Review: Dark Angel: A Gothic Fairy Tale by T.J. Bennett

Strong winds and storm surges batter the hull of a ship carrying the young widow Catherine Briton home to England.

Catherine spots land and tells the captain that they should abandon ship and try to make it to the island. To her dismay the captain refuses and denies that he even saw the land.

The ship eventually sinks and Catherine is left floating in the ocean waiting for death to overtake her. Instead of dying, she wakes up on the beach of the island she saw from the ship.

A stranger rescues her and takes her back to his castle. When she awakes she finds that the man, Gerard, not only saved her life but he is ridiculously good looking as well.

As she regains her strength she finds that things are a little strange on the island. She seems to be stuck in some weird time  lapse. There is also a feral beast that stalks the island.

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Review: Tiger’s Curse (The Tiger Saga #1) by Colleen Houck

For recent high school graduate, Kelsey Hayes, the summer is all about finding a job so she can start community college in the fall.

But in a sleepy Oregon town, there are not a lot of job opportunities for high school grads so when she is offered a job at a traveling circus she quickly accepts.

The jobs sounds pretty easy: selling tickets, helping clean up after shows, and she gets to live on sight….oh and she has to help care for the circus tiger.

She isn’t really sure what to do about the tiger, on one hand he scares her but she finds him oddly intriguing and comforting. Every night after the show she sneaks into the tiger tent to read to him and draw.

One night after the show, Kelsey finds a man outside the tiger’s cage. She learns that he has offered to purchase the tiger and take him back to India to a tiger refuge. But there is a catch–he wants Kelsey to accompany him and the tiger to India.

After talking to her foster parents, they agree to let her go as it would be a great for her to travel and possibly gain some job experience. When she arrives in India, it’s soon revealed that everything is not what it seems.

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Review: Bellman and Black: A Ghost Story by Diane Setterfield

As a child, William Bellman makes one tragic mistake that will haunt him all his life. Though it doesn’t seem like a big deal, William soon finds out what a big deal it was.

William is showing off for a few of his friends. He has perfected his slingshot and to impress his friends he claims he can hit a rook (of the raven family) with absolute precision.

When he kills the bird with that fateful shot, he has no idea it will be the mistake that alters his life and the lives of those present that day forever and those that William cares for most.

The Bellman family has done quite well for itself over the years. They are widely known for their textile mill throughout the country side. When William reaches adulthood, his uncle takes him under his wind and start showing him the ropes of mill operation.

His uncle’s own son has zero interest in the running of the mill so that means that when the uncle dies the mill for go to his son but he will need a trusted advisor to run it for him.

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Review: Banquet of Lies by Michelle Diener

In Sweden one fateful night, the life of a young English woman changes forever. Giselle Barrington witnesses the murder of her father, a spy for the British crown. While in Sweden, Giselle’s (Gigi) father procures a dangerous document that if discovered could mean a political nightmare for England, France, Sweden, and Russia!

It’s for this document he is killed for. He gave the document to Gigi to keep safe shortly before he will killed. After witnessing the murder Gigi knows three things–she must take the document safely back to England and second, the person who killed her father was also British which means there is a traitor in her father’s circle, and finally that man who killed her father will surely come for her next.

She needs to get it in into the hands of someone she can trust but she’s been away from the English court for so long and her father basically kept her in the dark as to his dealings.

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Review: The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert

Reading this book was like peeling the petals off of a flower, each petal a little more beautiful than the one before.

This novel is a complex family saga surrounded by the beauty of the budding botanical world.

We begin with the base born Henry Whittaker who dares to dream and make something of himself.

After stealing his way into some wealth, his father’s employer discovers that poor Henry has been robbing him blind.

Instead of turning him over to the authorities, he sends Henry on a voyage with the famous explorer Captain Cook.

On that voyage Henry learns a great deal about botany and life, and when he returns to England four years later he is rewarded with another voyage, this time to South America.

Here is learns more about cultivating plants and exotic botany. After a falling out with his benefactor, Henry ventures out on his own and quickly becomes one of the wealthiest men in America.

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