Book Review: Stockholm Diaries, Caroline: The Foreign Fling Duet by Rebecca Hunter

 

Stockholm Diaries, Caroline:

 The Foreign Fling Duet 

By Rebecca Hunter

• Publication Date : July 1, 2015

The Plan:
A month in Sweden to jump-start her photojournalism career
Not in the Plan:
The hot, grumpy neighbor across the hall

But an adventure abroad never goes according to plan...right? Especially when the not-in-the-plan guy has a bad reputation.

Time is running out. Caroline must choose what is safe or choose what her heart tells her is right.

But what if her heart wants more than one thing?

 Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review 

Stockholm Diaries, Caroline:

The Foreign Fling Duet 

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Despite the slow start, this novel turned out to be an unstoppable page turner. This story begins as a sort of self-discovery, Caroline leaves her long-term boyfriend to pursue her dream of becoming a travel photographer. And then Niklas is thrown into the mix and muddles everything up!

I really enjoyed reading about both Niklas and Caroline and watching how their story unfolded.

 There are a few grammatical errors in this novel which could be fixed with a thorough edit which is why I have given this book a four book rating rather than a five. 

You can find it over on Amazon

Rebecca Hunter is the award-winning author of sensual, emotional adventures of the heart. She is a reader, traveler, former English teacher, chocolate lover, and keeper of a very messy desk.

Her debut book, Stockholm Diaries, Caroline, won the 2016 National Excellence in Romance Fiction Award (NERFA), and Best Laid Plans, the first book in her Blackmore Inc. series for the Harlequin Dare line, won the 2019 NERFA and the 2019 HOLT Medallion contests and earned a starred review from Library Journal.

Book Review: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

The Book Thief

By Markus Zusak

It is 1939. In Nazi Germany, the country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier - and will become busier still.

By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed forever when she picks up a single object, abandoned in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, and this is her first act of book thievery. So begins Liesel's love affair with books and words, and soon she is stealing from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library . . . wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times, and when Liesel's foster family hides a Jew in their basement, nothing will ever be the same again.

Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review 

The Book Thief

📚📚 

I really wanted to like this book, and I really did try. The writing is flawless, the delivery is brilliant, but and the one thing I found really uncomfortable while reading this book is that death is the narrator. I know that sounds crazy, but I just could not get my head around it and I found it really creepy. 

There was also a lack of  I don't know, tension. There was a sort of tension but it was easily resolved, and there were beautifully written scenes but they did not compel me to carry on reading. I don't like not finishing a book, but I really had a difficult time with this one.

You can find it over on Amazon

Markus Zusak is the author of five books, including the international bestseller, The Book Thief , which spent more than a decade on the New York Times bestseller list, and is translated into more than forty languages – establishing Zusak as one of the most successful authors to come out of Australia.

Book Review: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green @realjohngreen

 

The Fault in Our Stars 

By John Green

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.

Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars brilliantly explores the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.

 Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review 

The Fault in Our Stars 

📚📚📚📚📚

Now I know what all the fuss was about. This book is deserving of all the acclaim it has received. It was simply brilliant from beginning to end. 

You will need a box of tissues by you side when you read this novel because it is desperately  sad. It is one of the most emotional books that I think I have ever read. It is also the kind of book that one only needs to read the once, for I do not think I can put myself through so much heartache again.

This is a wonderful novel, I really cannot praise it enough. If it isn't on your to-read list then it jolly well should be!

You can find it over on Amazon

John Green's first novel, Looking for Alaska, won the 2006 Michael L. Printz Award presented by the American Library Association. His second novel, An Abundance of Katherines, was a 2007 Michael L. Printz Award Honor Book and a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. His next novel, Paper Towns, is a New York Times bestseller and won the Edgar Allen Poe Award for Best YA Mystery. In January 2012, his most recent novel, The Fault in Our Stars, was met with wide critical acclaim, unprecedented in Green's career. The praise included rave reviews in Time Magazine and The New York Times, on NPR, and from award-winning author Markus Zusak. The book also topped the New York Times Children's Paperback Bestseller list for several weeks. Green has also coauthored a book with David Levithan called Will Grayson, Will Grayson, published in 2010. The film rights for all his books, with the exception of Will Grayson Will Grayson, have been optioned to major Hollywood Studios.

In 2007, John and his brother Hank were the hosts of a popular internet blog, "Brotherhood 2.0," where they discussed their lives, books and current events every day for a year except for weekends and holidays. They still keep a video blog, now called "The Vlog Brothers," which can be found on the Nerdfighters website, or a direct link here.

Book Review: Lady Ashby's Major Scandal by Myretta Robens

Lady Ashby's Major Scandal

By Myretta Robens 

Lady Ashby has a pressing problem

Widowed at a young age, Isabel Ashby, yearns to marry again—this time to a young, handsome, titled husband—and live a nice, quiet life with two or three cherubic children. Having limited choices among the gentlemen of her acquaintance, Isabel decides to orchestrate a compromising position for herself to entrap the Earl of Caenby into marriage. But it all goes dreadfully wrong when she ends up unwittingly catching Major Sidney Chamberlayne instead.

Major Chamberlyane has a stoic solution

Sidney Chamberlyane is a second son, a military man of honor who is far more comfortable on the back of a horse than in a ballroom flirting with ladies of the ton. But when Sidney is caught in a passionate kiss with the delectable Lady Ashby, he can do nothing less than marry her.

With their marriage off to a stormy start, both Isabel and Sidney wade through the murky waters of mistrust. But as they begin to recognize the changes in their feelings, will the winds of scandal and gossip drag them down into dangerous depths, or will truth and love guide them home?

Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review 

Lady Ashby's Major Scandal

📚📚📚

This was a tough one for me to rate, it wasn't a two book rating, but neither did I think it worthy of a three. It is a well written story but I just could not connect with the characters and the story was predictable.

This is a very sensual novel, and I thought these scenes were beautifully written it was just the characters themselves.  I don't know. I guess this novel was just not my cup of tea.

Myretta Robens has lived in Regency England since she was old enough to read Jane Austen. As no eligible peers presented themselves and she never could get vouchers for Almack's, she was forced to make her way by going into trade. She spent more years than she cares to count working in the field of information technology. It was rewarding in its own way but she never abandoned her first love. In 1997, She found an interesting way to insinuate the 19th century into the world of technology when she joined a friend in creating a Jane Austen web site. She still manages The Republic of Pemberley and invites you to visit if your obsession runs to Jane Austen.

When Myretta is not in the Regency, she lives outside Boston with her Australian Cattle Dog and a varying number of cats.

Book Review: Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng @pronounced_ing

 

Little Fires Everywhere

By Celeste Ng 

Everyone in Shaker Heights was talking about it that summer: how Isabelle, the last of the Richardson children, had finally gone around the bend and burned the house down.

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is meticulously planned - from the layout of the winding roads, to the colours of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren - an enigmatic artist and single mother- who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenage daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than just tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past, and a disregard for the rules that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town - and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at an unexpected and devastating cost . . .

 Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review

Little Fires Everywhere

📚📚📚📚  

This was a fun read, although at times it was a little on the slow side and there are many characters to get to grips with, but the prose is gripping and the story is wonderful.

It is, without a doubt, an intriguing drama, and one that once I got into I found very difficult t turn away from.

I like this novel very much!

You can find it over on Amazon

Celeste Ng grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Shaker Heights, Ohio.
She attended Harvard University and earned an MFA from the University of
Michigan. Her debut novel, Everything I Never Told You, won the Hopwood Award, the
Massachusetts Book Award, the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature and the
ALA's Alex Award and is a 2016 NEA fellow. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Book Review: American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins @jeaninecummins

 

American Dirt

By Jeanine Cummins 

FEAR KEEPS THEM RUNNING. HOPE KEEPS THEM ALIVE.

Vivid, visceral, utterly compelling, AMERICAN DIRT is an unforgettable story of a mother and son's attempt to cross the US-Mexico border. Described as 'impossible to put down' (Saturday Review) and 'essential reading' (Tracy Chevalier), it is a story that will leave you utterly changed.

Yesterday, Lydia had a bookshop.

Yesterday, Lydia was married to a journalist.

Yesterday, she was with everyone she loved most in the world.

Today, her eight-year-old son Luca is all she has left.

For him, she will carry a machete strapped to her leg.

For him, she will leap onto the roof of a high speed train.

For him, she will find the strength to keep running.

Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review 

American Dirt

📚📚📚📚📚

If I could give this book more than a five star book rating then I would. This is a breathtakingly brilliant novel that grabbed me from that opening chapter and did not let go of me. This is, at times, a tough read, but I thought it is one of those books that really challenges you and makes you think. 

The poor reviews this book has received are not at all deserved, this book is one that should not be overlooked. Read this book!

You can find it over on Amazon

Jeanine Cummins is the author of four books: the bestselling memoir A Rip in Heaven, and the novels The Outside Boy, The Crooked Branch, and American Dirt. She lives in New York with her husband and two children.

Book Review: The Woman I Was Before by Kerry Fisher @KerryFSwayne

 

The Woman I Was Before

By Kerry Fisher

A new home can be a happy ending. Or a fresh start. Or a hiding place...

Of all the emotions single mother Kate Jones feels as she walks into her brand new house on Parkview Road, hope is the most unexpected. She has changed her name and her daughter’s, and moved across the country to escape the single mistake that destroyed their lives.

Kate isn’t the only woman on the street starting afresh. Warm, whirlwind Gisela with her busy life and confident children, and sharp, composed Sally, with her spontaneous marriage and high-flying career, are the first new friends Kate has allowed herself in years. Whilst part of her envies their seemingly perfect lives, their friendship might help Kate to leave her guilt behind.

Until one day, everything changes. Kate is called to the scene of a devastating car accident, the consequences of which will test everything the women thought they knew about each other, and themselves.

Can Kate stop her own secrets from unravelling, or was her hope for a new life in vain?

Book Rating:

📚📚📚📚📚 = I could not put this book down. I Highly Recommend.

📚📚📚📚 = A really great read.

📚📚📚 = It was enjoyable.

📚📚 = It was okay.

📚 = Um...! 😕

My Review

The Woman I Was Before

📚📚📚📚📚

You know a book is great when you find yourself trying to slow down, limiting yourself to several pages a day because you don't want the story to end. This is such a book.

This novel is a reminder that not everything you see on social media is real - it does not depict real life.  The three characters in this novel, Kate, Gisela  and  Sally, seemingly have it all together - at least on social media, but the truth is,  life isn't as picture perfect as they have made it out to be.

I thought this novel was something very special indeed. It certainly deserves to be read. 

Kerry Fisher is an internationally bestselling author of women's contemporary fiction, including The Woman I Was Before, The Silent Wife (USA Today bestseller) and The Secret Child. She was born in Peterborough, studied French and Italian at the University of Bath and spent several years living in Spain, Italy and Corsica. After returning to England to work as a journalist, she eventually abandoned real life stories for the secrets of fictional families. She now lives in Surrey with her husband, two teenage children and a naughty Lab/Schnauzer called Poppy.