Jody Offen: A Vampire's Garden of Stones

I wish I were a witch and could curse the day Amazon started with those one-click purchases. I accidentally clicked on this book and spent 1.20 Dollars on this nonsense. This book was an insult to all the readers and no one should pay for it. No one!

Honestly, can just anyone write a book and sell it right to the seller and skip the whole proofreading process these days? I know that the proofreaders don't usually correct grammar but someone should see it before it reaches the reader who pays for it. 

Plot-wise the book wasn't so bad. You have this vampire who has waited centuries to find his destined mate and once she is almost at his grasp she keeps getting into deadly situations where it's mere seconds before she is lost forever. The vampire is manipulative - he can erase memory and command. He also lies a lot. Which makes him very poor boyfriend material and it doesn't go well with happily-ever-after theme because once these lies become clear his eternity will tumble like a house made of cards - now that's something I'd be more interested in reading. 

But unfortunately even if the plot wasn't half bad there's the author's writing skill. Or the lack of it. I wanted to google how old this person is because I don't want to judge without perspective. It'd be good for a first attempt at a book by a fifteen-year-old but a very poor thing for someone who should know better. Needless to say I didn't find the info so I'm guessing this was written by an adult.

At the beginning I kept overlooking the punctuation mistakes (like missing quotation marks) but then serious mistakes like (to instead of too) started popping up. That got me uneasy. A non-native speaker of English should not be able to detect such things, right? I mean, I effin' learn from reading! I don't wanna learn a mistake by accident! It's your mother tongue for Christ's sake! Get a grip you lousy author! Anyway, needles to say I became a hater of this and the last straw was the classic mistake - you're vs. your - which is probably only made by half-witted idiots. Because not even the kids I teach (who speak English for only a couple of years) make it.
But that's not all. The heroine acts very immature and her inner monologues are cringe-worthy (too much GAWD in there) and unfortunately her male counterpart picks up the slang so that later you can't tell the difference between the language of a stupid 20-something-year-old and a centuries old vampire who otherwise "slips" into chivalrous behaviour. Why, oh why?

I. WANT. MY. MONEY. BACK. Really, I'm so outraged that I'm gonna give it just one vampire kiss in the rating - that hardly ever happens. 

GENRE: how to piss off  a reader

FANGS OUT: the story was OK-ish

FANGS RETRACTING: all the mistakes grammar Nazis hate and more

TOTAL SCORE:

Wholegrain Oatmeal Apple Cake

Wow, this one looks so good! That's only because of that artwork I sprinkled it with. Otherwise it's just another healthier alternative to have in the morning with your tea. What a way to start a new day... It's quite dry with wet core so that gives you this balanced feeling. Just try it, you'll see.

You'll need:

• 200g wholegrain rye flour
• 1 cup of oatmeal (well, I use some kind of mixture of 5 types of grain but no one can tell the difference)
• 125g room temperature butter
• 100g dark sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tbl spoon vanilla extract
• a pinch of salt
• 2 tbl spoons cinnamon
• about 3 tablespoons of milk (depending how the batter will look like)
• 1 packet of baking powder (mine says 12g)
• 3 apples thinly sliced
• icing sugar for decoration

1) You know me, just mix everything together till you have sticky batter. If it's too sticky just add more milk. You need to press it into your cake pan, not pour it. 

2) Butter your baking pan and press 1/2 of the batter on the bottom and to the sides.

3) Cover it with sliced apples.

4) Press the rest of the batter onto the apples so that they are covered - that's the tricky part since the batter is sticky but if you wet your hands I'm sure you'll manage.

5) Bake at 180°C for about 30 minutes. 

6) If you are feeling artsy just make a paper stencil and sprinkle the cake with icing sugar.

J. S. Scott: Ethan's Mate

These free e-books always take me on a roller coaster. One day it's a fine read, another day it's horrible and sometimes it's just plain. 

Unfortunately that's what this book was. It wasn't bad but it wasn't good either. Just luke warm if it makes any sense. It perches somewhere in the middle. In the "meh" land. And that's even worse than being significantly bad if you think of it. It makes you forget it immediately. 

See, it comes as the typical romance of finding your one and only after centuries of not feeling any emotions - yeah, we've been there already in numerous series. Since there is no space to build up the plot it goes too fast and makes it too harsh. 

The only light element in this are the brothers who make fun in all the situations but again, no space to write about that so no fun for the reader. 

It's very similar to the Carpathian series but lacks its depth. Sure, if you are a lazy reader who doesn't need much explaining or descriptions of everything around and just like to divulge in a quick hot romance then this is for you.

I am personally tired of this. Maybe if I haven't been catching up on my reading goals and basically marathoning the e-books during this weekend, I'd find more positives but with so many fresh memories of similar works I can't do it. 

GENRE: romance

FANGS OUT: Skip the plot and go right to the hot scenes if you like (that's why you grabbed this thing in the first place) and you won't question anything.
FANGS RETRACTING: I'm bored.
TOTAL SCORE:

Home-Made Rose and Coconut Body Cream

I've done some experimenting and came up with a really good product for winter. My skin tends to get dry in this cold season so I needed something to help me with it. I had a ton of different oils I usually use for my split ends or into bath so I could make it very rich. But coconut oil with just one other oil will do the trick, too. Apart from glycerin all ingredients are in food quality (virgin oils) which means it's good for you - say bye to the chemicals ;-)= 

And since coconut oil and rose water smell so good, so will you!

You'll need:

• 1 cup melted coconut oil
• 2 table spoons jojoba oil
• 1 table spoon cocoa butter
• 1 table spoon rose oil
• 1 table spoon avocado oil
• 1 table spoon rose water
• 1 table spoon glycerin

1) Melt all the ingredients if they need melting (coconut oil and cocoa butter probably will) and mix them in a bowl with the exception of glycerin - that one goes in in the last step.

2) Put the bowl somewhere cold for half an hour (it's winter so balcony was great place to put it in but you can use fridge). You know it's ready when it becomes solid BUT you can still press your finger through it.

3) Whip it. Use a hand mixer and beat it till light and fluffy. Now you can add the glycerin and whip it some more.

4) Put it in a jar and use it on your dry areas (split ends, chappy lips, dry elbows...). You may use it all over your body unless you have oily skin - in that case your skin won't be able to soak it all in fast and you will be shiny for a long time (you can apply it at night and you should be OK by the morning).

A. C. James: Eternal Ever After

Oh, I wish I haven't downloaded so many e-books! I have to go through so much to bring you a review (a hint for you, my lovely reader: sent me either dark chocolate, a black rose, any cool decadent piece of jewelry,...) 'cause I'm doing this for free and what once looked like fun is now pain. 

Because in the book I've just finished was that nasty feeling of deja vu. Ever read Twilight, a Sookie Stackhouse novel and Fifty Shades of whatever? It's all mixed in here. 

The beginning introduces a gifted waitress who shines like a beacon for the vampire world (yaaas, that's the Sookie part) and there is this vampire guy who approaches her and despite his inability to sparkle in the sunlight he bears certain resemblance of Edward from Twilight since he likes to stalk in the name of protection, show off (jumping on the tall buildings, being fast, buying new cars and being melodramatic by saying how Holly - that's the protagonist- should keep away from him while he is getting closer and closer), manipulate ... and since this is for adults he likes to spank people (hello, Mr Grey). But fret not, he's got a core of a marshmallow.

It was a quite disturbing read regarding the fact it was a mix of three books (maybe more, I haven't read everything under the sun) because you just can't help it and snicker at the scenes you've once read in a different book and you just know how the characters will act. But then again it may be a good thing - as I once said, people who grew up on Twilight surely bought all those Fifty Shades books which means there is quite large audience likely to enjoy this book. 

GENRE: (un)popular fiction revisited

FANGS OUT: not that badly written for a piece which was free
FANGS RETRACTING: we've all read it before
TOTAL SCORE:

Strawberry Cheesecake with Cocoa Butter Fail

"Oh mother, tell your children not to do what I have done..." :-D=
I got some cocoa butter for Christmas and tried to make something from it. The internet search mainly suggests home-made chocolate recipes but I needed a cake for my family to sate their appetite so I tried to be creative and heathier at the same time and failed terribly. 

The chocolate crust was so effing hard I couldn't slice it and it resulted in really nasty-looking slices of cake with demented mosaic pieces of chocolate at the top. To say nothing of the fact that it was initially so runny that it ran down along the sides of the cake pan and penetrated the crumb layer at the bottom so that later when it was chilled I couldn't slice through it either. Not that it mattered because the butter didn't hold the crumbs together and it was falling apart anyway. It tasted delicious but the form, oh the form...

Don't do it like this:

bottom layer

• 80g of biscuits
• 2 table spoons coconut oil
• 2 table spoons cocoa butter

cheese filling

• 250g cream cheese
• 6 big strawberries (I had some left from the summer in the freezer so I let them thaw out first)
• 3 table spoons sugar

chocolate top

• 1/2 cup coconut oil
• 1/2 cup cocoa butter
• 1/2 cup cocoa powder
• 1 table spoon sugar

1) Crush the biscuits and wet them with the melted coconut oil and cocoa butter. Press to the bottom of a pan and bake for about 10 minutes at 180°C.

2) Whip the cream cheese with mashed strawberries and sugar and spread over the cooled biscuit layer.

3) Melt everything for the chocolate part and pour over the cake. Let cool down in the fridge. Decorate with more thawed strawberries. Be disappointed when slicing it. ;-)= 

J. C. Diem: Death Beckons

OK, while I was about to forsake all the free e-book reads when I saw the cheesy amateurish cover of the book I'm reviewing today I actually stumbled upon something worth reading! Yaaassss!

I have no idea what's going on in Australia which naturally lacks vampire myths in their folklore but somehow they are becoming a strong voice in vampire literature. Now that I think of it - it actually makes sense that a sunny country without vampires would come up with something refreshing. No bias there. 

See, the story is quite uncomplicated and not so unpredictable since we've already read things like this - I mean, a boring girl who is insignificant in every way gets turned into a creature of the night and somehow gains abilities beyond even the strongest vampire's dreams. But before you get bored here since you've read numerous works like this one you'll basically realise that you can't peel your eyes off the screen of your e-book reader because it's frickin' hilarious. And I know, we have many smart-ass heroines with clever remarks and funny comments out there but how can one get ever tired of it? I mean, you can't get bored by fun, can you? Funny characters will always get one big plus from me. They even make me overlook the mistakes - like surprisingly long international flights in Europe and other not possible stuff like that.

So while I was thinking of shooting my brains out after reading other free books to forget I believe it was a wise step from Diem to allow the readers to access the first book in a series for free because I have no doubt many will continue reading.

GENRE: action despite the cover

FANGS OUT: it's fresh
FANGS RETRACTING: Six hours from Romania to France by plane? Really? Did you fly with snail airlines?
TOTAL SCORE: