Shopaholic Christmas by Sophie Kinsella

 

What is a favorite series that you have read?  I have always enjoyed the Shopaholic series for a light funny read that helped me out when I was sick with Hyperemesis gravidarum when I was pregnant.  I was very saddened to learn of Sophie Kinsella’s premature death from cancer.  I was looking through her works and realized I had missed the last Shopaholic book – Christmas Shopaholic.  I love this series and Christmas books, so I decided Christmas was the time to read it.

Becky Bloomwood is back in England with her husband Luke and daughter Minnie.  She is excited for her traditional family Christmas at her parents’ house.  Her life is thrown into a tailspin when she discovers that her parents are moving for a time to the trendy Shoreditch neighborhood in London so that her half sister Jess and husband can stay at their home for the holidays.  Becky is now hosting Christmas!  Everyone has a lot of demands and needs that need to be met that are pulling the joy out of Christmas.  Will Becky be able to have a Christmas that meets her family’s needs while also having a good Christmas for herself and her little family?

My thoughts on this novel:

·       I could relate to this book as I have had many similar feelings while hosting family events.  I really liked how Luke kept advising Becky  to think - is it really needed for the true core and family or is it extra fluff?

·       Becky still hasn’t gotten over her shopping addiction, but she is a caring person that always thinks of others.  She is just really lucky she married a rich husband!

·       I laughed out loud several times.  It reminded me why I love this series.  I need to reread the entire series.

·       This is number nine in the series.  It has been quite some time since I’ve read the previous book, and it was pretty easy for me to jump back in and remember the characters.  I think you could read this as a standalone, but it is really fun to experience all of the books.

·       This book was very engaging, and I read it very quickly.

·       I love all the characters.  They are like old friends.

·       The book had a great ending that is also now the ending for the series.

·       I was continually amazed at all the scraps that Becky is able to get herself into.  I wonder how Kinsella thought it all up – it was hilarious!

·       This was a fun read that made me happy

·       In between the chapters there were text messages, emails, Google searches and the like that related to the action and moved the story along.  They were pretty funny.

Overall, Christmas Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella was a light, engaging, and hilarious read that was perfect to read during the holiday season.

Book Source:  Purchased from Amazon.com

The Page Turner by Viola Shipman

 

Title:  The Page Turner

Author:  Viola Shipman

Narrated by:  Katharine Chin

Publisher: Harlequin Audio

Length: Approximately 9 hours and 49 minutes

Source: Audiobook and ebook review Copy from NetGalley.  Thank-you!

 

Where is your favorite setting for a book?  The Page Turner by Viola Shipman is set in South Haven Michigan with action also taking place in the Hamptons and New York City.  I loved the South Haven, Michigan, setting as I grew up in southwest Michigan.  Our family loved to visit South Haven and swim at the beach.  My Great Uncle and Aunt lived in a beautiful historic home in South Haven.  It’s a beautiful community.  I now live in a Lake Michigan Community in Wisconsin.  The lake vibes in this novel were very relatable.

 

Emma Page has just graduated from the University of Michigan and is trying to figure out what to do with her life.  Her parents own The Mighty Pages publishing house, which prints literary fiction.  Emma has secretly written a romance novel and loves romance just as her grandmother did.  When Emma discovers a family secret, how will it affect them and the man who is trying to take their family down?

 

My thoughts on this novel:

·       Viola Shipman is the pen name of Wade Rouse in honor of his beloved Grandma.  He writes the best female characters that really speak to me.  His Grandma taught him well!

·       I read this novel in May as part of the Brenda Novak Book Group.  I loved Wade Rouse’s interview as part of the Brenda Novak Book Group.  He is delightful and his interview was so interesting.

·       GiGi, Emma’s Grandmother, was a wonderful character.  She is the type of loving and sassy Grandma everyone should have.  I was blessed to have one myself.  I loved how she loved to foster the love of reading in her kids and grandkids.

·       There were interesting literary discussions and allusions throughout the novel.  Who gets to decide what is the great American novel?  Why is romance always looked down upon as a genre?

·       The novel was a love letter to Michigan with blueberries, the state flag, roadside farms, lighthouses, Lake Michigan beaches, etc.

·       Jonathan Livingston Seagull is mentioned a lot.  I have never read it, but it has been on my TBR forever.  Have you read this novel?  If so, what do you think?

·       This novel also highlighted family dysfunction and pulling together to protect your family overall.

·       I am looking forward to his next book that will be set in Palm Springs.  It is called Thank-you for Being a Friend and seems to be Golden Girls inspired.

·       I enjoyed listening to this book on audiobook.  It was entertaining and captured my interest on long drives.

Overall, The Page Turner by Viola Shipman was a perfect summer read with great characters, a love of literature, beaches, and a sinister villain.

The Summer Pact by Emily Giffin

 

What was your last summer read?  I finished up The Summer Pact earlier this month for my last summer book read of the year.

The Summer Pact is about four individuals that meet at college and form a lifelong friendship.  One when tragically dies, the others promise to always get together to help each other if any of the three of them are in a time of need.  When Hannah finds her fiancé in bed with another woman, she finds herself in crisis.  When the friends gather together to help out Hannah, will they all make changes to their own lives and move forward?

My thoughts on this novel:

·       I have enjoyed Emily Giffin’s books in the past and especially enjoyed Something Borrowed, Something Blue, and Baby Proof.  This one was not as good as her other novels.

·       The story was slow in the middle, and it took me a long time to finish it.

·       This novel is a look at friendship and the lengths we will go to for our friends.  It also delves into grief and how everyone deals with it differently and how friends can help.

·       The story is told through the three point of views of the three friends.  I didn’t feel like I liked or connected with the characters.

·       The romance came very late in the novel and then it seemed to be immediately tied up in the epilogue.   I did not feel the romantic connection between the love interests.

·       I really didn’t like the character Lainey.  She was an actress that acted very immature for a thirty something.  She needed more of a growth story to me.  I also didn’t like how she very obviously was an alcoholic, but her friends did not help her with this problem at all.

·       I thought we would get more of Summer’s story and her untimely death and there would be a bit of a mystery.  It just remained a sad unexplained traumatic death from their college days.

Overall, I was disappointed by The Summer Pact, but I will definitely try another Emily Giffin book.

Book Source:  Review copy from NetGalley. Thank-you!  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Four Weddings and a Christmas by Phillipa Ashley

 

Do you have “go to” authors that you read when you are looking for a certain type of story?  Phillipa Ashley is one of my “go to” authors that I go to for Christmas and summer reads that I know will both be a good story and have great characters.

Freya has a history of being a runaway bride.  In grade school she ran away from a pretend wedding to young Travis, and as an eighteen-year-old, she also ran away from an engagement to the same Travis.  Now years later, Freya has a successful business preparing vacation homes for people in England’s Lake District.  She recently ended an engagement with a dependable boyfriend and has started to believe that she may never find love.  Travis returns to town this Christmas season.  He is now a famous wildlife photographer, and he has returned to start his own store and photography business in town.  He also wants to spend more time with his family.  The last thing he expects is to run back into Freya and immediately have the same old feelings for her again.  Freya does not want to get into a relationship again as she seems to have no luck with them.  Will Freya and Travis be able to figure out their future?

I loved Freya and Travis, but also all the other characters in this novel.  Phillipa Ashley writes wonderful characters.  I also liked how Freya and Travis both had troubling aspects of their childhood that have carried over into their adult relationships.  Being able to understand the past helps them both to move on into the future.  Their family situations were important and solving some of those problems added a greater depth to the story.  Freya and Travis also had great chemistry.  They had a friends-to-lovers and a second chance romance story, both tropes that I enjoy.

I also loved the Lake District.  It sounded beautiful and I loved the small-town feel.  Everyone knew each other and helped each other out.  The Christmas spirit was in the story.  I loved this story from start to finish and it was the perfect story to be reading at Christmas.  It was one of my favorite books this Christmas season.

Book Source:  Review copy from NetGalley. Thank-you!  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

The Wishing Bridge by Viola Shipman (TLC Book Tours)

 

Do you have any towns or areas you visit for the Christmas season?

Frankenmuth, Michigan is a beautiful town known as Michigan’s “Little Bavaria” and takes celebrating Christmas seriously with a giant Christmas store, Bronner’s and a beautifully decorated town. I have only visited Frankenmuth once while I was in college, but I would love to visit again.  Frankenmuth is the setting of The Wishing Bridge by Viola Shipman.

Henrietta “Henri” Wegner grew up in Frankenmuth and her parents started Wegner’s, an iconic Christmas store that draws tourists from far and wide.  The business has had troubles making it through COVID and tough competition from Amazon.  Henri left Frankenmuth after graduating from the University of Michigan and works for a mergers and acquisitions company in Detroit.  Her boss sends her home for the holidays to make a big deal for a corporation to take over her family’s business.  Once home, she reconnects with her best friend, Sofie, and her childhood sweetheart, Shep.  She discovers that Shep has been divorced for five years and he makes it clear to her that he is ready to date again.  Henri must decide, does she want to help her family business get back on track, or does she want to finish the big corporate deal that will help her keep her current job?

I loved this book.  Viola Shipman (pen name of Wade Rouse) writes vivid characters with great depth.  I loved Henri, Sofie, Shep, and Henri’s entire family.  I could imagine Henri trying to find success in the world, but suddenly realizing all that she misses as she has strived for success.  She also has great flashbacks and memories of her Grandma that help her to shape her decisions as the novel progresses. I enjoyed that Henri was a class of ’85 graduate and a generation X protagonist in her fifties.  The only time I had to stretch my imagination was besides Henri’s parents still running their business, it seemed like there were a lot of people that worked at her family’s store still there from her childhood.  They would mostly likely be in their late 70’s or 80’s and that seemed to be stretching it on age to me.  The romance was sweet, and the setting was perfect.  I loved that Wegner’s was a veiled version of the real-life Bronner’s.

The extras is this novel are a treat.  The novella Christmas Angels is at the back of this book, as well as book club questions, and a very thoughtful letter to the readers.  I loved this quote in the letter, “The Wishing Bridge is about choice we make in our life – some good, some bad – but realizing if we have a strong foundation, it is never too late to cross that bridge in our lives to become the people we dreamed we could become.”  What a perfect description.

Favorite quotes from the novel:

“Memories serve as the voice to our souls, the soundtrack to our lives.”

“The holidays are hard for a lot of us.  Too many people acting like the world is perfect when others are battling a lot of bad memories, or loss.”

“It’s humbling and a bit terrifying to realize, when you really stop to think about it, that when you reach the age of fifty, there are only, perhaps five people in the universe who truly ‘get’ you.  And the sad part?  They all now probably live in a different city than you.”

“Time, there is never enough.”

The Wishing Bridge by Viola Shipman is a heartfelt, perfect novel about Christmas, the importance of family, and how it is never too late to make a change in your life.  I highly recommend it.

Book Source:  Review copy from Graydon Books as part of the TLC Book Tour. Thank-you!  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

About The Wishing Bridge

• Publisher: Graydon House (November 7, 2023)

• Paperback: 336 pages

Workaholic Henrietta Wegner can feel her edge beginning to dull in middle age. Once the company’s hottest mergers and acquisitions executive, Henri can see the ambitious and impossibly young up-and-comers gunning for her job. When her boss makes it clear she’ll be starting the New Year unemployed unless she can close a big deal before the holidays, Henri impulsively tells him that she can convince her aging parents to sell Wegner’s—their iconic Frankenmuth, Michigan, Christmas store—to a massive, soulless corporation. It’s the kind of deal cool corporate Henri has built her career on.

Home for the holidays has typically meant a perfunctory twenty-four-hour visit for Henri, then back to Detroit as fast as her car will drive her. So turning up at the Wegner’s offices in early December raises some eyebrows: from her delighted, if puzzled, parents to her suspicious brother and curious childhood friends. But as Henri fields impatient texts from her boss while reconnecting with the magic of the store and warmth of her hometown, what sounded great in the boardroom begins to lose its luster in real life. She’s running out of time to pull the trigger on what could be the greatest success of her career…or the most awkward family holiday of her life.

About the author

Wade Rouse is a popular award-winning memoirist and internationally bestselling author of twelve books, which have been translated into twenty languages and selected as Today show Must-Reads, Indie Next Picks and Michigan Notable Books. Rouse writes fiction under his grandma’s name, Viola Shipman, to honor the woman whose heirlooms inspire his writing. He lives in Michigan and California, and hosts Wine & Words with Wade, A Literary Happy Hour, every Thursday. 

The Breakaway by Jennifer Weiner

 

Do you like to ride bikes?  What is the longest distance you have ridden?  I loved to ride bikes and used to ride a lot before I got married and had kids.  I sadly don’t get to ride as much as I would like to, but hopefully as the kids get older, I will ride more again.  I never used to measure the distance of my rides, but The Breakaway has inspired me to take a longer biking trip.

Abby is thirty-three and floating through life.  She hasn’t figured out what she wants to do for a permanent job and her apartment looks like she is still a college student.  She has reunited with her high school sweetheart and is trying to figure out what she wants to do with life.  She loves riding her bike on long bike journeys and helps a friend out by taking the leadership role on a tour that will go from New York City to Niagara Falls.  The group is a motley crew of a variety of personalities and age groups. Unfortunately, it also includes Abby’s mother who is very critical of Abby’s weight and a man she had a one-night stand with a couple of years ago.  Will she be able to make it through this trip and keep her group on track?

The Breakaway was immensely readable.  I took this book on our Labor Day weekend campout, and I couldn’t put it down.  I was especially caught up thinking about taking such a bike adventure and was inspired that people of all ages and body types were taking the trip.  I like how we get to know the other riders in the group as the book progresses as well. 

Weiner is aways great writing about body issues and this book was no exception.  Abby was raised by an almond mom who is very critical of what Abby eats and sent her to fat camp repeatedly when she was a teenager.  I will admit though of having a “first world problem” moment when reading this book.  In a flashback to teenage years, Abby is horrified about being sent to fat camp instead of drama camp in Maine and throws a giant fit about it.  I was sad for her about going to fat camp, but I never got to go to any camp because my family couldn’t afford it.  I was working in the fields as a teenager when Abby was throwing a fit about not getting to go to Maine.  I had a really hard time feeling empathy for her and thought she should probably not go to any camp and maybe work in the fields like I did to lose the weight her Mom wanted her too.  Kidding aside, I was horrified thinking about how this would really warp a teenager’s body image.

SPOILER ALERT

The section I had the hardest time with what Weiner’s attempt to put women’s issues into the book.  There are a mother daughter duo on the trip from a state where abortion isn’t legal.  The daughter is 15, pregnant, and plans to stop by an abortion clinic while on the ride.  She is sure her mother will not understand and does not talk to her about being pregnant or her plan.  I can understand that.  What I couldn’t understand was when several other members of the group find out about it and are helping the 15-year-old without talking to her mother.  They all judge and assume the worst about the mother.  I found it very cringy to have people helping an underage girl with such an important decision and leaving her mother completely out of it.  This entire side story felt forced and out of place.  The story line concluded in a satisfying way, but I was ready to throw my book for a large part of it.

I felt the same way about the romance in this novel.  While I could see that Abby’s teenage love might not be Mr. Right, I also didn’t like one night stand guy at all.  I wasn’t into this romance and the whole thing was cringe.

SPOILER END

I have mixed feelings about this book.  There were things I loved, storylines that I didn’t think worked, but overall, I couldn’t stop reading.

Book Source: I preordered this book on Amazon.com.

The Summer Skies by Jenny Colgan

 

Do you prefer a window seat or aisle seat when you fly?  I always love sitting in a window seat and getting to see what is happening when I am on an airplane.  I’m finishing up my summer reads and read The Summer Skies by Jenny Colgan earlier this month. I always love reading Jenny Colgan’s novels.  I get swept away by the stories.

The Summer Skies is set in far northern Scotland.  Morag McGinty has been born into a family of pilots.  She works for a major airline, but after a near accident, she is working on being ready to fly again.   During this situation, she has finally found a man she thinks she has a future with, Hayden.  Together they plan on relocating to Dubai.  Morag decides she can be the co-pilot on long haul flights and won’t have to face her fear of being the pilot in charge again. The family business is flying a plane service from island to island in northern Scotland. When Morag’s grandfather falls ill, she helps out by coming back home to help with the flying.  Will she be able to overcome her fears of flying as the primary pilot again?

I always love how in Jenny Colgan’s novels, the primary character is a woman who is trying to find her way in the world.  What does Morag really want for her future?  She is not sure herself and it takes coming home and being put into a precarious situation that really makes her realize what is important.  I love her side characters too – as there were many new and unique characters in this book.  Another great element is the food. There is a mouth-watering description of bread in this book that made me want to go out and make my own home made loaf.  The settings are also wild and wonderful as well.  I really want to visit northern Scotland now.  I wasn’t sure where this story was going, and I enjoyed the journey. I also have always loved aviation and enjoyed the elements in this story. I hope that it is the start of a lovely new series.  I enjoyed reading this novel.

Book Source: Review Copy from NetGalley.  Thank-you!  Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

The Christmas Bookshop by Jenny Colgan

 

 

Title: The Christmas Bookshop

Author:  Jenny Colgan

Narrated by:  Eilidh Beaton

Publisher: Harper Audio

Length: Approximately 11 hours and 23 minutes

Source: Checked out from the Kewaunee Public Library through Overdrive.  Thank-yo

Have you ever shopped at a Christmas shop?  What about a Christmas Book Shop?

I’ve been to Frankenmuth Michigan over twenty years ago and it was filled with beautiful Christmas stores. I need to go back someday.  I’ve never been to a Christmas Book Shop, but I would love it.

In The Christmas Bookshop, Carmen has lost her job working in retail when the store she works at closes for good.  With no prospects in her town, she goes to live with her sister Sofia and her children in Edinburgh.  Sofia is a lawyer with a client who owns a book shop that is going to close.  Sofia hopes that Carmen can help the shop to make a profit over the Christmas season.  Carmen is not sure she can do it, but she decides to give it a try.  Along the way she meets two potential suitors.  What will Carmen do with life and which suitor will she chose?

Jenny Colgan is one of my favorite authors and I love her Christmas stories. I love that her stories often involve a woman down on her luck who manages to find out what her passions in life are and make a fresh start.  I love bookstores so reading about how Carmen is able to spruce up the store and reinvent it as a Christmas Bookshop was delightful.  I was also intrigued by the vivid descriptions of Edinburgh.  It made me really want to visit this city and see the architecture.  It sounds like a beautiful place to visit at Christmas.

I also loved that Carmen and Sofia were two very different sisters that didn’t really get along, but they are able to really understand each other and have a better relationship in this story.  I also loved Carmen’s relationship with her nieces and nephew.  I also loved the bookshop owner, Mr. McCredie.  I loved how his story slowly came together piece by piece. 

Eilidh Beaton was a soothing narrator who gave the characters a good voice.  Each character had a different voice from her, which I enjoy.  This overall was a very enjoyable and charming Christmas story.

Summer Island by Shelley Noble

 

Do you have a place that you like to visit to get away from it all?  Reporter Phoebe Adams has just lost her job and her fiancé, while her mother Ruth has discovered that her husband has left her for another woman.  They decide to visit Grandma Alice who lives on Summer Island.  It’s Phoebe and Ruth’s shelter from the storm of their lives.  They find that Great Aunt Vera has also come to visit for the summer.  The four women bond together to determine the next steps in their lives. 

The women also grew interested in their grump neighbor Lars, who has recently lost his wife.  His son Ty has moved back to the island to help him out, but Lars has made it difficult.  He thinks of Ty as a failure and has pretty much given up on life.  What will get Lars back out into the world?  Will he ever except his son?

I enjoyed the characters and the relationships they renewed and built as they progressed with their lives.  I especially liked that Ty has a lot more to him than his father realizes.  Ty is a mechanical engineer that works on clean water projects around the world.  As an environmental engineer, I was very excited by this character.  I really liked that Ruth connected with her childhood best friend and decided to live life for herself.  Phoebe was also great working through what she wanted for both a career and for love.

Summer Island is a great summer (or fall) read!  It was my last read of August.

Book Source:  Review Copy from Avon Books.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

An Island Wedding by Jenny Colgan

 

Do you have an auto-buy author?  Jenny Colgan’s books are auto buys for me.  I love her.

An Island Wedding is the fifth book of the Mure series. I love Colgan’s series, especially this series.  With it being a series, I feel like I get to know all of the characters on the island of Mure in the North Sea so well.  It’s like visiting with old friends each time I pick up a new book in the series.

Flora Mackenzie and her fiancé Joel are finally going to get married.  Unfortunately, the two of the them have very different ideas on what they want for a wedding.   Joel gets Flora to agree on a small wedding, but everyone on the island is sure that they will be invited.  Jan’s sister, model Olivia Macdonald is also returning to Mure to have a large and lavish wedding at Flora’s hotel, the Rock, the same weekend as her wedding!  Saif and Lorna’s relationship is threatened by circumstances that are mostly out of their control.  Will everyone get their happily ever after?

I vastly enjoyed this story.  I hope that the Mure series continues on as I love all of the characters and the setting.  I want to visit this beautiful fictional island in the north between Scotland and Norway.  I did get a bit annoyed at Flora not being more up front with Joel about what she wanted for a wedding until far into the process.  I loved that she picked a colored dress to go more with her skin tone and hair.  I enjoyed meeting Jan’s sister and the family dynamics there.  I loved that Olivia seemed very icy, but she had picked the perfect man for her.  I especially enjoyed Saif and Lorna’s story.  I hope we can enjoy more of their story.

I would suggest reading this series in order.  The books build on each other.

Overall, An Island Wedding is a great addition to the Mure series.

Book Source:  Review Copy from Avon Books and NetGalley.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Sunrise by the Sea by Jenny Colgan

What are your favorite comfort reads?

 Jenny Colgan is one of my favorite authors and one that I turn to when I’m looking for comfort reads.  I love her characters and really like the Little Beach Street, Summer Seaside Kitchen, and Scottish Bookshop series.  I always can’t wait what is in store for the characters next.

 Sunrise by the Sea is a new book in the Little Beach Street Bakery series.  Marisa Rosso has moved to the village of Mount Polbearne to try to start over.  Marisa’s beloved grandfather has passed away and she can’t get over her death and move on.  She realizes she has anxiety and tries to figure out how to deal with it.  Unfortunately, the peace and quiet she craves, quickly vanishes when a piano teacher, Alex, moves in next door. Will she be able to get over her fears and work with him to find peace and quiet?  Will she be able to get to know her community and Alex?

 While there is a new character, old favorites Polly, Huckle, and there twins also are part of the story.  The story moves between Polly and Marisa.  Polly’s family is having a hard time with finances and making their businesses work in these trying times.  How can they make it all work and what is the most important thing to them?

 I really liked having a new character while still enjoying old characters.  I really liked the exploration of anxiety and grief in this novel and how Marisa was able to get the help she needed.  I also loved Marisa’s relationship with her grandmother over Skype. She didn’t know here that well as she had always spent time with her Grandfather.  I love that they cooked together, watched TV together, and talked.  They were two lonely people who found comfort with each other over the distance.

 Favorite Quote:

“But being an introvert meant that often she hadn’t quite managed to pluck up the courage to tell people she didn’t like them that much, and things could bumble along, or she would lack the courage to make it clear to people she did like that she liked them, and they’d pass her by.”

 Overall, Sunrise by the Sea was a nice comfort read that continues as one of my favorite stories.

 Book Source:  Review Copy from William Morrow. Thank-you!

 

Anne of Manhattan by Brina Starler

 

Are you a fan of Anne of Green Gables?  I LOVE Anne of Green Gables.  I read all of L.M. Montgomery’s books as a tween/teen and have enjoyed rereading them as an adult.  I was so excited to hear that there was a modern take on Anne’s story.

Anne grew up in Avonlea Long Island with loving foster parents, Marilla and Matthew.  She currently lives in Manhattan with her best friend Diana. She works at a bookstore and is working her way through her last year of grad school.  She is shocked when her old nemesis Gilbert Blythe shows up from California and is attending the same grad school as her.  What happened their last night together after high school?  Why do they have a rivalry?  Will Anne and Gil be able to find their happily ever after?

I felt that Brina Starler had a great love for Anne of Green Gables and the characters that are involved in the original series.  She gave them all an update to modern times but stayed true to their characters.  She also added in minor characters from the original series in the perfect places. 

The story was told in the present with flash backs to tell the story of Anne’s growing up at Green Gables and relationship with Gilbert.  If you’ve ever wondered about the more passionate side of their relationship, you will wonder no more after this book.  It has some rather steamy sex scenes.  I’m more of a closed-door romance type of person myself.

Favorite Quote:

“If there was one thing Anne Shirley would stand firm against all arguments, it was that a person could never have too many books.” – Great first line!

Overall, Anne of Manhattan was a fun update of one of my favorite books.

Book Source:  Review Copy from William Morrow.  Thank-you!

The Jane Austen Dating Agency by Fiona Woodifield

 

Sophie Johnson is working for a high-powered fashion magazine in London in sales.  She would much rather be writing editorials for the magazine.  She has been unfortunate in love, but when she discovers the Jane Austen Dating Agency, she thinks her dreams have been answered.  It’s described as an “Exclusive dating agency for ladies to meet real gentleman in beautiful settings – only the truly romantic may apply!  Dine like Elizabeth and Darcy at Chatsworth aka Pemberley, picnic like Emma or Knightley on juicy strawberries and sparkling champagne on Box Hill.”

 Sophie is soon meeting new people and having new adventures through the dating agency.  Will she find her own Mr. Darcy, or will it be Mr. Wickham?

 This was the March Book Club selection for JASNA Northwoods Book Club.  We had our meeting yesterday and it seemed that everyone felt the same about this novel as I did.  It was a fun book, but there were just too many characters.  The author tried to put in characters and plot items from four of Austen’s novels and it was just too much.  It was hard to keep track of the characters and I don’t feel the romance was well developed between the leads.  I wish the author would have written a separate book for each Austen novel with less characters – it would have been fun.

 Favorite Quotes:

“My brother, Ben, always says I have such unrealistic expectations of men due to an alarming overconsumption of romantic novels as a teenager.  Maybe he’s right, I know I love to escape into a book – I should probably at least try to live in the real world.  But right now it feels pretty inadequate.”

 “I want him to gaze at me, although maybe not in a creepy stalker way, and not controlling either.  Just romantic – you know what I mean.”

 “I really admire you.  In spite of your ridiculous gaucheness our bizarre friends and ability to burst out laughing at random moments, I think maybe . . . well, I really like you.  You’re not like anyone else I’ve ever met.”

 “The time has come for me, Sophie Johnson, to kick ass and sort out my own happy ever after.”

 Overall, The Jane Austen Dating Agency was a fun book, but lost its way with too many characters.

 Book Source:  Purchased on my Kindle from Amazon.com

Shipped by Angie Hockman

Shipped is the February Pick for the Brenda Novak Book Club.  The meeting was last week.  I couldn’t attend due to my Girl Scout Troop having a Winter Tubing Event, but luckily the meeting and interview with author Angie Hockman is online.  It was fun and entertaining to be a part of the meeting even after the fact.

 Shipped is a fun romantic comedy novel.  Henley Evans is busy at work and trying to earn her MBA.  She works for a global adventure cruise line and is trying to get a promotion to digital director.  The only thing standing in her way is Grahame Cracker-Collins.  He works remotely from Michigan but has seemingly been treading on Henley’s toes the entire time he has been with the company.  Their boss decides to send them on a cruise to the Galapagos to see who can come up with the best digital media proposal.  Who will come up with the best presentation?  How will the two get along on the cruise?

 Shipped is a workplace romance and enemies become lover’s trope.  I enjoy romantic comedies and this one was great.  The dynamic between Henley and Grahame was both magnetic and hilarious.  I really enjoyed how they had differences but were able to work through their misunderstandings for a better future.  That’s a lesson that the entire world needs right now!  I also loved Henley’s sister Walsh who is also along for the adventure.  She deserves a book of her own.

 I especially enjoyed the unique setting of an adventure cruise to the Galapagos.  The conservation aspects and how Henley worked them into her presentation were also wonderful.  I’m an environmental engineer and the environment and conservation are near and dear to my heart.  I loved this.  Even better was learning that author Angie Hockman works for a conservation cruise company and has been to Galapagos.  Her vivid descriptions are from real world experiences!

 I also liked the very real work dynamics that take place with a terrible boss.  Henley is put into a bad situation where she does a ton of work but is not recognized for it.  Grahame helps her to realize she needs to stand up for herself.  She uses her team of work friends to help her out and make it so that her potential can me seen.  I really, really enjoyed this. I think unfortunately a lot of us have had bad work experiences and I loved seeing how Henley was able to turn it into a good situation.

 Overall, Shipped is a fun, unique workplace romantic comedy is a fantastic setting.  I highly recommend it! This is author Angie Hockman’s first novel and I can’t see what she comes up with next.   

 

Book Source:  Purchased from Amazon.com