Book Review: HER by Britney King

Title: HER 
Author: Britney King
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Release Date: February 28, 2019
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“After four, I quit counting. What’s the point if you know it isn’t going to stop?”
 
Sadie is jealous. Why wouldn’t she be? Her life is falling apart. Meanwhile, her new neighbor is everything she is not.
 
Ann is perfect—the kind of woman everyone loves to hate—and a best friend to die for. She hosts over-the-top dinner parties, takes parenting to an entirely different level, and makes ambition look sexy as hell. 
 
Sadie learns quick: the best way to cure jealousy is to befriend it. She also learns there’s more to her new friend than meets the eye. She’s patient, she’s kind, and possibly a serial killer.
 
It isn’t until Ann’s proclivities hit a little too close to home that Sadie has to ask herself how much she’s willing to overlook in the name of getting what she wants.
 
Exquisitely paced, Her is an unnerving and electrifying psychological thriller about jealousy, passion, and the dangerous places desire can take you. Full of enough tension and twists to make even the most seasoned suspense reader break out in a cold sweat, it keeps you guessing until the very last page.
 
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My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

I wish someone had told me: worry is a waste of time. The real troubles of your life will be things that never even bothered to cross your mind.

 

Ann says a lot of things. She believes in survival of the fittest, and she wants everyone else to believe in it too. But there are too many stupid people in this world for me to embrace that notion wholeheartedly.

 

I only wish someone had told me that making friends as an adult isn’t any easier than it is as a kid. It’s worse. You have all of those hardened beliefs and insecurities to contend with. And those at the top? They like to stay there.

 

Her emotions have hairpin turns.

My Review:

 

A plethora of adjectives and adverbs came to mind as I raced through Britney King’s Her, but I have yet to find adequate words to encapsulate my thoughts. I am stunned and may be in shock as I’ve never read anything like this.   Her was deviously clever, brilliantly crafted, disturbing, surreal, unsettling, and simply riveting to say the least. It was frighteningly brilliant and kept me on edge, off-balance, and highly intrigued throughout. I could never get my footing with these intense and alluring sociopaths; I was smirking at their cleverly snarky observations and inner musings one minute and reeling from their heinously twisted plotting and rationalizations in the next. The ingeniously penned storylines were completely unpredictable and enthrallingly contrived, obviously dark magic had to have been invoked. At 85% in, my stomach and jaw both dropped and I couldn’t seem to get enough oxygen into my lungs. Britney King is a wickedly talented wordsmith and a cunning mastermind, and while I greatly admire her mad skills, I would definitely think twice about living in her neighborhood.

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Britney King lives in Austin, Texas with her husband, children, two dogs, one ridiculous cat, and a partridge in a pear tree.
When she’s not wrangling the things mentioned above, she writes psychological, domestic and romantic thrillers set in suburbia.
 
Currently, she’s writing three series and several standalone novels.
 
The Bedrock Series features an unlikely heroine who should have known better. Turns out, she didn’t. Thus she finds herself tangled in a messy, dangerous, forbidden love story and face-to-face with a madman hell-bent on revenge. The series has been compared to Fatal Attraction, Single White Female, and Basic Instinct.
 
The Water Series follows the shady love story of an unconventional married couple—he’s an assassin—she kills for fun. It has been compared to a crazier book version of Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Also, Dexter.
 
Around The Bend is a heart-pounding standalone, which traces the journey of a well-to-do suburban housewife, and her life as it unravels, thanks to the secrets she keeps. If she were the only one with things she wanted to keep hidden, then maybe it wouldn’t have turned out so bad. But she wasn’t.
The With You Series at its core is a deep love story about unlikely friends who travel the world; trying to find themselves, together and apart. Packed with drama and adventure along with a heavy dose of suspense, it has been compared to The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and Love, Rosie.
The Social Affair is an intense standalone about a timeless couple who find themselves with a secret admirer they hadn’t bargained for. For fans of the anti-heroine and stories told in unorthodox ways, the novel explores what can happen when privacy is traded for convenience. It is reminiscent of films such as One Hour Photo and Play Misty For Me. 
 
Without a doubt, connecting with readers is the best part of this gig. You can find Britney online here: 
Web• http://BritneyKing.com
Instagram • https://instagram.com/britneyking_ 
Facebook • https://www.facebook.com/BritneyKingAuthor
Twitter• http://twitter.com/BritneyKing_
Goodreads • http://bit.ly/BritneyKingGoodreads
 
To get more– grab two books for free, by subscribing to her mailing list at britneyking.com
Happy reading

 

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Book Review: Let Me Burn by Carrie Elks

Let Me Burn

(Angel Sands Book 1)

by Carrie Elks 

Amazon US / UK / Universal 

She isn’t looking for love. He’s not planning on staying around. But when they meet, sparks fly… 
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Lucas Russell lives for his job as a big city firefighter. But when he’s forced to take extended leave following an accident, he returns to his small hometown to stay at the beach cottage his grandparents left him. The problem is, he’s not used to having so much time on his hands.  After a broken engagement, Ember Kennedy isn’t ready for love right now. But she didn’t count on meeting a handsome firefighter with a dimpled smile. After Lucas saves her from one awkward situation too many, she can’t stop thinking about him.
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Ember finds Lucas impossible to resist, and he’s determined not to let her. As long summer days melt into sultry, passionate nights what begins as a fling develops into something much deeper. Until the day Ember’s ex-fiancé returns to town and threatens to destroy the fragile connection that’s building between them.

*This stand-alone romance is low on angst and big on feels. If you enjoy a heartwarming read that’s sweet with heat, Let Me Burn is for you*

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

“Hey, if life gives you lemons—” “Add a little tequila,”

 

“She’s beautiful and she’s funny but she’s fresh out of a relationship.” “How fresh?” “I’m not sure. A few months maybe.” “That’s not fresh… That’s rancid. She’s probably ready for another date.”

 

If he’d felt like the King of the World before, now he felt like he’d expanded his empire to include the rest of the galaxy… “I like you, Lucas Russell,” she whispered. “I like you a lot.” Forget the galaxy, he was king of the universe.

 

He’s gorgeous. And a natural with kids. I only have to look at him and my ovaries start to flutter.

 

My Review:

 

Lucas and Ember were the sweetest couple and easily fell into a fun, satisfying, considerate, sexy, and supportive relationship. Let Me Burn was a pleasant start to a promising new series and an enjoyable and welcome change from angsty stories with constant conflict and drama. The writing and storylines were engaging, well-paced, lively, easy to follow, and performed an excellent job of introducing the characters and establishing the foundation for subsequent installments. I am anxious to see who will be the focus of the next book as I am already curious about several of the characters.

About the Author

 Twitter – CarrieElks

Facebook – CarrieElksAuthor

Goodreads – 7266211.Carrie_Elks

Website – https://carrieelks.com

Carrie Elks writes contemporary romance with a sizzling edge. Her first book, Fix You, has been translated into eight languages and made a surprise appearance on Big Brother in Brazil. Luckily for her, it wasn’t voted out. Carrie lives with her husband, two lovely children and a larger-than-life black pug called Plato. When she isn’t writing or reading, she can be found baking, drinking an occasional (!) glass of wine, or chatting on social media.

Book Review: California Girls by Susan Mallery

 California Girls

by Susan Mallery

AmazonUS / UK / AU / CA B&N / iBooks

  • Hardcover: 432 pages
  • Publisher: MIRA; Original edition (February 26, 2019)

The California sunshine’s not quite so bright for three sisters who get dumped in the same week…

Finola, a popular LA morning show host, is famously upbeat until she’s blindsided on live TV by the news that her husband is sleeping with a young pop sensation who has set their affair to music. While avoiding the tabloids and pretending she’s just fine, she’s crumbling inside, desperate for him to come to his senses and for life to go back to normal.

Zennie’s breakup is no big loss. Although the world insists she pair up, she’d rather be surfing. So agreeing to be the surrogate for her best friend is a no-brainer—after all, she has an available womb and no other attachments to worry about. Except…when everyone else, including her big sister, thinks she’s making a huge mistake, being pregnant is a lot lonelier—and more complicated—than she imagined.

Never the tallest, thinnest or prettiest sister, Ali is used to being overlooked, but when her fiancé sends his disapproving brother to call off the wedding, it’s a new low. And yet Daniel continues to turn up “for support,” making Ali wonder if maybe—for once—someone sees her in a way no one ever has.

But side by side by side, these sisters will start over and rebuild their lives with all the affection, charm and laugh-out-loud humor that is classic Susan Mallery.

 

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Finola, we have models in the building. Tall, skinny, hungry models. They’re starting to look feral and turn on each other. I’m convinced it’s the smell of bacon.

 

… she alternated between trying to figure out a plan to win Nigel back and wondering if she could find a few anthrax spores to send him in the mail.

 

Finola told herself they weren’t deliberately cruel, they were just young and thoughtless. At least she hoped they were because otherwise the next generation was going to be a disappointment.

My Review:

 

I fell into this irresistible story and didn’t want to come back out. Susan Mallery has extraordinarily strong word voodoo. I was fully invested and right beside them or sitting in a corner watching as they bantered and argued. The storylines were deftly written and cleverly crafted with ample servings of levity and curiously addictive conundrums. Each character was uniquely compelling and so enticingly well drawn I could easily identify them in a police line-up. The mother was heinously shallow and possessed all the warmth and nurture of a rattlesnake and whose self-involvement was second only to her eldest daughter, Finola, who was a complete narcissist, although Finola had the wittiest quips of anyone. I adored Ali and Zennie, although my favorite character was the sweet and thoughtful Daniel and was totally besotted with him by the end of the book. Sigh, I want to clear off my TBR and only read Susan Mallery stories for the rest of my life.

About Susan Mallery

#1 NYT bestselling author Susan Mallery writes heartwarming, humorous novels about the relationships that define our lives-family, friendship, romance. She’s known for putting nuanced characters in emotional situations that surprise readers to laughter. Beloved by millions, her books have been translated into 28 languages.  Susan lives in Washington with her husband, two cats, and a small poodle with delusions of grandeur. Visit her at SusanMallery.com.

Connect with Susan

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

Book Review: What If (Small Town Big Love Series #1) by Kelly Collins

What If 

(Small Town Big Love Series #1)

by Kelly Collins 

Amazon US / UK / AU / CA 

She’s a town icon. He’s all business. Will their rivalry bring ruin or romance?  Graphic artist Lucy Shoemaker has never known a life outside of Blackwood. And she’s determined to show the world why she loves her quaint Colorado hometown. But when a billionaire arrives looking to sell the land, Lucy feels both outrage and an irrepressible attraction…

John Blackwood usually gets what he wants. He never expected that selling the Podunk town would send him directly into a firecracker of a local. John knows that Lucy won’t stop causing him problems…but is that why he can’t get her off his mind?

With compromise off the table, will John and Lucy’s passion disappear along with Blackwood or can they discover love’s common ground?

What If… is a standalone contemporary romance with sizzling chemistry. If you like headstrong heroines, small-town drama, and a fresh twist on billionaire boyfriends, then you’ll adore Kelly Collins’ sassy saga.

Buy What If… to negotiate romance today! 

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

If sin had a look, he’d be the model.

 

All her life she’d tried to shove a hundred-pound dream into a ten-pound bag and it never worked.

 

She thought that whoever had designed the bra should be given an award equivalent to the Nobel Peace Prize. Anything that could make a pair of ordinary breasts extraordinary deserved recognition. A Grammy? An Oscar? A mammogrammy? The booby prize, she thought with a giggle.

 

The dark room was lit by beer signs and the bright eyes of jealous women.

 

“Are they hoping money will just fall off you?” She laughed, imagining people following him with cups, hoping for his pockets to empty into them.

My Review:

 

I always seem to start a new series with an equal measure of hopeful anticipation and trepidation. Will it be too similar, too different, too complicated, or too familiar? Silly me, I should know better by now when it comes to Kelly Collins. Although, the style and tone of What If seemed considerably different from her usual and the main characters were a bit of a challenge for me to warm up to, especial Lucy. Lucy had a difficult personality; she was a childishly impulsive drama llama who was flippant, hot-tempered, testy, and obstinately resistant to change. I did enjoy her feisty sass and smart mouth –  takes one to know one. 😉

I also initially had doubts about John, the wealthy and sex on legs Lamborghini driving lothario, who currently holds the lofty position of my current BBF. I was afraid he was playing Lucy to influence her into moving out of her home and business space without fuss to allow his family to sell their holding without issue, and he kind of was and kind of wasn’t. Of course, Lucy’s heated tantrums and behavioral outbursts led to increasingly hotter exchanges and sheet-scorching sensual encounters. The storylines were original, easy to follow, and held my interest despite a considerable amount of conflict and the pervasive angsty uncertainty about the vexing issue of Lucy’s future living situation.

ABOUT KELLY COLLINS   

Kelly Collins writes with the intention of keeping the love alive.

Always a romantic, she is inspired by real-time events mixed with a dose of fiction. She encourages her readers to reach the happily ever after but bask in the afterglow of the perfectly imperfect love.

Kelly lives in Colorado with her husband of twenty-five years. She loves hockey, shiny objects and has a new-found appreciation for green smoothies.

Book Review: Hottie Lumberjack by Tawna Fenske

Hottie Lumberjack 

 by Tawna Fenske

Available from these stores:

AmazonAppleBarnes & NobleKoboThaliaBol.deAngus & RobertsonMondadori Store

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When Mark Bracelyn lumbers into Chelsea Singer’s cupcake shop with an axe, she’s poised to hit the panic button. But he fixes her door, praises her buttercream, and sends her skittish heart pounding like a hammer on a hollow log, so he can’t be all that scary. Chelsea’s sure there’s a gooey marshmallow center under Mark’s tough outer shell, though admittedly she’s been wrong before.

Mark may look like a grungy lumberjack, but he’s also the wealthy part-owner of Ponderosa Luxury Ranch Resort. The lone Bracelyn heir to avoid a childhood of fancy boarding schools, he stays hidden behind the scruffy beard and battered truck. But something else separates Mark from his siblings, and keeping his guard up means keeping his secret—and his family.

When someone threatens Chelsea and her daughter, Mark becomes their personal protector. When he’s not watching her back, he’s watching the rest of Chelsea’s body and warning himself not to touch. With danger mounting, they bond over phallic cupcakes and bizarre bunny behavior, while Mark battles his surging attraction. Can a sweet-toothed mountain man and a cautious single mom escape their histories, or will their hearts land on the chopping block?

 

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

For some reason I just assumed he has a dog. He looks like the sort of guy who’d have a Rottweiler or maybe a blue ox named Babe.

 

“Neutered?” Libby scrunches up her nose and studies the other end of the rabbit. “That’s where they cut off his boy parts to make him behave better,” Mrs. Percy offers helpfully. “To make him a nice boy.” Chelsea tries unsuccessfully to stifle a laugh while Libby turns her attention to me. “Did it hurt?” “Did what hurt?” “You brought us donuts, so you’re nice,” she says. “Did it hurt when they cut off your boy parts?”

 

Libby cocks her head at me. “How are babies made?” Uh-oh. “Um—” “Libby.” Chelsea pulls it together and musters up a stern tone. “You know the answer to this. We have that book, How Babies Are Made.” “Well yeah, but I wanted to see if he knows.” Libby studies me like a schoolteacher issuing a quiz.

 

Dating a Bracelyn is like riding on the luggage carousel at the airport. It’s exciting and fun and makes you feel like you’re getting away with something insanely cool. But there’s a helluva lot of baggage there.

 

My Review:

 

Hottie Lumberjack was good fun and an irreverently amusing Romantic Comedy, which was considerably better than the cheesy title would lead you to expect. I always enjoy Tawna Fenske’s clever wit and breezy writing style, but I revel in her delightfully titillating, smirk-worthy, and bawdy sense of humor. The premise was entertaining and intriguing, the characters were lovably quirky and endearing, and the writing was well balanced with levity, sizzling sensuality, and engaging storylines.

 

Mark wasn’t a lumberjack but like the old commercial, he could have played one on TV. He was huge in size although underneath all that flannel was a total marshmallow and tenderhearted mama’s boy with significant issues and insecurities regarding his identity. He may have appeared roughly hewn and was an avid fan of profanity and conversed with a terse manner of speaking, although his inner musings reflected a sharp wit and thoughtful observations. I have always enjoyed Ms. Fenske’s amusingly idiosyncratic characters although I was fully infatuated with Mark as well as his sweet cupcake baker Chelsea – an independent and hard-working single mom to an adorable and outspoken six-year-old.   Chelsea’s delicious and unique cupcakes may have been the lure that snagged Mark’s attention first, but it didn’t take long until the sweet aftereffects migrated from his stomach to his brain, permeating his every thought, before finally making way to his massive chest to ensnare his enormous heart. But be warned – this delicious tale was a colossal challenge to my diet.

 

About the Author    

Website 

Amazon

Goodreads

When Tawna Fenske finished her English lit degree at 22, she celebrated by filling a giant trash bag full of romance novels and dragging it everywhere until she’d read them all. Now she’s a RITA-nominated, USA Today bestselling author who writes humorous fiction, risqué romance, and heartwarming love stories with a quirky twist. Publishers Weekly has praised Tawna’s offbeat romances with multiple starred reviews and noted, “There’s something wonderfully relaxing about being immersed in a story filled with over-the-top characters in undeniably relatable situations. Heartache and humor go hand in hand.”

Tawna lives in Bend, Oregon, with her husband, stepkids, and a menagerie of ill-behaved pets. She loves hiking, snowshoeing, standup paddleboarding, and inventing excuses to sip wine on her back porch. She can peel a banana with her toes and loses an average of twenty pairs of eyeglasses per year. To find out more about Tawna and her books, visit www.tawnafenske.com.

Book Review: THE LOST GIRLS OF PARIS by Pam Jenoff

 

 THE LOST GIRLS OF PARIS

by Pam Jenoff

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Amazon US / UK / AU / CA | B&N | iBooks

Paperback: 384 pages

Publisher: Park Row; Original edition (January 29, 2019)

From the author of the runaway bestseller The Orphan’s Tale comes a remarkable story of friendship and courage centered around three women and a ring of female secret agents during World War II.

1946, Manhattan

One morning while passing through Grand Central Terminal on her way to work, Grace Healey finds an abandoned suitcase tucked beneath a bench. Unable to resist her own curiosity, Grace opens the suitcase, where she discovers a dozen photographs—each of a different woman. In a moment of impulse, Grace takes the photographs and quickly leaves the station.

Grace soon learns that the suitcase belonged to a woman named Eleanor Trigg, leader of a network of female secret agents who were deployed out of London during the war. Twelve of these women were sent to Occupied Europe as couriers and radio operators to aid the resistance, but they never returned home, their fates a mystery. Setting out to learn the truth behind the women in the photographs, Grace finds herself drawn to a young mother turned agent named Marie, whose daring mission overseas reveals a remarkable story of friendship, valor and betrayal.

Vividly rendered and inspired by true events, New York Times bestselling author Pam Jenoff shines a light on the incredible heroics of the brave women of the war and weaves a mesmerizing tale of courage, sisterhood and the great strength of women to survive in the hardest of circumstances.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Professor Digglesby walked back into the workshop and returned with what appeared to be feces. “We plant detonators in the least likely of places,” he added. The girls squealed with disgust. “Also fake,” he muttered good-naturedly. “Holy shit!” Josie said.

 

Eleanor produced a necklace with a silver bird charm and held it out. Marie was surprised. But it was not a gift; Eleanor twisted the necklace and it unscrewed to reveal a cyanide capsule. “The final friend,” Eleanor declared.

 

Grace imagined herself at seventeen— she had been concerned with coming-out parties and summers at the beach. She could not have navigated her way across Manhattan at that point. Yet these girls were on their own in France battling the Nazis. Grace was overcome with awe and inadequacy at the same time.

 

My Review:

 

This was my first experience reading the talented Pam Jenoff and I became an instant and ardent fan. She has mad skills. I was quickly immersed in her tale and so fully invested and simpatico with her characters that I found myself flinching when one was injured. I seldom read historical fiction, as I don’t enjoy being reminded of the ignorant and concerted behaviors that oppressed women for centuries, although I will readily consider the genre when strong female trailblazers are featured. I cannot resist a kick-ass heroine! Such was the case with The Lost Girls of Paris, which featured everyday women who were recruited by for a specialized project within a little known agency of the British government during WWII, the SEO. I had never heard of this branch before but it was an actual section during Churchill. After significant failures and heavy losses of male agents, Eleanor, the secretary to the SEO Director, convinced her boss to employ female agents instead, an idea that was not well received by the Neanderthals of the day but was put into place under Eleanor’s exacting eye. The women weren’t spies and were resented and dismissively scoffed upon by MI6 and the British military, although once in place, the female’s contributions were soon heavily relied upon and invaluable, until through no fault of their own, something went amiss.

 

The compelling and well-crafted storylines were fictional although well researched, impeccably detailed, and featured three strong and admirably tenacious women across three timelines but only one of which, Marie, had been an actual operative and Eleanor her feared and revered supervisor/mentor. Marie’s story was the most poignant and perilous, and I often found myself taut with tension with my shoulders in my ears while I read. Grace came into the story shortly after the war when she stumbled upon Eleanor’s abandoned suitcase in New York’s Grand Central station with no awareness of what she had found until much later. Grace seemed to have sticky fingers, as she pocketed not only a set of photos before replacing the bag where she had found it, she also pilfered something else later on in the story. Grace had moxie and her own set of skills beyond typing.   It was Grace’s insatiable curiosity that led her to uncover the intriguing tale of Eleanor, the SEO, Marie, and the other women’s poignant tales of heroism and sacrifice, as well as the ultimate betrayal that led to their demise. But who had compromised their mission? The answer was heartbreaking, the premise was ingenious, and the writing was transcendent.

 

About Pam Jenoff

Pam Jenoff is the author of several novels, including the international bestseller The Kommandant’s Girl, which also earned her a Quill Award nomination. Pam lives with her husband and three children near Philadelphia where, in addition to writing, she teaches law school.

Connect with Pam

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

 

Book Review: Fall (Montgomery Men #3) by C.A. Harms

Fall

(Montgomery Men #3)

by C.A. Harms

Amazon US UK / AU / CA 

Knoxville Montgomery liked things his way. He kept everything simple and he was always in control. That is until a head-strong blonde stumbled into his life and changed everything. She became a challenge he refused to walk away from.

It didn’t matter how much Knoxville tried, Tinley would not give into him. She couldn’t. On the outside, she appeared to be resilient and untouchable, but her reality was a much different story.

But Knoxville would not give up. Little by little, he started to tear down her walls, and at that moment, Tinley knew. Even though she fought it with every, single fiber in her body, their outcome was fated.

She would Fall…
And all she could do now was hope he’d be willing to catch her.

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Lexington Russell is my brother’s secretary, best friend to Kinsley and Shanelle, and the biggest fan of the Montgomery men. The last part was no fucking joke. Lex loved us, as in loved to get us riled up, flustered, and half-naked. Again, no fucking joke. The guy was a menace.

 

“I can assure you, I am not pleasant company… I’m moody and cranky at least eighty -two percent of the day.” “How about the remaining eighteen?” “I’m asleep.”

 

“Fancy to me is using real silverware instead of plastic.” The sad part is, I wasn’t joking.

 

“I don’t need you to set us up, because I’m confident I can do that on my own. I’m pretty terrific after all. I just need a chance to get him alone.” I suddenly feel a little bad for Greg. “I know a homosexual man when I see one, and he is in fact into men. If I have things my way, he’ll be into me.” Lexington wags his brows suggestively, as if I didn’t already catch on to his little innuendo.

 

My Review:

 

I was unfamiliar with the Montgomery Men series but that didn’t seem to matter as I had no problem comprehending the story, although after reading this installment I am more than eager to pick up the first two as I am already enamored with the entire family and am quite certain I would enjoy the earlier books as much as I did Knox’s story in Fall. Knox was a sweet treat, a sexy, fiercely protective, and thoughtful man who seemed to have the patience of a saint. He was magnetically attracted to lovely Tinley, who didn’t put of encouraging vibes, at all. Tinley had shut herself down following a traumatic attack the previous year and was a difficult and prickly pear to even converse with. Knox enjoyed the challenge as much as her snark and barbs, and gradually won her over one inch at a time. The writing was full of sizzle and sassy humor while the storylines were engaging, easy to follow, interesting, well-paced, and cast with highly appealing and well-matched characters. C.A. Harms has been a recent discovery for me starting with her Oh Tequila series, but I have greatly enjoyed each and every one of books I that I have had the pleasure to peruse.

About The Author 

I am an Illinois girl, born and raised. Simple and true. I love the little things; they truly mean the most. I may have a slight addiction to my new Keurig—oh my, that thing is a godsend. And so fast too. I have two children who truly are the greatest part of my days, and their faces never fail to put a smile on my face. I have been married to my best friend for seventeen years, and looking forward to many more.

I am one of those authors that adore my readers. I love to hear from you. After all, it is because of each one of you that I continue to write.

FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/AuthorCAHarms/
INSTAGRAM: Instagram.com/authorcaharms/
NEWSLETTER: http://bit.ly/1xsgHCS
AMAZON: http://www.amazon.com/C.A.-Harms/e/B0…

Book Review, Giveaway: It Started With A Note by Victoria Cooke

It Started With A Note

by Victoria Cooke

Amazon US / UK / CA / AU 

 B&NKobo

 

One lost letter. A chance to change her life!

Superhero single mum Cath always puts other people first. But now that she’s seen her son safely off to university (phew!), life seems a little, well…empty.

So when Cath unexpectedly discovers some letters written by her great-grandfather during the First World War, she decides to take herself on an adventure to France to retrace his footsteps.

Cath expects to spend her holiday visiting famous battlefields and testing out her French phrase book. What she doesn’t anticipate is that her tour guide, the handsome Olivier, will be quite so charming! Soon Cath isn’t simply unearthing the stories of the past – she’s writing a brand new one of her own, which might end up taking her in a very unexpected direction…

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

I never swear. Ever. But if I did, Hells Angels would blush at the words I’d choose right now.

 

I’d let him move in about six months ago while he got himself back on his feet, but so far he’s not displayed any signs of getting a job and moving out, and he only uses his feet to walk to the pub.

 

My comfy nude-coloured pants are from a multipack from the clothing department at work and the mismatched bra is a plain black jersey style. It isn’t even underwired. I could be a poster girl for ‘Agent Preventer’, the lesser-known underwear-brand-slash-birth-control guaranteed to put off even the most amorous of men.

 

We each get one chance at life, and if this vast number of gravestones represents something it’s how precious life is.

 

It’s like flying ant day in my stomach.

 

Being together is like pain relief, so, I suppose we need to see one another for medicinal purposes.

 

My Review:

 

It Started With a Note was a pleasantly entertaining and engaging read that hit all the feels from amusing humor to sweet romance and on to poignant and respectful remembrances that stung my eyes and put hot rocks in my throat more than once. I adored the character and become more than a bit besotted with Olivier, he was such a sweet and thoughtful man. I want one just like him and seem to be experiencing an intense urge to wander the French countryside and stalk tour coaches in search of a hot travel guide. I was totally cheated by my last excursion, as the guide I was assigned appeared better suited for Harry Potter’s Diagon Alley, and I don’t mean that in a complimentary way. I scooped two new addition to my Brit Word List with overegging – to overdo or exaggerate; and a bit of a doss – which is slang for an easy piece of work or convenient place to sleep.

Author Bio 

Victoria Cooke grew up in the city of Manchester before crossing the Pennines in pursuit of her career in education. She now lives in Huddersfield with her husband and two young daughters and when she’s not at home writing by the fire with a cup of coffee in her hand, she loves working out in the gym and traveling. Victoria was first published at the tender age of eight by her classroom teacher who saw potential in a six-page story about an invisible man. Since then she’s always had a passion for reading and writing, undertaking several writers’ courses before completing her first romantic comedy novel, ‘The Secret to Falling in Love,’ in 2016.

Cooke’s third novel, Who Needs Men Anyway? became a digital bestseller in 2018.

Social Media Links 

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16345710.Victoria_Cooke

https://www.facebook.com/VictoriaCookeAuthor/

https://twitter.com/VictoriaCooke10

https://www.instagram.com/victoriacookewriter/

Giveaway 

 Win a Signed copy of It Started With A Note

 (UK Only)

*Terms and Conditions –UK entries welcome. Please enter using the Rafflecopter box below. The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then Rachel’s Random Resources reserves the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will be passed to the giveaway organizer and used only for the fulfillment of the prize, after which time Rachel’s Random Resources will delete the data. I am not responsible for dispatch or delivery of the prize.

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Book Review: Once a Liar by A.F. Brady

Once a Liar

by A.F. Brady

Amazon | B-A-M | B & N

Paperback: 384 pages

Publisher: Park Row; Original edition (January 29, 2019)

 

In this electrifying psychological thriller, a high-powered sociopath meets his reckoning when he’s accused of the brutal murder of his mistress.

Did he kill Charlie Doyle? And if he didn’t…who did?

Peter Caine, a cutthroat Manhattan defense attorney, worked ruthlessly to become the best at his job. On the surface, he is charming and handsome, but inside he is cold and heartless. He fights without remorse to acquit murderers, pedophiles and rapists.

When Charlie Doyle, the daughter of the Manhattan DA—and Peter’s former lover—is murdered, Peter’s world is quickly sent into a tailspin. He becomes the prime suspect as the DA, a professional enemy of Peter’s, embarks on a witch hunt to avenge his daughter’s death, stopping at nothing to ensure Peter is found guilty of the murder.

In the challenge of his career and his life, Peter races against the clock to prove his innocence. As the evidence mounts against him, he’s forced to begin unraveling his own dark web of lies and confront the sins of his past. But the truth of who killed Charlie Doyle is more twisted and sinister than anyone could have imagined…

“A.F. Brady delivers a knockout sophomore effort. Peter Caine has a very Patrick Bateman air about him, and the whole story sizzles with sinister madness and incessant tension right to the last page. Not to be missed.” —J.T. Ellison, NYT Bestselling author of Tear Me Apart

“A smart, nuanced and spine-chilling portrayal of a sociopath walking among us… Brady’s depth of knowledge and skillful hand make us root for him in spite of everything he may—or may not—have done. Once a Liar is a thriller you won’t soon forget.” —Wendy Walker, bestselling author of All Is Not Forgotten

“Brady is a master of intense characters and riveting storylines.” —Kaira Rouda, bestselling author of Best Day Ever and The Favorite Daughter

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Claire has been living in my house for eight years, but I still can’t fully acclimate to cohabitating with another human being with her own will and own needs… I still stumble over her things, crash into her when she stands between me and my destination and I can never remember how she takes her coffee.

 

I realize that I am lying to myself as much as I’m lying to everyone else. I’m not in control, and I see now that I never have been. I’ve just lied so much that I believe myself.

 

“You, sir—” he leans forward and bores a hole in my face with his penetrating eyes “— have a monster inside of you. The only question is, can you keep it contained? That is up to you and you alone.”

 

My Review:

 

I was enthralled by this deviously clever tale of Peter Caine, a highly successful and brilliant criminal defense attorney who had become as contemptible and loathsome as the wealthy yet repulsive criminals he represented. Peter didn’t start out that way but had become morally bankrupt, a prolific liar, a social fraud, a manipulative and narcissistic sociopath, and an atrocious human being. He had callously abandoned his child and avoided having any type of relationship with him, seeing his mere existence as a nuisance until deciding that taking custody of his motherless child would be good for his image. He put on a performance when required in public but he had long ago buried his emotional self and selfishly found human interactions to be an arduous waste of his energy. But was he a murderer?   I couldn’t decide, but I really didn’t think so as he seemed too arrogant and emotionally lazy to have committed such a passionate act, although… he might well have if he felt his well-crafted persona was threatened.

 

Peter was despicable and I despised him, deeply; yet the wily wordsmith known as A. F. Brady wove such a beguiling tale I was incapable of putting my Kindle down. Her word voodoo was far too strong. I was captivated, too invested, hopelessly intrigued, and deeply engrossed. I couldn’t tear myself away from this cunningly contrived story and read it in a day. The storylines were adroitly plotted, insidiously sly, and quickly sucked me into the vile vortex of Peter’s inner musings. I don’t believe I even took a full breath until the last page.   It was wicked good!

About A. F. Brady

A.F. Brady is a New York State Licensed Mental Health Counselor/Psychotherapist. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Brown University and two Masters degrees in Psychological Counseling from Columbia University. She is a life-long New Yorker and resides in Manhattan with her husband and their family.

Connect with A. F.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram

Book Review: It Never Goes Away (Brighton’s No.1 Private Detective #3) by Tom Trott

It Never Goes Away

  (Brighton’s No.1 Private Detective #3)

by Tom Trott

Amazon US / UK / CA / AU 

From No.1 Private Detective to No.1 Suspect

A cryptic message from an old friend leads Joe Grabarz to an abandoned farmhouse in the middle of the South Downs. But Joe is too late, someone else has got there first: his friend is dead, and all the evidence points to him.

Ten years ago the farmhouse was the scene of three infamous murders when a young boy killed his mother, father, and little sister. Now an adult, he was released from prison with a new identity. Could he be involved? The farmhouse also sits on valuable land, fought over in a struggle between building houses and drilling for shale gas. But could it really be worth killing for? Whatever is going on, Joe knows one thing for sure: his friend’s murder is just a tiny part of it.

To bring the killer to justice Joe must dig up the past, and reckon with his own, because no matter how hard you work, it never goes away.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

He had a strong nose with a bridge that could support haulage, a jaw that could grind stones, and a face that rested in a scowl.

 

He didn’t reply for a couple of minutes, going over the story in his head, different wrinkles twitching as though his face was being prickled with electricity.

 

That look could boil an egg.

 

We’re not all carnivores… not all the time. It’s the lifecycle of a lawyer, Mr Grabarz: you start out with morals, then pretty soon you have to pay your rent so you sell them, then before you know it you’ve got a Mercedes on the drive and you desperately try to buy them back.

 

She had a mass of curly red hair that spilled out in all directions, and wore a purple one of those fashionable but comfy Scandinavian jumpers under a blue Anorak. In the middle of it all sat the sort of face that instantly inspires friendly feelings. They should make her as a cuddly doll for children who can’t sleep.

My Review:

 

It Never Goes Away picked up three years after the end of the last book and Joe had been quite prosperous in between as he was enjoying a nicer apartment, better wardrobe with Italian leather shoes, a nice new office with associates, and was driving a Jag. He feared he had gotten soft, and too bad for him, this tale was none stop danger and high activity with car chases and crashes and running for his life from violent criminals while also dodging the police. The story has as many twists and turns as a nest of snakes and was as complicated as the highly compelling characters of Joe and his arch nemesis, Max. I will admit to falling into a fuzzy state of confusion more than once, but I’d follow the enigmatic Joe through a blizzard as he is like my mailman – he may occasionally be late but he always delivers.

 

New additions to my Brit word list include prang – which is British informal for a car crash; and near the knuckle – a risqué joke, typically about sex and likely to offend. Mr. Google was unable to help me with the idiom of a man being “far too wet” but I am assuming it means wimpy. But you know what usually happens when I ass/u/me…

Author Bio 

 Born in Brighton, I went to school in here, worked many jobs here, and have never lived anywhere else. I first started writing at school, where I and a group of friends devised and performed comedy plays for assemblies, much to the amusement of our fellow pupils. The young ones would cheer (and the old ones would groan) as we stepped up onto the stage, the buzz was tangible. It has been with me ever since.

As an adult I have written a short comedy play that was performed at the Theatre Royal Brighton in May 2014 as part of the Brighton Festival; Daye’s Work, a television pilot for the local Brighton channel; and won the Empire Award (thriller category) in the 2015 New York Screenplay Contest. I published my first novel, You Can’t Make Old Friends, in 2016; my second, Choose Your Parents Wisely, in 2017, my third, The Benevolent Dictator, in 2018, and now my fourth, It Never Goes Away, in 2019. When I’m not writing books, I’m writing about writing, books, and film on Medium.

My inspirations as a writer come from a diverse range of storytellers, but I have a particular love for the works of Raymond Chandler, Agatha Christie, Joel & Ethan Coen, Arthur Conan-Doyle, Daphne du Maurier, Alfred Hitchcock, Bryan Fuller, Ira Levin, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Towne, JRR Tolkien, and many many more books and films beside. If you can’t find me, or I’m not answering my phone, I’m probably at the cinema.

Social Media Links 

 www.twitter.com/tjtrott

www.facebook.com/tomtrottbooks

www.tomtrott.com