Monday Reads: Some Anthologies, a YA Historical, and a Forgotten Book

COLLIDE's blog tour is underway... check out the previous post to see the stops and enter for your chance to win a $25 Amazon gift card! 

So while I've been busy with the blog tour (and trying not to over-spam people with the posts), I've also been reading. Last week I mentioned that I'd only read two books but that didn't feel right... well now Goodreads is showing I read another book in between those two books! Clearly, I forgot about it, and clearly GR wasn't showing it at the time, though who knows why.

The book I read a few weeks ago was THE ROSIE PROJECT by Graeme Simsion. I'd heard so much good stuff about this book but it didn't end up being what I thought it was. Still an interesting and entertaining read, but I didn't love it like I wanted to. 4 stars.

The past couple of weeks I read two short story anthologies: DANGEROUS TO KNOW: JANE AUSTEN'S RAKES AND GENTLEMAN ROGUES edited by Christina Boyd (editor extraordinaire of THEN COMES WINTER and THE DARCY MONOLOGUES) and MY TRUE LOVE GAVE TO ME: TWELVE HOLIDAY STORIES edited by Stephanie Perkins. I also read Mackenzi Lee's THE GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO VICE AND VIRTUE.

Both anthologies were excellent. The Christmas one had a nice mix of funny/serious and contemp/fantastical stories. There were a couple I didn't like as much as the rest, but in all I really enjoyed this anthology. DANGEROUS TO KNOW was sooo good. I wasn't sure how I'd feel reading about Austen's rakes (I prefer the heroes myself), but each author delved into their backstory so well that I often found myself sympathizing, despite their bad behavior. I don't think I could name a favourite because they were all so well done. 

THE GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE... was a great book. But warning: it definitely had more vice than virtue in it. The MC was sometimes idiotic, sometimes annoying, and sometimes weak, and yet he still remained likable which is saying something. I definitely liked both Percy and Felicity better as characters, but as a trio they were compelling and fun and they balanced each other out nicely. Fun read and 4 stars.