Getting Played ~ Review

Title: Getting Played

Series: Getting Some #2

Author: Emma Chase

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Release Date: October 8, 2019

Publisher: Indi / Audible Studios

Pages: 292

Blurb:

Dean Walker is all about keeping life simple. He’s effortlessly talented and intelligent—spending his summers playing drums in the local band and the rest of the year teaching high school in the same Jersey town where he grew up. He likes his love life simple too, enjoying the commitment-free hook-ups his good looks and sexy charm have always made oh so easy.

Then he meets Lainey Burrows. And his simple, easy life gets turned upside down.

One wild one-night stand was all it was ever supposed to be, so Lainey is shocked when she discovers that her sizzling summer fling is also her son’s new math teacher. But that’s nothing compared to the most unexpected twist of all—their hot hook-up left Lainey knocked up, and now they’re about to become parents. Together.

What ensues is an addictive, insatiable, sweet and tender romance that won’t be simple, but it will be more than worth the fight.

Return to the Big Valley ~ Review

Title: Return to the Big Valley (Wilma’s Wish, Martha’s Miracle, and Alma’s Acceptance)

Series: N/A

Author: Wanda Brunstetter, Jean Brunstetter, and Richelle Brunstetter

Genre: Amish Romance/Christian

Release Date: June 1, 2021

Publisher: Barbour Fiction

Pages: 448

Blurb:

Truly Devious ~ Review

Title: Truly Devious

Series: Truly Devious #1

Author: Maureen Johnson

Genre: YA Mystery

Release Date: January 16, 2018

Publisher: HarperCollins

Pages: 416

Blurb:

Ellingham Academy is a famous private school in Vermont for the brightest thinkers, inventors, and artists. It was founded by Albert Ellingham, an early twentieth century tycoon, who wanted to make a wonderful place full of riddles, twisting pathways, and gardens. “A place,” he said, “where learning is a game.”

Shortly after the school opened, his wife and daughter were kidnapped. The only real clue was a mocking riddle listing methods of murder, signed with the frightening pseudonym “Truly, Devious.” It became one of the great unsolved crimes of American history.

True-crime aficionado Stevie Bell is set to begin her first year at Ellingham Academy, and she has an ambitious plan: She will solve this cold case. That is, she will solve the case when she gets a grip on her demanding new school life and her housemates: the inventor, the novelist, the actor, the artist, and the jokester. But something strange is happening. Truly Devious makes a surprise return, and death revisits Ellingham Academy. The past has crawled out of its grave. Someone has gotten away with murder. 

The two interwoven mysteries of this first book in the Truly Devious series dovetail brilliantly, and Stevie Bell will continue her relentless quest for the murderers in books two and three.

Heidi’s Guide to Four Letter Words ~ Review

Title: Heidi’s Guide to Four Letter Words

Series: N/A

Author: Tara Sivec & Andi Arndt

Genre: Chick Lit/ Contemporary Romance

Release Date: September 3, 2019

Publisher: Indie

Pages: 197

Blurb:

Cowritten by USA Today best-selling author Tara Sivec and award-winning narrator Andi Arndt, a hysterically funny, heartfelt romance about starting over and taking chances.

Nothing good ever comes from drinking a box of wine alone. So when I decided to entertain my drunken self by setting up some hand-me-down podcasting equipment and reading the steamy parts from romance novels, I never thought anyone would actually listen. The fact that I admitted my huge crush on my sexy next door neighbor made the whole thing even more mortifying. But sometimes life surprises you, and that’s how my podcast, Heidi’s Discount Erotica, was born.

Yes & I Love You ~ Review

Title: Yes & I Love You
Series: Say Everything #1
Author: Roni Loren
Release Date: March 2, 2021
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Pages: 352

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Blurb:

Everyone knows Miz Poppy, the vibrant reviewer whose commentary brightens the New Orleans nightlife. But no one knows Hollyn, the real face behind the media star…or the fear that keeps her isolated. When her boss tells her she needs to add video to her blog or lose her job, she’s forced to rely on an unexpected source to help her face her fears.

When aspiring actor Jasper Deares finds out the shy woman who orders coffee every day is actually Miz Poppy, he realizes he has a golden opportunity to get the media attention his acting career needs. All he has to do is help Hollyn come out of her shell…and through their growing connection, finally find her voice.

On the Rocks ~ Review

Title: On the Rocks
Series: Becker Brothers, #1
Author: Kandi Steiner
Release Date: June 4, 2019
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Indie
Pages: 340

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Blurb:

Noah Becker is nothing but trouble.

That’s what Mama told me when I was a kid, kicking his pew in church and giggling at the games we’d play. It’s what the town said when his father died and the Becker brothers went wild. And it’s on repeat in my mind the day I walk into the whiskey distillery where he works to buy a wedding gift for my fiancé.

He’s trouble.
Dirty, sweaty, rude trouble.

No matter how many times I repeat it, I can’t escape Noah in our small Tennessee town. And the more I run into him, the more he infuriates me.

Because he sees what no one else does.

Forget Me Not ~ Review

Title: Forget Me Not
Series: N/A
Author: Q.B. Tyler
Release Date: September 25, 2019
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Indie
Pages: 298

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Blurb:

What do you do when the love of your life forgets?
Not the good times.
Not the love.
Not the passion.
But the pain and heartbreak and betrayal.
He doesn’t remember that he broke my heart.
But I do.
He doesn’t remember the darkest parts of our marriage.
He doesn’t remember that six months ago, I said goodbye.
What do you do when the love of your life remembers your marriage but not your divorce?

My Darling Duke ~ Review

Title: My Darling Duke
Series: Sinful Wallflowers #1
Author: Stacy Reid
Release Date: December 31, 2019
Genres: Historical Romance
Publisher: Entangled: Amara
Pages: 377

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Blurb:

Miss Katherine Danvers is a desperate wallflower. Her family is on the brink of financial ruin, and it is up her to save her mother and sisters from a life of indignities. So she transforms herself into the incomparable Kitty Danvers, the fiancée of the enigmatic and reclusive Alexander Masters, Duke of Thornton—once dubbed the mad, bad, and dangerous catch of the Season.

Ten years ago, society and the woman Alexander Masters loved called him a monster, after a tragic accident left him scarred and confined to a wheelchair. His heart exists in cold, lonely exile, until he learns he has a fiancée—a deceptive, clever, and utterly intriguing woman he’s never met. Miss Danvers will now learn the consequences of engaging herself to the beast, for Alexander is determined to make her his. Soon, they are involved in a chase, a clash of wills, and though he once vowed to never love again, he burns for the enchanting Miss Danvers. And denying his heart may cost him an exquisite love that happens only once in a lifetime.

The Other Bennet Sister ~ Review #JaneAustenJuly

Title: The Other Bennet Sister
Series: N/A
Author: Janice Hadlow
Release Date: January 9, 2020
Genres: Historical Fiction / Romance
Publisher: Henry Holt & Company
Pages: 480

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Blurb:

Mary, the bookish ugly duckling of Pride and Prejudice’s five Bennet sisters, emerges from the shadows and transforms into a desired woman with choices of her own.

What if Mary Bennet’s life took a different path from that laid out for her in Pride and Prejudice? What if the frustrated intellectual of the Bennet family, the marginalized middle daughter, the plain girl who takes refuge in her books, eventually found the fulfillment enjoyed by her prettier, more confident sisters? This is the plot of The Other Bennet Sister, a debut novel with exactly the affection and authority to satisfy Austen fans.

Ultimately, Mary’s journey is like that taken by every Austen heroine. She learns that she can only expect joy when she has accepted who she really is. She must throw off the false expectations and wrong ideas that have combined to obscure her true nature and prevented her from what makes her happy. Only when she undergoes this evolution does she have a chance at finding fulfillment; only then does she have the clarity to recognize her partner when he presents himself—and only at that moment is she genuinely worthy of love.

Mary’s destiny diverges from that of her sisters. It does not involve broad acres or landed gentry. But it does include a man; and, as in all Austen novels, Mary must decide whether he is the truly the one for her. In The Other Bennet Sister, Mary is a fully rounded character—complex, conflicted, and often uncertain; but also vulnerable, supremely sympathetic, and ultimately the protagonist of an uncommonly satisfying debut novel.

Longbourn ~ Review #JaneAustenJuly

Title: Longbourn
Series: N/A
Author: Jo Baker
Expected Release Date: October 8, 2013
Genres: Historical Fiction / Romance
Publisher: Knopf
Pages: 352

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Blurb:

• Pride and Prejudice was only half the story •

If Elizabeth Bennet had the washing of her own petticoats, Sarah often thought, she’d most likely be a sight more careful with them.

In this irresistibly imagined belowstairs answer to Pride and Prejudice, the servants take center stage. Sarah, the orphaned housemaid, spends her days scrubbing the laundry, polishing the floors, and emptying the chamber pots for the Bennet household. But there is just as much romance, heartbreak, and intrigue downstairs at Longbourn as there is upstairs. When a mysterious new footman arrives, the orderly realm of the servants’ hall threatens to be completely, perhaps irrevocably, upended.

Jo Baker dares to take us beyond the drawing rooms of Jane Austen’s classic—into the often overlooked domain of the stern housekeeper and the starry-eyed kitchen maid, into the gritty daily particulars faced by the lower classes in Regency England during the Napoleonic Wars—and, in doing so, creates a vivid, fascinating, fully realized world that is wholly her own.