Month: March 2021

The Lost Manuscript is a beautiful uplifting story about a manuscript accidently misplaced and all the people whose lives were changed or inspired after reading it, including its own authors.

Told in letters, the story begins when Anne-Lise Briard finds a manuscript tucked away in a drawer in the hotel room she is staying in France. She finds a name and address within its pages and sends off a letter. She immediately falls in love with the story in the manuscript. She soon gets her reply by mail from the author who tells her he lost the manuscript over 30 years ago, but never completed the story so is unsure as to who or when the manuscript was completed.

Anne-Lise intrigued by the mystery makes it her mission to track down who finished the manuscript and how it ended up in the drawer. With few clues and a little help from old and new friends she begins a journey which will take her all over France, London and beyond.

During her investigation she will learn the manuscript has changed hands many times. How the power of the story and the way each person found the manuscript and how reading it affected them, giving them the strength they needed to endure lost love, heartaches and heartbreaks, new love and past love.

Along the way she too gains strength from their stories, some which were never suppose to be told, while learning how sometimes true love never dies, but is capable of finding its way back to where it always belonged.

The conclusion to this cleverly written book will both satisfy you and will certainly bring you to tears as the long journey of the lost manuscript falls into the hands of its rightful owners and finds its way home.

The latest installment in the Hannah Swensen series finds Lake Eden Mayor Bascomb, a notorious cheater and scammer, dead in his office after having a very heated exchange with Hannah’s sister Andrea. Unfortunately this makes her the prime suspect.

Andrea says she did go back to the Mayor’s office but to apologize and give him a piece of Hannah’s Triple Chocolate Cheesecake where she found him dead. With husband Bill unable to help with the murder investigation, it is up to Hannah to try and clear her sister’s name.

Hannah goes into case solving mode to try and find out what really happened. But with so many residents who live in town and others who have left who the Mayor has offended throughout the years, (including his wife), Hannah must begin the long process of eliminating suspects.

And while this investigation is going on, Hannah herself is very busy preparing for the Easter season at her cookie shop, The Cookie Jar. She has been experimenting with not only new cookie ideas, but cupcakes as well.

More importantly though, Hannah is still trying to come to grips with her husband’s murder and all that entailed while still unable to live at her condo where the murder took place. She is like a nomad moving from her mother’s apartment to her friend Norman’s house. Her life seems to be in quite a turmoil and now with the pressure to help her sister she feels as if she is in a fog.

Hopefully her head will clear long enough to solve this murder or she could be the killer’s next victim.

Once again, Joanne Fluke has written a wonderful cozy murder mystery with characters we all love and look forward to reading about to find out where they are headed next. And this book comes just in time for bakers everywhere looking for some new recipes! Sometimes it’s just nice to read a good old fashion who done it which features mouth watering recipes we can try once we catch the killer!

Thank you #NetGalley #Kensington #JoanneFluke #TripleChocolateCheesecakeMurder for the advanced copy.

This really is not a ghost story, but…it is as creepy and close to one as you can possibly get! This is not a love story, but…it is as heartbreaking as any story can possibly be.

This is a story of a young girl, looking to put the past behind her to hopefully evolve into a better future.

The story is told to the reader by Daffodil Franklin, a young woman who will be attending college this coming fall. As other seniors take their summer before college to enjoy friends and relax, Daffodil finds a job working in order to support herself in school. But something happened to Daffodil which she will not tell us. She calls it the thing that cannot be said.

She finds an incredible job babysitting a huge house for the summer for a professor who needs to be out of town. There is construction going on and he would like someone to house sit and make sure all goes well. And the pay is incredible.

But from the moment she steps into the house she feels like something is off. From strange workers, to a friend of the professor’s who seems to pop in anytime she likes, everything seems a bit unsettling. Perhaps she doesn’t belong there. Why did she take this job? But the bottom line, she needs the money and can’t leave.

Then things go missing and missing things show up. Perhaps the house is angry at her for some reason. When these strange occurrences begin to happen Daffodil shrugs them off as old house syndrome. This house does have quite the story behind it. But when these unusual irregularities begin to creep into her dreams, she tries to explain them away as still being upset about the thing she will not tell us.

The longer her stay in the house, the more bitter the house becomes, and Daffodil begins to not know what is reality and what is hallucination. Perhaps in anger the house wants to swallow her up. But why?

And with the astonishing conclusion when we finally, finally discover what the thing is she will not say, we come to many realizations about Daffodil, the workmen, her life and the house.

An incredible page turner.

But…this is not a ghost story, I promise…

In the second book by the author of The Tenant, we find Detective Jeppe Korner now divorced and living with his anxiety ridden, overbearing mother. His partner Anette Werner is out on maternity leave after a very surprising pregnancy.

When a paperboy finds the dead body of a naked woman in a fountain with slits all over her body and all the blood drained out of her Korner and replacement partner Falck, a bumbling sort of detective, begin to try and put the pieces of this murder together.

Werner, who is having a difficult time adjusting to motherhood and the whole bonding experience recognizes the name of the murdered victim from the maternity ward where she has just given birth. She decides to investigate the murder on her own, behind her husband’s back and against Korner’s wishes.

Then a second body is discovered with the exact same marks on its body, and once again all the blood drained. As in the first killing, no one saw anything and there is no forensic evidence that could link anyone to either murder. But they do get a significant break in the case. Both victims had previously worked in a private hospital called The Butterfly House. It was a place for children with eating disorders, anxiety and psychological problems. It was a private pay facility and medications were recommended as well as counseling. But The Butterfly House had been shut down a few years ago after after one of its counselors was found drowned and one of the residence, a young woman killed herself. The parents of the dead girl sued the care facility and it shut down soon after.

Could it be possible that someone who use to work or live there had a grudge against the remaining staff and was slowly killing them all? As Korner and Falck begin to interrogate former staff and family from The Butterfly House, unbeknownst to Korner, Werner has come to the somewhat same conclusion and begins her own investigation by trying to find the teens who were at the facility at the time of the suicide. What she uncovers is alarming.

During the same time all this is going on the Coronary Hospital seems to be experiencing a more than usual sudden death count. One of the former Butterfly House nurses just happens to work there. And she is still friends with the psychiatrist from her prior job.

Korner is given an ultimatum by his superior. Find out who is doing all these killings or you will have consequences. Now, not only is he in a race to hopefully prevent more murders, but now his job is in jeopardy. Meanwhile Werner seems to be getting closer to the truth. Flying solo she suddenly becomes the obsession of the killer. With no one knowing where or what she is up to could this possibly be the end of her partnership with Korner forever?

But while suspects are eliminated there seems to be many more questions than answers as to what was really happening at The Butterfly House years ago and why so many people who worked there are dead.

As in The Tenant, Engberg’s explosive twisted ending impeccably ties up all the unanswered questions. Characters from the first story are once again given their own storyline which was a special treat. Overall The Butterfly House is a suspenseful, enjoyable read with characters we all can relate.

Thank you #NetGalley #Gallery/ScoutPress #KatrineEngberg #TheButterflyHouse for the advanced copy.

Ree Drummond also known as The Pioneer Woman, cook show host, author and entrepreneur’s latest book Frontier Follies is an uplifting book of essays about her life on the Drummond ranch with her in-laws, children, cowboys and husband. Now, if you are not a fan of Ree, (I personally feel like she is a friend in my head), this book may not be for you. But if you enjoy witty stories about life, love and skunks you will enjoy this book of well written, heartwarming themes.

In Frontier Follies, Drummond gives the reader an inside seat at her and husband Ladd’s table where she shares some very funny, sometimes crude table talk on life on a ranch. Whether it’s how she seems to wash dishes as she and Ladd have arguments, (I Do Dishes When I Argue), or how no one comes between Ladd and a meal, (Ladd and the Gala) or what their trials and tribulations were during their first year of marriage with Ree being pregnant and trying to adjust to life on a ranch where her closest neighbor is almost an hour away, there is a certain flair and sarcasm she uses to make even the direst of situations make you smile.

As she chronicles her families lives on the ranch, attempting homeschooling, or planting sunflowers only to have them destroyed, or telling the tale of a family of skunks who moved in under their house on the ranch, each essay exudes her charm.

There is a section on losing Ladd’s mother Nan a few years ago as well as a naughty essay about Nan which made me laugh out loud. Also included is the story of how they became foster parents to their “bonus kid” Jamar and what the adjustment was like for everybody in their family. Oh, and there are stories about the cowboys on the ranch!

Frontier Follies is an enjoyable, easy read with a tender and lighthearted look into how someone’s track in life of becoming a lawyer took a deep turn when she fell in love with a cowboy.

Emma Lord, author of the adorable bestselling young adult novel, Tweet Cute has struck gold with her latest novel, another heartfelt, empowering, riveting and intriguing story in You Have A Match.

When Abby and her best friends Leo and Connie send out their DNA as part of a school science project, Abby is mildly curious for herself, but more so for Leo who is adopted and who although is her best friend is also her secret crush. But the results that come back are more startling than anyone could ever imagine. Abby finds out she has an older sister who just happens to be a social media phenomenon named Savannah Tully (Savvy). Her parents have never once mentioned anything about having another child and when Abby agrees to meet Savvy they realize they are practically clones of each other. They don’t understand why they would have given Savvy up for adoption. And then they discover that their parents knew each other at the time of the adoption.

So Abby is extremely confused. Since her grandfather passed she has been lost. He was everything a young awkward teenager needed in a friend. A photographer, he encouraged her love for taking pictures of people and urged her to branch other into other areas. Her grades have been sliding and she feels uncomfortable with herself and feels unable to explain to her parents what she really wants out of life as she feels they already have her life planned out for her. She is self conscience around Leo after Connie’s admission that he does not feel the same way about her.

Abby and Savvy hatch a plan to go the summer camp where Savvy is a counselor. They decide at some point their parents will come and visit and find out the girls know they are related and hopefully tell them what happened all those years ago. But unbeknownst to Abby, Leo is there as a camp chef which then puts Abby’s emotional turmoil into high gear. How can Abby be herself with Leo here?

But when Abby and Savvy’s parents finally meet, it does not go well at all. Abby’s parents decide she needs to come home. How can Abby and Savvy try and save their own relationship if their parent won’t even communicate? And more importantly what on earth put the adults on this path years ago? Why was Savvy given away?

You Have A Match is a charming coming of age novel written with feeling and emotion. This creative story has wit, love, romance, family support and mystery.

Thank you #NetGalley #WednesdayBooks #EmmaLord #YouHaveAMatch for the advanced copy.