Books, Reading

Special Feature: The Secret Life of Mrs. London by Rebecca Rosenberg

by The Lit Bitch1 Comment on Special Feature: The Secret Life of Mrs. London by Rebecca Rosenberg

The Secret Life of Mrs. London
by Rebecca Rosenberg

Publication Date: January 30, 2018
Lake Union Publishing
eBook & Paperback; 348 Pages

Genre: Historical Fiction

 

 

San Francisco, 1915. As America teeters on the brink of world war, Charmian and her husband, famed novelist Jack London, wrestle with genius and desire, politics and marital competitiveness. Charmian longs to be viewed as an equal partner who put her own career on hold to support her husband, but Jack doesn’t see it that way…until Charmian is pulled from the audience during a magic show by escape artist Harry Houdini, a man enmeshed in his own complicated marriage. Suddenly, charmed by the attention Houdini pays her and entranced by his sexual magnetism, Charmian’s eyes open to a world of possibilities that could be her escape.

As Charmian grapples with her urge to explore the forbidden, Jack’s increasingly reckless behavior threatens her dedication. Now torn between two of history’s most mysterious and charismatic figures, she must find the courage to forge her own path, even as she fears the loss of everything she holds dear.

Available for Pre-Order on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and IndieBound

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Review: The Lost Season of Love and Snow by Jennifer Laam

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This is my first book review of 2018 and I couldn’t have picked a better book to kick things off with. Though I read this in 2017, I am ringing in the new year with love and snow!

There is something about Jennifer Laam’s writing that I find so lovely and elegant. It’s hard to describe but her books are consistently good and well written which made me all the more anxious to read this one!

At the age of sixteen, Natalya Goncharova is stunningly beautiful and intellectually curious. But while she finds joy in French translations and a history of Russian poetry, her family is more concerned with her marriage prospects.

It is only fitting that during the Christmas of 1828 at her first public ball in her hometown of Moscow she attracts the romantic attention of Russia’s most lauded rebel poet: Alexander Pushkin.

Enchanted at first sight, Natalya is already a devoted reader of Alexander’s serialized novel in verse, Evgeny Onegin. The most recently published chapter ends in a duel, and she is dying to learn what happens next. Finding herself deeply attracted to Alexander’s intensity and joie de vivre, Natalya hopes to see him again as soon as possible.

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Review: The City of Brass (The Daevabad Trilogy #1) by S.A. Chakraborty

by The Lit Bitch3 Comments on Review: The City of Brass (The Daevabad Trilogy #1) by S.A. Chakraborty

As 2017 comes to an end, I couldn’t ask for a better book to close out the year with.

This book was all over my Instagram feed for weeks and it was also on Book of the Month so it basically got a lot of hype. I was really hesitant because of the hype, but believe me when I say—the hype is real!

Nahri has never believed in magic. Certainly, she has power; on the streets of 18th century Cairo, she’s a con woman of unsurpassed talent. But she knows better than anyone that the trade she uses to get by—palm readings, zars, healings—are all tricks, sleights of hand, learned skills; a means to the delightful end of swindling Ottoman nobles.

But when Nahri accidentally summons an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to accept that the magical world she thought only existed in childhood stories is real. For the warrior tells her a new tale: across hot, windswept sands teeming with creatures of fire, and rivers where the mythical marid sleep; past ruins of once-magnificent human metropolises, and mountains where the circling hawks are not what they seem, lies Daevabad, the legendary city of brass?a city to which Nahri is irrevocably bound.

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Review: Our Lady of Guadalupe: Mother of the Civilization of Love by Carl A. Anderson, Eduardo Chávez

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I don’t often read a lot of nonfiction but ever once in a while a book catches my eye that I simply must read and that’s what happened with this book.

Our Lady of Guadalupe’s feast day is Dec 12 and even though I am a Catholic myself (albeit a new one), I wasn’t very familiar with anything to do with her. I first started becoming interested in Our Lady back when I was living in Arizona over ten years ago.

In Arizona she is huge as there is a large Hispanic population there. It was amazing to see the devotional level to Our Lady yet as a non-Hispanic person, I felt odd showing interest in Our Lady. Almost as if she was an image reserved only for the Hispanic culture.

Flash forward twelve or so years and here I am as a new Catholic convert and in a new state (Oregon) where Our Lady is not so venerated here as we have a smaller Hispanic population….and it’s Dec 12th and my Parrish priest is heading to a city wide celebration for Our Lady. I was surprised that there was such a huge following.

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Review: The Woman in the Camphor Trunk (Anna Blanc Mysteries #2) by Jennifer Kincheloe

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About a couple of years ago, I read the first Anna Blanc mystery and was in love with her character and eager to see the romance develop between her and Joe.

It seemed an age before the next book would come out but then suddenly it was out and I quickly picked it up from my library before anyone else could get their hands on it!

This time we find a very different Anna from the Anna we met in the first book. A once rich society girl, we now find a poor Anna struggling to get by.

Los Angeles, 1908. In Chinatown, the most dangerous beat in Los Angeles, police matron Anna Blanc and her former sweetheart, Detective Joe Singer, discover the body of a white missionary woman, stuffed in a trunk in the apartment of her Chinese lover. Her lover has fled.

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