REVIEW: This Used to Be Us by Renee Carlino

OUR REVIEW:

Renee Carlino does this to me EVERY TIME! She sucks me in and then plays with my heart. In the case of Alex and Danielle, we follow a two decades long love story. Sure there's a divorce thrown in there (and it's a significant part of their journey) but throughout it all, what you see is love despite all of the frustration, annoyance, and hurt feelings of it all. I liked how we got to see it all--all the love and all of the things that make marriages so difficult. We saw the goodness in them and the not so good things about them, which made for fully developed characters. Neither Alex or Danielle were wholly good or bad, just regular, flawed humans that got to the point where they didn't *think* they loved each other anymore. Tricks on them, they really did love each other, they just couldn't stand each other sometimes and they beauty of this book is that we get to see why. We see how the small things become really annoying things they can't get past. We see the real and perceived burdens they each felt. And we get to see what happens when you don't communicate well...and we see it all through flashbacks and present day events. 

As Renee Carlino is known to do, she reels you in, gives you hope, and then hurts your heart. This Used to Be Us is no different. The ending was just so bittersweet...and that's all I'll say about that. It's been way too long since we've had a new read from Renee Carlino and I hope this means she's back in writing mode and working on something new for us. 

BUY IT HERE: https://amzn.to/3VXHRoB

SYNOPSIS: 

There are two sides to every love story—and every breakup. Get ready for an emotional roller coaster of family, marriage, and divorce that will have you both laughing and crying, from the bestselling author of Before We Were Strangers.

After twenty-two years together, Danielle and Alex are getting a divorce. Once fiercely in love, they can barely stand the sound of each other’s voice. Instead of shuffling the kids between two broken homes, Alex and Danielle decide to share a nesting apartment while swapping days with their two teenage boys at the family home.

In the apartment, Dani and Alex, on their own, begin to reflect on the last two decades—why they fell in love, and why the marriage fell, spectacularly, apart. With the newfound space and time, they are given a chance to find their autonomous selves again. They both get back in the dating pool, Dani finds major success at work as a showrunner on her own TV project, while Alex faces the challenges of a new relationship.

Still, they find they just can’t stay away from each other, and somehow, the distance allows them to remember (for the first time in years) what they used to love about one another. When a family crisis draws them back into each other’s orbit, Danielle and Alex are, once again, put to the test, which leads to a dramatic conclusion that will have readers weeping.

 

NEW REVIEW: The Woman by the Lake by Kristen Ashley

OUR REVIEW:

Everyone knows that when Kristen Ashley comes out with a new novel, we read it. No questions asked, we grab it and start because we know, with rare exception, that we will pick it up and love it. In the Misted Pines series, we cannot seem to escape the psychopaths and The Woman by the Lake definitely shows us that. In this novel we have a new transplant, Nadia, living next door to the only other person who lives on the lake, Doc Riggs. Their first two meetings don't go very well, and honestly, he kinda came off as a douchebag. But as we all know KA will do, she shows us that even someone who comes off like that can be so much more than that. In the case of Doc Riggs, as soon as he finds out who Nadia is (member of an uber wealthy family) and why she's there (to recover from the vicious murder of her mother), he quickly gets his shit together and becomes the good guy he had the potential to be. Now could we blame Nadia for not really caring for him at first? After his initial smug/annoying behavior? No. But, as he steps up to take care of her and she learns more about why the cute cabin she's renting is really never rented, she relents and becomes fast friends with him. And of course, that friendship quickly becomes more, just as the weirdness on the island amps up.

The Woman by the Lake may be the eeriest yet of this series. Some of the things that happened while she was staying there were truly creepy and amped up the suspense of who was behind all of the things happening. As you should expect, I enjoyed this new novel by KA and am once again looking forward to what she releases next.

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SYNOPSIS:

Nadia Williams needs somewhere peaceful to sort through her grief after her mother is brutally murdered. She finds a cozy cabin at the side of a tranquil lake in the quaint town of Misted Pines in the Pacific Northwest.

The minute she arrives, she knows it’s perfect.

The very night of her arrival, however, someone—or something—is scratching at her window.

The next morning, she meets her one and only neighbor, Doc Riggs. He’s a rough, good-time guy who rubs Nadia wrong immediately. They clash, and neither of them are happy to be sharing their lake.

But soon, Nadia learns the lore around her cabin, and how the townsfolk are certain it’s haunted by the ghost of the man who was murdered there fifteen years before.

Riggs and Nadia are suddenly thrown into a tangled web of history, betrayal, grief, secrets, with only one thing certain.

Someone—or something—wants them off that lake.

 

NEW REVIEW: Not Another Love Song by Julie Soto

OUR REVIEW:

Once again, Julie Soto knocked it out of the park. In Not Another Love Song, we get to meet two talented musicians: Gwen and Xander (Alex). She's a talented violinist who plays with the Pops Orchestra and he's a talented cellist who also plays in the Pops but is also uber famous for the band he's in. She knows who he is because she's crushed on him for a while....he has no clue who she is until they meet at a wedding. He quickly becomes enamored with her, while she's nothing but flustered, and bam! one brief post-wedding meeting where he insults her and she gets her feelings hurt and we're off to the land of romance. 

Over the course of months we get to see him fall for her, see her try to reject him, see him continually put his foot in his mouth, see her mistrust and doubt throw them curveballs, and see his mistrust do the same. We get to see him realize how truly talented she is, to see her get to shake him up out of his protective bubble, and see them merge into what could be a musical super couple. Of course nothing is ever that easy. There are bad guys, past histories that mess with their heads, and yet....and yet they have people hoping and rooting for them to figure it out.

I enjoyed Not Another Love Song so much. I loved being in the world of orchestral music and all of the intrigue there could be there. I'm so glad I found Julie Soto and I just am so very eager to see who/what she writes next. 

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SYNOPSIS:

Two string players fight their attraction for each other as they compete for center stage in this spicy and emotional romance.

Gwen Jackson and Xander Thorne are both musical prodigies, but each has had very different paths to success. Xander was born into classical music royalty, while Gwen had a natural ear for music that was nurtured by a kind shop owner.

After Gwen performs at his friend’s wedding, she’s mortified when she realizes Xander has no clue who she is—despite having worked together for a year at the Pops Orchestra. But she’s more furious that he arrogantly critiques her performance.

When Gwen is offered the role of First Chair of the orchestra, something Xander had secretly coveted for years, their existing hostility goes up a notch. But their respect for each other's music is undeniable, and their onstage chemistry off the scale. As they begin to explore their feelings for one another, suddenly they're box office dynamite and the fragile romance that's growing between them is in danger of being crushed beneath a publicity stunt...

 

REVIEW: The Paradise Problem by Christina Lauren

 

OUR REVIEW:

It's been a while since I've read a Christina Lauren novel and this one just struck me as a little different than what I've read from them in the past so I decided to give it a try. I'm so glad I did. Anna and West (aka Liam) were interesting characters to read. They were the epitome of opposites attract: she was a starving artist, he came from money. She was had a loving relationship with her father, he was avoiding his family at all costs. Despite all of that, when he needed her to fulfill an obligation as his "wife"...an agreement they entered into years ago as college students who needed to be married in order to get into cheaper housing...she agreed, for a price. He'd pay her for playing his wife and he'd get his family off of his back. 

From the moment they boarded the plane, I knew they'd be fun. He was so anxious and she was so free-spirited that the mixture of two was fun to read. As they got to know each other on the plane, and then on the days following, you could see that there was no way they weren't going to end up together because while she may have needed his monetary donation, he needed her far more than either of them could know. I loved that she supported him and took his back, and suffered the uncomfortable situations that she was thrown in so that he could get through a tough ten days. I loved that he was not an elitist jerk, that he recognized his role in the drama of his family, and that he also had her back. And when all hell broke loose and the truth of everything was revealed, I loved the resolution of it all, especially the very end. 

Easy, cute read that will leave you feeling good. A definite great summer read. 

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SYNOPSIS:
Anna Green thought she was marrying Liam “West” Weston for access to subsidized family housing while at UCLA. She also thought she’d signed divorce papers when the graduation caps were tossed, and they both went on their merry ways.

Three years later, Anna is a starving artist living paycheck to paycheck while West is a Stanford professor. He may be one of four heirs to the Weston Foods conglomerate, but he has little interest in working for the heartless corporation his family built from the ground up. He is interested, however, in his one-hundred-million-dollar inheritance. There’s just one catch.

Due to an antiquated clause in his grandfather’s will, Liam won’t see a penny until he’s been happily married for five years. Just when Liam thinks he’s in the home stretch, pressure mounts from his family to see this mysterious spouse, and he has no choice but to turn to the one person he’s afraid to introduce to his one-percenter parents—his unpolished, not-so-ex-wife.

But in the presence of his family, Liam’s fears quickly shift from whether the feisty, foul-mouthed, paint-splattered Anna can play the part to whether the toxic world of wealth will corrupt someone as pure of heart as his surprisingly grounded and loyal wife. Liam will have to ask himself if the price tag on his flimsy cover story is worth losing true love that sprouted from a lie.

REVIEW: Game Changer by Lana Ferguson

 

OUR REVIEW:

Lana Ferguson, I love you. Your novels always entertain me, making anything but reading impossible. I find that when I'm reading your characters I'm Lol-ing, cheering them on, or fanning myself from the heat level. Game Changer continues that trend. 

In this novel we have Lila and Ian--two people who've known each other since their childhood--thrown together by their PR people to try to improve his image and her show ratings. No biggie, right? Wellllll, for Lila, she's had a massive crush on Ian for forever and for Ian, he's her brother's best friend....and the Lila he knew when she was much younger has grown into an attractive, funny, and smart woman. So while both of them agree to do this faux dating thing, they both figure out really quickly how hard it's going to be. Neither of them can seem to stop obsessively thinking about the other and are worried about ruining things, but once they figure that out, it's game on. They flirt and make out and fall hard for each other, with the only obstacle being Lila's brother Jack. Fortunately, Lana Ferguson takes it easy on us and doesn't make us die before we get to their HEA. Like my reading of The Nanny, I'd love to return to this world and get to know more of the other characters, but I don't think that will happen, so I'll just happily wait for the next thing that Lana Ferguson gives us.

BUY IT: https://amzn.to/4b0Tdyk

SYNOPSIS:

A hockey player and a baker shoot their shot in this steamy new romance by Lana Ferguson, USA Today bestselling author of The Nanny.

When a very public breakup becomes a PR nightmare for Ian Chase's team, he hopes to focus on his game, but that suddenly seem less likely than a hat trick. With his career and the team’s image in jeopardy, Ian is surprised to find a solution through none other than Delilah Baker, his best friend and teammate's little sister…who isn’t so little anymore.

Delilah Baker is known as “the darling of baking” on her local cable show, and being in the public eye is her bread and butter. But with her numbers dwindling and her producers turning up the heat, Delilah offers up the half-baked idea to collaborate with her brother’s team to entice the hockey fans of Boston to tune in to her show. Delilah thinks it will be a piece of cake—until the team sends Ian Chase, her brother’s best friend and the object of a decade-long crush that she’s never quite gotten over. 

REVIEW: Dishonestly Yours by Krista and Becca Ritchie

 OUR REVIEW:

It's been a while since I've read a Ritchie sisters' novel, but I remembered enjoying their writing and thought I'd try out Dishonestly Yours when it popped up in my NetGalley feed. I went into the novel totally blind and, honestly, it took me a few chapters to settle in and feel like I understood my surroundings. Another bit of honesty? I found this cast of characters to be pretty unlikeable at first...but I think that's what they wanted us to feel...like who the heck are these people and why are they so scammy? If you're feeling like that, I would suggest that you keep reading. Phoebe and Rocky and their gang of misfits (aka, their siblings) start to become people you like, as you get to know and understand how and why they are the way they are. As a matter of fact, I became so absorbed in their story that the ending (that ending!) snuck up on me and I felt really very disappointed that I'd have to wait to get more of their story. I felt like I was just getting to know them and like them and then BAM! the last word is there and I'm just like dammit! I need more! 

I love it when that happens; when a novel that I feel a little uncertain about turns into a page turner that I can't put down. I need more Phoebe, Rocky, their siblings, and this dysfunctional town ASAP, Ritchie sisters!

BUY IT: https://amzn.to/4cNmM84

SYNOPSIS:

Starting fresh is the only way Phoebe can escape a life of crime, but her best friend's older brother complicates honest dreams in this gripping new series from the authors of the Addicted series.

Phoebe Graves grew up in a family where deception and seduction are as commonplace as breathing. The Graves and her best friend Hailey’s family have been on the run their whole lives, but after a high-stakes con job goes south, Phoebe and Hailey decide to run away and start over. The small Connecticut town they settle in seems too good to be true.

The biggest flaw in their plan is Hailey’s frustratingly handsome brother, Rocky, who insists on coming with them. Living honestly isn’t in his DNA, and his past with Phoebe is downright messy. He’s everything she wants, but nothing she can have.

Phoebe worries that Rocky will tempt them back into their old ways, where lying is second nature. She doesn’t want Rocky to mess up the new life she’s begun for herself. The longer she stays in town, the more she realizes what it means to have a reputation—and what a normal life with the man she loves could look like.