Angieville

If I'm being perfectly honest with myself, I've done a shamefully poor job of addressing my love for Cat Sebastian 's books around these parts. I've certainly noted each time her beautiful stories have appeared on my end-of-the-year best of lists, see:  The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes ,  basically every book in  The Cabots series , and of course  We Could Be So Good .  And the pull is, quite simply, this: nobody is as kind and gentle with their characters and with their hearts than Cat Sebastian. Nobody. I haven't always been one for the gentler stories, but I cannot overstate the absolute gift it is sinking into one of Sebastian's exquisitely crafted historicals knowing that I get to spend the next however many pages watching two idiots pine and deny that feelings exist and just  take care of each other  as they fall in love. I wouldn't trade that experience for the world. Not this one or any other.  Only two things in the world people count b...

 Hi. Hey. Hello there. It's been a . . . well, you know what it's been. We're all still living this together. So I will simply skip to the fact that I couldn't not review this book here. Because reading it was something special. I knew nothing about Ali Hazelwood 's debut novel except that it involved women in STEM and that the cover made me smile. I decided to set it aside for myself as a reward. Work has been . . . punishing . . . for the last year, and I have been so exhausted every hour of every day. And so I determined to buy The Love Hypothesis  on release day knowing nothing about it. But when I went to the bookstore to get my copy, none were available. In fact, none were available anywhere for love nor money, in store or online. At first I was moderately disappointed. Then I told myself maybe it's not that great after all and I didn't necessarily need to feel this preemptive sense of loss. But it kept gnawing at me. The loss. And so I paused work an...

The first book to make it onto my best books I've read so far this year list was actually a surprise. Thanks to Bridgerton's massive success, Julia Quinn's name is everywhere these days. And I'm chuffed about the whole thing. That said, my Quinn reading up to this point has been sporadic at best. And I'd only read two novels in the actual Bridgerton series. So I decided to rectify that at the beginning of the year by starting with Eloise's story (the fifth in the series) because she is my uncontested favorite of the siblings. I had no idea what her story held, but I knew she would be a compelling lead. I also love the title and the role that letters play in the story.   Eloise Bridgerton is tired of everything. She is tired of the endless inane whirl of life among the ton. She is tired of being paraded around and forced to dance and converse with all the wrong men. But most of all she is tired of being suddenly and unexpectedly alone after her best friend Penelo...

It's been years since I picked up a Mhairi McFarlane novel, and I'm not really sure why that is. I liked  It's Not Me, It's You well enough (it's obvious she's quite a witty writer), but something about the execution felt off and I think I let that keep me from diving deeper into her backlist. Then came an offer to review her upcoming title If I Never Met You , and something about this one seemed to call out to me. As though it was time. As though Laurie and Jamie might be the ones. Spoiler alert: It was and they were. It was the perfect read for a couple of dreary, grey January days. While not perhaps as bubbly as I've Got Your Number , I would definitely recommend it to readers who enjoyed that novel. They share a business setting, two individuals who are more than they know themselves to be, and a wonderfully slow burn romance. Readers who love Sarra Manning and  Beth O'Leary 's  The Flatshare should also take note. Comedy was tragedy plus ...

I'm delighted to be a part of the blog tour for this first novel in  Julie Anne Long 's new historical series―The Palace of Rogues. I found my way to Ms. Long's writing in a bit of a piecemeal fashion. Her long-running Pennyroyal Green series is widely beloved and records the various and sundry escapades of the always-scheming, never repentant Eversea and Redmond families. Really, the series is worth the price of admission for the hilarious (and ever-evolving) "Ballad of Colin Eversea" alone (though Colin's is not actually my favorite book). But I've come to believe that this sweeping eleven-book series has something for every reader. You just have to dip your toes in enough times to find your favorites. And once you do, they will become instant and confirmed comfort reads. Spoiler alert: mine are It Happened One Midnight and What I Did for a Duke . I'm sorry, Colin, but the Duke of Falconbridge, you are not . You'll be just fine, though. Madel...

I looked forward to this book with barely restrained delight from the moment I heard the first faint whisperings of its existence. I read it as soon as I could get my hands on it, and then life got in the way (as it is wont to do), and I never quite got around to reviewing it. But I flatly refuse to let the year end without talking about this first book in Sarah MacLean 's new series. Just in case you haven't, you know, read it yet. That way you'll have time to fit it in before the second book comes out next July. As I have mentioned before, it was a Sarah MacLean novel that first got me into reading historical romances just a few years ago. And then earlier this year, I had the opportunity to meet her and tell her that, to tell her how much I love her books and just how much finding them meant to me. I hope you all have that chance someday. I've been fortunate enough to meet many of my very favorite authors. And while my facility with language generally flees when...

 Well, hi there. It's been . . . it's been awhile, hasn't it? I'm sitting here gazing at the tower of books I have to review (or finish reviews on), and I'm not gonna lie. It's gotten a little on top of me. The thing is, I definitely want to review each one of them. Because I've had some spectacular reading this year, guys. Really spectacular. I want to share my thoughts. And this is still my favorite place to do so. It will probably always be. All the other formats seem too limited, too awkwardly shaped, for the size of my thoughts. So. I'll keep trucking. More reviews to come before the end of the year. Promise. For now, I wanted to just give you a heads up on the full-fledged binge I've fallen into with my discovery of Mariana Zapata 's novels. She writes contemporary, frequently sports-themed (yay!) stories set in Texas, with strong central romances of the slowest of slow burn varieties. Like, whoa do these couples take their time work...

Phoenix Unbound —the first book in Grace Draven 's new Fallen Empire series—releases from Ace Trade Paperback on September 25th. In honor of the release, Penguin Random House is celebrating with a giveaway that features not only an ARC of Phoenix Unbound but also a Fantasy Romance Starter Kit made up of other first-in-series romantic fantasy books by Ilona Andrews , Patricia Briggs , Nalini Singh , Anne Bishop , and Chloe Neill . Guys, this includes the first Kate Daniels and Alpha & Omega books. Two of my very favorites. I love the whole idea! Just click here to enter the sweepstakes giveaway. PHOENIX UNBOUND by GRACE DRAVEN Ace Trade Paperback | September 25, 2018 A woman with power over fire and illusion and an enslaved son of a chieftain battle a corrupt empire in this powerful and deeply emotional romantic fantasy from the  USA Today  bestselling author of  Radiance . Every year, each village is required to send a young woman to the Empire's capital--her fa...

I think this is (shamefully) the first Tessa Dare book I've reviewed on the site. I believe I initially read a couple of her Spindle Cove books awhile back and didn't really land upon the "right" one for me. Then I gave Romancing the Duke a try and found it to be ridiculously charming. The rest of the books in that series weren't quite my cuppa, but that first one was so fun that I went back and found the right Spindle Cove novel for me ( Any Duchess Will D o , in case you're interested; ugh, I love that book). Which brings me to  The Governess Game , which   is a delight from start to finish. That's the wonderful thing about books by talented and prolific authors. They're not all necessarily going to work for you, but it is so lovely reading your way through as time and whims allow and finding the ones that are yours. Alexandra Mountbatten tells time. That is to say, she sets clocks. For a living. Carting her instruments from aristocratic hous...

The moral of this story is that it has been far too long since I read a Gail Carriger book. I discovered her back when her debut novel Soulless first came out and thought it was perfectly delightful. I read the next couple of Parasol Protectorate novels and then sort of lost my way a bit. I've always rather wanted to return and, my word, has she been prolific in the intervening years. When I began hearing happy rumblings about this first installment in a new series of novellas set in the same familiar world, it felt like the perfect time to jump back in and test the waters. Faith Wigglesworth (I know) has been exiled to London and ordered to find herself a werewolf husband posthaste. Her family appears to view such a fate as merely her just desserts for the scandal she caused them back home in Boston. Faith remembers the story a trifle differently. But she is nothing if not relieved to be an ocean away from her less-than-loving family and not at all opposed to a werewolf spou...

The Kiss Quotien t crossed my radar around about the same time I got wind of  The Wedding Date . Both debut books looked like exactly the sort of charming romcoms I wanted in my life at this specific point in time (always, really), and both sported perfectly adorable covers. I was intrigued not only by the obvious mathematical aspect of this novel, but with the fact that the protagonist is on the spectrum and that the story itself was inspired by Helen Hoang 's own diagnosis with Autistic Spectrum Disorder. I found myself very eager to dive in and find out just what this gender-swapped Pretty Woman revision had to offer.  Stella Lane's mother will not leave her alone. She would like a suitable suitor for her daughter and the requisite grandchildren, and she would like them now . And Stella just can't with the pressure anymore. Relationships―interactions with people in general―have never been her strong suit. She far prefers math and her job as an econometrician to att...

I'm so grateful for reader friends you know and trust. Mine always bring me the best finds, ones I would likely completely miss otherwise. Such was the case with Kate Clayborn 's Luck of the Draw . I'd seen it floating about the 'verse for a little while now. But something about the cover inexplicably gave me country music vibes. And I just was not in the mood for that story right now, you know? But then the excellent  Brie took to talking it up on Twitter, and thank heavens for that. Because I bought it on her word alone and am so very glad I did. Nothing about it has anything to do with country music. In fact, it is quite a serious tale about two wounded people who have no reason whatsoever to like the other person, but who are trying hard to improve themselves and the lives of those around them. If that sounds like something you're in the mood for, then by all means, read on. Zoe Ferris and her two best friends won the jackpot. Literally. Jointly, they bough...