50 States, 500 Campgrounds by Joe Yogerst (TLC Book Tours)

Do you like to camp?  If so, do you tent camp, or camp in a cabin or camper?  We used to tent camp, but now we camp in our pop-up camper.  I also tent camp or in cabins  with Scouts.   I liked this statistic at the start of this book, “According to the data portal Statista, more than 40 million Americans camp each year, and they spend about $3 billion per annum buying camping equipment. And that’s just tent campers.  Millions more experience the great outdoors staying in cabins and glamping, and more than eight million American households own RVs.”  Wow!!

 This book takes into account that there are many different ways to camp from rustic to glamping, family adventures to romantic.  I also like that it starts with a section on responsible camping covering many of the items we cover in Girl and Boy Scouts (such as Leave No Trace).  They are important items for keeping our parks nice for everyone.  I noticed last year that with more campers, there seemed to be a lot more people that didn’t know about responsible camping. 

 The sections are split up by state in alphabetical order.  There are highlights about the state include how many national and state parks there are. Each park is listed as well as a symbol for what type of camping, address, when it’s open, rates, amenities, and where there are ADA sites.    It’s fun looking through all of the different types of campgrounds around the United States.  It is giving me ideas for future camping trips.

 I looked around to see if any campgrounds I’ve been too were included.  The only ones I could find that I’ve camped at were Indiana Dunes State Park, Mackinaw Mill Creek Campground (Michigan), Peninsula State Park (Wisconsin), and Devil’s Lake State Park (Wisconsin).  I’m kind of curious how the campgrounds were chosen.  Mackinaw Mill Creek Campground was pretty good but plagued by the fact that the RV dump station was right next to the pool.  PU!!  We did have the most beautiful campsite ever with our tent right on the straits of Mackinac.  It was awe inspiring opening up our tent each morning.  The way the Wisconsin State Campgrounds were listed was atrange.  The title was the area of the parks instead of the actual park name.  Nicolet Bay is a section within the Peninsula State Park campground.  The Quartzite campground is a section of Devil’s Lake State Park.  I would have titled the section Devil’s Lake State Park and state that you like a certain section of the campground best and why.

 Do you have any favorite places to camp?

 Overall, 50 States, 500 Campgrounds is a fun book to use to think about planning a camping trip to someplace new.

 Book Source:  A Review Copy from Hachette Book Group as part of the TLC Book Tour.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Excerpt from The Summer Getaway by Susan Mallery (TLC Book Tours)

 

I am excited to be a part of the book tour for The Summer Getaway by Susan Mallery.  I have enjoyed her novels in the past and this looks like it will be a great one - I can't wait to read it!  I am looking forward to reading about warm summer days while still experiencing the cold Wisconsin days.  This novel will be out soon on March 15th.  Now without further ado, an excerpt from The Summer Getaway:

He parked, then got out and looked around. The sky was a deep blue, with not a single cloud. There were unfamiliar trees and bushes, probably native, with several palm trees looking as out of place as he felt. When he inhaled, he smelled the ocean. The house was only a few blocks from the Pacific, and he would guess several of the balconies he’d seen had a perfect view.

A surprisingly normal back door opened, and a tall, thin woman stepped out. She had short white hair and a cautious but steady gait.

She approached him, her face bright with anticipation, her smile friendly.

“Mason, at last. You’ve been very elusive.”

Mason was wary around people he didn’t know, and he’d been chided all his life for being slow to warm up to strangers. But Lillian Holton radiated an open welcome that promised acceptance and understanding.

He took her outstretched hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Lillian.”

She studied him. “I can see a little of your Uncle Leo in you.”

Given how distantly connected they had been, he doubted that.

She linked arms with him. “Come inside. Salvia prepared a snack. She works here five days a week to clean and look after me, as well as oversee the maids and gardeners. She’s very excited to meet you. We’ve talked of nothing else for days.”

As they walked toward the house, he was aware of her fragility. Her bones felt as hollow as a bird’s. He shouldn’t be surprised. She was over ninety.

They went through a big mudroom and into a massive kitchen with white plaster walls and dark wood beams. The white cabinets had to be fifty years old, and the countertops were some fancy tile. The appliances were new—stainless steel and nicer than anything he’d ever used. Not that he cooked much.

She showed him into a large room off the kitchen. Big windows opened onto a lush walled garden. A large wooden table stood in the center, surrounded by eight chairs. A pitcher of lemonade and two glasses stood next to a plate of cookies. Two chairs were occupied by sleeping cats.

“Please,” she said, motioning to a tall-backed chair with a woven seat. She sat opposite him and poured them both a drink.

“How delightful to have you here at last,” she said, passing him his lemonade. “I thought you were never going to take me up on my invitation.”

“You were persistent.”

“I can be.”

Her eyes were pale blue, but he would guess they’d been much darker when she’d been younger. Her face was lined, but in a way that made him think she’d smiled and laughed a lot in her life.

Her first letter had arrived while he’d been stationed in Iraq. He’d ignored it. The second had followed two weeks later, then a third. He’d finally answered, mostly in self-defense. Otherwise, she was going to drown him in paper.

She’d explained that they were distantly related through her late husband and that he would be inheriting their house after she died. This house.

“If I’d done drugs, I would swear I was having a flashback,” he admitted, trying to take it all in.

“She does take some getting used to. But you’re here, and you have all the time you need.” She gave him an impish smile. “I don’t plan on dying for a long time.”

“I’m glad. It’s going to take a long time to get used to this.”

She reached over and placed her hands on his. “You’re going to love it here. The weather is perfect, and you’ll be able to explore at your leisure. She has many secrets, as any female of a certain age should.”

Okay, this was getting weirder by the minute. He glanced longingly toward the door. Maybe letting go of his rental house in Texas had been a mistake. Only Lillian had guilted him into an indefinite stay while he “got to know his inheritance” and went through her late husband’s research materials.

 

About The Summer Getaway

Publisher: HQN; Original edition (March 15, 2022)

Hardcover: 416 pages

One woman discovers the beauty in chaos in this poignant and heartwarming story about the threads that hold family together from #1 New York Times bestselling author Susan Mallery.

With her divorce settlement about to run out and a mortgage she can’t afford, Robyn Caldwell needs a plan for her future. She nurtured her family and neglected herself. But how’s she supposed to think when her daughter has become the most demanding bride ever, her son won’t even consider college, her best friend is on the brink of marital disaster and her ex is making a monumentally bad decision that could bring everything crashing down on Robyn’s head? So when her great-aunt Lillian invites her to Santa Barbara for the summer, Robyn hops on the first plane.

But it’s hard to run away when you’re the heart of the family. One by one, everyone she left behind follows her across the country. Somehow, their baggage doesn’t feel as heavy in the sun-drenched, mishmash mansion. The more time Robyn spends with free-spirited Lillian, the more she sees the appeal in taking chances—on dreams, on love, on family. Life is meant to be lived on purpose. All she has to do is muster the courage to take a chance on herself.

About Susan Mallery

#1 NYT bestselling author Susan Mallery writes heartwarming, humorous novels about the relationships that define our lives?family, friendship, romance. She’s known for putting nuanced characters in emotional situations that surprise readers to laughter. Beloved by millions, her books have been translated into 28 languages. Susan lives in Washington with her husband, two cats, and a small poodle with delusions of grandeur. Visit her at SusanMallery.com.

All Her Little Secrets by Wanda M. Morris

2

Do you have something from your childhood that you wouldn’t want your coworkers to know?   Ellice Littlejohn has an Ivy League law degree and is a lawyer at a large corporation in Atlanta.  She doesn’t want her co-workers to know about her troubled childhood or her brother who has spent time in prison.  She also doesn’t want them to know that she is having an affair with her boss, Michael.

 Ellice’s world comes tumbling down when she comes to work one morning early to meet her boss and finds him dead in his office.  Who killed Michael?  Why is her workplace pushing her into his executive position so quickly? Why does most of the executive team seem to be hiding something and taking an active dislike to her?

 I enjoyed All Her Little Secrets.  It’s a good legal thriller.  It was slow burn at first, but once I got past a point in the middle, I literally couldn’t put this book down until I finished it. I really wanted to know what happened.  I also really liked the details of Ellice’s life and her experiences as the only person of color on the executive team.  She was also one of the only women in a powerful position was interesting as well.   Keeping secrets comes back to haunt Ellice as it makes her look very suspicious to the police.  I love how she wanted to protect her family and I also really liked her brother’s friend Juice.  It made me laugh that she made assumptions about him that were totally off base. 

 Favorite Quotes:

 “Just because he made a mistake doesn’t mean he can’t right himself up.  Mistakes don’t make nobody bad.  It makes ‘em human.”

 “Every lie you tell, every secret you keep, is a fragile little thing that must be protected and accounted for.  One misstep, one miscalculation, and your safe little treasures can topple the perfect life you’ve built around them.”

 “I had to believe that I was more than my worst mistake.  Every one of my secrets had been a painful lesson that I should have been learning from instead of running from.”

 Overall, All her Little Secrets is a riveting legal thriller while also being a great discussion about being a black woman in corporate America.  It’s also a great look at the side effects of telling lies, even what you believe to be harmless ones.

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

Once Upon a Wardrobe by Patti Callahan

 

What is the last book or movie that made you cry?

In Once Upon a Wardrobe, Megs Devonshire is a seventeen-year-old math student at Oxford in 1950.  Her seven-year-old brother George has a weak heart and is dying.  He has just read a wonderful new book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis.  He knows that C.S. Lewis is a professor at Oxford, and he ask Megs to find out, where did Narnia come from?  Megs follows C.S. Lewis home and is discovered sitting on his fence by his brother Warner.  They invite Megs in and start to tell her the story of his life.  What do all of these stories have to do with where Narnia comes from?  Megs takes the train home on the weekends and tells her brother the stories of “Once Upon a Wardrobe.”  Why can’t Megs get a straight answer from “Jack” Lewis?

This was a beautiful story.  It was the story of the love between siblings, and how to deal with the end of the life of someone that you love.  It is also the story of “Jack” Lewis growing up and how these formative years played into his writings.  I felt for Meg. As a mathematician she wanted a direct answer – what is the meaning of the book?  How can she save her brother?  But life sadly is not a math equation with a direct answer.  The book was sad and made me cry, but it also had a heartwarming ending.

I really need to read Patti Callahan’s novel about the wife of C.S. Lewis, Becoming Mrs. Lewis.  There is a note at the end of the novel by actor Douglas Gresham, one of Lewis’ stepsons from his marriage to Joy.  He fully endorses the novel and Becoming Mrs. Lewis.  It was a nice surprise.

Favorite Quotes:

“Reason is how we get to the truth, but imagination is how we find meaning.”

“Some babies are born closer to the end of their story than others, and this little boy was one of those.”

“With stories, I can see with other eyes, imagine with other imaginations, feel with other hearts, as well as with my own. Stories aren’t equations.”

Overall, Once Upon a Wardrobe by Patti Callahan is a beautiful and unique story.  I highly recommend it.

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

100 Counties, 5000 Ideas by National Geographic (TLC Book Tours)

 

If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you travel?

 I have never left North America!  Mexico and Canada are the only other countries that I have visited.  I would really like to travel to more locations that I have read about around the world.  A book like 100 Counties, 5000 Ideas gives me a lot of great ideas on where to travel, and to enjoy thinking about traveling from the comfort of my home.  I have a lot of places I would like to visit on my bucket list.

 100 Counties, 5000 Ideas is a large soft covered book.  It starts with a map of the world with countries labeled and then goes through countries alphabetically from A to Z.  Countries are from six of the seven continents, only Antarctica excluded.  Each country has beautiful pictures to show what you can see in that country and a description of highlights in the country that may include landscapes, cities, cultural heritage, cruises, monuments, nature and wildlife, festivals and traditions depending on the country. Each country has a sidebar list of “What to see and Do,” “When to go” to different parts of the country through the year, “Travel Advice” including pros, cons, and safety.  There is also a “Traveler’s notebook” which includes the main contacts, travel documents for US citizens, time zone, language & currency, population, capital, religion, celebrations, and shopping.

 I thought it was interesting to read about countries I’m already familiar with, but also to learn more about countries I’m not as familiar about.  We have a large, diverse, and beautiful world to explore.  A few items on my bucket list are:  seeing the Machu Picchu in Peru, visiting the islands of Portugal, Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, or visiting Angkor Wat in Cambodia.  What are some places you’d like to visit on your bucket list?

 I had fun also seeing how the United States was represented.  My current state, Wisconsin, was not represented, but my birth state of Michigan was.  It did a good job highlighting the various areas of the United States from Washington DC to Yellowstone National Park.

 Overall, 100 Countries, 5000 Ideas is a great book to plan travel or to learn about all of the countries around the world.

 Book Source:  A Review Copy from Hachette Book Group as part of the TLC Book Tour.  Thank-you! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

The Story Girl by L.M. Montgomery

 

Title:  The Story Girl

Author: L.M. Montgomery

Narrated by:  Grace Conlin

Publisher: Blackstone Publishing

Length: Approximately 8 hours and 59 minutes

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

 What type of books do you read to relax?  Work had been pretty stressful lately, so I thought it was time to harken back to the books that help me to relax; childhood favorites such as L.M. Montgomery.  I read all of her books when I was a teenager.  Reading them again now as an adult brings me back to simpler times and happy memories. 

 In The Story Girl, Beverley (Bev) and Felix King are two brothers who come to live with their Uncle Alex and Aunt Janet on Prince Edward Island while their father travels for work.  Their father has told them many stories about the family farm, and they are delighted to finally see the farm and family members for themselves.  They spend their time with their group of friends; their cousins Dan, Felicity, Cecily and Sara, hired boy Peter Craig, neighbor Sara Ray.  Sara Stanley is known for her ability to tell grand stories and is also known as “the story girl.”  The book tells the adventures of the friends and also the stories that Sara tells.  It is an interesting mix of stories and I enjoyed it.  It’s a fun book to listen to as an audiobook.  Grace Conlin was a good narrator.

 I found the stories to be charming.  They made me think of my own childhood playing with my cousins and friends on the family farm.  I even had a few similar times in the 1980s when we thought the world was going to end and also the discovery of an old trunk of my great-grandfathers. 

 I thought it was strange how Felicity was always looking down on Peter as the “hired hand.”  It was odd to me that being poor, Peter now just worked as a hired hand and didn’t go to school.  He was allowed to play with the kids after work.  It’s interesting.  Also interesting is that I read that L.M. Montgomery based the character of Peter on Herman Leard, the great love of her life.  Her family looked down on Herman and didn’t think he was good enough for her or high enough class.

 There is a lot of talk about Methodists and Presbyterians in the novel and Peter’s confusion about the difference between the two.  I thought it was amusing that they seem to be the only two churches in the area.

 I loved the show Avonlea in the 90s.  We didn’t have the Disney channel, but my grandparents would tape it for me.  This is one of the books that the show was based on.  There are many of the same characters, but also many changes.  I really need to rewatch this series!

 L.M. Montgomery also writes fantastic cats into her fiction.  In The Story Girl, we meet Pat the cat.  He is a large and in charge type of cat until he mysteriously falls ill.  The kids are sure he has been cursed by a woman who visited that many believe is a witch.  Do you have any favorite authors that write great animal characters?

 Favorite Quotes:

“Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.”

 “It is always safe to dream of spring. For it is sure to come; and if it be not just as we have pictured it, it will be infinitely sweeter.”

 “I do like a road, because you can be always wondering what is at the end of it.”

 “Only a few, who remain children at heart, can ever find that fair, lost path again; and blessed are they above mortals. They, and only they, can bring us tidings from that dear country where we once sojourned and from which we must evermore be exiles. The world calls them its singers and poets and artists and story-tellers; but they are just people who have never forgotten the way to fairyland.”

 Overall, The Story Girl is a delightful mix of stories that brings back the happiness of childhood.

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

 

What is your favorite book or movie about twin sisters?  I’ve always been intrigued by twins, which must be why I loved the Sweet Valley Twins so much. 

 The Vanishing Half was the February Pick for the Rogue (aka FLICKS) Book Club, and it was an intriguing book to discuss.  The Vanishing Half spans the era from the 1950s to around 1990.  Desiree and Stella Vignes are twin sisters that grow up in the small town of Mallard, Louisiana.  The town prides itself as being populated with very light skinned African Americans.  When Desiree and Stella disappear one day, the town is shocked, but even more so when Desiree reappears fourteen years later without her sister.  Where was Desiree at?  What happened to Stella?  Where is the father of Desiree’s child, Jude?

 I thought the book was fascinating and it gave me a lot to think about.  I loved the nonlinear storytelling, and the beautiful writing.  There was enough mystery that I just kept wanting to read and see what happened.  I cared for the characters and wanted to see how their stories played out.  There were a lot of secrets and trying to figure out what is the best life for you. Desiree decides to return home and take care of her mother, but she also finds true love in an unexpected place.  Stella decides to leave her family forever and to pass as a white person.  She lives her life always hoping that no one will guess her secret.  Jude grows up and attends college on a track scholarship.  She meets and falls in love with Reese, who has secrets of his own.  Jude also meets her cousin, Kennedy, who does not know her Mother Stella’s secret.  The way that everyone’s lives intertwine was captivating.

 As a mother, I was sad at the numerous characters that had to cut off ties with their families to live their best lives.  I can’t imagine never seeing my children again.  I could empathize with the characters though and know why they did it.  The book does have you wonder though, was it better to live a life as someone else or to live a life true to yourself?  I think Desiree was happier as her true self, but Stella had a more luxurious and safe life.

 I’m still thinking about this book over a week later.  I need to check out more books by author Brit Bennett.

 Also, as I’m always looking for engineers in books – I was happy to see that a line about a character’s ex-girlfriends included, “Hannah, the engineer, studying how to improve sanitation in poor countries.  Kennedy had imagined a frumpy girl wading through sewage, not this perky blonde on the subway, perfectly balanced in her five-inch boots.”  This is my line of engineering and I love that the author made the engineer sexy!

 Favorite Quotes:

 “She’d always known that it was possible to be two different people in one lifetime, or maybe it was only possible from some.  Maybe others were just stuck with who they were.”

 “This big ol’ world and we only get to go through it once.  The saddest thing there is, you ask me.”

 “At first, passing seemed so simple, she couldn’t understand why her parents hadn’t done it.  But she was young then.  She hadn’t realized how long it takes to become somebody else, or how lonely it can be living in a world not meant for you.”

 “This river, like all rivers, remembered its course.  They floated under the leafy canopy of trees, begging to forget.”

 Overall, The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett is an intriguing look into racial and gender identity and a fascinating story of a family.  It was a beautifully written novel.

 Book Source:  Purchased from Amazon.com during a buy two get one free deal!

A Blizzard of Polar Bears by Alice Henderson

 

Have you read any good thrillers lately?  Do you like books with non-stop action or books with slower thrills?

 A Blizzard of Polar Bears is a follow up to last year’s novel, A Solitude of Wolverines and starts right where the last book ended.  That being said, A Blizzard of Polar Bears also works as a standalone novel.  I would recommend reading A Solitude of Wolverines first if you can.

 Alex Carter is a wildlife biologist just finishing up a wolverine study in Montana.  She is hired for an exciting new polar bear study in Manitoba Canada.   She starts work and is excited to be making a difference studying the effects of climate change on polar bears in the artic.  After the first few days of great work, things start to go wrong with the study. Someone breaks into the lab, takes all of their data, and steals their samples.  Their helicopter pilot is hired by someone else.  Then the group realizes that they themselves have become the hunted.  Who is after them?  There is a lot of suspicious activity happening in this small town.

 I really enjoyed the wildlife biology and climate change aspects of this novel.  I find them intriguing and interesting; I am an environmental engineer for my career.  I work in the water field and not with wildlife so it’s interesting to see the science and how research is performed.  Just like with a Solitude of Wolverines, A Blizzard of Polar Bears has nonstop action as the plot progresses.  It’s kind of like an environmental action thriller.  It would be a big blockbuster movie with lots of explosions.  I find it highly entertaining, and I read this book in one day.

 One item I really loved was that the mysterious man that seems to be following Alex around in A Solitude of Wolverines, actually meets with Alex and works with her in A Blizzard of Polar Bears.  What is his back story?  Why is he following Alex around?  Will Alex be able to warm him back up when he falls into freezing cold water in the wilderness?  Ha!!!!  I feel like every snow set movie or book has a warming up scene in it.  Do you have a favorite movie or book with this type of lifesaving scene?

 Overall, A Blizzard of Polar Bears is a very entertaining wildlife ecology thriller.  I can’t wait for the next book in this series.

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

Excerpt from Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron (Austenprose PR Blog Tour)

 

I am thrilled to be a part of the Jane and the Year Without a Summer by Stephanie Barron Book Tour.  I LOVED this novel and this entire series.  My review can be found at this link.  Author Stephanie Barron has written another fascinating novel that captures the "voice" of Jane Austen as a character.  It's set during the interesting summer of 1816 that Jane and her sister Cassandra spent in the Cheltenham Spa in Glouchestershire.  Stephanie Barron also stopped by to chat about this book and her new series at the JASNA Northwoods book club.  We were delighted to have her and learned so much!  Now without further ado, an excerpt from the novel as Jane meets other guests that are boarding with her in Cheltenham.

Jane and the Year Without a Summer Excerpt 

“Mrs. Smith.” Pellew had removed his tricorn and now

bowed to his fellow-lodger. “I hope I see you in good health,

ma’am?”

“Captain,” she replied, “I am very well, I thank you.” At

that instant, she perceived me standing at a little remove

from them both, and stepped impulsively in my direction.

“Miss Austen. I must beg your pardon, I was very rude to

you last night! Only think, Captain, this lady is our fellow lodger—

may I introduce Captain Pellew to your notice,

ma’am?—and I had barely made her acquaintance before I

ran away in a fretful temper!”

“You had barely eaten dinner, too, I warrant,” Captain

Pellew replied shrewdly. “Miss Austen, your servant.”

I dropped the gentleman a curtsey. “I detected no rudeness,

Mrs. Smith, I assure you. Only perhaps a certain

disinclination for company, which any of us might feel at

the close of a long day.”

“You are very good,” the young woman told me. Her eyes,

which were moss-green flecked with amber, studied me

gravely for an instant, then warmed. “You will have detected

Miss Garthwaite’s disapproval, I am sure. I shall forestall

that excellent lady’s gossip, and warn you myself that I am a

scandalous creature, an intimate of Mr. John Bowles Watson’s

Cheltenham Theatre, undeserving of genteel notice. I give

you leave to cut me direct, and shall never reproach your taste.”

“Nonsense,” Captain Pellew said roughly. “I have known

Mrs. Smith nearly all my life, Miss Austen, and I may assure

you there is no one more respectable. Her humour, perhaps,

is capricious.” He gestured at her volume. “Do you undertake

to master comedy, ma’am? I had thought Shakespeare more

your suit. Caesar, wasn’t it, last week?”

“Indeed. And my work was rewarded—the play is to

be mounted in two days’ time, and Jasper bids fair to be a

charming Brutus. But this,” she explained with a wave of

the Sheridan, “is next week’s bill—and Tess is to play Lady

Teazle.”

“Good Lord!” A smile suffused Pellew’s countenance,

transforming it instantly. “Watson doesn’t ask much. Lady

Teazle! He might as well demand you turn loaves into fish.”

“She’ll look like an angel.”

“Tess always does,” he agreed. “That isn’t the trouble. She’ll

also open her mouth.”

I must have knit my brows in confusion, for the Captain

explained, “Mrs. Smith is charged with a heavy duty, ma’am.

She is required to instruct the members of Mr. Watson’s

company to speak the King’s English.”

“Are they . . . French?” I suggested.

“No, no,” Mrs. Smith replied on a laugh. “Merely

unschooled.”

“Mrs. Smith turns any number of sows’ ears into silk purses

before the curtain rises.” Captain Pellew’s lips pursed. “She

makes the worst Back Alley Tom sound like a lord, and every

barmaid a duchess. Gives them proper airs, too, and notes on

how to raise a quizzing glass.”

“You instruct the traveling company,” I said wonderingly,

“in . . . elocution? And genteel behaviour?”

“Someone must.” The young lady’s features were alight

with mischief. “And I will own that, save for those lacking

all talent, actors are in general quick studies. Most are ambitious—

and to acquire refinement, in voice and air, is to gain

a distinct professional advantage. The theatre is unforgiving.

Pretty faces age, but graces do not.”

“Tess has not the slightest scrap of talent,” Captain Pellew

said. “I wish you joy of her.”

“You’re sadly correct.” Mrs. Smith’s mouth curved. “And

as I am already a quarter-hour behind in my duty, I have not

another second to waste. Adieu! ”

She parted from us with a friendly nod.

Pellew’s eyes followed her through the throng of library

patrons, as tho’ he had forgot my presence. But in this I was

mistaken.

“There goes one of the most admirable women of my

acquaintance,” he said. “I do not know what Miss Garthwaite

may have said of her—all manner of nonsense, no doubt!—

but I would urge you to form your own opinion.”

“I make a habit of doing so,” I replied.

 

Chapter 7, pages 66-68

 

QUICK FACTS

·       Title: Jane and the Year Without a Summer

·       Series: Being a Jane Austen Mystery (Book 14)

·       Author: Stephanie Barron

·       Genre: Historical Mystery, Austenesque

·       Publisher: Soho Press (February 8, 2022)

·       Length: (336) pages

·       Format: Hardcover, eBook, & audiobook 

·       ISBN: 978-1641292474

·       Tour Dates: February 7-20, 2022

 

BOOK DESCRIPTION

 
May 1816: Jane Austen is feeling unwell, with an uneasy stomach, constant fatigue, rashes, fevers and aches. She attributes her poor condition to the stress of family burdens, which even the drafting of her latest manuscript—about a baronet's daughter nursing a broken heart for a daring naval captain—cannot alleviate. Her apothecary recommends a trial of the curative waters at Cheltenham Spa, in Gloucestershire. Jane decides to use some of the profits earned from her last novel, Emma, and treat herself to a period of rest and reflection at the spa, in the company of her sister, Cassandra.
 
Cheltenham Spa hardly turns out to be the relaxing sojourn Jane and Cassandra envisaged, however. It is immediately obvious that other boarders at the guest house where the Misses Austen are staying have come to Cheltenham with stresses of their own—some of them deadly. But perhaps with Jane’s interference a terrible crime might be prevented. Set during the Year without a Summer, when the eruption of Mount Tambora in the South Pacific caused a volcanic winter that shrouded the entire planet for sixteen months, this fourteenth installment in Stephanie Barron’s critically acclaimed series brings a forgotten moment of Regency history to life.

 

ADVANCE PRAISE

Advance Praise

“Outstanding...Barron fans will hope Jane, who died in 1817, will be back for one more mystery.”— Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“No one conjures Austen's voice like Stephanie Barron, and Jane and the Year Without a Summer is utterly pitch-perfect.”— Deanna Raybourn, bestselling author of the Veronica Speedwell Mysteries

“…a page-turning story, imbued with fascinating historical detail, a cast of beautifully realized characters, a pitch-perfect Jane Austen, and an intriguing mystery. Highly recommended.”— Syrie James, bestselling author of The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen

“Jane and the Year Without a Summer is absolute perfection. Stephanie Barron expertly weaves fact and fiction, crafting a story that is authentically Austen in its elegance, charm, and wit. The characters and setting will enchant you, and the mystery will keep you guessing to the last page. This Regency-set gem is truly a diamond of the first water.”— Mimi Matthews, USA Today bestselling author of The Siren of Sussex

 

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AUTHOR BIO

Francine Mathews was born in Binghamton, New York, the last of six girls. She attended Princeton and Stanford Universities, where she studied history, before going on to work as an intelligence analyst at the CIA. She wrote her first book in 1992 and left the Agency a year later. Since then, she has written twenty-five books, including five novels in the Merry Folger series (Death in the Off-Season, Death in Rough Water, Death in a Mood Indigo, Death in a Cold Hard Light, and Death on Nantucket) as well as the nationally bestselling Being a Jane Austen mystery series, which she writes under the penname, Stephanie Barron. She lives and works in Denver, Colorado.

 

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