I enjoy Sally Hepworth’s writing, so I was excited to get her latest novel The Good Sister from Net Galley. I enjoyed the story, which has some twists to it. To be honest, even if it wasn’t a mystery and just a straightforward story, I would have enjoyed it as I loved the character of Fern – a neurodiverse librarian who meets a young man as unique as she is and falls in love. For me, Fern’s story was enough for an entire novel – suspense wasn’t needed!
This was yet another book that I couldn’t put down and read straight through!
Here’s the overview:
Description
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER “A stunningly clever thriller made doubly suspenseful by not one, but two unreliable narrators.” —People Sally Hepworth, the author of The Mother-In-Law delivers a knock-out of a novel about the lies that bind two sisters in The Good Sister.
There’s only been one time that Rose couldn’t stop me from doing the wrong thing and that was a mistake that will haunt me for the rest of my life.
Fern Castle works in her local library. She has dinner with her twin sister Rose three nights a week. And she avoids crowds, bright lights and loud noises as much as possible. Fern has a carefully structured life and disrupting her routine can be…dangerous.
When Rose discovers that she cannot get pregnant, Fern sees her chance to pay her sister back for everything Rose has done for her. Fern can have a baby for Rose. She just needs to find a father. Simple.
Fern’s mission will shake the foundations of the life she has carefully built for herself and stir up dark secrets from the past, in this quirky, rich and shocking story of what families keep hidden.
Today I’m part of the tour for this WWI historical fiction story about two sisters who live out their lives quietly in the house where they were born. They seem fairly quiet and ordinary, but, through diaries we come to know them and their lives, hopes, and lost dreams.
I really liked this one, though it was sad. This story is told in two parts: current day and 1917-22. I much preferred the story and characters from the past. I think they reminded me a bit of a relative I had that would have been the same age who also lived her life with her sibling in the house where she grew up. Who knows what stories she left behind that we have yet to uncover?
Thank you for my copy and for making me part of the tour! I always enjoy books from Bookouture!
Book Description: Two ordinary sisters. A long and brutal war. A heroic sacrifice…
London, 1915. As German bombs rain down on the East End of London and hungry children queue for rations in the blistering cold, fifteen-year-old Florrie is forced to grow up fast. With her father fighting in the muddy trenches, Florrie turns to her older sister Edith for comfort. But the war has changed Edith. She has grown quiet, with dark shadows under her eyes, and has started leaving the house at night in secret. When Florrie follows her sister through the dark and winding streets of London, she is shocked by what she discovers. But she knows she must keep her sister’s secret for the sake of their family, even if she herself must pay the ultimate price…
Years later Kate, running from her broken relationship, is sorting through her dead aunt Florrie’s house, which she shared with her sister Edith. As she sits on the threadbare carpets, looking at photos of Florrie during the war, she notices the change in her aunt – from carefree young girl with a hopeful smile to a hollow-cheeked young woman, with dark sad eyes.
Determined to put her family’s ghosts to rest, Kate must unearth the secret past of her two aunts. Why is there a hidden locked room in the little house they shared? What is the story behind the abandoned wedding dress wrapped in tissue and tied up with a ribbon? And when Kate discovers the tragic secrets that have bound her family together, will she ever be able to move on?
A heartbreaking historical novel of war, tragedy and the sacrifices we make for those we love. Fans of Fiona Valpy, Kristin Hannah and Victoria Hislop will be hooked by The Shut-Away Sisters.
Author Bio: Following an eventful career as a public relations consultant, specialising in business and travel, Suzanne Goldring turned to writing the kind of novels she likes to read, about the extraordinary lives of ordinary people. Whether she is working in her thatched cottage in Hampshire or her seaside home in North Cornwall, Suzanne finds inspiration in the secrets hidden by everyday life.
The good people of Books Forward recently sent me an audiobook of Julie McGue’s memoir chronicling her search for her biological parents.
Here’s the overview:
Michigan City, IN – Julie Ryan McGue is adopted. And she is also a twin. But because their adoption was closed, she and her sister lack both a health history and the names of their birth parents — which becomes pertinent for Julie when, at 48 years old, she finds herself facing several serious health issues. McGue’s poignant and hopeful debut memoir, “Twice a Daughter,” (May 11, 2021, She Writes Press) chronicles the complex search for her uncharted family history.
To launch the probe into her closed adoption, McGue first needs the support of her sister. The twins talk things over and make a pact: McGue will approach their adoptive parents for the adoption paperwork and investigate search options, and the sisters will split the costs involved in locating their birth relatives. But their adoptive parents aren’t happy that their daughters want to locate their birth parents — and that is only the first of many obstacles Julie will come up against as she digs into her background.
The quest for her birth relatives spans five years and involves a search agency, a private investigator, a confidential intermediary, a judge, an adoption agency, a social worker and a genealogist.
By journey’s end, what began as a simple desire for a family medical history has evolved into a complicated quest — one that unearths secrets, lies and family members that are literally right next door.
McGue earnestly writes about discovering who you are and where you come from, all while trying to make sense of it all. In sharing her unconventional journey through life, which involves new family, exploration and acceptance, this heavy-hearted history considers personal identity and all the complicated and captivating moments that encapsulate one’s life.
Me again!! This was an interesting one, with even a touch of “truth is stranger than fiction” to it. However, what I found so interesting in this book was the author’s drive to find her biological parents. She was an adult who was raised in a family where she was loved. She had a wonderful husband and family and an active life. But her sense of identity was tightly wound up in the fact that she was adopted at birth and even though she started the search for health reasons, she was not willing to stop even after she received medical histories, etc. It was important for her to find her actual birth parents and any possible half siblings; and she wasn’t going to stop before she did.
Also interesting to me was that, while her twin was invested in the process, this seemed to be truly Julie’s journey. It made me ponder the concept of identity and how we come to define who we are and those things that shape us. In one poignant moment she discovers through DNA testing that she is not Irish (at all) and yet for her whole life she has identified as Irish as her adoptive family was a large Irish family and she had physical features that appeared “Irish”. It does make one wonder how we come to develop who we are and what has the power to add or take away from that knowledge.
An interesting read! Thank you for sending me the audiobook, which was engaging during my drives!
Here’s some background on Julie:
JULIE RYAN McGUE is an author, a domestic adoptee and an identical twin. She writes extensively about finding out who you are, where you belong and making sense of it.
Julie’s debut memoir “Twice a Daughter: A Search for Identity, Family, and Belonging” (She Writes Press) comes out in May 2021. It’s the story of her five-year search for birth relatives. Her weekly blogs That Girl, This Life and her monthly column at The Beacher focus on identity, family and life’s quirky moments.
Born in Chicago, Illinois, Julie received a BA from Indiana University in psychology. She earned a MM in Marketing from the Kellogg Graduate School of Business, Northwestern University. She has served multiple terms on the Board of the Midwest Adoption Center and is an active member of the American Adoption Congress.
Married for over 35 years, Julie and her husband split their time between Northwest Indiana and Sarasota, Florida. She’s the mother of four adult children and has three grandsons. If she’s not at her computer, she’s on the tennis court or out exploring with her Nikon. Julie is currently working on a collection of personal essays. For more information, visit her website, juliemcgueauthor.com.
If you know me, you know I love the WWII era historical mystery series of Maggie Hope. Maggie is a super sharp code breaker and spy, working for the Allies during WWII. This installment took Maggie to Los Angeles to reunite and help an old flame solve a murder. Along the way, she faces prejudice and racism directed towards her friends and colleagues, all in the shadow of the golden days of Hollywood.
I love anything to do with the glory days of Hollywood, and I love reading about what life was like in those days. I had not known about the “Nazi groups” in the LA area during the war, nor the prevalence of the Klan (though I did know that the Klan was in Napa – my hometown – in the first part of the 20th century). I knew that Susan must have meticulously researched this, and of course she did. Interesting — and disturbing!
I love this series, and you will, too. Each book can be a stand alone but I like reading them in order. That said, each story is unique and you will never feel like it’s a “formula”.
Thank you for my review copy via Net Galley!
Description
Maggie Hope is off to California to solve a crime that hits too close to home—and confront the very evil she thought she had left behind in Europe—as theacclaimed World War II mystery series from New York Times bestselling author Susan Elia MacNeal continues.
“A swift, vibrant novel that peels back the asbestos curtain on the complex history of Los Angeles, home to heroes and villains.”—Steph Cha, author of Your House Will Pay
Los Angeles, 1943. As the Allies beat back the Nazis in the Mediterranean and the United States military slowly closes in on Tokyo, Walt Disney cranks out wartime propaganda and the Cocoanut Grove is alive with jazz and swing every night. But behind this sunny façade lies a darker reality. Somewhere in the lush foothills of Hollywood, a woman floats lifeless in the pool of one of California’s trendiest hotels.
When American-born secret agent and British spy Maggie Hope learns that this woman was engaged to her former fiancée, John Sterling, and that he suspects her death was no accident, intuition tells her he’s right. Leaving London under siege is a lot to ask. But John was once the love of Maggie’s life . . . and she won’t say no.
Maggie struggles with seeing her lost love again, but what’s more shocking is that her own country is as divided and convulsed with hatred as Europe. The Zoot Suit Riots loom large in Los Angeles, and the Ku Klux Klan casts a long shadow everywhere. But there is little time to dwell on memories once she starts digging into the case. As she traces a web of deception from the infamous Garden of Allah to the iconic Carthay Circle Theater, she discovers things aren’t always the way things appear in the movies—and the political situation in America is more complicated, and dangerous, than the newsreels would have them all believe.
Today I’m thrilled to be part of the blog tour for Susan Mallery’s latest novel: The Step Sisters. This was a great summer read, focusing on three step sisters who are not close (at all!) and who find that their lives’ circumstances bring them together. Daisy is dealing with a troubled marriage, Sage is going through a divorce, and Cassidy is recovering from an accident. Their time together is emotional, at times funny and at times heart-breaking.
Happy to be part of the tour and thank you for my Net Galley copy!
Here’s the scoop:
Once upon a time, when her dad married Sage’s mom, Daisy was thrilled to get a bright and shiny new sister. But Sage was beautiful and popular, everything Daisy was not, and she made sure Daisy knew it.
Sage didn’t have Daisy’s smarts—she had to go back a grade to enroll in the fancy rich-kid school. So she used her popularity as a weapon, putting Daisy down to elevate herself. After the divorce, the stepsisters’ rivalry continued until the final, improbable straw: Daisy married Sage’s first love, and Sage fled California.
Eighteen years, two kids and one troubled marriage later, Daisy never expects—or wants—to see Sage again. But when the little sister they have in common needs them both, they put aside their differences to care for Cassidy. As long-buried truths are revealed, no one is more surprised than they when friendship blossoms.
Their fragile truce is threatened by one careless act that could have devastating consequences. They could turn their backs on each other again…or they could learn to forgive once and for all and finally become true sisters of the heart.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
#1 NYT bestselling author Susan Mallery writes heartwarming, humorous novels about the relationships that define our lives―family, friendship, romance. She’s known for putting nuanced characters in emotional situations that surprise readers to laughter. Beloved by millions, her books have been translated into 28 languages. Susan lives in Washington with her husband, two cats, and a small poodle with delusions of grandeur.
If you know me, you know I love historical fiction! WWII is my favorite, so I was excited to get this engaging and captivating story and be part of this tour. I’ve read one of Kelly Rimmer’s other novels, Truths I Never Told You, so I know that I would enjoy it! This story is based in fact and I had heard of Irena Sendler, but this story just sucked me in. The details were amazingly vivid and the story stayed with me long after I was done reading. I will say that some of it was hard to read, but I liked how the ending felt so hopeful.
Thank you for having me as part of the tour and for my e-galley!
Here’s the scoop:
The Warsaw Orphan : A WWII Novel Kelly Rimmer On Sale Date: June 1, 2021 9781525895999 Trade Paperback $17.99 USD Fiction / Historical / World War II 416 pages
ABOUT THE BOOK:
With the thrilling pace and historical drama of Pam Jenoff and Kristin Hannah, New York Times bestselling author Kelly Rimmer’s newest novel is an epic WWII saga and love story, based on the real-life efforts of two young people taking extraordinary risks to save their countrymen, as they try to find their way back to each other and the life they once knew.
Following on the success of The Things We Cannot Say, this is Kelly Rimmer’s return to the WWII category with a brand new novel inspired by Irena Sendler, the real-life Polish nurse who used her access to the Warsaw ghetto to smuggle Jewish children and babies to safety. Spanning the tumultuous years between 1942 and 1945 in Poland, The Warsaw Orphan follows Emilia over the course of the war, her involvement with the Resistance, and her love for Sergiusz, a young man imprisoned in the Jewish ghetto who’s passion leads him to fight in the Warsaw Uprising. From the Warsaw ghetto to the Ravensbruck concentration camp, through Nazi occupation to the threat of a communist regime, Kelly Rimmer has penned her most meticulously researched and emotionally compelling novel to date.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Kelly Rimmer is the worldwide, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Before I Let You Go, The Things We Cannot Say, and Truths I Never Told You. She lives in rural Australia with her husband, two children and fantastically naughty dogs, Sully and Basil. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty languages. Please visit her at https://www.kellyrimmer.com/
I’m thrilled to be taking part in the blog tour for this suspenseful thriller just out from Hannah Mary McKinnon: You Will Remember Me. A young man awakes on a beach with no memory of who he is. His girlfriend searches for him yet he finds his way to Maine where his family has been searching for him. But who his girlfriend knows and who his family knows seems like two different people.
This one was fast and fun and kept me guessing! Highly recommended it for those who like suspenseful mysteries!
Thanks for making me part of the tour and for my e-copy!
YOU WILL REMEMBER ME Author: Hannah Mary McKinnon ISBN: 9780778331810 Publication Date: May 25, 2021 Publisher: MIRA Books
Author Bio:
Hannah Mary McKinnon was born in the UK, grew up in Switzerland and moved to Canada in 2010.
After a successful career in recruitment, she quit the corporate world in favor of writing, and is now the author of The Neighbors, Her Secret Son, and Sister Dear. She lives in Oakville, Ontario, with her husband and three sons, and is delighted by her twenty-second commute.
Book Summary:
He wakes up on a deserted beach in Maryland, wearing only swim trunks and a gash on his head. He can’t remember who he is. Everything—his identity, his life, his loved ones—has been replaced by a dizzying fog of uncertainty. But returning to his Maine hometown in search of the truth raises more questions than answers.
Lily Reid thinks she knows her boyfriend, Jack. Until he goes missing one night, and her frantic search reveals that he’s been lying to her since they met, desperate to escape a dark past he’d purposely left behind.
Maya Scott has been trying to find her estranged stepbrother, Asher, since he disappeared without a trace. Having him back, missing memory and all, feels like a miracle. But with a mutual history full of devastating secrets, how far will Maya go to ensure she alone takes them to the grave?
Today I’m throwing the spotlight on this new book which is calling my name!
I had difficulty downloading my kindle copy so the publicists recently sent me a hard copy and I’ve had a chance to read it. This is a very readable and interesting book full of tips and info about how to eat healthy and vegan. As someone who is trying to make healthy choices, this book resonated with me. It even comes with yummy recipes! I will say that whenever I eat vegan I have so many less issues with my stomach and digestion. I feel better all around! My favorite part of this book was the personal aspect and stories.
Thank you for my copy and for making me part of the tour!
The Simplest and Most Effective Way to Prevent and Even Reverse the Nation’s #1 Killer
Using Nutritional Medicine to Beat Chronic Disease, Despite Family History
Joyful, Delicious, Vegan: Life Without Heart Disease
By Sherra Aguirre
Joyful, Delicious, Vegan: Life Without Heart Disease will empower readers with the simplest, most effective way to prevent or even reverse the nation’s number one killer, heart disease, despite family history. Enjoying good health naturally at any age starts in the kitchen by changing what and how we eat. Although this book is important for anyone who wants to enjoy a healthy, disease-free life, it targets women, especially African American women. Women typically have the greatest influence over what goes on our tables, and the healthcare choices of those close to us, which puts them on the front lines of the fight against heart disease and other diet-related illnesses. By nurturing our bodies with delicious whole foods and mindful health practices, we set in motion a chain of positive events – physical, mental, emotional and spiritual – that are healing and transformational.
Joyful, Delicious, Vegan is packed with nutritional medicine, research and personal stories which demonstrate the effectiveness of a plant-based diet in restoring health. Readers will be guided through simple steps to increase vitality and reduce dependence on medications by learning to prepare and enjoy flavorful plant-strong, anti-inflammatory foods, based on the recommendations of two world-renowned cardiologists, Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn and Dr. Dean Ornish, who have demonstrated positive patient results for many years. Sherra shares her personal story of reversing her own hypertension and heart disease with tips and over 25 delicious recipes to ensure no one has to choose between great food and great health.
About the Author:
SHERRA AGUIRRE is an articulate health enthusiast, environmentalist and food security activist. She founded and led a successful business for three decades, winning national awards for entrepreneurship, innovation, and service excellence. She sold the company in 2016 to focus on sharing her passion for healthy diet and lifestyle.
Aguirre describes herself as high energy, in better overall health, and in many ways more fit than in her thirties or forties. She has practiced meditation and yoga daily for more than twenty-five years, and for many years has researched and read extensively about diet and lifestyle as the most important factors for achieving and maintaining good health. By adopting a whole plant-based diet, she improved her overall heart health and eliminated symptoms of hypertension despite a significant family history of heart attack, stroke, and high blood pressure. She is passionate about empowering others to maintain vibrancy and good health throughout their lifetimes.
One of Aguirre’s main goals with her new book is to make the change to a healthier diet and lifestyle more accessible, particularly to African Americans and other communities who are at high risk for diabetes and heart disease.
Aguirre writes about the healing qualities of compassion, simplicity, and gratitude, and the ripple effect vegan eating can have on individuals, families, and communities. She is married with two daughters—Tembi Locke– actor, speaker, screenwriter, and New New York Times best-selling author; and Attica Locke– multiple award-winning novelist, New York Times best-selling author and screen writer/producer.
I always enjoy Pam Jenoff’s writing. Her historical fiction is well-researched and has compelling characters. This latest story was haunting – it followed the journey of a young Jewish woman and her family as they sought to avoid the Nazis in Krakow, Poland by hiding and living in the sewers. This seems quite extraordinary but I remember watching a movie once (based on a true story) where a man hid a whole group of Jewish villagers in the sewer (it’s called In Darkness). This novel followed Sadie and her friends and family as they try to stay alive.
I really enjoyed it! Thank you for making me part of the tour!
Here’s the overview:
The Woman with the Blue Star
Pam Jenoff
On Sale Date: May 4, 2021
9780778389385, 0778389383
Trade Paperback
$17.99 USD, $22.99 CAD
Fiction / Historical / Jewish
336 pages
About the Book:
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Girls of Paris comes a riveting tale of courage and unlikely friendship during World War II.
1942. Sadie Gault is eighteen and living with her parents in the Kraków Ghetto during World War II. When the Nazis liquidate the ghetto, Sadie and her pregnant mother are forced to seek refuge in the perilous tunnels beneath the city. One day Sadie looks up through a grate and sees a girl about her own age buying flowers.
Ella Stepanek is an affluent Polish girl living a life of relative ease with her stepmother, who has developed close alliances with the occupying Germans. While on an errand in the market, she catches a glimpse of something moving beneath a grate in the street. Upon closer inspection, she realizes it’s a girl hiding.
Ella begins to aid Sadie and the two become close, but as the dangers of the war worsen, their lives are set on a collision course that will test them in the face of overwhelming odds. Inspired by incredible true stories, The Woman with the Blue Star is an unforgettable testament to the power of friendship and the extraordinary strength of the human will to survive.
About the Author:
Pam Jenoff is the author of several books of historical fiction, including the NYT bestseller The Orphan’s Tale. She holds a degree in international affairs from George Washington University and a degree in history from Cambridge, and she received her JD from UPenn. Her novels are inspired by her experiences working at the Pentagon and as a diplomat for the State Department handling Holocaust issues in Poland. She lives with her husband and 3 children near Philadelphia, where she teaches law.
I love a book that reminds me of lazy summer days as a kid, and The Clover Girls was exactly that. Four girls enjoy summer overnight camp together and then grow apart. When one of them dies many years later, the grown women are reunited at their old sleepaway camp to face memories and betrayals and to work through their issues and relationships.
Such a fun read! Thank you for making me part of the tour and for my copy!
Here’s the scoop:
THE CLOVER GIRLS
Author: Viola Shipman
ISBN:9781525896002
Publication Date: May 18, 2021
Publisher: Graydon House
BIO:
Viola Shipman is the pen name for Wade Rouse, a popular, award-winning memoirist. Rouse chose his grandmother’s name, Viola Shipman, to honor the woman whose heirlooms and family stories inspire his writing. Rouse is the author of The Summer Cottage, as well as The Charm Bracelet and The Hope Chest which have been translated into more than a dozen languages and become international bestsellers. He lives in Saugatuck, Michigan and Palm Springs, California, and has written for People, Coastal Living, Good Housekeeping, and Taste of Home, along with other publications, and is a contributor to All Things Considered.
BOOK SUMMARY:
As comforting and familiar as a favorite sweater, Viola Shipman’s novels never fail to deliver a heartfelt story of friendship and familty, encapsulating summer memories in every page. Fans of Dorthea Benton Frank and Nancy Thayer will love this new story about three childhood friends approaching middle age, determined to rediscover the dreams that made them special as campers in 1985.
Elizabeth, Veronica, Rachel and Emily met at Camp Birchwood as girls in 1985, where they called themselves The Clover Girls (after their cabin name). The years following that magical summer pulled them in very different directions and, now approaching middle age, the women are facing new challenges: the inevitable physical changes that come with aging, feeling invisible to society, disinterested husbands, surley teens, and losing their sense of self.
Then, Elizabeth, Veronica and Rachel each receive a letter from Emily – she has cancer and, knowing it’s terminal, reaches out to the girls who were her best friends once upon a time and implores them to reunite at Camp Birchwood to scatter her ashes. When the three meet at the property for the first time in what feels like a lifetime, another letter from Emily awaits, explaining that she has purchased the abandoned camp, and now it belongs to them – at Emily’s urging, they must spend a week together remembering the dreams they’d put aside, and find a way to become the women they always swore they’d grow up to be. Through flashbacks to their youthful summer, we see the four friends then and now, rebuilding their lives, flipping a middle finger to society’s disdain for aging women, and with a renewed purpose to find themselves again.
Beth's Book-Nook Blog 