Erin's bookshelf: read en-US Thu, 08 May 2025 15:13:09 -0700 60 Erin's bookshelf: read 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg The Love Haters 217387810 It’s a thin line between love and love-hating.

Katie Vaughn has been burned by love in the past—now she may be lighting her career on fire. She has two choices: wait to get laid off from her job as a video producer or, at her coworker Cole’s request, take a career-making gig profiling Tom “Hutch� Hutcheson, a Coast Guard rescue swimmer in Key West.

The catch? Katie’s not exactly qualified. She can’t swim—but fakes it that she can.

Plus: Cole is Hutch’s brother. And they don’t get along. Next stop paradise!

But paradise is messier than it seems. As Katie gets entangled with Hutch (the most scientifically good looking man she has ever seen . . . but also a bit of a love hater), along with his colorful Aunt Rue and his rescue Great Dane, she gets trapped in a lie. Or two.

Swim lessons, helicopter flights, conga lines, drinking contests, hurricanes, and stolen kisses ensue—along with chances to tell the truth, to face old fears, and to be truly brave at last.]]> 320 Katherine Center 1250283825 Erin 0 to-read 4.00 2025 The Love Haters
author: Katherine Center
name: Erin
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Elizabeth of East Hampton (For the Love of Austen, #2)]]> 199797789 Pride and Prejudice transports you to summer in the Hamptons, where classes clash, rumors run wild, and love has a frustrating habit of popping up where you least expect it.

It’s a truth universally acknowledged—well, by Elizabeth Bennet anyway—that there’s nothing worse than summer in the Hamptons. She should she’s lived out there her whole life. Every June, her hometown on the edge of Long Island is inundated with rich Manhattanites who party until dawn and then disappear by September. And after twenty-five years, Lizzy wants to leave, too.

But after putting her own dreams on hold to help save her family’s failing bakery, she’s still surfing the same beach every morning and waiting for something, anything, to change. She’s not holding her breath though, not even when her sister starts flirting with the hot new bachelor in town, Charlie Pierce, and he introduces Lizzy to his even hotter friend.

Will Darcy is everything Lizzy Bennet is not. Aloof, arrogant…and rich. Of course, he’s never cared about money. In fact, it’s number one on his long list of things that irk him. Number two? His friend Charlie’s insistence on setting him up with his new girlfriend’s sharp-tongued sister. Lizzy Bennet is all wrong for him, from her money-hungry family to her uncanny ability to speak to him as bluntly as he does everyone else. But then maybe that’s why he can’t stop thinking about her.

Lizzy is sure Will hates everybody. He thinks she willfully misunderstands them. Yet, just as they strike an uneasy truce, mistakes threaten Charlie and Annabelle’s romance, with Will and Lizzy caught in the undertow. Between a hurricane and a hypocritical stepmother, a drunken voicemail and a deceptive property developer, the two must sift through the gossip and lies to protect the happiness of everyone they love—even if it means sacrificing their own. But when the truth also forces them to see each other in an entirely new light, they must swallow their pride to learn that love is a lot like sometimes the only way to survive is to let yourself fall.]]> 384 Audrey Bellezza 1668052555 Erin 0 to-read 3.89 Elizabeth of East Hampton (For the Love of Austen, #2)
author: Audrey Bellezza
name: Erin
average rating: 3.89
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Mystery of the Blue Train (Hercule Poirot, #6)]]> 16335
When the Blue Train stops, the jewel is missing, and the woman is found dead in her compartment. It's the perfect mystery, filled with passion, greed, deceit, and confusion.

Is Hercule Poirot the perfect detective to solve it?]]> 317 Agatha Christie 1579126952 Erin 4 3.84 1928 The Mystery of the Blue Train (Hercule Poirot, #6)
author: Agatha Christie
name: Erin
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1928
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2025/04/30
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Say You'll Remember Me (Say You'll Remember Me, #1)]]> 216437557 disastrously close. A gorgeous veterinarian giving Greek god vibes—all while cuddling a tiny kitten? Immediately yes. That is until Xavier opens his mouth and proves that even sculpted gods can say the absolute wrong thing. Like, really wrong. Of course, there’s nothing Samantha loves more than proving an asshole wrong�

. . . unless, of course, he can admit he made a mistake. But after one incredible and seemingly endless date—possibly the best in living history—Samantha is forced to admit the truth, that her family is in crisis and any kind of relationship would be impossible. Samantha begs Xavier to forget her. To remember their night together as a perfect moment, as crushing as that may be.

Only no amount of distance or time is nearly enough to forget that something between them. And the only thing better than one single perfect memory is to make a life—and even a love—worth remembering.]]> 416 Abby Jimenez 0349442827 Erin 0 to-read 4.09 2025 Say You'll Remember Me (Say You'll Remember Me, #1)
author: Abby Jimenez
name: Erin
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Emma of 83rd Street (For the Love of Austen, #1)]]> 62919381
Beautiful, clever, and rich, Emma Woodhouse has lived twenty-three years in her tight-knit Upper East Side neighborhood with very little to distress or vex her…that is, until her budding matchmaking hobby results in her sister’s marriage—and subsequent move downtown. Now, with her sister gone and all her friends traveling abroad, Emma must start her final year of grad school grappling with an entirely new emotion: boredom. So when she meets Nadine, a wide-eyed Ohio transplant with a heart of gold and drugstore blonde highlights to match, Emma not only sees a potential new friend but a new project. If only her overbearing neighbor George Knightley would get out of her way.

Handsome, smart, and successful, the only thing that frustrates Knightley more than a corked whiskey is his childhood friend, Emma. Whether it’s her shopping sprees between classes or her revolving door of ill-conceived hobbies, he is only too happy to lecture her on all the finer points of adulthood she’s so hell-bent on ignoring. But despite his gripes—and much to his own chagrin—Knightley can’t help but notice that the girl next door is a woman now…one who he suddenly can’t get out of his head.

As Emma’s best laid plans collide with everyone from hipster baristas to meddling family members to flaky playboy millionaires, these two friends slowly realize their need to always be right has been usurped by a new need entirely, and it’s not long before they discover that even the most familiar stories still have some surprises.]]> 384 Audrey Bellezza 1668008394 Erin 4 3.74 2023 Emma of 83rd Street (For the Love of Austen, #1)
author: Audrey Bellezza
name: Erin
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves:
review:

]]> The God of the Woods 199698485 When a teenager vanishes from her Adirondack summer camp, two worlds collide

Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.

As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.]]> 490 Liz Moore Erin 4 wsirn-rec 4.15 2024 The God of the Woods
author: Liz Moore
name: Erin
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/13
date added: 2025/04/13
shelves: wsirn-rec
review:

]]> Great Big Beautiful Life 218559595 Two writers compete for the chance to tell the larger-than-life story of a woman with more than a couple of plot twists up her sleeve in this dazzling and sweeping new novel from Emily Henry.

Alice Scott is an eternal optimist still dreaming of her big writing break. Hayden Anderson is a Pulitzer-prize winning human thundercloud. And they’re both on balmy Little Crescent Island for the same reason: To write the biography of a woman no one has seen in years--or at least to meet with the octogenarian who claims to be the Margaret Ives. Tragic heiress, former tabloid princess, and daughter of one of the most storied (and scandalous) families of the 20th Century.

When Margaret invites them both for a one-month trial period, after which she’ll choose the person who’ll tell her story, there are three things keeping Alice’s head in the game.

One: Alice genuinely likes people, which means people usually like Alice—and she has a whole month to win the legendary woman over.

Two: She’s ready for this job and the chance to impress her perennially unimpressed family with a Serious Publication

Three: Hayden Anderson, who should have no reason to be concerned about losing this book, is glowering at her in a shaken-to-the core way that suggests he sees her as competition.

But the problem is, Margaret is only giving each of them pieces of her story. Pieces they can’t swap to put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room.

And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story—just like the tale Margaret’s spinning—could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad…depending on who’s telling it.]]> 432 Emily Henry Erin 0 to-read 4.12 2025 Great Big Beautiful Life
author: Emily Henry
name: Erin
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/11
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands (Emily Wilde, #2)]]> 134119076 When mysterious faeries from other realms appear at her university, curmudgeonly professor Emily Wilde must uncover their secrets before it’s too late, in this heartwarming, enchanting second installment of the Emily Wilde series.

Emily Wilde is a genius scholar of faerie folklore who just wrote the world’s first comprehensive encyclopaedia of faeries. She’s learned many of the secrets of the Hidden Ones on her adventures . . . and also from her fellow scholar and former rival Wendell Bambleby.

Because Bambleby is more than infuriatingly charming. He’s an exiled faerie king on the run from his murderous mother and in search of a door back to his realm. And despite Emily’s feelings for Bambleby, she’s not ready to accept his proposal of marriage: Loving one of the Fair Folk comes with secrets and dangers.

She also has a new project to focus on: a map of the realms of faerie. While she is preparing her research, Bambleby lands her in trouble yet again, when assassins sent by his mother invade Cambridge. Now Bambleby and Emily are on another adventure, this time to the picturesque Austrian Alps, where Emily believes they may find the door to Bambleby’s realm and the key to freeing him from his family’s dark plans.

But with new relationships for the prickly Emily to navigate and dangerous Folk lurking in every forest and hollow, Emily must unravel the mysterious workings of faerie doors and of her own heart.]]> 370 Heather Fawcett 0593500202 Erin 0 to-read 4.28 2024 Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands (Emily Wilde, #2)
author: Heather Fawcett
name: Erin
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde, #1)]]> 61317425
Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world's first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is not good at people. She could never make small talk at a party--or even get invited to one. And she prefers the company of her books, her dog, and the Fair Folk.

So when she arrives in the hardscrabble village of Hrafnsvik, Emily has no intention of befriending the gruff townsfolk. Nor does she care to spend time with another new arrival: her dashing and insufferably handsome academic rival Wendell Bambleby, who manages to charm the townsfolk, get in the middle of Emily's research, and utterly confound and frustrate her.

But as Emily gets closer and closer to uncovering the secrets of the Hidden Ones--the most elusive of all faeries--lurking in the shadowy forest outside the town, she also finds herself on the trail of another mystery: Who is Wendell Bambleby, and what does he really want? To find the answer, she'll have to unlock the greatest mystery of all--her own heart.]]> 354 Heather Fawcett Erin 5 4.11 2023 Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries (Emily Wilde, #1)
author: Heather Fawcett
name: Erin
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/31
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Nobody’s Fool (Detective Sami Kierce #2)]]> 217394492 In this stunningly twisty thriller from #1 New York Times bestselling author Harlan Coben, a secret from former Detective Sami Kierce’s college days comes back to haunt him. His memory is clear, but all these years later, the facts don’t add up…which is something he cannot ignore.

Sami Kierce, a young college grad backpacking in Spain with friends, wakes up one morning, covered in blood. There’s a knife in his hand. Beside him, the body of his girlfriend. Anna. Dead. He doesn’t know what happened. His screams drown out his thoughts—and then he runs.

Twenty-two years later, Kierce, now a private investigator, is a new father who’s working off his debts by doing low level surveillance jobs and teaching wannabe sleuths at a night school in New York City. One evening, he recognizes a familiar face at the back of the classroom. Anna. It’s unmistakably her. As soon as Kierce makes eye contact with her, she bolts. For Kierce there is no choice. He knows he must find this woman and solve the impossible mystery that has haunted his every waking moment since that terrible day.

His investigation will bring him face-to-face with his past—and prove, after all this time, he’s nobody’s fool.]]> 352 Harlan Coben 1538756358 Erin 0 to-read 4.10 2025 Nobody’s Fool (Detective Sami Kierce #2)
author: Harlan Coben
name: Erin
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping [On a Dead Man] (Vera Wong, #2)]]> 215805924 Vera Wong is back and as meddling as ever in this follow-up to the hit Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers.�

Ever since a man was found dead in Vera's teahouse, life has been good. For Vera that is. She’s surrounded by loved ones, her shop is bustling, and best of all, her son, Tilly, has a girlfriend! All thanks to Vera, because Tilly's girlfriend is none other than Officer SelenaGray. The very same Officer Gray that she had harassed while investigating the teahouse murder. Still, Vera wishes more dead bodies would pop up in her shop, but one mustn't be ungrateful, even if one is slightly...bored.

Then Vera comes across a distressed young woman who is obviously in need of her kindly guidance. The young woman is looking for a missing friend. Fortunately, while cat-sitting at Tilly and Selena's, Vera finds a treasure Selena's briefcase.Inside is a file about the death of an enigmatic influencer—who also happens to be the friend that the young woman was looking for.

Online, Xander had it a parade of private jets, fabulous parties with socialites, and a burgeoning career as a social media influencer. The only problem is, after his body is fished out of Mission Bay, the police can't seem to actually identify him. Who is Xander Lin? Nobody knows. Every contact is a dead end. Everybody claims not to know him, not even his parents.

Vera is determined to solve Xander's murder. After all, doing so would surely be a big favor to Selena, andthere is nothing she wouldn't do for her future daughter-in-law.]]> 325 Jesse Q. Sutanto 0593546253 Erin 0 to-read 4.26 2025 Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping [On a Dead Man] (Vera Wong, #2)
author: Jesse Q. Sutanto
name: Erin
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)]]> 61431922 Enter the brutal and elite world of a war college for dragon riders...

Twenty-year-old Violet Sorrengail was supposed to enter the Scribe Quadrant, living a quiet life among books and history. Now, the commanding general—also known as her tough-as-talons mother—has ordered Violet to join the hundreds of candidates striving to become the elite of Navarre: dragon riders.

But when you’re smaller than everyone else and your body is brittle, death is only a heartbeat away...because dragons don’t bond to “fragile� humans. They incinerate them.

With fewer dragons willing to bond than cadets, most would kill Violet to better their own chances of success. The rest would kill her just for being her mother’s daughter—like Xaden Riorson, the most powerful and ruthless wingleader in the Riders Quadrant.

She’ll need every edge her wits can give her just to see the next sunrise.

Yet, with every day that passes, the war outside grows more deadly, the kingdom's protective wards are failing, and the death toll continues to rise. Even worse, Violet begins to suspect leadership is hiding a terrible secret.

Friends, enemies, lovers. Everyone at Basgiath War College has an agenda—because once you enter, there are only two ways out: graduate or die]]> 517 Rebecca Yarros 1649374046 Erin 0 to-read 4.56 2023 Fourth Wing (The Empyrean, #1)
author: Rebecca Yarros
name: Erin
average rating: 4.56
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> You Are Fatally Invited 213597331 An exclusive locked-room murder mystery party hosted by a legendary thriller writer on his private island for his fellow thriller writer friends turns lethal when a guest is found murdered in this twisty debut novel.

When the legendary and mysterious author J. R. Alastor hires Mila del Angel to host a murder mystery retreat on his private island off the coast of Maine, she jumps at the chance. The guest list? Six thriller writers, all masters of deceit, misdirection, and mayhem.

Alastor is planning a week of games, trope-fuelled riddles, and maybe a jump-scare or two--and Mila is plotting some fun of her own. But when a guest turns up dead--for real--and Alastor goes rogue, Mila suddenly finds herself in a deadly endeavor to stay alive. With a storm cutting off the island, and the body count rising, Mila must outwit a killer who knows literally every trick in the book...]]> 363 Ande Pliego 0593871588 Erin 4 3.70 2025 You Are Fatally Invited
author: Ande Pliego
name: Erin
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves:
review:

]]> Famous Last Words 212421066
From the author of Reese’s Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller Wrong Place Wrong Time comes an addictive thriller about a new mother’s world upended when her husband commits a terrifying crime. How well does she truly know the man she loves? And what danger does she face if her entire life has been built on a lie?

It is June 21st, the longest day of the year, and new mother Camilla’s life is about to change forever. After months of maternity leave, she will drop her infant daughter off at daycare for the first time and return to her job as a literary agent. Finally. But, when she wakes, her husband Luke isn’t there, and in his place is a cryptic note.

Then it starts. Breaking news: there's a hostage situation developing in London. The police arrive, and tell her Luke is involved. But he isn't a hostage. Her husband—doting father, eternal optimist—is the gunman.

What she does next is crucial. Because only she knows what the note he left behind that morning says...

Famous Last Words is the story of a crime, a marriage, and more secrets than Camilla ever could have imagined. This novel cements Gillian McAllister’s reputation as “the best at putting her characters in impossible situations and making her readers not only contemplate but feel what it would be like to find themselves in those situations.� (Emily Henry)]]> 336 Gillian McAllister 0063338424 Erin 4 3.70 2025 Famous Last Words
author: Gillian McAllister
name: Erin
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/13
date added: 2025/03/13
shelves:
review:

]]> Andromeda 61487462
En ung kvinna kommer till förlaget som praktikant men blir kvar under många år och får ett allt större ansvar för författarna och förlagets utgivning. Allt under överinseende Gunnar, den litteräre chefen som står bakom förlagets finaste utgivning, den som publiceras under namnet Andromeda.

Med åren växer deras arbetsrelation till något som de båda har svårt att definiera. Kanske handlar det om ömsesidigt förtroende? Eller handlar det i själva verket om något annat?

Therese Bohmans roman utspelas i Stockholm och vecklar ut sig till en berättelse om tradition och modernitet, förhoppningar och besvikelser, idealism och krass verklighet.]]> 196 Therese Bohman 9113121758 Erin 0 3.54 2022 Andromeda
author: Therese Bohman
name: Erin
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Winter Street (Winter Street, #1)]]> 20928835 Cozy up with New York Times bestselling author Elin Hilderbrand's first Christmas novel, hailed “a diverting tale� filled with humor, romance, and realism� by USA Today, in which a family gathers on Nantucket for a holiday filled with chaos, caroling, and cheer.

Kelley Quinn is the owner of Nantucket's Winter Street Inn and the proud father of four, all of them grown and living in varying states of disarray. Patrick, the eldest, is a hedge fund manager with a guilty conscience. Kevin, a bartender, is secretly sleeping with a French housekeeper named Isabelle. Ava, a school teacher, is finally dating the perfect guy but can't get him to commit. And Bart, the youngest and only child of Kelley's second marriage to Mitzi, has recently shocked everyone by joining the Marines. As Christmas approaches, Kelley is looking forward to getting the family together for some quality time at the inn. But when he walks in on Mitzi kissing Santa Claus (or the guy who's playing Santa at the inn's annual party), utter chaos descends. With the three older children each reeling in their own dramas and Bart unreachable in Afghanistan, it might be up to Kelley's ex-wife, nightly news anchor Margaret Quinn, to save Christmas at the Winter Street Inn. Before the mulled cider is gone, the delightfully dysfunctional Quinn family will survive a love triangle, an unplanned pregnancy, a federal crime, a small house fire, many shots of whiskey, and endless rounds of Christmas caroling, in this heart-warming novel about coming home for the holidays.Follow the Quinn family through the entire Winter Street Winter Street Winter Stroll Winter Storms Winter Solstice ]]> 249 Elin Hilderbrand Erin 0 currently-reading 4.07 2014 Winter Street (Winter Street, #1)
author: Elin Hilderbrand
name: Erin
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> The Stolen Queen 211051568 From New York Times bestselling author Fiona Davis, an utterly addictive new novel that will transport you from New York City’s most glamorous party to the labyrinth streets of Cairo and back.

Egypt, 1936: When anthropology student Charlotte Cross is offered a coveted spot on an archaeological dig in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings, she leaps at the opportunity. But after an unbearable tragedy strikes, Charlotte knows her future will never be the same.

New York City, 1978: Eighteen-year-old Annie Jenkins is thrilled when she lands an opportunity to work for iconic former Vogue fashion editor Diana Vreeland, who’s in the midst of organizing the famous Met Gala, hosted at the museum and known across the city as the “party of the year.� Though Annie soon realizes she’ll have her work cut out for her, scrambling to meet Diana’s capricious demands and exacting standards.

Meanwhile, Charlotte, now leading a quiet life as the associate curator of the Met’s celebrated Department of Egyptian Art, wants little to do with the upcoming gala. She’s consumed with her research on Hathorkare—a rare female pharaoh dismissed by most other Egyptologists as unimportant.

That is, until the night of the gala. When one of the Egyptian art collection’s most valuable artifacts goes missing . . . and there are signs Hathorkare’s legendary curse might be reawakening.

As Annie and Charlotte team up to search for the missing antiquity, a desperate hunch leads the unlikely duo to one place Charlotte swore she’d never return: Egypt. But if they’re to have any hope of finding the artifact, Charlotte will need to confront the demons of her past—which may mean leading them both directly into danger.]]> 349 Fiona Davis 0593474295 Erin 0 currently-reading 4.19 2025 The Stolen Queen
author: Fiona Davis
name: Erin
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/01
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> Family Family 133286908 “Not all stories of adoption are stories of pain and regret. Not even most of them. Why don’t we ever get that movie?�

India Allwood grew up wanting to be an actor. Armed with a stack of index cards (for research/line memorization/make-shift confetti), she goes from awkward sixteen-year-old to Broadway ingenue to TV superhero.

Her new movie is a prestige picture about adoption, but its spin is the same old tired story of tragedy. India is an adoptive mom in real life though. She wants everyone to know there’s more to her family than pain and regret. So she does something you should never do—she tells a journalist the truth: it’s a bad movie.

Soon she’s at the center of a media storm, battling accusations from the press and the paparazzi, from protesters on the right and advocates on the left. Her twin ten-year-olds know they need help–and who better to call than family? But that’s where it gets really messy because India’s not just an adoptive mother�

The one thing she knows for sure is what makes a family isn’t blood. And it isn’t love. No matter how they’re formed, the truth about family is this: it's complicated.]]> 400 Laurie Frankel 1250236819 Erin 4 wsirn-rec 4.08 2024 Family Family
author: Laurie Frankel
name: Erin
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/23
date added: 2025/03/01
shelves: wsirn-rec
review:

]]> Open Season (Joe Pickett #1) 40051887 Don't miss the Spectrum Originals series JOE PICKETT!

The first novel in the #1 New York Times bestselling series featuring Wyoming Game Warden Joe Pickett--the book that launched one of the biggest, most reliable, and fastest growing franchises in commercial fiction!

Joe Pickett is the new game warden in Twelve Sleep, Wyoming, a town where nearly everyone hunts and the game warden--especially one like Joe who won't take bribes or look the other way--is far from popular. When he finds a local hunting outfitter dead, splayed out on the woodpile behind his state-owned home, he takes it personally. Even after the discovery of two more bodies, and the resolution of the case by local police, Joe continues to investigate.

As Joe digs deeper into the murders, he soon discovers that the outfitter brought more than death to his backdoor: he brought Joe an endangered species, thought to be extinct, which is now living in his woodpile. But if word of this rare species gets out, it will destroy any chance of InterWest, a multi-national natural gas company, building an oil pipeline through the mountains and forests of Twelve Sleep. The closer Joe comes to the truth behind the outfitter murders, the endangered species, and InterWest, the closer he comes to losing everything he holds dear.]]> 316 C.J. Box Erin 0 4.28 2001 Open Season (Joe Pickett #1)
author: C.J. Box
name: Erin
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2001
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Hallmarked Man (Cormoran Strike, #8)]]> 210081845 32 Robert Galbraith Erin 0 to-read 4.36 2025 The Hallmarked Man (Cormoran Strike, #8)
author: Robert Galbraith
name: Erin
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Back After This 198563641 From the New York Times bestselling author of Evvie Drake Starts Over and Flying Solo, a podcast producer agrees to host a new series about modern dating—but will the show jeopardize her chance at finding real love?

Cecily Foster loves to make podcasts. She fiercely protects her colleagues, dearly adores her friends, and never misses dinner with her sister. But after a disastrous relationship with a colleague who stole her heart and her ideas, she’s put romantic love on hold.

When the boss who’s disappointed her again and again finally offers her the chance to host her own show, she wants to be thrilled. But there’s a catch—actually, two catches. First, the show will be about Cecily’s dating life. And second, she has to follow the guidance of influencer and newly minted relationship coach Eliza Cassidy, whose relentlessly upbeat attitude seems ready-made for social media, not real life.

Cecily would rather do anything other than put her singledom on display (ugh) or take advice from the internet (UGH). But when her boss hints that doing the show is the only way to protect a friend’s job, she realizes she has no choice.

To make matters more complicated, once she’s committed to twenty blind dates of Eliza’s choosing, Cecily finds herself unable to stop thinking about Will, a photographer she helped to rescue a very big and very lovable lost dog. Even though there are sparks between the two, Will’s own path is uncertain, and Eliza’s skeptical comments about Cecily’s decision-making aren’t helping. On the one hand, Will seems great. But on the other hand . . . don’t they all?

As Cecily struggles to balance the life she truly desires and the one Eliza wants to create for her, she finds herself at a crossroads. Can Cecily sort through all the advice and find a way to do what she loves without losing herself in the process?]]> 320 Linda Holmes 059359925X Erin 0 to-read 3.77 2025 Back After This
author: Linda Holmes
name: Erin
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Queens of Crime 211003830 The Mystery of Mrs. Christie returns with a thrilling story of Christie’s legendary rival Dorothy Sayers, the race to solve a murder, and the power of friendship among women.

London, 1930. The five greatest women crime writers have banded together to form a secret society with a single goal: to show they are no longer willing to be treated as second-class citizens by their male counterparts in the legendary Detection Club. Led by the formidable Dorothy L. Sayers, the group includes Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham and Baroness Emma Orczy. They call themselves the Queens of Crime. Their plan? Solve an actual murder, that of a young woman found strangled in a park in France who may have connections leading to the highest levels of the British establishment.

May Daniels, a young English nurse on an excursion to France with her friend, seemed to vanish into thin air as they prepared to board a ferry home. Months later, her body is found in the nearby woods. The murder has all the hallmarks of a locked room mystery for which these authors are famous: how did her killer manage to sneak her body out of a crowded train station without anyone noticing? If, as the police believe, the cause of death is manual strangulation, why is there is an extraordinary amount of blood at the crime scene? What is the meaning of a heartbreaking secret letter seeming to implicate an unnamed paramour? Determined to solve the highly publicized murder, the Queens of Crime embark on their own investigation, discovering they’re stronger together. But soon the killer targets Dorothy Sayers herself, threatening to expose a dark secret in her past that she would do anything to keep hidden.

Inspired by a true story in Sayers� own life, New York Times bestselling author Marie Benedict brings to life the lengths to which five talented women writers will go to be taken seriously in the male-dominated world of letters as they unpuzzle a mystery torn from the pages of their own novels.]]> 310 Marie Benedict 1250280753 Erin 0 to-read 3.81 2025 The Queens of Crime
author: Marie Benedict
name: Erin
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> We All Live Here 213243915 The #1 New York Times bestselling author, whose books so many love, brings us a fresh, contemporary story of a woman and her unruly blended family

Lila Kennedy has a lot on her plate. A broken marriage, two wayward daughters, a house that is falling apart, and an elderly stepfather who seems to have quietly moved in. Her career is in freefall and her love life is... complicated. So when her real dad—a man she has barely seen since he ran off to Hollywood thirty-five years ago—suddenly appears on her doorstep, it feels like the final straw. But it turns out even the family you thought you could never forgive might have something to teach about love, and what it actually means to be family.]]> 450 Jojo Moyes 1984879324 Erin 0 to-read 3.86 2025 We All Live Here
author: Jojo Moyes
name: Erin
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The House on the Strand 50246
Alternate cover is available here.]]> 329 Daphne du Maurier Erin 4 amanda 3.85 1969 The House on the Strand
author: Daphne du Maurier
name: Erin
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1969
rating: 4
read at: 2008/05/01
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: amanda
review:
I never thought I liked time-travel books, but this one might have changed my mind! Narrator is pulled between his real life and the world he witnesses on his travels. In the former, unwanted decisions and responsibilities press upon him; in the later, he is powerless to to have any effect, no matter how much he might like to intervene.
]]> The Frozen River 112975658 A gripping historical mystery inspired by the life and diary of Martha Ballard, a renowned 18th-century midwife who defied the legal system and wrote herself into American history.

Maine, 1789: When the Kennebec River freezes, entombing a man in the ice, Martha Ballard is summoned to examine the body and determine cause of death. As a midwife and healer, she is privy to much of what goes on behind closed doors in Hallowell. Her diary is a record of every birth and death, crime and debacle that unfolds in the close-knit community. Months earlier, Martha documented the details of an alleged rape committed by two of the town’s most respected gentlemen—one of whom has now been found dead in the ice. But when a local physician undermines her conclusion, declaring the death to be an accident, Martha is forced to investigate the shocking murder on her own.

Over the course of one winter, as the trial nears, and whispers and prejudices mount, Martha doggedly pursues the truth. Her diary soon lands at the center of the scandal, implicating those she loves, and compelling Martha to decide where her own loyalties lie.

Clever, layered, and subversive, Ariel Lawhon’s newest offering introduces an unsung heroine who refused to accept anything less than justice at a time when women were considered best seen and not heard. The Frozen River is a thrilling, tense, and tender story about a remarkable woman who left an unparalleled legacy yet remains nearly forgotten to this day.]]> 432 Ariel Lawhon 0385546874 Erin 0 to-read 4.37 2023 The Frozen River
author: Ariel Lawhon
name: Erin
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Favorites 211400175 To the world, they were a scandal. To each other, an obsession.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER � An epic love story set in the sparkling, savage sphere of elite figure skating, starring a woman determined to carve her own path on and off the ice

“P Wuthering Heights and part Daisy Jones & The Six, this novel is as brilliantly choreographed as a gold medal performance and will keep you guessing until its last page.”—Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of By Any Other Name

She might not have a famous name, funding, or her family’s support, but Katarina Shaw has always known that she was destined to become an Olympic skater. When she meets Heath Rocha, a lonely kid stuck in the foster care system, their instant connection makes them a formidable duo on the ice. Clinging to skating—and each other—to escape their turbulent lives, Kat and Heath go from childhood sweethearts to champion ice dancers, captivating the world with their scorching chemistry, rebellious style, and roller-coaster relationship.

Until a shocking incident at the Olympic Games brings their partnership to a sudden end.

As the ten-year anniversary of their final skate approaches, an unauthorized documentary reignites the public obsession with Shaw and Rocha, claiming to uncover the “real story� through interviews with their closest friends and fiercest rivals. Kat wants nothing to do with the documentary, but she can’t stand the thought of someone else defining her legacy. So, after a decade of silence, she’s telling her story: from the childhood tragedies that created her all-consuming bond with Heath to the clash of desires that tore them apart. Sensational rumors have haunted their every step for years, but the truth may be even more shocking than the headlines.]]> 464 Layne Fargo 0593732057 Erin 0 4.16 2025 The Favorites
author: Layne Fargo
name: Erin
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at: 2025/01/26
date added: 2025/01/26
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Night Gate (The Enzo Files, #7)]]> 57118477
A famous art critic is viciously murdered in a nearby house.

Both deaths have occurred more than 70 years apart.

Asked by a forensic archaeologist in Paris to take a look at the site of the former, Enzo Macleod quickly finds himself embroiled in the investigation of the latter, and two narratives are set in train - one historical, unfolding against a backdrop of real events in Occupied France in the 1940s; the other contemporary, set in a France going back into Covid lockdown in the autumn of 2020.

At the heart of both is da Vinci's Mona Lisa.

Tasked by de Gaulle to keep the world's most famous painting out of Nazi hands after the fall of France in 1940, 28-year-old Georgette Pignal finds herself swept along by the tide of history. Following in the wake of the Mona Lisa as it is moved from chateau to chateau by the Louvre, she finds herself both wooed and pursued by two Germans sent to steal it for rival patrons - Hitler and Göring.

What none of them know is that the Louvre has secretly engaged the services of the 20th century's greatest forger to produce a duplicate of the great lady, one that even those who know her well find hard to tell apart. The discovery of its existence is the thread that links both narratives. And both murders.]]> 373 Peter May Erin 0 to-read 4.18 The Night Gate (The Enzo Files, #7)
author: Peter May
name: Erin
average rating: 4.18
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Odin (Alex Mason #1) 59014545
ODIN is about as secret as a government agency can get.

Because within ODIN there is General Operations, which speaks for itself; ODIN 5i, which deals with intelligence gathering, and then there is ODIN 1i which deals in operations so sensitive not even the CIA can touch them. All three are run with an iron first by The Chief, a giant with a gigantic IQ. His top agent is Alex Mason, hard and cool � he's a law unto himself.

But when an ODIN 5i agent based at the US Embassy in Manila, goes missing, and his encrypted laptop disappears with him, the whole ODIN structure is put in peril. Then the agents he was managing start to disappear one by one, and things start to look ugly.

So Alex Mason is sent to Manila, and what he finds there is the growing shadow of Chinese imperialism threatening not only America’s presence in the Pacific, but the security of the whole Western World�

This is a job for ODIN 1i

And for Alex Mason.]]> 262 David Archer 1636960448 Erin 0 4.16 2021 Odin (Alex Mason #1)
author: David Archer
name: Erin
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/18
shelves: sampled-not-finished-abandoned
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Marble Hall Murders (Susan Ryeland, #3)]]> 216850869
She is freelancing for Causton Books, where she is asked to work on a ‘continuation� novel , Pünd’s Last Case, by a young author, Eliot Crace. Eliot Crace is the grandson of one of the most well known children’s authors ever, Marian Crace. Think Enid Blyton, then double her sales. Marian Crace died some 15 years previously and Eliot is sure she was poisoned.

Rather doubtfully, Susan starts to read the opening chapters, finding to her relief that Pünd’s Last Case is actually pretty good. Set in the South of France, it revolves around the mysterious death of Lady Margaret Chalfont who, though mortally ill, is poisoned � perhaps by a member of her own family. But why? And who did it?

It soon becomes clear to Susan that the clues to who was responsible for the death of Eliot’s grandmother, Marian Crace, are hidden from view in this Atticus Pünd mystery.

Eliot’s behaviour becomes increasingly erratic as his alcohol and gambling addictions increase. But when he is killed in a hit and run accident, Susan realises that she is suspected of his murder.

Three mysterious deaths and a group of people with multiple motives for Susan realises that if she doesn’t solve the mystery in Pünd’s Last Case, her death may well be next …]]> 579 Anthony Horowitz 1804943010 Erin 0 to-read 4.53 2025 Marble Hall Murders (Susan Ryeland, #3)
author: Anthony Horowitz
name: Erin
average rating: 4.53
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> You Are Here 201465867
Michael is coming undone. Adrift after his wife's departure, he has begun taking himself on long, solitary walks across the English countryside. Becoming ever more reclusive, he’ll do anything to avoid his empty house.

Marnie, on the other hand, is stuck. Hiding alone in her London flat, she avoids old friends and any reminders of her rotten, selfish ex-husband. Curled up with a good book, she’s battling the long afternoons of a life that feels like it’s passing her by.

When a persistent mutual friend and some very unpredictable weather conspire to toss Michael and Marnie together on the most epic of ten-day hikes, neither of them can think of anything worse. Until, of course, they discover exactly what they’ve been looking for.

Michael and Marnie are on the precipice of a bright future . . . if they can survive the journey.]]> 368 David Nicholls 0063394057 Erin 0 to-read, wsirn-rec 3.97 2024 You Are Here
author: David Nicholls
name: Erin
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/05
shelves: to-read, wsirn-rec
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Professor (McMurtrie and Drake, #1)]]> 26031530 Law professor Thomas Jackson McMurtrie literally wrote the book on evidence in the state of Alabama. But when a power-hungry colleague uses a recent run-in between McMurtrie and headstrong student Rick Drake to end his career, he is left unsure what to do next.

Meanwhile, a devastating trucking accident in Henshaw, Alabama, leaves a young family dead. Drake, now a fledgling lawyer, takes the case against the freight carrier and soon begins to uncover the truth behind the tragedy that is buried in a tangled web of arson, bribery, and greed. On the eve of the trial and with his case unraveling in the midst of a dangerous cover-up that threatens to silence his star witnesses, Drake realizes that only his estranged mentor, Professor McMurtrie, can help him now.

With everything to lose and only justice to gain, will McMurtrie and Drake overcome bad blood to defeat a ruthless adversary? Can the Professor turn back the clock and recover all that he’s lost?

Revised edition: This edition of The Professor includes editorial revisions.

]]> 429 Robert Bailey 1503945537 Erin 4 4.42 2014 The Professor (McMurtrie and Drake, #1)
author: Robert Bailey
name: Erin
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/04
date added: 2025/01/04
shelves:
review:

]]> A Month in the Country 60707 160 J.L. Carr 0940322471 Erin 0
1. Mineral, painting and decoration, medieval � conservation and restoration. 2. North Riding of Yorkshire, England �. 3. World war, 1914-1918 � veterans. 4. Art restorers. 5. Villages.]]> 4.10 1980 A Month in the Country
author: J.L. Carr
name: Erin
average rating: 4.10
book published: 1980
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/31
shelves:
review:
Page 92 � And at such a time for a few of us there will always be a tugging at the heart � knowing our precious moment gone and we were not there. We can ask and ask, but we can’t have what once seemed ours forever � the way things looked, that church alone in the fields, a bed on a belfry floor, I remembered voice, the touch a hand, a loved face. They’ve gone, and you can only wait for the pain to pass.

1. Mineral, painting and decoration, medieval � conservation and restoration. 2. North Riding of Yorkshire, England �. 3. World war, 1914-1918 � veterans. 4. Art restorers. 5. Villages.
]]> The Answer Is No 219876684 In a hilarious short story from New York Times bestselling author Fredrik Backman, the absurdities of modern life cause one man’s solitary world to spin suddenly, and comically, out of control.

Lucas knows the perfect night entails just three things: video games, wine, and pad thai. Peanuts are a must! Other people? Not so much. Why complicate things when he’s happy alone?

Then one day the apartment board, a vexing trio of authority, rings his doorbell. And Lucas’s solitude takes a startling hike. They demand to see his frying pan. Someone left one next to the recycling room overnight, and instead of removing the errant object, as Lucas suggests, they insist on finding the guilty party. But their plan backfires. Colossally.

Told in Fredrik Backman’s singular witty style with sharply drawn characters and relatable antics, The Answer Is No is a laugh-out-loud portrait of a man struggling to keep to himself in a world that won’t leave him alone.]]> 68 Fredrik Backman 1662526520 Erin 0 3.94 2024 The Answer Is No
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Erin
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/29
shelves:
review:

]]> Defending Jacob 51443902
Andy believes in Jacob’s innocence. Any parent would. But the pressure mounts. Damning evidence. Doubt. A faltering marriage. The neighbors� contempt. A murder trial that threatens to obliterate Andy’s family. It is the ultimate test for any parent: How far would you go to protect your child? It is a test of devotion. A test of how well a parent can know a child. For Andy Barber, a man with an iron will and a dark secret, it is a test of guilt and innocence in the deepest sense.

How far would you go?]]> 431 William Landay Erin 4 4.20 2012 Defending Jacob
author: William Landay
name: Erin
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2012
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/29
date added: 2024/12/29
shelves:
review:

]]> Sipsworth 125432196 Over the course of two weeks in a small English town, a reclusive widow discovers an unexpected reason to live.


Following the loss of her husband and son, Helen Cartwright returns to the village of her childhood after living abroad for six decades. Her only wish is to die quickly and without fuss. She retreats into her home on Westminster Crescent, becoming a creature of routine and “Each day was an impersonation of the one before with only a slight shuffle—as though even for death there is a queue.�

Then, one cold winter night, a chance encounter with a mouse sets Helen on a surprising journey.


Sipsworth is a reminder that there can be second chances. No matter what we have planned for ourselves, sometimes life has plans of its own. With profound compassion, Simon Van Booy illuminates not only a deep friendship forged between two lonely creatures, but the reverberations of goodness that ripple out from that unique bond.]]> 198 Simon Van Booy 1567927955 Erin 4 4.39 2024 Sipsworth
author: Simon Van Booy
name: Erin
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/12/24
date added: 2024/12/24
shelves:
review:

]]> Atmosphere 220817728 From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six comes an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s Space Shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.

Joan Goodwin has been obsessed with the stars for as long as she can remember. Thoughtful and reserved, Joan is content with her life as a professor of physics and astronomy at Rice University and as aunt to her precocious niece, Frances. That is, until she comes across an advertisement seeking the first women scientists to join NASA’s Space Shuttle program. Suddenly, Joan burns to be one of the few people to go to space.

Selected from a pool of thousands of applicants in the summer of 1980, Joan begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond and scientist John Griffin, who are kind and easy-going even when the stakes are highest; mission specialist Lydia Danes, who has worked too hard to play nice; warm-hearted Donna Fitzgerald, who is navigating her own secrets; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer, who can fix any engine and fly any plane.

As the new astronauts become unlikely friends and prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined. In this new light, Joan begins to question everything she thinks she knows about her place in the observable universe.

Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, everything changes in an instant.

Fast-paced, thrilling, and emotional, Atmosphere is Taylor Jenkins Reid at her best: transporting readers to iconic times and places, with complex protagonists, telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love, this time among the stars.]]> 352 Taylor Jenkins Reid 0593158717 Erin 0 to-read 4.45 2025 Atmosphere
author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
name: Erin
average rating: 4.45
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Going Zero 61166695
In the name of national security, the CIA in partnership with Silicon Valley wunderkind Cy Baxter have created the ultimate surveillance program known as FUSION. Ahead of its roll out, ten Americans have been carefully selected to Beta test the groundbreaking system.

At the appointed hour, each of the ten will have two hours to “Go Zero”—to turn their cellphones off, cut ties with friends and family, and use any means possible to disappear. They will then have 30 days to evade detection and elude the highly sophisticated Capture Teams tasked to find them using the most cutting-edge technology. The goal is to see if it is possible to successfully go “off the grid� and escape detection.

The stakes are immense. If FUSION is a success, Cy Baxter will secure a coveted 10-year, $100 billion dollar government contract and access to intelligence resources he truly believes will save lives. For any participant who beats the massive surveillance, it means a $3 million cash prize.

Among the contestants is an unassuming Boston librarian named Kaitlyn Day. She’s been chosen as the gimme, the easy target expected to be found first. But Kaitlyn excels at confounding expectations. Her talents at this particular game are far more effective than all the security experts suspect, and her reasons for playing far more personal than anyone can imagine. . . .]]> 304 Anthony McCarten Erin 5 4.12 2023 Going Zero
author: Anthony McCarten
name: Erin
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/01
date added: 2024/12/01
shelves:
review:

]]> The Lost Story 199927030 The Chronicles of Narnia, this wild and wondrous novel is a fairy tale for grown-ups who still knock on the back of wardrobes—just in case—from the author of The Wishing Game.

As boys, best friends Jeremy Cox and Rafe Howell went missing in a vast West Virginia state forest, only to mysteriously reappear six months later with no explanation for where they’d gone or how they’d survived.

Fifteen years after their miraculous homecoming, Rafe is a reclusive artist who still bears scars inside and out but has no memory of what happened during those months. Meanwhile, Jeremy has become a famed missing persons� investigator. With his uncanny abilities, he is the one person who can help vet tech Emilie Wendell find her sister, who vanished in the very same forest as Rafe and Jeremy.

Jeremy alone knows the fantastical truth about the disappearances, for while the rest of the world was searching for them, the two missing boys were in a magical realm filled with impossible beauty and terrible danger. He believes it is there that they will find Emilie’s sister. However, Jeremy has kept Rafe in the dark since their return for his own inscrutable reasons. But the time for burying secrets comes to an end as the quest for Emilie’s sister begins. The former lost boys must confront their shared past, no matter how traumatic the memories.

Alongside the headstrong Emilie, Rafe and Jeremy must return to the enchanted world they called home for six months—for only then can they get back everything and everyone they’ve lost.]]> 352 Meg Shaffer 0593598873 Erin 0 3.78 2024 The Lost Story
author: Meg Shaffer
name: Erin
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/01
date added: 2024/11/30
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year]]> 204982650 Knives Out gets a holiday rom-com twist in this rivals-to-lovers romance-mystery fromNew York Timesbestselling author Ally Carter.

The bridge is out. The phones are down. And the most famous mystery writer in the world just disappeared out of a locked room three days before Christmas.

Meet Maggie Chase and Ethan

She’s the new Queen of the Cozy Mystery.

He’s Mr. Big-time Thriller Guy.

She hates his guts.

He thinks her name is Marcie (no matter how many times she’s told him otherwise.)

But when they both accept a cryptic invitation to attend a Christmas house party at the English estate of a reclusive fan, neither is expecting their host to be the most powerful author in the Eleanor Ashley, the Duchess of Death herself.

That night, the weather turns, and the next morning Eleanor is gone.

She vanished from a locked room, and Maggie has to Is Eleanor in danger? Or is it all some kind of test? Is Ethan the competition? Or is he the only person in that snowbound mansion she can trust?

As the snow gets deeper and the stakes get higher, every clue will bring Maggie and Ethan closer to the truth—and each other. Because, this Christmas, these two rivals are going to have to become allies (and maybe more) if they have any hope of saving Eleanor.

Assuming they don’t kill each other first.]]> 303 Ally Carter 0063276739 Erin 0 4.11 2024 The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year
author: Ally Carter
name: Erin
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/11/28
date added: 2024/11/28
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Grey Wolf (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #19)]]> 204174589
Relentless phone calls interrupt the peace of a warm August morning in Three Pines. Though the tiny Québec village is impossible to find on any map, someone has managed to track down Armand Gamache, head of homicide at the Sûreté, as he sits with his wife in their back garden. Reine-Marie watches with increasing unease as her husband refuses to pick up, though he clearly knows who is on the other end. When he finally answers, his rage shatters the calm of their quiet Sunday morning.

That's only the first in a sequence of strange events that begin THE GREY WOLF, the nineteenth novel in Louise Penny's #1 New York Times-bestselling series. A missing coat, an intruder alarm, a note for Gamache reading "this might interest you", a puzzling scrap of paper with a mysterious list—and then a murder. All propel Chief Inspector Gamache and his team toward a terrible realization. Something much more sinister than any one murder or any one case is fast approaching.

Armand Gamache, Jean-Guy Beauvoir, his son-in-law and second in command, and Inspector Isabelle Lacoste can only trust each other, as old friends begin to act like enemies, and long-time enemies appear to be friends. Determined to track down the threat before it becomes a reality, their pursuit takes them across Québec and across borders. Their hunt grows increasingly desperate, even frantic, as the enormity of the creature they’re chasing becomes clear. If they fail the devastating consequences would reach into the largest of cities and the smallest of villages.

Including Three Pines.]]> 432 Louise Penny 1250328144 Erin 4 4.42 2024 The Grey Wolf (Chief Inspector Armand Gamache, #19)
author: Louise Penny
name: Erin
average rating: 4.42
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/11/18
date added: 2024/11/18
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[We Solve Murders (We Solve Murders, #1)]]> 203955668 A brand new series. An iconic new detective duo. And a puzzling new murder to solve...

Steve Wheeler is enjoying retired life. He does the odd bit of investigation work, but he prefers his familiar habits and routines: the pub quiz, his favorite bench, his cat waiting for him when he comes home. His days of adventure are over: adrenaline is daughter-in-law Amy’s business now.

Amy Wheeler thinks adrenaline is good for the soul. As a private security officer, she doesn’t stay still long enough for habits or routines. She’s currently on a remote island keeping world-famous author Rosie D’Antonio alive. Which was meant to be an easy job...

Then a dead body, a bag of money, and a killer with their sights on Amy have her sending an SOS to the only person she trusts. A breakneck race around the world begins, but can Amy and Steve stay one step ahead of a lethal enemy?]]> 397 Richard Osman 0593653238 Erin 4 4.26 2024 We Solve Murders (We Solve Murders, #1)
author: Richard Osman
name: Erin
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/11/10
date added: 2024/11/10
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies (The Vacation Mysteries, #1)]]> 195790849 Ten days, eight suspects, six cities, five authors, three bodies . . . one trip to die for.

All that bestselling author Eleanor Dash wants is to get through her book tour in Italy and kill off her main character, Connor Smith, in the next in her Vacation Mysteries series―is that too much to ask?

Clearly, because when an attempt is made on the real Connor’s life―the handsome but infuriating con man she got mixed up with ten years ago and now can't get out of her life―Eleanor’s enlisted to help solve the case.

Contending with literary rivals, rabid fans, a stalker―and even her ex, Oliver, who turns up unexpectedly―theories are bandied about, and rivalries, rifts, and broken hearts are revealed. But who’s really trying to get away with murder?

Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies is the irresistible and hilarious series debut from Catherine Mack, introducing bestselling fictional author Eleanor Dash on her Italian book tour that turns into a real-life murder mystery, as her life starts to imitate the world in her books.]]> 342 Catherine Mack 1250325854 Erin 0 to-read 3.47 2024 Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies (The Vacation Mysteries, #1)
author: Catherine Mack
name: Erin
average rating: 3.47
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Restoring Grace 267738 Artist Ellie Summers' life is unraveling too. She's pregnant, but her boyfriend is less than enthusiastic about parenthood, and her parents are not exactly inviting her to move back home. She has to come up with a new plan. Fast.
Ellie needs a place to stay; Grace needs a lodger. Each of them needs a friend, and together they begin the work of fixing up the house. But then an unexpected and disconcertingly handsome man arrives on the scene, apparently determined to help. And when Grace discovers some beautiful and potentially valuable paintings hidden behind the tattered dining-room curtains, the whole business of restoration starts to get serious....
This fresh, funny romance from bestselling novelist Katie Fforde offers charm, wit, and restorative new beginnings for all.]]> 352 Katie Fforde 0312358776 Erin 0 to-read 3.77 2004 Restoring Grace
author: Katie Fforde
name: Erin
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2004
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/10/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Kala 63184768 A gripping literary page-turner from a rising Irish talent in which former friends, estranged for twenty years, reckon with the terrifying events of the summer that changed their lives.

In the seaside village of Kinlough, on Ireland’s west coast, three old friends meet for the first time in years. They—Helen, Joe and Mush—were part of an original group of six inseparable teenagers in the summer of 2003, with motherless, reckless Kala Lanann at its white-hot center. But later that year, Kala disappeared without a trace. Now remains have been discovered in the woods—including a skull with a Polaroid photo tucked inside—and the town is both aghast and titillated at reopening this old wound.

On the eve of this gruesome discovery, Helen had reluctantly returned for her father’s wedding, the world-famous musician Joe had come home to dry out and reconnect with something authentic, and Mush had never left, too shattered by the events of that summer to venture beyond the counter of his mother’s café. But when two more girls go missing, they are forced to confront their own complicity in the events that led to Kala’s disappearance. Ultimately, they must do what others should have done before to stop the violent patterns of their town’s past repeating themselves once again.

In cracklingly vivid prose, Kala brilliantly examines the sometimes brutal costs of belonging, as well as the battle in the human heart between vengeance and forgiveness, despair and redemption.]]> 416 Colin Walsh 0385549636 Erin 0 to-read 3.96 2023 Kala
author: Colin Walsh
name: Erin
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/10/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> A Happier Life 177059676
1976: Rebecca “Becks� Saint James has made a name for herself as the best hostess North Carolina has ever seen. Her annual summer suppers have become the stuff of legend, and locals and out-of-towners alike clamor for an invitation to her stunning historic home. But she’s struggling behind the façade. Becks strives to make the lives of those around her as easy as possible, but this summer she is facing a dilemma that even she can’t solve. And as the end of the season looms, she is brought to a decision she never wanted to make.

As both Keaton and Becks face new challenges and chapters, they are connected through time by the house on Sunset Lane, which has protected the secrets, hopes, and dreams of the women in their family for generations.]]> 378 Kristy Woodson Harvey Erin 0 4.43 2024 A Happier Life
author: Kristy Woodson Harvey
name: Erin
average rating: 4.43
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/10/01
date added: 2024/10/13
shelves:
review:

]]> Swan Song (Nantucket, #4) 200497570 In the grand finale of "queen of the beach read" Elin Hilderbrand's beloved Nantucket novels, there's a new couple in town... and they instantly shake things up. Amid the extravagant parties on land and sea, there's trouble on the island, forcing Chief of Police Ed Kapanesh to postpone his retirement and changing the fabric of life on the picturesque island forever...

After thirty-five years serving as the Chief of Police on the island of Nantucket, Ed Kapenash's heart can no longer take the stress. But his plans to retire are thwarted when, with only three days left to serve, he receives a phone call. A 22-million-dollar summer home, recently purchased by the flashy new couple in town, the Richardsons, has burned to the ground. The Richardsons are far from hurt—in fact, they're out on the water, throwing a lavish party on their yacht—but when news of the fire reaches them, they discover that their personal assistant has vanished. The Chief is well-acquainted with the Richardsons, and his daughter is best friends with the now-missing girl, leaving him no choice but to postpone his retirement and take on the double case.

On a small island like Nantucket, the Richardsons shook things up from the second they stepped on to the scene, throwing luxurious parties and doing whatever they could to gain admittance to the coveted lunches at the Field & Oar Club (with increasing desperation). They instantly captured the attention of local real estate agent Fast Eddie, and the town gossip Blond Sharon, both dealing with their own personal dramas. Blond Sharon is going through a divorce, and in order to avoid becoming a cliché, she's enrolled in a creative writing class, putting her natural affinity for scandal towards a more noble purpose. To solve the case of the fire and track down his daughter's best friend, the Chief will have to string together the pieces of the lives of all of these characters and more, rallying his strength for his final act of service to the tight-knit community he knows and loves.

The last of Elin Hilderbrand's bestselling Nantucket novels, Swan Song is a propulsive medley of glittering gatherings, sun-soaked drama, wisdom and heart, featuring the return of some of her most beloved characters, including, most importantly, the beautiful and timeless island of Nantucket itself.]]> 400 Elin Hilderbrand 0316259705 Erin 5 4.28 2024 Swan Song (Nantucket, #4)
author: Elin Hilderbrand
name: Erin
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/10/06
date added: 2024/10/06
shelves:
review:

]]> The Ministry of Time 199798179 A time travel romance, a spy thriller, a workplace comedy, and an ingenious exploration of the nature of power and the potential for love to change it all: Welcome to The Ministry of Time, the exhilarating debut novel by Kaliane Bradley.

In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on. A recently established government ministry is gathering “expats� from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible—for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.

She is tasked with working as a “bridge�: living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as �1847� or Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as “washing machines,� “Spotify,� and “the collapse of the British Empire.� But with an appetite for discovery, a seven-a-day cigarette habit, and the support of a charming and chaotic cast of fellow expats, he soon adjusts.

Over the next year, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a horrifically uncomfortable roommate dynamic, evolves into something much deeper. By the time the true shape of the Ministry’s project comes to light, the bridge has fallen haphazardly, fervently in love, with consequences she never could have imagined. Forced to confront the choices that brought them together, the bridge must finally reckon with how—and whether she believes—what she does next can change the future.

An exquisitely original and feverishly fun fusion of genres and ideas, The Ministry of Time asks: What does it mean to defy history, when history is living in your house? Kaliane Bradley’s answer is a blazing, unforgettable testament to what we owe each other in a changing world.]]> 339 Kaliane Bradley 1668045141 Erin 3 3.54 2024 The Ministry of Time
author: Kaliane Bradley
name: Erin
average rating: 3.54
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/09/22
date added: 2024/09/22
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Managing Expectations: A Memoir in Essays]]> 59513806
A charming, poignant, and mesmerizing memoir in essays from beloved actor and natural-born storyteller Minnie Driver, chronicling the way life works out even when it doesn’t.

In this intimate, beautifully crafted collection, Driver writes with disarming charm and candor about her bohemian upbringing between England and Barbados; her post-university travails and triumphs—from being the only student in her acting school not taken on by an agent to being discovered at a rave in a muddy field in the English countryside; shooting to fame in one of the most influential films of the 1990s and being nominated for an Academy Award; and finding the true light of her life, her son. She chronicles her unconventional career path, including the time she gave up on acting to sell jeans in Uruguay, her journey as a single parent, and the heartbreaking loss of her mother.

Like Lena Dunham in Not That Kind of Girl, Gabrielle Union in We’re Going to Need More Wine and Patti Smith in Just Kids, Driver writes with razor-sharp humor and grace as she explores navigating the depths of failure, fighting for success, discovering the unmatched wonder and challenge of motherhood, and wading through immeasurable grief. Effortlessly charming, deeply funny, personal, and honest, Managing Expectations reminds us of the way life works out—even when it doesn’t.]]> 278 Minnie Driver 0063115328 Erin 0 to-read 4.07 2022 Managing Expectations: A Memoir in Essays
author: Minnie Driver
name: Erin
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Heiress: The Revelations of Anne de Bourgh]]> 53825379 In this gorgeously written and spellbinding historical novel based on Pride and Prejudice, the author of The Clergyman’s Wife combines the knowing eye of Jane Austen with the eroticism and Gothic intrigue of Sarah Waters to reimagine the life of the mysterious Anne de Bourgh.

As a fussy baby, Anne de Bourgh’s doctor prescribed laudanum to quiet her, and now the young woman must take the opium-heavy tincture every day. Growing up sheltered and confined, removed from sunshine and fresh air, the pale and overly slender Anne grew up with few companions except her cousins, including Fitzwilliam Darcy. Throughout their childhoods, it was understood that Darcy and Anne would marry and combine their vast estates of Pemberley and Rosings. But Darcy does not love Anne or want her.

After her father dies unexpectedly, leaving her his vast fortune, Anne has a moment of clarity: what if her life of fragility and illness isn’t truly real? What if she could free herself from the medicine that clouds her sharp mind and leaves her body weak and lethargic? Might there be a better life without the medicine she has been told she cannot live without?

In a frenzy of desperation, Anne discards her laudanum and flees to the London home of her cousin, Colonel John Fitzwilliam, who helps her through her painful recovery. Yet once she returns to health, new challenges await. Shy and utterly inexperienced, the wealthy heiress must forge a new identity for herself, learning to navigate a “season� in society and the complexities of love and passion. The once wan, passive Anne gives way to a braver woman with a keen edge—leading to a powerful reckoning with the domineering mother determined to control Anne’s fortune . . . and her life.

An extraordinary tale of one woman’s liberation, The Heiress reveals both the darkness and light in Austen’s world, with wit, sensuality, and a deeply compassionate understanding of the human heart.]]> 368 Molly Greeley 0063032023 Erin 0 to-read 3.81 2021 The Heiress: The Revelations of Anne de Bourgh
author: Molly Greeley
name: Erin
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Quartet in Autumn 227002 186 Barbara Pym 0330326481 Erin 0 to-read 3.90 1978 Quartet in Autumn
author: Barbara Pym
name: Erin
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1978
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> It Had to Be You 201102402 Two contract killers, each with a hit out on the other, must fight their growing attraction as they face off in an epic game oflustand murder across Western Europe.When Eva and Jonathan hook up on the sleeper train from Florence to Paris, they think they’ll never see each other again. Which is too bad, because neither has ever felt a spark like this for another person. But love isn’t on the agenda in their line of work.Six months later, they run into each other in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles. This meeting is not by chance, because Eva has been hired to kill Jonathan. She’s a contract killer, but what she doesn’t know is that he is too.Their meeting kicks off a high-stakes cross-continent adventure across Western Europe. There will be tourism.There will be bodies. Eva and Jonathan might even fallfor each other.As the two get closer to completing their assignments, it becomes clear that they are also being hunted—by something even more dangerous thanlove. . .]]> 384 Eliza Jane Brazier 0593438922 Erin 0 to-read 3.56 2024 It Had to Be You
author: Eliza Jane Brazier
name: Erin
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/09/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table]]> 53645 282 Ruth Reichl 0767903382 Erin 4 4.08 1998 Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table
author: Ruth Reichl
name: Erin
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1998
rating: 4
read at: 2024/09/01
date added: 2024/09/01
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[New Women in the Old West: From Settlers to Suffragists, an Untold American Story]]> 58613433 303 Winifred Gallagher 0735223262 Erin 0 to-read 3.63 New Women in the Old West: From Settlers to Suffragists, an Untold American Story
author: Winifred Gallagher
name: Erin
average rating: 3.63
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times]]> 165053041 'This remarkable book points not to some unreachable ideal of life but to a deeper, more soulful and meaningful experience of the lives we're actually living.'
Oliver Burkeman

'A rich and soul-searching exploration of what it means to believe in a shifting age. This is a rare thing - an open, human and vulnerable profession of faith. I learned a lot. '
Katherine May

'This is deep stuff, personal yet learned, funny and vulnerable ... the book I didn't know I needed.'
Sally Phillips

'Luminous in a manner that a medieval anchorite might have appreciated, while simultaneously wise in the ways of coping with a pram on a crowded bus.'
Tom Holland

'A great gift to all in search of a deeper life.'
Krista Tippett

What does it mean to live a good, whole and fulfilling life? And if the world really is ending, or at least expecting turbulent change, what kind of people will we need when it happens?

In FULLY ALIVE Elizabeth Oldfield explores how we can build spiritual core strength for an unstable age.
Drawing on the ancient wisdom of faith and stories from her own life, Oldfield writes about her quest to live a meaningful, fulfilling life, and the niggling questions that bother all of us below the surface, such

How can I focus on what really matters and stop getting so distracted by trivialities?
How do I become a depolarising person in a culture of outrage, tribalism, and division?
Can I find my highs in expansive, life-giving ways, rather than in a bottle of wine or a tub of ice cream?
And what kind of world am I leaving for the next generation?

FULLY ALIVE is for readers looking for an honest conversation about the deepest questions in our ordinary lives, and practical, meaningful ideas to help us pay attention to the people we are becoming. For ourselves, our communities and the world.

'When I was writing UNAPOLOGETIC more than a decade ago, I knew the job would soon need doing again. And again. Because the bridge between faith and contemporary experience constantly needs to be rebuilt as times change. So here it is, the bridge for the present moment, across which seekers for more meaning in their lives can travel in the knowledge that they won't be bullied, browbeaten or talked down to. This book. This one. In your hand. Right now.'
Francis Spufford

'Plainspoken, fearless, disarmingly tender. Oldfield is a leader by example, and her book is a glowing argument for faith - one that speaks urgently to our fractured world.'
Rhik Samadder]]> 273 Elizabeth Oldfield 1399810782 Erin 0 to-read 4.22 Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times
author: Elizabeth Oldfield
name: Erin
average rating: 4.22
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Breakfast at Tiffany's 9888 157 Truman Capote 0140274111 Erin 0 to-read 3.72 1958 Breakfast at Tiffany's
author: Truman Capote
name: Erin
average rating: 3.72
book published: 1958
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> State of Wonder 9118135
As Dr. Marina Singh embarks upon an uncertain odyssey into the insect-infested Amazon, she will be forced to surrender herself to the lush but forbidding world that awaits within the jungle.

Charged with finding her former mentor Dr. Annick Swenson, a researcher who has disappeared while working on a valuable new drug, she will have to confront her own memories of tragedy and sacrifice as she journeys into the unforgiving heart of darkness.

Stirring and luminous, "State of Wonder" is a world unto itself, where unlikely beauty stands beside unimaginable loss beneath the rain forest's jeweled canopy.]]> 353 Ann Patchett 0062049801 Erin 5 goochland-library, overdrive
“� he assumed that by chewing bark, the women were, in essence, giving themselves a little bump. It was Annick who made the connection between the trees and extended fertility. Apparently, he never noticed that they kept getting pregnant.�

I’ve never believed the women of the world are entitled to leave everyone of their options. Open for a lifetime.

At the same time, I will give them a drug that will, if anything, undermine the health of women and make them a truly obscene fortune.

Perhaps instead of trying to reproduce themselves, these postmenopausal women who want to be mothers could adopt up some of the excess that will surely be available.

� was as if they had waited for him every day he had been gone, holding their burning sticks above their heads, pouring their souls up to heaven in a single voice of ululation until he came back.
]]> 3.88 2011 State of Wonder
author: Ann Patchett
name: Erin
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2024/08/23
date added: 2024/08/24
shelves: goochland-library, overdrive
review:
So he had been a cannibal once, if only another lifetime. In light of all that it happened, it was hardly worth mentioning.

“� he assumed that by chewing bark, the women were, in essence, giving themselves a little bump. It was Annick who made the connection between the trees and extended fertility. Apparently, he never noticed that they kept getting pregnant.�

I’ve never believed the women of the world are entitled to leave everyone of their options. Open for a lifetime.

At the same time, I will give them a drug that will, if anything, undermine the health of women and make them a truly obscene fortune.

Perhaps instead of trying to reproduce themselves, these postmenopausal women who want to be mothers could adopt up some of the excess that will surely be available.

� was as if they had waited for him every day he had been gone, holding their burning sticks above their heads, pouring their souls up to heaven in a single voice of ululation until he came back.

]]> <![CDATA[The Busy Body (Ghostwriter Mystery, #1)]]> 138378622
Her collaborator is impressed by Dorothy's work ethic and steel-trap mind, not to mention the stunning surroundings (and one particularly gorgeous bodyguard). But when a neighbor dies under suspicious circumstances, Dorothy is determined to find the killer in their midst. And when Dorothy Gibson asks if you want to team up for a top secret, possibly dangerous murder investigation, the only answer "Of course!"

The best ghostwriters are adept at asking questions and spinning stories . . . two talents, it turns out, that also come in handy for sleuths. Dorothy's political career, meanwhile, has made her an expert at recognizing lies and double-dealing. Working together, the two women are soon untangling motives and whittling down suspects, to the exasperation of local police. But this investigation-much like the election-may not unfold the way anyone expects.]]> 336 Kemper Donovan 1496744535 Erin 4
“mispronunciation being a common hazard Ming avid readers as opposed to avid talkers.� ]]> 3.45 2024 The Busy Body (Ghostwriter Mystery, #1)
author: Kemper Donovan
name: Erin
average rating: 3.45
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/22
date added: 2024/08/22
shelves:
review:
“I tell other people’s stories for a living.�

“mispronunciation being a common hazard Ming avid readers as opposed to avid talkers.�
]]> <![CDATA[Loose Lips (Ghostwriter Mystery, #2)]]> 211960944
The USA Today bestselling host of the "All About Agatha" podcast injects the spark and fizz of a Golden Age murder mystery into the present-day, as the ghostwriter’s skills are put to the test aboard a bestselling author’s decidedly insalubrious cruise.

Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. So goes the adage, but sometimes, even a first-rate ghostwriter and successful mystery author needs to make a buck. Even if that means setting foot on a cruise ship, something she vowed she’d never do. To top it off, the “Get Lit Cruise� is being organized by Payton Garrett, a very popular, bestselling author—and the ghostwriter’s long-time frenemy from back in their MFA days.

Over the years, Payton has reinvented herself. She gained a wife while ditching her journalist husband—who is also on board. And she’s acquired a rabid following who eagerly snapped up the invitations sent to a select few of her newsletter subscribers. The guests, all female, will receive personalized instruction from experts in five different writing genres, while basking in Payton’s reflected glow.

Between mentoring guests, flirting with Payton’s ex, and taking bets on how long before someone performs a reenactment of Titanic’s “I’m flying!� scene (answer: not long enough), there’s plenty to keep a ghostwriter occupied. But there’s one activity nobody expected: solving a murder.

When an attendee is found dead under suspicious circumstances and several others suffer symptoms of poisoning, there are numerous motives and suspects to choose from. But could it be that the victim wasn’t even the intended target? As the body count rises along with onboard tensions, no one is safe—except, perhaps, for a killer whose scruples have long abandoned ship. And of course, like every well-plotted mystery, this one has an extra twist . . .]]> 336 Kemper Donovan 1496744543 Erin 0 to-read 3.64 2025 Loose Lips (Ghostwriter Mystery, #2)
author: Kemper Donovan
name: Erin
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Princess of Las Vegas 90587135
Crissy Dowling has created a world that suits her perfectly. She passes her days by the pool in a private cabana, she splurges on ice cream but never gains an ounce, and each evening she transforms into a Princess, performing her musical cabaret inspired by the life of the late Diana Spencer. Some might find her strange or even delusional, an American speaking with a British accent, hair feathered into a style thirty years old, living and working in a casino that has become a dated trash heap. On top of that, Crissy’s daily diet of Adderall and Valium leaves her more than a little tipsy, her Senator boyfriend has gone back to his wife, and her entire career rests on resembling a dead woman. And yet, fans see her for the gifted chameleon she is, showering her with gifts, letters, and standing ovations night after night. But when Crissy’s sister, Betsy, arrives in town with a new boyfriend and a teenage daughter, and when Richie Morley, the owner of the Buckingham Palace Casino, is savagely murdered, Crissy’s carefully constructed kingdom comes crashing down all around her. A riveting tale of identity, obsession, fintech, and high-tech mobsters, The Princess of Las Vegas is an addictive, wildly original thriller from one of our most extraordinary storytellers.]]> 400 Chris Bohjalian 0385547587 Erin 3 3.39 2024 The Princess of Las Vegas
author: Chris Bohjalian
name: Erin
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/08/19
date added: 2024/08/19
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Things Don't Break on Their Own]]> 203019749 259 Sarah Easter Collins 0593798333 Erin 4 3.74 2024 Things Don't Break on Their Own
author: Sarah Easter Collins
name: Erin
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/08/19
shelves:
review:
“The match flares in the half-dark of our kitchen. �
]]> Summer Fridays 198137181 You've Got Mail for a new generation, set in the days of AOL and instant messenger banter,about a freshly engaged editorial assistant who winds up spending her "summerFridays" with the person she least expects

Summer 1999: Twentysomething Sawyer is striving to make it in New York. Between her assistant job in publishing, her secret dreams of becoming a writer, and her upcoming wedding to her college boyfriend, her is plate full. Only one problem: She is facing an incredibly lonely summer as her fiancé has been spending longer and longer hours at work . . . with an all-too-close female colleague, Kendra.

When Kendra’s boyfriend, Nick, invites Sawyer to meet up and compare notes about their suspicions, the meeting goes awry. She finds Nick cocky and cynical, and he finds her stuck in her own head. But then Nick seeks out Sawyer online to apologize, and a friendship develops.

Soon, Sawyer’s lonely summer takes an unexpected turn. She and Nick begin an unofficial ritual—exploring New York City together every summer Friday. From hot dogs on the Staten Island Ferry and Sea Breezes in a muggy East Village bar to swimming at Coney Island, Sawyer feels seen by Nick in a way that surprises her. He pushes her to be braver. To ask for what she wants. Meanwhile, Sawyer draws Nick out of his hard shell, revealing a surprisingly vulnerable side. They both begin living for their Friday afternoons together.

But what happens when the summer is over?]]> 432 Suzanne Rindell 0593473922 Erin 4 4.08 2024 Summer Fridays
author: Suzanne Rindell
name: Erin
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/18
date added: 2024/08/18
shelves:
review:
Enjoyed the insights into the publishing world and also how the emails/AOL chats make me think of all the epistolary novels I’ve loved.
]]> Burn 202102018 From the best-selling author of The Dog Stars, a novel about two men—friends since boyhood—who emerge from the woods of rural Maine to a dystopian country racked by bewildering violence

Every year, Jess and Storey have made an annual pilgrimage to the most remote corners of the country, where they camp, hunt, and hike, leaving much from their long friendship unspoken. Although the state of Maine has convulsed all summer with secession mania—a mania that has simultaneously spread across other states—Jess and Storey figure it’s a fight reserved for legislators or, worst-case scenario, folks in the capital.

But after weeks hunting off the grid, the men reach a small town and are shocked by what they find: a bridge blown apart, buildings burned to the ground, and bombed-out cars abandoned on the road. Trying to make sense of the sudden destruction all around them, they set their sights on finding their way home, dragging a wagon across bumpy dirt roads, scavenging from boats left in lakes, and dodging armed men—secessionists or U.S. military, they cannot tell—as they seek a path to safety. Then, a startling discovery drastically alters their path and the stakes of their escape.

Drenched in the beauty of the natural world and attuned to the specific cadences of male friendship, even here at the edge of doom, Burn is both a blistering warning about a divided country’s political strife and an ode to the salvation found in our chosen families.]]> 291 Peter Heller 0593801628 Erin 0 to-read 3.51 2024 Burn
author: Peter Heller
name: Erin
average rating: 3.51
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Same Bright Stars 199897974
Meanwhile, the DelDine group has been snapping up beloved eateries along this stretch of coast, and it is pursuing Jack with a very generous offer to take Schmidt’s off his hands. Jack craves companionship and maybe even a family. He wonders whether closing the door on the restaurant might open a window for him—but who would he be without Schmidt’s, and can he trust DelDine’s claims that it will continue to employ his staff and honor his family’s legacy?]]> 304 Ethan Joella 1668024616 Erin 3 3.99 2024 The Same Bright Stars
author: Ethan Joella
name: Erin
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/08/12
date added: 2024/08/12
shelves:
review:

]]> The Wedding People 177328214 A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
A Today Show #ReadwithJenna Book Club Pick

A propulsive and uncommonly wise novel about one unexpected wedding guest and the surprising people who help her start anew.

It’s a beautiful day in Newport, Rhode Island, when Phoebe Stone arrives at the grand Cornwall Inn wearing a green dress and gold heels, not a bag in sight, alone. She's immediately mistaken by everyone in the lobby for one of the wedding people, but she’s actually the only guest at the Cornwall who isn’t here for the big event. Phoebe is here because she’s dreamed of coming for years—she hoped to shuck oysters and take sunset sails with her husband, only now she’s here without him, at rock bottom, and determined to have one last decadent splurge on herself. Meanwhile, the bride has accounted for every detail and every possible disaster the weekend might yield except for, well, Phoebe and Phoebe's plan—which makes it that much more surprising when the two women can’t stop confiding in each other.

In turns absurdly funny and devastatingly tender, Alison Espach’s The Wedding People is ultimately an incredibly nuanced and resonant look at the winding paths we can take to places we never imagined—and the chance encounters it sometimes takes to reroute us.]]> 384 Alison Espach 1250899567 Erin 4 Page 240: for so long Phoebe could not imagine another possible future for herself
Page 350: she is energized by the thought of not knowing what she is even writing, of getting to decide it with every sentence.
Page 363: one of these days she’ll tell it as the beginning

Page 242: So she walks into the group, and they celebrate her arrival, clap and twirl around her. She feels silly at first, but they make it so easy. They are generous with their enthusiasm. ]]> 4.22 2024 The Wedding People
author: Alison Espach
name: Erin
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/08/11
date added: 2024/08/11
shelves:
review:
Page 181: she is suddenly curious about what she has not yet become
Page 240: for so long Phoebe could not imagine another possible future for herself
Page 350: she is energized by the thought of not knowing what she is even writing, of getting to decide it with every sentence.
Page 363: one of these days she’ll tell it as the beginning

Page 242: So she walks into the group, and they celebrate her arrival, clap and twirl around her. She feels silly at first, but they make it so easy. They are generous with their enthusiasm.
]]> <![CDATA[206 Bones (Temperance Brennan, #12)]]> 5957702 The #1 New York Times bestselling author and producer of the Fox television hit, Bones, returns with a spectacular new Tempe Brennan novel.

There are 206 bones in the human body. Forensic anthropologists know them intimately, can read in them stories of brief or long lives and use them to reconstruct every kind of violent end. 206 Bones opens with Tempe regaining consciousness and discovering that she is in some kind of very small, very dark, very cold enclosed space. She is bound, hands to feet. Who wants Tempe dead, or at least out of the way, and why? Tempe begins slowly to reconstruct...

Tempe and Lieutenant Ryan had accompanied the recently discovered remains of a missing heiress from Montreal to the Chicago morgue. Suddenly, Tempe was accused of mishandling the autopsy -- and the case. Someone made an incriminating phone call. Within hours, the one man with information about the call was dead. Back in Montreal, the corpse of a second elderly woman was found in the woods, and then a third.

Seamlessly weaving between Tempe's present-tense terror as she's held captive and her memory of the cases of these murdered women, Reichs conveys the incredible devastation that would occur if a forensic colleague sabotaged work in the lab. The chemistry between Tempe and Ryan intensifies as this complex, riveting tale unfolds. Reichs is writing at the top of her game.]]> 308 Kathy Reichs 0743294394 Erin 0 to-read, mystery 3.94 2009 206 Bones (Temperance Brennan, #12)
author: Kathy Reichs
name: Erin
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/08/07
shelves: to-read, mystery
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Beekeeper's Apprentice (Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes #1)]]> 8542759 The Twentieth-Anniversary Edition of the First Novel of the Acclaimed Mary Russell Series by Edgar Award–Winning Author Laurie R. King. An Agatha Award Best Novel Nominee � Named One of the Century's Best 100 Mysteries by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association In 1915, Sherlock Holmes is retired and quietly engaged in the study of honeybees in Sussex when a young woman literally stumbles onto him on the Sussex Downs. Fifteen years old, gawky, egotistical, and recently orphaned, the young Mary Russell displays an intellect to impress even Sherlock Holmes. Under his reluctant tutelage, this very modern, twentieth-century woman proves a deft protégée and a fitting partner for the Victorian detective. They are soon called to Wales to help Scotland Yard find the kidnapped daughter of an American senator, a case of international significance with clues that dip deep into Holmes's past. Full of brilliant deduction, disguises, and danger, The Beekeeper's Apprentice, the first book of the Mary Russell–Sherlock Holmes mysteries, is "remarkably beguiling" (The Boston Globe).]]> 369 Laurie R. King 1429936509 Erin 4 mystery, goochland-library
I've also added some Sherlock Holmes to my reading list, since I've (prepare yourself) never read even one.]]> 4.14 1994 The Beekeeper's Apprentice (Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes #1)
author: Laurie R. King
name: Erin
average rating: 4.14
book published: 1994
rating: 4
read at: 2010/11/01
date added: 2024/08/01
shelves: mystery, goochland-library
review:
Loved this book - thank you Kim! I'm a big fan of smart mysteries and powerful heroines. This book gave me all that plus an evolving partnership that brings out the best in Mary Russell (the apprentice) and Sherlock Holmes, now retired and studying bees in rural England. Just imagine how pleased I was when I learned this was the first in a series!

I've also added some Sherlock Holmes to my reading list, since I've (prepare yourself) never read even one.
]]> <![CDATA[The DallerGut Dream Department Store (DallerGut Dream Department Store, #1)]]> 199524153 What if there was a store that sold dreams? Which would you buy? And who might you become when you wake up?

In a mysterious town hidden in our collective subconscious there's a department store that sells dreams. Day and night, visitors both human and animal shuffle in to purchase their latest adventure. Each floor specializes in a specific type of dream: childhood memories, food dreams, ice skating, dreams of stardom. Flying dreams are almost always sold out. Some seek dreams of loved ones who have died.

For Penny, an enthusiastic new hire, working at Dallergut is the opportunity of a lifetime. As she uncovers the workings of this whimsical world, she bonds with a cast of unforgettable characters, including Dallergut, the flamboyant and wise owner, Babynap Rockabye, a famous dream designer, Maxim, a nightmare producer, and the many customers who dream to heal, dream to grow, and dream to flourish.

A captivating story that will leave a lingering magical feeling in readers' minds, this is the first book in a bestselling duology for anyone exhausted from the reality of their daily life.]]> 207 Lee Mi-ye 0369749359 Erin 3 3.74 2020 The DallerGut Dream Department Store (DallerGut Dream Department Store, #1)
author: Lee Mi-ye
name: Erin
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2024/07/31
date added: 2024/07/31
shelves:
review:

]]> One-Star Romance 201245798 A struggling writer is forced to walk down the aisle at her best friend’s wedding with the man who gave her book a very public one-star rating in this fresh romantic comedy from Laura Hankin.

Natalie and Rob couldn’t have less in common. Nat’s a messy artist, and Rob’s a rigid academic. The only thing they share is their devotion to their respective best friends—who just got engaged. Still, unexpected chemistry has Natalie cautiously optimistic about being maid of honor to Rob’s best man.

Until, minutes before the ceremony, Nat learns that Rob wrote a one-star review of her new novel, which has them both reeling: Nat from imposter syndrome, and Rob over the reason he needed to write it.

When the reception ends, these two opposites hope they’ll never meet again. But, as they slip from their twenties into their thirties, they’re forced together whenever their fast-track best friends celebrate another milestone. Through housewarmings and christenings, life-changing triumphs and failures, Natalie and Rob grapple with their own choices—and how your harshest critic can become your perfectly imperfect match.

After all, even the truest love stories sometimes need a bit of rewriting.]]> 400 Laura Hankin 0593438213 Erin 0 3.64 2024 One-Star Romance
author: Laura Hankin
name: Erin
average rating: 3.64
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/29
shelves: sampled-not-finished-abandoned
review:

]]> Not Another Love Song 201627074 Two string players fight their attraction for each other as they compete for center stage in this spicy and emotional romance.

Gwen Jackson and Xander Thorne are both musical prodigies, but each has had very different paths to success. Xander was born into classical music royalty, while Gwen had a natural ear for music that was nurtured by a kind shop owner.

After Gwen performs at his friend’s wedding, she’s mortified when she realizes Xander has no clue who she is—despite having worked together for a year at the Pops Orchestra. But she’s more furious that he arrogantly critiques her performance.

When Gwen is offered the role of First Chair of the orchestra, something Xander had secretly coveted for years, their existing hostility goes up a notch. But their respect for each other's music is undeniable, and their onstage chemistry off the scale. As they begin to explore their feelings for one another, suddenly they're box office dynamite and the fragile romance that's growing between them is in danger of being crushed beneath a publicity stunt...]]> 384 Julie Soto 1538740915 Erin 0 4.05 2024 Not Another Love Song
author: Julie Soto
name: Erin
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/07/29
shelves:
review:

]]> Honey 196600306 A coming-of-age story that follows the meteoric rise of singer Amber Young as she navigates fame in the late-1990s and early-2000s era of pop music superstardom

It is 1997, and Amber Young has received a life-changing call. It is a chance thousands of girls would die for: the opportunity to join girl group Cloud9 in Los Angeles and escape her small town. She quickly finds herself in the orbits of fellow rising stars Gwen Morris, a driven singer-dancer, and Wes Kingston, a member of the biggest boy band in the world, ETA.

As Amber embarks on her solo career and her fame intensifies, her rich interior life is frequently reduced. Surrounded by people who claim to love her but only wish to exploit her, and driven by a desire for recognition and success, for love and sex, for agency and connection, Amber comes of age at a time when the kaleidoscope of public opinion can distort everything and one mistake can shatter a career.

Isabel Banta’s debut novel redefines the narratives of some of the most famous pop icons of the 1990s and 2000s. It reimagines the superstars we idolized and hated, oversexualized and underestimated, and gives them the fresh, multifaceted story they deserve.]]> 315 Isabel Banta 1250333474 Erin 3 3.49 2024 Honey
author: Isabel Banta
name: Erin
average rating: 3.49
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/07/28
date added: 2024/07/28
shelves:
review:

]]> The Hunter (Cal Hooper, #2) 174156145
Cal Hooper took early retirement from Chicago PD and moved to rural Ireland looking for peace. He’s found it, more or he’s built a relationship with a local woman, Lena, and he’s gradually turning Trey Reddy from a half-feral teenager into a good kid going good places. But then Trey’s long-absent father reappears, bringing along an English millionaire and a scheme to find gold in the townland, and suddenly everything the three of them have been building is under threat. Cal and Lena are both ready to do whatever it takes to protect Trey, but Trey doesn’t want protecting. What she wants is revenge.

A nuanced, atmospheric tale that explores what we’ll do for our loved ones, what we’ll do for revenge, and what we sacrifice when the two collide.]]> 467 Tana French 0593493435 Erin 4 3.95 2024 The Hunter (Cal Hooper, #2)
author: Tana French
name: Erin
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/07/26
shelves:
review:

]]> Lies and Weddings 197146587 From the iconic internationally bestselling author of the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy: A forbidden affair erupts volcanically amid a decadent tropical wedding in this outrageous comedy of manners from the iconic author of Crazy Rich Asians.

Rufus Leung Gresham, future Earl of Greshambury and son of a former Hong Kong supermodel has a problem: the legendary Gresham Trust has been depleted by decades of profligate spending, and behind all the magazine covers and Instagram stories manors and yachts lies nothing more than a gargantuan mountain of debt. The only solution, put forth by Rufus’s scheming mother, is for Rufus to attend his sister’s wedding at a luxury eco-resort, a veritable who’s-who of sultans, barons, and oligarchs, and seduce a woman with money.

Should he marry Solène de Courcy, a French hotel heiress with honey blond tresses and a royal bloodline? Should he pursue Martha Dung, the tattooed venture capital genius who passes out billions like lollipops? Or should he follow his heart, betray his family, squander his legacy, and finally confess his love to the literal girl next door, the humble daughter of a doctor, Eden Tong? When a volcanic eruption burns through the nuptials and a hot mic exposes a secret tryst, the Gresham family plans—and their reputation—go up in flames.

Can the once-great dukedom rise from the ashes? Or will a secret tragedy, hidden for two decades, reveal a shocking twist?

In a globetrotting tale that takes us from the black sand beaches of Hawaii to the skies of Marrakech, from the glitzy bachelor pads of Los Angeles to the inner sanctums of England’s oldest family estates, Kevin Kwan unfurls a juicy, hilarious, sophisticated and thrillingly plotted story of love, money, murder, sex, and the lies we tell about them all.]]> 448 Kevin Kwan 0385546300 Erin 4 3.96 2024 Lies and Weddings
author: Kevin Kwan
name: Erin
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/20
date added: 2024/07/20
shelves:
review:

]]> The Blonde Identity 78816606 376 Ally Carter 0063276690 Erin 3 3.97 2023 The Blonde Identity
author: Ally Carter
name: Erin
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/07/11
date added: 2024/07/11
shelves:
review:

]]> 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 Erin 4 3.79 2024 The Midnight Feast
author: Lucy Foley
name: Erin
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/07
date added: 2024/07/07
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Cyclist's Guide to Crime & Croissants (Cyclist's Guide Mysteries Book 1)]]> 198669778 Vicariously tour the sundrenched Mediterranean Coast in this perfectly escapist new cozy mystery series starring American expat-turned-bike tour company owner in Southern France. Perfect for fans of Donna Leon’s The Commissario Guido Brunetti Mysteries, M.L. Longworth’s Provençal Mystery series, and armchair travel! Nine months ago, Sadie Greene shocked friends and family by ditching her sensible office job in the Chicago suburbs and buying a sight-unseen French bicycling tour company, Oui Cycle. Now she’s living the unconventional life of her dreams in the gorgeous village of Sans-Souci-sur-Mer. Sans souci means carefree, but Sadie feels enough pressure to burst a tire when hometown friends arrive for a tour, including her former boss, Dom Appleton. Sadie is determined to show them the wonders of France and cycling—and to prove she made the right move. She hopes her meticulously planned nine-day itinerary will win them over, with its stunning seascapes, delicious wine tastings, hilltop villages, and, of course, frequent stops for croissants. When Dom drags his heels on fun, Sadie vows he’ll enjoy if it kills her. That is, until Dom ends up dead. The tragedy was no accident. Someone went out of their way to bring a permanent end to Dom’s vacation. As more crimes—and murder—roll in, suspicions hover over Oui Cycle. To save her dream business, help her friends, and bring justice, Sadie launches her own investigation. However, mysteries mount with every turn. On an uphill battle for clues, can Sadie come to terms with her painful past while spinning closer to the truth—or will a twisted killer put the brakes on her for good?]]> 353 Ann Claire 1496745701 Erin 3 3.88 2024 A Cyclist's Guide to Crime & Croissants (Cyclist's Guide Mysteries Book 1)
author: Ann Claire
name: Erin
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/07/05
date added: 2024/07/05
shelves:
review:

]]> The Paris Novel 195430688
Stella reached for an oyster, tipped her head and tossed it back. It was cool and slippery, the flavor so briny it was like diving into the ocean... Oysters, she thought, where have they been all my life?

When her estranged mother dies, Stella is left with an unusual a one-way plane ticket and a note reading Go to Paris . But Stella is hardly cut out for adventure; a childhood trauma has kept her confined to the strict routines of her comfort zone. When her boss encourages her to take time off, Stella resigns herself to honoring her mother’s last wishes.

Alone in a foreign city, Stella falls into old habits, living cautiously and frugally. Then she stumbles across a vintage store where she tries on a fabulous Dior dress. The shopkeeper insists that this dress was meant for Stella and, for the first time in her life, Stella does something impulsive. She buys the dress and together they embark on an adventure.

Her first iconic brasserie Les Deux Magots, where Stella tastes her first oysters, and then meets an octogenarian art collector who decides to take her under his wing. As Jules introduces her to a veritable who’s who of the 1980s Paris literary, art, and culinary worlds, Stella begins to understand what it might mean to live a larger life.

As weeks—and many decadent meals—go by, Stella ends up living as a “tumbleweed� at famed bookstore Shakespeare & Company, uncovers a hundred-year-old mystery in a Manet painting, and discovers a passion for food that may be connected to her past. A feast for the senses, this novel is a testament to living deliciously, taking chances, and finding your true home.]]> 288 Ruth Reichl 0812996305 Erin 4 3.67 2024 The Paris Novel
author: Ruth Reichl
name: Erin
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/01
date added: 2024/07/01
shelves:
review:

]]> 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 Erin 5 4.25 2024 Husbands & Lovers
author: Beatriz Williams
name: Erin
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/30
date added: 2024/06/30
shelves:
review:

]]> The Rom-Commers 195790586 She’s rewriting his love story. But can she rewrite her own?

Emma Wheeler desperately longs to be a screenwriter. She’s spent her life studying, obsessing over, and writing romantic comedies―good ones! That win contests! But she’s also been the sole caretaker for her kind-hearted dad, who needs full-time care. Now, when she gets a chance to re-write a script for famous screenwriter Charlie Yates―The Charlie Yates! Her personal writing god!―it’s a break too big to pass up.

Emma’s younger sister steps in for caretaking duties, and Emma moves to L.A. for six weeks for the writing gig of a lifetime. But what is it they say? Don’t meet your heroes? Charlie Yates doesn’t want to write with anyone―much less “a failed, nobody screenwriter.� Worse, the romantic comedy he’s written is so terrible it might actually bring on the apocalypse. Plus! He doesn’t even care about the script―it’s just a means to get a different one green-lit. Oh, and he thinks love is an emotional Ponzi scheme.

But Emma’s not going down without a fight. She will stand up for herself, and for rom-coms, and for love itself. She will convince him that love stories matter―even if she has to kiss him senseless to do it. But . . . what if that kiss is accidentally amazing? What if real life turns out to be so much . . . more real than fiction? What if the love story they’re writing breaks all Emma’s rules―and comes true?]]> 336 Katherine Center 1250283809 Erin 5 4.05 2024 The Rom-Commers
author: Katherine Center
name: Erin
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/06/19
date added: 2024/06/19
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Just for the Summer (Part of Your World, #3)]]> 195820807
Emma hadn't planned that her next assignment as a traveling nurse would be in Minnesota, but she and her best friend agree that dating Justin is too good of an opportunity to pass up, especially when they get to rent an adorable cottage on a private island on Lake Minnetonka.

It's supposed to be a quick fling, just for the summer. But when Emma's toxic mother shows up and Justin has to assume guardianship of his three siblings, they're suddenly navigating a lot more than they expected--including catching real feelings for each other. What if this time Fate has actually brought the perfect pair together?]]> 432 Abby Jimenez 1538704439 Erin 0 4.35 2024 Just for the Summer (Part of Your World, #3)
author: Abby Jimenez
name: Erin
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/06/19
date added: 2024/06/19
shelves:
review:

]]> I Hope This Finds You Well 200987323 In this wildly funny and heartwarming office comedy, an admin worker accidentally gains access to her colleagues� private emails and DMs and decides to use this intel to save her job—a laugh-till-you-cry debut novel you’ll be eager to share with your entire list of contacts, perfect for fans of Anxious People and Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine.

As far as Jolene is concerned, her interactions with her colleagues should start and end with her official duties as an admin for Supershops, Inc. Unfortunately, her irritating, incompetent coworkers don’t seem to understand the importance of boundaries. Her secret to survival? She vents her grievances in petty email postscripts, then changes the text colour to white so no one can see. That is, until one of her secret messages is exposed. Her punishment: sensitivity training (led by the suspiciously friendly HR guy, Cliff) and rigorous email restrictions.

When an IT mix-up grants her access to her entire department’s private emails and DMs, Jolene knows she should report it, but who could resist reading what their coworkers are really saying? And when she discovers layoffs are coming, she realizes this might just be the key to saving her job. The plan is simple: gain her boss’s favour, convince HR she’s Supershops material and beat out the competition.

But as Jolene is drawn further into her coworker’s private worlds and secrets, her carefully constructed walls begin to crumble—especially around Cliff, who she definitely cannot have feelings for. Soon she will need to decide if she’s ready to leave the comfort of her cubicle, even if it means coming clean to her colleagues.

Crackling with laugh-out-loud dialogue and relatable observations, I Hope This Finds You Well is a fresh and surprisingly tender comedy about loneliness and love beyond our computer screens. This sparkling debut novel will open your heart to the everyday eccentricities of work culture and the undeniable human connection that comes with it.]]> 338 Natalie Sue 0063320363 Erin 4 3.74 2024 I Hope This Finds You Well
author: Natalie Sue
name: Erin
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/06/09
date added: 2024/06/09
shelves:
review:

]]> Funny Story 194802722 A shimmering, joyful new novel about a pair of opposites with the wrong thing in common, from #1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Henry.

Daphne always loved the way her fiancé, Peter, told their story. How they met (on a blustery day), fell in love (over an errant hat), and moved back to his lakeside hometown to begin their life together. He really was good at telling it... right up until the moment he realized he was actually in love with his childhood best friend Petra.

Which is how Daphne begins her new story: stranded in beautiful Waning Bay, Michigan, without friends or family but with a dream job as a children’s librarian (that barely pays the bills), and proposing to be roommates with the only person who could possibly understand her predicament: Petra’s ex, Miles Nowak.

Scruffy and chaotic—with a penchant for taking solace in the sounds of heart break love ballads—Miles is exactly the opposite of practical, buttoned-up Daphne, whose coworkers know so little about her they have a running bet that she’s either FBI or in witness protection. The roommates mainly avoid one another, until one day, while drowning their sorrows, they form a tenuous friendship and a plan. If said plan also involves posting deliberately misleading photos of their summer adventures together, well, who could blame them?

But it’s all just for show, of course, because there’s no way Daphne would actually start her new chapter by falling in love with her ex-fiancé’s new fiancée’s ex... right?]]> 400 Emily Henry Erin 4 4.21 2024 Funny Story
author: Emily Henry
name: Erin
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/27
date added: 2024/05/27
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[In the Woods (Dublin Murder Squad, #1)]]> 237209
Twenty years later, the found boy, Rob Ryan, is a detective on the Dublin Murder Squad and keeps his past a secret. But when a twelve-year-old girl is found murdered in the same woods, he and Detective Cassie Maddox—his partner and closest friend—find themselves investigating a case chillingly similar to the previous unsolved mystery. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him and that of his own shadowy past.]]> 429 Tana French 0670038601 Erin 3 own, nook-book 3.75 2007 In the Woods (Dublin Murder Squad, #1)
author: Tana French
name: Erin
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2007
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/21
date added: 2024/05/21
shelves: own, nook-book
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Framed Women of Ardemore House]]> 127975990 A sharp, savvy mystery about an autistic editor who inherits a crumbling English estate, only to find herself at the center of a murder investigation when a family portrait vanishes and a dead body turns up.

Jo Jones has always had a little trouble fitting in. As a neurodivergent, hyperlexic book editor and divorced New Yorker transplanted into the English countryside, Jo doesn’t know what stands out more: her Americanisms or her autism.

After losing her job, her mother, and her marriage all in one year, she couldn’t be happier to take possession of a possibly haunted (and clearly unwanted) family estate in North Yorkshire. But when the body of the moody town groundskeeper turns up on her rug with three bullets in his back, Jo finds herself in potential danger—and she’s also a potential suspect. At the same time, a peculiar family portrait vanishes from a secret room in the manor, bearing a strange connection to both the dead body and Jo’s mysterious family history.

With the aid of a Welsh antiques dealer, the morose local detective, and the Irish innkeeper’s wife, Jo embarks on a mission to clear herself of blame and find the missing painting, unearthing a slew of secrets about the town—and herself—along the way. And she’ll have to do it all before the killer strikes again…]]> 336 Brandy Schillace 1335014039 Erin 3 3.57 2024 The Framed Women of Ardemore House
author: Brandy Schillace
name: Erin
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/13
date added: 2024/05/13
shelves:
review:

]]> The Searcher 52661162
Then a local boy appeals to him for help. His brother is missing, and no one in the village, least of all the police, seems to care. And once again, Cal feels that restless itch.

Something is wrong in this community, and he must find out what, even if it brings trouble to his door.]]> 451 Tana French 073522465X Erin 4 3.70 2020 The Searcher
author: Tana French
name: Erin
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2020
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/04
date added: 2024/05/04
shelves:
review:

]]> Girls and Their Horses 62692859 Set in the glamorous, competitive world of showjumping, a novel about the girls who ride, their cutthroat mothers, and a suspicious death at a horse show

When the nouveau riche Parker family moves to an exclusive community in the heart of Southern California, they believe it’s their chance at a fresh start. Heather Parker is determined to give her daughters the life she never had—starting with horses.

She signs them up for riding lessons at Rancho Santa Fe Equestrian, where horses are a lifestyle. Heather becomes a “Barn Mom,� part of a group of wealthy women who hang at the stables, drink wine, and prepare their daughters for competition.

It’s not long before the Parker family is fully enmeshed in the horse world—from mean girl cliques to barn romance and dark secrets. With the end of summer horse show fast approaching, the pressure is on, and these mothers will stop at nothing to give their daughters everything they deserve.

Before the summer is over, lies will turn lethal, accidents will happen, and someone will end up dead.]]> 400 Eliza Jane Brazier 0593438884 Erin 0 to-read 3.68 2023 Girls and Their Horses
author: Eliza Jane Brazier
name: Erin
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/05/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Close to Death (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #5)]]> 142327669 From global bestselling Anthony Horowitz, a brilliantly entertaining new mystery in the Hawthorne and Horowitz series.

Richmond, London . Six attractive houses are tucked away in an exclusive and very upmarket gated Riverside Close. Surrounded by flowers and shrubbery, they're sealed off from the busy main road and the realities of urban life. At weekends, with the gate locked, the residents enjoy the sound of birdsong, the whirr of mowers, the occasional snatch of opera through an open window.

Everyone knows each other. Everyone gets on.

That is, until the Kenworthies arrive. With their four big gas-guzzling cars, their noisy children and their plans to build a swimming pool in their garden, they quickly offend every one of their neighbours.

When Charles Kenworthy is found dead on his porch, the bolt of a crossbow through his chest, Daniel Hawthorne is called in.

But how do you solve a murder when everyone has the same motive?]]> 411 Anthony Horowitz Erin 4 4.24 2024 Close to Death (Hawthorne & Horowitz, #5)
author: Anthony Horowitz
name: Erin
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/05/02
date added: 2024/05/02
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect (Ernest Cunningham, #2)]]> 167006698
The program is a who’s who of crime writing royalty:

the debut writer (me!)

the forensic science writer

the blockbuster writer

the legal thriller writer

the literary writer

the psychological suspense writer

But when one of us is murdered, the remaining authors quickly turn into five detectives. Together, we should know how to solve a crime.

Of course, we should also know how to commit one.

How can you find a killer when all the suspects know how to get away with murder?]]> 320 Benjamin Stevenson 006327907X Erin 3 3.81 2023 Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect (Ernest Cunningham, #2)
author: Benjamin Stevenson
name: Erin
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/05/01
date added: 2024/05/02
shelves:
review:

]]> Table for Two 195474144 From the bestselling author of The Lincoln Highway, A Gentleman in Moscow, and Rules of Civility, a richly detailed and sharply drawn collection of stories set in New York and Los Angeles. The millions of readers of Amor Towles are in for a treat as he shares some of his shorter six stories set in New York City and a novella in Los Angeles. The New York stories, most of which are set around the turn of the millennium, take up everything from the death-defying acrobatics of the male ego, to the fateful consequences of brief encounters, and the delicate mechanics of compromise which operate at the heart of modern marriages. In Towles’s novel, Rules of Civility, the indomitable Evelyn Ross leaves New York City in September, 1938, with the intention of returning home to Indiana. But as her train pulls into Chicago, where her parents are waiting, she instead extends her ticket to Los Angeles. Told from seven points of view, “Eve in Hollywood� describes how Eve crafts a new future for herself—and others—in the midst of Hollywood’s golden age. Throughout the stories, two characters often find themselves sitting across a table for two where the direction of their futures may hinge upon what they say to each other next. Written with his signature wit, humor, and sophistication, Table for Two is another glittering addition to Towles’s canon of stylish and transporting historical fiction.]]> 451 Amor Towles 0593296370 Erin 4 4.15 2024 Table for Two
author: Amor Towles
name: Erin
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at:
date added: 2024/04/14
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Ladies' Lunch: and Other Stories]]> 125078349
From the master of the short short comes a collection of 16 new stories featuring old friends who have loved and lunched together for over 40 years. These erudite, sharp-minded nonagenarians offer startling insights into friendship, family and aging.

Can the group organize a visit to one of their number in her new, and detested, assisted living situation? Is this a fabulous party with old friends, or a funeral reception? And does who was sleeping with whom, way back when, still matter?

In story after story, Segal's voice is always hilarious and urbane, heartbreaking and profound, keen and utterly unsentimental, as she tackles aging's affronts.]]> 131 Lore Segal 1685891012 Erin 0 to-read 3.22 2017 Ladies' Lunch: and Other Stories
author: Lore Segal
name: Erin
average rating: 3.22
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/04/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Baby X 173476065 When any biological matter can be used to create life, stolen celebrity DNA sells to the highest bidder—or the craziest stalker—in this propulsive thriller.

With a vivid imagining of the future, _Gattaca _meets Black Mirror in Kira Peikoff’s Baby X.

In the near-future United States, where advanced technology can create eggs or sperm from any person’s cells, celebrities face the alarming potential of meeting biological children they never conceived. Famous singer Trace Thorne is tired of being targeted by the Vault, a black market site devoted to stealing DNA. Sick of paying ransom money for his own cell matter, he hires bio-security guard Ember Ryan to ensure his biological safety.

Ember will do anything she can to protect her clients. She knows all the Vault’s tricks—discarded tissues, used straws, lipstick tubes—and has prevented countless DNA thefts. Working for Thorne, her focus becomes split when she begins to fall for him, but she knows she hasn’t let anything slip—love or not, his DNA is safe. But then she and Thorne are confronted by a pregnant woman, Quinn, who claims that Thorne is the father of her baby, and all bets are off.

Brilliantly plotted and terrifyingly prescient, Baby X is an unpredictable and relentless speculative thriller perfect for fans of Blake Crouch and John Marrs.]]> 326 Kira Peikoff 1639106332 Erin 3 3.82 2024 Baby X
author: Kira Peikoff
name: Erin
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/03/31
date added: 2024/03/31
shelves:
review:

]]> No Two Persons 60196684 One book. Nine readers. Ten changed lives. New York Times bestselling author Erica Bauermeister’s No Two Persons is “a gloriously original celebration of fiction, and the ways it deepens our lives.�

That was the beauty of books, wasn’t it? They took you places you didn’t know you needed to go�

Alice has always wanted to be a writer. Her talent is innate, but her stories remain safe and detached, until a devastating event breaks her heart open, and she creates a stunning debut novel. Her words, in turn, find their way to readers, from a teenager hiding her homelessness, to a free diver pushing himself beyond endurance, an artist furious at the world around her, a bookseller in search of love, a widower rent by grief. Each one is drawn into Alice’s novel; each one discovers something different that alters their perspective, and presents new pathways forward for their lives.

Together, their stories reveal how books can affect us in the most beautiful and unexpected of ways—and how we are all more closely connected to one another than we might think.]]> 314 Erica Bauermeister 1250284376 Erin 5 4.02 2023 No Two Persons
author: Erica Bauermeister
name: Erin
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/03/30
date added: 2024/03/30
shelves:
review:

]]> 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 Erin 4 3.97 2024 First Lie Wins
author: Ashley Elston
name: Erin
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/03/24
date added: 2024/03/24
shelves:
review:

]]> Annie Bot 156023123
She’s learning, too.

Doug says he loves that Annie’s artificial intelligence makes her seem more like a real woman, but the more human Annie becomes, the less perfectly she behaves. As Annie's relationship with Doug grows more intricate and difficult, she starts to wonder whether Doug truly desires what he says he does. In such an impossible paradox, what does Annie owe herself?]]> 231 Sierra Greer 0063312697 Erin 0 3.81 2024 Annie Bot
author: Sierra Greer
name: Erin
average rating: 3.81
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/10
date added: 2024/03/17
shelves:
review:

]]> Listen for the Lie 127279000 What if you thought you murdered your best friend? And if everyone else thought so too? And what if the truth doesn't matter?

Lucy and Savvy were the golden girls of their small Texas town: pretty, smart, and enviable. Lucy married a dream guy with a big ring and an even bigger new home. Savvy was the social butterfly loved by all and, if you believe the rumors, especially popular with the men in town. But after Lucy is found wandering the streets, covered in her best friend Savvy’s blood, everyone thinks she is a murderer.

It’s been years since that horrible night, a night Lucy can’t remember anything about, and she has since moved to LA and started a new life. But now the phenomenally huge hit true crime podcast Listen for the Lie and its too-good looking host, Ben Owens, have decided to investigate Savvy’s murder for the show’s second season. Lucy is forced to return to the place she vowed never to set foot in again to solve her friend’s murder, even if she is the one who did it.

The truth is out there, if we just listen.]]> 352 Amy Tintera 1250880319 Erin 4 4.06 2024 Listen for the Lie
author: Amy Tintera
name: Erin
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/03/17
date added: 2024/03/17
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Love in Color: Mythical Tales from Around the World, Retold]]> 54698746
A young businesswoman attempts a great leap in her company, and an even greater one in her love life.

A powerful Ghanaian spokeswoman is forced to decide whether she should uphold her family’s politics or be true to her heart.

In her debut collection, internationally acclaimed writer Bolu Babalola retells the most beautiful love stories from history and mythology with incredible new detail and vivacity. Focusing on the magical folktales of West Africa, Babalola also reimagines Greek myths, ancient legends from the Middle East, and stories from long-erased places.

With an eye towards decolonizing tropes inherent in our favorite tales of love, Babalola has created captivating stories that traverse across perspectives, continents, and genres.]]> 290 Bolu Babalola 006307849X Erin 0 to-read 4.00 2020 Love in Color: Mythical Tales from Around the World, Retold
author: Bolu Babalola
name: Erin
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Portrait of a Lady 398121 594 Henry James 0375759190 Erin 0 to-read, w-andre 3.77 1881 The Portrait of a Lady
author: Henry James
name: Erin
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1881
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/11
shelves: to-read, w-andre
review:

]]> Dune Messiah (Dune #2) 44492285
Dune Messiah continues the story of Paul Atreides, better known--and feared--as the man christened Muad'Dib. As Emperor of the Known Universe, he possesses more power than a single man was ever meant to wield. Worshipped as a religious icon by the fanatical Fremens, Paul faces the enmity of the political houses he displaced when he assumed the throne--and a conspiracy conducted within his own sphere of influence.

And even as House Atreides begins to crumble around him from the machinations of his enemies, the true threat to Paul comes to his lover, Chani, and the unborn heir to his family's dynasty...

Includes an introduction by Brian Herbert]]> 336 Frank Herbert 0593098234 Erin 0 to-read 3.89 1969 Dune Messiah (Dune #2)
author: Frank Herbert
name: Erin
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Last List of Mabel Beaumont]]> 148516779 The list he left had just one item on it. Or, at least, it did at first�

Mabel Beaumont’s husband Arthur loved lists. He’d leave them for her everywhere. ‘Remember: eggs, butter, sugar�. ‘I love you: today, tomorrow, always�.

But now Arthur is gone. He died: softly, gently, not making a fuss. But he’s still left her a list. This one has just one item on it though: ‘Find D�.

Mabel feels sure she knows what it means. She must track down her best friend Dot, who she hasn’t seen since the fateful day she left more than sixty years ago.

It seems impossible. She doesn’t even know if Dot’s still alive. Also, every person Mabel talks to seems to need help first, with missing husbands, daughters, parents. Mabel finds her list is just getting longer, and she’s still no closer to finding Dot.

What she doesn’t know is that her list isn’t just about finding her old friend. And that if she can admit the secrets of the past, maybe she could even find happiness again�

A completely heartbreaking, beautiful, uplifting story, guaranteed to make you smile but also make you cry. Perfect for fans of My Name is Ove, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, and The Keeper of Stories.]]> 314 Laura Pearson 1785136054 Erin 0 4.03 2023 The Last List of Mabel Beaumont
author: Laura Pearson
name: Erin
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at: 2024/03/03
date added: 2024/03/03
shelves:
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Walk into a Room: The Art of Knowing When to Stay and When to Walk Away]]> 177317676 New York TimesBestseller

If life were a house, then every room holds a story. What do we do when a room we’re in is no longer a room where we belong?

What do you do when you start to feel a shift and must decide if it’s time to make a change? When it comes to navigating big decisions about when to stay and go, how can we know for sure when the time is right? Though we enter and exit many rooms over the course of our life—jobs, relationships, communities, life stages—knowing how and when it’s time to leave is a decision that rarely has a clear answer.

Podcast host, spiritual director, and bestselling author of The Next Right Thing, Emily P. Freeman offers guidance to help us recognize when it’s time to move on from situations that no longer fit, allowing us to find new spaces where we can flourish and grow.

How to Walk Into a Room helps us begin to uncover the silent, nuanced, and hidden arrows for anyone asking questions How do I know if it’s time to move on? What if I stay and nothing changes? What if I leave and everything falls apart?

Through thought-provoking questions,spiritual practices, and personal stories, How to Walk into a Roomwill help you to know and name the caution flags in your current spaces, discern the difference between true peace and discomfort avoidance, navigate endings even when there is no closure, find peacefor when you feel ready but it isn’t time,and courage for when it’s time but you don’t feel ready.

For anyone standing in a threshold, here’s a book to help discern the how, when, and what now of walking out of rooms and into new ones with peace, confidence, and a whole heart.]]> 232 Emily P. Freeman 0063328844 Erin 0 to-read 3.91 How to Walk into a Room: The Art of Knowing When to Stay and When to Walk Away
author: Emily P. Freeman
name: Erin
average rating: 3.91
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Floating Hotel 195177497 This cozy debut science fiction novel tells a story of misfits, rebels, found family—and a mystery that spans the stars.

Welcome to the Grand Abeona Hotel: home of the finest food, the sweetest service, and the very best views the galaxy has to offer. All year round it moves from planet to planet, system to system, pampering guests across the furthest reaches of the milky way. The last word in sub-orbital luxury—and an absolute magnet for intrigue. Intrigues such as: Why are there love poems in the lobby inbox? How many Imperial spies are currently on board? What is the true purpose of the Problem Solver's conference? And perhaps most pertinently�who is driving the ship?

Each guest has a secret, every member of staff a universe unto themselves. At the center of these interweaving lives and interlocking mysteries stands Carl, one time stowaway, longtime manager, devoted caretaker to the hotel. It's the love of his life and the only place he's ever called home. But as forces beyond Carl's comprehension converge on the Abeona, he has to face one final question: when is it time to let go?]]> 324 Grace Curtis 075641931X Erin 0 to-read 3.65 2024 Floating Hotel
author: Grace Curtis
name: Erin
average rating: 3.65
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/03/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]>