🌟🌟🌟🌟 A softly graceful look at what could be called destiny, fate, or simply the lucky encounter of two troubled Londoners, looking for escape, a second chance, and the healing embrace of a gorgeous (if somewhat decrepit) country mansion in the magnificent Sussex Downs. The first in a trilogy, this…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 As dependable a treat as the coldest, sweetest, ice-cream on a summer day, any book by Ann Cleeves, including this hot-off-the-press installment (#10) in the glorious #Vera series, will not disappoint. Vera, back with all the brash, brave, headstrong (and unabashedly offensively-leaning) determination she brings to any crime-solving venture,…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Like sinking into the softest pillow, reading this book takes you into a world so compelling that you will find it impossible to leave behind. With a story told in an alternating “Before” and “After” timeline, centering around a horrifying murder committed in the opening pages, this reader was…
🌟🌟🌟🌟 A gentle and charming book, the final in the trilogy, brimming with the bluest skies of summer; a houseful of noisy, dusty renovations; budding romances; troublesome tenants; family secrets, loss and grief, and last but certainly not least, forgiveness, love and the long-overdue tranquility of solace. Abigail Carey, winding…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 A pure delight from start to finish, this lovely children’s book cannot help but light up your day. Leo, our main protagonist, is a ten-year-old boy with puffy orange hair that has earned him the nickname of Lion (short for Dandelion). Leo, a solitary and troubled boy, suffers from…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 A gritty and haunting look at the ravages of shame and abuse extending from childhood into the life-long decay of self and identity, this book is somewhat reminiscent of the also magnificent “Shuggie Bain”. A graceful and compassionate triumph - a brilliant book that will hurt to read -…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 A fascinating, insightful and oh-so-wise look at love, through the eyes of a master psychoanalytic therapist, long versed in the compassionate practice of rooting out “dilemmas we face in relationships, which draw couples together and tear them apart.” Through the composite sketches provided of thirteen semi-fictional couples, the author…
🌟🌟🌟🌟1/2 A captivating YA read, sparkling with starlight and magical realism, a tough and unmistakably tender heroine, an existential quest, and a whole townfull of lost and lovely souls. Welcome to Hadley, Arizona. Belutha, our main protagonist, is sixteen years old, a social misfit and an "invisible girl", who is…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 Wildly original, this all-verse rendering of an age-old story hits so many notes on so many levels that to attempt to define it would be to constrain it. Profoundly moving, lyrical and beautiful, tragic and infuriating - a feminist tribute to every woman (literally “every” woman) who has been…
🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 A beaker of “bubbly, fizzy happiness”, this gentle, uplifting marvel is so sweet and so endearing you will yearn for a sequel. Luckily, for this reader, there is a prequel, and another book by this talented author just waiting to dive into. Lucinda Green, a 40 year-old raven-haired beauty,…