The Jetsetters by Amanda Eyre Ward is the new book pick for Reese Witherspoon’s book club! This story centers around Charlotte whose husband is long passed away, her best friend just died and her adult children aren’t very close to her and have problems of their own.
When Charlotte wins a cruise to Greece, she decides to take her family. Why not? She wants to throw caution to the wind and do something different. The chapters alternate between Charlotte and her older daughter Lee, younger daughter Regan and son Cord. Each of them is struggling with something, secrets or things from the past which they cannot let go of. Though they are on this luxury cruise, their problems and issues are right there with them.
Here’s the official synopsis”
When seventy-year-old Charlotte Perkins submits a sexy essay to the “Become a Jetsetter” contest, she dreams of reuniting her estranged children: Lee, an almost-famous actress; Cord, a handsome Manhattan venture capitalist who can’t seem to find a bride; and Regan, a harried mother who took it all wrong when Charlotte bought her a Weight Watchers gift certificate for her birthday.
Charlotte yearns for the years when her children were young and she was a single mother who meant everything to them. When she wins the cruise, the family packs all their baggage—literal and figurative—and spends ten days traveling from sun-drenched Athens through glorious Rome to tapas-laden Barcelona on an over-the-top cruise ship, the Splendido Marveloso. As lovers new and old join the adventure, long-buried secrets are revealed, and the Perkins family is forced to confront the defining choices in their lives. Can four lost adults find the peace they’ve been seeking by reconciling their childhood aches and coming back to each other?
Amanda’s writing is fantastic, I really enjoyed reading her descriptions. When the book starts, I almost felt a physical ache for Charlotte as she loses her very best friend and the person who brought her fun and joy. You can see how the parent of grown children would become lonely and long for something different in their life.
Each character brings their own emotions and issues, which are easy to sympathize with. This novel is insightful and humorous, yet serious and made me think and feel a variety of emotions. I loved it.
Grace is Gone by Emily Elgar was fantastic! I loved this story. Yes, its a little reminiscent of the Gypsy Blanchard case but it definitely takes a turn and ends up being a complete mystery. I thought the author did a great job of putting a new spin on the story and I was sucked in right away.
Meg and her daughter Grace are the most beloved family in Ashford, the lynchpin that holds the town together. So when Meg is found brutally murdered and her daughter missing, the community is rocked by the tragedy. Her daughter, Grace, has been sick for years and all Meg has ever done is look after her. Now Meg is dead, Grace is gone – and fears are growing for her life.
Who would kidnap a sick teenager? Who would murder a mother who sacrificed everything? As the community come to terms with what’s happened, an unlikely pair start searching for answers: Jon, the most hated journalist in Ashford and Cara, the young woman who found Meg’s body. But once they start digging into the past, they will soon realise there’s no going back.
This was twisty and had some turns that I didn’t expect. I liked the way the author built up the suspense and I read this one in record time. Actually, I read it in a single sitting because it was impossible to put down! I know you will feel the same way!
Excellent book, you can get it here.
The Sun Down Motel by Simone St. James …I could have sworn I reviewed this already, maybe I’m just seeing it all over!
Readers are really enjoying this novel thanks to the compelling dual timelines and the creepy setting. I liked the suspense that propels the book forward and it sometimes borders on horror because I was so nervous for Carly as she investigates what happened to her aunt back in the early 80s. Soon Carly herself is contending with some pretty creepy circumstances.
Take a look:
The secrets lurking in a rundown roadside motel ensnare a young woman, just as they did her aunt thirty-five years before, in this new atmospheric suspense novel from the national bestselling and award-winning author of The Broken Girls.
Upstate NY, 1982. Every small town like Fell, New York, has a place like the Sun Down Motel. Some customers are from out of town, passing through on their way to someplace better. Some are locals, trying to hide their secrets. Viv Delaney works as the night clerk to pay for her move to New York City. But something isn’t right at the Sun Down, and before long she’s determined to uncover all of the secrets hidden
I really like a book that takes us back to the 80s so I was very much into the story of Viv. Carly is a likable woman who is a quiet introvert but also headstrong and ambitious in finding out what happened to Viv. There is definitely a mystery to be solved and I didn’t expect the story to veer off into something spooky like it did!
If you enjoy books that are suspenseful with a hint of horror and a splash of paranormal activities then this is for you!
The Lady Upstairs by Halley Sutton comes out on July 14th but I wanted to feature it now so you can place an order or add it to your Goodreads list.
I got a sneak peek and quickly read it, I couldn’t help but be intrigued by the promise of a dark page-turner.
Here’s the plot:
Jo’s job is blackmailing the most lecherous men in Los Angeles–handsy Hollywood producers, adulterous actors, corrupt cops. Sure, she likes the money she’s making, which comes in handy for the debt she is paying off, but it’s also a chance to take back power for the women of the city. Eager to prove herself to her coworker Lou and their enigmatic boss, known only as the Lady Upstairs, Jo takes on bigger and riskier jobs.
When one of her targets is murdered, both the Lady Upstairs and the LAPD have Jo in their sights. Desperate to escape the consequences of her failed job, she decides to take on just one more sting–bringing down a rising political star. It’s her biggest con yet–and she will do it behind the Lady’s back, freeing both herself and Lou. But Jo soon learns that Lou and the Lady have secrets of their own, and that no woman is safe when there is a life-changing payout on the line.
An interesting premise for a book and I was curious to find out more about this mysterious lady at the same time I was nervous for Jo! I wanted her to pay off her debts and leave the sleazy work she was doing. It’s a testament to the author’s writing when we feel deeply for the main characters and want them to get out of whatever mess they find themselves in!
It’s well written and described as “noir” which I would agree with. I felt like it was dark literally and figuratively, maybe it was due to the setting of darkened hotels and bars at night. This is going to be a very popular novel this summer and I am excited about a movie deal which I anticipate will be coming soon! A vigilante film of women who blackmail men? I can see it now!
Because I enjoyed My Lovely Wife so very much, I was nervous starting He Started It by Samantha Downing. I worried that this book wouldn’t be as good as the first. I didn’t need to worry because this was a terrific novel and I don’t want to give too much away…but that ending!
Here’s the synopsis:
Beth, Portia, and Eddie Morgan haven’t all been together in years. And for very good reasons—we’ll get to those later. But when their wealthy grandfather dies and leaves a cryptic final message in his wake, the siblings and their respective partners must come together for a cross-country road trip to fulfill his final wish and—more importantly—secure their inheritance.
But time with your family can be tough. It is for everyone.
It’s even harder when you’re all keeping secrets and trying to forget a memory—a missing person, an act of revenge, the man in the black truck who won’t stop following your car—and especially when at least one of you is a killer and there’s a body in the trunk. Just to name a few reasons.
But money is a powerful motivator. It is for everyone.
I always talk about plots we haven’t seen and how it’s so important for writers to come up with something fresh and new or put a new spin on something we’ve maybe read before. A road trip with siblings combined with the potential for inheritance is not a storyline I’ve read a million times.
With this novel, I liked how everyone has their own hangups and baggage and the trip is thick with tension. You have to love the greed that pops up when money is involved, combine that with dysfunctional family dynamics and you have the recipe for a fantastic novel.
I am pretty confident that I am going to love whatever Samantha writes next!
Pre-order here, the book will be published on April 28!
Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid was a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick, did you read it? I read it right away and had high expectations for it. I was intrigued by the plot and had high expectations!
Here’s the plot:
Alix Chamberlain is a woman who gets what she wants and has made a living showing other women how to do the same. A mother to two small girls, she started out as a blogger and has quickly built herself into a confidence-driven brand. So she is shocked when her babysitter, Emira Tucker, is confronted while watching the Chamberlains’ toddler one night. Seeing a young black woman out late with a white child, a security guard at their local high-end supermarket accuses Emira of kidnapping two-year-old Briar. A small crowd gathers, a bystander films everything, and Emira is furious and humiliated. Alix resolves to make it right.
But Emira herself is aimless, broke, and wary of Alix’s desire to help. At twenty-five, she is about to lose her health insurance and has no idea what to do with her life. When the video of Emira unearths someone from Alix’s past, both women find themselves on a crash course that will upend everything they think they know about themselves, and each other.
I liked the book and thought the author has a nice writing style with chapters that seamlessly flowed. You can see how something like this happening in real life would kick off an entire storm of harsh feelings between people and I expected it to veer off into another direction with more tension. It is, however, insightful and well written and if you adjust your expectations- its not a hugely shocking story as I first anticipated, I think you will enjoy it.
Saint X by Alexis Schaitkin has been described as a “slow burn” and I agree. It’s not a heart-pounding mystery or thriller that has you turning the pages, dying to see what’s happening, its more of a good story that is meant to be taken in and enjoyed. It’s atmospheric and very detailed in the descriptions. You really do get a sense of the island and you can almost feel the humid air on your skin!
Claire is only seven years old when her college-age sister, Alison, disappears on the last night of their family vacation at a resort on the Caribbean island of Saint X. Several days later, Alison’s body is found in a remote spot on a nearby cay, and two local men – employees at the resort – are arrested. But the evidence is slim, the timeline against it, and the men are soon released. The story turns into national tabloid news, a lurid mystery that will go unsolved. For Claire and her parents, there is only the return home to broken lives.
Years later, Claire is living and working in New York City when a brief but fateful encounter brings her together with Clive Richardson, one of the men originally suspected of murdering her sister. It is a moment that sets Claire on an obsessive pursuit of the truth – not only to find out what happened the night of Alison’s death but also to answer the elusive question: Who exactly was her sister? At seven, Claire had been barely old enough to know her: a beautiful, changeable, provocative girl of eighteen at a turbulent moment of identity formation.
As Claire doggedly shadows Clive, hoping to gain his trust, waiting for the slip that will reveal the truth, an unlikely attachment develops between them, two people whose lives were forever marked by the same tragedy.
This is a book that you can read slowly and allow yourself to sink into the words and the scenes and really imagine it all as the story unfolds. The characters were so well written and lifelike, its hard to achieve such flawed yet sympathetic characters when writing and the author did it.
You can get this book by going here. Let me know how you like it!
If you love books like Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, The Library of Lost and Found, and stories in that vein, you will enjoy The Love Story of Missy Carmichael by Beth Morrey.
I really enjoy stories that make me feel introspective or show a character with a change of heart towards life in general. Which reminds me, have you seen After Life on Netflix? Its a much watch and inspires much of the same emotions as reading this book!
Millicent “Missy’ Carmichael is an older woman who is all alone and quite depressed. She suffers from a damaged relationship with her family and my heart ached for Missy. I could see how this could be a real scenario for someone and that’s what makes me feel so sad. She’s not the happiest or most pleasant person but I saw a vulnerability within her and I connected to her despite her nasty thoughts towards other people.
Take a look:
Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. Woman meets dog…
The world has changed around Missy Carmichael. At seventy-nine, she’s estranged from her daughter, her son and only grandson live across the world in Australia, and her great love is gone. Missy spends her days with a sip of sherry, scrubbing the kitchen in her big empty house and reliving her past–though it’s her mistakes, and secrets, that she allows to shine brightest. The last thing Missy expects is for two perfect strangers and one spirited dog to break through her prickly exterior and show Missy just how much love she still has to give. Filled with wry laughter and deep insights into the stories we tell ourselves, The Love Story of Missy Carmichael shows us it’s never too late to teach an old dog new tricks. It’s never too late to love.
I loved Missy and her story. I really like books like this one where its a lovely story and characters you won’t soon forget. The way Missy changed throughout the pages shows us that its never too late in late to change things around.
This is another must-read it! Out on April 7, order it here.
When something seems too good to be true…it usually is! Such is the case in The Apartment by K.L. Slater who introduces us to Freya and her young daughter Skye. Freya is totally down on her luck so when she happens to meet a kind man who offers her a luxury apartment for cheap, she cannot believe it! Things are looking up.
Suddenly Freya is living in a posh place in a beautiful area of town. She is excited for a fresh start after the death of her husband and this place is going to be perfect! Except…things are starting to seem weird. And the people act kind of bizarre. What’s with the sounds coming from the other side of the apartment? And when she hears rumors of a young woman dying in this very same apartment, Freya begins to wonder if maybe this isn’t the best place for her and Skye.
Take a look here:
Freya Miller needs a miracle. In the fallout of her husband’s betrayal, she’s about to lose her family home, and with it the security she craves for her five-year-old daughter, Skye. Adrift and alone, she’s on the verge of despair until a chance meeting with the charismatic Dr Marsden changes everything. He’s seeking a new tenant for a shockingly affordable flat in a fashionable area of London.
Adder House sounds too good to be true… But Freya really can’t afford to be cynical, and Dr Marsden is adamant she and Skye will be a perfect fit with the other residents.
But Adder House has secrets. Even behind a locked front door, Freya feels as if she’s being watched: objects moving, unfamiliar smells, the blinking light of a concealed camera… and it’s not long before she begins to suspect that her dream home is hiding a nightmarish reality. Was it really chance that led her here—or something unthinkably dark?
As the truth about Adder House starts to unravel, can Freya and Skye get out—or will they be locked in forever?
I was totally hooked from the beginning pages and liked the authors writing style. This is the second book I’ve read by her and will definitely be reading more. Highly recommend, this book is due out on April 28 but she has loads of suspense to choose from in the meantime!
Pre-order this book right here!
Framed by S.L. McInnis was a fast-paced read with twists and turns to satisfy the biggest fans of this genre! Beth Crawford and her husband Jason live in Los Angeles where she is a piano teacher and he’s a movie producer.
Cassie is Beth’s old friend from her college days and when she calls to say she’s coming to town and wants to see Beth, we wonder why? The two have grown apart over the years. Why now? What does Cassie have to hide and what is she doing? There’s a bit of a police procedural thrown in here too with the point-of-view from a policeman who is working on a case. Is his case connected to Beth, Cassie, Jay and how or why? So many questions!
Here’s the official plot:
One dark Los Angeles night, Beth Crawford is driving home from a dinner party, furious at her husband for spending money they don’t have. A few blocks away, a scantily dressed woman in a blonde wig lugs a suitcase full of blood-spattered cash toward a bus stop. In the streets between the two women, police cars flash past, racing to the scene of a quadruple homicide, a botched drug deal in which an undercover LAPD officer is among the dead….
I like reading books where I have no idea what is going to happen next. So many times I can figure things out and make connections but this had me stumped. This is a book that I read in a single day, I had to know what was going to happen!
Framed is out now and ready to download on your Kindle here!
Truths I Never Told You by Kelly Rimmer is fiction but could easily be a story that is real. Being a mother is really hard and not many people talk about this. So when Beth has trouble coping with her newborn, it’s easier to throw herself into cleaning her parent’s old house than it is to be home with her baby.
Going through all the stuff accumulated through the years is an enormous undertaking but Beth is glad to do it. Once in the midst of sorting through the old papers and books, she comes across her (now deceased) mother’s old journal entry. She discovers her mother didn’t die in a car accident as she and her siblings were led to believe. What really happened? Maybe there was more to her mother and her father too than she ever knew.
Here’s the official synopsis:
With her father recently moved to a care facility for his worsening dementia, Beth Walsh volunteers to clear out the family home and is surprised to discover the door to her childhood playroom padlocked. She’s even more shocked at what’s behind it—a hoarder’s mess of her father’s paintings, mounds of discarded papers and miscellaneous junk in the otherwise fastidiously tidy house.
As she picks through the clutter, she finds a loose journal entry in what appears to be her late mother’s handwriting. Beth and her siblings grew up believing their mother died in a car accident when they were little more than toddlers, but this note suggests something much darker. Beth soon pieces together a disturbing portrait of a woman suffering from postpartum depression and a husband who bears little resemblance to the loving father Beth and her siblings know. With a newborn of her own and struggling with motherhood, Beth finds there may be more tying her and her mother together than she ever suspected.
This is a beautifully written book that tackles post-partum depression, caring for older parents, siblings, parenting, secrets. The book goes between 1996 with Beth and 1957 with her mother Grace but what links them through time is their struggles and severity of their overwhelming emotions.
A deep and intense read about a subject we should probably talk about more. Truths I Never told you will be out on April 14. I’d love to see this as a movie!
Though I am typically not a fan of books that aren’t rooted in things that could happen in real life, I did enjoy Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore! I just had to get my hands on this because the description really intrigued me.
Take a look:
It’s New Year’s Eve 1982, and Oona Lockhart has her whole life before her. At the stroke of midnight, she will turn nineteen, and the year ahead promises to be one of consequence. Should she go to London to study economics, or remain at home in Brooklyn to pursue her passion for music and be with her boyfriend? As the countdown to the New Year begins, Oona faints and awakens thirty-two years in the future in her fifty-one-year-old body. Greeted by a friendly stranger in a beautiful house she’s told is her own, Oona learns that with each passing year she will leap to another age at random. And so begins Oona Out of Order…
Hopping through decades, pop culture fads, and much-needed stock tips, Oona is still a young woman on the inside but ever-changing on the outside. Who will she be next year? Philanthropist? Club Kid? World traveler? Wife to a man she’s never met? Surprising, magical, and heart-wrenching, Margarita Montimore has crafted an unforgettable story about the burdens of time, the endurance of love, and the power of family.
I always love some good pop culture references so I loved that part of the book! The author has a writing style that flows nicely and I connected with Oona’s struggles, not struggles of jumping through years of her life out of order, but about the things going on around her. I especially liked Oona and her mother’s relationship.
Margarita was so creative with this inventive novel! I’ve never read such a story where the main character is living life with years out of order. Imagine how hard that would be? At certain times, Oona knows what’s going to happen, other times, she is baffled.
This was a fun read and gave the reader a fresh perspective on life and living in the moment.
This is out now! Go here to grab a copy.
The Lucky One by Lori Rader-Day is another slow burn of a novel. A suspense, it takes time to unfold so you can read slowly and without fear of missing something important because your eyes and brain are working overtime to keep up with the story.
The novel is about Alice, the “lucky one” who was stolen as a child but was found later. She volunteers for a website that is committed to tracking down people who have gone missing. Imagine her reaction when she sees the person who abducted her as a child. Later, the post is deleted but its too late. She is now set on finding this man.
The search is dark and twisty, I cannot imagine being Alice and dealing with a traumatic event then hunting for the person who committed the crime.
Here’s the official synopsis:
As a child, Alice was stolen from her backyard in a tiny Indiana community, but against the odds, her policeman father tracked her down within twenty-four hours and rescued her from harm. In the aftermath of the crime, her family decided to move to Chicago and close the door on that horrible day.
Yet Alice hasn’t forgotten. She devotes her spare time volunteering for a website called The Doe Pages scrolling through pages upon pages of unidentified people, searching for clues that could help reunite families with their missing loved ones. When a face appears on Alice’s screen that she recognizes, she’s stunned to realize it’s the same man who kidnapped her decades ago. The post is deleted as quickly as it appeared, leaving Alice with more questions than answers.
Embarking on a search for the truth, she enlists the help of friends from The Doe Pages to connect the dots and find her kidnapper before he hurts someone else. Then Alice crosses paths with Merrily Cruz, another woman who’s been hunting for answers of her own. Together, they begin to unravel a dark, painful web of lies that will change what they thought they knew—and could cost them everything.
I thought this was a great premise for a story and there was so much intrigue. I feel like it could be a true crime story that I’d listen to on a podcast!
This is out now so you can read it today!
If you haven’t read anything by Suzanne Rindell, do yourself a favor and go read one of her books right now. She is one of my favorite writers, her style strikes the perfect chord of descriptive, emotional, and detailed, with a dash of suspense, rooted in another time and place.
In The Two Mrs. Carlyles, we are introduced to three orphan girls who are best friends but consider themselves to be more like sisters. When a fire breaks out at the orphanage, they take the opportunity to run. Having no money or experience, the best they can do is live at a boardinghouse and work as dance hall girls with the exception of Violet who works as a cook/maid. Life is a struggle for the girls where they work hard for little money and aren’t treated well.
When the earthquake occurs and kills their boss this wild ride of a story begins!
Synopsis:
Violet may be one of three people in San Francisco grateful for the devastating destruction of the 1906 earthquake, which leaves her and her two best friends unexpectedly wealthy – assuming they can leave the horrifying secret that binds them together buried beneath the rubble. Fearing discovery, the women strike out on their own, and Violet finds herself in a new and fulfilling life of independence.
When a whirlwind romance with the city’s most eligible widower, Harry Carlyle, lands her in a luxurious mansion as the second Mrs. Carlyle, it seems like all of her dreams of happiness and love have come true. But all is not right in the Carlyle home, and Violet soon finds herself trapped by the lingering specter of the first Mrs. Carlyle, and by the inescapable secrets of her own violent history.
The Two Mrs. Carlyles grabbed me from the first page and I loved it until the very end. Those who love history and suspense will devour this book!
It’s due out on July 28, pre-order now. In the meantime, read any of Suzanne Rindells other books, they are all terrific!
What Lies Between Us by John Marrs was a twisted and dark story that alternates between mother’s and daughter’s point of view. You really never know who is telling the truth and several times, I was left with my jaw open saying, “NO WAY!”
Talk about family problems and dysfunction! This goes beyond what you could ever imagine although if you watch true crime shows as I do, nothing is surprising.
I wasn’t sure what was going on… or who could we, the reader, trust?
Here’s the synopsis:
They say every house has its secrets, and the house that Maggie and Nina have shared for so long is no different. Except that these secrets are not buried in the past.
Every other night, Maggie and Nina have dinner together. When they are finished, Nina helps Maggie back to her room in the attic, and into the heavy chain that keeps her there. Because Maggie has done things to Nina that can’t ever be forgiven, and now she is paying the price.
But there are many things about the past that Nina doesn’t know, and Maggie is going to keep it that way—even if it kills her. Because in this house, the truth is more dangerous than lies.
This is one of those books where the less you know going into the book, the better. You want to be surprised and shocked! But know that John Marrs is a gifted suspense writer who never lets me down with his downright creepy stories!
This comes out on May 15, pre-order here. You can read The Good Samaritan, one of his earlier novels, for free on Kindle Unlimited.
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