Posts

Review- Diana Biller's The Brightest Star in Paris

Image
  I loved The Widow of Rose House and I was super excited to get a book about another member of the adorable Moore family.  Benedict, the brilliant doctor and Sam’s brother in Widow, returns to France for a conference. There he runs into the girl who had dragged him back from his grief twelve years before. The girl is now a prima ballerina for the Paris Opera Ballet. Amelie St. James has spent the last seven years pretending that she’s not being haunted by the past. Now she is being haunted by a literal ghost right when the man she never stopped loving reappears in her life. But Amelie’s entire life is built upon her saintly image, her future and that of her little sister depends on it. She needs help figuring out how to stop the hauntings. She recruits Ben since his brother Sam is an expert. She agrees to fake a relationship with him to keep the gossips from destroying her hard-won reputation.  This was a gorgeously written book. But, in my opinion, it is not a romance. Yes it has a h

Review- Lorraine Heath The Duchess Hunt

Image
The Duke of Kingsland needs a wife since his potential fiancee ditched him in the last book. His secretary, the stalwart Penelope Pettypeace is tasked with finding him a duchess. Pettypeace is determined to find him the perfect wife even though it will break her heart since she has been in love with him for years. But she's resigned to unrequited love because not only is she a commoner but she also hides a terrible secret and a scandalous past. I love Lorraine Heath. She's one of the few authors I still auto-buy. I like her authorial voice, her prose is clean and not flowery, her books are romantic, her heroes sexy and she has a wicked way with a plot twist. All of these things are present in this book. I loved the dialogue, the humor, and the revelations that even after reading most of her books I didn't see coming. I liked Penelope. I loved her strength, her directness, and the way she just told it like it was. She was also a virgin but she wasn't shy about what she w

Review- Mafia Mistress by Mila Finelli

Image
Pre pandemic me: I will never read Mafia romance and I most definitely don’t care for daddy kink. Ew. Pandemic me: PUT IT IN MY VEINS! My old snooty dismissive self can take a hike because a mafia book with daddy kink is now one of my favorite books of the year. Fausto “Il Diavolo” is THE mafia king and no one dares double-cross him unless they want to sleep with the fishes, har har. So when a fellow but less powerful Canadian mobster owes him a  debt he repays it by giving Fausto his eldest daughter Frankie as a bride for his son, thus uniting the two families. Frankie has dreams of going away to college and finally living a normal life away from the suffocating constraints of being the daughter of a notorious mobster. So when she finds out she has to marry some dude she never met, she nopes on out of there and escapes. Experienced romance readers know that escaping heroines, no matter how plucky, never make it very far. They also know the captor will inevitably become enthralled by h

Book Review: Along Came a Lady by Christi Caldwell

Image
As with every Christi Caldwell book I read, I ended my reading experience feeling very satisfied and anxious for the next book in the series. Christi has a magic about her writing that always leaves me breathless, creating characters who are unique and relatable, a setting that makes you feel you are there alongside them, and a plot that shows you the way romance should be. The amazing thing is - she writes multiple books a year and yet, I never feel that an idea is recycled or a character reused. Each book is unique, each character is crafted with care, and I am always shocked when I get to the end and realize there is no more book. I always want more from this author, even when she ties everything up in a neat bow for us to feel closure. Bastard born and living under a false identity, Miss Edwina Dalrymple is working hard to create a life for herself as an etiquette instructor for young ladies. She has been unable to break into the realm of aristocracy, however...until now. When she

𝑨𝑹π‘ͺ π‘Ήπ’†π’—π’Šπ’†π’˜: 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑳𝒐𝒗𝒆 π‘―π’šπ’‘π’π’•π’‰π’†π’”π’Šπ’” π’ƒπ’š π‘¨π’π’Š π‘―π’‚π’›π’†π’π’˜π’π’π’… (𝒅𝒆𝒃𝒖𝒕 𝒂𝒖𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒓)

Image
-Reviewed by Biologistreadsromance- If you want to know what it's like to live a life of a poor PhD student (e.g. looking for seminars with free food, tattered old cheap clothes or free T-shirts from companies' conference booths etc.), read this book! I can attest to the authenticity of that academic life that is so well portrayed here. It's like it's telling MY own life story, except I've never met any "tall, broody, sullen hunk with genius IQ" professor who hates everyone but me! 😩😭 πŸ‘©πŸ»‍πŸ”¬ Olive Smith is a Stanford biology PhD student, passionate for her research work and loyal to her friends, so much so that she invents an elaborate fake-dating scheme so her best friend could date her ex without feeling guilty. Enter Adam Carlsen, a superstar young professor in the department who terrifies every students and postdocs with his blunt and brutal critiques and high scientific standards... πŸ§‘πŸ»‍πŸ”¬ I LOVE Adam! He's a big nerdy grump with a squishy hea

Sweet Transgression - Renee Wilde | HR Debut

Image
Hello book lovers! Here is a debut novel from Renee Wilde. I enjoyed her writing and will definitely be reading more of her books πŸ€—  What you can expect from tropes 🀧 Heroine cares for the hero when he is brought back injured from Waterloo and has no memory of who he is 🎩 He's a duke - and she has a big secret that makes them an impossible couple. Or does it? πŸ‘©‍⚕️STEM heroine, she's a war nurse and has aspirations to become a doctor πŸ’‰ Vaccines 101: heroine administers cowpox virus during an outbreak of smallpox to save lives πŸ•―Slow Burn Romance πŸ₯Ί Hero suffers from PTSD after war during storms πŸ₯ Cinnamon roll hero and strong willed heroine  πŸ‘΅ Hero's aunt is a sweet society dragon πŸ˜‚ I loved this book, it has so many tropes I love and the vaccine theme was very on point. The only thing I wish was different was that they would have talked about the conflict at the end, even though the Hero just wanted to be together with the Heroine, it would have brought more closure

Review: Adriana Anders Uncharted

Image
I'm a big ol' chicken and can't handle too much suspense or my anxiety shoots through the roof. I usually avoid highly suspenseful books. I made an exception for Whiteout and I'm so glad I did. Like that book, Uncharted puts the reader in the front seat from page one as Leo, our intrepid heroine, flies out into the Alaskan wilderness to find a recluse in possession of a deadly virus before the bad guys can. What she finds instead is Elias, a gorgeous bearded monosyllabic grump, and his dog. The bad guys aren't far behind and our MCs are immediately thrust into a life or death run for their lives. This one lived up to my expectations. It had the same breathless yet lusty fight for your life vibes of Whiteout and two leads that I rooted for. Elias was a sweet grump who was all in from almost the word go. Leo was a revelation, I expected a intransigent ball buster but the way the author peeled off her layers to show the vulnerable yet strong woman beneath was a fantast