Excerpt: THIEF’S MARK (Sharpe & Donovan #7) by Carla Neggers

With fall coming up, I am starting to move into mystery mode. There is something about the turning of the leave and the colder nights that just screams ‘read a mystery’. So as we go into fall, I thought it would share and except from the upcoming mystery, THIEF’S MARK by Carla Neggers.

As a young boy, Oliver York witnessed the murder of his wealthy parents in their London apartment. The killers kidnapped him and held him in an isolated Scottish ruin, but he escaped, thwarting their plans for ransom. Now, after thirty years on the run, one of the two men Oliver identified as his tormentors may have surfaced.

Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan are enjoying the final day of their Irish honeymoon when a break-in at the home of Emma’s grandfather, private art detective Wendell Sharpe, points to Oliver. The Sharpes have a complicated relationship with the likable, reclusive Englishman, an expert in Celtic mythology and international art thief who taunted Wendell for years. Emma and Colin postpone meetings in London with their elite FBI team and head straight to Oliver. But when they arrive at York’s country home, a man is dead and Oliver has vanished.

As the danger mounts, new questions arise about Oliver’s account of his boyhood trauma. Do Emma and Colin dare trust him? With the trail leading beyond Oliver’s small village to Ireland, Scotland and their own turf in the US, the stakes are high, and Emma and Colin must unravel the decades-old tangle of secrets and lies before a killer strikes again (summary from Goodreads).

EXCERPT

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Review: Impossible Views of the World by Lucy Ives

Person disappears in a museum? A museum mystery? With maps? Yes, yes and yes! Is what went through my mind when this one came up for review.

The summary promised lots of tantalizing elements which is what drew me in for a review.

Stella Krakus, a curator at Manhattan’s renowned Central Museum of Art, is having the roughest week in approximately ever. Her soon-to-be ex-husband (the perfectly awful Whit Ghiscolmbe) is stalking her, a workplace romance with “a fascinating, hyper-rational narcissist” is in freefall, and a beloved colleague, Paul, has gone missing.

Strange things are afoot: CeMArt’s current exhibit is sponsored by a Belgian multinational that wants to take over the world’s water supply, she unwittingly stars in a viral video that’s making the rounds, and her mother–the imperious, impossibly glamorous Caro–wants to have lunch. It’s almost more than she can overanalyze.

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Review: The Luster of Lost Things by Sophie Chen Keller

When I got this book in the mail, the sweet dog on the over sitting with a little boy totally did me in. We all know how I feel about covers with animals on them…I’m a complete and utter sucker!

What a way to lure readers….so cute and charming was this cover. Plus I love the blue and gold accents. Basically this was an easy yes for a review based on the cover.

But the question for me was when can I work it in to my schedule? I was already pretty tight for early fall reviews so I had planned on Oct for this one.

But the cover just kept coming to mind on a regular basis so I decided to make room and read this book so I could stop seeing a cute golden dog with his little boy in my mind every time I opened a new book!  Continue reading “Review: The Luster of Lost Things by Sophie Chen Keller”

Review: How to Find Love in a Book Shop by Veronica Henry

Full disclosure…..the title of this book alone would make me want to read it and don’t even get me started on the charming cover. If you are a book lover and always dreamed of finding love in a bookshop then this is the book for you based on the title alone!

A quaint bookshop in the Cotswolds and a town full of people all of whom have found love (in one way or another) all thanks to the town bookshop, Nightingale Books. As cheesy as it sounds I feel like every single person should have a HEA in this story.

Everyone has a story . . . but will they get the happy ending they deserve?

Emilia has just returned to her idyllic Cotswold hometown to rescue the family business. Nightingale Books is a dream come true for book-lovers, but the best stories aren’t just within the pages of the books she sells – Emilia’s customers have their own tales to tell.

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Review: Cocoa Beach by Beatriz Williams

I am a total fan girl of Beatriz Williams, let’s just get that out of the way right off the bat. I love her books. She has a beautiful, lyrical story telling style and I am almost always completely engrossed in her novels!

This novel was all over my Twitter feed for weeks and I broke down and bought it because I couldn’t pass up such an interesting sounding novel plus it’s set in WWI so you know I was all over that!

Burdened by a dark family secret, Virginia Fortescue flees her oppressive home in New York City for the battlefields of World War I France. While an ambulance driver for the Red Cross, she meets a charismatic British army surgeon whose persistent charm opens her heart to the possibility of love. As the war rages, Virginia falls into a passionate affair with the dashing Captain Simon Fitzwilliam, only to discover that his past has its own dark secrets—secrets that will damage their eventual marriage and propel her back across the Atlantic to the sister and father she left behind.

Five years later, in the early days of Prohibition, the newly widowed Virginia Fitzwilliam arrives in the tropical boomtown of Cocoa Beach, Florida, to settle her husband’s estate. Despite the evidence, Virginia does not believe Simon perished in the fire that destroyed the seaside home he built for her and their young daughter. Separated from her husband since the early days of their marriage, the headstrong Virginia plans to uncover the truth, for the sake of the daughter Simon never met.

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