and manipulated, and not is a great way. If I were Esme, after the tasting in the barn, and the woodsman's hut, I would have felt used and cheap. But maybe that's just me.

I will probably revisit this story at another time. Maybe reread in a couple of months. ( I think I'm in a funk!) Several authors who I have Looooooved in the past, have been so-so lately. So for now, I'll give this a 3.5. It wasn't great, but an enjoyable little read. Who knows, next time, I may give it a 5! You be the judge!

Tall, Dark, and Cajun

Spoiler Alert----Sorta----Mebbe----I'm typin' Cajun!!---Did, I hear St. Jude!!!

HOT, BOTHERED, AND IN OVER HER HEAD!

Men! After finally dumping her fiancÈ, whose idea of romance was making sure she toned her butt and abs, decorator Rachel Fortier hightails it out of D.C. straight for Cajun country. But her ex-taxidermist grandma's cabin on stilts in the Louisiana bayou isn't quite the grand estate she imagined. Throw in a pet alligator named Useless, a herd of Southerners born and bred, and Remy LeDeux, the smoldering-eyed pilot angling for her family's property, and Rachel's in for a passel of trouble-especially since their chemistry is hotter than the Atchafalaya Swamp in July. With his miniskirted great-aunt itching to marry him off and her rifle-toting grandma ready to shoot Remy the second he sets foot on her land, the sexiest bad boy this side of the Mason-Dixon line will need a special kind of voodoo to win this civil war.

Ok, let me start off with my Issues! When Remy reveals to Rachel that he is sterile, following a horrible accident and subsequent surgeries following Desert Storm, she dumps him, for not telling her sooner! Talk About!! They've been "seeing" each other for like 2 weeks. (seeing alot of each other, nudge nudge!!) In her defense, her fiance had a vasectomy like 1 month ago without telling her. (dumps the chump! ) What did she expect?! "Hi, my name is Remy. I think you're hot, btw I'm sterile!!" Yikes!! He's a guy, a man's man, and admitting something like that would be similar to a woman walking around town wearing a t-shirt with her weight in BIG print. (Any takers?! I thought not!) She overreacts, and his family sides with her when he finally tells him his embarrassing little secret. I get it, that the fact that he can't father a child, (biologically) is not the big deal he thinks it is, but for her to be sooo insensitive to how that makes him feel, is beyond me.

Soapbox, put away!! I still very much liked the characters and the story. Sandra Hill, discusses this sensitive topic with grace and humor. There is a cajun granny to rival Tanta Lulu! Believe it! Ms. Hill also revives the Mullet! Gone but not Forgotten!! I kept waiting for a Billy Ray Cyrus song to come on the radio or tickets to his concert or something. (hee hee!)

There is a famous Richard Gere moment, but I won't tell you which one. Ya'll have to read it for ya'll selves. This installment sets up for Charmaine's story. We even get glimpses several times.

Raoul...hubba hubba!!

The Red-Hot Cajun

The long hot Louisiana summer just got hotter for Rene LeDeux. He's burned out by D.C. politics and only wants to build his cabin in peace. But if his wacky, matchmaking great-aunt has her way, Bayou Black's prodigal son will be hitched before he can say butt-naked! That honor goes to Valerie "Ice" Breaux, Rene's high school nemesis turned Trial TV anchor, who's been abducted by Rene's activist friends.

Mon Dieu! It's bad enough being kidnapped and having her power suit ride up her thighs. Did she have to land in the lap of the most irritating, sexiest hunk she's ever laid her eyes on? Now Val's stranded in Rene's remote cabin, besieged by irrepressible LeDeux relations, not to mention a dingbat duo out to save the swamp.

It's a heat wave, guar-an-teed! Val vows she'll give her heart to the Cajun bad boy when alligators fly. Rene swears to get the girl who got away. It's never been steamier in the bayou than with two people this red-hot with desire... and more than ready for love.

I really enjoyed this book! It was "hotter" than I prefer. The story, and characters were great! The fun was abundant, and that was a clincher for me. I read this out of order, which chaps my hide! But, c'est la vie! I'll be reading more Sandra Hill, and hopefully in order. woo hoo!!

The Love Potion

A Love Potion in a Jelly Bean?

Yep! Fame and fortune are surely only a swallow away when Dr Sylvie Fontaine discovers a chemical formula guaranteed to attract the opposite sex. Though her own love life is purely hypothetical, the shy chemist's professional future is assured...as soon as she can find a human guinea pig.

The only problem is the wrong man has swallowed Sylvie's love potion. Bad boy Lucien LeDeux is more than she can handle even before he's dosed with the Jelly Bean Fix. The wildly virile lawyer is the last person she'd choose to subject to the scientific method.

When the dust settles, Sylvie and Luc have the answers to some burning questions--Can a man die of testosterone overload? Can a straight-laced female lose every single one of her inhibitions?--and they learn that old-fashioned romance is still the best catalyst for love.

I enjoyed this book a lot! Sandra Hill has a knack for writing believable characters who have issues as well as humor. I love feeling their history and seeing how it affects their decisions! I love the humor, and the fun secondary characters. Tante Lulu and Samson & Delilah! The book was fast paced for me, and I couldn't put it down. The Love scenes were Hot! I personally prefer warm, but it was ok with me, cuz they weren't every few pages. (That's just me!) I can't wait to read the rest of these Cajuns!!