steampunktendencies:

Snowy Victorian Houses 3

Snowy Victorian 1 & 2

Hello Romancelandia!

So like many of you, I too have WAY TOO MANY BOOKS on my TBR pile (but does that ever stop us from buying more? Nooooooooooooooo), and I’m sure, like many of you, there’s at least one book you got once upon a time because you read the back and thought “THIS IS MY CATNIP, GIMME, GIMME, GIMME!!!!” but for whatever reason, you didn’t sit down and read it right away…so it waited, and waited, and WAITED, on your pile UNTIL FINALLY that day came, and you got that book and you settled down, a big goofy grin on your face because you just knew, deep in your heart, this was going to be SO GOOD…

…only it wasn’t. Not even close. And whether you force yourself to finish it or not, you stare at the book and find yourself thinking, “how did this happen? You were supposed to be good!”

I’m sure we all have had AT LEAST one book like that. So I’m curious to hear your thoughts! What was that book, and please feel free to share what drew you to it, and what ultimately disappointed you?

I’ll start! So YEARS AGO, I found this list on goodreads about romances featuring plus-size heroines, and found this book by Sherrilyn Kenyon titled “Fantasy Lover”;

It sounded very hot–Greek-god hero trapped in a book, for whom our heroine rescues by more or less “reading him” into life, and the building sexual tension…but a hot love scene here and there isn’t enough to keep a book interesting. The plot was pretty…meh. Not a lot happened. And the author couldn’t seem to make up her mind what kind of book it was: comedy? Drama?  In all honesty, it would have been better had it been a 150 page novella. And I had issues with the hero’s backstory as well.

Anyway, please share! What books did you build up so much in your head, only to be let down when you finally got the chance to read them???

fortuitous-occurencess:

mimijag:

Hi @fortuitous-occurencess, I’m you Secret Santa!

I hope you’ll like what I did with your prompt that was :

: “It’s Christmas and Tom and Sybil take a special
holiday trip and have various, happy adventures; can be either show era or
modern, it’s up to you.”

I had a lot of fun writing it. It’s been a long time since the lasst thing I wrote so I’m a little bit unsure.Thank you to @skinnycat77 for the beta and @yankeecountess for organizing the secret exchange. Let me know what you think. Reviews are very welcome!

PS / I’m sorry but FF.net is shit and doesn’t wait to take my text as written. Sorry if it makes the reading difficult.

MERRY CHRISTMAS to the Tom/Sybil fandom!

A HOLIDAY TRIP

London, December 24th

It
was the middle of the afternoon and Tom just finished packing the car. He
worriedly looked up to the sky and then frowned. He was sure the snow would
start to fall soon and they needed to hit the road
quickly if they wanted to leave London without too much trouble.

They
have been together for three years now but it was their first Christmas Eve
together alone. As Sybil was working today, they had to decline the usual
invitation to Downton, on the pretext it would be better for them to drive up
there on Christmas morning rather than with thousands of Londoners on the Eve.
Of course, it was just a small lie as Sybil finished her work day at the
hospital at eight in the morning. But she insisted they spend the Eve alone
together and Tom didn’t argue, too happy to escape the long family dinner and
the games with the competitive Mary.

So
the plan was to drive to a small village near Downton (which name was still
unknown to him), spend the Eve together in a small rented cottage then drive to
the big house the next morning. Sybil was in charge so he didn’t have all the
whereabouts but she assured him that the cottage was lovely and warm and less
than an hour drive from Downton. The only thing he had to take care of was the
food and the drive.

He
liked it when she was all mysterious with him and he walked back to the
apartment with the ghost of a smile on his face. “Yes, I can be mysterious too,” he said to himself at the thought
of the small package safely packed in his travel bag.

(MORE)

Thank you so much, this is wonderful, and I love what you did with my prompt and the little plot twists at the end!