Barbara's bookshelf: all en-US Thu, 13 Mar 2025 17:17:07 -0700 60 Barbara's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Sunflower Sisters 55006449
Gerorgeanna "Georgey" Woolsey isn't meant for the world of lavish parties and the demure attitudes of women of her stature. So when war ignites the nation, Georgey follows her passion for nursing during a time when doctors considered women on the battlefront a bother. In proving hem wrong, she and her sister Eliza venture from New York o Washington, DC, to Gettysburg and witness the unparalleled horrors of slavery as they become involved in the war effort.

In the South, Jemma is enslaved on the Peeler Plantation in Maryland, where she lives with her mother and father. Her sister, Patience, is enslaved on the plantation next door, and both live in fear of LeBaron, an abusive overseer who tracks their every move. When Jemma is sold by the cruel plantation mistress Anne-May at the same time the Union army comes through, she sees a chance to finally escape - but only by abandoning the family she loves.

Anne-May is left behind to run Peeler Plantation when her husband joins the Union army and her cherished brother enlists with the Confederates. In charge of the household, she uses the opportunity to follow her own ambitions and is drawn into a secret Southern network of spies, finally exposing herself to the fate she deserves.

Inspired by true accounts, 'SUNFLOWER SISTERS' provides a vivid, detailed look at the Civil War experience, from the barbaric and inhumane plantations, to a war-torn New York City, to the horrors of the battlefield. It's a sweeping story of women caught in a country on the brink of collapse, in a society grappling with nationalism and unthinkable racial cruelty, a story still so relevant today.]]> 528 Martha Hall Kelly 1524796417 Barbara 0 4.39 2021 Sunflower Sisters
author: Martha Hall Kelly
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/13
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]]> <![CDATA[The Medici Return (Cotton Malone, #19)]]> 214229344 From celebratedĚýNew York TimesĚýbestselling author Steve Berry comes the latest installment in his wildly popular Cotton Malone series—now in development as a streaming series. The Medici Return takes Cotton to Italy to solve a five hundred year-old mystery. Ěý

Cotton Malone is on the hunt for a forgotten 16th century Pledge of Christ—a sworn promise made by Pope Julius II that evidences a monetary debt owed by the Vatican, still valid after five centuries—now worth in the trillions of dollars. ĚýBut collecting that debt centers around what happened to the famed Medici of Florence—a family that history says died out, without heirs, centuries ago.Ěý

Who will become the next prime minister of Italy, and who will be the next pope?ĚýFinding answers proves difficult until Cotton realizes that everything hinges on when, and if, the Medici return.]]> 405 Steve Berry 1538770598 Barbara 0 4.48 2025 The Medici Return (Cotton Malone, #19)
author: Steve Berry
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/24
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]]> The Woman Next Door 45944614 I suppose everyone has regrets, wonders what if? People all have their reasons for living here. Who knows what lies behind the pretty curtains and the well-groomed lawns of Mulberry Avenue?

Lucy has a lovely husband, a job she adores as a teacher, and a house on Mulberry Avenue that she’s decorated just the way she wants � from the floaty curtains and the softest bed linen, right down to the perfectly-chosen velvet cushions on their comfortable sofa. Life isn’t perfect, but it’s pretty close.

She’s also got Amber. Her newest friend and neighbour. They’ve got so much in common. Even if Amber’s life sometimes seems a lot more glamorous and exciting, she shares Lucy’s down-to-earth sense of humour, and Amber seems so interested in Lucy and her life, it’s like they never run out of things to talk about.

But then Amber starts acting strangely, claiming her life isn’t all it seems, talking about how she thinks she might be pregnant, and confiding in Lucy that she’s started getting threatening messages.

She’s scared, and the only person she can turn to is Lucy. She wants to stay at Lucy’s house until things calm down.

Lucy wants to protect her friend. But can she really trust Amber? Because sometimes other people are not all that they seem. Sometimes they have secrets. And they’d do anything to keep them…]]> 304 Sue Watson Barbara 0 3.74 2019 The Woman Next Door
author: Sue Watson
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2025/01/17
date added: 2025/01/17
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]]> <![CDATA[The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell]]> 36183538
Sam believed it was God who sent Ernie Cantwell, the only African American kid in his class, to be the friend he so desperately needed. And that it was God’s idea for Mickie Kennedy to storm into Our Lady of Mercy like a tornado, uprooting every rule Sam had been taught about boys and girls.

Forty years later, Sam, a small-town eye doctor, is no longer certain anything was by design—especially not the tragedy that caused him to turn his back on his friends, his hometown, and the life he’d always known. Running from the pain, eyes closed, served little purpose. Now, as he looks back on his life, Sam embarks on a journey that will take him halfway around the world. This time, his eyes are wide open—bringing into clear view what changed him, defined him, and made him so afraid, until he can finally see what truly matters.

Winner of Suspense Magazine’s Crimson Scribe Award.]]> 449 Robert Dugoni 1503933334 Barbara 0 currently-reading 4.52 2018 The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell
author: Robert Dugoni
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.52
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/29
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review:

]]> Here One Moment 208894791 If you knew your future, would you try to fight fate?

Aside from a delay, there will be no problems. The flight will be smooth, it will land safely. Everyone who gets on the plane will get off. But almost all of them will be forever changed.
Ěý
Because on this ordinary, short, domestic flight, something extraordinary happens. People learn how and when they are going to die. For some, their death is far in the future—age 103!—and they laugh. But for six passengers, their predicted deaths are not far away at all.
Ěý
How do they know this? There were ostensibly more interesting people on the flight (the bride and groom, the jittery, possibly famous woman, the giant Hemsworth-esque guy who looks like an off-duty superhero, the frazzled, gorgeous flight attendant) but none would become as famous as “The Death Lady.�
Ěý
Not a single passenger or crew member will later recall noticing her board the plane. She wasn’t exceptionally old or young, rude or polite. She wasn’t drunk or nervous or pregnant. Her appearance and demeanor were unremarkable. But what she did on that flight was truly remarkable.
Ěý
A few months later, one passenger dies exactly as she predicted. Then two more passengers die, again, as she said they would. Soon no one is thinking this is simply an entertaining story at a cocktail party.
Ěý
If you were told you only had a certain amount of time left to live, would you do things differently? Would you try to dodge your destiny?
Ěý
Liane Moriarty’s Here One Moment is a brilliantly constructed tale that looks at free will and destiny, grief and love, and the endless struggle to maintainĚýcertainty and control in an uncertain world. A modern-day Jane Austen who humorously skewers social mores while spinning a web of mystery, Moriarty asks profound questions in her newest I-can’t-wait-to-find-out-what-happens novel.]]> 505 Liane Moriarty 0593798619 Barbara 0 4.18 2024 Here One Moment
author: Liane Moriarty
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/29
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]]> The Blue Hour 207249717 A stylish and immersive new novel of ambition, legacy, and betrayal from the #1ĚýNew York TimesĚýbestselling author ofĚýThe Girl on the Train.

An isolated Scottish island, accessible to the mainland only twelve hours a day. A famous (some might say infamous) artist whose notoriously unfaithful husband disappeared after visiting her twenty years ago. A present-day discovery that intimately connects three people and unveils a web of secrets and lies.

ĚýA masterful and propulsive novel that asks searing questions of ambition, power, gender and perception, The Blue Hour recalls the very best of Shirley Jackson and Patricia Highsmith and cements Hawkins’s place among the very best of our most nuanced, powerful and stylish storytellers.]]> Paula Hawkins 0063396564 Barbara 0 3.37 2024 The Blue Hour
author: Paula Hawkins
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.37
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/18
date added: 2024/11/18
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]]> Hope in a Jar: A Novel 8148785 368 Beth Harbison Barbara 0 3.74 2009 Hope in a Jar: A Novel
author: Beth Harbison
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/12
date added: 2024/11/12
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]]> The Briar Club 60873122 A haunting and powerful story of female friendships and secrets in a Washington, D.C. boardinghouse during the McCarthy era.

Washington, D.C., 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital, where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely poised English beauty Fliss whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; police officer’s daughter Nora, who is entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Bea, whose career has ended along with the women’s baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy’s Red Scare.

Grace’s weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. When a shocking act of violence tears apart the house, the Briar Club women must decide once and for Who is the true enemy in their midst?]]> 430 Kate Quinn 0063244764 Barbara 0 4.44 2024 The Briar Club
author: Kate Quinn
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/09/29
date added: 2024/09/29
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]]> <![CDATA[The Truth You Told (Raisa Susanto, #2)]]> 199229118 A serial killer on death row challenges a forensic linguist to solve his final puzzle in a novel of breathtaking mind games by the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of The Lies You Wrote.

Forensic psychologist Callum Kilkenny lost his wife, Shay, to the very serial killer he’d hunted for five years. When Nathaniel Conrad—known as the Alphabet Man, for his love of tattooing codes onto his victims� bodies—was condemned to death row, Callum thought the game of cat and mouse was over. But just before execution, Nathaniel drops a he’s not the one who murdered Shay.

After analyzing the killer’s taunting, coded letters to authorities—one for each victim—FBI forensic linguist Raisa Susanto believes him. The discrepancies bear it out. So was it a copycat? A partner in crime? Or something more sinister? If Nathaniel knows the answer, Raisa fears he’ll be taking that closely guarded secret to his grave.

As Raisa and Callum are pulled into an investigation to solve Shay’s murder, it reopens old traumas that cut deeper than they could imagine. Before someone else dies, Raisa must decipher the unbelievable truth in an ever-twisting case built on a foundation of lies.]]> 316 Brianna Labuskes 166251137X Barbara 0 4.25 2024 The Truth You Told (Raisa Susanto, #2)
author: Brianna Labuskes
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/09/24
date added: 2024/09/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Next Mrs. Parrish (Mrs. Parrish, #2)]]> 198563729 Daphne and Amber Parrish are thrust back into each other’s lives upon the resurgence of a long-forgotten threat, forcing a vicious game of cat and mouse where everything is on the line, in this thrilling sequel to the million-copy-bestselling Reese’s Book Club pick The Last Mrs. Parrish.

Amber Patterson Parrish has come a long way from being an invisible wallflower. Her hard work and immaculate planning have paid off now that she’s a prominent socialite, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been bumps along the way. Less than a year since her husband Jackson’s tax-evasion scandal, Amber is still at the top of the Bishops Harbor community pecking order, free to do as she wishes while Jackson sits in prison. But that freedom is quickly coming to an end. With Jackson getting released from prison, Amber’s time—and money—is vanishing.

Meanwhile, Daphne Parrish left Bishops Harbor after her divorce from Jackson Parrish, swearing she would never go back. But when one of her daughters runs away from home, desperate to see her father, Daphne agrees to return for the summer to allow him supervised visits. Once out of prison, Jackson swears he’s a changed man, but Daphne knows all too well that he can’t be trusted.

When a ghost from Amber’s past emerges looking for revenge, the three of them find unlikely allies in one another, but who is playing who? When all is said and done, they’ll have to fight tooth and nail for everything they have left in this zero-sum game.

With shocking turns and entertaining characters, The Next Mrs. Parrish will make you rethink everything you thought you knew about duplicity and betrayal.]]> 336 Liv Constantine 0593599926 Barbara 0 to-read 3.75 2024 The Next Mrs. Parrish (Mrs. Parrish, #2)
author: Liv Constantine
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/09/20
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]]> Middle of the Night 199026522 In the latest jaw-dropping thriller from New York Times bestselling author Riley Sager, a man must contend with the long-ago disappearance of his childhood best friend—and the dark secrets lurking just beyond the safe confines of his picture-perfect neighborhood.

The worst thing to ever happen on Hemlock Circle occurred in Ethan Marsh’s backyard. One July night, ten-year-old Ethan and his best friend and neighbor, Billy, fell asleep in a tent set up on a manicured lawn in a quiet, quaint New Jersey cul de sac. In the morning, Ethan woke up alone. During the night, someone had sliced the tent open with a knife and taken Billy. He was never seen again.

Thirty years later, Ethan has reluctantly returned to his childhood home. Plagued by bad dreams and insomnia, he begins to notice strange things happening in the middle of the night. Someone seems to be roaming the cul de sac at odd hours, and signs of Billy’s presence keep appearing in Ethan’s backyard. Is someone playing a cruel prank? Or has Billy, long thought to be dead, somehow returned to Hemlock Circle?

The mysterious occurrences prompt Ethan to investigate what really happened that night, a quest that reunites him with former friends and neighbors and leads him into the woods that surround Hemlock Circle. Woods where Billy claimed monsters roamed and where a mysterious institute does clandestine research on a crumbling estate.

The closer Ethan gets to the truth, the more he realizes that no place—be it quiet forest or suburban street—is completely safe. And that the past has a way of haunting the present.]]> 367 Riley Sager 0593472373 Barbara 0 to-read 3.65 2024 Middle of the Night
author: Riley Sager
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/09/20
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]]> The Widow of Pale Harbor 42867746
Maine, 1846. Gabriel Stone is desperate to escape the ghosts that haunt him in Massachusetts after his wife’s death, so he moves to Maine, taking a position as a minister in the remote village of Pale Harbor.

But not all is as it seems in the sleepy town. Strange, unsettling things have been happening, and the townspeople claim that only one person can be responsible: Sophronia Carver, a reclusive widow who lives with a spinster maid in the eerie Castle Carver. Sophronia must be a witch, and she almost certainly killed her husband.

As the incidents escalate, one thing becomes clear: they are the work of a twisted person inspired by the wildly popular stories of Mr. Edgar Allan Poe. And Gabriel must find answers, or Pale Harbor will suffer a fate worthy of Poe’s darkest tales.]]> 360 Hester Fox 1488036624 Barbara 0 3.49 2019 The Widow of Pale Harbor
author: Hester Fox
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2019/10/29
date added: 2024/09/17
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]]> True Irish Ghost Stories 5367833 128 St. John D. Seymour Barbara 0 to-read 3.42 True Irish Ghost Stories
author: St. John D. Seymour
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.42
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/08/20
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]]> If I Could Turn Back Time 23127727 If I Could Turn Back Time is the fantasy of every woman who has ever thought, "If I could go back in time, knowing what I know now, I'd do things so differently..."

Thirty-seven year old Ramie Phillips has led a very successful life. She made her fortune and now she hob nobs with the very rich and occasionally the semi-famous, and she enjoys luxuries she only dreamed of as a middle-class kid growing up in Potomac, Maryland. But despite it all, she can't ignore the fact that she isn't necessarily happy. In fact, lately Ramie has begun to feel more than a little empty.

On a boat with friends off the Florida coast, she tries to fight her feelings of discontent with steel will and hard liquor. No one even notices as she gets up and goes to the diving board and dives off...

Suddenly Ramie is waking up, straining to understand a voice calling in the distance...It's her mother: "Wake up! You're going to be late for school again. I'm not writing a note this time..."

Ramie finds herself back on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, with a second chance to see the people she's lost and change the choices she regrets. How did she get back here? Has she gone off the deep end? Is she really back in time? Above all, she'll have to answer the question that no one else can: What it is that she really wants from the past, and for her future?]]> 335 Beth Harbison 1466842199 Barbara 0 3.32 2015 If I Could Turn Back Time
author: Beth Harbison
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2015/09/17
date added: 2024/07/22
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]]> Husbands & Lovers 199223202
New England, 2022. Three years ago, single mother Mallory Dunne received the telephone call every parent dreads—her ten-year-old son Sam had been airlifted from summer camp with acute poisoning from a toxic death cap mushroom, leaving him fighting for his life. Now, in a search for the donor kidney that will give her son a chance for a normal life, Mallory’s forced to confront two harrowing secrets from her past: her mother’s adoption from an infamous Irish orphanage in 1952, and her own all-consuming summer romance fourteen years earlier with her childhood best friend Monk Adams—now one of the world’s most beloved singer-songwriters—a fairytale cut short by an agonizing betrayal.

Cairo, 1951. After suffering tragedy beyond comprehension in the war, Hungarian refugee Hannah Ainsworth has forged a respectable new life for herself—marriage to a wealthy British diplomat, a coveted posting in glamorous Cairo. But a fateful encounter with the enigmatic manager of a hotel bristling with spies leads to a passionate affair that will reawaken Hannah's longing for everything she once lost. As revolution simmers in the Egyptian streets, a pregnant Hannah finds herself snared into a game of intrigue between two men…and an act of sacrifice that will echo down the generations.

Timeless and bittersweet, Husbands And Lovers draws readers on an unforgettable journey of heartbreak and redemption, from the revolutionary fires of midcentury Egypt to the moneyed beaches of contemporary New England. Acclaimed author Beatriz Williams has written a poignant and beautifully voiced novel of deeply human characters entangled by morally complex issues—of privilege, class, and the female experience—inside worlds brought shimmeringly to life.]]> 384 Beatriz Williams 0593724232 Barbara 0 to-read 4.25 2024 Husbands & Lovers
author: Beatriz Williams
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> The Only One Left 62703226 At seventeen, Lenora Hope
Hung her sister with a rope

Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.

Stabbed her father with a knife
Took her mother’s happy life

It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer�I want to tell you everything.

“It wasn’t me,� Lenora said
But she’s the only one not dead

As Kit helps Lenora write about the events leading to the Hope family massacre, it becomes clear there’s more to the tale than people know. But when new details about her predecessor’s departure come to light, Kit starts to suspect Lenora might not be telling the complete truth—and that the seemingly harmless woman in her care could be far more dangerous than she first thought.]]> 383 Riley Sager 0593183223 Barbara 0 to-read 4.12 2023 The Only One Left
author: Riley Sager
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> The House Across the Lake 58909880 The New York Times best-selling author of Final Girls and Survive the Night is back with his most unexpected thriller yet.

Casey Fletcher, a recently widowed actress trying to escape a streak of bad press, has retreated to the peace and quiet of her family’s lake house in Vermont. Armed with a pair of binoculars and several bottles of liquor, she passes the time watching Tom and Katherine Royce, the glamorous couple who live in the house across the lake. They make for good viewing—a tech innovator, Tom is rich; and a former model, Katherine is gorgeous.

One day on the lake, Casey saves Katherine from drowning, and the two strike up a budding friendship. But the more they get to know each other—and the longer Casey watches—it becomes clear that Katherine and Tom’s marriage is not as perfect and placid as it appears. When Katherine suddenly vanishes, Casey becomes consumed with finding out what happened to her. In the process, she uncovers eerie, darker truths that turn a tale of voyeurism and suspicion into a story of guilt, obsession and how looks can be very deceiving.

With his trademark blend of sharp characters, psychological suspense, and gasp-worthy surprises, Riley Sager’s The House Across the Lake unveils more than one twist that will shock readers until the very last page.]]> 369 Riley Sager Barbara 0 to-read 3.57 2022 The House Across the Lake
author: Riley Sager
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> First Lie Wins 164444179 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780593492918.

Evie Porter has everything a nice Southern girl could want: a doting boyfriend, a house with a white picket fence, a tight group of friends. The only catch: Evie Porter doesn’t exist.

The identity comes first: Evie Porter. Once she’s given a name and location by her mysterious boss, Mr. Smith, she learns everything there is to know about the town and the people in it. Then the mark: Ryan Sumner. The last piece of the puzzle is the job.

Evie isn’t privy to Mr. Smith’s real identity, but she knows this job isn’t like the others. Ryan has gotten under her skin, and she’s starting to envision a different sort of life for herself. But Evie can’t make any mistakes—especially after what happened last time.

Evie Porter must stay one step ahead of her past while making sure there’s still a future in front of her. The stakes couldn’t be higher—but then, Evie has always liked a challenge. . . .]]> 340 Ashley Elston Barbara 0 to-read 3.97 2024 First Lie Wins
author: Ashley Elston
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> The Woman in Me 63133205 The Woman in Me is a brave and astonishingly moving story about freedom, fame, motherhood, survival, faith, and hope.

In June 2021, the whole world was listening as Britney Spears spoke in open court. The impact of sharing her voice—her truth—was undeniable, and it changed the course of her life and the lives of countless others. The Woman in Me reveals for the first time her incredible journey—and the strength at the core of one of the greatest performers in pop music history.

Written with remarkable candor and humor, Spears’s groundbreaking book illuminates the enduring power of music and love—and the importance of a woman telling her own story, on her own terms, at last.]]> 288 Britney Spears 1668009048 Barbara 0 to-read 3.83 2023 The Woman in Me
author: Britney Spears
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> The Covenant of Water 123008485 Spanning the years 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water follows a family in southern India that suffers a peculiar in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning - and in Kerala, water is everywhere.

At the turn of the century a twelve-year-old girl, grieving the death of her father, is sent by boat to her wedding, where she will meet her forty-year-old husband for the first time. From this poignant beginning, the young girl and future matriarch - known as Big Ammachi - will witness unthinkable changes at home and at large over the span of her extraordinary life, full of the joys and trials of love and the struggles of hardship.

A shimmering evocation of a lost India and of the passage of time itself, The Covenant of Water is a hymn to progress in medicine and to human understanding, and a humbling testament to the hardships undergone by past generations for the sake of those alive today. Imbued with humour, deep emotion and the essence of life, it is one of the most masterful literary novels published in recent years.]]> 796 Abraham Verghese 180471044X Barbara 0 to-read 4.60 2023 The Covenant of Water
author: Abraham Verghese
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.60
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> Demon Copperhead 60194162 "Anyone will tell you the born of this world are marked from the get-out, win or lose."

Set in the mountains of southern Appalachia, this is the story of a boy born to a teenaged single mother in a single-wide trailer, with no assets beyond his dead father's good looks and copper-colored hair, a caustic wit, and a fierce talent for survival. In a plot that never pauses for breath, relayed in his own unsparing voice, he braves the modern perils of foster care, child labor, derelict schools, athletic success, addiction, disastrous loves, and crushing losses. Through all of it, he reckons with his own invisibility in a popular culture where even the superheroes have abandoned rural people in favor of cities.

Many generations ago, Charles Dickens wrote David Copperfield from his experience as a survivor of institutional poverty and its damages to children in his society. Those problems have yet to be solved in ours. Dickens is not a prerequisite for readers of this novel, but he provided its inspiration. In transposing a Victorian epic novel to the contemporary American South, Barbara Kingsolver enlists Dickens' anger and compassion, and above all, his faith in the transformative powers of a good story. Demon Copperhead speaks for a new generation of lost boys, and all those born into beautiful, cursed places they can't imagine leaving behind.]]> 560 Barbara Kingsolver 0063251922 Barbara 0 to-read 4.46 2022 Demon Copperhead
author: Barbara Kingsolver
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.46
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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review:

]]> <![CDATA[Romancing Mister Bridgerton (Bridgertons, #4)]]> 56947799 On the sixth of April, in the year 1812 - precisely two days before her sixteenth birthday - Penelope Featherington fell in love. But Colin Bridgerton certainly didn't fall in love with her in 1812 (and not in 1813, 1814, 1815, or - oh blast, not in all the years 1816-1822, either, and certainly not in 1823, when he was out of the country the whole time, anyway). Penelope Featherington has secretly adored her best friend's brother for well, it feels like forever. After half a lifetime of watching Colin Bridgerton from afar, she thinks she knows everything about him, until she stumbles across his deepest secret and fears she doesn't know him at all.
Colin Bridgerton is tired of being thought of as nothing but an empty-headed charmer, tired of everyone's preoccupation with the notorious gossip columnist Lady Whistledown, who can't seem to publish an edition without mentioning him in the first paragraph. But when Colin returns to London from a trip abroad he discovers nothing in his life is quite the same - especially Penelope Featherington! The girl haunting his dreams. But when he discovers that Penelope has secrets of her own, this elusive bachelor must decide is she his biggest threat - or his promise of a happy ending?

]]> 374 Julia Quinn Barbara 0 to-read 3.98 2002 Romancing Mister Bridgerton (Bridgertons, #4)
author: Julia Quinn
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2002
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/07/05
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]]> The Midnight Feast 199791337 Secrets. Lies. Murder. Let the festivities begin...

It’s the opening night of The Manor, and no expense, small or large, has been spared. The infinity pool sparkles; crystal pouches for guests� healing have been placed in the Seaside Cottages and Woodland Hutches; the “Manor Mule� cocktail (grapefruit, ginger, vodka, and a dash of CBD oil) is being poured with a heavy hand. Everyone is wearing linen.

But under the burning midsummer sun, darkness stirs. Old friends and enemies circulate among the guests. Just outside the Manor’s immaculately kept grounds, an ancient forest bristles with secrets. And the Sunday morning of opening weekend, the local police are called. Something’s not right with the guests. There’s been a fire. A body’s been discovered.

THE FOUNDER * THE HUSBAND * THE MYSTERY GUEST * THE KITCHEN HELP

It all began with a secret, fifteen years ago. Now the past has crashed the party. And it’ll end in murder at� The Midnight Feast.]]> 320 Lucy Foley 0063003120 Barbara 0 3.79 2024 The Midnight Feast
author: Lucy Foley
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/06/21
date added: 2024/06/21
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]]> Damage Control 8482165
But bad things happen in threes, her mother has told her. When Dana discovers her husband cheating, she throws herself headlong into the investigation. Delaying cancer treatment, she teams with an intuitive detective to find the link between a one-of-a-kind earring found in her brother's bedroom and a mysterious girlfriend no one seems to be able to identify. But those connected to the murder are beginning to turn up dead, the evidence trail is growing cold and someone is masquerading as a police officer, cleaning up the details as they go along.]]> 406 Robert Dugoni Barbara 0 4.38 2007 Damage Control
author: Robert Dugoni
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/31
date added: 2024/05/31
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]]> One Perfect Couple 199897897 Harkening to Agatha Christie’s classic And Then There Were None, this high-tension and ingenious thriller follows five couples trapped on a storm-swept island as a killer stalks among them.

Lyla is in a bit of a rut. Her post-doctoral research has fizzled out, she’s pretty sure they won’t extend her contract, and things with her boyfriend, Nico, an aspiring actor, aren’t going great. When the opportunity arises for Nico to join the cast of a new reality TV show, The Perfect Couple, she decides to try out with him. A whirlwind audition process later, Lyla find herself whisked off to a tropical paradise with Nico, boating through the Indian Ocean towards Ever After Island, where the two of them will compete against four other couples—Bayer and Angel, Dan and Santana, Joel and Romi, and Conor and Zana—in order to win a cash prize.

But not long after they arrive on the deserted island, things start to go wrong. After the first challenge leaves everyone rattled and angry, an overnight storm takes matters from bad to worse. Cut off from the mainland by miles of ocean, deprived of their phones, and unable to contact the crew that brought them there, the group must band together for survival. As tensions run high and fresh water runs low, Lyla finds that this game show is all too real—and the stakes are life or death.

A fast-paced, spellbinding thriller rife with intrigue and characters that feel so true to life, this novel proves yet again that Ruth Ware is the queen of psychological suspense.]]> 416 Ruth Ware Barbara 0 3.87 2024 One Perfect Couple
author: Ruth Ware
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/22
date added: 2024/05/22
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]]> The Four Winds 53496907
Texas, 1921. A time of abundance. The Great War is over, the bounty of the land is plentiful, and America is on the brink of a new and optimistic era. But for Elsa Wolcott, deemed too old to marry in a time when marriage is a woman’s only option, the future seems bleak. Until the night she meets Rafe Martinelli and decides to change the direction of her life. With her reputation in ruin, there is only one respectable choice: marriage to a man she barely knows.

By 1934, the world has changed; millions are out of work and drought has devastated the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as crops fail and water dries up and the earth cracks open. Dust storms roll relentlessly across the plains. Everything on the Martinelli farm is dying, including Elsa’s tenuous marriage; each day is a desperate battle against nature and a fight to keep her children alive.

In this uncertain and perilous time, Elsa—like so many of her neighbors—must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or leave it behind and go west, to California, in search of a better life for her family.

The Four Winds is a rich, sweeping novel that stunningly brings to life the Great Depression and the people who lived through it—the harsh realities that divided us as a nation and the enduring battle between the haves and the have-nots. A testament to hope, resilience, and the strength of the human spirit to survive adversity, The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.]]> 464 Kristin Hannah 1250178622 Barbara 0 4.44 2021 The Four Winds
author: Kristin Hannah
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.44
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2024/05/15
date added: 2024/05/15
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]]> The Fury 125500880 A masterfully paced thriller about a reclusive ex–movie star and her famous friends whose spontaneous trip to a private Greek island is upended by a murder � from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Silent Patient.

This is a tale of murder.

Or maybe that’s not quite true. At its heart, it’s a love story, isn’t it?

Lana Farrar is a reclusive ex–movie star and one of the most famous women in the world. Every year, she invites her closest friends to escape the English weather and spend Easter on her idyllic private Greek island.

I tell you this because you may think you know this story. You probably read about it at the time � it caused a real stir in the tabloids, if you remember. It had all the necessary ingredients for a press a celebrity; a private island cut off by the wind…and a murder.

We found ourselves trapped there overnight. Our old friendships concealed hatred and a desire for revenge. What followed was a game of cat and mouse � a battle of wits, full of twists and turns, building to an unforgettable climax. The night ended in violence and death, as one of us was found murdered.

But who am I?

My name is Elliot Chase, and I’m going to tell you a story unlike any you’ve ever heard.]]> 295 Alex Michaelides Barbara 0 3.51 2024 The Fury
author: Alex Michaelides
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/30
date added: 2024/04/30
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]]> The Silent Patient 40396699 Promising to be the debut novel of the season The Silent Patient is a shocking psychological thriller of a woman’s act of violence against her husband—and of the therapist obsessed with uncovering her motive�

Alicia Berenson’s life is seemingly perfect. A famous painter married to an in-demand fashion photographer, she lives in a grand house with big windows overlooking a park in one of London’s most desirable areas. One evening her husband Gabriel returns home late from a fashion shoot, and Alicia shoots him five times in the face, and then never speaks another word.

Alicia’s refusal to talk, or give any kind of explanation, turns a domestic tragedy into something far grander, a mystery that captures the public imagination and casts Alicia into notoriety. The price of her art skyrockets, and she, the silent patient, is hidden away from the tabloids and spotlight at the Grove, a secure forensic unit in North London.

Theo Faber is a criminal psychotherapist who has waited a long time for the opportunity to work with Alicia. His determination to get her to talk and unravel the mystery of why she shot her husband takes him down a twisting path into his own motivations—a search for the truth that threatens to consume him....]]> 362 Alex Michaelides Barbara 0 4.18 2019 The Silent Patient
author: Alex Michaelides
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/24
date added: 2024/04/24
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]]> The Maidens 53672372 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Silent Patient comes a spellbinding tale of psychological suspense, weaving together Greek mythology, murder, and obsession, that further cements “Michaelides as a major player in the field� (Publishers Weekly).

Edward Fosca is a murderer. Of this Mariana is certain. But Fosca is untouchable. A handsome and charismatic Greek Tragedy professor at Cambridge University, Fosca is adored by staff and students alike—particularly by the members of a secret society of female students known as The Maidens.

Mariana Andros is a brilliant but troubled group therapist who becomes fixated on The Maidens when one member, a friend of Mariana’s niece Zoe, is found murdered in Cambridge.

Mariana, who was once herself a student at the university, quickly suspects that behind the idyllic beauty of the spires and turrets, and beneath the ancient traditions, lies something sinister. And she becomes convinced that, despite his alibi, Edward Fosca is guilty of the murder. But why would the professor target one of his students? And why does he keep returning to the rites of Persephone, the maiden, and her journey to the underworld?

When another body is found, Mariana’s obsession with proving Fosca’s guilt spirals out of control, threatening to destroy her credibility as well as her closest relationships. But Mariana is determined to stop this killer, even if it costs her everything—including her own life.]]> 335 Alex Michaelides 1250881161 Barbara 0 3.76 2021 The Maidens
author: Alex Michaelides
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/22
date added: 2024/04/22
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]]> <![CDATA[The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle]]> 40033006
There are eight days, and eight witnesses for you to inhabit.

We will only let you escape once you tell us the name of the killer.

Understood? Then let's begin . . .

Evelyn Hardcastle will die. Every day until Aiden Bishop can identify her killer and break the cycle. But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up in the body of a different guest. And some of his hosts are more helpful than others . . .

The most inventive debut of the year twists together a mystery of such unexpected creativity it will leave listeners guessing until the very last second.]]> 482 Stuart Turton Barbara 0 currently-reading 3.78 2018 The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
author: Stuart Turton
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/04/15
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]]> Daughter of Mine 177058733 The new thrilling novel from Megan Miranda, the instant New York Times bestselling author of All the Missing Girls, The Last to Vanish, and The Only Survivors.

When Hazel Sharp, daughter of Mirror Lake’s longtime local detective, unexpectedly inherits her childhood home, she’s warily drawn back to the town—and people—she left behind almost a decade earlier. But Hazel’s not the only relic of the past to a drought has descended on the region, and as the water level in the lake drops, long-hidden secrets begin to emerge…including evidence that may help finally explain the mystery of her mother’s disappearance.]]> 365 Megan Miranda Barbara 0 4.12 2024 Daughter of Mine
author: Megan Miranda
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/15
date added: 2024/04/15
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]]> <![CDATA[The Chalice of the Gods (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #6)]]> 63048246 236 Rick Riordan 1368098274 Barbara 0 4.39 2023 The Chalice of the Gods (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #6)
author: Rick Riordan
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/13
date added: 2024/04/13
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]]> The Unquiet Bones 86518541 A shocking discovery of human bones reopens an almost fifty-year-old cold case—and rips apart the lives of a group of friends—in a riveting novel by Loreth Anne White, the Amazon Charts and Washington Post bestselling author of The Maid’s Diary.

When human bones are found beneath an old chapel in the woods, evidence suggests the remains could be linked to the decades-old case of missing teen Annalise Jansen.

Homicide detective Jane Munro—pregnant and acutely attuned to the preciousness of life—hopes the grim discovery will finally bring closure to the girl’s family. But for a group of Annalise’s old friends, once dubbed the Shoreview Six by the media, it threatens to expose a terrible pledge made on an autumn night forty-seven years ago.

The friends are now highly respected, affluent members of their communities, and none of them ever expected the dark chapter in their past to resurface. But as Jane and forensic anthropologist Dr. Ella Quinn peel back the layers of secrets, the group begins to fracture. Will one cave? Will they turn on each other?

The investigation takes a sharp turn when Jane discovers a second body—that of the boy long blamed for Annalise’s disappearance. As the bones tell their story, the group learns just how far each will go to guard their own truth.]]> 351 Loreth Anne White Barbara 0 4.32 2024 The Unquiet Bones
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/01
date added: 2024/04/12
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]]> She's Not Sorry 136142444 An ICU nurse accidentally uncovers a patient’s frightening past in thisĚýchilling thriller from theĚý New York Times Ěýbestselling author ofĚýLocal Woman MissingĚýandĚý Just the Nicest Couple .

Meghan Michaels is trying to find balance between being a single mom to a teenage daughter and working as a full time nurse. While on duty at the hospital one day, a patient named Caitlin arrives in a coma with a traumatic brain injury, having jumped from a bridge and plunging over twenty feet to the train tracks below.Ěý

But when a witness comes forward with shocking details about the fall, it calls everything they know into question. Was CaitlinĚýpushedĚýand if so, by whom and why?Ěý

Meghan has always tried to stay emotionally detached from her patients, but this time, she mistakenly lets herself get too close until she’s deeply entangled in Caitlin’s and her family’s lives. Only when it’s too late, does she realize that she and her daughter could be the next victims.]]> 331 Mary Kubica 0369746945 Barbara 0 3.95 2024 She's Not Sorry
author: Mary Kubica
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/07
date added: 2024/04/07
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]]> <![CDATA[The Sun and the Star (The Nico di Angelo Adventures #1)]]> 63028719 Demigods Nico di Angelo and Will Solace must endure the terrors of Tartarus to rescue an old friend in this thrilling adventure co-written by New York Times #1 best-selling author Rick Riordan and award-winning author Mark Oshiro.

As the son of Hades, Nico di Angelo has been through so much, from the premature deaths of his mother and sister, to being outed against his will, to losing his friend Jason during the trials of Apollo. But there is a ray of sunshine in his life–literally: his boyfriend, Will Solace, the son of Apollo. Together the two demigods can overcome any obstacle or foe. At least, that’s been the case so far...

Now Nico is being plagued by a voice calling out to him from Tartarus, the lowest part of the Underworld. He thinks he knows who it is: a reformed Titan named Bob whom Percy and Annabeth had to leave behind when they escaped Hades’s realm. Nico’s dreams and Rachel Dare’s latest prophecy leave little doubt in Nico’s mind that Bob is in some kind of trouble. Nico has to go on this quest, whether Mr. D and Chiron like it or not. And of course Will insists on coming with. But can a being made of light survive in the darkest part of the world? and what does the prophecy mean that Nico will have to “leave something of equal value behind?�

Nico will have to face demons both internal and external as his relationship with Will is tested to the core in this standalone adventure featuring two of the most popular characters in the Percy Jackson saga.]]> 480 Rick Riordan 1368081347 Barbara 0 4.21 2023 The Sun and the Star (The Nico di Angelo Adventures #1)
author: Rick Riordan
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2024/04/04
date added: 2024/04/04
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]]> A Day Like This 58022057
Annie Beyers has everything—a beautiful house, a loving husband, and an adorable daughter. It’s a day like any other when she takes Hannah to the pediatrician…until she wakes hours later from a car accident. When she asks for her daughter, confused doctors tell Annie that Hannah never existed. In fact, nothing after waking from the crash is the same as Annie remembers. Five happy years of her life apparently never happened.

Annie’s marriage is coming to an end. Now a successful artist living in Manhattan, she’s no longer home in their beloved upstate farmhouse. Her long-estranged sister is more like a best friend, and her recently deceased dog is alive and well. With each passing day, Annie’s remembered past and unfamiliar present begin to blur. Haunted by visions of Hannah, and with knowledge of things she can’t explain, Annie wonders…is everyone lying to her?

The search for answers leads Annie down an illuminating path far from home, to reconcile the memories with reality and to discover the truth about the life she’s living.]]> 287 Kelley McNeil 1542030439 Barbara 0 currently-reading 4.31 2021 A Day Like This
author: Kelley McNeil
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/30
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Daughter of the Deep 57191016 New York Times #1 best-selling author Rick Riordan pays homage to Jules Verne in his exciting modern take on 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Ana Dakkar is a freshman at Harding-Pencroft Academy, a five-year high school that graduates the best marine scientists, naval warriors, navigators, and underwater explorers in the world. Ana's parents died while on a scientific expedition two years ago, and the only family's she's got left is her older brother, Dev, also a student at HP. Ana's freshman year culminates with the class's weekend trial at sea, the details of which have been kept secret. She only hopes she has what it'll take to succeed. All her worries are blown out of the water when, on the bus ride to the ship, Ana and her schoolmates witness a terrible tragedy that will change the trajectory of their lives.

But wait, there's more. The professor accompanying them informs Ana that their rival school, Land Institute, and Harding-Pencroft have been fighting a cold war for a hundred and fifty years. Now that cold war has been turned up to a full broil, and the freshman are in danger of becoming fish food. In a race against deadly enemies, Ana will make amazing friends and astounding discoveries about her heritage as she puts her leadership skills to the test for the first time.

Rick Riordan's trademark humor, fast-paced action, and wide cast of characters are on full display in this undersea adventure.

Complete your middle grade action-adventure collection with these titles:

- Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
- Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
- Rick Riordan Presents: Aru Shah and the End of Time by Roshani Chokshi
- Rick Riordan Presents: City of the Plague God by Sarwat Chadda]]> 416 Rick Riordan 1368077943 Barbara 0 4.54 2021 Daughter of the Deep
author: Rick Riordan
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.54
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/30
date added: 2024/03/30
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[Cold Waters (Normal, Alabama #1)]]> 43381002 From USA Today bestselling author Debbie Herbert comes a thrilling story of murder and madness set in the darkest corner of Alabama.

Everyone thinks fourteen-year-old Violet is a murderer. After a summer-night swim with her best friend, Ainsley, Violet is found confused, wandering in the forest—and Ainsley’s never seen again. But without a body, murder charges won’t stick, so Violet is sent away.

After more than a decade in a psychiatric ward, Violet returns to her broken-down hometown of Normal, Alabama, to claim her dead mother’s inheritance and help her overworked sister care for their unstable, alcoholic father. Violet, still haunted by that night eleven years ago, endures horrific flashbacks and twisted hallucinations while townsfolk spit accusations—and for all she knows, they’re right.

As the summer heats up, details of Ainsley’s fate appear like a beast’s wild eyes, watching in the darkness, and grim revelations about Violet’s family threaten to devour her. Already on the edge of madness, Violet must fight to keep her sanity long enough for the terrible truth to burst from the cold, dark waters.]]> 333 Debbie Herbert 1542042496 Barbara 0 3.84 2019 Cold Waters (Normal, Alabama #1)
author: Debbie Herbert
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/27
date added: 2024/03/27
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]]> Under a Gilded Moon 52128630
Biltmore House, a palatial mansion being built by the Vanderbilts, American “royalty,� is in its final stages of construction in North Carolina. The country’s grandest example of privilege, it symbolizes the aspirations of its owner and the dreams of a girl, just as driven, who lives in its shadow.

Kerry MacGregor’s future is derailed when, after two years in college in New York City, family obligations call her home to the beautiful Appalachians. She is determined to distance herself from the opulence she sees rising in the Blue Ridge Mountains, however close its reach. Her family’s land is among the last pieces required to complete the Biltmore Estate. But something more powerful than an ambitious Vanderbilt heir could change Kerry’s fate as, one by one, more outsiders descend on the changing landscape—a fugitive from Sicily, a reporter chasing a groundbreaking story, a debutante tainted by scandal, and a conservationist prepared to put anyone at risk to stoke the resentment of the locals.

As Kerry finds herself caught in a war between wealth and poverty, innocence and corruption, she must navigate not only her own pride and desperation to survive but also the temptations of fortune and the men who control it.]]> 415 Joy Jordan-Lake 1503958205 Barbara 0 3.82 2020 Under a Gilded Moon
author: Joy Jordan-Lake
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/25
date added: 2024/03/24
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]]> <![CDATA[The Atlas Maneuver (Cotton Malone #18)]]> 179957048
1945. In the waning months of World War II, Japan hid vast quantities of gold and other stolen valuables in boobytrapped underground caches all across the Philippines. By 1947 some of that loot was recovered, not by treasure hunters, but by the United States government, which told no one about the find. Instead, those assets were stamped classified, shipped to Europe, and secretly assimilated into something called the Black Eagle Trust.

Present day. Retired Justice Department operative, Cotton Malone, is in Switzerland doing a favor for a friend. But what was supposed to be a simple operation turns violent and Cotton is thrust into a war between the world's oldest bank and the CIA, a battle that directly involves the Black Eagle Trust. He quickly discovers that everything hinges on a woman from his past, who suddenly reappears harboring a host of explosive secrets centering around bitcoin. The cryptocurrency is being quietly weaponized, readied for an assault on the world's financial systems, a calculated move that will have devastating consequences. Cotton has no choice. He has to act. But at what cost?

From the stolid banking halls of Luxembourg, to the secret vaults of Switzerland, and finally up into the treacherous mountains of southern Morocco, Cotton Malone is stymied at every turn. Each move he makes seems wrong, and nothing works, until he finally comes face-to-face with the Atlas Maneuver.]]> 405 Steve Berry 1538721023 Barbara 0 4.50 2024 The Atlas Maneuver (Cotton Malone #18)
author: Steve Berry
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.50
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/18
date added: 2024/03/18
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]]> <![CDATA[The Lies You Wrote (Raisa Susanto, #1)]]> 86497148 For a brilliant forensic linguist, crimes of the past hold clues to new series of murders in a twisting novel of suspense by the Wall Street Journal bestselling author of A Familiar Sight.

The double murder of a married couple in a small Washington town draws FBI forensic linguist Raisa Susanto into an investigation that mirrors a decades-old crime. Twenty-five years ago—to the day—Alex Parker murdered his parents, then took his own life, leaving behind a note admitting everything.

Raisa, paired with forensic psychologist Callum Kilkenny, uses her skills to read between the lines. Especially now that paranoid postings on a conspiracy thread suggest that Alex was a victim himself—theories that have piqued the interest of a perceptive content moderator and a true-crime podcaster eager for a big break.

As old and new crimes converge, messages from the living and the confessions of the dead take on new meaning for Raisa. Something more sinister than a copycat crime is at play, and plundering the darkest corners of a killer’s mind leaves her vulnerable to a deadly twist even she never saw coming.]]> 350 Brianna Labuskes 1662511353 Barbara 0 4.09 2024 The Lies You Wrote (Raisa Susanto, #1)
author: Brianna Labuskes
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/05
date added: 2024/03/05
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]]> <![CDATA[The Girl in the Moss (Angie Pallorino, #3)]]> 36494977 A shallow grave exposes deadly secrets as bestselling author Loreth Anne White brings her thrilling series of romantic suspense to its shocking conclusion�

Disgraced ex-cop Angie Pallorino is determined to make a new start for herself as a private investigator. But first, she and her lover, newly promoted homicide detective James Maddocks, attempt a quiet getaway to rekindle a romance struggling in the shadows of their careers. The peace doesn’t last long when human skeletal remains are found in a nearby mossy grove.

This decades-old mystery is just what Angie needs to establish her new career—even as it thrusts her and Maddocks back into the media spotlight, once again endangering their tenuous relationship.

Then, when Angie’s inquiry into the old crime intersects with a cold case from her own policing past—one that a detective on Maddocks’s new team is working—the investigation takes a startling twist. It puts more than Angie’s last shot at redemption and a future with Maddocks at risk. The mystery of the girl in the moss could kill her.

An Arthur Ellis Award Finalist for Best Crime Novel]]> 398 Loreth Anne White 1503956652 Barbara 0 4.51 2018 The Girl in the Moss (Angie Pallorino, #3)
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at: 2024/02/27
date added: 2024/02/27
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[The First Shot (Mrs. Parrish, #0.5)]]> 59617125 In this gripping prequel to the blockbuster best seller and Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick 'The Last Mrs. Parrish', readers will discover exactly how Amber Patterson transformed from small-town girl to master manipulator - after all, practice makes perfect.

Amber Patterson has many secrets. This much is clear when she sneaks out of her home in the dead of night and hitchhikes across state lines to meet up with a man she hasn’t seen or spoken to since high school graduation. So begins her desperate attempt to leave her old life behind, and she’ll use everything and everyone at her disposal, from social media stalking to the kindness of unsuspecting strangers, to get where she needs to go. It’s not long before she’s ready for the main event: armed with a new identity and a new purpose, she heads to Gunnison, Colorado, preparing herself to meet her future husband among the wealthy vacationers.

Even the smallest misstep could derail this carefully-laid plan, and in the end, can you even truly outrun your past? 'THE FIRST SHOT' is an absorbing, binge-able thriller that shows just how far some will go to build the lives they want.]]> 85 Liv Constantine Barbara 0 3.82 The First Shot (Mrs. Parrish, #0.5)
author: Liv Constantine
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.82
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/02/27
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]]> <![CDATA[The Lullaby Girl (Angie Pallorino, #2)]]> 34873257
Angie’s lover and partner, James Maddocks, sees it, too. But spearheading an ongoing probe into a sex-trafficking ring and keeping Angie’s increasing obsession with her case in check is taking its toll. However, as startling connections between the parallel investigations emerge, Maddocks realizes he has more than Angie’s emotional state to worry about.

Driven and desperate to solve her case, Angie goes rogue, risking her relationship, career, and very life in pursuit of answers. She’ll learn that some truths are too painful to bear, and some sacrifices include collateral damage.

But Angie Pallorino won’t let it go. She can’t. It’s not in her blood.]]> 385 Loreth Anne White 1542097975 Barbara 0 4.32 2017 The Lullaby Girl (Angie Pallorino, #2)
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.32
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/01
date added: 2024/02/24
shelves:
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]]> The Women 126918788 From the celebrated author of The Nightingale and The Four Winds comes Kristin Hannah's The Women—at once an intimate portrait of coming of age in a dangerous time and an epic tale of a nation divided.

Women can be heroes. When twenty-year-old nursing student Frances “Frankie� McGrath hears these words, it is a revelation. Raised in the sun-drenched, idyllic world of Southern California and sheltered by her conservative parents, she has always prided herself on doing the right thing. But in 1965, the world is changing, and she suddenly dares to imagine a different future for herself. When her brother ships out to serve in Vietnam, she joins the Army Nurse Corps and follows his path.

As green and inexperienced as the men sent to Vietnam to fight, Frankie is over-whelmed by the chaos and destruction of war. Each day is a gamble of life and death, hope and betrayal; friendships run deep and can be shattered in an instant. In war, she meets—and becomes one of—the lucky, the brave, the broken, and the lost.

But war is just the beginning for Frankie and her veteran friends. The real battle lies in coming home to a changed and divided America, to angry protesters, and to a country that wants to forget Vietnam.

The Women is the story of one woman gone to war, but it shines a light on all women who put themselves in harm’s way and whose sacrifice and commitment to their country has too often been forgotten. A novel about deep friendships and bold patriotism, The Women is a richly drawn story with a memorable heroine whose idealism and courage under fire will come to define an era.]]> 472 Kristin Hannah Barbara 0 currently-reading 4.71 2024 The Women
author: Kristin Hannah
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.71
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/02/19
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Drowned Girls (Angie Pallorino, #1)]]> 31682141 He surfaced two years ago. Then he disappeared ...

But Detective Angie Pallorino never forgot the violent rapist who left a distinctive calling card—crosses etched into the flesh of his victim’s foreheads.

When a comatose Jane Doe is found in a local cemetery, sexually assaulted, mutilated, and nearly drowned, Angie is struck by the eerie similarities to her earlier unsolved rapes. Could he be back?
�
Then the body of a drowned young woman floats up in the Gorge, also bearing the marks of the serial rapist, and the hunt for a predator becomes a hunt for a killer. Assigned to the joint investigative task force, Angie is more than ready to prove that she has what it takes to break into the all-male homicide division. But her private life collides with her professional ambitions when she’s introduced to her temporary partner, James Maddocks—a man she’d met the night before in an intense, anonymous encounter.

Together, Angie and Maddocks agree to put that night behind them. But as their search for the killer intensifies so does their mutual desire. And Angie’s forays into the mind of a monster shake lose some unsettling secrets about her own past . . .

How can she fight for the truth when it turns out her whole life is a lie? ]]> 526 Loreth Anne White 1503996220 Barbara 0 4.25 2017 The Drowned Girls (Angie Pallorino, #1)
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/01
date added: 2024/02/19
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]]> In the Barren Ground 29243822
Rookie cop Tana Larsson doesn’t mind the dark and quiet. Five months pregnant and hoping to escape the mistakes of her past, she takes a post in Twin Rivers, population 320. Maybe here she can find peace and community for her child.

But with her superior out of commission, Tana becomes the sole police officer in 17,500 square miles. One bitter night, she gets a call about the fatal wolf mauling of two students, and the only way to reach the remote scene is to enlist the help of the arrogant, irritatingly handsome Cameron “Crash� O’Halloran, a local bush pilot with a shady reputation for smuggling and a past cloaked in shadow.

When the macabre scene they uncover suggests violence much more sinister than animal, Tana must trust Crash if she wants to protect the town—and herself—from the evil that lurks in the frozen dark.

IN THE BARREN GROUND, a dark, atmospheric romance and police procedural with gothic/horror overtones set in a remote fly-in community just south of the arctic circle ...]]> 396 Loreth Anne White 1503991210 Barbara 0 4.28 2016 In the Barren Ground
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at: 2024/02/13
date added: 2024/02/13
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]]> In the Deep 48840119 I hope you don’t find him. And if you do, I hope he’s dead and that he suffered�

Real-estate mogul Martin Cresswell-Smith is the best thing that has ever happened to Ellie. After her daughter’s devastating death, a divorce, and an emotional breakdown, he’s helped her move as far as possible from the grief, the rage, and the monsters of her past. Ellie imagines her new home with Martin in an Australian coastal town will be like living a fairy tale. But behind closed doors is another story—one that ends in Martin’s brutal murder. And Ellie seems almost relieved�

Naturally, everyone thinks Mrs. Cresswell-Smith is guilty.

Senior Constable Lozza Bianchi has reasonable doubt. She sees evidence of a twisted psychological battle and a couple who seemed to bring out the worst in each other—adultery, abuse, betrayal, and revenge. If anything Ellie says can be believed, that is. As the case takes twist after spiraling twist, Lozza can’t shake the gut instinct that she’s being manipulated. That Ellie is hiding something. That there are secrets yet to surface. Lozza has no idea.]]> 367 Loreth Anne White Barbara 0 4.23 2020 In the Deep
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2024/02/08
date added: 2024/02/08
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]]> We Ate the Dark 136981990 Four women investigating the haunting murder of their friend discover more than they ever imagined in a terrifying novel about good and evil, love and death, and the spaces between.

Five years after Sofia Lyon disappeared, her remains are found stuffed into the hollow of a tree bursting through the floorboards of an abandoned house in the woods. The women who loved her flock home to the North Carolina hills to face their grief.

Frankie, Sofia’s twin, is in furious mourning. Poppy is heartbroken. Cass has never felt more homesick. And Marya knows something the rest of them don’t. Determined to find Sofia’s murderer, they share more than a need to see justice done for their friend. Each woman is haunted, bound to the next by something both cruel and kind, and now stalked by a shadowy presence they’ve yet to understand. Only to question, and to fear.

As Sofia’s secrets unravel, so do those of the woods, and the women soon realize that Sofia might not be who they thought she was at all. And that whoever—or whatever—killed her is coming after them.]]> 438 Mallory Pearson 1662515391 Barbara 0 currently-reading 2.77 2024 We Ate the Dark
author: Mallory Pearson
name: Barbara
average rating: 2.77
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/01/25
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> In the Waning Light 25882482 Two decades after her sister’s brutal attack and murder, Meg Brogan has finally found happiness…or so it appears. A bestselling true-crime writer, Meg has money, fame, and a wealthy fiancé. But when a television-show host presses her to tackle the one story everyone claims she cannot write—the story of her own family’s destruction—her perfect life shatters.

Determined to finally face her past, Meg returns to her hometown of Shelter Bay. Shrouded in cold, brooding fog, the close-knit coastal town harbors dark secrets and suspicious residents. One of the few people to welcome Meg back is Blake Sutton, her high-school sweetheart and the marina’s new owner. Desperate for clues, Meg digs through her family’s files. As Pacific storms brew outside, her passion for Blake reignites.

But someone doesn’t want Meg digging up the past. And that person will go to deadly lengths to prevent the writer from revealing a terrible truth.

]]> 432 Loreth Anne White 150394655X Barbara 0 4.39 2015 In the Waning Light
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/01
date added: 2024/01/24
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]]> The Push 53820934 DS Alison Hegarty, herself struggling with infertility, is called in to investigate. She’s convinced the fall was not an accident, and finds the new parents have a lot to hide. Wealthy Ed and Monica show off their newborn while their teenage daughter is kept under virtual house arrest. Hazel and Cathy conceived their longed-for baby via an anonymous sperm donor—or so Hazel thinks. Anita and Jeremy planned to adopt from America, but there’s no sign of the child. Kelly, whose violent boyfriend disrupted previous group sessions, came to the party even though she lost her baby. And then there’s Jax, who’s been experiencing strange incidents for months—almost like someone’s out to get her. Is it just a difficult pregnancy? Or could it be payback for something she did in the past? It’s a nightmare of a case, and as events get even darker it begins to look impossible. Only one thing is clear: they all have something to hide. And for one of them, it’s murder.]]> 363 Claire McGowan Barbara 0 3.85 2020 The Push
author: Claire McGowan
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/16
date added: 2024/01/16
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]]> The Last Time I Lied 36626748
Now a rising star in the NYC art scene, Emma turns her past into paintings.. They catch the attention of Francesca Harris-White, the socialite and wealthy owner of the very same Camp Nightingale--and when Francesca implores Emma to return to the camp as a painting counselor, Emma sees an opportunity to find closure and move on.

Yet, it is immediately clear that all is not right at Camp Nightingale. Already haunted by surfacing memories, Emma is suddenly plagued by a security camera pointed directly at her cabin, mounting mistrust from Francesca, and, most disturbing of all, cryptic clues Vivian apparently left behind about the camp's twisted origins. And as history begins to repeat itself and three girls go missing again, Emma must face threats from both man and nature in order to uncover all the buried secrets--including what really happened all those years ago.]]> 402 Riley Sager Barbara 0 4.02 2018 The Last Time I Lied
author: Riley Sager
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/11
date added: 2024/01/11
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]]> The Trade Off 61940828 From the New York Times bestselling author of the Reese's Book Club Pick The Other Woman comes The Trade Off, an electrifying new novel of suspense that begs the Would you tell a story, if you knew it was a lie? Or tell the truth and sleep at night?

For Stella, deputy editor of The Globe, the choice has always been clear. It doesn’t matter how low she has to stoop—getting the best story is what she’s built her reputation on.

For Jess, The Globe’s rookie reporter, the story stops when the truth does. But she knows that the dirty tricks of the tabloids will be hard to overturn.

And when a celebrity is hounded by The Globe and pays the ultimate price, Jess wonders just how much Stella and the paper are responsible.

Determined to show the world what the tabloid is capable of, Jess will do whatever it takes to uncover the truth, but she needs to watch her back, because someone else is prepared to kill to bury it.

RISK or REWARD. JUSTICE or REVENGE. INNOCENCE or GUILT.]]> 336 Sandie Jones 1250836948 Barbara 0 3.38 2023 The Trade Off
author: Sandie Jones
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2024/01/04
date added: 2024/01/04
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]]> The Wedding Game 54173345 The Wedding Game, a “do-it-yourself� TV show, for the title of Top DIY Wedding Expert.

As a jaded divorce lawyer, Alec Baxter scoffs at weddings and romance. But when his recently engaged brother begs him to participate in The Wedding Game, Alec grudgingly picks up a glue gun and prepares for some family bonding.

Both fierce competitors, Luna and Alec clash on national TV as harsh words and glitter fly with abandon. But as they bicker over color swatches and mood boards, they find themselves fighting something else: their growing mutual attraction. While Luna is torn between family loyalty and her own feelings, Alec wonders if he might have been wrong about love and marriage all along�
]]> 397 Meghan Quinn 1542025206 Barbara 0 currently-reading 3.92 2021 The Wedding Game
author: Meghan Quinn
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/12/31
shelves: currently-reading
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]]> Final Girls 32796253 Ěý
Now, Quincy is doing well—maybe even great, thanks to her Xanax prescription. She has a caring almost-fiancé, Jeff; a popular baking blog; a beautiful apartment; and a therapeutic presence in Coop, the police officer who saved her life all those years ago. Her memory won’t even allow her to recall the events of that night; the past is in the past.
Ěý
That is, until Lisa, the first Final Girl, is found dead in her bathtub, wrists slit, and Sam, the second, appears on Quincy's doorstep. Blowing through Quincy's life like a whirlwind, Sam seems intent on making Quincy relive the past, with increasingly dire consequences, all of which makes Quincy question why Sam is really seeking her out. And when new details about Lisa's death come to light, Quincy's life becomes a race against time as she tries to unravel Sam's truths from her lies, evade the police and hungry reporters, and, most crucially, remember what really happened at Pine Cottage, before what was started ten years ago is finished.]]> 352 Riley Sager 1101985364 Barbara 0 3.81 2017 Final Girls
author: Riley Sager
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/12/30
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]]> The Phoenix Crown 64417401
San Francisco, 1906. In a city bustling with newly minted millionaires and scheming upstarts, two very different women hope to change their fortunes: Gemma, a golden-haired, silver-voiced soprano whose career desperately needs rekindling, and Suling, a petite and resolute Chinatown embroideress who is determined to escape an arranged marriage. Their paths cross when they are drawn into the orbit of Henry Thornton, a charming railroad magnate whose extraordinary collection of Chinese antiques includes the fabled Phoenix Crown, a legendary relic of Beijing’s fallen Summer Palace.

His patronage offers Gemma and Suling the chance of a lifetime, but their lives are thrown into turmoil when a devastating earthquake rips San Francisco apart and Thornton disappears, leaving behind a mystery reaching further than anyone could have imagined . . . until the Phoenix Crown reappears five years later at a sumptuous Paris costume ball, drawing Gemma and Suling together in one last desperate quest for justice.]]> 384 Kate Quinn 0063304732 Barbara 0 to-read 3.76 2024 The Phoenix Crown
author: Kate Quinn
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/19
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]]> The Song of Achilles 13623848 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780062060624.

Achilles, "the best of all the Greeks," son of the cruel sea goddess Thetis and the legendary king Peleus, is strong, swift, and beautiful, irresistible to all who meet him. Patroclus is an awkward young prince, exiled from his homeland after an act of shocking violence. Brought together by chance, they forge an inseparable bond, despite risking the gods' wrath.

They are trained by the centaur Chiron in the arts of war and medicine, but when word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, all the heroes of Greece are called upon to lay siege to Troy in her name. Seduced by the promise of a glorious destiny, Achilles joins their cause, and torn between love and fear for his friend, Patroclus follows. Little do they know that the cruel Fates will test them both as never before and demand a terrible sacrifice.]]> 408 Madeline Miller Barbara 0 4.30 2011 The Song of Achilles
author: Madeline Miller
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at: 2023/11/28
date added: 2023/12/19
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]]> <![CDATA[Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass, #1)]]> 76703559 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN can be found here.

In a land without magic, where the king rules with an iron hand, an assassin is summoned to the castle. She comes not to kill the king, but to win her freedom. If she defeats twenty-three killers, thieves, and warriors in a competition, she is released from prison to serve as the king's champion. Her name is Celaena Sardothien.

The Crown Prince will provoke her. The Captain of the Guard will protect her. But something evil dwells in the castle of glass—and it's there to kill. When her competitors start dying one by one, Celaena's fight for freedom becomes a fight for survival, and a desperate quest to root out the evil before it destroys her world.]]> 406 Sarah J. Maas 163973094X Barbara 0 to-read 4.18 2012 Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass, #1)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/19
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]]> Lessons in Chemistry 58065033 390 Bonnie Garmus Barbara 0 to-read 4.23 2022 Lessons in Chemistry
author: Bonnie Garmus
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/19
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]]> In the Dark 44527037 A secluded mountain lodge. The perfect getaway. So remote no one will ever find you.

The promise of a luxury vacation at a secluded wilderness spa has brought together eight lucky guests. But nothing is what they were led to believe. As a fierce storm barrels down and all contact with the outside is cut off, the guests fear that it’s not a getaway. It’s a trap.

Each one has a secret. Each one has something to hide. And now, as darkness closes in, they all have something to fear—including one another.

Alerted to the vanished party of strangers, homicide cop Mason Deniaud and search and rescue expert Callie Sutton must brave the brutal elements of the mountains to find them. But even Mason and Callie have no idea how precious time is. Because the clock is ticking, and one by one, the guests of Forest Shadow Lodge are being hunted. For them, surviving becomes part of a diabolical game.]]> 413 Loreth Anne White 1542003822 Barbara 0 4.05 2019 In the Dark
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at: 2023/12/14
date added: 2023/12/14
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]]> The Maid's Diary 60588456
When homicide cop Mallory Van Alst is called to a scene at a luxury waterfront home known as the Glass House, she’s confronted with evidence of a violent attack so bloody it’s improbable the victim is alive. But there’s no body. The homeowners are gone. And their maid is missing. The only witness is the elderly woman next door, who woke to screams in the night. The neighbor was also the last person to see Kit Darling alive.

As Mal begins to uncover the secret that has sent the lives of everyone involved on a devious and inescapable collision course, she realizes that nothing is quite as it seems.

And no one escapes their past.]]> 376 Loreth Anne White Barbara 0 currently-reading 4.23 2023 The Maid's Diary
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.23
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/08
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Every Last Secret 52347808 Welcome to the neighborhood. Watch your husband, watch your friends, and watch your back.

Cat Winthorpe has worked hard to get what she has: a gorgeous home; social standing; and William, her successful, handsome husband. Then a friendly new couple moves into the estate next door. While cautious, a good neighbor like Cat greets them with open arms and warm hospitality.

Neena Ryder isn’t a fellow lady of leisure. A life coach with off-the-rack dresses, personal issues, and a husband who hasn’t delivered, she’s anxious to move up in the world. This beautiful new town is a step in the right direction. It’s also making Neena aware of what she doesn’t have. Namely, William. When Neena’s infatuation escalates into obsession, it’s just a matter of eliminating a few obstacles to get the life she wants. The life next door.

As Neena’s secret fixation grows, so does her friendship with Cat. But beneath their cordial interactions is a wealth of temptations, secrets, and toxic jealousy. For both women, the desire for a perfect life can turn perfectly dangerous.]]> 291 A.R. Torre 1542020182 Barbara 0 currently-reading 3.95 2020 Every Last Secret
author: A.R. Torre
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2020
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/08
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]]> Beneath Devil's Bridge 55542167
True crime podcaster Trinity Scott is chasing breakout success, and her brand-new serial may get her there. Her subject is Clayton Jay Pelley. More than two decades ago, the respected family man and guidance counselor confessed to the brutal murder of teenage student Leena Rai. But why he killed her has always been a mystery.

In a series of exclusive interviews from prison, Clayton discloses to Trinity the truth about what happened that night beneath Devil’s Bridge. It’s not what anyone in the Pacific Northwest town of Twin Falls expects. Clayton says he didn’t do it. Was he lying then? Or now?

As her listeners increase and ratings skyrocket, Trinity is missing a key player in the story: Rachel Walczak, the retired detective who exposed Pelley’s twisted urges and put him behind bars. She’s not interested in playing Clayton’s game - until Trinity digs deeper and the podcast’s reverb widens. Then Rachel begins to question everything she thinks she knows about the past.

With each of Clayton’s teasing reveals, one thing is clear: he’s not the only one in Twin Falls with a secret.]]> 344 Loreth Anne White 1542021308 Barbara 0 4.27 2021 Beneath Devil's Bridge
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.27
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/12/08
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]]> The Blame Game 58724732
As a psychologist specializing in domestic abuse, Naomi has found it hard to not become overly invested in her clients� lives. But after helping the middle-aged Jacob make the decision to leave his wife, Naomi has begun to worry that she’s gone too far this time. On the morning of Jacob’s first session after his escape, doors that Naomi is sure she’d locked have been mysteriously left open, and Jacob’s client file is missing.

Then, another client approaches Naomi for assistance in leaving behind her abusive husband, and Naomi is once again unable to turn aside someone in need. But are the missing papers and unlocked doors symptoms of Naomi’s own dark past raising its ugly head, or something more? And is it possible that her clients aren’t the only ones in danger, but Naomi herself?]]> 256 Sandie Jones 1250836905 Barbara 0 3.28 2022 The Blame Game
author: Sandie Jones
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.28
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/12/05
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]]> The Lincoln Highway 57109107 The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s America

In June, 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of the work farm where he has just served a year for involuntary manslaughter. His mother long gone, his father recently deceased, and the family farm foreclosed upon by the bank, Emmett’s intention is to pick up his eight-year-old brother and head west where they can start their lives anew. But when the warden drives away, Emmett discovers that two friends from the work farm have hidden themselves in the trunk of the warden’s car. Together, they have hatched an altogether different plan for Emmett’s future.

Spanning just ten days and told from multiple points of view, Towles’s third novel will satisfy fans of his multi-layered literary styling while providing them an array of new and richly imagined settings, characters, and themes.]]> 576 Amor Towles 0735222355 Barbara 0 to-read 4.18 2021 The Lincoln Highway
author: Amor Towles
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/05
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]]> Remarkably Bright Creatures 58733693 Remarkably Bright Creatures, an exploration of friendship, reckoning, and hope, tracing a widow's unlikely connection with a giant Pacific octopus.

After Tova Sullivan's husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she's been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago.

Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn't dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors--until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova.

Ever the detective, Marcellus deduces what happened the night Tova's son disappeared. And now Marcellus must use every trick his old invertebrate body can muster to unearth the truth for her before it's too late.

Shelby Van Pelt's debut novel is a gentle reminder that sometimes taking a hard look at the past can help uncover a future that once felt impossible.]]> 368 Shelby Van Pelt 0063204150 Barbara 0 to-read 4.35 2022 Remarkably Bright Creatures
author: Shelby Van Pelt
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/12/05
shelves: to-read
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]]> A Dark Lure (A Dark Lure, #1) 25316313 Twelve years ago, Sarah Baker was abducted by the Watt Lake Killer and sexually assaulted for months before managing to escape. The killer was caught, but Sarah lost everything: her marriage, her child, and the life she loved.

Struggling with PTSD, Sarah changes her name to Olivia West and finds sanctuary working on Broken Bar Ranch. But as her scars finally begin to heal, a cop involved with her horrific case remains convinced the Watt Lake Killer is still out there. He sets a lure for the murderer, and a fresh body is discovered. Now Olivia must face the impossible—could the butcher be back, this time to finish the job?

As a frigid winter isolates the ranch, only one person can help Olivia: Cole McDonough, a writer, adventurer, and ranch heir who stirs long-dormant feelings in her. But this time, Olivia’s determination to shut out her past may destroy more than her chance at love. It could cost her her life.

]]> 418 Loreth Anne White 1477878734 Barbara 0 4.25 2015 A Dark Lure (A Dark Lure, #1)
author: Loreth Anne White
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/12/02
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]]> <![CDATA[The Naturalist (The Naturalist, #1)]]> 34330645
As a computational biologist, Theo is more familiar with digital code and microbes than the dark arts of forensic sleuthing. But a field trip to Montana suddenly lands him in the middle of an investigation into the bloody killing of one of his former students. As more details, and bodies, come to light, the local cops determine that the killer is either a grizzly gone rogue� or Theo himself. Racing to stay one step ahead of the police, Theo must use his scientific acumen to uncover the killer. Will he be able to become as cunning as the predator he hunts—before he becomes its prey?]]> 382 Andrew Mayne 1612184979 Barbara 0 currently-reading 4.09 2017 The Naturalist (The Naturalist, #1)
author: Andrew Mayne
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2017
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Turn of the Screw 12948
A very young woman's first job: governess for two weirdly beautiful, strangely distant, oddly silent children, Miles and Flora, at a forlorn estate... An estate haunted by a beckoning evil. Half-seen figures who glare from dark towers and dusty windows- silent, foul phantoms who, day by day, night by night, come closer, ever closer. With growing horror, the helpless governess realizes the fiendish creatures want the children, seeking to corrupt their bodies, possess their minds, own their souls. But worse-much worse- the governess discovers that Miles and Flora have no terror of the lurking evil. For they want the walking dead as badly as the dead want them.

Excerpt:
I remember the whole beginning as a succession of flights and drops, a little seesaw of the right throbs and the wrong. After rising, in town, to meet his appeal, I had at all events a couple of very bad days - found myself doubtful again, felt indeed sure I had made a mistake. In this state of mind I spent the long hours of bumping, swinging coach that carried me to the stopping place at which I was to be met by a vehicle from the house.]]> 121 Henry James 0140620613 Barbara 0 to-read 3.42 1898 The Turn of the Screw
author: Henry James
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.42
book published: 1898
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
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]]> Fahrenheit 451 13079982 Sixty years after its original publication, Ray Bradbury’s internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 stands as a classic of world literature set in a bleak, dystopian future. Today its message has grown more relevant than ever before.

Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.� But when he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known.]]> 194 Ray Bradbury Barbara 0 to-read 3.97 1953 Fahrenheit 451
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1953
rating: 0
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]]> <![CDATA[We Have Always Lived in the Castle]]> 89724 Shirley Jackson’s beloved gothic tale of a peculiar girl named Merricat and her family’s dark secret

Taking readers deep into a labyrinth of dark neurosis, We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a deliciously unsettling novel about a perverse, isolated, and possibly murderous family and the struggle that ensues when a cousin arrives at their estate. This edition features a new introduction by Jonathan Lethem.]]> 152 Shirley Jackson 0143039970 Barbara 0 to-read 3.93 1962 We Have Always Lived in the Castle
author: Shirley Jackson
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.93
book published: 1962
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
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]]> Sula 11346 174 Toni Morrison 0452283868 Barbara 0 to-read 4.05 1973 Sula
author: Toni Morrison
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1973
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
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]]> Animal Farm 7613
The book tells the story of a group of farm animals who rebel against their human farmer, hoping to create a society where the animals can be equal, free, and happy. Ultimately, however, the rebellion is betrayed, and the farm ends up in a state as bad as it was before, under the dictatorship of a pig named Napoleon.

One night, all the animals at Mr. Jones' Manor Farm assemble in a barn to hear old Major, a pig, describe a dream he had about a world where all animals live free from the tyranny of their human masters. Old Major dies soon after the meeting, but the animals � inspired by his philosophy of Animalism � plot a rebellion against Jones.

Two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon, prove themselves important figures and planners of this dangerous enterprise. When Jones forgets to feed the animals, the revolution occurs, and Jones and his men are chased off the farm. Manor Farm is renamed Animal Farm, and the Seven Commandments of Animalism are painted on the barn wall...]]> 129 George Orwell Barbara 0 to-read 3.90 1945 Animal Farm
author: George Orwell
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1945
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
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]]> Of Mice and Men 890 “I got you to look after me, and you got me to look after you, and that's why.�

They are an unlikely pair: George is "small and quick and dark of face"; Lennie, a man of tremendous size, has the mind of a young child. Yet they have formed a "family," clinging together in the face of loneliness and alienation. Laborers in California's dusty vegetable fields, they hustle work when they can, living a hand-to-mouth existence. But George and Lennie have a plan: to own an acre of land and a shack they can call their own.

While the powerlessness of the laboring class is a recurring theme in Steinbeck's work of the late 1930s, he narrowed his focus when composing Of Mice and Men, creating an intimate portrait of two men facing a world marked by petty tyranny, misunderstanding, jealousy, and callousness. But though the scope is narrow, the theme is universal: a friendship and a shared dream that makes an individual's existence meaningful.

A unique perspective on life's hardships, this story has achieved the status of timeless classic due to its remarkable success as a novel, a Broadway play, and three acclaimed films.]]> 107 John Steinbeck 0142000671 Barbara 0 to-read 3.88 1937 Of Mice and Men
author: John Steinbeck
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1937
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/11/03
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]]> <![CDATA[The Year of the Witching (Bethel, #1)]]> 49789629 A young woman living in a rigid, puritanical society discovers dark powers within herself in this stunning, feminist fantasy debut.

In the lands of Bethel, where the Prophet’s word is law, Immanuelle Moore’s very existence is blasphemy. Her mother’s union with an outsider of a different race cast her once-proud family into disgrace, so Immanuelle does her best to worship the Father, follow Holy Protocol, and lead a life of submission, devotion, and absolute conformity, like all the other women in the settlement.

But a mishap lures her into the forbidden Darkwood surrounding Bethel, where the first prophet once chased and killed four powerful witches. Their spirits are still lurking there, and they bestow a gift on Immanuelle: the journal of her dead mother, who Immanuelle is shocked to learn once sought sanctuary in the wood.

Fascinated by the secrets in the diary, Immanuelle finds herself struggling to understand how her mother could have consorted with the witches. But when she begins to learn grim truths about the Church and its history, she realizes the true threat to Bethel is its own darkness. And she starts to understand that if Bethel is to change, it must begin with her.]]> 368 Alexis Henderson 0593099605 Barbara 0 to-read 3.79 2020 The Year of the Witching (Bethel, #1)
author: Alexis Henderson
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/10/31
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]]> <![CDATA[Becoming Irish American: The Making and Remaking of a People from Roanoke to JFK]]> 123505400 Ěý
As millions of Irish immigrants and their descendants created community in the United States over the centuries, they neither remained Irish nor simply became American. Instead, they created a culture and defined an identity that was unique to their circumstances, a new people that they would continually Irish Americans.
Ěý
Historian Timothy J. Meagher traces the Irish American experience from the first Irishman to step ashore at Roanoke in 1585 to John F. Kennedy’s election as president in 1960. As he chronicles how Irish American culture evolved, Meagher looks at how various groups adapted and thrived—Protestants and Catholics, immigrants and American born, those located in different geographic corners of the country. He describes how Irish Americans made a living, where they worshiped, and when they married, and how Irish American politicians found particular success, from ward bosses on the streets of New York, Boston, and Chicago to the presidency.
Ěý
In this sweeping history, Meagher reveals how the Irish American identity was forged, how it has transformed, and how it has held lasting influence on American culture.]]> 344 Timothy J. Meagher 0300126271 Barbara 0 to-read 3.55 2023 Becoming Irish American: The Making and Remaking of a People from Roanoke to JFK
author: Timothy J. Meagher
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/31
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[One Last Kill (Tracy Crosswhite, #10)]]> 62059957
Tracy Crosswhite is reopening the investigation into Seattle’s Route 99 serial killer. After thirteen victims, he stopped hunting and the trail went cold, stirring public outrage. Now, nearly three decades after his first kill, Tracy is expected to finally bring closure to the victims� families and redeem the Seattle PD’s reputation. Even if it means working with her nemesis, Captain Johnny Nolasco.

Lead detective of the original task force, Nolasco dares Tracy to do what he failed to: close the case. Forming an uneasy alliance, Tracy and Nolasco revisit old leads and pursue new evidence only to unearth high-level corruption and cover-ups as dangerous as the elusive killer himself. At the risk of being exposed, such deadly and powerful forces will go to extremes to stay in the shadows.

That’s just where Tracy and Nolasco are headed—to find the twisted truth behind a killer’s motives, his disappearance, and his chilling comeback.]]> 351 Robert Dugoni 1662500203 Barbara 0 4.48 2023 One Last Kill (Tracy Crosswhite, #10)
author: Robert Dugoni
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2023/10/19
date added: 2023/10/19
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]]> <![CDATA[The Falcon (Nina Guerrera, #3)]]> 58530873 333 Isabella Maldonado 1542035600 Barbara 0 4.39 2022 The Falcon (Nina Guerrera, #3)
author: Isabella Maldonado
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2023/10/17
date added: 2023/10/17
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]]> Bright Young Women 101124639
The survivors, including key witness Pamela Schumacher, will be forever changed by this night. They have all become victims. But they tell their perspectives here, they remain masters of their stories. And they hunt the perpetrator on their own - against resistance from the justice system and the police; against public opinion, which idolizes the serial killer.]]> 384 Jessica Knoll 1501153226 Barbara 0 to-read 3.99 2023 Bright Young Women
author: Jessica Knoll
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/17
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[A Different Dawn (Nina Guerrera, #2)]]> 55531410 For nearly thirty years a serial killer has been hiding in plain sight. So has the key to an FBI agent’s dark past.

A family is murdered as they sleep. FBI Special Agent Nina Guerrera and her new team are tasked with determining whether there is any link between this attack and another triple homicide from four years earlier and more than two thousand miles away. In the process, they’ll discover a serial killer so cunning that his grisly trail of death spanning nearly three decades has gone undetected. Each crime scene reminds Nina of the ghostly Latin folktale of La Llorona, which terrified her when she was an abandoned and vulnerable child. Now it’s back to haunt her.

Nina has known evil, but these macabre reenactments are as disturbing as they are baffling. Now she must uncover the meaning behind the rituals as the evidence leads her in an unexpected direction—far closer to home than anyone could have imagined. As the team narrows in on a suspect, the present collides with Nina’s past in a twist of fate that forces her to make the ultimate sacrifice.]]> 352 Isabella Maldonado 1542022797 Barbara 0 4.42 2021 A Different Dawn (Nina Guerrera, #2)
author: Isabella Maldonado
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2023/10/16
date added: 2023/10/16
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]]> The Lighthouse Witches 56808509 Two sisters go missing on a remote Scottish island. Twenty years later, one is found—but she's still the same age as when she disappeared. The secrets of witches have reached across the centuries in this chilling Gothic thriller from the author of the acclaimed The Nesting.

When single mother Liv is commissioned to paint a mural in a 100-year-old lighthouse on a remote Scottish island, it's an opportunity to start over with her three daughters--Luna, Sapphire, and Clover. When two of her daughters go missing, she's frantic. She learns that the cave beneath the lighthouse was once a prison for women accused of witchcraft. The locals warn her about wildlings, supernatural beings who mimic human children, created by witches for revenge. Liv is told wildlings are dangerous and must be killed.

Twenty-two years later, Luna has been searching for her missing sisters and mother. When she receives a call about her youngest sister, Clover, she's initially ecstatic. Clover is the sister she remembers—except she's still seven years old, the age she was when she vanished. Luna is worried Clover is a wildling. Luna has few memories of her time on the island, but she'll have to return to find the truth of what happened to her family. But she doesn't realize just how much the truth will change her.]]> 350 C.J. Cooke 059333423X Barbara 0 to-read 3.91 2021 The Lighthouse Witches
author: C.J. Cooke
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2021
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/06
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Diamond Eye 58513281 Alternate cover edition of ASIN B0983KXF42.

The New York Times bestselling author of The Rose Code returns with an unforgettable World War II tale of a quiet bookworm who becomes history's deadliest female sniper. Based on a true story.

In 1937 in the snowbound city of Kiev (now known as Kyiv), wry and bookish history student Mila Pavlichenko organizes her life around her library job and her young son--but Hitler's invasion of Ukraine and Russia sends her on a different path. Given a rifle and sent to join the fight, Mila must forge herself from studious girl to deadly sniper--a lethal hunter of Nazis known as Lady Death. When news of her three hundredth kill makes her a national heroine, Mila finds herself torn from the bloody battlefields of the eastern front and sent to America on a goodwill tour.

Still reeling from war wounds and devastated by loss, Mila finds herself isolated and lonely in the glittering world of Washington, DC--until an unexpected friendship with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and an even more unexpected connection with a silent fellow sniper offer the possibility of happiness. But when an old enemy from Mila's past joins forces with a deadly new foe lurking in the shadows, Lady Death finds herself battling her own demons and enemy bullets in the deadliest duel of her life.

Based on a true story, The Diamond Eye is a haunting novel of heroism born of desperation, of a mother who became a soldier, of a woman who found her place in the world and changed the course of history forever.]]> 448 Kate Quinn Barbara 0 4.43 2022 The Diamond Eye
author: Kate Quinn
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2023/10/05
date added: 2023/10/05
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]]> <![CDATA[Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland]]> 40163119
Patrick Radden Keefe's mesmerizing book on the bitter conflict in Northern Ireland and its aftermath uses the McConville case as a starting point for the tale of a society wracked by a violent guerrilla war, a war whose consequences have never been reckoned with. The brutal violence seared not only people like the McConville children, but also I.R.A. members embittered by a peace that fell far short of the goal of a united Ireland, and left them wondering whether the killings they committed were not justified acts of war, but simple murders.

Patrick Radden Keefe writes an intricate narrative about a notorious killing in Northern Ireland and its devastating repercussions.]]> 441 Patrick Radden Keefe 0385521316 Barbara 0 to-read 4.47 2018 Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland
author: Patrick Radden Keefe
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.47
book published: 2018
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/04
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]]> <![CDATA[Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World's Most Notorious Diaries]]> 60041102 Two teens. Two diaries. Two social panics. One incredible fraud.

In 1971, Go Ask Alice reinvented the young adult genre with a blistering portrayal of sex, psychosis, and teenage self-destruction. The supposed diary of a middle-class addict, Go Ask Alice terrified adults and cemented LSD's fearsome reputation, fueling support for the War on Drugs. Five million copies later, Go Ask Alice remains a divisive bestseller, outraging censors and earning new fans, all of them drawn by the book's mythic premise: A Real Diary, by Anonymous.

But Alice was only the beginning.

In 1979, another diary rattled the culture, setting the stage for a national meltdown. The posthumous memoir of an alleged teenage Satanist, Jay's Journal merged with a frightening new crisis—adolescent suicide—to create a literal witch hunt, shattering countless lives and poisoning whole communities.

In reality, Go Ask Alice and Jay's Journal came from the same dark place: Beatrice Sparks, a serial con artist who betrayed a grieving family, stole a dead boy's memory, and lied her way to the National Book Awards.

Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World's Most Notorious Diaries is a true story of contagious deception. It stretches from Hollywood to Quantico, and passes through a tiny patch of Utah nicknamed "the fraud capital of America." It's the story of a doomed romance and a vengeful celebrity. Of a lazy press and a public mob. Of two suicidal teenagers, and their exploitation by a literary vampire.

Unmask Alice . . . where truth is stranger than nonfiction.]]> 349 Rick Emerson 1637740425 Barbara 0 to-read 3.93 2022 Unmask Alice: LSD, Satanic Panic, and the Imposter Behind the World's Most Notorious Diaries
author: Rick Emerson
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2022
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/04
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[Witches Get Stuff Done (Starfall Point, #1)]]> 128154834 Reigning queen of paranormal romantic comedy Molly Harper is back with the first book in a spellbinding new series!

Riley Denton-Everett always felt like something was missing in her life—and her numerous odd jobs and short-lived relationships haven’t brought her any closer to finding it. Everything changes when she receives a mysterious message: You’re a Denton. You belong on Starfall Point. Once you’re here, I’ll tell you everything you need to know.

When Riley arrives on the island, she learns her aunt has left her a historic mansion brimming with haunted antiques. Turns out, that’s not the only thing she’s inherited. Riley also hails from a long line of witches whose magic is critical to protecting the living.

Edison Held, the town’s frustratingly hot librarian, is completely unaware of the ghosts in Riley’s ancestral home and is determined to convince her to open it up to the public. Riley starts to wonder if Edison’s knowledge of the island’s history can help her get a handle on her new powers—but can she trust him with her secrets? And can she trust herself with the simmering attraction brewing between them?]]> 287 Molly Harper 1728276799 Barbara 0 to-read 3.55 2023 Witches Get Stuff Done (Starfall Point, #1)
author: Molly Harper
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.55
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/04
shelves: to-read
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]]> The Witches of Bone Hill 65214066
When her older, carefree sister, Eustace—a cannabis grower in Boulder, calls to inform her the great aunt they never met has died and they must travel to a small town in Connecticut to deal with the estate, she sees an opportunity to unload the house and save herself.

But once there, the sisters learn they are getting much more than they bargained for. The Victorian mansion they stand to inherit is bound in a dynasty trust controlled by their late aunt's aging attorney who insists they inhabit the house and retain it but keeps them in the dark about the peculiar rituals of their ancestors. Not to mention a sexy, tattooed groundskeeper with a shrouded past who refuses to leave the carriage house and a crypt full of dead relatives looming at the property line.

As both women grapple with their current predicament, they come face to face with a haunting family secret, the truth of what happened to their mother, and the enemy that's been stalking them from the shadows for generations. In a twisting torrent of terror and blood, the sisters must uncover the power within them to heal their fractured relationship, reverse their mysteriously declining health, and claim the lineage they wanted to escape but now must embrace if they are to survive at Bone Hill.]]> 416 Ava Morgyn 1250835437 Barbara 0 to-read 3.66 2023 The Witches of Bone Hill
author: Ava Morgyn
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.66
book published: 2023
rating: 0
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date added: 2023/10/04
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[The Late Mrs. Willoughby (Mr. Darcy & Miss Tilney, #2)]]> 63113559
Catherine and Henry Tilney of Northanger Abbey are not entirely pleased to be sending their eligible young daughter Juliet out into the world again: the last house party she attended, at the home of the Knightleys, involved a murder—which Juliet helped solve. Particularly concerning is that she intends to visit her new friend Marianne Brandon, who's returned home to Devonshire shrouded in fresh scandal—made more potent by the news that her former suitor, the rakish Mr. Willoughby, intends to take up residence at his local estate with his new bride.

Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley are thrilled that their eldest son, Jonathan—who, like his father, has not always been the most socially adept—has been invited to stay with his former schoolmate, John Willoughby. Jonathan himself is decidedly less taken with the notion of having to spend extended time under the roof of his old bully, but that all changes when he finds himself reunited with his fellow amateur sleuth, the radiant Miss Tilney. And when shortly thereafter, Willoughby's new wife—whom he married for her fortune—dies horribly at the party meant to welcome her to town.

With rumors flying and Marianne—known to be both unstable and previously jilted by the dead woman's newly made widower—under increased suspicion, Jonathan and Juliet must team up once more to uncover the murderer. But as they collect clues and close in on suspects, eerie incidents suggest that the killer may strike again, and that the pair are in far graver danger than they or their families could imagine.

A VINTAGE ORIGINAL.]]> 390 Claudia Gray Barbara 0 4.13 2023 The Late Mrs. Willoughby (Mr. Darcy & Miss Tilney, #2)
author: Claudia Gray
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2023/01/01
date added: 2023/09/17
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]]> Zero Days 62970022
Hired by companies to break into buildings and hack security systems, Jack and her husband, Gabe, are the best penetration specialists in the business. But after a routine assignment goes horribly wrong, Jack arrives home to find her husband dead. To add to her horror, the police are closing in on their suspect—her.

Suddenly on the run and quickly running out of options, Jack must decide who she can trust as she circles closer to the real killer in this unputdownable and heart-pounding mystery from an author whose “propulsive prose keeps readers on the hook and refuses to let anyone off until all has been revealed� (Shelf Awareness).]]> 352 Ruth Ware 1982155310 Barbara 0 3.88 2023 Zero Days
author: Ruth Ware
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2023/09/10
date added: 2023/09/10
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]]> <![CDATA[Oh Crap! Potty Training: Everything Modern Parents Need to Know to Do It Once and Do It Right]]> 25205433
Worried about potty training? Let Jamie Glowacki, potty-training expert, show you how it’s done. Her six-step, proven process to get your toddler out of diapers and onto the toilet has already worked for tens of thousands of kids and their parents.

Here’s the good news: your child is probably ready to be potty trained EARLIER than you think (ideally, between 20�30 months), and it can be done FASTER than you expect (most kids get the basics in a few days—but Jamie’s got you covered even if it takes a little longer). If you’ve ever said to yourself:

-How do I know if my kid is ready?
-Why won’t my child poop in the potty?
-How do I avoid “potty power struggles�?
-How can I get their daycare provider on board?
-My kid was doing so well—why is he regressing?
-And what about nighttime?!

Oh Crap! Potty Training can solve all of these (and other) common issues. This isn’t theory, you’re not bribing with candy, and there are no gimmicks. This is real-world, from-the-trenches potty training information—all the questions and all the answers you need to do it once and be done with diapers for good.]]> 294 Jamie Glowacki 1501122983 Barbara 0 3.88 2015 Oh Crap! Potty Training: Everything Modern Parents Need to Know to Do It Once and Do It Right
author: Jamie Glowacki
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at: 2023/09/07
date added: 2023/09/07
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]]> <![CDATA[The Bone Hacker (Temperance Brennan, #22)]]> 62969982
Called in to examine what is left of a body struck by lightning, Tempe traces an unusual tattoo to its source and is soon embroiled in a much larger case. Young men—tourists—have been disappearing on the islands of Turks and Caicos for years. Seven years ago, the first victim was found in a strange location with both hands cut off; the other visitors vanished without a trace. But, recently, tantalizing leads have emerged and only Tempe can unravel them.

Maddeningly, the victims seem to have nothing in common—other than the strange locations where their bodies are eventually found, and the fact that the young men all seem to be the least likely to be involved in foul play. Do these attacks have something to do with the islands� seething culture of gang violence? Tempe isn’t so sure. And then she turns up disturbing clues that what’s at stake may actually have global significance.

It isn’t long before the sound of a ticking clock grows menacingly loud, and then Temper herself becomes a target.]]> 352 Kathy Reichs Barbara 0 4.37 2023 The Bone Hacker (Temperance Brennan, #22)
author: Kathy Reichs
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2023/09/06
date added: 2023/09/06
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]]> Not One of Us 51498422 From the bestselling author of Cold Waters comes a brooding thriller about a woman who must decide if safeguarding her family is worth burying a truth that will haunt her forever.

Thirteen years ago, Jori Trahan’s boyfriend vanished without a trace. Now, after moving back home to Alabama to care for her ailing grandmother and autistic brother, she comes face-to-face with the deadly mystery behind his disappearance.

Jori has a rare form of synesthesia, meaning she can “hear� colors; to her, tones of voice are as unique as fingerprints. With the help of this ability and a sympathetic cop, Jori comes dangerously close to uncovering the truth. But those responsible will go to any length—including murder—to keep their dark secrets buried.

Soon, it seems that no one in the sleepy bayou town is safe, and after Jori’s brother is kidnapped, she knows she must drop the investigation or risk losing her family. But when protecting them means letting an evil deed go unpunished, putting family first may be the last thing she’ll ever do.]]> 303 Debbie Herbert 1542024919 Barbara 0 currently-reading 3.94 2021 Not One of Us
author: Debbie Herbert
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/08/27
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Twenty Years Later 57940030 The New York Times Best Thrillers This Season | E! News Recommended Books | Overdrive Biggest Books of the Month

Fans of Verity by Colleen Hoover won’t want to miss this thrilling new suspense novel from the #1 internationally bestselling author of The Girl Who Was Taken! Hiding her own dark past in plain sight, a TV reporter is determined to uncover the truth behind a gruesome murder decades after the investigation was abandoned. But TWENTY YEARS LATER, to understand the present, you need to listen to the past�

Avery Mason, host of American Events, knows the subjects that grab a TV audience’s attention. Her latest story—a murder mystery laced with kinky sex, tragedy, and betrayal—is guaranteed to be ratings gold. New DNA technology has allowed the New York medical examiner’s office to make its first successful identification of a 9/11 victim in years. The twist: the victim, Victoria Ford, had been accused of the gruesome murder of her married lover. In a chilling last phone call to her sister, Victori
Emma Kind has waited twenty years to put her sister to rest, but closure won’t be complete until she can clear Victoria’s name. Alone she’s had no luck, but she’s convinced that Avery’s connections and fame will help. Avery, hoping to negotiate a more lucrative network contract, goes into investigative overdrive. Victoria had been having an affair with a successful novelist, found hanging from the balcony of his Catskills mansion. The rope, the bedroom, and the entire crime scene was covered in Victoria’s DNA.

But the twisted puzzle of Victoria’s private life just the beginning. And what Avery doesn't realize is that there are other players in the game who are interested in Avery’s own secret past—one she has kept hidden from both the network executives and her television audience. A secret she thought was dead and buried . . .

Accused of a brutal murder, Victoria Ford made a final chilling call from the North Tower on the morning of 9/11. Twenty years ago, no one listened. Today, you will.]]> 304 Charlie Donlea Barbara 0 4.35 2021 Twenty Years Later
author: Charlie Donlea
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at: 2023/08/08
date added: 2023/08/08
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]]> Her Little Flowers 63259070
When Francine’s estranged sister, Madeleine, returns to the manor after years away, she brings with her a story that threatens everything Francine has always believed. It is a tale of cruelty and desperation, of terror and unbearable heartache. And as Francine learns more about the darkness in her family’s past—and the role she may have played in it—she realizes that confronting the truth may mean losing what she holds most dear.]]> 368 Shannon Morgan 1496743881 Barbara 0 to-read 3.74 2023 Her Little Flowers
author: Shannon Morgan
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/07/06
shelves: to-read
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]]> Cleopatra's Dagger 58990962
New York, 1880. Elizabeth van den Broek is the only female reporter at the Herald, the city’s most popular newspaper. Then she and her bohemian friend Carlotta Ackerman find a woman’s body wrapped like a mummy in a freshly dug hole in Central Park—the intended site of an obelisk called Cleopatra’s Needle. The macabre discovery takes Elizabeth away from the society pages to follow an investigation into New York City’s darkest shadows.

When more bodies turn up, each tied to Egyptian lore, Elizabeth is onto a headline-making scoop more sinister than she could have imagined. Her reporting has readers spellbound, and each new clue implicates New York’s richest and most powerful citizens. And a serial killer is watching every headline.

Now a madman with an indecipherable motive is coming after Elizabeth and everyone she loves. She wants a good story? She may have to die to get it.]]> 361 Carole Lawrence 1542014298 Barbara 0 3.76 2022 Cleopatra's Dagger
author: Carole Lawrence
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2023/06/30
date added: 2023/06/30
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]]> <![CDATA[The Cipher (Nina Guerrera, #1)]]> 53966623 To a cunning serial killer, she was the one that got away. Until now�

FBI Special Agent Nina Guerrera escaped a serial killer’s trap at sixteen. Years later, when she’s jumped in a Virginia park, a video of the attack goes viral. Legions of new fans are not the only ones impressed with her fighting skills. The man who abducted her eleven years ago is watching. Determined to reclaim his lost prize, he commits a grisly murder designed to pull her into the investigation…but his games are just beginning. And he’s using the internet to invite the public to play along.

His coded riddles may have made him a depraved social media superstar—an enigmatic cyber-ghost dubbed “the Cipher”—but to Nina he’s a monster who preys on the vulnerable. Partnered with the FBI’s preeminent mind hunter, Dr. Jeffrey Wade, who is haunted by his own past, Nina tracks the predator across the country. Clue by clue, victim by victim, Nina races to stop a deadly killer while the world watches.]]> 332 Isabella Maldonado 1542022487 Barbara 0 4.19 2020 The Cipher (Nina Guerrera, #1)
author: Isabella Maldonado
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at: 2023/06/25
date added: 2023/06/25
shelves:
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #2)]]> 50659468
Feyre has undergone more trials than one human woman can carry in her heart. Though she's now been granted the powers and lifespan of the High Fae, she is haunted by her time Under the Mountain and the terrible deeds she performed to save the lives of Tamlin and his people.

As her marriage to Tamlin approaches, Feyre's hollowness and nightmares consume her. She finds herself split into two different one who upholds her bargain with Rhysand, High Lord of the feared Night Court, and one who lives out her life in the Spring Court with Tamlin. While Feyre navigates a dark web of politics, passion, and dazzling power, a greater evil looms. She might just be the key to stopping it, but only if she can harness her harrowing gifts, heal her fractured soul, and decide how she wishes to shape her future-and the future of a world in turmoil.

Bestselling author Sarah J. Maas's masterful storytelling brings this second book in her dazzling, sexy, action-packed series to new heights.]]> 626 Sarah J. Maas 1635575583 Barbara 0 to-read 4.65 2016 A Court of Mist and Fury (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #2)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2023/06/21
shelves: to-read
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]]> <![CDATA[A Court of Thorns and Roses (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #1)]]> 50659467
At least, he’s not a beast all the time.

As she adapts to her new home, her feelings for the faerie, Tamlin, transform from icy hostility into a fiery passion that burns through every lie she’s been told about the beautiful, dangerous world of the Fae. But something is not right in the faerie lands. An ancient, wicked shadow is growing, and Feyre must find a way to stop it, or doom Tamlin—and his world—forever.

From bestselling author Sarah J. Maas comes a seductive, breathtaking book that blends romance, adventure, and faerie lore into an unforgettable read.]]> 419 Sarah J. Maas 1635575567 Barbara 0 to-read 4.16 2015 A Court of Thorns and Roses (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #1)
author: Sarah J. Maas
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2015
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]]> Daisy Jones & The Six 40597810 Everyone knows DAISY JONES & THE SIX, but nobody knows the reason behind their split at the absolute height of their popularity . . . until now.

Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip, sleeping with rock stars, and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it’s the rock ’n� roll she loves most. By the time she’s twenty, her voice is getting noticed, and she has the kind of heedless beauty that makes people do crazy things.

Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by the brooding Billy Dunne. On the eve of their first tour, his girlfriend Camila finds out she’s pregnant, and with the pressure of impending fatherhood and fame, Billy goes a little wild on the road.

Daisy and Billy cross paths when a producer realizes that the key to supercharged success is to put the two together. What happens next will become the stuff of legend.

The making of that legend is chronicled in this riveting and unforgettable novel, written as an oral history of one of the biggest bands of the seventies. Taylor Jenkins Reid is a talented writer who takes her work to a new level with Daisy Jones & The Six, brilliantly capturing a place and time in an utterly distinctive voice.]]> 368 Taylor Jenkins Reid 1524798622 Barbara 0 to-read 4.20 2019 Daisy Jones & The Six
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: Barbara
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2019
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]]> I Am Not Who You Think I Am 58203050 Eight cryptic words.
Lifetimes of ruin.

Wayland Maynard is just eight years old when he sees his father kill himself, finds a note that reads I am not who you think I am, and is left reeling with grief and shock. Who was his father if not the loving man Wayland knew? Terrified, Wayland keeps the note a secret, but his reasons for being afraid are just beginning.

Eight years later, Wayland makes a shocking discovery and becomes certain the note is the key to unlocking a past his mother and others in his town want to keep buried.

With the help of two friends, Wayland searches for the truth. Together they uncover strange messages scribbled in his father’s old books, a sinister history behind the town’s most powerful family, and a bizarre tragedy possibly linked to Wayland’s birth. Each revelation raises more questions and deepens Wayland’s suspicions of everyone around him. Soon, he’ll regret he ever found the note, trusted his friends, or believed in such a thing as the truth.

I Am Not Who You Think I Am is an ingenious, addictive, and shattering tale of grief, obsession, and fate as eight words lead to lifetimes of ruin.

I Am Not Who You Think I Am is an ingenious, addictive, and shattering tale of grief, obsession, and fate as eight words lead to lifetimes of ruin.]]> 260 Eric Rickstad 1094000353 Barbara 0 currently-reading 3.84 2021 I Am Not Who You Think I Am
author: Eric Rickstad
name: Barbara
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2021
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]]> Where Dreams Begin 60294939 Lianne Moriarty Barbara 0 2.43 Where Dreams Begin
author: Lianne Moriarty
name: Barbara
average rating: 2.43
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