Playing Catch up – Part Two!

I made it back!  Look at me go, one post a week for two weeks!  

This is part two of the best books I’ve read in the last, my goodness, six years. It’s been six years since I blogged regularly. Things tapered off in 2019, the world went to Hell, and I stopped reading much.  

As I was going through this list, I realized I had more, so this may be a thing I do for a bit, just to get caught up.


The Only One Left by Riley Sager
Mystery/Thriller
Dutton | June 20, 2023

About the Book:

At seventeen, Lenora Hope
Hung her sister with a rope


Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.

Stabbed her father with a knife
Took her mother’s happy life


It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer—I want to tell you everything.

“It wasn’t me,” Lenora said
But she’s the only one not dead


As Kit helps Lenora write about the events leading to the Hope family massacre, it becomes clear there’s more to the tale than people know. But when new details about her predecessor’s departure come to light, Kit starts to suspect Lenora might not be telling the complete truth—and that the seemingly harmless woman in her care could be far more dangerous than she first thought.

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I’m definitely a Riley Sager fan, but their books have run the gambit for me.  I’ve yet to read anything bad, but they range from just okay to super awesome.

The Only One Left was SUPER awesome!  I wasn’t blogging at the time, but oooh boy did I tell everyone I knew to get this book and read it.  My daughter has a copy and I’ve been dying for her to read it just to have someone to talk to about it. The twists and turns were so much fun, but even more than that I loved the atmosphere at Hope’s End.  The cliffs, water, and the tilting mansion all really worked to set the spooky vibes. 

If you haven’t read a Riley Sager book, Birdie recommends! 

 


Book Lovers by Emily Henry
Romantic Comedy
Berkley | May 3, 2022

About the Book:

One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn’t see coming….

Nora Stephens’ life is books—she’s read them all—and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.

Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters’ trip away—with visions of a small-town transformation for Nora, who she’s convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they’ve met many times and it’s never been cute.

If Nora knows she’s not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he’s nobody’s hero, but as they are thrown together again and again—in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow—what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they’ve written about themselves.

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Emily Henry is another auto-buy author.  I’ve enjoyed every book she’s written, and I know she’s Booktok beloved.  Book Lovers stands out from the rest because of Nora.  It’s a small-town romance that directly tackles the stigma that high powered driven women in romance are regularly demonized.  

There are plenty of high-powered driven women in the small-town trope, but they almost always hate their lives and fall in love with small-town magic, and the small-town hero.

Not in Book Lovers.  In Book Lovers there is nothing wrong with being a small-town person, but there’s also nothing wrong with being a driven woman.  It left me with so many thoughts and strong feminist sentiments.  

(Advocating for both the women who want the small-town life AND the women who want to rule Manhatten!)


 

For the Fans by Nyla K.
MM Forbidden Romance
Indie Pub | February 23, 2023

About the Book:

Kyran Harbor is everything I’m not.

Rich. Popular. A superstar football player who’s awfully broody for someone who has it all. Basically, he’s a preppy jock who hates me. Oh, and he’s also my stepbrother.

That’s right. We’re stuck together, sharing a school, a house… A bathroom. Honestly, I wouldn’t care… If he wasn’t such an uptight control-freak who messes with me just because we’re different.

I had every intention of avoiding him when we got to college… Until abrupt misfortune forces us both into a compromising position.

Now the grouchy jerk I was hoping to evade might be the only person who can help me out of it.

Avi Vega is everything I despise.

A dreamer. A flake. An artist who smokes too much weed and thinks aliens exist. And by some sick cosmic joke, he’s now my stepbrother, following me on what should’ve been my escape plan.

It was already a disaster. Add a sudden financial disruption to the mix, and let’s just say my options are heavily limited.

If I want to stay an all-star quarterback on the way to the NFL, I’ll need to do something drastic. Unfortunately for me, and my desperate desire for control, the perpetually smiling stoner has a plan.

Maybe we can stop hating each other just enough to pull this off. As long as we remember we’re only doing it… for the fans.

** For The Fans is a full-length standalone MM forbidden romance with an HEA. This book contains sensitive subject matter that could make some readers uncomfortable. Please heed foreword warnings and proceed with caution.

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I’d never heard about Nyla K.  Back in my regular blogging/Goodreads days, I was very much into the LGBT romances, but since returning to the book world I’ve realized that the authors most talked about have drastically changed.  

I steered clear of books I’d been burnt out on previously, but when you hear the same books yelled about over and over, one tends to break down and pick it up.  For the Fans was one of those books, and the hype was real.  

For the Fans is an enemies-to-lovers, step-brother forbidden romance.  The two MMCs are thrown together in high school, having never known each other before, and are forced to live together when their parents get married.  I mean, I’m not sure how “forbidden” that is, because marriage doesn’t suddenly force relationships, but that’s another topic. 

Both characters were interesting.  The story was addicting.  Oh, and it was HOTTT -with three T’s.  If enemies to lovers and “forbidden” is your thing, or if you’re thinking of dabbling, this is for you.  


Binding 13 by Chloe Walsh
Boys of Tommen Series
YA/NA Coming of Age
Bloom Books | July 18, 2018

About the Book:

He wants to save her. She wants to hide.

She’s damaged. He’s determined.

Fate brought them together. Love binds them.

Johnny Kavanagh has everything going for him. On the rugby pitch, he’s a force to be reckoned with, even plagued with a hidden injury. Everyone knows he’s heading straight for the top—but that means there’s no room for mistakes or distractions. Not even the shy new girl at Tommen College, the one with the sad eyes and hidden bruises. He needs to stay focused, keep his cool, and not let anything get in the way of the bigger picture.  Except before he knows it, this lonely girl has become his only picture.

Life has never been easy for Shannon Lynch. Bullied and tortured, she arrives at Tommen College mid-way through the school year praying for a fresh start and desperate to shake off the demons that plague her. But when she meets the notorious Johnny Kavanagh on her first day, her plans to keep a low profile are at serious risk.

As they fall into a complicated friendship and grapple with their undeniable chemistry, hidden pain and complicated secrets threaten to be their undoing—but Johnny won’t give up on Shannon. No matter what it might cost them both.

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This is all about Boys of Tommen! 

Yes, I specifically highlighted Binding 13 here, but it is simply because it’s the first book.  The entire series is phenomenal.  I had no idea what to expect when I finally read this series.  I haven’t been reading much YA in the last six years, so I didn’t know what to expect.  Oh, and it is also written with Irish slang, so it has a glossary and I did a lot of googling.  Like, what the heck is Hurling??  I was imagining something like Shotput… hurling something really far.  Yeah, not even close.

Anyway, despite my reservations, I was blown away by the depth of the story.  Brilliant.

But it shouldn’t be shelved as YA.


This has been fun!  I can’t believe I haven’t done this in so long!  

If any of you have read these, please comment.  Give me your thoughts.  Did you enjoy them as much as I did?

Oh, and there will be a part three!

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About Birdie

Don’t look for her in any bar, club, crazy raging party, or anywhere there may be a large gathering of strangers. She’s more likely to be found tucked into the corner of the couch watching one of her favorite shows, or preferably under a comforter with her current novel.

4 Responses

  1. Riley Sager and Emily Henry are two of my favorites also. Though I will admit – Book Lovers is the only Henry I have yet to read. I need an unread book by her ALWAYS in the wings!

    Great reviews, Birdie! 🙂

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