REVIEW: HOLY COW! The Therapist by B.A. Paris was unputdownable. I literally couldn’t put this book down. I ordered pizza last night because I didn’t want to take time to cook. The pizza was great but, the book was better. Have you ever been so engrossed in a book and looked up to find you were sitting at home on your couch? That happened to me with this book. Wow!

There were so many suspects in this book and so many reasons they were each a suspect. Then so many reasons why they weren’t a suspect. I was lead to believe there were spirits in the house. Were there? Maybe! 

This book had me hanging onto every word trying to figure all of what was happening. If you know anything about me, you know I can’t figure them out. That is why I love mysteries, suspense and thrillers. I’m just glued until the end of the book when the author lays it all out for me. I tell ya… it is worth every minute! 

I read Behind Closed Doors by this author before I started reviewing and I think this book was better! B.A. Paris has outdone herself with The Therapist. If you like her books or you just love Domestic Thrillers or Psychological Suspense, you’re going to love this book. 

I received a copy of this book from #StMartinsPress/#Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: The multimillion-copy New York Times bestselling author B.A. Paris returns to her heartland of gripping psychological suspense in The Therapist—a powerful tale of a house that holds a shocking secret.

When Alice and Leo move into a newly renovated house in The Circle, a gated community of exclusive houses, it is everything they’ve dreamed of. But appearances can be deceptive…

As Alice is getting to know her neighbours, she discovers a devastating secret about her new home, and begins to feel a strong connection with Nina, the therapist who lived there before.

Alice becomes obsessed with trying to piece together what happened two years before. But no one wants to talk about it. Her neighbors are keeping secrets and things are not as perfect as they seem…

REVIEW: Oh My Goodness! I just finished The War Nurse by Tracey Enerson Wood. It was such a good book. This one is Historical Fiction but, it was not in your face and I believe even those that don’t like war stories will like this one. 

I loved finding out about the early days of x-ray technology and that it was very new during WWI. I knew there wasn’t any penicillin then and it was also during the 1918 influenza outbreak. It was interesting to see how the nurses handled those situations and prevented themselves from getting sick. It reminded me of the covid epidemic we are fighting.

There was a love story that took place in the background. Julia was the head nurse and Fred was over the whole hospital. They liked each other but, it was inappropriate and grounds for dismissal for Julia from the Red Cross. Of course gossip flew and they were the favorites of many staff members. 

This book took place in France and not to far from Paris. It was an enjoyable read and I had hard time putting it down. I think it has something for everyone and it isn’t a heavy story at all. I enjoyed the glimpses of life in France back in the War time. 

I received a copy of this book from #BookBrowse/#Sourcebooks for use in a book discussion. All opinions are my own.. Thank you!

SYNOPSIS: Based on a true story, The War Nurse is a sweeping historical novel by USA Today bestselling author Tracey Enerson Wood that takes readers on an unforgettable journey through WWI France.

She asked dozens of young women to lay their lives on the line during the Great War. Can she protect them?

Superintendent of Nurses Julia Stimson must recruit sixty-four nurses to relieve the battle-worn British, months before American troops are ready to be deployed. She knows that the young nurses serving near the front lines of will face a challenging situation, but nothing could have prepared her for the chaos that awaits when they arrive at British Base Hospital 12 in Rouen, France. The primitive conditions, a convoluted, ineffective system, and horrific battle wounds are enough to discourage the most hardened nurses, and Julia can do nothing but lead by example―even as the military doctors undermine her authority and make her question her very place in the hospital tent.

When trainloads of soldiers stricken by a mysterious respiratory illness arrive one after the other, overwhelming the hospital’s limited resources, and threatening the health of her staff, Julia faces an unthinkable choice―to step outside the bounds of her profession and risk the career she has fought so hard for, or to watch the people she cares for most die in her arms.

Fans of Martha Hall Kelly’s Lost Roses and Marie Benedict’s Lady Clementine will devour this mesmerizing celebration of some of the most overlooked heroes in history: the fierce, determined, and brave nurses who treated soldiers in World War I.

If you haven’t started this series, a new Box Set will be released on July 21, 2021! Priced at just $9.99 it will be a better price than buying them individually.

REVIEW: I had such fun reading the new novel from Hilary Grossman titled Mom Rules! This book is about Donna and is the fourth and probably the last in the Forest River PTA Moms Series. I enjoyed getting reacquainted with all the ladies from Forest River Elementary School. In each of the books we get to see more of one character and their viewpoint.

I really enjoyed Donna. The poor woman has one heck of a year brought on by her friends. If, you want to call them that. These women start so many rumors and gossip so much. It’s fun to see what kind of crazy things they come up with. She grew and came into herself with all the trials she went through. I found myself cheering her on. I think I like and dislike all of the characters at one time or another. 

This is my favorite book so far. If you’re looking for a series that will make you laugh and break your heart, give this one a try. I think you just might find a good time! Although, this may be the end of the series, a little birdie tells me there is a lot more to look forward to from Hilary Grossman. Yay!

I received a copy of this book from the author for a fair and honest review. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: Donna Warren is not who everyone thinks she is….

It’s no secret – to survive in a superficial town like Forest River, New York, where perfection is a requirement –a mom must follow the rules.

For the past five years, Donna has worked hard to exceed social expectations. She held the prestigious role of PTA treasurer, and her best friend, Jackie, is the most powerful woman at the elementary school.

But in a town where most mothers earn their black belt in backstabbing before their offspring enter pre-k, something was bound to go wrong…

And it did. Now, her former bestie has become her mortal enemy and destroyed Donna’s reputation. Eagar to believe the rampant rumors, half the elementary school mommies think Donna is a drama queen and the rest believe she is a vindictive witch.

As she and her children’s social standing dangles on thin ice, Donna is willing to try anything to fix her mistake. Unfortunately, all her efforts backfire, and she makes everything worse. Just when Donna is about to give up, she receives some shocking news. Forced to face the most difficult situation of her life, will she finally become the woman she wants to be?

REVIEW: Make You Feel My Love by Robin Lee Hatcher is a wonderful book. She is a great author and I don’t know why she has recently popped up on my radar. The books I’ve read by her are Contemporary Christian Fiction. These books often remind me to lean on my faith. I think it is something some of us forget in our everyday lives now and then. 

There are two time lines in this story. One starting in 1895 and the other is modern day. I loved both timeliness equally well and got so involved when reading one that I sometimes went kicking and screaming to the other. It only took a paragraph or two and I was completely immersed again. 

The books by Hatcher I’ve read have such great characters and I love a story that is character driven rather than by events only. These characters have a say in how they deal with life and what is thrown at them. They find a way to deal with the the challenges that come their way. I like that!  Makes me remember I have that ability also with God walking with me every step of the way. 

I feel renewed after reading Make You Feel My Love! I will live in that cocoon for several days. Isn’t that a special book? If you love Robin Lee Hatcher, you’ll want to read this one. If you do, let me know what you think! If you haven’t read any of her books yet, this is a good one to start with. 

I received a copy of this book from #ThomasNelson/#Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: One broken woman. One lost man. And the long-buried secrets tying them together.

After escaping an abusive relationship, Chelsea Spencer flees to Chickadee Creek—the town where her great aunt Rosemary owns a quaint little antique shop. There, Chelsea plans to help with the shop as her aunt heals from an accident—and perhaps find some healing of her own.

Liam Chandler was one film away from a leading role when his brother Jacob was stricken with cancer. After spending the last months of Jacob’s life with him in Boise, Liam heads to the vacation home he built outside of Chickadee Creek to get his life and his faith back on track.

While working to clean out a storage room in the antique shop, Chelsea finds an old violin. Aunt Rosemary says she may have the instrument, but they soon learn it is very valuable and once belonged to Cora Chandler, Liam’s great-great-grandmother.

Drawn together by the old violin and stories from the past, Chelsea and Liam begin to find answers for their present and the future God has in store for them.

REVIEW: Sweet Tea by Piper Huguley is being released by Hallmark Publishing. It reminded me of a Hallmark movie and a lot of ladies love Hallmark as much as I do. It was a good book and well worth the time to read it. 

There was a lot of angst between the characters and was probably the one thing I wasn’t fond of. Tea goes back to her hometown to make sure her Grandmother was safe from a filmmaker and he wasn’t stealing her recipes. Jack, the filmmaker and Tea as you would expect have a lot in common and a rough time with each other. She also had a rough past with her Grandmother and Jack with his father. So…a lot of angst.

This was a fun book even if it was a little predictable. I’m a softie for these kinds of books and movies. This would make a nice little book to take to the beach or the pool. Sweet Tea was the first book by Piper Huguley that I’ve read and I won’t hesitate to read another of hers. 

I received a copy of this book from #Hallmark Publishing/#Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: Southern traditions, history, and hope come together in author Piper Huguley’s heartfelt romance from Hallmark Publishing.

Althea Dailey has succeeded beyond her wildest dreams: she’s about to make partner at her prestigious law firm in New York. So why doesn’t she feel more excited about it? When she has to travel South for a case, she pays a long-overdue visit back home to Milford, Georgia. To her surprise, a white man she’s never met has befriended her grandmother.

Jack Darwent wasn’t interested in the definition of success dictated by Southern high society. His passion for cooking led him to his current project: a documentary and cookbook about authentic Southern food. Althea’s grandmother is famous for her cooking at Milford College, a historically Black institution. But Althea suspects Jack of trying to steal her grandmother’s recipes.

Despite Althea and Jack’s first impressions of one another, they discover they have more in common than they’d guessed…and even as they learn about one another’s pasts, they both see glimmers of a better future. 

This Southern small-town romance includes a free Hallmark original recipe for Grandma’s Biscuits and Gravy.

REVIEW: If you love the work of Lauren K Denton like I do, you will likely love her new book The One You’re With. It was a satisfying read that wasn’t straight forward. It taught the lesson that marriage is a commitment and a lot of hard work. 

I really love the message of this book. It talked of making your choices, standing behind them, working through problems and not giving up. I have to hand it to the characters in this book because they all lived with their choices. Your choices are not always right and sometimes the consequences of those choices are hard to live with. These characters are so rich in depth and love. They are tested many times over the years. 

From my point of view, one of the characters is taking what she considers a betrayal and a couple of lies and blowing them out of shape. It takes her a while to settle in her mind a couple situations and to decide on the direction of her life. This character was my main reason for the one star deduction. Otherwise, I loved the book and the lesson it was trying to teach. 

I received a copy of this book from the publisher/#Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you!

SYNOPSIS: Written in Lauren K. Denton’s signature Southern style, The One You’re With tells a story of marriage, choices, and what a good life really looks like.

High-school sweethearts Mac and Edie Swan lead a seemingly picture-perfect life in the sleepy-sweet community of Oak Hill, near Mobile, Alabama. Edie is a respected interior designer, Mac is a beloved pediatrician, and they have two great kids and a historic home on tree-lined Linden Avenue. From the outside, the Swan family is the definition of “the good life.” And life is good—mostly. Until a young woman walks into Mac’s office one day. A young woman whose very existence threatens all Mac and Edie have built and all they think they know about each other.

Nineteen years after a summer apart, with a family and established lives and careers, the past that Mac and Edie thought they left behind has come back to greet them. For the first time, constants in their lives are called into question: their roles as parents, their reputation as upstanding members of the community, and the very foundations of their marriage. As they wade through the upheaval in both their family and professional lives, they must each examine choices they made long ago and chart a new course for their future.

REVIEW: Outstanding! I’m blown away by the new novel Shoulder Season by Christina Clancy. Don’t get me wrong, her first novel Second Home was great but this new novel was even better. I am astounded. I enjoyed immersing myself in this story and I didn’t want it to end. It was that good. 

A large portion of the book has to do with a young girl named Sherri who applies for and becomes a Playboy Bunny. We learn what life was like at the resort for Sherri and we find out what the training and expectations were for these women. Although most of the Playboy clubs are closed, a few still exist.   

Her research was excellent. It was a big part of what made this book so good. The clubs were considered family friendly and I enjoyed the behind the scenes peek. I think you will too!

Her writing flowed like butter and her character development was excellent. There were parts that were hard to read especially the ones we see mistakes in judgement being made. You care for Sherri enough you want to reach out and tap her on the shoulder and tell her to think twice. I enjoyed getting to know her and all the pieces that make her who she was.

If you liked Second Home, you’ll love Shoulder Season even though it is so totally different. I highly recommend this book! 

I received a copy of this book from #St.MartinsPublishingGroup and #Netgalley. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: A dazzling portrait of a young woman coming into her own, the youthful allure of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, and what we lose—and gain—when we leave home.

ONCE IN A LIFETIME, YOU CAN HAVE THE TIME OF YOUR LIFE

The small town of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin is an unlikely location for a Playboy Resort, and nineteen-year old Sherri Taylor is an unlikely bunny. Growing up in neighboring East Troy, Sherri plays the organ at the local church and has never felt comfortable in her own skin. But when her parents die in quick succession, she leaves the only home she’s ever known for the chance to be part of a glamorous slice of history. In the winter of 1981, in a costume two sizes too small, her toes pinched by stilettos, Sherri joins the daughters of dairy farmers and factory workers for the defining experience of her life.

Living in the “bunny hutch”—Playboy’s version of a college dorm—Sherri gets her education in the joys of sisterhood, the thrill of financial independence, the magic of first love, and the heady effects of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. But as spring gives way to summer, Sherri finds herself caught in a romantic triangle—and the tragedy that ensues will haunt her for the next forty years.

From the Midwestern prairie to the California desert, from Wisconsin lakes to the Pacific Ocean, this is a story of what happens when small town life is sprinkled with stardust, and what we lose—and gain—when we leave home. With a heroine to root for and a narrative to get lost in, Christina Clancy’s Shoulder Season is a sexy, evocative tale, drenched in longing and desire, that captures a fleeting moment in American history with nostalgia and heart.

REVIEW: My book club just read and discussed The Things We Cannot Say by Kelly Rimmer. What a beautiful story she wrote for us! I devoured this book. It is almost 400 pages and I read it in two days. Well…I lead the discussion so, I had to get it done. Let me tell you though I would have read it in two days anyway. It was that spellbinding! 

The story takes place in two time periods. Modern day and World War II in Poland. I have read several books on WWII but never anything in Poland. I like stories that take place in different countries because you learn what their life was like and how the War affected their daily life and how they survived. 

I enjoyed her characters because she took time to flesh them out so we were reading about what seemed to be real people. She even gave you enough about the minor characters so you felt tied to them also. I think most of us would like these folks as family. They had principles and morals. They cared for and love one another. 

When I finished the story, I found myself hugging my tablet and sighing. It was that good! I can’t recommend this book strongly enough. I can’t wait for her next novel The Warsaw Orphan. It promises to be just as good.

SYNOPSIS: Now a New York Times bestseller!

In 1942, Europe remains in the relentless grip of war. Just beyond the tents of the Russian refugee camp she calls home, a young woman speaks her wedding vows. It’s a decision that will alter her destiny…and it’s a lie that will remain buried until the next century.

Since she was nine years old, Alina Dziak knew she would marry her best friend, Tomasz. Now fifteen and engaged, Alina is unconcerned by reports of Nazi soldiers at the Polish border, believing her neighbors that they pose no real threat, and dreams instead of the day Tomasz returns from college in Warsaw so they can be married. But little by little, injustice by brutal injustice, the Nazi occupation takes hold, and Alina’s tiny rural village, its families, are divided by fear and hate.

Then, as the fabric of their lives is slowly picked apart, Tomasz disappears. Where Alina used to measure time between visits from her beloved, now she measures the spaces between hope and despair, waiting for word from Tomasz and avoiding the attentions of the soldiers who patrol her parents’ farm. But for now, even deafening silence is preferable to grief.

Slipping between Nazi-occupied Poland and the frenetic pace of modern life, Kelly Rimmer creates an emotional and finely wrought narrative. The Things We Cannot Say is an unshakable reminder of the devastation when truth is silenced…and how it can take a lifetime to find our voice before we learn to trust it.

Don’t miss Kelly Rimmer’s new and unforgettable novel, The Warsaw Orphan.  

REVIEW: Dream Girl by Laura Lippman was a bit of a letdown for me. I have noticed her name out there and know she has a lot of published books. I assume she has a large following so, I decided to give her new book a try. I now understand this is a bit of a departure for this author into horror. I’ve seen it classified as horror, mystery and thriller. I didn’t see it as any of those genres.

I loved the premise of the book. Gerry Andersen is a prize winning author who is laid up in his Baltimore apartment for at least 12 weeks. His assistant does daily care and errands and he has a nurse for the night shift. I didn’t like Gerry. The whole book was pretty much his rambling thoughts as he was laying in his hospital bed. I found it a boring. There weren’t any characters I could identify with or like.

 If you like autobiographies or memoirs, you most likely will like this book even though Gerry is not a real person. It came off a such for me. I don’t usually stay interested in a memoir so probably why this book didn’t hold my interest. This is not a poorly written book. It just wasn’t my kind of book. Give it a try and let me know what you think! 

I received a copy of this book from #Netgalley for a fair and honest review. Thank you! 

SYNOPSIS: In the end, has anyone really led a blameless life?

Injured in a freak fall, novelist Gerry Andersen is confined to a hospital bed in his glamorous high-rise apartment, dependent on two women he barely knows: his incurious young assistant, and a dull, slow-witted night nurse.

Then late one night, the phone rings. The caller claims to be the “real” Aubrey, the alluring title character from his most successful novel, Dream Girl. But there is no real Aubrey. She’s a figment born of a writer’s imagination, despite what many believe or claim to know. Could the cryptic caller be one of his three ex-wives playing a vindictive trick after all these years? Or is she Margot, an ex-girlfriend who keeps trying to insinuate her way back into Gerry’s life?

And why does no one believe that the call even happened?

Isolated from the world, drowsy from medication, Gerry slips between reality and a dreamlike state in which he is haunted by his own past: his faithless father, his devoted mother; the women who loved him, the women he loved.

And now here is Aubrey, threatening to visit him, suggesting that she is owed something. Is the threat real or is it a sign of dementia? Which scenario would he prefer? Gerry has never been so alone, so confused – and so terrified.

Chilling and compulsively readable, touching on timely issues that include power, agency, appropriation, and creation, Dream Girl is a superb blend of psychological suspense and horror that reveals the mind and soul of a writer.