Reading
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Review: Victoria by Daisy Goodwin
I am going to preface this post by saying that Queen Victoria is absolutely my favorite queen! I’ve had my eye on this book for MONTHS waiting for it to come out. When this came up for review I literally jumped for joy. So I was already geared up to love this one but my biggest fear was that because I was so excited to read it that I didn’t want to be let down if it wasn’t good. Well my fears were entirely unfounded! This was an excellent read! Less than a month after her eighteenth birthday, a young Alexandrina Victoria is roused from bed with the news that…
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Review: At the Edge of Summer by Jessica Brockmole
A couple of years ago I read Jessica Brockmole’s debut novel, LETTERS FROM SKYE and it was one of my most favorite books! I loved it! So when her follow up novel AT THE EDGE OF SUMMER came out, I was eager to read it and see if it too had the same magic as her first novel. Luc Crépet is accustomed to his mother’s bringing wounded creatures to their idyllic château in the French countryside, where healing comes naturally amid the lush wildflowers and crumbling stone walls. Yet his maman’s newest project is the most surprising: a fifteen-year-old Scottish girl grieving over her parents’ fate. A curious child with…
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Review: Love You Dead (Roy Grace #12) by Peter James
This is the fall of more modern thrillers for me, particularly ones set in England. I love love love British thrillers and when I heard this one was set in Brighton, I was all over it! I haven’t read anything by Peter James or heard anything about him, so this was a completely new author for me. Jodie Bentley had two dreams in life – to be beautiful and rich. She’s achieved the first, with a little help from a plastic surgeon, and now she’s working hard on the second. Her philosophy on money is simple: you can either earn it or marry it. Marrying is easy, it’s getting rid…
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Review: The Inheritance (Charles Lenox Mysteries #10) by Charles Finch
One of my favorite ‘armchair detectives’ is back…..though he’s less of an amateur and more of a professional than he was in the first books! Charles Lenox receives a cryptic note from a former classmate, pleading for help and eludes to the fact that he might be in danger. Lenox and his friend Leigh agree to meet but when Leigh doesn’t turn up, Lenox begins to worry. Fortunately Leigh is found alive but his lawyer is not……and it’s clear that Leigh is being stalked by a group of gangsters but what is unclear is the why? Leigh was lured back to London after many years abroad, with the promise of…
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Review: Friday on My Mind (Frieda Klein Mystery, #5) by Nicci French
It’s just another day on the River Thames. Commuters are avoiding the Tube by taking the water ferry when a body catches the attention of the passengers. The body is that of a man who has had his throat slashed and while he lacks any other identification, he is wearing a hospital ID tag that reads Dr F Klein. The police quickly discover that Dr F Klein is actually a women, Dr Frieda Klein psychotherapist to be exact, and one who has helped the police in many investigations before this. Dr Klein identifies the body as her former lover, Sandy. Dr Klein quickly becomes the prime suspect in his murder.…
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Review: Romancing the Inventor (Supernatural Society #1) by Gail Carriger
In the Parasol Protectorate books, one of my most favorite characters was the unconventional Genevieve Lefoux. So when a short story was presented about the inventor I was totally on board. I am a huge fan of Gail Carriger’s books and even though I don’t read a lot of short stories nor have I read any LBGTQ literature, I couldn’t help but want to read about the fascinating character that is Madam Lefoux.
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Cover Reveal: The Fortune Teller by Gwendolyn Womack
The Fortune Teller by Gwendolyn Womack Release Date: June 6, 2017 Picador USA eBook & Paperback; 320 Pages Genre: Fiction/Romantic Suspense FROM THE AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF THE MEMORY PAINTER COMES A SWEEPING AND SUSPENSEFUL TALE OF ROMANCE, FATE, AND FORTUNE. Semele Cohen appraises antiquities for an exclusive Manhattan auction house, specializing in deciphering ancient texts. And when she discovers a manuscript written in the time of Cleopatra, she knows it will be the find of her career. Its author tells the story of a priceless tarot deck, now lost to history, but as Semele delves further she realizes the manuscript is more than it seems. Both a memoir…
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Review: The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks
Finding a historical fiction novel set in the ‘ancient world’ always seems to be a challenge for me. In my experience, the historical fiction genre is saturated with books from the Tudor, Regency, and Victorian eras, so when I find a historical fiction novel set in another era, I’m usually on board to give it a shot. THE SECRET CHORD is one such novel….something different set in a unique period of time.
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Review: A Girl Like You: A Henrietta and Inspector Howard Novel by Michelle Cox
For Henrietta von Harmon times are hard. Not only is it the 1930s but her father committed suicide leaving behind a large family. Henrietta helps support her family by working as a 26 girl in a local pub and waiting tables when she can. But it’s not enough. So she takes a job taxi dancing to help support her younger siblings and mother. It’s while she’s taxi driving that she meets the mysterious Clive Howard. Detective Inspector Howard is investigating the dance hall as a potential supplier of prostitutes to a mob establishment.
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Review: A Murder in Time (Kendra Donovan #1) by Julie McElwain
Kendra Donovan has worked hard to become respected in the FBI as one of their youngest agents ever. She has been working tirelessly on a case that reveals a mole within the FBI itself. She is wounded during the course of duty and once she recovers she is hell bent on revenge for her team. Unfortunately her quest for revenge is short lived as she falls through a worm hole at a castle in England only to reemerge in the early 19th century…..1815. After having more or less come to terms with the fact that she some how time travels back to 1815, she realizes her purpose there might be more…