I saw this meme on It’s All About Booksand thought, I like this!! So, I decided to do it once a month also. Many thanks to Yvonne for initially posting this!!
This post is what it says: Places I travel to in books each month. Books are lovely and take you to places you would never get a chance to go. That includes places of fantasy too!!
So….enjoy!! Please let me know if you have read these books or traveled to these areas (other than the fantasy….lol).
Panem
District 12, Capitol
United States
Florida
Ohio (Chestnut)
Maine (Dearmont)
New York (New York City, upstate New York)
Crooked Tree (unknown state)
New York (Willow Cove)
Massachusetts (Boston, Riverton)
Massachusetts (Pittsfield, Boston, Amherst)
Florida (The Everglades)
California (Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Pasadena, Studio City)
Texas (Houston)
North Carolina (Raleigh)
Washington D.C.
Massachusetts (Coventry)
California (San Verde)
Wisconsin (Fontana, Lake Geneva)
Florida (Accident)
Colorado (Last Word)
Washington (North Bend, San Juan Islands, Seattle), Montana
Illinois (Chicago)
Pennsylvania (Johnston)
Iowa (Ames, Sibley), Minnesota, South Carolina (Columbia),
Alabama (Summerland, Hell), New York (New York City)
Illinois (Chicago), New York (New York City), Montana
Ljosland
Hrafnsvik
Japan
Tokyo
Guatemala
Guatemala City
France
Limoges, Perigueux
Giverny
Scotland
Edinburgh
Edinburgh, North Berwick
England
Hull
London
Bellehaven Bay, Regency London
Essex, London, Kent
India
Delhi, Kanpur, Calcutta, Brahmapur
Argentina
Italy
Ostia, Padua, Port of Civitavecchia, Palmro, Sicily, Florence, Rome, Milan, Pompeii, Amalfi, Tropea
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (for Cover Scavenger Hunt 2023—a bird)—Finished 1-1-2023
A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth(for The StoryGraph Onboarding Challenge—-Read a book with more pages than the longest book you read in 2022)—Finished 1-17-2023
Tender is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica (for The StoryGraph Read the World—Argentina)—Finished 1-17-2023
The Tea Dragon Society by Kay O’Neill (for The StoryGraph’s Genre Challenge—a contemporary or literary fiction novel with disability rep)—Finished 1-24-2023
The Reader by M.K. Harkins (for Beat the Backlist 2023—a backlist book)—Finished 1-24-2023
The Shape of Thunder by Jasmine Warga (for Scavenger Hunt TBR Book Challenge—Read the most recently added book to your TBR)—Finished 1-3-2023
Red, White & Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston (for Scavenger Hunt—a book written by a woman using a male perspective)—Finished 1-19-2023
The Nightmare Man by J.H. Markert (for Popsugar Reading Challenge 2023—a book you meant to read in 2022)—Finished 1-5-2023
Lost Soul by Adam J. Wright (for 2023 TBR Toppler—a TBR vet)—Finished 1-3-2023
In Our Blood by William J. Goyette (for 2023 Monthly Themes—books that make you feel cold)—Finished 1-10-2023
Before the Coffee Get Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (for 2023 Reading challenge—a translated work)—Finished 1-11-2023
All Hallows by Christopher Golden (for 2023 ABC Challenge—A)—Finished 1-19-2023
The Family Game by Catherine Steadman (for Romanceopoly 2023!—read a thriller or mystery where one of the main characters are a detective or private investigator)—Finished 1-3-2023
Hello Stranger by Katherine Center (for 2023 TBR Prompts—a 5-star prediction)—Finished 1-16-23
A playful and emotional romantic comedy from the author of Ten Rules for Faking It
Hailey Sharp has a one-track mind. Get By the Cup salad shop off the ground. Do literally everything possible to make it a success. Repeat. With a head full of entrepreneurial ideas and a bad ex in her rearview, her one and only focus is living life the way she wants to. No distractions.
Wes Jansen never did understand the fuss about relationships. With a string of lackluster first dates and the pain from his parents’ angry divorce following him around, he’d much rather find someone who he likes, but won’t love. Companionship, not passion, is the name of the game.
When Hailey and Wes find each other in a disastrous meet cute that wasn’t even intended for them, they embarrassingly go their separate ways. But when Wes finds Hailey to apologize for his behavior, they strike a friendship. Because that’s all this can be. Hailey doesn’t want any distractions. Wes doesn’t want to fall in love.
What could possibly go wrong?
First Line:
Salad paid the bills. At least, it was supposed to.
A Guid to Being Just Friends by Sophie Sullivan
I’ll admit this; I didn’t read the blurb when I accepted the invite from St. Martin’s Press. I saw the title and the cover (in the widget email they sent) and made my decision from that. To be clear, I rarely accept books based on the title and/or cover. So, I was a little hesitant when I saw it next on my reading schedule. But, once I realized what series this book was a part of, I was excited to read it.
A Guide to Being Just Friends is the 3rd (and final) book in the Jansen Brothers series. While readers can read this as a standalone, I recommend reading the first two books before picking this one up. I recommend this so you, as a reader, can understand some of the relationships discussed in this book.
There are some trigger warnings that I want to warn you about in this book. Hailey (the main character) is fresh out of an emotionally and verbally abusive relationship. In one scene, her ex tries (and stress tries) to verbally abuse and manhandle her, but Wes stops it. Wes’s parents are divorced, and Hailey’s family is dysfunctional (her parents love each other and ignore her). If any of these triggers you, I recommend not reading this book.
A Guide to Being Just Friends is a medium to fast-paced book that takes place entirely in San Verde,California. The pacing of the book fluctuates during it.
As mentioned above, A Guide to Being Just Friends is Wes and Hailey’s love story. Hailey has just opened a restaurant that only serves salad (By the Cup) and is focused only on getting it off the ground and making money. She has no room for a relationship or wants one after what her ex-boyfriend has done to her. Wes couldn’t agree more with her. He is still dealing with the wounds of his parent’s divorce and has been on several not-so-great first dates. All he wants is companionship. So meeting Hailey and developing feelings for her was not part of his master plan (the same goes for Hailey). While being in a relationship is not in the cards for either of them, they will settle for being just friends. But their feelings grow, and being just friends is starting to sound not so great. Will Hailey and Wes wake up and see that the person they want the most is standing in front of them? Or will they forever be just friends?
I like going into a book and knowing at least one of the characters. For me (and I don’t know about you), it made connecting with the other main characters easier. I also liked seeing a different side of that character than what was portrayed in other books.
Hailey: I liked her. She was super focused on getting her business off the ground and wouldn’t let anything or anyone distract her. She was also one of the sweetest people in the book and didn’t deserve the treatment she got from her parents, ex-boyfriend, and Ana. I also liked that she overcame all the self-doubt and self-esteem issues that her ex gave her. Of course, since this is a romance, I wanted to shake her when it came to Wes. But I understood why she was holding herself back.
Wes—I was talking about him in the above paragraph. I liked seeing little glimpses of him in the previous two books. I did have a view of him from what I read. So it was nice for that view to be expanded and for how he acted explained. Wes had a lot on his plate, a lot of pressure from his father and Ana (the CEO ofa company he’s trying to buy). Plus, he had awful luck on the relationship front. The blind dates the author showed were horrible. I did like his character growth, though. By the end of the book, he wasn’t afraid to do what was right for him (and yes, that involved Ana and her meddling ways!!)
The secondary characters were interesting. They should be since they were all previous characters in the other two books. A couple of new characters were introduced (Hailey’s cousin and her group of friends), and I hope the author decides to create another series in this world. I would love to see some of those people get their HEAs!!
A Guide to Being Just Friends fits perfectly into the romance genre. I liked that this romance took months to ignite and just as long to get off the ground. I love those types of romances. They seem more genuine, and (because I am a weirdo) I can picture them lasting in real life.
There is sex in A Guide to Being Just Friends. But it isn’t graphic. The author sets the mood, starts the sexual encounter, and ends the chapter. The next chapter is the following day with a satisfied hero and heroine. I am a fan of smut and graphic sex scenes, but sometimes it is nice to let my imagination do what it does best. And it did its best in this book. Also, there were only a couple of sex scenes.
The main storyline is Wes and Hailey’s romance. As I said, the author made this into a slow-burn romance, and I liked it. She also made it as realistic as possible. Hailey and Wes went through what I considered the usual ebb and flow until everything exploded. There was only one thing that I disagreed with: Ana. She was a vindictive, nasty person. What she did to Hailey (and let’s not forget what she tried to do) was pretty low.
Several secondary storylines enriched the main storyline. The secondary storyline that stands out to me the most was the landlord raising the rent on the apartments and shops where Hailey had her business. I loved how the author kept me wondering what would happen there and then melded it into the main storyline. It was perfect!!
The end of A Guide to Being Just Friends made me an emotional mess. I cried during the big reveal scene. I was mad because of what Hailey assumed was happening between Ana and Wes. I was happy because that assumption wasn’t true. And the epilogue. It was freaking perfect!!! I couldn’t have asked for a better epilogue than that.
I would recommend A Guide to Being Just Friends to anyone over 21. There is language, mild violence, and very mild sex scenes. Also, see my content warning above.
I want to thank St. Martin’s Press, St. Martin’s Griffin, NetGalley, and Sophie Sullivan for allowing me to read and review A Guide to Being Just Friends. All opinions stated in this review are mine.
If you enjoyed reading A Guide to Being Just Friends, then you will enjoy reading these books:
What are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? What do you think you’ll read next?
Personal:
I hope you all had a wonderful week last week.
Mine was alright, super rainy, but alright until Saturday. What happened Saturday? Well, for one, BK was away on business but was coming home that morning. Second, I ended up in a veterinary ER for almost 4 hours. Settle in, and let me tell you what happened.
I was in the kitchen with my girls and 3 out of the 5 cats. Miss R decided she wanted to make sunny-side-up eggs with toast for breakfast, Miss B was going to make scrambled, and I was supervising Miss R. Vinnie, Tony, and Jesper were sitting on our chest freezer watching the girls crack eggs (I think they thought they would get some??). Meanwhile, Loki and Snickers were going between the living room, Miss R’s bedroom, and the dining room.
I heard a commotion, though nothing of it because Snickers and Loki have a love/hate relationship, and figured she was chasing him again. Then Miss B noticed the blood on the floor. We checked our feet (to ensure no onewas cut), wiped up the blood, and then checked Vinnie, Tony, and Jesper. I hunted down Loki while Miss R walked toward Snickers, who was lying in her room. Miss R screamed, and I came running. Snickers’s left eye was full of blood. So, I called my regular vet (who wasn’t in), grabbed the big cat carrier, and took her to the emergency vet. Thankfully, that was only 5 mins away. To make a long story short, after 4 hours, the vet saw her and told us that the tear duct and a spot on her lower eyelid got lacerated. She didn’t need stitches, but I have to give her a medicated eye ointment every 8 hours. I’m also taking her to her regular vet on Friday to see if any other damage was done. I am beyond thankful that this emergency vet opened up during Covid. Because I have a feeling her eye would have gotten infected if we had to wait until Monday.
So that was the extent of my exciting weekend/week. I was so stressed out on Saturday that it ruined the rest of the day. And ever try giving a cat eye meds? Thankfully, she’sgood about letting me do it, but I have gotten scratched.
Reading:
I got a lot of reading down until Saturday. Then that happened, and I couldn’t bring myself to read. I was too upset to concentrate. So, it set me back a little but not much. I picked up my Kindle on Monday, finished reading one book, and started another (see below).
The longest book I read this week:Hello, Stranger. I started reading it on Friday and expected to finish it on Saturday. Then…..well, Snickersapocolypse happened. It took me three days to finish.
The shortest book I read this week:The Things We Do To Our Friends. I finished it within a day of starting.
How was your week? Read anything good? Did you do anything exciting?
As always, let me know if you have read or are planning to read any of these books!!
What I Recently Finished Reading:
Sadie Montogmery has had good breaks and bad breaks in her life, but as a struggling artist, all she needs is one lucky break. Things seem to be going her way when she lands one of the coveted finalist spots in a portrait competition. It happens to coincide with a surgery she needs to have. Minor, they say. Less than a week in the hospital they say. Nothing about you will change, they say. Upon recovery, it begins to dawn on Sadie that she can see everything around her, but she can no longer see faces.
Temporary, they say. Lots of people deal with this, they say. As she struggles to cope―and hang onto her artistic dreams―she finds solace in her fourteen-year-old dog, Peanut. Thankfully, she can still see animal faces. When Peanut gets sick, she rushes him to the emergency vet nearby. That’s when she meets veterinarian Dr. Addison. And she’s pleasantly surprised when he asks her on a date. But she doesn’t want anyone to know about her face blindness. Least of all Joe, her obnoxious neighbor who always wears a bowling jacket and seems to know everyone in the building. He’s always there at the most embarrassing but convenient times, and soon, they develop a sort of friendship. But could it be something more?
As Sadie tries to save her career, confront her haunting past, and handle falling in love with two different guys she realizes that happiness can be found in the places―and people― you least expect.
What I am currently reading:
Vikram Seth’s novel is, at its core, a love story: Lata and her mother, Mrs. Rupa Mehra, are both trying to find—through love or through exacting maternal appraisal—a suitable boy for Lata to marry. Set in the early 1950s, in an India newly independent and struggling through a time of crisis, A Suitable Boy takes us into the richly imagined world of four large extended families and spins a compulsively readable tale of their lives and loves. A sweeping panoramic portrait of a complex, multiethnic society in flux, A Suitable Boy remains the story of ordinary people caught up in a web of love and ambition, humor and sadness, prejudice and reconciliation, the most delicate social etiquette and the most appalling violence.
What books I think I’ll read next:
Working at the local processing plant, Marcos is in the business of slaughtering humans —though no one calls them that anymore.
His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the “Transition.” Now, eating human meat—“special meat”—is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.
Then one day he’s given a gift: a live specimen of the finest quality. Though he’s aware that any form of personal contact is forbidden on pain of death, little by little he starts to treat her like a human being. And soon, he becomes tortured by what has been lost—and what might still be saved.
A Body Washes Ashore is the heart-racing sequel to The Killings Begin and Death in a Dark Alley that you’ve been waiting for. Bradley Pay’s signature blend of contemporary romance and psychological suspense will sweep you off your feet and into the thick of mortal danger. Tour Europe with Tracey’s new friend, Remy Martin, as she risks everything for the rush of true love.
Tracey’s new group of friends seems perfect. For as long as he could remember, he felt like an outsider, struggling to make connections, and living as an unknown serial killer certainly didn’t help. Now he and his new wife have discovered a circle of friends that begins to fill his need for close relationships. He’s one step closer to living a “normal” life despite the persistent cold-case investigators who refuse to ignore his murderous past in the US.
Remy Martin, a renowned professor of art history and one of Tracey’s new friends, also bears scars on her damaged heart. She has vowed to only sleep with married men to protect herself from heartbreak. However, the stakes rise when she breaks her biggest rule and takes things too far. But how can she resist? She never meant to fall in love or hurt anyone. Just like Tracey, though, she can’t erase her past. She must deal with the consequences of her affair, whatever the cost.
Don’t miss this landmark installation in the Spectrum Series saga, complete with the complex characters you love and a new romance you’ll never forget.
With the 80’s nostalgia of Stranger Things, this horror drama from NYT bestselling author Christopher Golden follows neighborhood families and a mysterious, lurking evil on one Halloween day.
It’s Halloween night, 1984, in Coventry, Massachusetts, and two families are unraveling. Up and down the street, horrifying secrets are being revealed, and all the while, mixed in with the trick-or-treaters of all ages, four children who do not belong are walking door to door, merging with the kids of Parmenter Road. Children in vintage costumes with faded, eerie makeup. They seem terrified, and beg the neighborhood kids to hide them away, to keep them safe from The Cunning Man. There’s a small clearing in the woods now that was never there before, and a blackthorn tree that doesn’t belong at all. These odd children claim that The Cunning Man is coming for them…and they want the local kids to protect them. But with families falling apart and the neighborhood splintered by bitterness, who will save the children of Parmenter Road?
New York Times bestselling, Bram Stoker Award-winning author Christopher Golden is best known for his supernatural thrillers set in deadly, distant locales…but in this suburban Halloween drama, Golden brings the horror home.
All Hallows. The one night when everything is a mask…
A playful and emotional romantic comedy from the author of Ten Rules for Faking It
Hailey Sharp has a one-track mind. Get By the Cup salad shop off the ground. Do literally everything possible to make it a success. Repeat. With a head full of entrepreneurial ideas and a bad ex in her rearview, her one and only focus is living life the way she wants to. No distractions.
Wes Jansen never did understand the fuss about relationships. With a string of lackluster first dates and the pain from his parents’ angry divorce following him around, he’d much rather find someone who he likes, but won’t love. Companionship, not passion, is the name of the game.
When Hailey and Wes find each other in a disastrous meet cute that wasn’t even intended for them, they embarrassingly go their separate ways. But when Wes finds Hailey to apologize for his behavior, they strike a friendship. Because that’s all this can be. Hailey doesn’t want any distractions. Wes doesn’t want to fall in love.
December has flown by for me (I don’t know about you guys). I was stretched thin between my kids’ Christmas events, last-minute shopping, and the actual holiday. I hope January is less hectic and I can breathe again.
Interior Design School?Check.Cute house to fix up?Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans?Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
First Line:
If she’d had to lay down money on which of her motely crew would cause the most trouble, Grace Travis would not have picked the chihuahua.
How to Love your neighbor by sophie sullivan
I was a little iffy about reading and reviewing How to Love Your Neighbor. I had been getting away from contemporary romances. No real reason; I just hadn’t been reading them as much as I had been. Then, I got the invite for How to Love Your Neighbor, and the blurb called to me. I thought it would be an enemy to lover’s romance, but it wasn’t. There was so much more to this book than what the blurb let on, and I am pretty happy that I read it.
How to Love Your Neighbors had a funny and engaging plotline. Grace is a fledgling interior designer who decided to move into her grandparents’ house. Noah is a big-shot real estate investor who moved from NYC to CA to get out from under his father’s thumb. They unofficially meet when the dogs from Grace’s side gig of dog walking bowl Noah over on the beach. They officially meet when Grace moves into her grandparent’s house, and Noah asks her to sell it to him to build a pool. But, when a prestigious home decor magazine takes notice of both Noah’s house and Grace’s talent, they are forced to work together. The more their feelings for each other grow, the more they are determined to fight it. But what happens when they don’t? Can they have a relationship and a good working relationship? Or will everything go back to what it was once the home rehab and magazine spread is done?
I loved Grace in How to Love Your Neighbor. She came from a rough upbringing (not knowingher father and a mother who could care less about her), and she was on track to realizing her dream. Inheriting her grandparent’s house, a space she could call her own, was a dream come true. So, I didn’t blame her when she acted the way she did when Noah came over and asked to buy the house. I also understood why she deliberately let Noah think that she couldn’t do the things that men “traditionally” do, and I loved it when she showed him up. But, there was also another side of Grace that made me sad. She wanted a relationship with her mother, and her mother (one of the most selfish characters I have ever read) took advantage of that. Unfortunately, it is a struggle that many adults with toxic parents deal with, and I liked how Grace ended up resolving it.
I loved Noah also. I will admit that I did get the wrong impression of him during the book’s first few chapters. He did come across as a pretty crappy guy. But, as the author went into his character’s background, I grew to love him. He was dealing with so much from his father, and he was also trying to find his way in CA. He spent a good part of the book feeling like he wasn’t amounting to anything and not getting anywhere. It wasn’t until almost the end that things started to come together for him.
The romance angle of the book was so sweet. I loved watching Grace and Noah fall in love. They both fought it, making it so much more precious to read.
There are a couple of nongraphic sex scenes in How to Love Your Neighbor. Now, I don’t mind explicit sex scenes, but nongraphic was the way to go in a book like this.
The end of How to Love Your Neighbor was your typical HEA. But what I loved was the epilogue (even if it wasn’t called that). It made me unbelievably happy, and looking forward to reading book 2.
I would recommend How to Love You Neighbor to anyone over 16. There are mild language and non-explicit sex scenes.
What are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? What do you think you’ll read next?
Personal:
Last week, I had done an update of what was happening with me (why I wasn’t posting). Here’s the update to that.
My arm is better. I got back my full range of motion but it still hurts when I move it in certain directions (like taking my bra on/off or brushing my hair). Other than giving birth naturally (which happened with Miss R), that is the most painful thing I have experienced to date and do not wish to experience again.
We got the results of Miss R’s sleep study. She was diagnosed with periodic limb movement disorder. I am still waiting to hear from the Dr but got the diagnosis from the patient portal when I logged on yesterday. I am expecting a phone call from the specialist today (maybe?) and then we will discuss what will happen going forward.
Mr. Z got his braces last Thursday!!! They only put on the top braces which weren’t something I was expecting. I had thought they were going to do top and bottom. But, ortho explained that he wants the top teeth to start to straighten out before he puts the bottom and the Herbstdevice on. Mr. Z wasn’t thrilled with that change in plan but oh well, what is he going to do?
Miss B had her doctor’s appointment yesterday (for her 16 well-child) and we found out that she has slight scoliosis of the spine. Her Dr wasn’t that concerned with it. She has reached her adult height of 5’0″ and the curvature isn’t going to affect her in any way. Still, was very surprised to find out.
Reading
I have been reading like a fiend. I have finished 4 books (I think) since last week and plan on finishing at least 2 more by the end of this week. I have caught up with all of my indie authors and now am working on my NetGalley backlog. So yay!!!!
But, I am very behind on reviews. I have two reviews due this week (one I am working on after I am done with this post) and then 2 more that need to get written by next week. I am planning on buckling down after this post and getting at least 2 reviews written today and hopefully the rest is written tomorrow (keeping my fingers crossed).
Watching:
I had been watching the Olympics and put most of my shows on pause while that was going on. I wasn’t too impressed with what was shown. I would have loved to see some of the lesser-known or newer sports on prime time. Instead, it was repeat upon repeat of the same thing. NBC dropped the ball on that one (and I refused to get Peacock to watch what I wanted). I had the same complaints about the Summer Olympics too.
Once they ended, I started watching my shows again. I binged Archive 81 in 4 days. I don’t know if any of you have watched that but it is freaking creepy. I also didn’t like the ending. Put it this way, I didn’t see it coming and wasn’t thrilled with what happened. But, it did lead into a Season2 (maybe, hopefully). So, we’ll see. Right now, I am watching Chosen. It is a Dutch show about a girl finding out the truth about their small, quiet town. I am still on episode 1 and not really feeling it. But, I felt the same way about Archive 81 and ended up liking it, so we’ll see.
Making:
This week I am making a Philly Cheesesteak French Onion Soup. Not having high hopes for this recipe….lol. BK is home and he is making marinated chicken also, so there is a backup. Next week, I’m making a garlic lover’s pot roast.
So, that the catch up with me. As always, let me know if you have read any of these books and what you have thought about them.
What I Recently Finished Reading:
Who is the power behind the throne?
Marian has risked everything to bring King Richard the Lionheart to England.
But as the king’s heart turns toward vengeance who will be left to stand in his wake?
If you like inspirational heroines, unique love stories, and non-stop twists and turns, this action-packed fantasy retelling is for you!
I wasn’t a big fan of how this book went. It seemed a little rushed. It left me with a bad taste in my mouth. Mainly because in the first two books, Mare was portrayed as someone different and in this book, she did a 180. Still, would highly recommend this Robin Hood retelling!!
What I am currently reading:
Interior Design School?Check.Cute house to fix up?Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans?Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
I am enjoying this book. It is a cute read and I am 100% team Grace. Noah is rubbing me the wrong way, even with him trying to make amends. I am about 50% (or so) through and I have a feeling this book is going to get a lot better!!!
What books I think I’ll read next:
All of these books are NetGalley ARC’s that are past their publication date. I am expecting to get to at least the first 3 by next Wednesday.
A biting novel from an electrifying new voice, Such a Pretty Smile is a heart-stopping tour-de-force about powerful women, angry men, and all the ways in which girls fight against the forces that try to silence them.
There’s something out there that’s killing. Known only as The Cur, he leaves no traces, save for the torn bodies of girls, on the verge of becoming women, who are known as trouble-makers; those who refuse to conform, to know their place. Girls who don’t know when to shut up.
2019: Thirteen-year-old Lila Sawyer has secrets she can’t share with anyone. Not the school psychologist she’s seeing. Not her father, who has a new wife, and a new baby. And not her mother—the infamous Caroline Sawyer, a unique artist whose eerie sculptures, made from bent twigs and crimped leaves, have made her a local celebrity. But soon Lila feels haunted from within, terrorized by a delicious evil that shows her how to find her voice—until she is punished for using it.
2004: Caroline Sawyer hears dogs everywhere. Snarling, barking, teeth snapping that no one else seems to notice. At first, she blames the phantom sounds on her insomnia and her acute stress in caring for her ailing father. But then the delusions begin to take shape—both in her waking hours, and in the violent, visceral sculptures she creates while in a trance-like state. Her fiancé is convinced she needs help. Her new psychiatrist waves her “problem” away with pills. But Caroline’s past is a dark cellar, filled with repressed memories and a lurking horror that the men around her can’t understand.
As past demons become a present threat, both Caroline and Lila must chase the source of this unrelenting, oppressive power to its malignant core. Brilliantly paced, unsettling to the bone, and unapologetically fierce, Such a Pretty Smile is a powerful allegory for what it can mean to be a woman, and an untamed rallying cry for anyone ever told to sit down, shut up, and smile pretty.
A mysterious plague that causes random bouts of violence is sweeping the nation. Now three generations of women must navigate their chilling new reality in this moving exploration of identity, cycles of abuse, and hope.
Chelsea Martin appears to be the perfect housewife: married to her high school sweetheart, the mother of two daughters, keeper of an immaculate home.
But Chelsea’s husband has turned their home into a prison; he has been abusing her for years, cutting off her independence, autonomy, and support. She has nowhere to turn, not even to her narcissistic mother, Patricia, who is more concerned with maintaining the appearance of an ideal family than she is with her daughter’s actual well-being. And Chelsea is worried that her daughters will be trapped just as she is–until a mysterious illness sweeps the nation.
Known as The Violence, this illness causes the infected to experience sudden, explosive bouts of animalistic rage and attack anyone in their path. But for Chelsea, the chaos and confusion the virus causes is an opportunity–and inspires a plan to liberate herself from her abuser.
1866. In a coastal village in southern England, Nell picks violets for a living. Set apart by her community because of the birthmarks that speckle her skin, Nell’s world is her beloved brother and devotion to the sea.
But when Jasper Jupiter’s Circus of Wonders arrives in the village, Nell is kidnapped. Her father has sold her, promising Jasper Jupiter his very own leopard girl. It is the greatest betrayal of Nell’s life, but as her fame grows, and she finds friendship with the other performers and Jasper’s gentle brother Toby, she begins to wonder if joining the show is the best thing that has ever happened to her.
In London, newspapers describe Nell as the eighth wonder of the world. Figurines are cast in her image, and crowds rush to watch her soar through the air. But who gets to tell Nell’s story? What happens when her fame threatens to eclipse that of the showman who bought her? And as she falls in love with Toby, can he detach himself from his past and the terrible secret that binds him to his brother?
Moving from the pleasure gardens of Victorian London to the battle-scarred plains of the Crimea, Circus of Wonders is an astonishing story about power and ownership, fame and the threat of invisibility.
The past comes back to haunt psychologist Alex Delaware and Detective Milo Sturgis when they investigate a grisly double homicide and uncover an even more unspeakable motive in this riveting thriller from the #1 New York Times bestselling master of suspense.
Los Angeles is a city of sunlight, celebrity, and possibility. The L.A. often experienced by Homicide Lt. Detective Milo Sturgis and psychologist Alex Delaware, is a city of the dead.
Early one morning, the two of them find themselves in a neighborhood of pretty houses, pretty cars, and pretty people. The scene they encounter is anything but. A naked young man lies dead in the street, the apparent victim of a collision with a moving van hurtling through suburbia in the darkness. But any thoughts of accidental death vanish when a blood trail leads to a nearby home.
Inside, a young woman lies butchered. The identity of the male victim and his role in the horror remain elusive, but that of the woman creates additional questions. And adding to the shock, Alex has met her while working a convoluted child custody case. Cordelia Gannett was a self-styled internet influencer who’d gotten into legal troubles by palming herself off as a psychologist. Even after promising to desist, she’s found a loophole and has continued her online career, aiming to amass clicks and ads by cyber-coaching and cyber-counseling people plagued with relationship issues.
But upon closer examination, Alex and Milo discover that her own relationships are troublesome, including a tortured family history and a dubious personal past. Has that come back to haunt her in the worst way? Is the mystery man out in the street collateral damage or will he turn out to be the key to solving a grisly double homicide? As the psychologist and the detective explore L.A.’s meanest streets, they peel back layer after layer of secrets and encounter a savage, psychologically twisted, almost unthinkable motive for violence and bloodshed.
This is classic Delaware: Alex, a man Milo has come to see as irreplaceable, at his most insightful and brilliant.
An impossible crime. A detective on the edge of madness. The future of time travel at stake. From the author of The Warehouse.
January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder.
Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly waiting to catch their “flights” to the past.
Or where proximity to the timeport makes the clocks run backward on occasion—and, rumor has it, allows ghosts to stroll the halls.
None of that compares to the corpse in room 526. The one that seems to be both there and not there. The one that somehow only January can see.
On top of that, some very important new guests have just checked in. Because the U.S. government is about to privatize time-travel technology—and the world’s most powerful people are on hand to stake their claims.
January is sure the timing isn’t a coincidence. Neither are those “accidents” that start stalking their bidders.
There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. A reason why she’s the only one who can catch a killer who’s operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once.
But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and as her past, present, and future collide, she finds herself confronting not just the hotel’s dark secrets but her own.
At once a dazzlingly time-twisting murder mystery and a story about grief, memory, and what it means to—literally—come face-to-face with our ghosts, The Paradox Hotel is another unforgettable speculative thrill ride from acclaimed author Rob Hart.
What are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? What do you think you’ll read next?
Personal:
For the 4th week in a row, we are expecting snow here in Western NC. Our local weather people are going insane over this because it never happens. I am OK with it as long as the kids don’t miss school.
Miss R is having a sleep study done. She has been waking up gasping and isn’t getting a good night’s sleep. Her Dr said to do a sleep study to rule out sleep apnea and then onto an ENT. Was not expecting that but it needs to be looked at. Keeping my fingers crossed that the sleep test rules out stuff and that the ENT doesn’t need to do surgery.
Mr. Z has officially applied to the high school of his choice. In my area of NC, the city has 4different high schools. There is the local high school, the magnate high school, and two charter high schools. His choice (drum roll please): the magnate high school that his sister attends. While she attends the criminal justice academy, he will be attending the computer programming academy. That is if he gets in (but I have it on good authority that he will).
Miss B had to drop out of the air rifle team. Their practices were after school (for the local highschool) but during her last period. So she couldn’t attend and she was very upset. She was looking forward to it. I have pushed her into joining the Gay/Straight Student Alliance but she is not really feeling it. In her words: “I don’t need to announce to everyone that I’m gay.” She is debating on trying out for the play (I think it’s called Zombie Prom??) but she hasn’t made up her mind.
Reading
January sucked for me with reading. My start into February has been great and I am hoping to keep my reading streak up. I am a little behind with my indie author reading. I have a paperback that an author sent me that I haven’t picked up and the review was due two weeks ago…sigh. I am also severely behind with my NetGalley ARCs. I am not sweating it, though. A lot of those ARCs have archive dates way in the future and I am getting to them when I get to them. The indie authors are more important.
I am just about caught up with my indie author reviews (I have to buckle down and finish one for tomorrow and one over the weekend). I am caught up with my NetGalley reviews (for once).
Watching:
Honestly, I haven’t been watching much of anything. I have been either too tired to watch TV or I have lost interest in anything that I was watching (except ER). So, any suggestions would be nice.
Making:
I made a chile-lime pulled beef (not pork like I said in last week’s post) on Monday. I served it over white rice. It was alright. The kids liked it but they all said it wouldn’t be something that they asked for again. Next week, I plan on making a beef bourguignon in the crockpot. On paper it looks good, we’ll see about how it tastes. The author of the recipe says to serve it with mashed potatoes but since it has potatoes in the recipe, I’ll be skipping that.
So, that the catch up with me. As always, let me know if you have read any of these books and what you have thought about them. Just a warning, it will basically be the same as last week.
What I Recently Finished Reading:
Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . .
Time is running out in the empire of Rheinvelt.
The sudden appearance of a strange and frightening statue foretells darkness. The Hierophants—magic users of the highest order—have fled the land. And the shadowy beasts of the nearby Hinterlands are gathering near the borders, preparing for an attack.
Young Prince Alphonsus is sent by his mother, the Empress Sabine, to reassure the people while she works to quell the threat of war. But Alphonsus has other problems on his mind, including a great secret: He has a clock in his chest where his heart should be—and it’s begun to run backwards, counting down to his unknown fate.
Searching for answers about the clock, Alphonsus meets Esme, a Hierophant girl who has returned to the empire in search of a sorceress known as the Nachtfrau. When riddles from their shared past threaten the future of the empire, Alphonsus and Esme must learn to trust each other and work together to save it—or see the destruction of everything they both love.
I enjoyed reading this book. But, I wouldn’t go as far as to recommend it to younger kids. This is a higher middle-grade book (think over 13). There are a lot of very dark undertones in the book. There are also some scenes where younger kids would be scared.
What I am currently reading:
“We’re all complicit in things we regret. Sometimes, we just do what we must.”
In the city-state of Devovea, behind the walls of the Castle, Scylla Delevan waits for a chance to prove herself. When a Magistrate is murdered and her father stands accused of the crime, she eagerly sets out to prove his innocence. As she races to find the real killer before it is too late, she begins to unearth dangerous secrets that could throw the fragile balance of her city into chaos. In too deep to turn back, Scylla is forced to question all she has ever known and choose between what is expected of her and what is right.
Family loyalty and personal beliefs collide as Scylla navigates a dystopian world divided by race and gender. Heir of Blood and Secrets will challenge you to consider how far you are willing to go—and what you are willing to sacrifice—to forge a better world.
What books I think I’ll read next:
I am listing these in the order that I expect to read them. Barring an act of God (or my kids not having school), I do plan on reading at least the first 4 by next week.
He took them in, but could they ever leave? There’s something off about Lord Rupert Lacy, but Caz’s hippy mother and dreamy younger sister don’t see it. In fact, they’re so taken with the guy that within a week of meeting him, they accept his invitation to move in. Though it’s a step up from living in a trailer, Lacy’s dilapidated mansion scares Caz. Haunted by strange noises and bizarre dreams, Caz becomes convinced that Lacy’s missing daughter is trying to tell her something.
Scotland, 1342. The Great Plague ravages the countryside. In its wake the body of a beautiful, young noble is laid to rest on a funeral pyre. Her fiancé begs a sorcerer to use his magic to summon a demon and bring the young woman back to life in exchange for his own. Fast Forward to: America, Present. Fourteen year old Jeremy McKee attends a fantasy workshop which is run by a young woman named Ariella. One afternoon, an old vagrant on the street offers Jeremy a small crystal which produces visions of a young woman resurrected from death hundreds of years ago. Slowly, the truth begins to reveal itself. The woman in the vision and the one running the workshop are one in the same. The vagrant is the sorcerer, Armand. He explains that Jeremy’s ancestor, D’Arcy, offered his soul for the life of his betrothed but reneged at the last minute. Now the demon has returned for payment and is prepared to unleash the Black Plague if he doesn’t get what he he is owed.
Who is the power behind the throne?
Marian has risked everything to bring King Richard the Lionheart to England.
But as the king’s heart turns toward vengeance who will be left to stand in his wake?
If you like inspirational heroines, unique love stories, and non-stop twists and turns, this action-packed fantasy retelling is for you!
If you could read someone’s mind, what would you do with the truth?
Hunted by both the military and her own personal stalker, Dani conceals her psychic abilities and hides in plain sight. Within her mind is the ability to change the landscape of nations. For that, a branch of the government would lock her away—to ensure her safety.
Marc Crofton left his black-ops unit to join his brothers’ private investigative after discharge. A chance meeting with the quiet, unassuming spitfire in his veterinarian’s office sends his world in a tail spin involving spies, both domestic and international.
Each must rely on the other to survive a world where betrayal and deception, desire and trust, weave a fabric that transcends time.
A biting novel from an electrifying new voice, Such a Pretty Smile is a heart-stopping tour-de-force about powerful women, angry men, and all the ways in which girls fight against the forces that try to silence them.
There’s something out there that’s killing. Known only as The Cur, he leaves no traces, save for the torn bodies of girls, on the verge of becoming women, who are known as trouble-makers; those who refuse to conform, to know their place. Girls who don’t know when to shut up.
2019: Thirteen-year-old Lila Sawyer has secrets she can’t share with anyone. Not the school psychologist she’s seeing. Not her father, who has a new wife, and a new baby. And not her mother—the infamous Caroline Sawyer, a unique artist whose eerie sculptures, made from bent twigs and crimped leaves, have made her a local celebrity. But soon Lila feels haunted from within, terrorized by a delicious evil that shows her how to find her voice—until she is punished for using it.
2004: Caroline Sawyer hears dogs everywhere. Snarling, barking, teeth snapping that no one else seems to notice. At first, she blames the phantom sounds on her insomnia and her acute stress in caring for her ailing father. But then the delusions begin to take shape—both in her waking hours, and in the violent, visceral sculptures she creates while in a trance-like state. Her fiancé is convinced she needs help. Her new psychiatrist waves her “problem” away with pills. But Caroline’s past is a dark cellar, filled with repressed memories and a lurking horror that the men around her can’t understand.
As past demons become a present threat, both Caroline and Lila must chase the source of this unrelenting, oppressive power to its malignant core. Brilliantly paced, unsettling to the bone, and unapologetically fierce, Such a Pretty Smile is a powerful allegory for what it can mean to be a woman, and an untamed rallying cry for anyone ever told to sit down, shut up, and smile pretty.
Interior Design School? Check.Cute house to fix up?Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans? Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
A mysterious plague that causes random bouts of violence is sweeping the nation. Now three generations of women must navigate their chilling new reality in this moving exploration of identity, cycles of abuse, and hope.
Chelsea Martin appears to be the perfect housewife: married to her high school sweetheart, the mother of two daughters, keeper of an immaculate home.
But Chelsea’s husband has turned their home into a prison; he has been abusing her for years, cutting off her independence, autonomy, and support. She has nowhere to turn, not even to her narcissistic mother, Patricia, who is more concerned with maintaining the appearance of an ideal family than she is with her daughter’s actual well-being. And Chelsea is worried that her daughters will be trapped just as she is–until a mysterious illness sweeps the nation.
Known as The Violence, this illness causes the infected to experience sudden, explosive bouts of animalistic rage and attack anyone in their path. But for Chelsea, the chaos and confusion the virus causes is an opportunity–and inspires a plan to liberate herself from her abuser.
1866. In a coastal village in southern England, Nell picks violets for a living. Set apart by her community because of the birthmarks that speckle her skin, Nell’s world is her beloved brother and devotion to the sea.
But when Jasper Jupiter’s Circus of Wonders arrives in the village, Nell is kidnapped. Her father has sold her, promising Jasper Jupiter his very own leopard girl. It is the greatest betrayal of Nell’s life, but as her fame grows, and she finds friendship with the other performers and Jasper’s gentle brother Toby, she begins to wonder if joining the show is the best thing that has ever happened to her.
In London, newspapers describe Nell as the eighth wonder of the world. Figurines are cast in her image, and crowds rush to watch her soar through the air. But who gets to tell Nell’s story? What happens when her fame threatens to eclipse that of the showman who bought her? And as she falls in love with Toby, can he detach himself from his past and the terrible secret that binds him to his brother?
Moving from the pleasure gardens of Victorian London to the battle-scarred plains of the Crimea, Circus of Wonders is an astonishing story about power and ownership, fame and the threat of invisibility.
The past comes back to haunt psychologist Alex Delaware and Detective Milo Sturgis when they investigate a grisly double homicide and uncover an even more unspeakable motive in this riveting thriller from the #1 New York Times bestselling master of suspense.
Los Angeles is a city of sunlight, celebrity, and possibility. The L.A. often experienced by Homicide Lt. Detective Milo Sturgis and psychologist Alex Delaware, is a city of the dead.
Early one morning, the two of them find themselves in a neighborhood of pretty houses, pretty cars, and pretty people. The scene they encounter is anything but. A naked young man lies dead in the street, the apparent victim of a collision with a moving van hurtling through suburbia in the darkness. But any thoughts of accidental death vanish when a blood trail leads to a nearby home.
Inside, a young woman lies butchered. The identity of the male victim and his role in the horror remain elusive, but that of the woman creates additional questions. And adding to the shock, Alex has met her while working a convoluted child custody case. Cordelia Gannett was a self-styled internet influencer who’d gotten into legal troubles by palming herself off as a psychologist. Even after promising to desist, she’s found a loophole and has continued her online career, aiming to amass clicks and ads by cyber-coaching and cyber-counseling people plagued with relationship issues.
But upon closer examination, Alex and Milo discover that her own relationships are troublesome, including a tortured family history and a dubious personal past. Has that come back to haunt her in the worst way? Is the mystery man out in the street collateral damage or will he turn out to be the key to solving a grisly double homicide? As the psychologist and the detective explore L.A.’s meanest streets, they peel back layer after layer of secrets and encounter a savage, psychologically twisted, almost unthinkable motive for violence and bloodshed.
This is classic Delaware: Alex, a man Milo has come to see as irreplaceable, at his most insightful and brilliant.
February is the month of groundhogs, love, and the Winter Olympics. I plan on ignoring the first one, celebrating the second, and watching the third.
I also plan on doing reading. A lot of reading. I have carried over a bunch of books from January. Maybe not as much as what I carried over from December, but still a lot.
So, here’s my list. Please let me know if you have read or are reading any of these books!!
January backlog:
Interior Design School?Check.Cute house to fix up?Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans?Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
There’s something out there that’s killing. Known only as The Cur, he leaves no traces, save for the torn bodies of girls, on the verge of becoming women, who are known as trouble-makers; those who refuse to conform, to know their place. Girls who don’t know when to shut up.
2019: Thirteen-year-old Lila Sawyer has secrets she can’t share with anyone. Not the school psychologist she’s seeing. Not her father, who has a new wife, and a new baby. And not her mother—the infamous Caroline Sawyer, a unique artist whose eerie sculptures, made from bent twigs and crimped leaves, have made her a local celebrity. But soon Lila feels haunted from within, terrorized by a delicious evil that shows her how to find her voice—until she is punished for using it.
2004: Caroline Sawyer hears dogs everywhere. Snarling, barking, teeth snapping that no one else seems to notice. At first, she blames the phantom sounds on her insomnia and her acute stress in caring for her ailing father. But then the delusions begin to take shape—both in her waking hours, and in the violent, visceral sculptures she creates while in a trance-like state. Her fiancé is convinced she needs help. Her new psychiatrist waves her “problem” away with pills. But Caroline’s past is a dark cellar, filled with repressed memories and a lurking horror that the men around her can’t understand.
As past demons become a present threat, both Caroline and Lila must chase the source of this unrelenting, oppressive power to its malignant core. Brilliantly paced, unsettling to the bone, and unapologetically fierce, Such a Pretty Smile is a powerful allegory for what it can mean to be a woman, and an untamed rallying cry for anyone ever told to sit down, shut up, and smile pretty.
If you could read someone’s mind, what would you do with the truth?
Hunted by both the military and her own personal stalker, Dani conceals her psychic abilities and hides in plain sight. Within her mind is the ability to change the landscape of nations. For that, a branch of the government would lock her away—to ensure her safety.
Marc Crofton left his black-ops unit to join his brothers’ private investigative after discharge. A chance meeting with the quiet, unassuming spitfire in his veterinarian’s office sends his world in a tail spin involving spies, both domestic and international.
Each must rely on the other to survive a world where betrayal and deception, desire and trust, weave a fabric that transcends time.
A virus invades the lives of all humanity and causes a madness pandemic from the reminder of the past and the exposure of thoughts threatening to change everything, but then another virus attempts to erase the memories and recover the future, while a third virus scopes to save the new generations.
Who is the power behind the throne?
Marian has risked everything to bring King Richard the Lionheart to England.
But as the king’s heart turns toward vengeance who will be left to stand in his wake?
If you like inspirational heroines, unique love stories, and non-stop twists and turns, this action-packed fantasy retelling is for you!
February TBR
Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . .
Time is running out in the empire of Rheinvelt.
The sudden appearance of a strange and frightening statue foretells darkness. The Hierophants—magic users of the highest order—have fled the land. And the shadowy beasts of the nearby Hinterlands are gathering near the borders, preparing for an attack.
Young Prince Alphonsus is sent by his mother, the Empress Sabine, to reassure the people while she works to quell the threat of war. But Alphonsus has other problems on his mind, including a great secret: He has a clock in his chest where his heart should be—and it’s begun to run backwards, counting down to his unknown fate.
Searching for answers about the clock, Alphonsus meets Esme, a Hierophant girl who has returned to the empire in search of a sorceress known as the Nachtfrau. When riddles from their shared past threaten the future of the empire, Alphonsus and Esme must learn to trust each other and work together to save it—or see the destruction of everything they both love.
1866. In a coastal village in southern England, Nell picks violets for a living. Set apart by her community because of the birthmarks that speckle her skin, Nell’s world is her beloved brother and devotion to the sea.
But when Jasper Jupiter’s Circus of Wonders arrives in the village, Nell is kidnapped. Her father has sold her, promising Jasper Jupiter his very own leopard girl. It is the greatest betrayal of Nell’s life, but as her fame grows, and she finds friendship with the other performers and Jasper’s gentle brother Toby, she begins to wonder if joining the show is the best thing that has ever happened to her.
In London, newspapers describe Nell as the eighth wonder of the world. Figurines are cast in her image, and crowds rush to watch her soar through the air. But who gets to tell Nell’s story? What happens when her fame threatens to eclipse that of the showman who bought her? And as she falls in love with Toby, can he detach himself from his past and the terrible secret that binds him to his brother?
Moving from the pleasure gardens of Victorian London to the battle-scarred plains of the Crimea, Circus of Wonders is an astonishing story about power and ownership, fame and the threat of invisibility.
A mysterious plague that causes random bouts of violence is sweeping the nation. Now three generations of women must navigate their chilling new reality in this moving exploration of identity, cycles of abuse, and hope.
Chelsea Martin appears to be the perfect housewife: married to her high school sweetheart, the mother of two daughters, keeper of an immaculate home.
But Chelsea’s husband has turned their home into a prison; he has been abusing her for years, cutting off her independence, autonomy, and support. She has nowhere to turn, not even to her narcissistic mother, Patricia, who is more concerned with maintaining the appearance of an ideal family than she is with her daughter’s actual well-being. And Chelsea is worried that her daughters will be trapped just as she is–until a mysterious illness sweeps the nation.
Known as The Violence, this illness causes the infected to experience sudden, explosive bouts of animalistic rage and attack anyone in their path. But for Chelsea, the chaos and confusion the virus causes is an opportunity–and inspires a plan to liberate herself from her abuser.
The past comes back to haunt psychologist Alex Delaware and Detective Milo Sturgis when they investigate a grisly double homicide and uncover an even more unspeakable motive in this riveting thriller from the #1 New York Times bestselling master of suspense.
Los Angeles is a city of sunlight, celebrity, and possibility. The L.A. often experienced by Homicide Lt. Detective Milo Sturgis and psychologist Alex Delaware, is a city of the dead.
Early one morning, the two of them find themselves in a neighborhood of pretty houses, pretty cars, and pretty people. The scene they encounter is anything but. A naked young man lies dead in the street, the apparent victim of a collision with a moving van hurtling through suburbia in the darkness. But any thoughts of accidental death vanish when a blood trail leads to a nearby home.
Inside, a young woman lies butchered. The identity of the male victim and his role in the horror remain elusive, but that of the woman creates additional questions. And adding to the shock, Alex has met her while working a convoluted child custody case. Cordelia Gannett was a self-styled internet influencer who’d gotten into legal troubles by palming herself off as a psychologist. Even after promising to desist, she’s found a loophole and has continued her online career, aiming to amass clicks and ads by cyber-coaching and cyber-counseling people plagued with relationship issues.
But upon closer examination, Alex and Milo discover that her own relationships are troublesome, including a tortured family history and a dubious personal past. Has that come back to haunt her in the worst way? Is the mystery man out in the street collateral damage or will he turn out to be the key to solving a grisly double homicide? As the psychologist and the detective explore L.A.’s meanest streets, they peel back layer after layer of secrets and encounter a savage, psychologically twisted, almost unthinkable motive for violence and bloodshed.
This is classic Delaware: Alex, a man Milo has come to see as irreplaceable, at his most insightful and brilliant.
“We’re all complicit in things we regret. Sometimes, we just do what we must.”
In the city-state of Devovea, behind the walls of the Castle, Scylla Delevan waits for a chance to prove herself. When a Magistrate is murdered and her father stands accused of the crime, she eagerly sets out to prove his innocence. As she races to find the real killer before it is too late, she begins to unearth dangerous secrets that could throw the fragile balance of her city into chaos. In too deep to turn back, Scylla is forced to question all she has ever known and choose between what is expected of her and what is right.
Family loyalty and personal beliefs collide as Scylla navigates a dystopian world divided by race and gender. Heir of Blood and Secrets will challenge you to consider how far you are willing to go—and what you are willing to sacrifice—to forge a better world.
The Insect Room by Felicity Hughes
Scotland, 1342. The Great Plague ravages the countryside. In its wake the body of a beautiful, young noble is laid to rest on a funeral pyre. Her fiancé begs a sorcerer to use his magic to summon a demon and bring the young woman back to life in exchange for his own. Fast Forward to: America, Present. Fourteen year old Jeremy McKee attends a fantasy workshop which is run by a young woman named Ariella. One afternoon, an old vagrant on the street offers Jeremy a small crystal which produces visions of a young woman resurrected from death hundreds of years ago. Slowly, the truth begins to reveal itself. The woman in the vision and the one running the workshop are one in the same. The vagrant is the sorcerer, Armand. He explains that Jeremy’s ancestor, D’Arcy, offered his soul for the life of his betrothed but reneged at the last minute. Now the demon has returned for payment and is prepared to unleash the Black Plague if he doesn’t get what he he is owed.
A locked-room murder mystery set at a hotel for time travelers—in which a detective must solve an impossible crime even as her own sanity crumbles—from the author of The Warehouse.
For someone with January Cole’s background, running security at a fancy hotel shouldn’t be much of a challenge.
Except the Paradox is no ordinary hotel. Here, the ultra-wealthy guests are costumed for a dozen different time periods, all anxiously waiting to catch their “flights” to the past. And proximity to the timeport makes for an interesting stay. The clocks run backwards on occasion—and, rumor has it, ghosts stroll the halls.
Now, January’s job is about to get a whole lot harder. Because the U.S. government is getting ready to privatize time-travel technology—and a handful of trillionaires have just arrived to put down their bids.
Meanwhile there’s a blizzard rolling in, and the timestream’s acting strange. Which means nobody’s leaving until further notice.
And there’s a murderer on the loose.
Or at least, that’s what January suspects. Except the corpse in question is one that somehow only she can see. And the accidents stalking their prestigious guests…well, the only way a killer could engineer those is by operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once. Which is surely impossible.
There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and forcing her to confront secrets of her own.
Because here at the Paradox Hotel, the past is waiting around every corner.
At once a dazzlingly time-twisting murder mystery and a story about grief, memory, and what it means to—literally—come face to face with our ghosts, The Paradox Hotel is another unforgettable speculative thrill-ride from acclaimed author Rob Hart.
What are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? What do you think you’ll read next?
Personal:
After a week of no school (but they did have virtual learning Thursday and Friday), my kids went back to school on Monday. I can’t tell you how excited I was for them to go back…lol. I love them but they were getting on each other’s nerves and mine.
We’re slated to get hit with another snowstorm on Saturday. Like I mentioned last week, any snow that we get, the city shuts down. My prediction….no school Monday and maybe a 2-3 hour delay on Tuesday. Of course, Miss R is thrilled. She loves snow and days off from school.
I don’t know if I mentioned it but Miss B got on her JROTC air rifle team. She got the email the week of January 10th and she is so excited!! She is also doing JROTC events and going up in rank.
I have nothing really to say about Mr. Z. He’s my low-key, no-maintenance kid. He has discovered a love for zombie books. We had gotten him books 1-3 of The Extinction Cycle series by Nicholas Sansbury Smith for Christmas and he devoured them. BK ordered books 4-6 around New Year and Mr. Z finished them. He’s asking for other books in that genre.
As I mentioned above, Miss R is loving the snow. She has spent hours outside, playing in it. I am liking it because she’s outside and not sitting around with her face glued to a screen. In other news (with her), I got her 3-week progress report for Quarter 3 (they get two progress reports a quarter). Her reading level blew me away. She went from an 80L (Lexile Range)-230L to a 665L-815L. Depending on the site, that puts her at a middle/late 3rd grade/early 4th-grade reading level. I am very proud of her!!
Reading:
I barely did any reading last week. I was very stressed out (with the kids being virtual). That also led to me developing my first ocular migraine. That lasted for a little over 4 days (Weds, Thurs,Fri, and Saturday) and I am still not feeling 100%. I am also behind on my indie author reviews. Thankfully, they are understanding (stupid migraine)
Review-wise, I am still behind. Because of my migraine, I wasn’t able to write anything (it hurt tolook at the screen). I am hoping to catch up with Random House/SMP reviews by Friday and to have the indie author reviews written by Sunday. I hate being behind!!
Watching:
BK and I started watching Foundation on Apple Plus but we stopped after the first episode. It was because of my migraine and not feeling well. We also started watching Ted Lasso.
Making:
I made the unstuffed shells yesterday. It was a pretty easy dish to make and the kids loved it. Next week, I am making Chile Lime pulled pork. I am not holding my breath with them liking it (they are all very picky) but miracles have happened.
So, that the catch up with me. As always, let me know if you have read any of these books and what you have thought about them. Just a warning, it will basically be the same as last week.
What I Recently Finished Reading:
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Wife Upstairs comes a deliciously wicked gothic suspense, set on an isolated Pacific island with a dark history, for fans of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware.
When Lux McAllister and her boyfriend, Nico, are hired to sail two women to a remote island in the South Pacific, it seems like the opportunity of a lifetime. Stuck in a dead-end job in Hawaii, and longing to travel the world after a family tragedy, Lux is eager to climb on board The Susannah and set out on an adventure. She’s also quick to bond with their passengers, college best friends Brittany and Amma. The two women say they want to travel off the beaten path. But like Lux, they may have other reasons to be seeking an escape.
Shimmering on the horizon after days at sea, Meroe Island is every bit the paradise the foursome expects, despite a mysterious history of shipwrecks, cannibalism, and even rumors of murder. But what they don’t expect is to discover another boat already anchored off Meroe’s sandy beaches. The owners of the Azure Sky, Jake and Eliza, are a true golden couple: gorgeous, laidback, and if their sleek catamaran and well-stocked bar are any indication, rich. Now a party of six, the new friends settle in to experience life on an exotic island, and the serenity of being completely off the grid. Lux hasn’t felt like she truly belonged anywhere in years, yet here on Meroe, with these fellow free spirits, she finally has a sense of peace.
But with the arrival of a skeevy stranger sailing alone in pursuit of a darker kind of good time, the balance of the group is disrupted. Soon, cracks begin to emerge: it seems that Brittany and Amma haven’t been completely honest with Lux about their pasts––and perhaps not even with each other. And though Jake and Eliza seem like the perfect pair, the rocky history of their relationship begins to resurface, and their reasons for sailing to Meroe might not be as innocent as they first appeared.
When it becomes clear that the group is even more cut off from civilization than they initially thought, it starts to feel like the island itself is closing in on them. And when one person goes missing, and another turns up dead, Lux begins to wonder if any of them are going to make it off the island alive.
What I am currently reading:
When Kayla Carter’s husband dies in an accident while building their dream house, she knows she has to stay strong for their four-year-old daughter. But the trophy home in Shadow Ridge Estates, a new development in sleepy Round Hill, North Carolina, will always hold tragic memories. But when she is confronted by an odd, older woman telling her not to move in, she almost agrees. It’s clear this woman has some kind of connection to the area…and a connection to Kayla herself. Kayla’s elderly new neighbor, Ellie Hockley, is more welcoming, but it’s clear she, too, has secrets that stretch back almost fifty years. Is Ellie on a quest to right the wrongs of the past? And does the house at the end of the street hold the key? Told in dual time periods, The Last House on the Street is a novel of shocking prejudice and violence, forbidden love, the search for justice, and the tangled vines of two families.
Pall Warren lives in a world filled with unrivaled natural beauty, constant struggle and shifting perceptions of reality. The time frame of his story is set in a medieval context. Peace over the land he lives in is an illusion only. Pall discovers that war not only must be waged against competing interests within his own land, but also against unnerving entities filled with extreme malice toward the human race. As the journey to discover who he really is unfolds, he learns that appearances are not at all what they seem to be on their surfaces.
This story is ultimately about the battle between faith and disbelief, as well as how hope and cynicism clash against one another in the human spirit.
Can the ultimate basis of truth be found? In Pall’s quest for meaning, can virtue be used to combat and overcome evil?
What books I think I’ll read next:
A virus invades the lives of all humanity and causes a madness pandemic from the reminder of the past and the exposure of thoughts threatening to change everything, but then another virus attempts to erase the memories and recover the future, while a third virus scopes to save the new generations.
Tick . . . tick . . . tick . . .
Time is running out in the empire of Rheinvelt.
The sudden appearance of a strange and frightening statue foretells darkness. The Hierophants—magic users of the highest order—have fled the land. And the shadowy beasts of the nearby Hinterlands are gathering near the borders, preparing for an attack.
Young Prince Alphonsus is sent by his mother, the Empress Sabine, to reassure the people while she works to quell the threat of war. But Alphonsus has other problems on his mind, including a great secret: He has a clock in his chest where his heart should be—and it’s begun to run backwards, counting down to his unknown fate.
Searching for answers about the clock, Alphonsus meets Esme, a Hierophant girl who has returned to the empire in search of a sorceress known as the Nachtfrau. When riddles from their shared past threaten the future of the empire, Alphonsus and Esme must learn to trust each other and work together to save it—or see the destruction of everything they both love.
If you could read someone’s mind, what would you do with the truth?
Hunted by both the military and her own personal stalker, Dani conceals her psychic abilities and hides in plain sight. Within her mind is the ability to change the landscape of nations. For that, a branch of the government would lock her away—to ensure her safety.
Marc Crofton left his black-ops unit to join his brothers’ private investigative after discharge. A chance meeting with the quiet, unassuming spitfire in his veterinarian’s office sends his world in a tail spin involving spies, both domestic and international.
Each must rely on the other to survive a world where betrayal and deception, desire and trust, weave a fabric that transcends time.
Who is the power behind the throne?
Marian has risked everything to bring King Richard the Lionheart to England.
But as the king’s heart turns toward vengeance who will be left to stand in his wake?
If you like inspirational heroines, unique love stories, and non-stop twists and turns, this action-packed fantasy retelling is for you!
A biting novel from an electrifying new voice, Such a Pretty Smile is a heart-stopping tour-de-force about powerful women, angry men, and all the ways in which girls fight against the forces that try to silence them.
There’s something out there that’s killing. Known only as The Cur, he leaves no traces, save for the torn bodies of girls, on the verge of becoming women, who are known as trouble-makers; those who refuse to conform, to know their place. Girls who don’t know when to shut up.
2019: Thirteen-year-old Lila Sawyer has secrets she can’t share with anyone. Not the school psychologist she’s seeing. Not her father, who has a new wife, and a new baby. And not her mother—the infamous Caroline Sawyer, a unique artist whose eerie sculptures, made from bent twigs and crimped leaves, have made her a local celebrity. But soon Lila feels haunted from within, terrorized by a delicious evil that shows her how to find her voice—until she is punished for using it.
2004: Caroline Sawyer hears dogs everywhere. Snarling, barking, teeth snapping that no one else seems to notice. At first, she blames the phantom sounds on her insomnia and her acute stress in caring for her ailing father. But then the delusions begin to take shape—both in her waking hours, and in the violent, visceral sculptures she creates while in a trance-like state. Her fiancé is convinced she needs help. Her new psychiatrist waves her “problem” away with pills. But Caroline’s past is a dark cellar, filled with repressed memories and a lurking horror that the men around her can’t understand.
As past demons become a present threat, both Caroline and Lila must chase the source of this unrelenting, oppressive power to its malignant core. Brilliantly paced, unsettling to the bone, and unapologetically fierce, Such a Pretty Smile is a powerful allegory for what it can mean to be a woman, and an untamed rallying cry for anyone ever told to sit down, shut up, and smile pretty.
Interior Design School? Check. Cute house to fix up? Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans? Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
A mysterious plague that causes random bouts of violence is sweeping the nation. Now three generations of women must navigate their chilling new reality in this moving exploration of identity, cycles of abuse, and hope.
Chelsea Martin appears to be the perfect housewife: married to her high school sweetheart, the mother of two daughters, keeper of an immaculate home.
But Chelsea’s husband has turned their home into a prison; he has been abusing her for years, cutting off her independence, autonomy, and support. She has nowhere to turn, not even to her narcissistic mother, Patricia, who is more concerned with maintaining the appearance of an ideal family than she is with her daughter’s actual well-being. And Chelsea is worried that her daughters will be trapped just as she is–until a mysterious illness sweeps the nation.
Known as The Violence, this illness causes the infected to experience sudden, explosive bouts of animalistic rage and attack anyone in their path. But for Chelsea, the chaos and confusion the virus causes is an opportunity–and inspires a plan to liberate herself from her abuser.
