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Showing posts from September, 2016

In a Dark, Dark Wood

Nora hasn't been in touch with her childhood best friend Clare in ten years. Then out of the blue an invitation to Clare's hen do arrives in her inbox. She knows going is a bad idea. She just didn't know how bad. This book was sloooooooow. The writing was nothing spectacular. I did like the last 15% or so of the book even if some of it was a bit far-fetched/convenient, but overall this was a disappointing read for me.

Christmas Angels: A Novella

Kate is a designer/decorator for a large interior landscaping company. She works her magic in the offices, homes and malls in St. Louis, making everything beautiful and spreading happiness. Her work keeps her from spending the holidays with her family but it also gives her less time to face the pain of a breakup just before Christmas the previous year. Kate's world is about to be turned upside down when she's asked to decorate the home of a widowed single dad.  I loved The Charm Bracelet so when I saw this on Netgalley I had to read it. Sadly this story wasn't for me. It was too fluffy and Kate's heart was always leaping into her throat. I did like the setting and what Kate does for a living and I do enjoy this author's writing and look forward to reading more. Anyone looking for a cute little romantic, heart-warming Christmas story should definitely check this out!

Root, Petal, Thorn

Ivy Baygren loves her husband, Adam, and their bungalow that's in one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Salt Lake City. She loves the quaint details and the rose bush called Emmeline Rose after one of the home's original inhabitants. When Adam would renovate their home and find treasures left behind from previous owners, he would call them "Easter Eggs" But Adam has unexpectedly died and it's up to Ivy to finish the home improvement projects they had planned. As she does so, she finds more Easter Eggs and uncovers clues about the women who have lived in the house throughout its one hundred years - the young Mormon torn between following her heart and her anti-polygamist beliefs, the Greek immigrant during World War II, a troubled single mother in the 1960's. As she learns about their lives, she also learns that there is a little sad in every story. The cover is beautiful. I loved the concept of the book and enjoyed learning about each of the five women connected

Fractured

Julie Prentice has had a stalker ever since the publication of her bestselling novel, The Murder Game. Hoping to start anew and leave her stalker in the past, Julie and her family move across the country. Their new neighbour, John Dunbar, befriends Julie but soon their friendship brings complications within their close-knit, watchful community. Despite her best efforts to fit in Julie inadvertently creates more problems that lead to disastrous consequences.  The chapters count down from twelve months ago with Julie's point of view and John's point of view with "today" in between each month. We know something bad has happened. The build up was great. The writing was excellent. I love how every little thing came together to set the end in motion. The characters felt real. I love that this book is about Julie, the woman who wrote The Murder Game (but The Murder Game and Fractured are actually written by Catherine McKenzie) Very interesting concept and very well-done.

The Murder Game

Meredith Delay became close friends with Johnathan, Julian and Lily during their time at law school. It's now ten years later and Meredith has been assigned to a high-profile prosecution involving the murder of a disgraced hockey star. The accused? Their old friend Julian. And who is going to defend him? Their friend Johnathan. Meredith isn't quite sure whose side Lily is on. But with everyone back together Meredith is brought back to her university days and how she made it to where she's at. I devoured this book. I had to stay up late to finish it, I didn't want to wait until the next day. I'm not into legal thrillers but there was something about the blurb that drew me in. What went on in the courtroom was (thankfully!) easy to understand. The writing was phenomenal - characters that come to life in gorgeous Montreal. Everything about this book was so good. I loved it!

Girl Number One

Eleanor Blackwood was only six-years-old when she witnessed her mother's murder. The killer was never found. Now, exactly 18 years later, Eleanor finds a woman's body in the same spot where her mother was killed. By the time Eleanor gets out of the woods and the police arrive, the body is gone. The police don't believe the body was ever there and Eleanor is left wondering if her mother's killer has resurfaced, who it could be and when they'll come after her. The writing wasn't that good. The characters were one-dimensional. The main character got on my nerves. She's finding dead bodies all over the place and all she's thinking about is how good Connor, Tris and Denzil look and which one she wants to sleep with at that particular moment, even when she suspects they could be the killer. The romance thrown into the book seemed out of place. The author spent too much time describing paths, hills and waves - I wanted to know about the murders! It was boring.

Distress Signals

Adam Dunne's longtime girlfriend, Sarah, is not on the plane when she's due to return from a Barcelona business trip. His life begins to crumble more and more with each passing day as texts and phone calls to her cell go unanswered. How could she leave him like this? How could she have gone to Barcelona and not tell her parents? Then Sarah's passport and a note that simply reads "I'm sorry-S" arrives in their mailbox. Adam believes something more sinister is going on and that Sarah didn't just decide to leave her old life behind. That's not the Sarah he knows. Or maybe he didn't know her as well as he thought he did. But as he digs around he is able to connect Sarah to a cruise ship called the Celebrate and to a woman who disappeared from that same ship almost exactly a year before. Adam needs answers and will do whatever he has to do in order to find out what really happened to his girlfriend. Wow. This book was GOOD! I was hooked from the very fi

Faithful

Shelby Richmond and her best friend Helene Boyd were in a car accident when they were teenagers. Shelby blames herself for what happened and always carried around the guilt of being the driver and the survivor. Shelby suffered through some dark years, but she's slowly crawling out of the depths of despair to discover what makes her happy - Chinese food, dogs and the people who cared about her when she didn't even care about herself. Not only has she found true friends but she finally found the angel that has been watching over her since that icy night long ago. At first I wasn't sure about this book. But I grew to love Shelby so much. Her feelings, her actions, just everything about her felt real. All of the characters felt real. The story was well-written, flowed smoothly and made me feel so many different emotions. It's one of those books that truly makes you feel as though you're part of the character's life in some way. I really enjoyed it!

The Night Stalker

DCI Erika Foster is called to a murder scene where the victim is found dead in bed with a plastic bag over his head. As DCI Foster and her team are looking for clues as to who could have committed the murder, another victim is found dead in bed with a plastic bag over his head. All they know at this point is that there is a calculated serial killer out there stalking the victims before going in for the kill. What could possibly link the victims to their killer? DCI Foster will do whatever it takes to find out. Another great book in the DCI Erika Foster series! It's well-written. It's descriptive, it's vivid, it's a page-turner. It has strong characters, great pacing. I can't say enough good things.

The Cabin

Mackenzie and six of her friends are spending the weekend at a cabin in the woods. She's expecting it to be a drunken good time but that's not what it turns out to be when they wake up in the morning to find that two of their friends have been killed. Detective Inspector Wright is working the case and is treating them all as suspects. He's not giving Mackenzie enough information and she wants to clear her name as well as her friends names so she does some investigating herself. She discovers that each of her friends has a secret and that any one of them could be capable of murder. The writing wasn't great. I know this comes out on September 6th but was previously published as "Covert" so I don't know if the errors are in the Covert as well, but there are lots!! Mackenzie went to Kyle's house to talk to him and when she left she hung up the phone. Blake walked to his truck and got in his car. The errors didn't affect my rating. My one star came from

Sewing the Shadows Together

Shona McIver was thirteen when she was murdered. That was almost forty years ago, and modern DNA evidence shows that the wrong man has been serving time. As Shona's brother Tom returns to Scotland from South Africa to scatter their mother's ashes, he grows closer to Sarah and together they try to figure out who could have killed Shona. Sarah was Shona's best friend and was with her just before she was killed. As Sarah's life begins to unravel she begins to realize that we don't always know the people closest to us. I felt like I was reading a book. I was not, at any time, absorbed in the story. I didn't really care for the characters. Lots of things were convenient. It all fell flat for me.