Breatheless-ly Good!

Brigid Kemmerer’s Breathless takes us back into the Elementals series with Nick Merrick’s story. Nick is the level headed brother. The one that can be counted on in an emergency, the one who always knows what to do and the best thing to say but now Nick is the one who doesn’t know what do to.

Brigid Kemmerer takes a turn that I didn’t expect with Nick. Though Nick has a girlfriend it’s her dance partner Adam that is throwing Nick into a tailspin. Unsure of what to do with the feelings Adam stirs with in him and uncertain of how his brothers would react if they found out as well as dealing with his desire to go away to school has left Nick feeling at his wits end.

I don’t even know what to say about how wonderful this story is. Having read the other books in the Elementals series I had no inclination that this was the direction Nick’s character would go. Maybe I should have, but I didn’t and I have to say I don’t care. Apparently the author is getting flack for introducing a gay character and thereby influencing innocent teenagers in inappropriate ways.
It still surprises me that in this day and age people still believe that kind of hogwash. As a 40 something year old heterosexual woman who has been reading most of her life and romance novels since she was 12, I say good for you Brigid Kemmerer!
It’s about time those in the LGBTQ community have characters in mainstream literature to identify with. It’s about time that those of us who are not part of the community see it as it really is. A community not so different from ours, whose people are just looking for love, acceptance and their place n the world. People who want to work, play and live happily ever after. Is that so different than you?

I say again, Bravo Brigid Kemmerer for writing a beautiful breathtaking story about two people finding each other in this crazy mixed up world. Two people who have so much more to deal with than anybody should have to deal with just to find
love.

What enterTAYned me this week

I wish I could say that Big Brother entertained me this week or even this season but so far I’ve found it to be predictable and annoying. Does Brittany really think she is playing the game? Do any of the coaches really think they have control of their players? And if they do have control of those players, shame on the players.

Janelle did a fabulous job at the coaches competition, she’d give Gene Simmons a run for his money with the tongue control she has. On that note I have to say that there was a competition I could have lived happily not seeing.

This week I read a teen paranormal book that I LOVED I can’t wait for August when the next one comes out.

Storm: The Elemental series by Brigid Keemerer was a new take on people who can control the elements, usually a talent reserved for witches and sorcerers but in this case,  four boys in their teens and early twenties who have lost their parents because of the fear their powers evoke in people.

On her way out of a self-defense class Becca happens upon two guys beating the crap out of another one. Without known why she steps into the fray running off the guys with her car and the threat that she called the police. Thus life as she knew it will never be the same. All the elements you expect are here. She is unsure of her feelings for two different guys. Chris and Hunter are so very different how is a girl supposed to know who to trust? There are major disagreements with her best friend and bullies to contend with and yet it seemed like a whole new world to me. One I can not wait to explore further. I am very excited that the second one comes out in August and so I don’t have long to wait. I was also thrilled to be able to read Michael’s story in the novella called Elemental and to discover that another novella called Fearless will be available tomorrow (July 31) thereby making the wait seem shorter.

My one problem with the book is the cover. The boy on the cover of Storm does not look like the youngest of the brothers who is the hero of this story, he looks like one of the twins. Also the twins don’t look identical which according to story line is inaccurate. Gabriel pretends to be Nick so that he can play on more than one sports team at school. None of this is vastly important in the grand scheme of things nor is it enough to make me stop reading the series especially since they seem to have done a better job on book 2’s cover.

On Saturday I finally got around to watching 21 Jumpstreet starring Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill. Though I didn’t find it as funny as many had lead me to believe it was I did enjoy it. I am a Channing Tatum fan and greatly enjoy the moments in a movie when he is just silly like in the band room. I also immensely enjoyed the big reveal during the big take down. I have to say I probably should have seen it coming but I really didn’t.  I look forward to seeing it again.

The most entertaining thing I saw this weekend though was the Pub Crawl I attended. As previously mentioned I work in a book store. Every year we have a pub crawl and we try to make our shirts book related with no mention of the company we work for. One year our shirts said Accio Beer! for those who don’t know that’s a Harry Potter reference. This year we had to pay homage to the best selling book out there so our shirts were grey with a tie on them and the title was Fifty Shades of Drunk. You can imagine the amount of comments we received while walking around town. At one pub a group was sitting on the patio and the guy asked what our shirts said. When I told him he asked what it meant while his girlfriend/date started laughing so I just smiled and said, “She knows. Ask her.” Besides the fun of the t-shirts it was my second oldest nieces’s first pub crawl (she turned 19 in March) and I had so much fun sharing the evening with her. It was a great evening with amazing co-workers, friends and family.

If you had to make a book related t-shirt for a pub crawl what would yours say?