GRR Reviews The Blogger vs the Bad Boy by Kellie McAllen

The Blogger vs. the Bad Boy had been retitled with reissued with a new cover, and this iteration is a lot better, with a hint of paranormal but interesting limitations for a bunch of half-angels (or "Celestia Divisa") fall in love with regular humans.

Jake is wealthy, gorgeous, popular, and bad boy to the bone. When his latest prank got him sent to community service, he ended up at a senior home serving meals to grumpy or forgetful seniors. Then he met Charisse, a half-angel. // Charisse's motto is "kindness is the best beauty product of all", and her beauty blog already enjoys a big audience, but she can't stand "the biggest jerk on the planet". Jake found himself wanting the girl who won't have anything to do with him. And Charisse was definitely not impressed by him or his wealth. When a devastating secret was revealed about Jake, Charisse will have to decide whether to use her one miracle in life to save him... from himself.

Cute, sweet, and clean. This is a paranormal romance, but the linked nature of the universe has a good consistency to it, if you read the books in sequence. The paranormal-ness didn't figure into the story until much later.

Category: Contemporary / Paranormal

Primary Plot: Can a half-angel beauty blogger save a bad boy when he learned a devastating truth about himself?

Overall Rating: 4/5

NOTE: Tropes are now in the "Labels" below.

GRR Reviews Healing Hands (Angel Romance Series) (T by Kellie McAllen

Healing Hands shows that one does not need vampires, shifters, witches, or wizards to have a paranormal romance, by weaving a tale of an independent and inspiring blind woman and the half-angel professor and doctor that loved her.

Doctor Rafel DiAngelo, aka Doc Rafe, is a Celestia Divisa... a half-angel with the gift of healing. One day, in a coffee shop, he came into contact with Cece, who had been blind since the age of 4 with no physical explanation. Cece no longer sees her blindness as a disability, and she hated doctors with a vengeance because they are so... meddlesome and wanted to run tests and such. and Doc Rafe never told her he's a MD... just that he teaches divinity and other things (he does teach divinity). The connection between them is undeniable, and both bonded with a girl suffering from hysteria blindness... caused by severe psychic trauma. When Doc Rafe's "secret" came out that he's a MD, Cece saw it as betrayal and cut off all ties. Rafe thought his gift of healing was for Cece, but perhaps his gift was meant for someone else?

My problem with this book is the ending relied on Cece changing her mind. If all it takes to resolve the problem is a change of heart, the problem can't be that serious, can it? The ending almost made up for it, but not quite. In the end, I felt this book wasn't quite as good as the previous volume, Double Blessing, so I had to give this 4/5.

Category: Paranormal

Primary Plot: Independent and inspiring blind woman wooed by half-angel doctor and professor, who never said he's a MD (she hates MDs)

Tropes: different worlds, doctor/patient, disguise

Overall Rating:  4/5

GRR Reviews Double Blessing (Angel Romance Series) by Kellie McAllen

Double Blessing is about faith, love, and serendipty between two sets of lovers, twins Maddox and Cheydan, and their respective lovers, Maddy and Lissie. The book is spiritual without being religiously preachy. There are no Bible quotes anywhere in this book, and that made it approachable to even agnostic readers.

Maddy struggled for years trying to get out from under her drinking aunt and a series of bad boyfriends, only to find her world collapsing around her. Her savings had been stolen. Her cash stash robbed. She can't go home with a drunken man in her home wanting to get his hands on her... and her job had just been eliminated. With no savings, no job, and no home, Maddy has joined the new homeless, and came to the attention of Maddox, who was working at the supermarket the Maddy came in a bought a can of tuna and one banana... three days in a row. Maddox and his twin brother Cheydan are Celestia Divisa, half-angels on Earth. Maddox gives away most of his income to help people, and he's drawn to this girl who seems to need help. Elsewhere in town, Cheydan, Maddox's twin brother, just started his job at an adoption agency, and a girl Lissie, came in asking for help to find her birth parents, because she has a kidney disease and need a transplant soon, and need a blood relative if they can be found. Cheydan found himself drawn to this girl, who don't seem to be in the best of health, and bent some rules to get her the information, only to see it turn into a dead end. Maddy's life can't sink any lower, and she can't allow herself to hope it can turn for the better, even with Maddox's help. Lissie's life is ending soon and she's giving up all hope, even with Cheydan's help. Both half angels need to decide if they should use up their one miracle each allowed in life to convince their respective girl that hope is not beyond their reach...

Clean romance does not mean boring, and this book managed to present dramatic turns of emotions, sacrifices, and revelations that will have you tearing up in despair to cheering in triumph as you realize there will be a happy ending for both after all.

And no, I'm not spoiling the ending for you, but you can probably guess from the title. If you want a prime example of how paranormal / spiritual fiction can/should be done without wolves / bears / dragons / vampires / sex, this is the book you SHOULD read.

Category: Contemporary / Paranormal

Primary Plot: Two half-angel twin brothers fall for two different girls, one's low down in life, one's life is ending; Can they be saved?

Tropes: spiritual, different worlds, scars, sick/comfort

Overall Rating:  5/5