The Year I Left - Christine Brae

The Year I Left
Christine Brae
Published by: Vesuvian Books
Publication date: August 20th 2019
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance, Women’s Fiction

“A thousand half loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.”
Carin Frost doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. A confident businesswoman, wife, and mother, she begins to resent everything about her life. Nothing makes sense. Nothing makes her feel. Maybe it’s the recent loss of her mother in a tragic accident. Or maybe she’s just losing her mind.
Enter Matias Torres. As their new business partnership thrives, so does their friendship—and his interest in her. Carin is determined to keep her distance, until a work assignment sends them to Southeast Asia where a storm is brewing on the island. In the midst of the chaos, Matias asks her to do something unimaginable, exhilarating, BOLD. Carin knows the consequences could be dire, but it may be the only way to save herself.
An honest look at love and marriage and the frailties of the human heart, this is a story of a woman’s loss of self and purpose and the journey she takes to find her way back.

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Author Bio:
Christine Brae is a senior executive with a full time career, who thought she could write a book about her life and then run away as far as possible from it. She never imagined that her words would touch the hearts of so many women with the same story to tell. Christine has written six books since her first release in 2013. She is the author of The Light in the Wound and His Wounded Light (2013), Insipid (2014), In This Life (2016) and Eight Goodbyes (2018).
Her latest book, The Year I Left is scheduled for release in August, 2019.
When not listening to the voices in her head or spending late nights at the office, Christine can be seen shopping for shoes and purses, running a half marathon or spending time with her husband and three children in Chicago.
Christine is represented by Italia Gandolfo of Gandolfo Helin & Fountain Literary Management.

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My Review

Sometimes when I'm reviewing books I struggle to know where to start. I have to admit that The Year I Left is one of those times. The book tells the story of Carin and her dissatisfaction with life. She meets a younger man through work, who she is drawn to irresistibly and her life begins to unravel around her as she tries to find her way again. 

I think part of my struggle with the review is not that I didn't enjoy the book, I did, but rather I didn't really like the main character. While I understood that she wasn't happy and felt for her feeling so trapped, there was also a lot that I didn't like and didn't really understand. I don't want to give away the things that happened in the course of the story, but on more than one occasion it was hard to understand why she acted the way that she did, or why she didn't just follow her heart without making a huge and drastic change. 

The story is beautifully written and it was next to impossible to put down, particularly in the second part of the book. I couldn't see where it was going to go and how things were going to be resolved, which of course kept me turning the pages. The storyline as a whole is thought-provoking and I can certainly see what the author was doing, it was just a shame for me at least, that I couldn't relate to the main character and didn't really have a lot of sympathy for her. Having said that, I was left satisfied with the end of the story and did warm to her a little eventually.

This was a great read, it dragged you along, pushing your emotions all the way and I think was ultimately attempting to get you to question what was really important. I'd definitely recommend it.

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What we do for love - Anne Pfeffer

What We Do For Love
Anne Pfeffer
Publication date: May 21st 2019
Genres: Adult, Contemporary

Thirty-eight year old Nicole Adams has given up on finding love. Instead, the single mother focuses on the things she cherishes most—her sixteen-year old son Justin, her friends, and her art.
When she convinces a prominent Los Angeles museum to feature a piece of her work, a large-scale installation, she thinks her life has finally turned a corner.
Then Justin brings a girl, Daniela, home to live with them. Daniela’s angry parents have thrown her out of the house, because she’s pregnant with Justin’s child. Shattered, Nicole takes Daniela in and, in so doing, is drawn into the inner circle of Daniela’s family—a frightening world of deceit and violence.
Nicole struggles to keep life going as normal. Forced to deal with people she doesn’t trust or like, fearful for the future of both her son and the grandchild they’re expecting, Nicole wonders if she can do what she tells Justin to do: always have faith in yourself and do the right thing.
—
What We Do for Love won the Chick Lit category of the 2019 Next Generation Indie Book Awards, and finalist for Best Cover Design/Fiction!

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Author Bio:
Hi! I grew up in the desert around Phoenix, Arizona, where I had a bay quarter horse named Dolly. If I wasn't riding, I was holed up somewhere reading Laura Ingalls Wilder or the Oz books or, later on, Jane Eyre and The Grapes of Wrath. Horses eventually faded as an interest, but I ended up with a lifelong love of books and reading.
After college and eight years of living in cold places like Chicago and New York, I escaped back to the land of sunshine. I now live in California, one mile from the Pacific Ocean, with my dachshund Taco. I have worked in banking and as a pro bono attorney, doing adoptions and guardianships for abandoned children.
As a writer, I'd always been interested in children's books, since they had meant so much to me as a kid. I've found I especially like writing books about teens and twenty-somethings, an age where you make so many decisions about who you are and how you want to spend your life.
I love hearing from readers, so please write to me any time at my website www.annepfeffer.com.

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My Review

I'm not really sure what genre of book I'd describe this as. There is some romance, although in many ways it's secondary to the other events that take place. The book deals with relationships of different types; there is the mother and child relationship in its various forms, there's friendship of different types and then there are romantic relationships. As our main character Nicole finds herself looking at the different relationships in her life, she questions them all and finds that things change.

I really enjoyed this read. It was interesting seeing the different way the mothers or potential mothers dealt with their relationship with their child and tried to protect them. I also liked the friendships between Nicole and the people that she had around her.

This was quite a light and easy read, although it dealt in some ways with some quite meaty topics. Overall it was an enjoyable and thought-provoking story, but one that didn't tax my little grey cells too much.

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The Other Half of Augusta Hope - Joanna Glen

The Other Half of Augusta Hope by Joanna Glen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a bit of an unusual story. I have to admit from the blurb, I wasn't really sure what to expect and even as the story unfolded I really wasn't sure where it was going. This is a story about living life, love and loss. Or perhaps in many ways, it would be more accurate to simply say that this is a story about life. It follows Augusta and her twin Julia from their early days, while at the same time we see snippets of Parfait's life. Of course, these two stories are going to eventually collide and it becomes apparent that they are in more ways than one, two halves of the same story.
What's really odd about this story is that in many ways it's a very sad or melancholy tale, there is a lot that happens that is truly awful for all of the various characters that we meet. Even the good stuff is tempered by decisions or events of the past. The really odd part of this is that despite all of that, there is something that does leave you feeling good when you've read this book. Possibly it's the ending? But I would say that I had that feeling as I read it, there's something about the story overall that just gives you a bit of a contented feeling, or perhaps that's just me.
I went into this book not really knowing what to expect and in many ways, I've come out of it, not really able to fully describe what it is, but knowing that I really enjoyed it,
I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

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Black Girls Must Die Exhausted - Jayne Allen

Black Girls Must Die Exhausted: A Novel for Grown Ups by Jayne Allen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've always been told that you should never judge a book by its cover, but it was the beautiful cover that caught my interest with this one. Fortunately, what was inside certainly lived up to that cover.
The idea that both women and black people have to work much harder to get the recognition that they deserve is certainly not a new one. Of course being a black woman means therefore that you have to work even harder again, which is why the title of this book proclaims that Black Girls Must Die Exhausted. For the lead character in this book, Tabatha Walker, that is certainly true. She has to constantly fight to get ahead, without wanting to be seen as too pushy or too aggressive. Everything is a struggle and even her body is turning against her in her attempts to succeed in her career, her personal life and the dream of one day being a wife and mother.
This book is not just about race, although it is an important theme in the book, it is also about relationships. Tabby has a number of strong women in her life, from her best friends Leila and Lexi to her grandmother, who is also called Tabatha. Added to this is her complex relationship with her father, less than ideal relationship with her boyfriend Marc and a long distance relationship with her mother. It is all of these relationships that add to the rich and complex mix that make this story.
This isn't a fairy tale with clearly defined goodies and baddies. Although there are people that are not so good at points, there are also explanations and reasons given for the way that they act. Not that you can excuse everything, but somehow giving reasons makes people seem more real and human.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. The added bonus is that it was actually the first in a trilogy (which I didn't realise until the very end) and I'm really keen to read the next instalment.
I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

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On Top of the World - David Lamb

I've always loved A Christmas Carol, so the idea of a modern take on the story, but as a contemporary romance, meant I had to give it a read.

On top of the World

2016 BEST FICTION-Pacific Book Awards. FROM THE FUNNY AND NATURALLY BRILLIANT DAVID LAMB, award-winning playwright of the New York Times celebrated play, Platanos Y Collard Greens, comes a modern spin on Dickens’ classic tale that perfectly combines humor and romance in a story re-imagined for our digital, consumerist age.  This version of Scrooge and Belle is familiar, yet unlike any you’ve come across before. Scrooge, or rather Scrooje, is music’s biggest superstar, with one hundred million albums sold, fifteen million devoted YouTube subscribers, two and a half million Facebook likes, and twenty-five million fanatical Twitter followers known as Scroojites. Belle, is a legal shark who gulps down her opposition voraciously and whose beauty and stunning figure causes traffic accidents as she zips through the sidewalks of Manhattan stylishly adorned and taking no prisoners.   They never imagined being music’s most powerful couple, but that’s exactly what happened when Belle fell head over heels and gave the Coke-bottle glasses wearing, plaid and stripe attired, scrawny, biggest nerd on her college campus the ultimate makeover, turning him into a fashion impresario whose style sets trends from Milan to NY Fashion Week and who can be seen courtside at the NBA Finals sporting a perfectly-fitted cashmere suit.   Then it happens. Belle realizes too late that she’s created a chart-topping monster as Scrooje’s ego explodes and he starts acting a fool.   Now, it’s been three years since they ve spoken. But tonight at Hollywood s biggest red carpet event, with the whole world watching, they’ll be given a second chance.

My Review

I loved this modern take on an old favourite. Not only was it a fun and updated version of the story, it still faithfully recreated Charles Dicken's original. Scrooje was thoroughly unlikeable when we first meet him. We see glimpses of his past, as he travels through his past with the ghosts that come to show him the error of his ways. We soon discover that he wasn't always the heartless, money mad, super star that he has become. 

I have to admit, that although Scrooje has become completely obsessed with money and greedy. I didn't think that Belle was much better. She was only really upset when he didn't do some acts of charity to appease her conscience, but was more than happy for him to shower her with gifts and throw parties with a huge, ostentatious display of wealth. Nice.

The idea of Scrooge (or in this case Scrooje) as a multi-million dollar music star, worked really well. It's not something that might spring immediately to mind, but it was really well done.

It was a fun and amusing story and although I knew what was going to happen, this being a retelling of an old favourite, it was still a really good read.

Links

davidlamb.club
@authordavidlamb

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Anything you ask of me - Heather Curley

Check out this new Historical novel from Heather Curley. While you're here, don't forget to enter the giveaway at the bottom of the post. It closes on the 29th of September.

Anything you ask of me

Although her home state of Maryland hasn’t sworn allegiance to either Union or Confederacy, twenty-two-year-old Elizabeth Archer’s life is shattered. Her father has fled North, abandoning the household. The man she loved—and who married her sister instead— is killed in battle. Elizabeth’s life of parties and societal obligations dwindles down to isolation and too many empty hours; hours to mourn the man who gave her up to chase an inheritance.

She meets Confederate general Jeb Stuart by chance and, in an instant, she’s the center of his attention.

As commander of the Army of Northern Virginia’s cavalry division, General Stuart doesn’t ask, he orders. The attraction seems mutual and, flattered by his affection, Elizabeth agrees to spy for the Confederacy. She’s Stuart’s La Belle Rebelle, the Beautiful Rebel; the siren of the south. She’s notorious in the Union and lauded in the Confederacy. And she’s falling in love with him.

Notoriety, however, is a spy’s worst enemy. Now pursued by a Federal officer tasked to stop her at any cost, Elizabeth faces the sentence of hanging if she’s convicted of treason against the Union. Devoted to a cause she doesn’t believe in and with Federal blood on her hands, Elizabeth must save herself—or die a traitor.

Time is running out. And no one, not even La Belle Rebelle, can outrun the war.

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31394969-anything-you-ask-of-me

Purchase:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01JFOMKLI/

B&N:http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/anything-you-ask-of-me-heather-curley/1120641544?ean=9781910282427

AUTHOR BIO:

Heather Hambel Curley was born in West Virginia and raised in Western Pennsylvania.  She graduated magna cum laude from Robert Morris University with a degree in Communications in 2004. Heather has been involved with Civil War reenacting since 2001.  In 2004, she volunteered at Harpers Ferry National Historical Park with the living history and archeology departments.  Currently, she is a corseted living historian with the Baltimore Light Artillery, a group of historians who provide artillery demonstrations in parks such as Harpers Ferry, Gettysburg National Military Park, and Antietam National Battlefield. Heather resides in Western Pennsylvania with her husband and two children.  She is a member of Pennwriters and the Historical Novel Society.

Author links: 

https://heatherhambelcurley.com/

https://www.facebook.com/heatherhambelcurley

https://twitter.com/Heather_Curley

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The Luminaries - Eleanor Catton

I got this for Christmas, over the past few years I've ended up reading many of the booker prize winners and am yet to find one I haven't enjoyed. Being set in New Zealand, this seemed to be even more of a draw than usual. 

It's taken until now to get around to reading it. Not because I didn't want to start it, but more because I had a couple of false starts. The chapters in the beginning of this book are very long, the first two times I tried to start it, I was tired and couldn't make it to a good place to stop before needing to get to sleep. I need to find a good stopping point when I'm reading, particularly in those first few pages.

I had a few nights where I was heading to bed early to read, so it seemed a good time to give the Luminaries a proper go. So I dived in. Although it is mostly set in Hokitika on the West Coast, I will admit that I was quite excited to find quite a few references to Port Chalmers. (I know, sad to admit that I'd find that exciting, but there you go.)

The story is mostly set in the West Coast gold rush of the 1800's and much of the action revolves around a number of characters who have gone to Hokitika to find their fortune. There is a lot going on in this book. Keeping track of the interweaving story lines isn't easy, and I wasn't sure at all where it was going for much of the time. 

I don't want to go dropping spoilers into this, in fact, were I to try to, we'd probably be here all week, there was so much going on in this book. It perhaps meant that there was no real lead or leads, with so many people taking the main role at one time or another in the book. Would it have been better if there had? Possibly, I would have liked to know more about one or two of those who started out in a strong leading role and then faded into the background later.

I did enjoy it, really enjoy it, but it was far from a favourite. There were still questions left to be answered by the end of the book. Or perhaps I lost them in the circular narrative. I'm not sure. It was a very good book technically, well told but just missing that final spark to make it truly fantastic.