New contest: "Wild Ride" by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer

ETA: This contest is closed. The winner is Justine!

I’m giving away a copy of Wild Ride by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer, signed by Jenny Crusie. She is one of my absolute idols and I’m so excited to have met her and be able to do this!

cover of Wild Ride, showing an outsized full moon rising behind a roller coaster. tagline: 'Get ready for the thrill of a lifetime'
This one isn’t a romance, although both main characters do have romance subplots–it’s a found family story, which I love just as much! The main characters are Mab, restorer of old amusement parks and carnival art (and isn’t that a cool job?) and Ethan, an ex-Special Forces guy whose family has traditionally guarded the demons held prisoner in their old amusement park.

Here’s what I said about this book in my Goodreads review:

I knew in advance that I would love this book because it was by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer and because it was about an amusement park that is also a demon prison.

I adored every character, and the plot was fabulous. I especially loved the way the portrayal of demons started out very black/white, good/evil, and then grew more nuanced. (This is what I wanted so badly to see on Buffy and never did–yes, we got demon and vampire characters who were obviously not evil, or not more evil than humans anyway, but the ideology never changed from “stake them on sight, they HAVE NO SOUL!”)

I think my favorite character was Cindy, the ice-cream maker. I loved her ice cream and how her subconscious manifests as dragons and how when the demons were acting out everyone’s worst fear, they chanted at her “Hungry, hungry, can’t feed us!” What can I say, I’m a cook.

Plus, I loved the recurring theme of the fortune “He loves you as much as he can, but he cannot love you very much,” because my mom actually got that fortune one time.

Just comment on this post to enter, and make sure you enter your e-mail address on the comment form–it won’t show up to other commenters, but I’ll get it and then I can easily notify you of your win. As always, if you want to be alerted when a new contest goes up, I recommend signing up for my newsletter.

NB: this is a copy I got signed at the RWA National Conference. Ms. Crusie isn’t involved in the giveaway and the book isn’t personalized. So if you want to tell her how much you loved her book, this isn’t the place. That would be her website. (But this IS the place to tell ME how much you loved it!)

16 thoughts on “New contest: "Wild Ride" by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer”

  1. I know that Jennifer Cruise is a must-read author in contemporary romance, but I can’t decide which book to read first!

    1. Personally I’d recommend starting with Agnes and the Hitman, Welcome to Temptation, or Bet Me…anybody have a different suggestion?

  2. Oh, I’ve been really curious about this one! Please enter me in the giveaway if it’s international (but I’ll understand if it isn’t).
    And I’d definitely recommend BET ME as a first Crusie novel! It’s so much fun, it’s even won over lots of men I know who don’t normally read romance novels (as well as everyone I know who DOES normally love them).

  3. the premise of the story seems unusually, atypical and interesting! I don’t frequent these types of novels often, but this sounds promising.

  4. I adore Wild Ride! And the dragon marshmallows! 🙂
    Bet Me or Welcome to Temptation are ones I usually recommend as places to start reading Jennifer Crusie. But now I feel the need to go reread Agnes!

  5. Hi Rose, wowww i love the premise of this novel, an amusement park which is also a demon prison. This must be very interesting. Look forward to read this one!

  6. I have yet to read a book by Jennifer so would welcome the chance. It sounds like an interesting concept for a book.

  7. What a coincidence, I just finished Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie last night. It too was different from her other books. No real romance and it was about a woman finding herself while caring for two orphans living in a haunted house. Wasn’t really a horror, paranormal or mystery, but general fiction with a touch of all three. I finished it in one day so I enjoyed it, but it was not what I expected.

  8. Sounds like you kind of liked this book, Rose.:-)
    It sounds different from anything I’ve ever read. I like interesting books, too. Thanks for your drawing.

  9. I love Jennifer Crusie’s books. WELCOME TO TEMPTATION is a must read! DON’T LOOK DOWN by Jennifer and Bob is also very good. I’d love to read WILD RIDE. Thanks.
    Meljprincess AT aol DOT com

  10. What a great idea for a book! I have never read anything by this author but now I am putting her on my list for my next trip to the library.

  11. “He loves you as much as he can, but he cannot love you very much,”
    I like that line.
    Haven’t heard it before, but it reminded me of what a forum member, on NaNoWriMo I think, said:
    “Just because someone doesn’t love you the way you want him or her to, doesn’t mean they don’t love you with all he or she have.”
    Such a sad, but very true line.

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