On Tour: The New Ever After by Julie Farley
Julie will be on tour April 7-14 with her novel The New Ever After The sequel to Tripped Up Love is here! After becoming a widow…
In My Mailbox: Week of March 31
Title: Unwell
Author: Marie Chow
Received: CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: She’s married to a wonderful man, pregnant with a healthy child, and knows there’s so much she should be thankful for, and yet–
She’s not ready for motherhood.
She’s not ready to be a wife.
She’s not ready for the realities that have trapped her.
To pass the time, fill the void, and in hopes that someone may eventually understand, she begins a letter to her unborn daughter. In it she tells, unflinchingly, her life story that bring her to this moment. She explains what she hasn’t told anyone else: not only who she is, but who she isn’t.
Title: On Grace
Author: Susie Orman Schnall
Received: Spark Points Studio
Synopsis: Meet Grace, who is actually excited about turning 40 in a few months, that is, until her job, marriage, and personal life take a dizzying downhill spiral. Can she recover from the most devastating time in her life, right before it’s supposed to be one of the best? Fans of Emily Giffin will love Susie Orman Schnall’s debut, which is all about rediscovering yourself–with grace–well after you think it’s even possible anymore. On Grace deals with themes such as divorce, infidelity, re-entering the workforce after children, breast cancer, and of course, turning 40. This novel is sure to hit a chord with many women readers.
Title: In the Mirror
Author: Kaira Rouda
Received: Kaira Rouda
Synopsis: What choices would you make if you knew you may die soon?
From the multi award-winning, best-selling author of four books, including Here, Home, Hope, a gripping and heart wrenching novel about a young mother who has it all. The only problem is she may be dying.
In her previous works including All the Difference, Rouda’s characters “sparkle with humor and heart,” and the stories are “told with honest insight and humor” (Booklist). “Inspirational and engaging” (ForeWord), these are the novels you’ll turn to for strong female characters and an “engaging read” (Kirkus).
In the Mirror is the story of Jennifer Benson, a woman who seems to have it all. Diagnosed with cancer, she enters an experimental treatment facility to tackle her disease the same way she tackled her life – head on. But while she’s busy fighting for a cure, running her business, planning a party, staying connected with her kids, and trying to keep her sanity, she ignores her own intuition and warnings from others and reignites an old relationship best left behind.
If you knew you might die, what choices would you make? How would it affect your marriage? How would you live each day? And how would you say no to the one who got away?
Title: Here For the Cake
Author: Emily Poule
Received: Emily Poule
Synopsis: “Something should happen: a thunderbolt should erupt, a car should crash, a bell should ring. There should be a soundtrack—some horrible, frightening sound to accompany the news of your ex-boyfriend marrying one of your best friends from high school. Especially when you’re still in love with him.”
No, of course she wasn’t going. Are you insane? For 29-year-old academic Mina Joseph, going to Ella Hutchinson’s destination wedding would be the ultimate act of lunacy. It would be much safer to stay in her shitty studio in Boston so she could stalk the Facebook pages of the bride, groom, and every other guest in attendance before falling asleep in a box of tears and Wheat Thins.
But Luke’s best man, the insufferably charming Benjamin Fogarty, has different plans for Mina. Not only is Ben desperate to break up the mismatched couple before they say their “I do’s,” he is convinced that Luke is still in love with Mina (though he can’t figure out why). So, Ben offers Mina $2400 and a plane ticket to come out of hiding and seduce the groom.
Armed with a new wardrobe, devious friends, and copious amounts of tequila, Mina has five days to rekindle her love with Luke, expose Ella for the certifiable psychopath that she is, and at all costs, avoid having sex with the best man, regardless of how hot it could be.
Title: The Art of Floating
Author: Kristin Bair O’Keeffe
Received: Penguin
Synopsis: At a time when nothing seems real,
it takes something truly unusual to put your life into focus.
When her beloved husband Jackson disappeared without a trace, popular novelist Sia Dane stopped writing, closed down her house, stuffed her heart into a cage, and started floating. It wasn’t the normal response to heartache, but Sia rarely did things the normal way.
Exactly one year, one month, and six days after Jackson’s disappearance, Sia discovers a mysterious man on the beach. He’s mute, unresponsive, and looks as if he has just walked out of the sea. It’s the sort of situation Jackson would have solved with a simple call to the police. But Jackson is gone.
As unreal as he seems, Sia is determined to help this man. Perhaps she can return him to his place in the world—to whoever lost him and loves him. Perhaps she can answer their questions the way no one could answer hers.
But as her friends and family help her winnow her way to the truth, Sia comes to realize that the unfathomable leap between sorrow and healing begins with a single step.
Title: No One Could Have Guessed the Weather
Author: Anne-Marie Casey
Received: Penguin
Synopsis: Sometimes what you want in your twenties isn’t what you want or need in your forties. . . .
When Lucy Lovett’s husband loses his job, she is forced to give up her posh life in London and move their family to a tiny apartment in Manhattan, where her husband has managed to secure a lowly position. Lucy finds herself living in the center of cool and hip. Across from their apartment is a trendy bar called PDT—whenever Lucy passes by, she thinks, Please Don’t Tell anyone I’m a middle-aged woman.
Homesick and resentful at first, Lucy soon embarks on the love affair of her life—no, not with her husband (though they’re both immensely relieved to discover they do love each other for richer or poorer), but with New York City and the three women who befriend her.
There’s Julia, who is basically branded with a Scarlet A when she leaves her husband and kids for a mini nervous breakdown and a room of her own; Christy, a much older man’s trophy wife, who is a bit adrift as only those who live high up in penthouses can be; and disheveled and harried Robyn, constantly compensating for her husband, who can’t seem to make the transition from wunderkind to adult.
Spot-on observant, laugh-out-loud funny, yet laced with kindness through and through, No One Could Have Guessed the Weather is a story of what happens when you grow up and realize the middle part of your story might just be your beginning.
CLP Blog Tours Sign Up: Chez Stinky by Susan C. …
Kat Stevens is a slightly insecure, mostly bored technical writer who likes her cat a lot more than her boss. She hasn’t laid eyes on her great aunt Abigail since she was eight, so she’s stumped when she inherits Abigail’s house in the small hamlet of Alpine Grove.
Kat’s uncomplicated life gets decidedly less so when she discovers the inheritance comes with some hairy conditions: four dogs and five cats that her aunt wanted her to love as her own. Of course, the house smells like a barn–with a touch of antique skunk–and, naturally, has serious roof issues. And that’s before the three-legged cat gets stuck in the wall and the shower goes kablooey.
When Kat meets Joel, an unemployed techie type with no love lost for his sister, Kat looks past his obvious flaws, given his timely and desirable skill set: a talent for fixing things (and his own tools).
Despite out-of-control dogs, cat fights, dust dinosaurs, massive spiders and an old grizzled hippie passed out in the yard, Kat discovers the tranquility of the forests of Alpine Grove starting to seep into her soul.
And why she can’t she stop thinking about Joel?
CLP Blog Tours Novel Spotlight: Becoming Mrs. Walsh by Jessica …
Jessica Gordon is now on tour with CLP Blog Tours and Becoming Mrs. Walsh Summary: Shoshana Thompson is 26 years old, miles from home, and engaged to…
On Tour: Dangled Carat by Hilary Grossman
Hilary will be on tour March 31-April 28 with her chick lit novel Dangled Carat Hilary had gotten used to dating the commitment-phobic Marc, thirteen…
Book Review: To Catch a Creeper by Ellie Campbell
To Catch a Creeper by Ellie Campbell is the sequel to Looking for La La. Most of the crazy gang from the original story are back. Cathy, after being applauded for the Looking For La La campaign, is now an account executive at a London advertising firm. She’s trying to get her footing as a career woman, while also juggling the care of her family and household. To add to her complications, she’s also agreed to find the “Creeper”/burglar who’s terrorizing the neighborhood. Throw in a pregnant best friend, a depressed and out of work husband, difficult neighbors and a couple of transvestites and you’ve got yourself a unique mystery. Fasten your seatbelts.
This is the third Ellie Campbell book I’ve read in the last year and the author is consistent with her writing style. The book has very interesting characters who at first don’t seem real, yet by the end of the story, you actually begin to relate to them. The plot is very convoluted, but again, at the end of the story, everything falls into place. The dialogue is sharp and witty. All the elements of a good book are there, so I’m not sure why this one didn’t resonate with me like the others. In the first book, Cathy stumbled into the mystery and had a personal stake in the outcome – but this time around, a friend asked Cathy to investigate. Then it seemed as if everyone was involved and although entertaining, it required quite a bit of suspended belief. That said, it’s a fun ride and I do recommend the book to readers who enjoy British humor, zany people and a good mystery.
4 Stars
In My Mailbox: Week of March 24
Title: Precious Words
Author: Leigh Fleming
Received: CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: Emberly Fallon is a smart, beautiful American attorney who goes on a dream vacation with her two best friends to the UK, where she meets the irresistible Niccolo Bartoli, an Italian tennis pro who is just as commanding off the court as he is on.
Emberly resists his advances, not wanting anything to do with paparazzi and Nico’s rabid fans.
Currently ranked number two in the world, Nico finds himself struggling with his game and his personal life. Although always surrounded by his entourage, he is lonely in his world of celebrity and constant travel. Emberly makes him feel grounded, and despite her best intentions, she does fall in love with the dashing, foreign sportsman.
Their romantic adventures take them to Miami, New York, and Rome. This whirlwind love story was not in Emberly’s future plans, but she allows herself to be happy with Nico—until she becomes the victim of threats. Someone is trying to bring Nico’s success and newfound happiness to a tragic end … and that person is much closer than they suspect.
Title: Diamonds in the Sky
Author: MA Harper
Received: CLP Blog Tours
Synopsis: DIAMONDS, LOVE, AND UFOS…
When struggling artist/shoe clerk Caddy Keyhoe stumbles across what may be a lost and untraceable diamond, her first reaction is down-to-earth: Maybe I can sell it. But how odd to be finding it in the gutter now, after last night’s dream of a UFO scattering bright gemstones. Research via Google leads her to the website of melancholy Alec Rix, semi-failed writer and newly-minted UFO authority—courtesy of his published interview with octogenarian Hatchell T. Beckham Sr., retired from farming and strangely eager to discredit the new crop circle on the Beckham property. The crop circle perpetrated by a neighborhood hoaxer. Or by those blazing diamond-shaped UFOs that just about everybody in Hopkins, South Carolina—except old Hatch—claims to have seen…?
As Caddy’s art career takes a magical turn for the stratosphere, Alec’s friendship with Hatch deepens through the old farmer’s tale of his long-lost family. Could there be a book in this? the blocked author has to wonder. But when pursuit of the story sends him blundering into radiant Caddy on the biggest night of her life, priorities immediately change. Because what can it really mean, to “follow a star”? And what does Hawaii have to do with it?
A feet-on-the-ground story with its head in the clouds, Diamonds In The Sky reports from the Unknown with quiet wit, endearing characters, and the speculation that love just might be forever—even if not all diamonds are.
Title: Keep Quiet
Author: Lisa Scottoline
Received: SHPNY
Synopsis: New York Times bestselling and Edgar Award winning author Lisa Scottoline is loved by millions of readers for her suspenseful novels about family and justice. Scottoline delivers once again withKeep Quiet, an emotionally gripping and complex story about one man’s split-second decision to protect his son – and the devastating consequences that follow.Jake Buckman’s relationship with his sixteen-year-old son Ryan is not an easy one, so at the urging of his loving wife, Pam, Jake goes alone to pick up Ryan at their suburban movie theater. On the way home, Ryan asks to drive on a deserted road, and Jake sees it as a chance to make a connection. However, what starts as a father-son bonding opportunity instantly turns into a nightmare. Tragedy strikes, and with Ryan’s entire future hanging in the balance, Jake is forced to make a split-second decision that plunges them both into a world of guilt and lies. Without ever meaning to, Jake and Ryan find themselves living under the crushing weight of their secret, which treatens to tear their family to shreds and ruin them all. Powerful and dramatic, Keep Quiet will have readers and book clubs debating what it means to be a parent and how far you can, and should, go to protect those you love.
Title: Confessions of a Paris Party Girl
Author: Vicki Lesage
Received: Vicki Lesage
Synopsis: Drinking too much bubbly. Meeting sappy Frenchmen who have girlfriends or are creeps or both. Encountering problème after problème with French bureaucracy. When newly-single party girl Vicki moved to Paris, she was hoping to taste wine, stuff her face with croissants, and maybe fall in love.
In her first book, this long-time blogger and semi-professional drinker recounts the ups and downs of her life in Paris. Full of sass, shamefully honest admissions, and situations that seem too absurd to be true, Vicki makes you feel as if you’re stumbling along the cobblestones with her.
Will she find love? Will she learn to consume reasonable amounts of alcohol? Will the French administration ever cut her a break?
Title: Second Hand Jane
Author: Michelle Vernal
Received: Michelle Vernal
Synopsis: When footloose and fancy-free Jessica, a thirty-something writer, decides to follow her journalistic instincts and trace the story of a young girl for her weekly column in a Dublin newspaper, she unwittingly embarks on a journey into Northern Ireland’s tragic past.
With her love of all things vintage, Jessica Jane Baré is known as Second-hand Jane to her friends. Hailing from New Zealand, these days she’s finding the grass is greener in Dublin and not just because of all the rain. In fact, life would be sweet if it weren’t for the reason she left home in the first place–her meddling mother. Marian views Jess’s life in Dublin as nothing more than a stop-gap until she meets Mr Right and he’s taking his time. Things look set to change, however, when Jess meets the delectable Nick, who ticks all of Marian’s boxes.
In the meantime, Jess’s latest second-hand collectible–a children’s book—gives her an idea for her column. Deciding to track down the girl whose name is scribbled inside the cover of that book, she uncovers more than she ever expected. “Amy was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” the girl’s taciturn brother, Owen, informs her. Intrigued, Jess travels to the family pig farm in County Down and listens to Amy’s poignant tale unfold through Owen. With a little help from a rather cute runt of the litter she names Wilbur, Jess is about to help put the past to rest and learn that appearances can be deceptive.
Then Marian announces she is coming to Dublin to sort her daughter’s increasingly tangled love life out and Jess’s chance of a happy ending like those in the story books she collects looks about as likely as Wilbur flying.
Title: Bridal Bootcamp
Author: Bella Bailey
Received: Bella Bailey
Synopsis: Bridal Bootcamp is a contemporary romantic comedy set in Dublin, Ireland. When Yvonne’s boyfriend Simon accepts her marriage proposal, she resolves to give her family and friends the best wedding imaginable! And if the little matter of money gets in the way…well, she’ll worry about that later.
Besides, it’s not as if she has nothing else to fret about – Simon’s twin sister Tracey is hell-bent on finding a way to stop the wedding. When Simon’s ex, Sandra, returns from the past and reveals that Simon is the father of her baby, it looks like Tracey might get her wish – especially as Sandra is demanding a kidney from Simon for their gravely ill child.
And that’s the easy part….what Yvonne doesn’t know is that her best friend, Rachel, is harbouring a deadly secret that has the potential to obliterate Yvonne’s relationship with Simon forever…..a secret that comes to light in a dramatic crescendo on their big day in front of everyone they know.
The power of this young couple’s love is put to the test again and again, and they embark on a journey of discovery about their relationship. The issues they face force them to evaluate what’s really important to them – their wedding, or their impending marriage.
Spring Giveaway with Chick Lit Plus and Toploft Clothing
Spring is here, and we want to celebrate! Chick Lit Plus is teaming up with Toploft Clothing, a new online clothing boutique, to bring you…
Book Review: The Au Pair by Janey Fraser
I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
Summary:
Apparently anyone can set up an au pair agency around their kitchen table. So when money gets tight, Jilly does exactly that. But she hadn’t reckoned on Marie-France, a sparky French girl, signing up in the hope of finding her father, twenty years after her own mother had been an au pair in the same town. Then there’s Matthew, a confused widower whose daughter has driven away a string of au pairs. Can Jilly ever find him the perfect match? And let’s not forget the rest of the au pair mafia, including Heidi, Fatima, and Antoinette, who “likes children but not very much.” The Au Pair is an hilarious but truthful romp through the world of au pairs and their unsuspecting families.
Review:
This book was pretty standard British chick lit for me- a lot to read with several characters. There were many aspects that I found interesting – particularly Marie-France and her quest for her father, and Matthew’s story with his daughter. If the book would have been just a touch shorter and maybe cut out about three characters and their sub-plots, I think my attention could have been held much better. But I found myself starting to flip through the pages quickly just to find the resolution. If you’re a fan of British chick lit I think you’ll like this one, just not totally my cup of tea.
3 stars
