Reviews: MUCH ADO ABOUT YOU & MAKE UP BREAK UP
My love for rom-coms has continued into 2021 and I’m excited to share my thoughts with you on two new ones that will hit bookstores tomorrow, Samantha Young’s Much Ado About You and Lily Menon’s Make Up Break Up.
Much Ado About You Goodreads Author: Samantha Young
Publication Date: February 2, 2021
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
Much Ado About You by Samantha Young is one of the most delightful rom-coms I’ve ever read. From its Shakespeare-loving heroine to its sexy farmer love interest to its quaint English village setting, this book captivated me from cover to cover.
The story follows 33-year-old Evie Starling, who just feels like her life is going nowhere. Her love life is not great to say the least, and when she is passed over for a big promotion at work that she fully expected to get, Evie decides it’s time for a change. That change comes in the form of a last minute holiday package to England. As part of the package deal, she will live in an apartment above a charming little bookstore called Much Ado About Books, which she will also temporarily manage. How perfect does that sound?! Evie’s plan is to take four weeks to lick her wounds, regroup, and come up with a new game plan for her life. She wants no distractions from this plan and for Evie, that especially means no men.
Let me just say how much I adored Evie from the opening chapter. I was cheering her on from the moment she told her boss off and quit her job. I admired her courage and her determination and I especially loved that she didn’t just wallow, but instead came up with this great plan to recharge and reset her life. It was so much fun watching her travel to this little village and immediately start fitting in with them like she belonged there.
I knew Evie was doomed though as soon as we meet my second favorite character in Much Ado About You, the sexy English farmer, Roane Robson. Roane is the most eligible bachelor in town and all the ladies swoon over him. He’s not a player though and is heart-set on finding that special someone to share his life with. Roane is kind, soft, and as soon as he meets Evie, he knows he wants to get to know her better. Needless to say, I was eager for Roane to find a way to wear down Evie’s defenses and her “No Men” rule because he was practically perfect. We’re talking serious book boyfriend material here! Not only that, but the chemistry between Evie and Roane is off the charts.
I devoured this book in just a couple of sittings because I was so invested in these characters and whether or not they would take their growing friendship to the next level. What I also loved is that the townspeople were clearly right there with me, trying to play matchmaker whenever possible. And speaking of the townspeople, the novel also features a delightful cast of secondary characters, including Roane’s cousin Caro, who becomes like a little sister to Evie, as well as Roane’s gigantic and fabulous dog, Shadow, who can be credited with Evie and Roane’s meet-cute when Evie runs into the street to keep him from being hit by a car.
Much Ado About You does pack some emotional weight to it as well as the fun and romance. There are some town rivalries and fractured relationships floating about, a touch of deception, and Evie has some drama with her mom and with her best friend from home. All of these elements added just the right touch of drama and made me love Much Ado About You all the more. 4.5 STARS
Make Up Break Up Goodreads Author: Lily Menon
Publication Date: February 2, 2021
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
I’m a sucker for a good enemies-to-lovers story as well as a second chance romance, so I was eager to read Lily Menon’s new novel Make Up Break Up as soon as I heard it featured both. It also features an inside look at dating apps and start up companies, and I’m drawn to books that feel timely when it comes to technology so in many ways, this book was a great fit for me.
I found myself very invested in the main character, Annika, primarily because she’s a female business owner in the tech industry. I found myself rooting for her company’s success, especially when it became clear that not only were they the underdogs of the story, but it appears that Annika’s chief rival, Hudson Craft, is rising to fame on what appears to be an idea about a dating app that he stole from her when they met over the summer at a conference in Las Vegas. The fact that Annika’s company is struggling while Hudson’s is clearly taking off makes matters all the worse.
I really wanted to hate Hudson on Annika’s behalf but I have to admit that he won me over pretty quickly because even though he could be totally obnoxious around Annika, he seemed like a nice guy otherwise. The story takes an awkward but entertaining turn when Hudson moves into Annika’s office building so that now she has to see him every day. In spite of her seeming animosity toward Hudson, it becomes clear pretty quickly that the two of them have major chemistry. It’s hard to tell from one moment to the next if they’re going to kill each other or end up making out.
Even though I enjoyed their interactions overall and most of their scenes were a lot of fun, there were a few times where it just felt like they were acting pretty juvenile and I wanted to yell at them to grow up and behave like adults. I also found myself a little torn when it came to the actual app development and business side of Annika’s life though. While it was really interesting at times, there were other moments when I wanted less tech talk and more relationship talk.
In spite of those issues, however, I still really enjoyed Make Up Break Up overall and look forward to reading more from Lily Menon in the future. 3.5 STARS
Reviews: THE NATURE OF FRAGILE THINGS and A BRIDGE ACROSS THE OCEAN
I’m going to start off by saying the reason you’re getting two Susan Meissner reviews today is that I loved her latest, The Nature of Fragile Things, so much that I immediately ran to my shelf to see what other books of hers I owned but hadn’t read yet and found A Bridge Across the Ocean.
The Nature of Fragile Things Goodreads Author: Susan Meissner
Publication Date: February 2, 2021
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
The Nature of Fragile Things is set primarily in San Francisco around the time of the Great Earthquake of 1906. It follows a young Irish immigrant named Sophie Whalen who has come to America looking for a better life. Instead of a better life, however, she has found herself living in a dirty, overcrowded slum in New York. Desperately searching for something better, Sophie answers a newspaper ad posted by a widow who is looking for a woman to marry him and help care for his 5-year-old daughter and run his household. The two of them come to an agreement and Sophie travels to San Francisco to get married and begin her new life.
Married life isn’t quite what she expects it to be, however. Her husband, Martin, is aloof and secretive, takes minimal interest in Sophie or his daughter, and stays away, supposedly for his job, for days at a time. When another woman shows up on their doorstep claiming ties to Martin, it becomes clear that Martin has been keeping secrets from Sophie. While Sophie is in the midst of confronting Martin about his deception, their lives literally and figuratively crumble around them when a devastating earthquake strikes the city. Will they make it out alive? If so, where do they go from here now that trust has been broken?
I absolutely fell in love with Sophie as I was reading this book. She’s just such a complex and well-drawn character. She’s definitely not without flaws and has a few secrets of her own, but I really admired her determination to keep pushing for the kind of life she’s looking for. I also adored the relationship she cultivates with Martin’s young daughter. She truly became a mom for that little girl and it was just so touching to watch the two of them together. Where I loved Sophie though, I totally loathed her husband. At first I just thought he was a little odd, but the more I saw of him, the more I grew to think of him as a monster who has lied his way through life.
In addition to crafting these incredibly vivid characters who made me feel so much, both good and bad, Meissner also does a wonderful job making me feel like I really was in San Francisco and that I was actually there when the earthquake struck. Her descriptions are so vivid and terrifying that my heart felt like it was in my throat the entire time I was reading those scenes.
If you enjoy historical fiction that tells a story of deception, betrayal, and heartbreak but also of sisterhood, found families, hope and second chances, The Nature of Fragile Things is a must-read for you. 5 STARS
A Bridge Across the Ocean Goodreads Author: Susan Meissner
Publication Date: March 14, 2017
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group
As anyone who has followed my blog for a while knows, I’m a huge fan of WWII historical fiction. I’ve actually not read much about war brides though so I was intrigued to see that Susan Meissner’s novel, A Bridge Across the Ocean, focuses on them.
A Bridge Across the Ocean also features one of my favorite elements in historical fiction, a dual timeline, one in present day and the other in 1946 right after WWII. The present timeline follows Brette Caslake, a young woman who can see and communicate with ghosts. It can be overwhelming at times because the spirits tend to follow her around once they realize she can see and speak to them, but when Brette visits the RMS Queen Mary, a famous haunted ship that once transported war brides from England to the U.S., she meets a spirit with a tale she cannot ignore. It sets her on a course to try and solve a 70-year old mystery surrounding a passenger who somehow fell overboard and drowned while the ship was crossing the Atlantic. Brette knows if she can find out the truth about what happened, she can give this spirit the closure it so desperately desires.
The second timeline takes us back 70 years to follow the journey of two women who end up aboard the RMS Queen Mary on that fateful trip. Simone Deveraux is a young French woman whose father and brother, part of the French Resistance, were murdered by Nazis right in front of her. Desperate and alone, Simone runs for her life and ends up hiding in a basement for months waiting for France to be liberated. Annaliese Lange is a German ballerina who catches the eye of a Nazi officer and is soon married off to him, at her parents’ insistence because they thought it would keep her safe. Unfortunately, that was not the case and Annaliese suffers greatly at the hands of this horrible man. After the war, Simone and Annaliese end up as roommates on the RMS Queen Mary headed to America for a fresh start. When their ship docks in New York, however, only one of them disembarks and she is the only one who knows what happened to the other woman. Thus, the mystery that Brette is trying to solve.
I found the war brides’ timeline to be the more compelling of the two. I was so invested in both Simone and Annaliese surviving the awful circumstances they found themselves in and was really rooting for them both to get that fresh start they so richly deserved. Even though I wasn’t quite as invested in the present day timeline with the ghost, I still loved the way Meissner pulled all of the intricate threads of both timelines together as Brette followed the clues and found her way to the truth about what really happened on that ship.
A Bridge Across the Ocean is a captivating story of tragedy and heartbreak, love and loss, and of survival and resilience. If you’re in the mood for a haunting mystery, you can’t go wrong with this book. 4 STARS
Reviews: The Ghost Tree and You are Invited
Happy Thursday! For those who read my 2021 goals post a couple of weeks ago, you may remember that I mentioned wanting to bring in a guest blogger. Well, today is the day that goal is becoming a reality. Sharon is one of my long-time best friends and she also happens to be an avid reader, particularly in the mystery/thriller genre. Since I don’t review many thrillers, I thought it would be fun to have Sharon share some of the thrillers she has been reading and, in the process, start a new feature on the blog, Thriller Thursday. We’re aiming for her to share reviews every other Thursday, but we’ll play it by ear depending on how busy her schedule is. Anyway, please give Sharon a warm welcome and I hope you’ll find some new reads to add to your TBRs. 🙂
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Hi everyone! My name is Sharon and I would like to thank Suzanne for the opportunity to share some of my reviews on her blog. I like to read a bunch of different genres, thrillers, mysteries, YA, fantasy. But my go to are the mystery/thriller type books. And today I would like to share a couple of thriller/supernatural books I have just read. The Ghost Tree and You Are Invited.
The Ghost Tree Goodreads Author: Christina Henry
Publication Date: September 8, 2020
Publisher: Berkley Books
I really cannot say too much about The Ghost Tree because pretty much anything I say will spoil it. But I will say this was awesome. It is filled with witches, curses and haunted woods. It is a bit graphic at times when describing the murder scenes, so be forewarned.
Smiths Hollow is a small town and something evil lives in the woods and only comes out once a year. Or so everyone thought… But then Lauren’s father was found murdered in the woods and his heart was torn out. And then 6 months later the mutilated bodies of 2 girls were found. What is the evil that lives in the woods and why the sudden change in its pattern?
Even though her father was murdered in the woods, Lauren has never been afraid to go there. She has been going there with her BFF Miranda since they were little. Lauren also knows that the police won’t find the killer of the girls because they never found out who killed her father. In fact, they surprisingly never really did much of an investigation and everyone has seemed to moved on. Then Lauren has a vision of a monster dragging those girls through the woods and killing them. She knows that she cannot let it go and have them forgotten (as all the others before them have been), so she goes into the woods to find evidence to help the police find the killer. But she finds more than that, Lauren discovers that their small town is cursed, and it is up to her to fix it.
The book is told from many POV’s and has a lot of things going on besides the murders, but it never got confusing. Everything just flowed so well and all the characters meshed so well together. While the book had multiple POV’s, Lauren was the main focal character and I just loved her. I loved how she cared about her younger brother David (who is such a little sweetie). Even though she is 14 and he is only 4 she took the time to spend time with him, be it playing a board game or going to the local fair. I also loved the growth Lauren had. She goes from a 14 ½ year old who is still a child, to a teenager on the edge of womanhood. She learns a lot about the town’s history as well as her own and she faces them both head on.
The book takes place in 1985 and I loved all the 80’s references (it was like going down memory lane)
And even though we find out early on in the book what is wrong with the town, it does not take anything away from the story; in fact, it actually adds to the tension. And boy does the tension ramp up as the book goes on! By the end I was on the edge of my seat. 4 Stars
You Are Invited Goodreads Author: Sarah A. Denzil
Publication Date: September 11, 2020
Publisher: Self Published
Cath Fenwick is an author of fantasy books. She has a large following on social media, but Cath has always been a loner. She has no real friends, except from her social media followers and she suffers from schizophrenia but can keep the voices at bay with the help of her medication. When Cath gets an invitation from Irene Jobert to take part in The Event, a retreat of sorts for social media influencers, she jumps at the chance. Irene is the most famous influencer in the world and Cath will get to spend a month with her and 3 others (Jules, a famous blogger; Nathan, a gamer; and Daniel, a fitness guru) in an old Transylvanian Monastery. They will be live streamed to millions of people around the world and the subscribers can donate money to their favorite influencer.
On her way to The Event, Cath’s taxi driver tells her the story of the nuns that were murdered at the monastery years ago “There are those who claim the ghosts walking the corridors of Sfântul Mihail are not ghosts at all.” And that may be true. As the group is roaming around parts of the Monastery, their viewers notice a dark shape lurking in a corner. Strange things start happening too. There are wolves in the woods, there is a snowstorm coming, and one of the viewers keeps offering them one million dollars to kill one of the group. Cath’s inner voices are also back. Add all of that up and you have a group that is beginning to crack and become paranoid, all while being live streamed.
The book is told from the POV of Cath and she was not a very reliable narrator, which just added to the mystery and suspense of the book.
I loved the eerie gothic setting. I think the author did a great job of making the scenery jump off the pages. The beginning of the book had the most eerie/supernatural feel to it, gave me chills a few times. The eerie feel tapered off midway through the book when a couple of twists were added that took the book in a new direction.
The ending did feel a bit rushed to me, and there were a few things that were left unanswered.
Other than that, I really enjoyed the supernatural/mystery feel of the book. And also the live stream and followers interaction aspect of the book. 3 ½ stars