Saxon Bennett

This book gave me some things to think about. For obvious reasons, I understand Maggie coming to terms with her sexuality, but I also sympathize with Amanda. Given the time in which the author wrote The Wish List, it seems Amanda did not have a reference point to cope with her mother's sudden lifestyle change. Yeah, Amanda may be like her father, and no she didn't need to do a Connie Corleone by throwing sh!@#t around; however, it's like what Gram Josephine said, Amanda needs time. It took Maggie time to realize the truth. The same can be said about Amanda needing time to accept/adjust to her mom's new lifestyle.
The title also caught my attention. Based on Merriam-Webster's definition, a wish list is something a person wants that's sometimes "realistically unobtainable." Maggie whished she had more confidence when she was younger, wasn't a coward, and most importantly wanted a life with Celia. These wishes are by no means "realistically unobtainable." I wonder if the same can said about her daughter's acceptance?… (meer)

My third book by, I believe only despite Gardner’s name up on GoodReads, Saxon Bennett (none of the covers list Gardner).

I had, and still do for that matter, loved the first book in this series. I’d mentioned a ‘negative’ that wasn’t really a negative – the part where the cover of the book said Saxon Bennett, yet two author names were listed on GoodReads so I wasn’t sure if this was a solo or group effort. That, despite my calling that a ‘negative’ really wasn’t a negative.

For the first time I’ll mention a negative that I had thought of at the time but pushed to the side as something that might not be important, reading further would let me know if it was important or not. Well, I’ve read the three Chase Banter books and so I know now. Other than ‘Chase’s partner’, I never had a firm grasp of Gitana. Heck, I had a better understanding of what made up the personality of Gitana’s sister than I did Chase’s own partner. Gitana owned a flower shop and was busy with that all the time. She has a sister and mother, who were introduced into the storyline. She loved and/or put up with Chase’s insanity. And her ‘continuing running gag of humor bit’ was that she, disastrously, couldn’t cook.

Hell, by the end of the third book, I knew more about Chase’s internal muses than I did about Gitana. So, yeah, I guess that negative was there. Unfortunately.

So, first book was loved, only real negative was the relative ‘thinness’ of Gitana’s character. Second book was liked, and some of the negatives which will overwhelm and almost keep me from being able to finish the third book were mixed and played with in the second book. I mean, having almost every straight person around them suddenly realize they were actually lesbians was kind of annoying. And a reoccurring theme. Lacey started off as someone I didn’t really want anything to do with but wasn’t disliked necessarily. By the third book I wanted all contact with her cut off. Severed. I wanted her outfitted with cement shoes and tossed into the nearest body of water.

And that pink mafia thing? That kind of enraged me when it popped up in the second book. Funny how this stupid fucking lesbian nation thing that Lacey started overwhelmed my loathing of the whole idea of the pink mafia, eh?

In terms of humor – there are obviously things which were supposed to be humorous but which I just found tedious to get through (I assume the whole lesbian nation thing, the Lesbian Illumination Institute, was supposed to be a joke, humorous). I didn’t find it funny. I was ready to give up on the book early on. But I did in fact love the first book, and like the second so I pressed on. And there were moments of humor still that I found, you know, humorous. Like, I don’t specifically recall what had occurred, but somewhere around the 32% mark, when I was contemplating not continuing, a bit of humor broke out. I thought I had written more notes. Hmms. I’ll conclude this section on ‘humor’ by noting that having your story include a scene that involves people laughing uproariously at ‘funny moments caught on film’ is kind of like a stand-up comic that laughs loudly at their own jokes before anyone else can even react to them (I mean, the scene with the cop? That wasn’t funny, that was downright scary. I mean, the fucking cop had actually pulled his gun at one point. Do you know how fucking easy it is to go from ‘we are all just joking around, not really’ to ‘oops, the cop just shot everyone’? Apparently it’s really fucking easy to go from one to the other, based on all the news lately. That’s not fucking funny).

So – lesbian nation flopped for me. That whole muse thing got really annoying in this book. I mean, Chase is described by her friends, lover, and shrink as being ‘better’ now. But, and I wish to stress this, but she seemed, in certain regards, ‘worse’ in this book. I mean, it’s this book wherein she’s in the middle of some activity and . . . suddenly she’s blocked off all outside noise and she’s reliving a scene in her shrinks office? When her muse manifested itself and tossed around a photo that had been on the wall? And then back to whatever scene she had been in before this . . . think that had occurred (I’d normally call it a flashback, but I’m not even sure the activity ever actually took place). And this seemed to be a running ‘gag’ in this book. Suddenly Chase is off inside her head, arguing with Divine Vulva and Commercial Endeavor (or whatever her Muses were called). And not paying much attention to the world around her.

Right, so. Too bad the author went the direction they went. It’s the lowest rated of the three books in the series, but still over 4 stars, so obviously others didn’t have a problem with the way things turned out in this here book.

December 14 2015… (meer)

Just a quick note - mostly funny story: Lacey continues to annoy me; pink mafia and concept kind of enraged me.

Reading these three books more or less one after the other probably wasn't smart. Not sure I'm going to be able to finish the third. The underlying story in that one is completely and utterly stupid. But that's the third book, this is the second.

It's four years after the first book. Bud, yes they still call their girl Bud, is 4 now. Addison, who played a deepish role in the first book appears to have been pushed aside for Bud in this book here. Though Addison makes an appearance here and there. Addison is 11 now. Addison's mother, and Chase's mother have become private eyes.

An interesting enough book. Still good. Slice of life. First book had no real negatives (beyond not knowing who actually wrote it). Second book had negatives (like Lacey, Pink Mafia, etc.).… (meer)