Review: Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 by Francine Prose

20 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932

• Print Length: 448 pages
• Publisher: Harper (April 22, 2014)

Paris in the 1920s. It is a city of intoxicating ambition, passion, art, and discontent, where louche jazz venues like the Chameleon Club draw expats, artists, libertines, and parvenus looking to indulge their true selves. It is at the Chameleon where the striking Lou Villars, an extraordinary athlete and scandalous cross-dressing lesbian, finds refuge among the club’s loyal denizens, including the rising photographer Gabor Tsenyi, the socialite and art patron Baroness Lily de Rossignol, and the caustic American writer Lionel Maine.

As the years pass, their fortunes—and the world itself—evolve. Lou falls in love and finds success as a race car driver. Gabor builds his reputation with vivid and imaginative photographs, including a haunting portrait of Lou and her lover, which will resonate through all their lives. As the exuberant twenties give way to darker times, Lou experiences another metamorphosis that will warp her earnest desire for love and approval into something far more sinister: collaboration with the Nazis.

Told in a kaleidoscope of voices, Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 evokes this incandescent city with brio, humor, and intimacy. A brilliant work of fiction and a mesmerizing read, it is Francine Prose’s finest novel yet.

Buy. Read. Discuss.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Indie Bound | Add to Goodreads

About the author, Francine Prose

Francine Prose is the author of twenty works of fiction. Her novel A Changed Man won the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and Blue Angel was a finalist for the National Book Award. Her most recent works of nonfiction include the highly acclaimed Anne Frank: The Book, The Life, The Afterlife and the New York Times bestseller Reading Like a Writer.

The recipient of numerous grants and honors, including a Guggenheim and a Fulbright, a Director’s Fellow at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library, Prose is a former president of PEN American Center, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She lives in New York City.

My Thoughts

As I was getting ready for the last day of Dallas Comic-Con on Sunday, I was listening to Weekend Edition on NPR, and this book – Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 was mentioned. Immediately, I grabbed my phone and tweeted, “Does anyone ELSE get excited when a book they’re already reading is mentioned by @NPR or @NPRbooks?” It was gratifying to learn that I am not the only one.

I had to leave the room before the show was over, so I didn’t get to hear the whole story, but that doesn’t matter. It was nice to know I was ahead of the curve on this book. At least, a little bit.

The Interwar period has been sort of haunting me lately, and Lovers… is just one of those pleasantly insistent ghosts. Told in many voices – a family historian, a young photographer, etc., it unfolds like a flower, or one of those paper “cootie catchers” we all made in childhood. There are stories within stories, and all involve rich characters, lush descriptions, and enough of the politics of the day to make you feel as if the Nazis are peering over your shoulder as you read.

I mean, seriously, Francine Prose nails it when it comes to “ominous.”

She also nails it when it comes to her vision of an underground club in Paris. What could have come off as a poor man’s La Cage aux Folles, instead, is so well described that I could smell the smoke from the cigarettes (I’m betting they were Gauloises) in their holders, and hear the soft, bubbling fizz of champagne and the gentle clinks and clicks of glassware and tableware. I could also envision the clothes, because we all know that the ambiguous cross-gender counterculture embraces the BEST couture in any age.

But it’s the story that’s important, and in telling Lou Villars’s story, Francine Prose shows us a spiral into evil, deception, and betrayal that manages to be gripping, sad, horrifying, and poignant all at once.

What would you do for love? What would you do for notoriety? For success? For money? For survival?

Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932 asks these questions, and if the answers aren’t always happy ones, at least they are finely crafted and brutally, brilliantly honest.

Goes well with champagne, dahling…or possibly absinthe.

This review is part of a virtual book tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information, and the complete list of tour stops, click HERE.

Review: Little Island, by Katharine Britton

19 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book Little Island

Paperback: 320 pages

Publisher: Berkley Trade (September 3, 2013)

Grace
Flowers
By the water
Have fun!

These are Grace’s mother’s last words – left behind on a note. A note that Grace interprets as instructions for her memorial service. And so her far-flung clan will gather at their inn on Little Island, Maine, to honor her.

Twenty years ago, a tragedy nearly destroyed the Little family – and still defines them. Grace, her husband Gar, and their three grown children, Joy, Roger and Tamar each played a role in what transpired. But this weekend, they will discover that there is more than pain and heartbreak that binds their family together, when a few simple words lift the fog and reveal what truly matters.

Watch the book trailer HERE. Read an excerpt HERE.

Buy. Read. Discuss.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-a-Million | Add to Goodreads

About the author, Katharine Britton

Katharine Britton has a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from Dartmouth College, and a Master’s in Education from the University of Vermont. Her screenplay, “Goodbye Don’t Mean Gone,” was a Moondance Film Festival winner and a finalist in the New England Women in Film and Television contest. Katharine is a member of the League of Vermont Writers, New England Independent Booksellers Association, and The New Hampshire Writer’s Project. She has taught at Institute for Lifelong Education at Dartmouth, Colby-Sawyer College, and The Writer’s Center in White River Junction.

When not at her desk, Katharine can often be found in her Norwich garden, waging a non-toxic war against the slugs, snails, deer, woodchucks, chipmunks, moles, voles, and beetles with whom she shares her yard. Katharine’s defense consists mainly of hand-wringing, after the fact.

Katharine’s first novel Her Sister’s Shadow was published in 2011 by Berkley Books (Penguin, USA). Little Island is her second novel. She is currently working on another manuscript.

Connect with Katharine

Website | Facebook | Pinterest | Twitter

My Thoughts

Maybe it’s because I was practically born on the beach, and grew up with sand and salt on my skin and in my hair, but I have a special fondness for “beach books.” I don’t mean the fluffy, light reading that people bring to the beach. I mean, well, I guess you could call them “contemporary coastals” – books that take place on or near the coast, and typically include a beach house, cottage, or the like.

Little Island takes place in a coastal inn, a family-run business on the water, which, in my personal categorization system, makes it a “beach book.” But like most of the books of this type, it’s actually a gripping drama that centers on the concepts of family, love, obligation, and belonging.

Some of the novel is told in first person, mainly those chapters from Joy’s point of view. I’m not sure if this makes Joy an unreliable narrator, but it does mean that I felt more connected to Joy. It is through her eyes that I experienced the rest of the story.

The setup is classic: everyone gathers for a memorial service. The result is anything but typical, and we see a fabulous collection of relationships – Joy’s parents, aging but still active, Joy’s twin siblings who are younger than she is, but were always the ones to exclude her, Joy’s twin nieces who are less than thrilled to be in their mother’s care during the novel, and of course Joy herself, because even though she has a husband and has just sent her son off to college, her real journey is one of self.

I think that’s why I responded to this novel so strongly. I mean, author Katharine Britton has given us an amazing setting (seriously, I want to live at this inn), three-dimensional characters, and a rich story with background characters who may not show up much but are nevertheless integral to the plot, but – for me – this was about the journey Joy has – the one we women all have at one time or another in our lives – to finding herself.

I was strongly reminded by the lines Samantha speaks near the end of the Sex and the City movie: “I’ve been in a relationship with myself for fifty years and that’s the one I need to work on.”

If you’re looking for fast-paced action or kinky sex, this is not the book for you. If, however, you want an absorbing read, a character-driven story, and a level of detail that allows you to smell the salt air, you should click over to your favorite bookseller’s website, and buy Little Island right now. You won’t regret it.

Goes well with fried clams and cold beer.

This review is part of a virtual book tour sponsored by TLC Book Tours. For more information, or the complete list of tour stops, click HERE.

Review: Fallout by Sadie Jones

14 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book, Fallout

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Harper (April 29, 2014)

Luke Kanowski is a young playwright— intense, magnetic, and eager for life. He escapes a disastrous upbringing in the northeast and, arriving in London, meets Paul Driscoll, an aspiring producer, and the beautiful, fiery Leigh Radley, the woman Paul loves.

The three set up a radical theater company, living and working together; a romantic connection forged in candlelit rehearsal rooms during power cuts and smoky late-night parties in Chelsea’s run-down flats. The gritty rebellion of pub theater is fighting for its place against a West End dominated by racy revue shows and the giants of twentieth-century drama.

Nina Jacobs is a fragile actress, bullied by her mother and in thrall to a controlling producer. When Luke meets Nina, he recognizes a soul in danger—but how much must he risk to save her?

Everything he has fought for—loyalty, friendship, art—is drawn into the heat of their collision. As Luke ricochets between honesty and deceit, the promise of the future and his own painful past, the fallout threatens to be immense.

Read and discuss Fallout, by Sadie Jones

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | IndieBound | Add to Goodreads

About the author, Sadie Jones

Sadie Jones is the author of The Outcast, a winner of the Costa First Novel Award in Great Britain, and a finalist for the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction; the novel Small Wars; and the bestselling novel The Uninvited Guests. She lives in London.

My Thoughts

As someone who has written for amateur theatrical productions, and been on stage as both an amateur and professional performer, I was intrigued by the description when the lovely folks at TLC Book Tours invited me to review Fallout.

I’m pleased to report that that the novel was every bit as interesting as I’d hoped. It presents a view of life in theater that is both romantic and gritty, hovering on the line of each. The central characters, Luke, Paul, Leigh, and Nina all feel very real, very three-dimensional, and I could easily see any or all of them existing in that heightened reality that is show business.

Because I, too, am the daughter of a strong (formidable, even) mother, I thought I would resonate most with Nina, but Nina is a fragile, broken young woman and ended up frustrating me at times. If she’d been my friend, I would have staged an intervention or two during her life.

Leigh was, in many ways, the least defined of the remaining central four, but it was her practicality and (apparently) easy attitude that really drew me in. The boys (yes, they’re adults, but they’re very much still boys), Paul and Luke, reminded me of people I actually know. Luke especially so, as I have a friend from improv and audio drama who finished his university studies two years ago, and has been attempting to write and produce plays, and is the kind of young man who is oblivious when a woman is flirting with him.

Sadie Jones gave us, in Fallout a plot that seemed predictable and yet was not. (I was half-expecting Luke to ride in on the proverbial white horse and rescue Nina forever), and it also showed a fairly realistic collection of romances, some less heady than others, some that lasted a lifetime, while others were clearly short duration affairs, but all of which made sense.

Jones also has a finely honed sense of place in this novel. I felt the rain, smelled the greasy chips, heard the footsteps on different floors. Nothing ever seemed contrived or false.

If you’re looking for a fluffy love story, Fallout is not the novel for you. If, on the other hand, you want a romantic tale based in a reality not too different from our own, with compelling, believable characters, go buy a copy right now. You won’t be sorry.

Goes well with steak and salad.

This review is part of a blog tour organized by TLC Book Tours. For more information, and the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: The Garden Plot, by Marty Wingate – with Giveaway

8 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book, The Garden Plot

Publisher: Alibi (May 6, 2014)
Sold by: Random House LLC

In an entirely appealing mystery debut, Marty Wingate introduces readers to a curious Texas ex-pat whose English gardening expertise on occasion leads her to unearth murderous goings-on.

Pru Parke always dreamed of living in England. And after the Dallas native follows an impulse and moves to London, she can’t imagine ever leaving—though she has yet to find a plum position as a head gardener. Now, as the sublet on her flat nears its end, the threat of forced departure looms. Determined to stay in her beloved adopted country, Pru takes small, private gardening jobs throughout the city.

On one such gig in Chelsea, she makes an extraordinary find. Digging in the soil of a potting shed, Pru uncovers an ancient Roman mosaic. But enthusiasm over her discovery is soon dampened when, two days later, she finds in the same spot a man’s bludgeoned corpse. As the London police swarm her worksite, ever inquisitive Pru can’t quite manage to distance herself from the investigation—much to the dismay of stern Detective Chief Inspector Christopher Pearse. It seems that, much as he tries, even handsome DCI Pearse can’t keep Pru safe from a brutal killer who thinks she’s already dug up too much.

Read and discuss The Garden Plot

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-a-Million | Add to Goodreads

About the author, Marty Wingate

Marty Wingate is a regular contributor to Country Gardens as well as other magazines. She also leads gardening tours throughout England, Scotland, Ireland, France, and North America. The Garden Plot is her first novel. More Potting Shed mysteries are planned.

My Thoughts

There are books that fall into your life at exactly the right moment. For me The Garden Plot was one of them. It was a murky weekend, I was sick in bed, and I needed something light enough that I could focus on, but with enough substance to keep me interested. This novel delivered that in spades – spades of rich, loamy, literary soil.

First, I loved that the main character, ex-pat Texan Pru was not some twenty-something girl with no life experience. I also liked that she was independent, often to her detriment, but that she also knew her stuff, with regard to her chosen field. I’m not single, but I still have moments when running away to live in another country is incredibly tempting, and I really identified with her.

The supporting characters are also amazing. DCI Christopher Pearse could have been a by-the-book detective, but morphed into a well-rounded character and love interest in a way that felt completely organic. Similarly, Pru’s friends and clients were all three-dimensional.

But for all it’s romantic elements The Garden Plot is also a mystery, and I found the plot to be well-crafted and compelling. While it’s possible my semi-drugged state made me less able to predict the outcome, I prefer to believe it was author Wingate’s talent for storytelling, because this novel has all of the traditional English cozy mystery elements – a fish-out-of-water protagonist, upper-class locals with secrets and hidden connections, and a dashing detective, and instead of feeling at all trite, The Garden Plot feels fresh – as fresh as the first sprouts of new plantings after a spring rain.

Goes well with Hot tea, cucumber sandwiches, and scones still warm from the oven.

Enter to Win

This tour includes a Rafflecopter giveaway for a Grand Prize of a $30 egiftcard to the ebook retailer of the winner’s choice, and a First Prize Mystery Prize Pack of three mystery mass market paperbacks and a gardening title from Random House!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

This review is part of a blog tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information and the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: The Supreme Macaroni Company, by Adriana Trigiani

7 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book, The Supreme Macaroni Company

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Harper Paperbacks; Reprint edition (May 6, 2014)

New York Times bestselling author Adriana Trigiani takes us from the cobblestone streets of Greenwich Village to lush New Orleans to Italy and back again, from the tricky dynamics between Old World craftsmanship and New World ambition, all amid a passionate love affair that fuels one woman’s determination to have it all.

For more than one hundred years, the Angelini Shoe Company in Greenwich Village has relied on the leather produced by Vechiarelli & Son in Tuscany. This ancient business partnership provides a twist of fate for Valentine Roncalli, the schoolteacher-turned-shoemaker, to fall in love with Gianluca Vechiarelli, a tanner with a complex past . . . and a secret.

But after the wedding celebrations are over, Valentine wakes up to the reality of juggling the demands of a new business and the needs of her new family. Confronted with painful choices, Valentine remembers the wise words that inspired her in the early days of her beloved Angelini Shoe Company: “A person who can build a pair of shoes can do just about anything.” Now the proud, passionate Valentine is going to fight for everything she wants and savor all she deserves—the bitter and the sweet of life itself.

Buy, Read, Discuss

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | IndieBound | Add to Goodreads

About the author, Adriana Trigiani

Adriana Trigiani is an award-winning playwright, television writer, and documentary filmmaker. Her books include the New York Times bestseller The Shoemaker’s Wife; the Big Stone Gap series; Very Valentine; Brava, Valentine; Lucia, Lucia; and the bestselling memoir Don’t Sing at the Table, as well as the young adult novels Viola in Reel Life and Viola in the Spotlight. She has written the screenplay for her debut novel Big Stone Gap, which she will also direct. She lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.

Connect with Adriana

Website | Facebook | Twitter

My Thoughts:

In The Supreme Macaroni Company, Adriana Trigiani combines three of my favorite things: realistic romance, shoes, and Italian-American culture. Having grown up in a New Jersey Neapolitan family, it is the latter, especially, that really resonated with me. In the voices of Valentine, her lover Gianluca, and the rest of her family, I heard echoes of my own wild, crazy, broadly gesticulating, incredibly LOUD grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins.

Not having read the previous novel in this series, I did feel a bit as if I had been thrown into the deep end of a pool, with leaky water-wings, but soon enough I had figured out all the relationships, and the experience ultimately enhanced my enjoyment of the story, because I imagine Gianluca felt the same way.

Trigiani’s characters all have delightful eccentricities, some of which are more subtle than others, but they all seemed like people I might know (or be related to). Having also grown up in a couple of family businesses, I could really identify with Valentine’s journey toward business success, a journey that was both aided and overshadowed by her family.

I thought the romance between Valentine and Gianluca was well-written, reminding me a little of my own parents’ relationship, though my stepfather is only 15 years older than my mother.

On the whole, this was a gripping family drama with enough romance to keep things tingly, despite a poignant ending, and enough talk of food to make even a gluten-free vegan crave a plate of lasagna with meatballs on the side.

Goes well with Cappuccino and cannoli, obviously.

This review is part of a virtual blog tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information and the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: Under a Silent Moon, by Elizabeth Haynes

1 May 2014 by Melissa

About the book Under a Silent Moon

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Harper (April 15, 2014)

Devour the Book
Connect the Clues
Discover a Killer

P. D. James meets E. L. James in Under a Silent Moon, this first novel in an exciting British crime series—a blend of literary suspense and page-turning thriller that introduces formidable Detective Chief Inspector Louisa Smith—from suspense talent Elizabeth Haynes, author of the bestselling Into the Darkest Corner.

Two women share one fate.
A suspected murder at an English Farm.
A reported suicide at a local quarry.
Can DCI Louisa Smith and her team gather the evidence and discover a link between them, a link which sealed their fate one cold night, Under a Silent Moon?

A tense, compelling and unsettling novel brimming with source material and evidence set over just six days, Under a Silent Moon will keep you gripped until the very last page and asks:

Can you connect the clues to discover the Killer?

Solve the crime alongside DCI Louisa Smith and her team.

Buy a copy and connect the clues.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

About the author, Elizabeth Haynes

Elizabeth Haynes is a police intelligence analyst, a civilian role that involves determining patterns in offending and criminal behavior. Under a Silent Moon is her fourth novel; rights to her first, Into the Darkest Corner, have been sold in twenty-five territories. Haynes lives in England in a village near Maidstone, Kent, with her husband and son.

Connect with Elizabeth

Website | Facebook | Twitter

My Thoughts

I’m a sucker for a good crime novel. I don’t mind blood and grit as long as that characters ring true, and the mystery is somewhat plausible. In her latest novel, Under a Silent Moon Elizabeth Hayes provides grit, amazing characters, and a story that is immensely readable.

Part conventional thriller, part police procedural, this novel is structured so that we see the tick-tock – the the hour-by-hour countdown of a law enforcement team as they work to solve the a murder, investigate an apparent suicide, and figure out how – and if – each incident is related, while at the same time navigating their personal lives.

DCI Louisa “Lou” Smith is the driving force of the novel, and we see much of it from her point of view. I instantly liked her mix of no-nonsense professionalism with just a hint of feminine softness at appropriate times. This novel very much feels like the first in a series, and I would happily read more of Lou’s adventures. She’s as real, as three dimensional as two of my other favorite female crime fighters, Sara Paretsky’s V.I. Warshawski and Margaret Maron’s Sigrid Harald (yes, yes, I know: Maron’s better known for Deborah Knott, but Sigrid’s just AWESOME) and even reminds me a little of the latter, if she were contemporary and British.

Lou’s entire team was interesting to see in action, and I’ll confess, for once I had NOT worked out the ending before it was revealed.

If you want a gripping story, great characters, and a thriller that truly thrills the imagination, look no further than Under a Silent Moon.

Goes well with Shepherd’s pie and a really good stout.

This review is part of a blog tour sponsored by TLC Book Tours. For more information, and the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: The Serpent of Venice by Christopher Moore

23 April 2014 by Melissa

About the book, The Serpent of Venice

The Serpent of Venice

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow (April 22, 2014)

Venice, a long time ago. Three prominent Venetians await their most loathsome and foul dinner guest, the erstwhile envoy from the Queen of Britain: the rascal-Fool Pocket.

This trio of cunning plotters—the merchant, Antonio; the senator, Montressor Brabantio; and the naval officer, Iago—have lured Pocket to a dark dungeon, promising an evening of sprits and debauchery with a rare Amontillado sherry and Brabantio’s beautiful daughter, Portia.

But their invitation is, of course, bogus. The wine is drugged. The girl isn’t even in the city limits. Desperate to rid themselves once and for all of the man who has consistently foiled their grand quest for power and wealth, they have lured him to his death. (How can such a small man, be such a huge obstacle?). But this Fool is no fool . . . and he’s got more than a few tricks (and hand gestures) up his sleeve.

Greed, revenge, deception, lust, and a giant (but lovable) sea monster combine to create another hilarious and bawdy tale from modern comic genius, Christopher Moore.

Buy a copy and start reading

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

About the author, Christopher Moore

Christopher Moore is the author of twelve previous novels: Practical Demonkeeping, Coyote Blue, Bloodsucking Fiends, Island of the Sequined Love Nun, The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove, Lamb, Fluke, The Stupidest Angel, A Dirty Job, You Suck, Fool , and Bite Me.

He lives in San Francisco, California.

Connect with Christopher

Website | Facebook | Twitter

My Thoughts

I’ve been a fan of Christopher Moore’s books forever. In fact, when I grow up, as a writer, I want to be Christopher Moore (albeit, a version of him with breasts and technicolor hair) so when I was offered the chance to read an ARC of his latest novel, The Serpent of Venice I told the publicist I’d give one of my dogs for the opportunity. Fortunately, that wasn’t actually necessary, and the ARC arrived shortly after, only to sit on my table, mocking me, until my TBR stack was caught up.

It was worth the wait.

This book combines Moore’s take on Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice with his usual comic view of the world, and adds in elements of other literary classics as well (care to try the Amontillado, anyone?). It’s also a sequel to his previous novel Fool, which, I confess, I have not read.

The characters are a blend of the familiar Shakespeare figures and Moore’s own creativity, and while the story has a slightly slow beginning, it ends up being a rollicking ~~roller-coaster~~ gondola ride through the streets and waterways of Venice, with enough real moments balanced by laugh-out-loud preposterous situations to keep everything flowing well but still ensure the reader is capable of drawing breath.

While knowledge of Shakespeare (and Poe…) isn’t essential to the enjoyment of The Serpent of Venice familiarity with the original play certainly didn’t hurt. Similarly, while I didn’t feel like I’d missed much by not having read Fool, I’m sure it would have increased my understanding of some of the nuances in the novel.

Goes well with A plate of spaghetti with marinara sauce and a glass of red wine.

This review is part of a virtual book tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information, and the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: The Time Traveler’s Boyfriend, by Annabelle Costa

17 April 2014 by Melissa

About the book, The Time Traveler’s Boyfriend

Print Length: 250 pages

Publisher: Dev Love Press (February 2, 2014)

Claudia’s geeky boyfriend Adam has just invented a time machine.

No, really—he has. She doesn’t believe it either until Adam provides her with definitive proof that he does, in fact, have a functioning time travel device sitting in the living room of his Manhattan brownstone.

But instead of getting ready to accept the Nobel Prize, Adam has very different plans for his groundbreaking invention. He wants Claudia to use the machine to travel back in time and stop the accident that landed him in a wheelchair over a decade ago, and prevent the trajectory of events that he believes ruined his life.

When Claudia reluctantly agrees to become the first human time traveler, she knows she’s making a big gamble. If she succeeds, she could have the happy ending with commitment-phobic Adam that she’s always dreamed of. But if she fails, it could mean the end of the universe as she knows it.

Read the first chapter, then buy a copy of your own

First Chapter | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Add to Goodreads

About the Author, Annabelle Costa

Annabelle Costa is a teacher who writes in her free time. She enjoys the wounded hero genre, involving male love interests with physical disabilities, who don’t follow the typical Hollywood perception of sexy.

My Thoughts

I don’t read a lot of “formula” romances (though I’ll cop to having had a serious Silhouette Desire addiction when I was a teenager – seriously, those things were like crack), but I’ve read enough of them to recognize that The Time Traveler’s Boyfriend is a slightly more contemporary version of a classic format. Despite that, however, or maybe even because of it, it’s an excellent read, full of fun and flirtatiousness, and the fact that it is from a publishing house that focuses on love stories featuring characters with disabilities gives it a lot more depth than it would otherwise have had.

While I found Claudia’s story to be a bit predictable, I still enjoyed taking her journey with her – a journey from slightly confused girlfriend who really wants a permanent commitment, to what is, eventually, a healthier, more mature version of herself. She’s likeable and relate-able, which is exactly what romance heroines should be.

Then there’s Adam. Geeky. Smart. Affectionate. Dead-sexy. And he happens to be in a wheelchair. What made this book more than ‘just’ a romance novel was how deftly the author, Annabelle Costa, handled Adam’s disability. She made it one facet of his character, but not necessarily a defining facet, and even used it to give him a super-sexy advantage that he would not have otherwise had. For a minute or two, I wanted to date Adam.

I liked the use of time-travel, something that is definitely not a typical romance trope. As I said, I found the plot twist a bit predictable, but it didn’t hurt my enjoyment of the story.

If you want a fun, fast, read with great characters and a couple of really hot love scenes, you should definitely check out The Time Traveler’s Boyfriend.

Goes well with Pad Thai and iced Thai tea.

This review is part of a virtual tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information, or the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: Outside In, by Doug Cooper

16 April 2014 by Melissa

About the book, Outside In

Hardcover: 253 pages

Publisher: Greenleaf Book Group Press (August 13, 2013)

From Memorial Day until the student workers and tourists leave in the fall, the island community of Put-In-Bay, Ohio, thrives on alcohol, drugs, sexual experimentation, and any other means of forgetting responsibilities. To Brad Shepherd–recently forced out of his job as a junior high math teacher after the overdose death of a student–it’s exactly the kind of place he’s looking for.

Allured by the comfort and acceptance of the hedonistic atmosphere, Brad trades his academic responsibilities and sense of obligation for a bouncer’s flashlight and a pursuit of the endless summer. With Cinch Stevens, his new best friend and local drug dealer, at his side, Brad becomes lost in a haze of excess and instant gratification filled with romantic conquests, late-night excursions to special island hideaways, and a growing drug habit. Not even the hope from a blossoming relationship with Astrid, a bold and radiant Norwegian waitress, nor the mentoring from a mysterious mandolin player named Caldwell is enough to pull him out of his downward spiral. But as Labor Day approaches, the grim reality of his empty quest consumes him. With nowhere left to run or hide, Brad must accept that identity cannot be found or fabricated, but emerges from within when one has the courage to let go.

A look at one man’s belated coming of age that’s equally funny, earnest, romantic, and lamenting, Doug Cooper’s debut novel explores the modern search for responsibility and identity, showing through the eyes of Brad Shepherd how sometimes, we can only come to understand who we truly are by becoming the person we’re not.

Buy a copy of your own, and start reading:

Amazon | Books-A-Million | Barnes & Noble

About the author, Doug Cooper

Doug Cooper has traveled to more than twenty countries on five continents and has held jobs in service, teaching, and business. He now lives and writes in Las Vegas. Outside In is his first novel.

Connect with Doug:
Facebook | Twitter | Pinterest | Instagram

My Thoughts

I’ve said before that first person novels tend to be tricky. Many try them, most fail. Doug Cooper, however, makes writing in first person seem effortless, and as a result, when I read Outside In, which, by the way, I LOVED, I felt like I really was seeing things unfold through the eyes of a real person.

For me, even if I’m enjoying a plot or really like a character, it’s the details that make a story really sing, so scenes like the trip on the ferry, and later, the first glimpse we get of the Round House, really gave me a sense of place, but also made everything else seem vivid.

As someone who is on the far side of 40, I always find it interesting when authors recognize that “coming of age” stories aren’t limited to people who are 18-21 years old, but can happen when you’re 25, 35, or even in your sixties. Doug Cooper’s main character is a teacher who is about to finish grad school, but that doesn’t make this any less a coming-of-age tale.

With nuance and a great sense of both language and place, Doug Cooper kept my attention from wandering for the entire length of Outside In (a line about humid air feeling ‘like jelly on my skin’ really struck me) and at the end, I was sad to bid goodbye to Brad and Haley and the rest of the “cast.”

If you’re not certain that this book is for you, let me assure you: IT IS.

Goes well with A really good burger with crinkle-cut fries, and a cold beer, preferably from a joint that caters to summer tourists.

This review is part of a virtual book tour sponsored by TLC Book Tours. For more information, or the complete list of tour stops, click here.

Review: Up at Butternut Lake by Mary McNear

16 April 2014 by Melissa

About the book, Up at Butternut Lake

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks (April 8, 2014)

In the tradition of Kristin Hannah and Susan Wiggs, Mary McNear introduces readers to the town of Butternut Lake and to the unforgettable people who call it home.

It’s summer, and after ten years away, Allie Beckett has returned to her family’s cabin beside tranquil Butternut Lake, where as a teenager she spent so many carefree days. She’s promised her five-year-old son, Wyatt, they will be happy there. She’s promised herself this is the place to begin again after her husband’s death in Afghanistan. The cabin holds so many wonderful memories, but from the moment she crosses its threshold Allie is seized with doubts. Has she done the right thing uprooting her little boy from the only home he’s ever known?

Allie and her son are embraced by the townsfolk, and her reunions with old acquaintances—her friend Jax, now a young mother of three with one more on the way, and Caroline, the owner of the local coffee shop—are joyous ones. And then there are newcomers like Walker Ford, who mostly keeps to himself—until he takes a shine to Wyatt . . . and to Allie.

Everyone knows that moving forward is never easy, and as the long, lazy days of summer take hold, Allie must learn to unlock the hidden longings of her heart, and to accept that in order to face the future she must also confront—and understand—what has come before.

Buy a copy of your own:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

About the author, Mary McNear

Mary McNear lives in San Francisco with her husband, two teenage children, and a high-strung, minuscule white dog named Macaroon. She writes her novels in a local doughnut shop, where she sips Diet Pepsi, observes the hubbub of neighborhood life, and tries to resist the constant temptation of freshly made doughnuts. She bases her novels on a lifetime of summers spent in a small town on a lake in the northern Midwest.

Connect with Mary on Facebook.

My Thoughts

It’s the little details that make or break a book for me. On the surface, Up at Butternut Lake may seem like just another contemporary romance. It’s got the cute small town setting, the strong women who are going through personal struggles (two of them, actually, Allie, and Jax) and the newcomer who still has ties from out of town. But that’s just the surface, and it would be a mistake to write this book off just because it includes a few common tropes.

Instead, look at the details: in the early pages Allie’s young son Wyatt spins on a diner stool. We don’t have a lot of classic diners left in the USA, but trust me, there isn’t a kid alive who could resist the urge to spin on one of those. (I know this from experience because my family owned just such a diner on the Jersey Shore, and we kids used to spin on the blue vinyl stools til we were nauseous.)

Then there’s Allie herself. She’s at the lake in part because it’s a personal haven for her, full of good memories, but also because, having lost her husband, she wants to be in a place where she can rebuild trust in herself, without the often-stifling offers of help. She isn’t a misanthrope; she just needs to find her footing.

These are the sorts of details, details of plot, setting, and character, that Mary McNear has given us in Up at Butternut Lake, and this is why it’s not ‘just a romance’ but a story about strong women, and the people whom they love.

Goes well with Sweet tea and strawberry-rhubarb pie.

This review is part of a virtual book tour hosted by TLC Book Tours. For more information, or to read the entire list of tour stops, click here.