Title: Beware of Geeks Bearing Gifts Series: N/A Author: Charlie Cochet Genre: Contemporary Length: Novella (86 pages) Publisher: Dreamspinner Press LLC (August 19th 2015) Heat Level: Moderate Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥ 4 Hearts Blurb: Julian “Quinn” Quinetro, a gruff, tough Miami SWAT officer, has been injured on the job, and all he’s looking for is a little peace and quiet to recover—difficult to achieve with his large Cuban family. An adventure in picking up his prescriptions puts him in the path of his geeky, brownie-baking neighbor, Spencer Morgan.
Spencer sweeps into Quinn’s life like a tropical storm of sunshine and rainbows. Not surprisingly, it’s chaos at first sight. Quinn’s in need of a little tender loving care, and Spencer decides he’s just the man for the job.
Their very different lives might clash, but they might also find some common ground—and maybe more.
Review: Oh my god the sugar rush on this book is high, it is that damn sweet and cute. I simply loved the two main characters Quinn and Spencer.
Quinn is a SWAT officer who has been injured on the job. He is big and bad with a grumpy attitude. Spencer is a sweet geek who has noticed Quinn since the day he moved next door to him. Not that Quinn has noticed him before. That all changes when Spencer worms his way into Quinn’s apartment and heart with brownies and other delish foods.
Really this was a well written and fast read. It gives two likeable men who are very different but somehow mesh perfectly together. This was funny and just damn enjoyable.
* I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review through http://mmgoodbookreviews.wordpress.com *
Hi guys, we have Charlie Cochet stopping by today with the tour for her newest THIRDS release Against the Grain, we have a fantastic exclusive excerpt, a fabulous giveaway and Tams review, so enjoy the post and click that Rafflecopter link <3 ~Pixie~
Against the Grain
(THIRDS 05)
by
Charlie Cochet
As the fiercest Defense Agent at the THIRDS, Destructive Delta’s Ash Keeler is foul-mouthed and foul-tempered. But his hard-lined approach always yields results, evident by his recent infiltration of the Coalition. Thanks to Ash’s skills and the help of his team, they finally put an end to the murdering extremist group for good, though not before Ash takes a bullet to save teammate Cael Maddock. As a result, Ash’s secrets start to surface, and he can no longer ignore what’s in his heart.
Cael Maddock is no stranger to heartache. As a Recon Agent for Destructive Delta, he has successfully maneuvered through the urban jungle that is New York City, picking up his own scars along the way. Yet nothing he’s ever faced has been more of a challenge than the heart of Ash Keeler, his supposedly straight teammate. Being in love isn’t the only danger he and Ash face as wounds reopen and new secrets emerge, forcing them to question old loyalties.
Hi guys, we have Charlie Cochet popping in today with the blog tour for Rise & Fall, the fourth book in the THIRDS series. We have a great excerpt, a fantastic giveaway and Tams review for you to enjoy, so check out the post and click that Rafflecopter link <3 ~Pixie~
Rise & Fall
(THIRDS Series, Book #4)
by
Charlie Cochet
After an attack by the Coalition leaves THIRDS Team Leader Sloane Brodie critically injured, agent Dexter J. Daley swears to make Beck Hogan pay for what he’s done. But Dex’s plans for retribution are short-lived. With Ash still on leave with his own injuries, Sloane in the hospital, and Destructive Delta in the Coalition’s crosshairs, Lieutenant Sparks isn’t taking any chances. Dex’s team is pulled from the case, with the investigation handed to Team Leader Sebastian Hobbs. Dex refuses to stand by while another team goes after Hogan, and decides to put his old HPF detective skills to work to find Hogan before Theta Destructive, no matter the cost.
With a lengthy and painful recovery ahead of him, the last thing Sloane needs is his partner out scouring the city, especially when the lies—however well intentioned—begin to spiral out of control. Sloane is all too familiar with the desire to retaliate, but some things are more important, like the man who’s pledged to stand beside him. As Dex starts down a dark path, it’s up to Sloane to show him what’s at stake, and finally put a name to what’s in his heart.
Hello all! Thank you for joining me on my little tour celebrating the release of Vixen’s Valor, the third book in the North Pole City Tales series. The series is named after the North Poles largest city. It’s also a Christmas themed city where all our Christmas elves hail from. Whenever the fellas are in town, whether walking into their favorite pub The White Hart, or waiting to catch a sleigh outside, I wanted to bring the reader into that magical world filled with the scents, sounds, and flavors of the holidays.
In North Pole City, the charming store fronts on Main Street are decorated with twinkling lights and sparkling tinsel, frosted ivy, garland, and wreaths. The cobbled streets are covered in white snow and in the distance the jingling bells of horses pulling sleighs can be heard. The scents of cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla waft through the air.
Everything is holiday themed, from the drinks served at the White Hart: peppermint juleps and cocoa cocktails. They have hot cocoa for breakfastwith cinnamon toast. Their meals consist of what we normally deem tasty holiday treats like fudge and sugar cookies. I had to research all kinds of traditional tasty goodies. One of my personal favorite holiday/winter drinks is mint hot cocoa with tiny marshmallows or plenty of whip cream on top. Yum! Researching this series is so much fun. Of course it always leaves me craving something chocolaty.
Do you have a favorite holiday treat, drink, or indulgence?
Hiya guys, we have Charlie Cochet stopping by today with her newest THIRDS story Rack & Ruin, we also have a very special guest in the shape of Agent Rosa Santiago *whoop* so I am going to leave you to it but remember to click that Rafflecopter link <3 ~Pixie~
Rack & Ruin
(THIRDS Book 3)
by
Charlie Cochet
New York City’s streets are more dangerous than ever with the leaderless Order of Adrasteia and the Ikelos Coalition, a newly immerged Therian group, at war. Innocent civilians are caught in the crossfire and although the THIRDS round up more and more members of the Order in the hopes of keeping the volatile group from reorganizing, the members of the Coalition continue to escape and wreak havoc in the name of vigilante justice.
Worse yet, someone inside the THIRDS has been feeding the Coalition information. It’s up to Destructive Delta to draw out the mole and put an end to the war before anyone else gets hurt. But to get the job done, the team will have to work through the aftereffects of the Therian Youth Center bombing. A skirmish with Coalition members leads Agent Dexter J. Daley to a shocking discovery and suddenly it becomes clear that the random violence isn’t so random. There’s more going on than Dex and Sloane originally believed, and their fiery partnership is put to the test. As the case takes an explosive turn, Dex and Sloane are in danger of losing more than their relationship.
Nights in the roaring city remind bright young things that life’s too short to take for granted. Tucked away in Times Square hides the Pantheon: a secret cabaret for wealthy gay men. Pretty young men in elaborate costumes and rouged lips are eager to please, and the champagne flows all night long. It’s a world of frivolity, fantasy, and debauchery. As Eros, the most sought after performer at the Pantheon, Julius uses his beauty and charm on enthusiastic patrons, but growing weary of superficial love, he longs to make a better life for himself.
Five years after being declared mentally unfit after surviving the trenches of No Man’s Land, Edward Joseph Clarence Junior pieced his shattered life back together. Now he’s ready to take on the family empire. To celebrate his thirtieth birthday, Edward’s cousin takes him to the most posh nightclub in town, the Pantheon. Falling under the sway of Eros, Edward and Julius find a love they’ve never imagined and the chance for a future they had only dared to dream about. But as Ares, a notorious gangster and Julius’s most important—and dangerous— client watches them, the threat to their love and their lives grows by the day.
Blurb: Eight years after leaving the deserts of Africa and the French Foreign Legion behind, Jonathan Wolfe has settled into life at Hawthorne Manor in the English countryside. Johnnie helps his adopted family run the manor and provide a safe, loving home for a new generation of “brats”: boys mistreated and discarded for their homosexuality—something all too familiar to Johnnie.
Although no longer an unruly youngster, Johnnie is as stubborn, foul-mouthed, and troublesome as ever. His recent rash behavior becomes a concern for those closest to him, especially Dr. Henry Young, the only man ever to capture Johnnie’s heart. Instead of soothing him, their closeness brings Johnnie’s insecurities from an unsettling past to the surface, and leads to an explosive situation that threatens to tear them apart. Then Henry’s past catches up to them….
Review: This is not exactly an accurate historical, and yes it’s about a group of gay men who take in gay orphans who have been abused and create a protective gay bubble for everyone to live in. Not very realistic for industrial revolution England. Just accept it and move on, because I loved everything else!
I enjoyed the interactions between the characters. I and I had the intended love/hate relationship with Johnnie, and his angst-filled ways. I loved to hate him and was rooting for him in the same minute! And don’t get me started on Chance! The drama that occurs when you really love someone, not as a lover but as a friend, and they keep making stupid decisions that you have to confront…it’s powerful in this story. Chance, Jacky, and Henry all have to make decisions regarding Johnnie…just what will the responsible one be?
I missed the first book in this series and will be hunting for it and downloading it very soon, for certain!
Blurb: All is not sparkly snowflakes and sweet candy canes in North Pole City. Office workers Tim and Noel do nothing all day but antagonize each other—petty fighting that might be based on hatred… or a heated mutual attraction. It’s up to Jack Frost and his elf-friend Rudy to broach the hostilities and introduce some Christmas kisses, but is the Frost Prince up to the challenge of launching a new romance when someone’s trying to break his holiday spirit?
Review: Tim has had a bad day at work, his supervisor Noel is making his life hell and Tim is struggling to keep his elf cheer. Noel doesn’t understand why he is so hard on Tim, but when they both get caught in some trouble Jack Frost and Rain Dear Rudy steps in and Jack gives Noel advice, but will Noel and Tim be around long enough to enjoy it or will the Toy Soldiers and the Mouse Kings Hoodlum’s destroy what has just begun?
This is a very cute Christmas story with a touch of excitement in the way of danger and conspiracy. Tim doesn’t have a clue as to why Noel is so mean to him, all he knows is that they used to be friendly and then Noel turned mean. After another mean trick Tim is on his way home when he overhears something he shouldn’t and it leads to him and Noel being chased and threatened; now they have to help Jack Frost discover who is after him. Noel really hasn’t got a clue about why he is so mean to Tim but after a talk with Jack he begins to discover that he wants Tim to himself, but first they have to help Jack and Rudy to save themselves.
I thoroughly enjoyed this cute story, with Tim and Noel finally discovering what they feel for each other under the hostility. I loved the way that the North pole was set out with the different departments, but I also loved that Jack Frost and Rudy were shaking things up, but I loved Noel’s and Tim’s awkward relationship most of all. Noel turns into a mean schoolboy when Tim is around, always poking and prodding to get a reaction… the poor guy is broken and is jealous but finally opening up to Tim might just help mend him. These two characters are cute and loveable, although Noel is a bit of a grouch he does grow on you. Jack and Rudy’s part in this story was sweet and the ending for all of them was very happy.
I recommend this if you truly love Christmas capers, a nefarious plot, a true and abiding love, a newly found love, accepting each other and getting a very happy Christmas ending.
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press (18th December 2013)
Heat Level: Low – Moderate
Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥ 4 Hearts
Reviewer: Pixie
Blurb: At the North Pole, no one is more powerful and feared than the Prince of Frost. As general of the toy soldier army, Jack Frost has been working extra hard to put away the villainous Mouse King once and for all. If that isn’t taxing enough, Jack has to deal with the scandal and gossip brought on by news of his relationship with Rudy Rein Dear, captain of the Rein Dear Squadron, which hit headlines last holiday season. Lucky for Jack, his reputation has managed to deter any foolish attempts to stir up trouble. At least until now.
When someone sabotages Rudy’s plane during a test run a few weeks before Christmas, Jack is determined to find the culprit by any means necessary. The closer he gets to finding answers, the more difficulty he has not falling back to his icy ways. Has the Mouse King stepped up his game in order to throw Jack off his, or is someone a little closer to home behind the attempt on Rudy’s life? Either way, Jack has every intention of delivering a Christmas they won’t soon forget, even if it means losing the newfound warmth in his heart.
Review:This story is part of a series and is best read in order. Jack and Rudy have faced scrutiny since their relationship was revealed, but Jack’s reputation stops others from causing them trouble. With Jack working extra hard to stop the Mouse King and his villainous plans and Rudy working on being the best Rein Dear pilot around their relationship is still going strong. But someone isn’t happy with Jack, and Rudy’s plane is sabotaged, with Rudy severally injured Jack goes on the hunt for the culprit but without Rudy to temper the ice Jack just might lose himself to the power of the ice. Can Rudy save Jack from himself or will Jack’s heart become encased in ice again?
Oh oh oh oh *squee* I was so happy when I began to read this book and saw that it was Jack and Rudy from Mending Noel, I couldn’t wait to find out how they were doing and what was happening in the North Pole and I was so pleased to see that although it was a year later we still discover that the chase for the Mouse King has only just ended. We join Jack and Rudy at the Silver Bells Christmas Ball and they are as in love as they have always been, but just a few short days later everything is crumbling around them and Jack is losing himself to the ice inside him.
Well if Mending Noel was a sweet, exciting story tinged with danger and conspiracy then this one is a sweet daring romance that is tinged with darkness and mystery. We follow along with this story with a confusing bewilderment, why would someone try to kill Rudy? Is it the Mouse King trying to get even with Jack? Or is someone finally acting on their jealousy of Jack and Rudy’s relationship? Or is it someone completely unexpected who has a grudge? Rudy and Jack might be madly in love but others are unhappy that they have rocked the status quo and that they have supported Noel and Tim in their relationship, so just who has the balls to launch a sneak attack on Jack and Rudy?
I loved this story and thought it was a very fitting one for Jack and Rudy, Jack is the most feared being in the North Pole and with good reason, we learn about his past and how Rudy slowly gained his love and how they will stand against anything thrown their way. But, as Jack seeks revenge for his poor injured love you see him start to revert to the icy being that laid waste to all around him during the Frost War, Rudy is the only one with a chance to keep him from losing himself but will he be able to melt the icy shell encasing his heart? It is something that Rudy isn’t sure of, but Kringle’s faith in him drives him to try.
I recommend this to those who love a Christmas mystery, saving the one you love from themselves, cute elves, a strong abiding love, great characters and a very happy Christmas ending.
Blurb: Chance Irving is a young man with a gift for getting into trouble—not surprising, as trouble is all he’s ever known. After losing everything he held dear one fateful night, he decides to leave New York and his past behind, and joins the French Foreign Legion. But even in Algiers, Chance can’t seem to shake his old ways, and he ends up being transferred to a unit made up of misfits and rabble-rousers like him—a unit he finds just in time to be captured and thrown into a cell with his new commandant, Jacky Valentine.
A highly respected commandant with a soft spot for hard luck cases, Jacky is the kind of guy who would go to war for you, and the three equally troubled youths from his unit he’s more or less adopted feel the same way about him. Suddenly Chance starts to think that his life doesn’t have to be as desolate and barren as the wastelands around him.
But even after their escape, with the promise of a future with Jacky to buoy his spirits, or maybe because of it, Chance can’t stop making mistakes. He disobeys orders, lashes out at the boys in Jacky’s care, and blazes a trail of self-destruction across the desert—until someone makes him realize he’s hurting more than just himself.
A Timeless Dreams title: While reaction to same-sex relationships throughout time and across cultures has not always been positive, these stories celebrate M/M love in a manner that may address, minimize, or ignore historical stigma.
Review: To talk about this book, I have to divide it into three parts. Beginning, middle, and end.
Beginning: (♥♥♥♥♥5Hearts)
It came as a shock, at first, to be spoken to directly from the narrator. It took a little adjusting, but Chance’s wit carried me through the slight awkwardness, and soon I fell in love with the style. Chance’s voice is funny, rude, blunt and sobering. The way he thought and narrated just made his character all the more endearing.
In the first part, we know “Jackie” is an important person to Chance, and we get glimpses of him in the narrative “a man continuously accompanied by chaos and some form of deep-seated lunacy”, which left me curious to know more about the man. Especially since the story opens with Chance shot in the stomach, and Chance knowing he has to get to Jackie. The stakes high, right from the start, and I wanted to know more—would he make it back to this Jackie? And why is this person so important to him? What is their story?
Also, this first part of the story shows us Chance (Chauncey at the beginning) growing up and the momentous events in his life that lead him eventually to a desert in Africa. I don’t want to give too much away, but reading it was emotional and engaging. I certainly sympathized with him.
Middle: (♥♥♥♥♥5+Hearts)
Gah. I was totally swept away in this story. Let me just say, once we got to Chance’s life in the desert I was a goner. Nothing could pry me away from reading. Nothing. I stayed up very late, consequently.
Here’s why:
It’s full of tension.
It made me swoon, swoon, and swoon some more.
The settings the author used made her scenes unique. For example, and this was the shining star of all scenes in the book (and many of them were good) but she had our two main characters, Chance and Jackie, meet in a box. Yes, a box. I refuse to say more, except that I recommend everyone read it! J
The sex was hot and it fit the characters perfectly.
Also, and this was what worried me a little when I first started reading—and was relieved to find it not the case—this is not a full on war story. The war is a background and we don’t “see” much of it. The story really does focus mostly on Chance’s growing and his and Jackie’s relationship.
End: (♥♥♥♥3.5Hearts)
Don’t get me wrong, here, I still LOVED the book, but the ending didn’t quite click with me. It seemed too neat somehow. I think I got irritated that we find out Jackie was suddenly wealthy. It seemed too fairytale, and while I love fairytales, it didn’t seem to quite match the rest of the book.
On the other hand, the lead up to the resolution was very emotional, and I got teary. All pluses for this wonderful book.
Overall: Great characters. Chance and Jackie are particularly well drawn, but also Johnnie, Alexander and Bobby, who I suspect we’ll see more of in future books.
I’ll leave you with my reaction after reading the last page:
Title: Beware of Geeks Bearing Gifts
![RoseByAnyOtherName[A]500](http://www.charliecochet.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/RoseByAnyOtherNameA500.jpg)
