Series Review - Dead Man by Lou Harper

In the last few months I have devoured Lou Harper's various paranormal series.
Dead Man, Sanguine, and LA Paranormal.

All three series are very similar in style. The books are made up of short stories, where the main thread that seems to hold the stories together is the development of the relationship, but somehow the stories intertwine and vague hanging threads and unanswered questions are eventually addressed in a later story, or even book.

Today I'm focusing on the Dead Man series.

Dead Man and the Restless Spirits, is the first book of the series and reintroduces us to 'Dead Man' Denton Mills, who we first met in the Sanguine series. Denton isn't actually dead, but he does see dead people. His new neighbour is the stoic and gorgeous Bran. Turns out Bran is a witch and he helps develop Denton's powers. The mysteries were fun and the guys are adorable together. Despite the light tone of the books the third story managed to move me to tears because of the haunting they were investigating.

Dead Man and the Lustful Spirit is a short story set between the two full length collections. It's New Year's Eve and Denton and Bran are at a party, but even then they can't help but stumble across a spirit.

I told you they were all connected. Dead Man and the Army of Frogs ties up all the loose ends from both the first book and the short story. The miscommunication in this collection had me wanting to shake Denton (since we are in his POV), but overall these two guys are still adorable, and more perfect for each other than they realise, and they end the book in a really solid place. Oh, and we get more Gabe (from the Sanguine series) which is excellent news as far as I'm concerned.

I've finished all these series now, but I'm hoping where will be more to come in the future from any or all of these couples.

Fiction Friday - on a Tuesday

It's been a month since I did a round up of my reading.

This has been favourite author reading month.

I started off with the L.A. Paranormal series by Lou Harper. I'd not read any of these stories before despite having had the first book on my Kindle for ages. I plan to do a separate series review post but needless to say it's well worth picking up this series.

In my last post I talked about how much I loved All in With the Duke by Ava March. I followed up by reading the next two books in the series. These books overlap with the first one and there are some excellent crossover scenes within the series. I really loved all the couples in this series.

A Flirty Dozen by JL Merrow is a collection of her short stories. The collection is excellent but my favourites are Love Found on Lindisfarne and A Pint of Beer, a Bag of Chips, and Thou.

I followed that up with another anthology from JL Merrow and Jo Myles, Truly, Madly, Boys (Mad About the Brit Boys Book 5). This includes one of my favourite  short stories, Epiphany but all four stories are excellent.

Rather than spending the entire month reading JL Merrow  (not that I wouldn't enjoy that) I moved on to Clare London and discovered her excellent timey-whimey story Timeslip.

Historical seems to be my genre of choice at the moment and I moved on to The Copper by Bonnie Dee. I love the stories she writes with Summer Devon so it was hardly a risk to take a chance on this story. Grittier than a lot of the books in her writing partnership but exciting and fast paced with engaging heroes.

No idea why but I had some notion that The Ghost Wore Yellow Socks by Josh Lanyon was an historical. It's not and I'm a numpty for waiting this long to read it. Great mystery and a lovely slow burn relationship.

Comfort read time next. Heat (Salisbury Stories #1) by RJ Scott and Chris Quinton. And it gave me a craving for Jelly Babies.

Another Lou Harper book (and a book to finish off a series) Temper Sanguine (Sanguine #2). I loved this books about a vampire Hunter and his vampire boyfriend. Gutted this is the last in the series. Lou Harper I'd be up for reading more of these two if you have a mind to write them.

If reconnecting and lost love is more your thing I can recommend Dancing Days by Clare London. And lovely to see a mature couple getting the limelight.

The good thing about a short story done well is that you can devour it all in one sitting. The bad thing about a short story done well is that you can devour... Yeah, I  know, impossible to please. Night Watch by Josh Lanyon is one such example. 42 pages of excellence.

Another historical series I devoured was Victorian Holiday Hearts by Bonnie Dee and Summer Devon. These novellas are based around a Victorian acting family and take place during various holidays.

And I finished off the month with a paranormal  (it is Halloween). Dead Man and the Restless Spirits (Dead Man #1) by Lou Harper. How can you resist a book where the first line is "Dying sucks hairy monkey balls, even when you're not the stiff.".  And the MCs in this one are adorable.

Next month will see a change of tack for the reading challenge. I'll be attempting to finish off some series that I'm partway through. And I'll also try to clear some of my free reads. So no more favourite authors? Wrong. First book lined up is Dead Man and the Lustful Spirit by, yep, Lou Harper!