Book Review: Dream With Me (With Me in Seattle #13) by Kristen Proby

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Dream With Me by Kristen Proby

Release Date: January 21, 2020

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Dream With Me, an all-new standalone contemporary romance in the beloved With Me In Seattle Series by New York Times Bestselling Author Kristen Proby.

Kane O’Callaghan knows what it is to have his work shown all over the world. His pieces are on display in palaces and museums, including the O’Callaghan Museum of Glass just outside of his beloved hometown of Seattle. Kane is a bit of a recluse, spending time on his farm alone and committed to his art. His life is full.

Until the day he meets her.

Wandering through museums is Anastasia Montgomery’s favorite way to spend her time. Not only does art feed her soul, but it inspires her own art of designing wedding cakes. When her muse seems to be gone, she finds her again among the beauty in the museums of Seattle, and the O’Callaghan Museum of Glass is her favorite. She’s never met the artist, but he must be absolutely brilliant, if he can make such beautiful things out of glass.

Bumping into a grumpy stranger at the museum wasn’t in Anastasia’s plan. And then discovering it was Kane himself was absolutely humiliating.

But when she sees him again at a charity fundraiser, and ends up spending an incredible, unforgettable night with the mysterious glass smith, Anastasia finds herself thinking of Kane and little else, even her precious work. Will this relationship bloom into the romance of a lifetime, or will their dreams of success get in the way of true love?

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Download your copy today!

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My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

I’m not a fan of people, especially when they’re all in one place. That place being wherever I am. I bought my land away from civilization for a reason.

 

How could I explain to her that the minute my eyes fell upon her in the museum, it was like recognizing a part of me I didn’t know was missing? I knew her, right then and there. It was a kind of knowing that I can’t explain, nothing I’ve ever felt before, but my grandda used to tell me it was the same way for him when he saw my grandmother.

 

“Oh, now you want to act like a doctor. Earlier, you refused to put my shoulder back in place so I could just go out for lunch with you guys.” “I’m a freaking veterinarian,” she says with an exasperated laugh.

 

My Review:

 

Oh, swoon! This lovely couple was adorable, I would trade all the beautiful shoes and purses in my closet to be treated and treasured the way Kane did Stasia. I’ve only recently discovered the delightful storytelling of Kristen Proby but I was a quick convert and remain enamored and besotted with her sweet and sexy style.   The characters were endearing, the storylines were entertaining and engaging, and the writing was cleverly amusing and insightfully observant.   Sigh, to sum it up in one word – perfection.

 

 

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Excerpt:

Okay, so the man has moves. It shouldn’t surprise me that someone who creates such amazing works of art can also lead a girl around the dance floor. With one palm firmly planted on my lower back, and the other clutching my hand, Kane keeps his eyes on mine.

“You’re a good dancer,” I murmur.

“You’re nervous,” he replies softly. “There’s no need to be. It’s just a dance.”

I take a deep breath and offer him a smile. He’s right. It’s just a dance.

The fact that he’s maybe the hottest man I’ve ever seen is a huge bonus.

And if he can move like this, with all of our clothes on, I can only imagine what it could be like if we were naked.

Mercy.

“I never got your name,” he says and guides me closer to him so we can talk into each other’s ears. I glance around the room, seeing my sister and the other girls smiling at us, watching us dance.

“Anastasia,” I say and turn my head, not quite planting my nose against his neck. The smell of this man is going to kill me.

And not because it triggers my asthma.

Because it’s too sexy.

I watch the pulse in his neck and enjoy the feeling of his strong arms holding me.

“That’s a lovely name.” The accent is thicker in his voice now. Irish? I’m not good with accents, but I’d bet he’s Irish.

His last name might be an indicator.

“Thank you.”

The song ends and flows into another ballad. Adele sings about finding another lover, as Kane moves against me, with me.

I wonder if it looks as sexy as it feels.

“You said yesterday,” he whispers against my ear, “that you’d be using your sketch for something else. What will that something be?”

“A cake.”

He pulls back far enough to smile down at me in surprise. “A cake, is it?”

I nod, more comfortable talking about what I do for a living than just dancing in silence.

“I design and build wedding cakes for a living. I can do them for other occasions, as well, but wedding cakes are what I’m known for.”

“Interesting.”

“I have a client who came into my shop about a month ago to hire me. They didn’t give me any direction at all. No colors, no requests. It just has to feed about two hundred guests.” I shake my head in disgust. “Not that I want them to tell me to copy a photo. I won’t do that, but usually, they have colors they like or flowers in mind. Something. Not these two. When I need inspiration, I like to look at what others have created. Or have conversations with people I enjoy.”

“That makes sense,” he says and leans in to kiss my forehead, which sends a shiver right down my spine to my lady parts—which had already sat up and taken notice of Kane.

“What was that for?” I ask.

“An apology,” he replies. “For being difficult yesterday.”

“Apology accepted.”

His lips quirk into that half-smile, his green eyes shining. The song is almost over, and I know I should thank him for the dance and find Lia and the others.

“Thanks for the dance.”

The last note plays, and I pull back, immediately wishing I was back in his arms.

He’s a stranger, and it’s crazy, but it’s true.

“Do you belong to a man, Anastasia?” Kane brushes his knuckles down the side of my cheek.

I frown. “I’ll never belong to anyone.”

“You know what I mean. Are you taken?”

“I’m single if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Good.” He kisses the back of my hand.

About Kristen:

Kristen was born and raised in a small resort town in her beloved Montana. In her mid-twenties, she decided to stretch her wings and move to the Pacific Northwest, where she made her home for more than a dozen years.

During that time, Kristen wrote many romance novels and joined organizations such as RWA and other small writing groups. She spent countless hours in workshops and more mornings than she can count up before dawn so she could write before going to work. She submitted many manuscripts to agents and editors alike but was always told no. In the summer of 2012, the self-publishing scene was new and thriving, and Kristen had one goal: to publish just one book. It was something she longed to cross off of her bucket list.

Not only did she publish one book, she’s since published close to thirty titles, many of which have hit the USA Today, New York Times and Wall Street Journal Bestsellers lists. She continues to self publish, best known for her With Me In Seattle and Boudreaux series, and is also proud to work with William Morrow, a division of HarperCollins, with the Fusion Series.

Kristen and her husband, John, make their home in her hometown of Whitefish, Montana with their two pugs and two cats.

Connect with Kristen:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BooksByKristenProby/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Handbagjunkie
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kristenproby/
BookBub: https://www.bookbub.com/authors/kristen-proby
Goodreads: http://bit.ly/2kBRdpj
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Pinterest: @handbagjunkie
Website: https://www.kristenprobyauthor.com/
Newsletter: https://mailchi.mp/kristenproby/newsletter-sign-up

Book Review: Cross Her Heart by Sarah Pinborough

Cross Her Heart
by Sarah Pinborough

AmazonUS / UK / CA / AU /

B&N / HarperCollins

 

 Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks; Reprint edition (January 14, 2020)

“Sarah Pinborough is about to become your new obsession.”—Harlan Coben

Lisa is living a lie and everyone is about to find out.

Lisa lives for her daughter Ava, her job and her best friend Marilyn.

But when a handsome client shows an interest in her, Lisa starts daydreaming about sharing her life with him, too. Maybe she’s ready now. Maybe she can trust again. Maybe it’s time to let her terrifying secret past go.

But when her daughter rescues a boy from drowning and their pictures are all over the news for everyone to see, Lisa’s world explodes.

As she finds everything she has built threatened, and not knowing who she can trust, it’s up to Lisa to face her past in order to save what she holds dear.

But someone has been pulling all their strings. And that someone is determined that both Lisa and Ava must suffer.

Because long ago Lisa broke a promise. And some promises aren’t meant to be broken.

My Rating:


Favorite Quotes:

 

I said yes because I wanted to. Because I’m lonely… being near him is like peeling back layers of delicate crepe paper wrapped around a treasure you’ve packed away somewhere to keep safe and forgotten about.

His eyes are full of quiet interrogation. Marriage, divorce… other boyfriends – all the information men are interested in. Things that boil down a woman’s relevance in relation to other men, rather than anything in and of themselves. The inside information comes later. Those talks are for the middle of the night, heads on pillows, faces only outlines in the darkness. That’s when people surrender their weapons to each other and hope they don’t end up stabbed in the night by them in the future.

This is the other thing she’s learned over time.   The secret is her own. It’s her burden and sharing it doesn’t lighten the load it simply doubles it… You can’t trust a drunk, she knows that too.

My Review:

This was a darkly intriguing, tragically twisted, and disturbingly realistic tale, which was cast with a full slate of unlikable and contemptible characters. There wasn’t one admirable person in the lot while the vast majority were quite vile and committed heinous acts that had me flinching and cringing and wanting to swear the most wicked expletives I know, and maybe even create a few more for good measure. 

The storylines were cunningly crafted, shrewdly paced, and deftly written from multiple POVs that kept the little pea rattling in my cranium on fire with constantly evolving theories and hypothesis, I fear the little legume will forever bear scorch marks.

Sarah Pinborough is obviously an evil genius, and someone her neighbors should seriously take heed to respectfully and quietly tip-toe around and should never even consider disturbing or knocking on her door without having armloads of tasty treats and posh bribes in hand.

I was provided with a review copy of this diabolically clever tale by HarperCollins and TLC Book Tours.

About the Author

Sarah Pinborough is the number one Sunday Times and New York Times bestselling author of the psychological thriller Behind Her Eyes, and more than twenty other novels and novellas, including The Death House and a young adult thriller, 13 Minutes. She has also written for the BBC. She lives in England.

Find out more about Sarah at her website, and connect with her on Twitter and Instagram.

Book Review: Kill Sleep Repeat by Britney King

Title: Kill Sleep Repeat
Author: Britney King
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Release Date: January 16, 2020

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𝙁𝙧𝙤𝙢 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙗𝙚𝙨𝙩𝙨𝙚𝙡𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙖𝙪𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙧 𝙤𝙛 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙎𝙤𝙘𝙞𝙖𝙡 𝘼𝙛𝙛𝙖𝙞𝙧 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙃𝙀𝙍 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙨 𝙖𝙣 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙙𝙚𝙖𝙙𝙡𝙮 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙫𝙤𝙘𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙞𝙡𝙡𝙚𝙧, 𝙬𝙝𝙞𝙘𝙝 𝙛𝙤𝙡𝙡𝙤𝙬𝙨 𝙖 𝙬𝙤𝙢𝙖𝙣 𝙬𝙝𝙤, 𝙞𝙣 𝙖 𝙛𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙨𝙪𝙧𝙫𝙞𝙫𝙖𝙡, 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙡𝙞𝙯𝙚𝙨 𝙝𝙚𝙧 𝙟𝙤𝙗, 𝙢𝙖𝙮 𝙘𝙤𝙨𝙩 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙣 𝙞𝙩 𝙥𝙖𝙮𝙨.

 

 
Several times a week, Charlotte Jones leaves suburbia behind and boards a chartered flight to parts unknown, where she wraps her hands around the necks of marks for just as long as she has to.
 
Then she goes back to domestic life with a paycheck, defense wounds, and the sense that she can handle anything.
 
Which is good, because being a wife, mother, and sociopath, with an insatiable taste for murder, gives the term work-life balance new meaning. When one life unexpectedly bleeds into the other, leading to a secret admirer and borderline insta-fame, Charlotte is forced to ask herself if she really can have it all.
 
Slick and unnerving, Kill, Sleep, Repeat is a cunning tale of deception and desire that begs the question: Do we ever really know people the way we think we do?

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

There are three rules. More than that, but three main ones: Stay focused. Remain in character. Don’t get murdered.

 

It’s funny how different he looks now that I don’t care about him anymore. Now, I can see how ordinary he is, how it was my love that made him special… that placed him on a pedestal.

 

 My Review:

 

Every single time I have picked up one of Britney King’s brilliantly paced and absorbing tales, I seem to be immediately sucked into her character’s vortex and there I remain, in the eye of her cleverly contrived storm long after the final page. Her word voodoo is strong! But ~ sputter ~ Holy Hell! As if I didn’t already know but this gripping tale confirms it – Britney King is one twisted sister! I gasped, I cringed, I shivered, I flinched, I sucked up wine like a dehydrated camel while white-knuckling my Kindle, but I couldn’t have stopped reading this unsettlingly insightful and well-crafted tale if my hair was on fire. Ms. King excels at seductive sociopaths, and I bow in awe and respect (and no small amount of fear) to her agile skill and word prowess.   Although, I feel in desperate need of brain bleach after this one, due to the heinous nature of the vile villains her clever character was dispatching – uuuggeee.

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 or just copy and paste bit.ly/britneykingweb into your browser. 
Happy reading.

 

HOSTED BY:

About the Author

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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: 
 
To get more– grab two books for free, by subscribing to her mailing list at britneyking.com or just copy and paste bit.ly/britneykingweb into your browser. 
Happy reading.

Book Review, Giveaway: When Hope Ends by Freya Barker

Title: When Hope Ends; Life Begins
Author: Freya Barker
Genre: Contemporary
Romance
Release Date: January 21, 2020
Hosted by: Buoni Amici Press, LLC.

It’s the best day of his life—the worst of hers.
She left her soul behind in the dead silence of a hospital room.
He is bright with hope after being so close to losing faith.
One moment in time leaves their paths unavoidably entwined.
An invisible connection held by one heart beating between them.

*Originally published in the Then There Was You box set.

AMAZON | APPLE BOOKS | NOOK | KOBO |

 

Tweet: When hope Ends; life Begins by @freya_barker is #Live on all platforms #Books2Read https://ctt.ec/eGbUu+ RomanceReads2020 #FreyaBarker #BAPpr @buoniamicipress

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

… he pays attention, and let’s be honest, that’s not always a quality evident in the opposite gender.

I’m so grateful having had this amazing opportunity to learn that when hope ends for one, life begins for another

“I don’t know who this woman is. I’ve never heard so much cursing in my life.” I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing. I remember this part too. Cassie had made me feel about an inch tall with her sharp tongue while she was delivering Kelty. She’d even smacked me because I was breathing too loudly.

My Review:

 

Freya Barker writes stories with all the feels, but this one was pure heart – some parts were heart-warming, others were heart-wrenching, and still more were heart-skipping and heart-stirring, but they were all only the good kinds of heart-related reading that shouldn’t lead a fear of heart-stoppage, possible angina, the need for CPR, or a cardiology referral. The heartfelt storylines were engaging and relevant with writing that was easy to fall into and alternated between steaming up my glasses, raising my heart rate, putting a smile on my face, and squeezing my coronary muscle like a two sizes too small pair of Spanx. It was divine. I’ll gladly ride on Freya Barker’s bus until the wheels fall off.

Freya Barker loves writing about ordinary people with extraordinary stories.
Driven to make her books about ‘real’ people; with characters who are perhaps less than perfect, but just as deserving of romance, thrills and chills, and their own slice of happy.
A recipient of the RomCon “Reader’s Choice” Award for best first book, “Slim To None”, and Finalist for the Kindle Book Award with “From Dust”, Freya has not slowed down.
She continues to add to her rapidly growing collection of published novels as she spins story after story with an endless supply of bruised and dented characters, vying for attention!

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Book Review: The Day That Changed Everything by Catherine Miller

 

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The Day That Changed Everything

by Catherine Miller

Amazon / B&N / Kobo /

Apple Books / Google Play

When you lose the love of your life, how do you find yourself again?

For Tabitha, the day that changed everything started like any other.

She woke up, slid her feet into fluffy slippers, wrapped herself in a dressing gown and tiptoed out of her bedroom, leaving her husband Andy sleeping. Downstairs, she boiled the kettle and enjoyed a cup of tea as the sun rose.

Upstairs, Andy’s alarm sounded, and Tabitha took him a freshly brewed coffee, like every other morning.  Except today, the incessant beeping rang out and her husband hadn’t stirred. She called his name, she nudged his shoulder. But Andy wouldn’t wake up.

Three years later Tabitha is trying her hardest to get by in the shadow of her grief. She may have lost the love of her life but she won’t give up on the family they dreamed of. Fostering troublesome teenage girls and a newborn baby is a chance to piece together her broken heart.

But being a mother isn’t easy, and neither is healing the heartache she carries around. After losing everything, could saving these three children help Tabitha save herself too?

This stunning tale will make you laugh and cry in equal measure, hold your loved ones close and see the beauty in the little things in life. Fans of Jojo Moyes, Jodi Picoult and Diane Chamberlain will love this moving and uplifting story.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

She wished she could grab a handful of his ashes and scatter them in all the places they’d loved. She wished they were like seeds and in planting them, they’d bring him back. That in sowing them in the quarters of the world that they’d loved, she’d be able to capture moments as if they were happening all over again. That by bringing him back in that way she’d feel that she was being held by him once again and somehow his seed would settle inside her and they’d go on to have the family they’d dreamed of.

 

‘You don’t want to talk about it because it hurts. Some things are better left unsaid. Some things are better dealt with by eating ice cream.’ And just like that, Tabitha had been schooled by a fifteen-year-old. Because how could she argue with that.

 

My Review:

 

This was a slowly evolving and heart-squeezing women’s fiction tale of loss and family drama. This stubborn young widow must have lost her mind for taking on two obnoxious, challenging, and troubled fifteen-year-olds twins and a medically involved newborn as her first attempt at fostering children; in addition to living out in the middle of nowhere and without transportation. I would have needed a fully stocked wine cellar, bars on the windows, and an Uber and therapist on speed dial before even considering such an insane scheme. This was my introduction to the taut storytelling of Catherine Miller, and her angsty tale was thoughtfully and perceptively written with observant insights while teasing and poking at my curiosity as she doesn’t let us in on the actual events of the day that changed everything until 84% into the book, and by then, I had puzzled out the correct scenario that was, thankfully, far afield of my initial assumption.

 

When Catherine Miller became a mum to twins, she decided her hands weren’t full enough so she wrote a novel with every spare moment she managed to find. By the time the twins were two, Catherine had a two-book deal with Carina UK. Her debut novel, Waiting For You, came out in March 2016. Catherine was an NHS physiotherapist, but for health reasons, she retired early from this career. As she loved her physiotherapy job, she decided if she couldn’t do that she would pursue her writing dream. It took a few years and a couple of babies, but in 2015 she won the Katie Fforde bursary, was a finalist in the London Book Fair Write Stuff Competition and highly commended in Woman magazine’s writing competition. Since then she’s had four novels published.

 

Book Review: The Place We Call Home by Faith Hogan

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The Place We Call Home
by Faith Hogan

AmazonUS UK / AU / CA / 

Kobo / GP / iBooks

Welcome to Ballycove, the home of Corrigan Mills…

Set against the backdrop of the beautiful Irish countryside the famed mills have created the finest wool in all of Ireland. Run by the seemingly perfect Corrigan family, but every family has its secrets, and how the mills came to be the Corrigan’s is one of them…

Miranda and her husband were never meant to own the mills, until one fateful day catapults them into a life they never thought they’d lead.

Ada has forever lived her life in her sister’s shadow. Wanting only to please her mother and take her place as the new leader of the mill, Ada might just have to take a look at what her heart really wants.

Callie has a flourishing international career as a top designer and a man who loves her dearly, she appears to have it all. When a secret is revealed and she’s unceremoniously turfed out of the design world, Callie might just get what’s she’s been yearning for. The chance to go home.

Simon has always wanted more. More money, more fame, more notoriety. The problem child. Simon has made more enemies than friends over the years, and when one of his latest schemes falls foul he’ll have to return to the people who always believe in him.

Ballycove isn’t just a town in the Irish countryside. It isn’t just the base of the famous mills. It’s a place to call home.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

It’s no place for a child, not really. Old Lord Blair is as odd as a hen in a hairdresser’s.

 

The years had taken inches from his height and added it to his waistband; his hair had greyed into the kind of silky thickness most women of his age would trade their best shoes for.

 

In that moment, Ada felt such a mixture of emotion for this man who had always stood by her, but who had turned into someone she hardly saw any more. He blended with the furniture of her life, so much so that she couldn’t imagine what she’d do without him, but on the other hand his presence was as banal as a kitchen appliance, useful but hardly stirring.

 

Simon had a feeling that the softest part of Herr Muller was his teeth, but that was beside the point.

 

 My Review:

 

This was an emotive, intriguing, and melancholy women’s fiction read with ample servings of family drama and romantic complications and told from multiple POVs. While emotional tension isn’t my preferred tone, I didn’t seem to mind the angst as Faith Hogan is a master storyteller. Her engaging storylines squeezed my heart and kept me guessing, although as I was nearing the last few pages I found myself growing increasingly restless and fearful of unresolved storylines, silly me, the crafty wordsmith had a few more tricks hidden in her purse. I gained a new phrase for my British Isles word list with Hooray Henry, which is British slang for an upper-class British male who exudes loud-mouthed arrogance and an air of superiority, and another form of one of my favorite Brit words of toff.

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About the Author

 

Faith lives in the west of Ireland with her husband, four children, and two very fussy cats. She has a Hons Degree in English Literature and Psychology, has worked as a fashion model and in the intellectual disability and mental health sector.
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Book Review: St. Francis Society for Wayward Pets by Annie England Noblin

St. Francis Society for Wayward Pets
by Annie England Noblin

 

Amazon US / UK / CA / AU

 HarperCollins / B & N

 Paperback: 384 pages

William Morrow Paperbacks; Reprint edition (January 14, 2020)

If you love Susan Mallery and Jill Shalvis, you won’t want to miss this new novel of second chances, dogs, and knitting, from the author of Pupcakes and Sit! Stay! Speak!

Laid off, cheated on, mugged: what else can go wrong in Maeve Stephens’ life? So when she learns her birth mother has left her a house, a vintage VW Beetle, and a marauding cat, in the small town of Timber Creek, Washington, she packs up to discover the truth about her past.

She arrives to the sight of a cheerful bulldog abandoned on her front porch, a reclusive but tempting author living next door, and a set of ready-made friends at the St. Francis Society for Wayward Pets, where women knit colorful sweaters for the dogs and cats in their care. But there’s also an undercurrent of something that doesn’t sit right with Maeve. What’s the secret (besides her!) that her mother had hidden?

If Maeve is going to make Timber Creek her home, she must figure out where she fits in and unravel the truth about her past. But is she ready to be adopted again—this time, by an entire town…?

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Your kids ought to be on a birth control commercial or something… I’m pretty sure their high-pitched shrieks would be enough for anybody to beg for the pill.

I made a big production of rummaging around in my purse before Holly sighed and handed over her platinum card… “Well, it wasn’t like that dude was going to accept the hairy Tic Tacs in the bottom of that gross purse of yours…”

The man standing before wasn’t ugly or anything-he was just… odd looking. With his curly red hair and smattering of freckles combined with his crisp black suit, he looked a bit like how I imagined Carrot Top would have looked if he’d picked a nine-to-five job instead of steroid use.

Well, her father is about fifteen pounds of crazy in a five-pound bucket.

My Review:

I adore this author and always enjoy and revel in her emotive and heart-squeezing tales, clever wit, engaging storylines, and insightful observations of complex social issues. Annie England Noblin is a master storyteller and St. Francis Society for Wayward Pets deftly tackled a variety of thorny and unfortunately all too common situations and did so with agility, thoughtful awareness, and profound sensitivity for such complicated issues as family violence, addiction, adoption and identify issues, teenage pregnancy, poverty, physical disability, and small-town living. The characters were curiously compelling, quirky, well fleshed out, and highly accessible though not always likable. The well-crafted storylines were easy to follow, thoughtfully written, unpredictable, and squeezed my heart between giggle-snorts and smirks with the various threads miraculously came together to form an uplifting and highly satisfying conclusion. I am already eager to see what Ms. Noblin comes up with next.

I was provided with a review copy of this delightful tale of tails by HarperCollins and TLC Book Tours.

About the Author

Annie England Noblin lives with her son, husband, and three dogs in the Missouri Ozarks. She graduated with an M.A. in creative writing from Missouri State University and currently teaches English and communications for Arkansas State University in Mountain Home, Arkansas. She spends her free time playing make-believe, feeding stray cats, and working with animal shelters across the country to save homeless dogs.

Find out more about Annie at her website, and follow her on FacebookTwitter, and Instagram.

Book Review: A Messy Affair (The Lena Szarka Mysteries #3) by Elizabeth Mundy

A Messy Affair
(The Lena Szarka Mysteries #3)
by Elizabeth Mundy

 

Amazon US / UK / AU / CA 

 

The only way is murder…

Lena Szarka, a Hungarian cleaner working in London, is forced to brush up on her detective skills for a third time when her cousin Sarika is plunged into danger.

Sarika and her reality TV star boyfriend Terry both receive threatening notes. When Terry stops calling, Lena assumes he’s lost interest. Until he turns up. Dead. Lena knows she must act fast to keep her cousin from the same fate.

Scrubbing her way through the grubby world of reality television, online dating and betrayed lovers, Lena finds it harder than she thought to discern what’s real – and what’s just for the cameras.

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

The devil’s own food, wasabi peas… Why turn an innocent pea into a torture device like that? The Japanese have no business making snacks.

 

I remember when the internet was invented… I thought that this internet thing would never take off. So slow. And so much information no one cared about. Full of chat rooms with lonely people scattered all over the world, spelling badly and swearing at each other.

 

Lena felt as though she should work in a bar, the amount of alcohol and sympathy she’d been dishing out recently. Men certainly seemed to have a detrimental effect on women’s livers.

 

Mrs Ives took a biscuit and then put it back down. ‘I’m watching my figure,’ she said. ‘I’m going to have to find myself a new man…. On second thoughts,’ she said, reaching for a biscuit, ‘I think I’d rather have chocolate than a man any day.’

 

In a funny way, things are better now… It’s like having stomach flu. It’s awful at the time, but then when you’ve recovered, you’ve lost half a stone and your jeans look great.

 

My Review:

 

I have thoroughly enjoyed Elizabeth Mundy’s wryly written cozy mysteries. I now feel compelled to go to the beginning and read the first in the series, as the last two have been cleverly entertaining. I definitely have a taste for Ms. Mundy’s sardonic sense of humor and cunningly paced writing style. Her well-contrived tales are more complex than most cozy mysteries and kept me guessing. I postulated and discarded several wild theories while I read. I adored Lena, the hard-working, ambitious, and highly observant Hungarian; she grappled valiantly with the complexities of the English language and confusing cultural issues while applying her special skills of deep cleaning and crime-solving, which for Lena went hand-in-hand. Lena did not believe in half-measures and took great care to accommodate her client’s quirks. I fervently wish I knew her contact information so I could send for her and her secret recipe of hand-made cleaning products to tackle my personal nest of accumulated detritus and filth. But please, don’t tell my mother that my sloth has put me in such dire need of such a service!

Elizabeth Mundy’s grandmother was a Hungarian immigrant to America who raised five children on a chicken farm in Indiana. Elizabeth is a marketing director for an investment firm and lives in London with her messy husband and two young children. She writes the Lena Szarka Mysteries, featuring a Hungarian cleaner as detective.

 

Book Review: A Clean Canvas (The Lena Szarka Mysteries Book 2) by Elizabeth Mundy 

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A Clean Canvas
(The Lena Szarka Mysteries Book 2)
by Elizabeth Mundy 

Amazon US / UK / AU 

Crime always leaves a stain . . .

Lena Szarka, a Hungarian cleaner, dusts off her detective skills when a masterpiece is stolen from a gallery she cleans with her cousin Sarika. But when Sarika goes missing too, accusations start to fly.

Convinced her cousin is innocent, Lena sweeps her way through the secrets of the London art scene. With the evidence mounting against Sarika and the police on her trail, Lena needs to track down the missing painting if she is to clear her cousin.

Embroiling herself in the sketchy world of thwarted talents, unpaid debts, and elegant fraudsters, Lena finds that there’s more to this gallery than meets the eye.

 

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

Her face was pale with a glistening sheen of sweat. She blinked like a mole in a sunbeam.

 

The decor was as Lena expected: the ubiquitous chintz of a house decorated in the seventies. It smelt of mothballs and loneliness.

 

I wish I’d never borrowed from those scoundrels! … I should have known not to get involved with them as soon as I went to their office. It was above a Turkish barbershop, you know. Men getting their ear hairs singed off with matches while they drink coffee sludge and home-brewed liquor and chain-smoke.

 

The sun had made Islington like an oven. As she’d walked through Islington Green, she’d seen usually conservative Londoners rolling up their trousers and removing their shirts, lying prostrated around the tiny stretch of grass as if victims of battle. Tomorrow they’d be an assortment of shades of angry pink, bad-tempered and painful to the touch as they crowded themselves into humid tube carriages.

 

A pity such a heavenly face has been installed on an empty brain. Like painting the Sistine Chapel with crayons.

 

 My Review:

 

I was pleasantly entertained by this amusing cozy mystery, I certainly didn’t guess the outcome and I liked that I couldn’t. A Clean Canvas was the second in a series, and while I would most likely enjoy reading the first book, it was not necessary as this volume had strong legs and could stand, walk, and run well enough on its own. I always find it interesting to be given the view of an outsider and Lena was a hard-working and ambitious Hungarian immigrant who struggled with the nuances of the English language as well as the customs and idioms. She endeavored to keep herself contained but her malapropisms and keen observations were clever, colorful, and humorous. Lena was proud, and I was proud of and for her to have established her own cleaning company, and she always had her “eyeball open” looking for sidelines to incorporate and expand her business. I enjoyed Ms. Mundy’s style and characters enough to continue on with the next in the series with A Messy Affair.

 

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About the Author

Elizabeth Mundy’s grandmother was a Hungarian immigrant to America who raised five children on a chicken farm in Indiana. Elizabeth is a marketing director for an investment firm and lives in London with her messy husband and two young children. She writes the Lena Szarka Mysteries, featuring a Hungarian cleaner as detective.

Book Review: THE LITTLE BOOKSHOP ON THE SEINE by Rebecca Raisin 

THE LITTLE BOOKSHOP ON THE SEINE
by Rebecca Raisin

ISBN: 9781335012500

Publication Date: 1/7/2020

Publisher: HQN Books

 Target / Walmart / Google / iBooks / Kobo

 

It’s The Holiday on the Champs-Élysées in a great big love letter to Paris, charming old bookstores and happily-ever-afters!

When bookshop owner Sarah Smith is offered the opportunity for a job exchange with her Parisian friend Sophie, saying yes is a no-brainer—after all, what kind of romantic would turn down six months in Paris? Sarah is sure she’s in for the experience of a lifetime—days spent surrounded by literature in a gorgeous bookshop, and the chance to watch the snow fall on the Eiffel Tower. Plus, now she can meet up with her journalist boyfriend, Ridge, when his job takes him around the globe.

But her expectations cool faster than her café au lait soon after she lands in the City of Light—she’s a fish out of water in Paris. The customers are rude, her new coworkers suspicious and her relationship with Ridge has been reduced to a long-distance game of phone tag, leaving Sarah to wonder if he’ll ever put her first over his busy career. As Christmas approaches, Sarah is determined to get the shop—and her life—back in order…and make her dreams of a Parisian happily-ever-after come true.

My Rating:

Favorite Quotes:

 

I only ran if chocolate was involved, and even then it was more a fast walk.

 

What? Just ’cause I’m an old woman that don’t mean I can’t appreciate beauty! My eyesight still works plenty fine!

 

Missy had a thing about boosting people up, she only saw the good in a person and threw compliments around like confetti.

 

The closest I’d come to confrontation was when the local book club dissolved into a heated argument, their opinions divided, and someone had to stand in and mediate. But I’d known those ladies my whole life, and all I had to do to calm them down was threaten to take the wine away.

 

He was my Mr. Right, there was no question about that. It was just a shame he wasn’t Mr. Right Here.

 

My Review:

 

I adored this tender story and debated and waffled in how to rate this lovely tale. The writing was easy to follow, highly relatable, and sweetly engaging while gently paced with several slowly evolving yet beguiling storylines and cast with a peculiar hodgepodge of curiously alluring and intriguing characters.   I enjoyed the leisurely, humorous, and captivating glimpses of the quirkiness of the authentic Parisian lifestyle and the secret marketing tactics utilized with the locals vs. tourist mentality. My heart seized at every mention of the iconic Notre Dame while I alternated between wistfully remembering my long-ago visit with the rather hideous gargoyles and recalling the more recent and distressing news videos of the beloved structure in flames. While it wasn’t an enrapturing breath-stealing romance or brain itching thriller, the descriptive and engaging prose kept me well entertained with a smile on my face for most of the day. I have finally hit a soft landing and alit on the smooth quality and skillful finesse of the talented wordsmith and a 4.5-stars rating while coveting more of the same.

About the Author

Author Website

Twitter: @JaxandWillsMum

Facebook: @RebeccaRaisinAuthor

Instagram: @RebeccaRaisinWrites

Goodreads

 

Rebecca Raisin is the author of several novels, including the beloved Little Paris series and the Gingerbread Café trilogy, and her short stories have been published in various anthologies and fiction magazines. You can follow Rebecca on Facebook, and at www.rebeccaraisin.com