SWEET MINOTAUR OF MINE

A Sweet Romantic Monster Comedy Series

De: Patti Petrone Miller

Narrado por: Virtual Voice

Romance novelist Charity Witherspoon has a foolproof system for avoiding real-life romance: Write about fictional boyfriends with perfect abs and zero commitment issues. Date nobody. Repeat.

This brilliant plan works perfectly until a mysterious stranger walks into her Greenwich Village bookstore asking weirdly specific questions about mythology, wearing leather pants at 2 PM on a Tuesday, and looking like he stepped off the cover of one of her own novels.

Rex Stoneheart is everything Charity writes about but has never actually encountered: tall, dark, devastatingly handsome, and completely out of her league. He's also hiding something big. Like, "accidentally crushing coffee cups with his bare hands" big.

When Rex's manager decides he needs a fake girlfriend to improve his "mysterious bad boy" image, Charity finds herself thrust into a world she thought only existed in her books. Suddenly she's attending industry parties, posing for magazine shoots, and pretending to be madly in love with a man who makes her forget how words work.

The problem? The fake relationship is starting to feel a little too real.

Between Rex's adorable inability to use normal human strength around disposable cups, his bandmates who seem to have their own secrets, and the growing suspicion that her entire worldview might need some major updates, Charity's carefully organized life is about to get very complicated.

Because some love stories are too good to be true. And some are too true to be good.

A laugh-out-loud paranormal romantic comedy about finding love in the most unexpected places, learning that normal is overrated, and discovering that sometimes the best fairy tales happen to people brave enough to believe in a little magic.

Perfect for fans of romantic comedy with a supernatural twist!

HOURS of SLOP

If i paid actual money for this, i would be furious. i decided to listen as an experiment, i just wish the conclusion had been better on a number of levels. the digital voice is bad enough, and frequently mispronouncing words is no fun either, but those are at least forgivable. and while i don't want to accuse the author of anything untoward, this story reads as if it were written, if not entirely, then at least heavily edited by AI. you can tell because there are analogies in every friggin sentence. EVERY SENTENCE! i have spent a lifetime reading everything from ancient Greek and medieval texts to the pokey little puppy, and no one writes like this except for AI. there are other symptoms that make me suspicious, like this nonsense: "i was running late because i was stuck behind a lady buying lottery tickets, like she was funding a small nation." and "He looked at me as if it meant something."

what does that even mean!? it means nothing. because AI makes analogies that do not make sense just for the sake of making an analogy. it's filler. fluff. padding. once is forgivable. but this is every. sentence. they all contain the words LIKE and SOMETHING.

Now, if i am wrong and this really is the author's true style, then it's still slop and bloody annoying because no one needs an analogy to describe every single little detail. editing with AI is fine. i get the fact that you'd want a proofreader who won't judge you over the subject (and this subject is pretty...ahem...anyway) but wow, have some standards when it comes to your ability to tell a story. you should actually care about your readers and the money they spend on your craft. actually earn it! ESPECIALLY if the subject is questionable. i'd heard of this fad mentioned in a podcast, and morbid curiosity got the better of me. mostly, i was curious about whether or not these authors would have the audacity to provide slop or an actual storyline. i am not anti-AI. i'm not kink-shaming. you're welcome to your proclivities.... but i am anti-lazy cash grabs that take advantage of readers.

Readers, you've been warned... if you're cool with this low standard, then do proceed. sometimes you just want some literary candy. ain't nothin' wrong with that. but I can't stick with this long enough to even find a story worth talking about. i am already peeved to have wasted so much time on it when i could have just read one of my dusty old 1980's comic books. as it stands, i will be removing it from my library.

this "style" is actual garbage, and i feel it's my duty to let others know before they pay for it. hopefully, the author is sensible and will either go back and edit out this junk. i sure as heck hope they don't put a price tag on it. if they were to remove just half of the analogies, this story itself might last fifteen minutes. it's that bad.