Many thanks to my friends at @vikingbooks and @pameladormanbooks for the free #gifted copy of this read.  

 

When the local community center is in danger of being shuttered, the senior citizens enlist help from some unlikely sources in their endeavor to save the building.  But what they find along the way might be even more significant.   

 

I fell hard and fast for Pooley’s storytelling last year when I discovered Iona Iverson.  And here, she continues to delight delivering a completely fun comfort read that warmed my heart.   

 

What you’ll find: 

👵🏻quirky and diverse cast 

👵🏻mature characters that are lively and bold 

👵🏻unlikely friendships 

👵🏻multiple POV 

👵🏻found family dynamics 

 

With a delightful cast of rich characters, this intergenerational story was like a warm hug of a book.  The witty dialogue and outrageous plot points had me in stitches.  But it was the emotional sincerity that gave the humor it’s true power within the narrative.  

 

Once again, Pooley delivers another perfectly endearing read that left me uplifted and full of joy. 

 

Funny.  Moving.  Heartfelt.  What an unexpected treat!  

 

After seeing trusted friends rave over this read, I expected to enjoy it.  But I didn’t expect to love it with my whole being the way I did.  

 

I laughed.  I cried.  My soul ached, and my heart felt full.  There was such a genuineness with the way joy and grief were intertwined. Newman struck the perfect balance of emotion which resonated deeply.  

 

“It's so crushingly beautiful, being human," the mother sighs, and the daughter rolls her eyes and says, "But also so terrible and ridiculous."

 

It’s not often that a book comes along and makes me feel as seen as this one did. I mean... my son just started middle school, so I’m not in the same stage of life as our FMC.  Yet, the musings regarding motherhood, the overwhelming love for our children, watching parents age, and feeling our own bodies decline (ahem—the frozen shoulder I was recently diagnosed with) all felt so vividly, deeply relatable.  

 

“This may be the only reason we were put on this earth. To say to each other, I know how you feel. To say, Same.”

 

Newman crafted a refreshing look at the aging process that felt authentic and profound filled with wit and humor.  I closed the last pages with a deep sense of gratitude—in much the same way our FMC did—for the multitudes that have created me into the person I am today and for the people it’s brought along my way.  

Many thanks to my friends at @harperaudio for the free #gifted audiobook.  

 

Engaging, impactful, and all-around fun!

 

Lula Dean wants her small Georgia town to read, but she wants to control what they read.  Lindsay won’t hear of it and sneaks to the lending library each night determined to thwart Lula Dean’s plan.  

 

Book bans are no laughing matter, especially at the alarming, record breaking rates we’re currently seeing.  And yet, Miller manages to take on this serious issue with perfectly plotted humor and heart.  

 

Steeped in satire, Miller’s storytelling delivers a fresh and welcome voice within the ongoing debates regarding censorship.  It’s provocative and candid.  It’s clever and witty.  She manages to create a narrative that is wildly entertaining without sacrificing meaning and purpose.  

 

As each character experienced one of the banned books snuck into Lula’s lending library with profound impact, my heart swelled.  The narrative pays homage to the power of books in a way that reinvigorated my own passion about reading.  

 

While some might see the ending as contrived, this native Georgian found it uplifting and full of hope.  In such a fraught political environment, this book painted a way forward.  A way towards empathy and compassion.  A way to overcome the pains of the past.  A way to unite with understanding.   Miller has me cheering for a joy filled future!

 

What starts as a teen prank becomes a heartwarming story of lessons learned and lives changed.  This book was a true delight.  

 

🎧January LaVoy is a master at her craft.  This book had a wide range of characters, and yet LaVoy delivered. Her performance was full of nuance and emotion.  It heightened the laughter and endeared those tender moments.  I devoured this audiobook. 

 

Many thanks to my friends at @prhaudio for the free #gifted copy of this audiobook.  

 

“Her voice, it seemed, had been continuously decrescendoing since birth, so that by age twelve, she could scarcely be heard.” 

 

A riveting mystery and epic family saga.  An easy 5⭐️ read.  

 

When a teenage girl vanishes from summer camp in the Adirondacks—one her family owns—the family and community are rocked to their core. You see...years before, the missing girl’s brother also disappeared on that very same stretch of land.   

 

This is my favorite kind of book.  It’s intricately plotted and chockfull of substance.  Moore takes her time with the narrative allowing it to unfold with precision as characters and plot points intersect.  With nonlinear, complex timelines and a large cast of characters, this tale is ambition in scope.  Yet, every character leaves an imprint, and the density of details evolves to a satisfying fullness with nothing going to waste.   

 

With melancholic undertones, the lush atmosphere amplifies the emotionally charged narrative.  The scenes are crafted with chilling nuance. It’s a stunning juxtaposition to the beauty of the Adirondack Mountains. This dynamic elicites cinematic detail to the time and place.  

 

This was an expertly crafted, mesmerizing read, and I savored the entire journey.  Easily one of my favorite reads of the year!

 

🎧 The narration by Saskia Maarleveld immediately drew me in and breathed life into the storytelling.  But with a wide cast of characters and nonlinear timelines, I found that I needed my print copy to keep details straight.  Truly, this novel works best as a tandem read where every aspect is enhanced.  

 

After finishing and LOVING The Paradise Problem, I found out that CLo was coming to my local indie bookstore.  But the tour was for a different book: Tangled Up in You.  Seeing CLo in person was a MUST for me, so I immediately queued up their contribution to the Disney Meant to Be collection.

This book turned out to be such an unexpected treat!  I’m old and crotchety enough that I tend to steer clear of most YA/NA reads.  But with CLo’s expert storytelling, I found myself fully charmed and easily immersed in this clever reimagining. 

I appreciated how the book stayed true to the Disney classic while also breathing new life into it.  I laughed at the witty banter.  I swooned at the smoldering tension.  And in true CLo fashion, I found myself cheering for the FMC.  Whip smart, bold, daring... like their other FMCs, Ren was a heroine worth celebrating. 

I flew through the story in 2 quick days.  It was an addictive binge read that fully entertained and further solidified that I will read anything CLo writes. 

AND... hearing CLo talk about this book only made me love it more.  If you ever get a chance to see them at a local event, I highly recommend binge reading their latest book and showing up ready to fall more deeply in love with them and their storytelling.  

 

Many thanks to @jessicaboothauthor for the free #gifted copy of this book. 

Cozy.  Adorable.  Swoony.  This book is the essence of a pumpkin spice latte in book form.  

I queued this audiobook up during my son’s double header over the weekend.  It was 87, and I was sitting in full sun.  But within the first few chapters, I was deeply immersed in all my favorite fall things—pumpkins, hay bales, black cats, and s’mores.  

Lia loves fall.  But her small Louisiana town’s fall festival has been in a decline for ages. So this year, Amelia is tasked with bringing it back to life.  When the town reporter comes to interview Lia about her progress, his high school buddy, Rhett—the one that made Lia the butt of so many jokes all those years ago—tags along.  Sparks immediately fly... but will they catch?

The storyline is perfectly peppered with festival preparation allowing Booth to capture the very essence of the season.  It was a fitting backdrop for this enemies to lovers romance.  I mean... we call it a roll in the hay for a reason!  🤭🔥

Watching Rhett and Lia get to know one another afresh while leaning into the smoking chemistry they shared was such a delight.  I blushed.  I grinned like a schoolgirl.  I rooted for them.  The heat was perfectly balanced with the sweetness, and I loved watching them fall in love. But before either of them could truly embrace the possibility, they had to overcome old hurts.  In the end, that made their swoon worthy HEA all the sweeter.  

This is an adorable fall themed romance with a dash of mystery and a reminder that self-acceptance opens the door for others to heap on love too.   

🎧I split my time between the physical and audiobook copies of this read.  And as much as I love an audiobook, this one worked better for me in print.  As a native southerner, I just can’t abide a fake southern accent.  And sadly, neither of the narrators came across as authentic.  Still, the audiobook made it easy for me to keep reading while I was driving, and that was important to me.  

Many thanks to my friends at @avidreaderpress and @simon.audio for the free #gifted copy of this read.  

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, The Safekeep is an impressive historical fiction debut.  

Set more than a decade after the end of World War II, this remarkable tale explores the lasting effects of war’s trauma and questions what it means to be complicit in its crimes.  

Isabel lives a lonely and repressed existence in the family home.  She is rigid and difficult and fixated on the past.  Eva is Louis’ latest girlfriend.  She is gaudy and vivacious and the antithesis of Isabel.  The storyline unfolds during one fraught summer when Eva and Isabel must live under the same roof.  Not only does Eva disrupt Isabel’s regimented existence, but she also forces her to reexamine her life and family.   

At the onset, the house—the safekeep itself—appeared as a mere residence safely guarding the contents and people within.  But as the storyline progressed, the house became integral to the plot.  Afterall, it alone had witnessed the fullness of this history and readily safeguarded all the precious secrets.  Tension radiated from the walls granting a sentient quality to the residence that oozed atmosphere throughout the narrative.  

Isabel struggled to reckon with the changes within her own house.  And yet, it was a transformative experience.  As though a flower blooming for the first time, Isobel’s discovery of self and desire awakened something within, catapulting her future in new directions. And as the connection between Isabel and Eva unfolded, the most important reckoning of the story was unveiled:  one of revenge and/or possible redemption.  

🎧This audiobook is primarily narrated by the talented Stina Nielsen.  She well showcased the vast range of emotions and easily breathed life into both characters with distinction. One of my favorites, Saskia Maarleveld reads the diary entries in the last section with powerful precision and well-honed the bottled-up anger that had been left to simmer throughout the years.

 

 

 

Many thanks to my friends at @stmartinspress @minotaur_books and @macmillan.audio

 

Fast paced.  Twisty.  Addictive.  This is exactly the kind of thriller I’ve come to expect from Finlay.  

 

Years ago, Ryan awoke to find his high school girlfriend, Ali, gone without a trace.  Now, her car has surfaced, and a cryptic note found inside might help unravel the mystery that has haunted him all this time.

 

Talk about a page turner!  This was a fun cat and mouse game full of propulsive action.  I flew through the short, attention-grabbing chapters constantly revamping my predictions.  I love when a thriller surprises me with its revelations, and Finlay did just that with these cunning twists.  

 

The large cast of characters seemed wholly unrelated in the beginning.  But connections were slowly unveiled fitting this complex puzzle together in a way that satisfied.  

 

🎧 This full cast narration includes Helen Laser, John Pirhalla, and Paul Dateh.  

Even with an intricate storyline, this cast made it easy to follow the plot and added a distinctiveness to each perspective.  This was a fun listen.  

 

Many thanks to my friends at  @macmillan.audio for the free #gifted copy of this book.  

There’s almost always an exception to a rule.  One of my reading “rules” (more of a habit really) is steering clear of short stories and novellas. They just tend to be too short and lacking in the depth I like.  But there’s one exception I always make... T. Kingfisher.  

Somehow Kingfisher always delivers with the wit laced horror that she writes. 

Her reimagining of “The Fall of the House of Usher” in What Moves the Dead was bizarre and creepy and an all-around stellar reenvisioning.  So, when I saw that Kingfisher was returning to that world for a second installment, I knew I needed it.  

Here, we meet back up with Alex returning to the family hunting lodge in Gallacia, the dark and dreary land from the first book.  Soon after arriving, Alex finds the house in disrepair and the caretaker dead.  Rumors abound of moroi stealing people’s breath as they sleep.  But Alex knows... there’s something more at play than mere superstitions.  

Dripping with a sense of Gothic eeriness, What Feasts at Night delivers a creepy atmosphere befitting of the nightmares Alex experiences.  But it’s always the wit and humor- in perfect juxtaposition to the mood- that I find most appealing and unique in Kingfisher’s writing.    

While this was a moody read, I found the horror elements much less terrifying than in the previous installment (or some of Kingfisher’s other books).  That left me wanting in many ways, but with the lighter notes, this book becomes easily accessible for those wanting to dip their toes in something more horror adjacent.

Entertaining and unsettling, I enjoyed reconnecting with these characters and this world.  I’m very interested to see if Kingfisher continues this series.  

🎧Avi Roque narrates both books in this series, and I’ve come to associate their voice with Easton’s. Rocque effortlessly portrays the emotion and humor throughout the read, and the tone and tenor of their voice lends well to the atmospheric mood.  

 

 

 

 

Clever.  Unputdownable.  Kuang’s Yellowface brilliantly begs the question: Who has the right to tell a story?  

June struggled to find her voice in the publishing industry.  With such sharp focus on diversity, she—just another white woman-- continued to get overlooked.  But when her Asian American friend suddenly died leaving behind a work in progress, June decided to tilt the scales in her own direction. 

Immediately, I was drawn into this skillfully crafted narrative.  It made me cringe.  It made me uncomfortable.  It made me laugh and ponder.  I binged this read in no time unable to stop until I found out how the shocking storyline would end!  The satire added both edginess and outlandish humor making this experience a roller coaster of varying emotions. 

This is a dark expose full of worthwhile critique.  Without doubt, the hype for this read is very real.  

🎧 Helen Laser is one of my favorite narrators and here she hits a homerun.  I started this book as I was dabbling with some small painting projects, and I found myself so immersed that I nearly repainted the entire living space.  Laser embodied the grittiness of June, and she portrayed her outlandish deeds in a way that held me rapt.  I highly recommend grabbing this on in audio format.