The Secret Society of Salzburg by Renee Ryan

 

Hello all! 
I hope everyone had a happy holiday. Today I bring to you The Secret Society of Salzburg by Renee Ryan. I was graciously given a copy by the publisher (no review was required). Here's a synopsis from Goodreads: 

London, 1933
 
At first glance, Austrian opera singer Elsa Mayer-Braun has little in common with the young English typist she encounters on tour. Yet she and Hattie Featherstone forge an instant connection—and strike a dangerous alliance. Using their friendship as a cover, they form a secret society with a daring goal: to rescue as many Jews as possible from Nazi persecution.
 
Though the war’s outbreak threatens Elsa and Hattie’s network, their efforts attract the covert attention of the British government, offering more opportunities to thwart the Germans. But Elsa’s growing fame as Hitler’s favorite opera singer, coupled with her secret Jewish ancestry, make her both a weapon and a target—until her future, too, hangs in the balance.
 
From the glamorous stages of Covent Garden and Salzburg to the horrors of Bergen-Belsen,  two ordinary women swept up by the tide of war discover an extraordinary friendship—and the courage to save countless lives.
 

This was one of those books where I felt the characters were so real. I also found that it was one of those rare times where I didn't want to "leave" them at the end of the book. I've read other books that take place during that horrible time in history and I am always so saddened. I think it's important that authors write about this and educate as many as they can about this topic. 

I really enjoyed this book. I loved the storyline, the characters and the way everything was described. I thought it was perfectly paced and honestly, I would like to see more about these characters! 

Thank you to the publisher for this opportunity. It was a great book and it's available now! I hope you all have a Happy New Year! 

Locust Lane by Stephen Amidon

 

I got an offer to read Locust Lane by Stephen Amidon via the publisher. In all honesty. I was hesitant at first because I thought it was going to be more of the same of the  type of books I have been reading. 

I'm glad I took the chance because I thought it was really good! 

Here's a synopsis from Goodreads: 

On the surface, Emerson, Massachusetts, is just like any other affluent New England suburb. But when a young woman is found dead in the nicest part of town, the powerful neighbors close ranks to keep their families safe. In this searing novel, Eden Perry’s death kicks off an investigation into the three teenagers who were partying with her that night, each a suspect. Hannah, a sweet girl with an unstable history. Jack, the popular kid with a mean streak. Christopher, an outsider desperate to fit in. Their parents, each with motivations of their own, only complicate the picture: they will do anything to protect their children, even at the others’ expense.

I don't like to say too much because I don't want to give anything away, but  I REALLY enjoyed this book. I find so many books these days don't keep me interested enough to want to get back to it quickly, but this one did and it moved just fast enough without tons of description. And, the best part? It got me at the end even though I was sure I knew the ending.  

Good story, good plot, good topics and good ending. Thank you to the publisher for the opportunity.  This book will release approximately in January 2023. Pick up a copy.  You won't be disappointed. 

The Prisoner by B.A. Paris

 

Hello, everyone! 

Today's blog is about The Prisoner, by B.A. Paris. This will be released on or around November 1, 2022.  

This book goes back and forth between the "Past" and the "Present" and eventually all turns into the present.  It take the reader into Amelie's life and her hard past.  She does what she can to overcome her obstacles and life finally seems to be on the way, when she makes a deal with Ned, (SIDE NOTE: My kindle edition has the husband all through the book listed as NED, while Goodreads and other readers are calling him Jed-go figure lol) a rich magazine owner. He also is rich via his family, but he has all sorts of secrets. Secrets that come out when Amelie is thrown into his world. All  she wanted to do was make a a life for herself but it just doesn't seem to be possible. 

A better synopsis from Goodreads: 

Amelie has always been a survivor, from losing her parents as a child in Paris to making it on her own in London. As she builds a life for herself, she is swept up into a glamorous lifestyle where she married the handsome billionaire Jed Hawthorne.

But then, Amelie wakes up in a pitch-black room, not knowing where she is. Why has she been taken? Who are her mysterious captors? And why does she soon feel safer here, imprisoned, than she had begun to feel with her husband Jed?

Now for my two cents: I usually don't mind switching back between the past and the present in books, but I found myself a little bored with the parts where Amelie was in the room where she was held captive.  That was because you had to get to the "past" parts to get any of inkling of what was going on.  There was only so much a writer can do having someone describe a room in which they are locked. 

So, after awhile, it DID start moving but as the end came, I kind of felt underwhelmed.  B.A. Paris will probably remain one of my automatic read authors but this one was just too slow and for me, unsatisfying at the end.  Don't let that stop you, though.  Seems a lot of people have enjoyed it so far on Goodreads!  Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for this opportunity. No review was required.  What are you reading?

A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor

Hello, everyone! 

I received this courtesy of NetGalley and Penguin Random House and I'm glad I did! I am a huge fan of C. J. Tudor and was so excited that she was coming out with a new book. Then,  full disclosure, I saw that it was a collection of short stories, and was a tad disappointed, because I am not a fan of short stories. I usually never read them, but being that it was one of my favorite authors, I decided to give it a go. 

I have to say, this is one collection of short stories I really enjoyed! They are all chilling and just fun to read! The description reads: 

The debut short story collection from the acclaimed author of The Chalk Man, featuring ten bone-chilling and mind-bending tales

Timeslips. Doomsday scenarios. Killer butterflies. C. J. Tudor's novels are widely acclaimed for their dark, twisty suspense plots, but with A Sliver of Darkness, she pulls us even further into her dizzying imagination.

In Final Course, the world has descended into darkness, but a group of old friends make time for one last dinner party. In Runaway Blues, thwarted love, revenge, and something very nasty stowed in a hat box converge. In Gloria, a strange girl at a service station endears herself to a cold-hearted killer, but can a leopard really change its spots? And in I'm Not Ted, a case of mistaken identity has unforeseen, fatal consequences.

Riveting and explosively original, A Sliver of Darkness is C. J. Tudor at her most wicked and uninhibited (from Goodreads). 

So, not much to say without giving too much away, but this is going to be a good read for you on those crisp fall nights! It releases in November 2022, so make sure you pick it up, get a hot beverage, your favorite blanket and read this collection of spooky stories! 

Thanks to Netgalley and to the publisher! I really enjoyed it! 
 

The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin

 

Hello, all! 

Today I bring to you The Librarian Spy by Madeline Martin.  I was graciously given a copy by the publisher and as of yesterday, it's now available!  

 

Book Summary: From the New York Times bestselling author of The Last Bookshop in London comes a moving new novel inspired by the true history of America’s library spies of World War II.

Ava thought her job as a librarian at the Library of Congress would mean a quiet, routine existence. But an unexpected offer from the US military has brought her to Lisbon with a new mission: posing as a librarian while working undercover as a spy gathering intelligence.

Meanwhile, in occupied France, Elaine has begun an apprenticeship at a printing press run by members of the Resistance. It’s a job usually reserved for men, but in the war, those rules have been forgotten. Yet she knows that the Nazis are searching for the press and its printer in order to silence them.

As the battle in Europe rages, Ava and Elaine find themselves connecting through coded messages and discovering hope in the face of war.

Read on for an excerpt from the book! :) 

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EXCERPT:

April 1943

Washington, DC

There was nothing Ava Harper loved more than the smell of old books. The musty scent of aging paper and stale ink took one on a journey through candlelit rooms of manors set amid verdant hills or ancient castles with turrets that stretched up to the vast, unknown heavens. These were tomes once cra­dled in the spread palms of forefathers, pored over by scholars, devoured by students with a rapacious appetite for learning. In those fragrant, yellowed pages were stories of the past and eternal knowledge.

 

It was a fortunate thing indeed she was offered a job in the Rare Book Room at the Library of Congress where the ar­chaic aroma of history was forever present.

She strode through the middle of three arches to where the neat rows of tables ran parallel to one another and care­fully gathered a stack of rare books in her arms. They were different sizes and weights, their covers worn and pages un­even at the edges, and yet somehow the pile seemed to fit to­gether like the perfect puzzle. Regardless of the patron who left them after having requested far more than was necessary for an afternoon’s perusal.

Their eyes were bigger than their brains. It was what her brother, Daniel, had once proclaimed after Ava groused about the com­mon phenomena—one she herself had been guilty of—when he was home on leave.

Ever since, the phrase ran through her thoughts on each encounter of an abandoned collection. Not that it was the fault of the patron. The philosophical greats of old wouldn’t be able to glean that much information in an afternoon. But she liked the expression regardless and how it always made her recall Daniel’s laughing gaze as he said it.

They’d both inherited their mother’s moss green eyes, though Ava’s never managed to achieve that same sparkle of mirth so characteristic of her older brother.

 

A glance at her watch confirmed it was almost noon. A knot tightened in her stomach as she recalled her brief chat with Mr. MacLeish earlier that day. A meeting with the Librarian of Congress was no regular occurrence, especially when it was followed by the scrawl of an address on a slip of paper and the promise of a new opportunity that would suit her.

Whatever it was, she doubted it would fit her better than her position in the Rare Book Room. She absorbed lessons from these ancient texts, which she squeezed out at whim to aid patrons unearth sought-after information. What could possibly appeal to her more?

Ava approached the last table at the right and gently closed La Maison Reglée, the worn leather cover smooth as butter be­neath her fingertips. The seventeenth century book was one of the many gastronomic texts donated from the Katherine Golden Bitting collection. She had been a marvel of a woman who utilized her knowledge in her roles at the Department of Agriculture and the American Canners Association.

Every book had a story and Ava was their keeper. To leave her place there would be like abandoning children.

Robert floated in on his pretentious cloud and surveyed the room with a critical eye. She clicked off the light lest she be subjected to the sardonic flattening of her coworker’s lips.

He held out his hand for La Maison Reglée, a look of irrita­tion flickering over his face.

“I’ll put it away.” Ava hugged it to her chest. After all, he didn’t even read French. He couldn’t appreciate it as she did.

She returned the tome to its collection, the family reunited once more, and left the opulence of the library. The crisp spring DC air embraced her as she caught the streetcar toward the address printed in the Librarian of Congress’s own hand.

 

Ava arrived at 2430 E Street, NW ten minutes before her appointment, which turned out to be beneficial considering the hoops she had to jump through to enter. A stern man, whose expression did not alter through their exchange, con­fronted her at a guardhouse upon entry. Apparently, he had no more understanding of the meeting than she.

Once finally allowed in, she followed a path toward a large white-columned building.

Ava snapped the lid on her overactive imagination lest it get the better of her—which it often did—and forced herself on­ward. After being led through an open entryway and down a hall, she was left to sit in an office possessing no more than a desk and two hardbacked wooden chairs. They made the seats in the Rare Book Room seem comfortable by comparison. Clearly it was a place made only for interviews.

But for what?

Ava glanced at her watch. Whoever she was supposed to meet was ten minutes late. A pang of regret resonated through her at having left her book sitting on her dresser at home.

She had only recently started Daphne du Maurier’s Re­becca and was immediately drawn in to the thrill of a young woman swept into an unexpected romance. Ava’s bookmark rested temptingly upon the newly married couple’s entrance to Manderley, the estate in Cornwall.

The door to the office flew open and a man whisked in wearing a gray, efficient Victory suit—single breasted with narrow lapels and absent any cuffs or pocket flaps—fashioned with as little fabric as was possible. He settled behind the desk. “I’m Charles Edmunds, secretary to General William Dono­van. You’re Ava Harper?”

The only name familiar of the three was her own. “I am.”

He opened a file, sifted through a few papers, and handed her a stack. “Sign these.”

“What are they?” She skimmed over them and was met with legal jargon.

“Confidentiality agreements.”

“I won’t sign anything I don’t read fully.” She lifted the pile.

The text was drier than the content of some of the more lackluster rare books at the Library of Congress. Regardless, she scoured every word while Mr. Edmunds glared irritably at her, as if he could will her to sign with his eyes. He couldn’t, of course. She waited ten minutes for his arrival; he could wait while she saw what she was getting herself into.

Everything indicated she would not share what was dis­cussed in the room about her potential job opportunity. It was nothing all too damning and so she signed, much to the great, exhaling impatience of Mr. Edmunds.

“You speak German and French.” He peered at her over a pair of black-rimmed glasses, his brown eyes probing.

“My father was something of a linguist. I couldn’t help but pick them up.” A visceral ache stabbed at her chest as a memory flitted through her mind from years ago—her father switch­ing to German in his excitement for an upcoming trip with her mother for their twenty-year anniversary. That trip. The one from which her parents had never returned.

“And you’ve worked with photographing microfilm.” Mr. Edmunds lifted his brows.

A frown of uncertainty tugged at her lips. When she first started at the Library of Congress, her duties had been more in the area of archival than a typical librarian role as she micro­filmed a series of old newspapers that time was slowly erod­ing. “I have, yes.”

“Your government needs you,” he stated in a matter-of-fact manner that broached no argument. “You are invited to join the Office of Strategic Services—the OSS—under the information gathering program called the Interdepartmen­tal Committee for the Acquisition of Foreign Publications.”

Her mind spun around to make sense of what he’d just said, but her mouth flew open to offer its own knee-jerk opinion. “That’s quite the mouthful.”

“IDC for short,” he replied without hesitation or humor. “It’s a covert operation obtaining information from newspa­pers and texts in neutral territories to help us gather intel on the Nazis.”

“Would I require training?” she asked, unsure how know­ing German equipped her to spy on them.

“You have all the training you need as I understand it.”

He began to reassemble the file in front of him. “You would go to Lisbon.”

“In Portugal?”

He paused. “It is the only Lisbon of which I am aware, yes.”

No doubt she would have to get there by plane. A shiver threatened to squeeze down her spine, but she repressed it. “Why am I being recommended for this?”

“Your ability to speak French and German.” Mr. Edmunds held up his forefinger. “You know how to use microfilm.” He ticked off another finger. “Fred Kilgour recommends your keen intellect.” There went another finger.

That was a name she recognized.

She aided Fred the prior year when he was microfilm­ing foreign publications for the Harvard University Library. After the months she’d spent doing as much for the Library of Congress, the process had been easy to share, and he had been a quick learner.

“And you’re pretty.” Mr. Edmunds sat back in his chair, the final point made.

The compliment was as unwarranted in such a setting as it was unwelcome. “What does my appearance have to do with any of this?”

He lifted a shoulder. “Beauties like yourself can get what they want when they want it. Except when you scowl like that.” He nodded his chin up. “You should smile more, Dollface.”

That was about enough.

“I did not graduate top of my class from Pratt and obtain a much sought-after position at the Library of Congress to be called ‘Dollface.’” She pushed up to standing.

“And you’ve got steel in that spine, Miss Harper.” Mr. Ed­munds ticked the last finger.

She opened her mouth to retort, but he continued. “We need this information so we best know how to fight the  Krauts. The sooner we have these details, the sooner this war can be over.”

She remained where she stood to listen a little longer. No doubt he knew she would.

“You have a brother,” he went on. “Daniel Harper, staff sergeant of C Company in Second Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, in the 101st Airborne Division.”

The Airborne Division. Her brother had run toward the fear of airplanes despite her swearing off them.

“That’s correct,” she said tightly. Daniel would never have been in the Army were it not for her. He would be an engi­neer, the way he’d always wanted.

Mr. Edmunds took off his glasses and met her gaze with his small, naked eyes. “Don’t you want him to come home sooner?”

It was a dirty question meant to slice deep.

And it worked.

    The longer the war continued, the greater Daniel’s risk of being killed or wounded.

She’d done everything she could to offer aid. When the ra­tion was only voluntary, she had complied long before it be­came law. She gave blood every few months, as soon as she was cleared to do so again. Rather than dance and drink at the Elk Club like her roommates, Ava spent all her spare time in the Production Corps with the Red Cross, repairing uni­forms, rolling bandages, and doing whatever was asked of her to help their men abroad.

She even wore red lipstick on a regular basis, springing for the costly tube of Elizabeth Arden’s Victory Red, the civilian counterpart to the Montezuma Red servicewomen were issued. Ruby lips were a derisive biting of the thumb at Hitler’s war on made-up women. And she would do anything to bite her thumb at that tyrant.

Likely Mr. Edmunds was aware of all this.

“You will be doing genuine work in Lisbon that can help bring your brother and all our boys home.” Mr. Edmunds got to his feet and held out his hand, a salesman with a silver tongue, ready to seal the deal. “Are you in?”

Ava looked at his hand. His fingers were stubby and thick, his nails short and well-manicured.

“I would have to go on an airplane, I’m assuming.”

“You wouldn’t have to jump out.” He winked.

Her greatest fear realized.

But Daniel had done far more for her.

It was a single plane ride to get to Lisbon. One measly take­off and landing with a lot of airtime in between. The bottoms of her feet tingled, and a nauseous swirl dipped in her belly.

This was by far the least she could do to help him as well as every other US service member. Not just the men, but also the women whose roles were often equally as dangerous.

She lifted her chin, leveling her own stare right back. “Don’t ever call me ‘Dollface’ again.”

“You got it, Miss Harper,” he replied.

She extended her hand toward him and clasped his with a firm grip, the way her father had taught  her. “I’m in.”

He grinned. “Welcome aboard.”

***********************************************************************************************My two cents: I think this book had a great premise and will do very well. I don't like to be negative about books, and I will never be.  However, this book wasn't for me.  I was very excited about the subject matter but this one ran too slow for me and I left at about 39 percent. I really tried coming back to it a few times, but it just didn't grab me.  BUT! That doesn't mean I don't think everyone will feel that way. I think a lot of people will love it. 

I want to thank the publisher for the opportunity. I am always grateful for the chance to read new books and share them! 

***********************************************************************************

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: 

Madeline Martin is a New York Times and international bestselling author of historical fiction novels and historical romance. She lives in sunny Florida with her two daughters, two incredibly spoiled cats and a husband so wonderful he's been dubbed Mr. Awesome. She is a die-hard history lover who will happily lose herself in research any day. When she's not writing, researching or 'moming', you can find her spending time with her family at Disney or sneaking a couple spoonfuls of Nutella while laughing over cat videos. She also loves travel, attributing her fascination with history to having spent most of her childhood as an Army brat in Germany.

Buy Links:

San Marco Books, Signed Copies for Preorders!

Story & Song Books, Signed Copies for Preorders!

BookShop.org

Harlequin

Barnes & Noble

Amazon

Books-A-Million

 

Social Links:

Author Website

Twitter: @MadelineMMartin

Facebook: @MadelineMartinAuthor 

Instagram: @madelinemmartin

Goodreads

The Liz Taylor Ring by Brenda Janowitz

 

The Liz Taylor Ring has a different kind of premise than I've been reading lately and I found that refreshing.  Lizzie and Ritchie have a love story for the ages.  Ritchie has a severe gambling problem that causes terrible friction and devastation during their marriage, but they always love each other and their three children, Addy, Nathan and Courtney. 

What follows is a journey about not only the ring, but the lives of the children and how their past has defined them.  They learn about themselves and even more about their parents even after they thought they knew everything. 

I really enjoyed this book.  I thought it was paced just right and it was written in a way that made me want to know what exactly happened to the ring and how the siblings would work it all out. It also teaches an age old lesson of something we should already know but forget: everyone is going through something at any given time so we should be cognizant of that when we treat people the way we do.  We also learn great lessons about family and forgiveness.  This is my first Brenda Janowitz story and it won't be my last.  I think a lot of people will enjoy the lifelong journey of Lizzie and Ritchie and then seeing the different viewpoints of the siblings.  Thank you to Netgalley and to the publisher. 

Here is an excerpt for you! 

Addy looked at herself in the mirror. Surely every woman looked like a wet dog after getting their hair washed at the hairdresser, didn’t they? 

She examined the lines of her face, the rings under her eyes. She looked tired. She looked old. She didn’t look like herself anymore. 

“Just to lighten you up a bit,” Roberto said, running his hands through her hair. He’d been styling her hair since she was nineteen—just over twenty years—and his pleas to color it had gotten more insistent as of late. 

But she would not be one of those women who colored her hair. She simply would not. After all, she had daughters to raise, twin girls who were sixteen years old. She had to set a good example. 

“You know how I feel about coloring my hair.” 

“Remind me again.” 

“It’s antifeminist.” 

“Coloring your hair does not have to be a political statement,” he said, self-consciously examining his own hairline, receding ever so slightly, in the mirror. “Forty is the new thirty, you know.”

“I’m forty-one.” Addy pressed her fingers to the lines that led from the edge of her lip, up to the side of her nose. Marionette lines, they called them. As if women were just wooden dolls, controlled by a master. Most women her age had already started Botox and fillers. They threw Botox parties at each other’s houses, getting shot up by people who weren’t even doctors. Still, they looked good. Better than she did.

“Oh, well, forty-one’s the new sixty.” They both laughed.

“Just a trim.”

“I could easily make you look the way you looked when we first met. It would only take an hour.”

When Roberto referenced when we first met, he meant the summer she turned nineteen. When she let her blond hair lighten in the sun, when it flowed in wavy bursts down her back. She could let her hair dry naturally and it would still look like it had been professionally done. She walked into the salon carefree, unencumbered by kids’ schedules, what to make for dinner that night, and college funds. She walked into the salon with a smile on her face, open to the possibilities of life in a way she could no longer fathom now. That’s how he saw her. That’s how he remembered that summer.

That’s not what Addy remembered. It was the summer after freshman year of college, and she’d come home to work with her dad, to learn how to run a retail store. Her father was still learning the retail game himself. Recently sworn off gambling and desperate for a job (a real job, not one of those get-rich-quick schemes he’d been chasing since the day he met her mother), he’d gotten the place for a steal from a friend of the family. It was a small store in the center of their Long Island town, filled with fast fashion. The sort of clothes that were ridiculously trendy and would go out of style in a season. (Which was good, because the quality only lasted a season, too.) 

He called the store “Lizzie and Ritchie’s” in a romantic gesture, and new to the retail game, he did all the books by hand. Addy was dying to put her digital marketing class to use, and when she told her father that one of her classmates had started a website and then quit school because the company took off, he wanted in. She got him onto QuickBooks, created a website, modeled all the clothing herself, and turned Lizzie and Ritchie’s into a dot-com. Ritchie barely understood what his daughter was doing, but he humored her because he loved her so much. He humored her because he was a doting father who hated to say no to his daughter. (Also, she was the smart one.)

Within a month, he understood. They could barely keep up with the online demand, and Addy brokered a deal with a classmate from Texas, whose family owned a manufacturing plant, to start making the clothing themselves. Within six months, Addy was back at school, and Ritchie had expanded his operation to a team of four. Within a year, the store was a half a million dollar a year business. Within three years, he expanded his team to ten. Within five years, his company—one brick-and-mortar shop and an online store—was a multimillion dollar enterprise.

And it was all because of Addy.

“We don’t even have to go to your old color,” Roberto said, pulling up a picture of a model on his phone. “We could make you a buttery dirty blond.”

“Showing my girls that I’m ashamed to get older is not the example I want to set,” Addy said, even though the sound of butter and dirt was intriguing.

“Your girls are all over Instagram giving Gigi and Bella a run for their money.”

“The modeling thing is just for fun,” Addy explained, as she’d explained to countless other people countless other times. “Gary really started having them do it to build their confidence.” (And 

because Addy was now too old to model the clothes herself, but better to leave that part unsaid.)

“I’d say they’re confident enough. Have you seen this?” He turned his phone toward Addy, and she immediately recognized it as the Lizzie and Ritchie’s Instagram page. A picture of her girls filled the screen: the clothes were beside the point (but they were wearing clothes, weren’t they?) as they stood, legs wide apart, mouths open, thumbs tugging on their bottom lips. The image was bold. It was strong. It was undeniably sexual. Addy was horrified.

“Of course I’ve seen that.” She had not. “At least they’re not coloring their hair.”

“Are they eating?” Roberto closed the photo and began scrolling through their individual feeds.

“Of course they eat.” When she was sixteen, Addy still had baby fat. Her girls had cheekbones like razor blades, bellies flat and taut. When she’d ask, Emma would laugh and explain how easy it was to manipulate the way you looked with makeup, camera angles, and filters. But Addy wasn’t so sure. “Lemme see that.”

As Roberto handed over his phone, Addy’s own phone rang out, the sound of an old-fashioned telephone filling the air.

“Do you need to get that?” he asked, holding up her purse with the ringing phone inside.

“No,” she said, transfixed by the store’s Instagram account. And then, instantly remembering herself: “I mean yes.” Addy swapped phones with Roberto. “It could be the girls or their school.” Addy looked at the screen. It was a number she didn’t recognize. The exchange looked international, a jumble of extra numbers. “I can let this go to voice mail.”

It would be hours before she remembered to check her messages. Long after her girls came home from school. After her husband came home from work.

After she cooked dinner and served it. After she fell into bed at ten, too tired to stay up to watch TV with Gary. It wasn’t until the next morning, after breakfast, that she remembered to check her voice mail.

And after that, nothing would be the same. 

Excerpted from The Liz Taylor Ring by Brenda Janowitz, Copyright © 2021 by Brenda Janowitz. Published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

The Couple at Number 9 by Clarie Douglas

 

The Couple at Number 9 was ...well hang on a second (lol).  The story is about Saffy and her husband Tom who inherit a home from her grandmother Rose.  Right off the bat the story takes off by telling the reader that there are two bodies in the garden of the home.  That was enough to blow me away right there and it was practically right there on the first page. No beating around the bush here! 

Saffy was really close to her grandmother, Rose, who is now, sadly, in an assisted care home suffering from dementia.  Rose hadn't lived in the cottage at number 9 in decades.  In fact, Saffys mother Lorna, doesn't ever remember living there either. So, either woman isn't going to be much help in telling anyone who these bodies belong to in her yard.  

An investigation ensues and so does a journey into the past concerning Rose and Lorna when she was little.  What could have happened back then to have not one, but two bodies in the yard? Who are they? I couldn't wait to find out. 

Let me tell you, when I found out what happened my mouth dropped open and I don't mean in a bad way.  I am a huge reader and sometimes I am incredulous when I get to the end of a book and think, "Is that IT?"  NOT the case here. My mouth dropped open in shock.  I was so thrilled with this clever unfolding of events.  I had one issue in the book that seemed kind of forced, but otherwise this was a crazy ride and I mean that in a good way!  It was so fun and if you want a really fast read with an ending that kept me guessing, this is for you.  I really enjoyed it.  This may have been my first Claire Douglas book but it won't be my last.  Unfortunately, you will have to wait until late Summer 2022, but it will be worth it! 

Thank you so much to NetGalley and to the publisher for this opportunity. No review was required. 

The Foundling by Ann Leary

 

The Foundling by Ann Leary will not be available until May 2022, but I was lucky enough to get an advance copy from the wonderful Netgalley.   First, a quick synopsis.  

Back in the 20's a hospital or "home" called the Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age exists for women who have been deemed "feebleminded" for whatever reason.  Some do need help, but some are classified this way for other reasons that seemed to be "the norm" back then.  I won't go into the whole thing, because that's part of the journey with the story.  However, suffice to say, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania thought it was doing society a favor by keeping this women from reproducing other humans that would cause havoc later.  Hence, they kept them locked away during those childbearing years.  

The story really involves Mary who gets a job with the head of the institution, Dr. Vogel. Mary finally feels, after a life of being in an orphanage and then with some unloving relatives, that she has finally made it and on her way to becoming someone important.  However, after working for awhile for Dr. Vogel, she recognizes someone from her time in the orphanage and has no idea why she would be in any facility with "feebleminded" in the title.  What follows is an investigation into why this girl would be here and what can be done about her circumstances.  Can Mary help her?  Will Mary's perceptions of the institution, its work and Dr. Vogel shift?  What about Mary's future?  

My two cents:  I really loved this story. I have said before and I'll say it again, I LOVE stories that make me look more into a topic, place or issue.  This was based on the author's grandmother's experience in a real institution that really did exist for this reason.  It's hard to imagine this now, but it's important to know these things happened.  From what happened to Mary to the other girls in the story to imagining that this kind of place really ran and operated for a long time kept me engrossed from beginning to end.   I really think this is something that should be known and while it's educational, it was also a wonderful story where I felt very invested in the characters.  Pick it up when it comes out May 2022.  You won't be disappointed.