Size 12 and Ready to Rock by Meg Cabot (Heather Wells #4)

Fisher Hall is hosting the Tania Trace Rock Camp after people around the famous pop singer keep getting hurt. So Heather Wells is stuck with her ex-boyfriend's pregnant new wife and a bunch of bratty teenage wannabes in her dorm. But the trouble the girls cause is nothing to what is happening around Tania.

For a generally snappy series, this entry in the Heather Wells series has some serious tones. It touches on domestic abuse and fertility issues. But really it only touches on the latter. The former plays out more explicitly. I wish the character of Tania was fleshed out a bit more, but it was nice to see more from the girl who "stole" Jordan away from Heather. And her story is given more substance which proves that everyone has something behind them.

But this is still a Heather Wells mystery and so it is still a pretty funny book. Heather is so good and sweet to people. And I love her and Cooper together. I'm glad to see their relationship progressing more. That's always nice see in a series (ahem, Stephanie Plum). Hopefully the next one will bring about a wedding. That would be pretty rare in a mystery series of this type. And I hope the next one has Jordan and Cooper's sisters in it because they were pretty hilarious.

Heather Wells Mysteries
Size 12 is Not Fat
Size 14 is Not Fat Either
Big Boned

Overbite (Insatiable #2) by Meg Cabot

Meena Harper is now working for the super secret Palatine Guard using her psychic abilities to keep its employees safe.  But when her ex-boyfriend, the prince of darkness and vampire king, Lucien reappears, she knows her life is about to get crazy again.  Something is going on in New York and within the Palatine Guard itself and Meena is right in the middle of the whole thing ... again.

And true, their relationship had gone from amazing to unmitigated disaster in record time because he'd kept biting her.  And then the members of his family kept trying to do the same.  And now vampires all over the world seemed to think of Meena's blood as a refreshing pick-me-up, like Dr. Pepper.  p.30

Another fun book from Meg Cabot and I'm guessing the last book in this series which is fine.  Meena is not very good at keeping in control of her life and she seems to attract the Alpha Male types, like Lucien and Alaric, neither of whom I liked very much.  Both of them rankled my nerves and I have a hard time believing someone as generous and kind as Meena would ever really love either of them.  But I am obviously wrong and, also, not the writer of these characters, because for some reason she does love them both.  So there is the kinda sorta love triangle, only not really because Lucien is a giant ass through the whole book and even Meena had to recognize this at some point.

I thought the mystery of who was turning everyone Meena knows into vampires was very good.  The perpetrator was a little obvious, but it still worked as far as mysteries goes. The book moved at a pretty good clip so there wasn't a lot of down time and Meena and her crew  have to work very fast to figure things out.  There were some funny moments as per any Meg Cabot book and I love Meena's brother who provides the most comedic relief.  The POV switched around so the reader gets a little bit of each person and the story unravels in a more whole manner.  It was a cute and funny story and definitely not the standard vampire story going around these days.  It's more old school than new school and I don't mind that at all. 

Insatiable by Meg Cabot

Meena Harper doesn't believe in vampires, but now she has to write about them for the soap opera she works for.  Then at her next door neighbor's party she meets Lucien and finds herself in the middle of an actual vampire war!

...even if vampires were stupid  Especially American vampires.  They hung out in places Alaric himself would never have gone, especially if he were immortal.  Such as high school.  And Walmart.   p.28

As much as I love Meg Cabot's young adult books, I really love her adult books.  The characters are much more rounded and usually don't make me feel like shaking anyone.  Meena is pretty well just awesome.  She has the power to see when a person is going to die and so that makes her much more sympathetic to others.  She is very relatable, with her frustrations with her job and her relationships.  I really liked her and her brother and her neighbors.  I was less than infatuated with Lucien and the vampire slayer, Alaric.  Alaric, in particular, was my least favorite character.

I thought the story was fun and fresh and enjoyed all the digs at the current vampire trend.  I like that the vampires were real vampires, teeth and seduction and blood drinking, and were unapologetic about it.  Meena's gift adds another great element to the story and I hope that this is the beginning of a series.  If it's not, then the story stands very well on its own.  But I'd like to hear more about Meena and her new adventures.

Hogwarts: Divination
Library

Being Nikki

Emerson Watts is still stuck in the body of world famous supermodel Nikki Howard after a tragic accident and a brain transplant. She is becoming more accustomed to the fame and the job, but she still misses her old life, family and her old friend, Christopher, who Em is still in love with. So when Nikki's brother shows up, Em is unsure how to handle him or the news that Nikki's mother is missing. And she doesn't know what to do when something even more shocking turns up in the search for the Howards' mother.

I admit that this is one of my favorite Meg Cabot series. I enjoyed Airhead and was looking forward to Being Nikki. Now I'm looking forward to Runaway, the next one in this series. Em seems to be a fairly typical teenager, boy-crazy with a good head on her shoulders. Although it did get a little tiring reading about Em worrying about the same thing over and over again. I was surprised, however, at the direction Cabot took the book in the end and enjoyed that. It's not often that I am surprised by a Meg Cabot.

I love Meg Cabot, really I do.

I love Meg Cabot. I do, I really do. But there is something about half of her female characters that just make me crazy. Queen of Babble made me want to kill myself, but I powered through it because it's Meg Cabot and I love her. But I won't be reading anymore of that series. I just can't do it. It's just that a lot of her characters are so stupid. When a normal rational thinking person would be like Oh he likes me or Oh this is obviously what is happening, some of them are like What! I never saw that coming and overreact or whatever. But it's Meg Cabot and I love her so I'll read whatever you put in front of me.

I loved the Princess Diaries even though the middle books were a little mind numbing and Mia can be so oblivious. I loved All American Girl and the sequel a lot. I LOVED Avalon High so much that I read it twice. And the Mediator series was very good and different for Meg Cabot. I've read her adult "chick lit" novels and they are good although fairly standard. As for her stand-alones, I've read Teen Idol, How to be Popular, Pants of Fire, and Jinx. Teen Idol was my favorite out of all of these. My husband even became interested in the audio version on a trip one time! But the female lead is pretty much a standard Meg Cabot character in all of the books, not a lot of variation. But it's Meg Cabot and I love her.

By far my favorite books is the Heather Wells series. She is one of the best Meg Cabot characters. If you don't know, Heather Wells was a pop star (a la Tiffany or Debbie Gibson) whose mother stole all her money and left Heather to fend for herself. So she works as a residence house coordinator at New York College. Every book a murder happens in the dorm and Heather solves it. It's standard mystery format but Heather Wells is so funny and well written. She is in love with her landlord/former boyfriend's brother who is a P.I. and treats Heather like a big brother much to her frustration. She is also more real than a lot of characters I've read. She does not have the perfect body and likes to eat. This is one series that I really enjoy reading and always grab the latest book as soon as it comes out.

P.S. Meg Cabot, if for some reason you ever see this, I love you, I do, I really do.