MARRYING DAISY BELLAMY by Susan Wiggs

June 15, 2018

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The Lakeshore Chronicles, Book 8

I think this was the most anticipated book in the series. A couple of books ago was a sort of cliffhanger featuring Daisy, and I know I was delighted to finally get to her story.

Daisy Bellamy and Julian Gastineaux met as teens at summer camp and they became best friends. They were from different worlds; Daisy, heir to the Bellamy fortune and founding family of the summer camp, and Julian, a scholarship kid.

Nonetheless, they stay best friends, keeping in touch over the years. Julian figures out the only way he’ll be able to afford college is through the armed services. He excels, as he does with everything, by working his butt off, and this time his reward is being sent to Columbia with an elite group of soldiers. Unfortunately, they are all killed.

Daisy is devastated, but eventually realizes that life must go on. She is still young, and a strong single mother to her son. His father, Logan, was a one night stand. But surprisingly, Logan is trying to be a good father and he decides the best course of action would be to marry his child’s mother. Talk about your rebound decisions, but Daisy does marry Logan and while they get along, there is no real connection between them other than their child. But they are both determined to make the marriage work. Until Julian returns.

This was a very difficult read at times, extremely emotional and gut wrenching, but ultimately love does conquer all. I think this is one of my favorite books of the series, mostly because I was so invested in these characters through the previous books and I wanted them to find their happy ending. I loved it.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

MARRYING DAISY BELLAMY by Susan Wiggs. MIRA; Original edition (July 28, 2015). ISBN 978-0778317715. 432p.

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ON THE JAVA RIDGE by Jock Serong

June 14, 2018

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Serong has written two novels in one. First it is a story involving men against the sea. Than it is a strong political message about the harm being done by the Australian policy regarding refugees from their neighbor, Indonesia. The “Java Ridge” is a boat sailing out of Indonesia providing tourism to groups of well heeled individuals. Sailing at the same time is the “Takalar” a boat similar to the “Java Ridge” but bearing people looking to escape the horrors of life in Indonesia.

The Java Ridge puts in to a sheltered reef on the Indonesian island of Dana with a storm approaching. The Takalar is caught by the same storm and driven into the shelter, but not before it has been destroyed by the power of the gale. In the meanwhile a new maritime policy regarding aid to asylum seeking vessels in distress has been put into place by the Australian government. Cassius Calvert who is the minister for border integrity is being browbeaten by the Prime Minister as a new election takes place. The PM wants him to enforce the policy without thought about any people effected by it.

With the circumstances enveloping both boats brought together by fate on the island of Dana, Serong presents the individuals comprising those sailing on the boats. Isi Natoli is the skipper of the Java Ridge. She is part owner of the boat with her boyfriend who was not able to make this trip. Roya and her pregnant mother are on the Takalar looking forward to freedom away from a repressive government. All are brought together by the circumstances presented to them by fate.

Serong has written a totally engrossing novel about people caught up in a set of uncaring government regulations and paying a great price through no fault of their own. The book moves inexorably towards an ending that is both frightening as well as indicative of the uncaring nature of government regulation. Certainly a mesmerizing description of government out of control.

5/18 Paul Lane

ON THE JAVA RIDGE by Jock Serong. Text Publishing Company (June 12, 2018).  ISBN 978-1925498394. 320p.

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THE SUMMER HIDEAWAY by Susan Wiggs

June 13, 2018

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The Lakeshore Chronicles, Book 7

I haven’t forgotten about this series, just put the reviews on the back burner for a bit. But it’s time to catch up with some of my favorite characters in my favorite make believe setting, the beautiful Willow Lake in the glorious Catskill Mountains.

In case I haven’t mentioned this before, these books can all stand alone so can be read in any order. I started with a later book but then went back and read the rest in order. Either way, they are wonderful.

This story revolves around George Bellamy, who is dying of cancer. He has a couple of regrets as he reaches the end of his life – that his grandson hasn’t married yet, and that he is still estranged from his brother after 55 years. Determined to go out in his own way, George starts interviewing palliative care nurses and finds the perfect match for both him, and he hopes for his grandson.

George hires Claire, and she has her own mysterious past. She is happy to go along with whatever George wants, and when she meets Ross, his grandson, sparks fly. But Ross is suspicious of the nurse, and wonders if she is after his money somehow.

Claire helps George fulfill all his last wishes, and this is a lovely story about the end of life as well as the beginnings of a great romance. A few of the regular characters in the series make brief appearances as well. This was another wonderful read in a terrific series.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

THE SUMMER HIDEAWAY by Susan Wiggs. MIRA; Original edition (March 25, 2014). ISBN 978-0778317005. 432p.

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BookCon 2018!

June 12, 2018

So happy to be able to share a few videos from BookCon 2018

 

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AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT: Melissa Broder

June 11, 2018

 

So now that you’re interested…

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THE PISCES by Melissa Broder

“Bold, virtuosic, addictive, erotic – there is nothing like The Pisces. I have no idea how Broder does it, but I loved every dark and sublime page of it.” —Stephanie Danler, author of Sweetbitter 

Lucy has been writing her dissertation on Sappho for nine years when she and her boyfriend break up in a dramatic flameout. After she bottoms out in Phoenix, her sister in Los Angeles insists Lucy dog-sit for the summer. Annika’s home is a gorgeous glass cube on Venice Beach, but Lucy can find little relief from her anxiety — not in the Greek chorus of women in her love addiction therapy group, not in her frequent Tinder excursions, not even in Dominic the foxhound’s easy affection.

Everything changes when Lucy becomes entranced by an eerily attractive swimmer while sitting alone on the beach rocks one night. But when Lucy learns the truth about his identity, their relationship, and Lucy’s understanding of what love should look like, take a very unexpected turn. A masterful blend of vivid realism and giddy fantasy, pairing hilarious frankness with pulse-racing eroticism, THE PISCES is a story about falling in obsessive love with a merman: a figure of Sirenic fantasy whose very existence pushes Lucy to question everything she thought she knew about love, lust, and meaning in the one life we have.

About the Author

Melissa Broder is the author of four poetry collections, including LAST SEXT (Tin House, 2016), and the essay collection SO SAD TODAY (Grand Central, 2016). Her first novel, THE PISCES, was published by Hogarth/Crown in May 2018.

Broder writes the So Sad Today column for VICE, the horoscopes for Lenny Letter, and the Beauty and Death column at Elle.com.

Poems appear in POETRY, The Iowa Review, Tin House, Guernica, Fence, The Missouri Review, Denver Quarterly, et al. You can read the online ones HERE. She is the winner of a Pushcart Prize for poetry.

Broder received her BA from Tufts University and her MFA from City College of New York. She lives in Los Angeles.

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WHEN LIFE GIVES YOU LULULEMONS by Lauren Weisberger

June 10, 2018
when life gives you lululemons

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I was not a fan of Lauren Weisberger. I was assigned to review The Devil Wears Prada for Library Journal when it first came out, and I really didn’t care for it. The story line was intriguing, but the execution was not good. This was the first sentence of my review:

“This chic read is sure to take the fashion world by storm, although the literary world may find it lacking.”

(If you dig deep enough, you can read the rest of the review on this site, just do a search.) In fact, it was that rare unicorn of a book that was completely eclipsed by the movie, which was worlds better. Since none of her later books were assigned to me, I didn’t read them. Until now.

It was with much trepidation that I started reading this new book. It’s gotten a lot of press, made it to a bunch of “summer must reads” lists so I went for it. And guess what – I liked it! Again the execution wasn’t perfect – the story is a bit convoluted at times – but it was a fun read.

There are three main characters here. Emily, from The Devil Wears Prada, where she toiled as Miranda Priestly’s number one assistant, has spun herself off from Runway magazine into the premier Hollywood fixer. Indeed we meet her as one of her clients has decided to wear a Nazi uniform for the fun of it and can’t understand why that is a problem.

Emily has a best friend, Miriam, who has left her high powered law office in NYC to be a stay-at-home mommy in Greenwich, Connecticut after her husband’s tech start up makes millions. Miriam is slowly adapting to the lifestyle, which is just skewered here, from wine soaked lunches to sex toy parties and completely ridiculous, over the top children’s birthday parties.

Then Emily starts losing customers to a younger, more tech savvy competitor and she hightails it to Greenwich to hang with her friend. But then another friend, Karolina Hartwell, gets into trouble.

Karolina is a supermodel married to a state senator with presidential ambitions. In the most far fetched plot point, she gets arrested for driving under the influence a few doors down from her house with a car full of kids. She becomes a pariah, and only Emily can help her regain her reputation and get some sort of custody of her stepson.

The fabulous Miranda Priestly makes an all too brief appearance, and if you blink you’ll miss Andrea Sachs as well. But all’s well that ends well, and everyone gets their happy ending here. If you want a read that is as light as a summer breeze, you’ve found your book.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

WHEN LIFE GIVES YOU LULULEMONS by Lauren Weisberger. Simon & Schuster (June 5, 2018).  ISBN 978-1476778440.  352p.

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THE FIRST TIME AT FIRELIGHT FALLS by Julie Anne Long

June 9, 2018

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Hellcat Canyon Novel, Book 4

Gabe, like most elementary school principals, is an ex-Navy Seal. Ha! I wish, I’d love kids to feel that safe in school. But in this fictional tale, he really is, and he really loves kids. He is also very lonely, and fills his days and nights with meetings, coaching, and volunteering all over town. He’s also really hot with a body that draws every female eye in town. It’s not surprising that every mom in the school finds a reason to stop by his office, but he only has eyes for Eden, a single mom with an amazing kid.

There is a strong attraction there but Eden has been so busy being a single mom that she hasn’t allowed herself to get involved with anyone. But Gabe is really hard to dismiss. He’s not pushy, he just keeps showing up and they talk – really talk – about anything and everything and slowly get to know one another. Eventually, they realize it is time to move the relationship to the next level.

Eden has a secret that she has been keeping since her daughter’s conception – no one, including her family, knows who the baby daddy is. Eden knows and she’s not ready to tell anyone, that is until he shows up in town, meets his daughter by accident and realizes rather quickly that she must be his – she’s the spitting image of his mother.  This throws a complication into the whole Gabe/Eden dynamic that neither of them saw coming.

This was a really fun read with great characters and a bit of steamy sex now and then. I  also really enjoyed the humor and all the obstacles in the way of the happily ever after.

I haven’t read the other books in the series but I know that Hot in Hellcat Canyon was a finalist for the Romance Writers of America 2017 Contemporary Romance award. (I just reserved it at my library.) And I wouldn’t be surprised if this new one landed on that list as well.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

THE FIRST TIME AT FIRELIGHT FALLS by Julie Anne Long. Avon (May 29, 2018). ISBN 978-0062672902.  384p.

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BEACH HOUSE REUNION by Mary Alice Monroe

June 8, 2018

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The Beach House Series

From the publisher:

Whisking you back to the shores of her bestselling Beach House series, Mary Alice Monroe weaves together a tale of the struggles and triumphs of the historic Rutledge family of Charleston, South Carolina. Beautifully wrought and rich with keen insight, this is an illuminating tale of new beginnings, resilience, and one family’s enduring love.

Cara Rutledge returns to her Southern home on the idyllic Isle of Palms. Everything is comfortingly the same, yet each detail is rife with painful memories. Only through reconnecting with family, friends, and the rhythms of the lowcountry can Cara release the hold of the past and open herself to the possibility of a new love, career, and hope for the future.

Meanwhile, her niece Linnea, a recent college graduate who doesn’t know where her life will take her, leaves her historic home in Charleston, with all its entitlement and expectations, and heads to her aunt’s beach house. On the island, she is part of the freer, natural ocean lifestyle she loves, rejoining the turtle team, learning to surf, and falling in love. Remembering the lessons of her beloved grandmother, Lovie, the original “turtle lady,” Linnea rediscovers a meaningful purpose to her life and finds the courage she needs to break from tradition.

In this heartwarming novel, three generations of the Rutledge family gather together to find the strength, love, and commitment to break destructive family patterns and to forge new bonds that will endure long beyond one summer reunion.

I’ve only read the last book in this series, Beach House for Rent, and I really enjoyed that book. This one, not so much.

It is set in the Lowcountry of South Carolina on Isle of Palms and in the same house as the last book. But that story had a lot more story to it. Not much happens here until about halfway through this book.

The first half is a love letter to the area with lots of descriptions and an emphasis on the turtles. I live in a turtle nesting area so I’m already very familiar with this so maybe that’s why I found it a bit boring. Eventually, there is a bit of romance and family drama, but it just took too long to get there and the book really dragged for me.

I was tempted on several occasions to just put it down and forget it, but because I liked the last one so much I stuck with it. I’m not sorry I did but I would only recommend it to fans of either Mary Alice Monroe, turtles, or the Lowcountry. There are much more interesting beach books out there.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

BEACH HOUSE REUNION by Mary Alice Monroe. Gallery Books (May 22, 2018).  ISBN 978-1501193293.  400p.

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TOO WILDE TO WED by Eloisa James

June 7, 2018

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Wildes of Lindow Castle, Book 2

From the publisher:

No one is more surprised than Lord North when he returns from war to find his ex-fiancee in his ancestral home…working as a governess in a sexy, fiery new Wildes of Lindow Castle romance by New York Times bestselling author Eloisa James…

The handsome, rakish heir to a dukedom, Lord Roland Northbridge Wilde—known to his friends as North—left England two years ago, after being jilted by Miss Diana Belgrave. He returns from war to find that he’s notorious: polite society has ruled him “too wild to wed.”

Diana never meant to tarnish North’s reputation, or his heart, but in her rush to save a helpless child, there was no time to consider the consequences of working as a governess in Lindow Castle. Now everyone has drawn the worst conclusions about the child’s father, and Diana is left with bittersweet regret.

When North makes it clear that he still wants her for his own, scandal or no, Diana has to fight to keep from losing her heart to the man whom she still has no intention of marrying.

Yet North is returning a hardened warrior—and this is one battle he’s determined to win.

He wants Diana, and he’ll risk everything to call her his own.

I usually love Eloisa James’s books but I struggled with this one. I found the storyline a bit convoluted at times and lacking the usual charm and wit of most of her books. The heroine, Diana, was more annoying than interesting and there wasn’t a whole lot of romance in this romance. It was an okay read but frankly, I was disappointed.

As an aside that truly means nothing, I found the cover odd, it looks more like a contemporary romance than historical.

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

TOO WILDE TO WED by Eloisa James. Avon (May 29, 2018). ISBN 978-0062848802. 304p.

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DREAMS OF FALLING by Karen White

June 6, 2018

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I am delighted to be part of the blog tour for Karen White’s latest!

PureWow, Southern Living, and PopSugar have all chosen Karen White’s DREAMS OF FALLING (Berkley Hardcover, June 5) as a best beach read of summer! It also made the list at LibraryReads.

From the publisher:

New York Times bestselling author Karen White crafts evocative relationships in this contemporary women’s fiction novel, set in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, about lifelong friends who share a devastating secret.

On the banks of the North Santee River stands a moss-draped oak that was once entrusted with the dreams of three young girls. Into the tree’s trunk, they placed their greatest hopes, written on ribbons, for safekeeping–including the most important one: Friends forever, come what may.

But life can waylay the best of intentions….

Nine years ago, a humiliated Larkin Lanier fled Georgetown, South Carolina, knowing she could never go back. But when she finds out that her mother has disappeared, she realizes she has no choice but to return to the place she both loves and dreads–and to the family and friends who never stopped wishing for her to come home.

Ivy, Larkin’s mother, is discovered badly injured and unconscious in the burned-out wreckage of her ancestral plantation home. No one knows why Ivy was there, but as Larkin digs for answers, she uncovers secrets kept for nearly fifty years–whispers of love, sacrifice, and betrayal–that lead back to three girls on the brink of womanhood who found their friendship tested in the most heartbreaking ways.

Connect with the author:  Karen White

Praise for Dreams of Falling

“Three lifelong best friends. One dark secret that will reverberate for generations to come. Told in multiple timelines of the present and the past, this is Southern fiction at its best. A novel about dreams, friendship, and family, Dreams of Falling will make you long for home.”—PopSugar

“Intricate storytelling across generations and time periods, using eloquent language, makes for deep characterization alongside a brisk-paced plot. Full of family secrets and southern charm, Dreams of Falling serves equal helpings of drama and comfort to fans of Dorothea Benton Frank, Mary Alice Monroe, and Barbara Claypole White.”—Booklist

6/18 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

DREAMS OF FALLING by Karen White. Berkley (June 5, 2018). ISBN 978-0451488411. 416p.

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