#BookReview Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse @RoanhorseBex @SagaSFF @FreshFiction

Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

While most of the world has drowned beneath the sudden rising waters of a climate apocalypse, Dinétah (formerly the Navajo reservation) has been reborn. The gods and heroes of legend walk the land, but so do monsters.

Maggie Hoskie is a Dinétah monster hunter, a supernaturally gifted killer. When a small town needs help finding a missing girl, Maggie is their last—and best—hope. But what Maggie uncovers about the monster is much larger and more terrifying than anything she could imagine.

Maggie reluctantly enlists the aid of Kai Arviso, an unconventional medicine man, and together they travel to the rez to unravel clues from ancient legends, trade favors with tricksters, and battle dark witchcraft in a patchwork world of deteriorating technology.

As Maggie discovers the truth behind the disappearances, she will have to confront her past—if she wants to survive.

Welcome to the Sixth World.

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TRAIL OF LIGHTNING is the first book in The Sixth World series. The world has drowned after a climate apocalypse and the Navajo reservation, now Dinétah has been reborn. It's a new world where gods and heroes walk the land. But, it's also a world filled with monsters. Maggie Hoskie is a Dinétah monsters hunter. She survived an attack by monsters when she was young and was trained by Neizghání the Monsterslayer of legend. The son of two holy people. However, now Neizghání has left her and she has to fight on her own. A new job has her hunting a monster that has abducted a small girl. This monster is something entirely new to her and she will discover that this is just the start of a nightmare...

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay @WmMorrowBooks

A Noise Downstairs by Linwood Barclay
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

EVERY STEP...
Paul Davis forgets things - he gets confused, he has sudden panic attacks. But he wasn't always like this.

TAKES YOU CLOSER...
Eight months ago, Paul found two dead bodies in the back of a co-worker's car. He was attacked, left for dead, and has been slowly recovering ever since. His wife tries her best but fears the worst...

TO THE TRUTH...
Therapy helps during the days, but at night he hears things - impossible things - that no one else can. That nobody else believes. Either he's losing his mind - or someone wants him to think he is.

Just because he's paranoid doesn't mean it's not happening...

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A NOISE DOWNSTAIRS is a book that just didn't work completely for me. I usually love reading Linwood Barcley's books and I'm not saying that this isn't well written. It's just the story didn't convince me. If it had been an author like Stephen King might I have bought the haunted typewriter, but in this case, I just waited for the truth to come out. The logical explanation. And, that kind of made the reading experience just not as enjoyable as with his previous books.

On the plus side did I enjoy Barclay's writing, I always do. He has such a grew flow, even as with this case the story isn't rocking my boat. I just breezed through the pages. Alas, I missed the suspense from his previous books.

Then comes the last part, here Barclay both surprise me and at the same time disappoint me. Yeah, I'm a bit on the fence about the ending. In one way it's WAY TOO typical on the other hand there is a twist that I did not see coming that made me go WOW. That's the way to go, Barclay, chock the reader. So, I'm a bit on the fence when it comes to the ending, I loved part of it, but not the whole deal.

A NOISE DOWNSTAIRS is a book that has an interesting premise. The writing is top-notch. But, ultimately I just couldn't find myself loving the story. However, I did like it and I would recommend the book.

I want to thank William Morrow for providing me with a free copy through Edelweiss for an honest review!

#BookReview Dead Girls by Graeme Cameron @HarperCollins @FreshFiction

Dead Girls by Graeme Cameron
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

I may not remember everything, but I know he won’t hurt anyone else.

I won’t let him.

It’s been two months since a serial killer brutally attacked police detective Alisha Green and left her for dead. Two months since she could effortlessly recall simple things, since her mind felt remotely sound. The nameless killer thinks he knows her, thinks she’s just another dead girl among many. Ali Green plans to show him he’s dead wrong about that.

Ali has two enemies now: the dangerous man she’s hunting and her own failing memory. As explosive new evidence comes to light and conflicting accounts from a witness and a surviving victim threaten both her investigation and her credibility, she begins to question what is and isn’t real. And now Ali has no choice but to remember the past…before it buries her.

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Police Detective Alisha "Ali" Green was brutally attacked two months ago. The killer left her almost dead and her partner dead. Since then has she had a memory problem, even simple things are hard to remember. She can't even be sure that her memory is always right. And, the killer is still out there.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#Wishlist July: Most Wanted 2019

For the July wishlist did I pick 5 titles published by Macmillan next year that I'm dying to read! 

Ready...

Set...

Go...

No Mercy

Joanna Schaffhausen

Police officer Ellery Hathaway and FBI profiler Reed Markham take on two difficult new cases in this stunning follow-up to The Vanishing Season.

Police officer Ellery Hathaway is on involuntary leave from her job because she shot a murderer in cold blood and refuses to apologize for it. Forced into group therapy for victims of violent crime, Ellery immediately finds higher priorities than "getting in touch with her feelings." 

For one, she suspects a fellow group member may have helped to convict the wrong man for a deadly arson incident years ago. For another, Ellery finds herself in the desperate clutches of a woman who survived a brutal rape. He is still out there, this man with the Spider-Man-like ability to climb through bedroom windows, and his victim beseeches Ellery for help in capturing her attacker.

Ellery seeks advice from her friend, FBI profiler Reed Markham, who liberated her from a killer’s closet when she was a child. Reed remains drawn to this unpredictable woman, the one he rescued but couldn’t quite save. The trouble is, Reed is up for a potential big promotion, and his boss has just one condition for the new job—stay away from Ellery. Ellery ignores all the warnings. Instead, she starts digging around in everyone’s past but her own—a move that, at best, could put her out of work permanently, and at worst, could put her in the city morgue

*********

The Widows

Jess Montgomery

“The Widows kept me on the edge of my seat. Montgomery is a masterful storyteller.” —Lee Martin, author of Pulitzer Prize-Finalist The Bright Forever

Kinship, Ohio, 1924: When Lily Ross learns that her husband, Daniel Ross, the town’s widely respected sheriff, is killed while transporting a prisoner, she is devastated and vows to avenge his death. 

Hours after his funeral, a stranger appears at her door. Marvena Whitcomb, a coal miner’s widow, is unaware that Daniel has died, and begs to speak with him about her missing daughter. 

From miles away but worlds apart, Lily and Marvena’s lives collide as they realize that Daniel was not the man that either of them believed him to be—and that his murder is far more complex than either of them could have imagined. 

Inspired by the true story of Ohio’s first female sheriff, this is a powerful debut about two women’s search for justic as they take on the corruption at the heart of their community.

**********

Strong As Steel

Jon Land

The electrifying ninth installment in the critically acclaimed Caitlin Strong series

1994: Texas Ranger Jim Strong investigates a mass murder on a dusty freight train linked to a mysterious, missing cargo for which no record exists.

The Present: His daughter, fifth-generation Texas Ranger Caitlin Strong, finds herself on the trail of that same cargo when skeletal remains are found near an excavation site in the Texas desert. She’s also dealing with the aftermath of a massacre that claimed the lives of all the workers at a private intelligence company on her watch.

These two cases are connected by a long-buried secret, one that men have killed and died to protect. Caitlin and her outlaw lover Cort Wesley Masters must prove themselves to be as strong as steel to overcome a bloody tide that has been rising for centuries.

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Watcher in the Woods

Kelley Armstrong

The next gripping installment of #1 bestselling Kelley Armstrong's riveting Casey Duncan series.

The secret town of Rockton has seen some rocky times lately; understandable considering its mix of criminals and victims fleeing society for refuge within its Yukon borders. Casey Duncan, the town's only detective on a police force of three, has already faced murder, arson, and falling in love in less than the year that she's lived there. Yet even she didn't think it would be possible for an outsider to find and cause trouble in the town she's come to call home.

When a US Marshal shows up in town demanding the release of one of the residents, Casey and her boyfriend, Sheriff Dalton, are skeptical. And yet only hours later, the marshal is shot dead and the only visible suspects are the townspeople and her estranged sister, in town for just the weekend . It's up to Casey to figure out who murdered the marshal, and why they would kill to keep him quiet. In #1 New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong's latest installment, Rockton and its fans are in for another hair raising mystery.

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The Malta Exchange

Steve Berry

The next in New York Times top 5 bestseller Steve Berry's Cotton Malone series involves the Knights of Malta, papal conclave, and lost documents that could change history.

The pope is dead and Cardinals are arriving at the Vatican to open a conclave to pick his successor, but one prince of the Church has fled Rome to Malta in search of a document that dates back to the 4th century and Constantine the Great.

Former Justice Department operative Cotton Malone is at Lake Como, Italy, on the trail of legendary letters between Winston Churchill and Benito Mussolini, letters that disappeared in 1945 and could now re-write world history. But someone else is after them too and, when Malone obtains then loses them, he’s plunged into a hunt involving the Knights of Malta, a 900-year-old organization rife with division and currently being steered by the Secreti, a sect within determined to affect the coming conclave.

With the help of Luke Daniels, Malone races both the Knights and the clock, across Italy to Malta, and finally to Rome, behind the walls of the Vatican, where the election of the next pope hangs in the balance. Bestseller Steve Berry delivers yet another remarkable thriller in The Maltese Exchange.

#CoverCrush The Gardener of Eden by David Downie

For new visitors do I want to explain that Cover Crush is something that my friend Erin over at Historical Fiction Reader came up with and I adopted the idea together with some other friends. And, now we try to put up a Cover Crush every week. You can check below my pick of the week for their choices this week!

A haunting and luminous novel that explores the dark secrets lurking beneath the stunning natural beauty of a dying timber town. 

A mysterious beachcomber appears one day on the coastal bluffs near Carverville, whose best days are long behind it. Who is he, and why has he returned after nearly forty years?

Carverville’s prodigal son, James, serendipitously finds work at the Eden Seaside Resort & Cottages, a gentrified motel, but soon finds his homecoming taking a sinister turn when he and a local teenager make a gruesome discovery, which force him to reckon with the ghosts of his past—and the dangers of the present. Rumors, distrust, and conspiracies spread among the townsfolk, all of them seemingly trapped in their claustrophobic and isolated world. But is there something even more sinister at work than mere fear of outsiders?

In The Gardener of Eden, David Downie weaves an intricate and compelling narrative of redemption, revenge, justice, and love—and the price of secrecy, as a community grapples with its tortured past and frightening future.

Thoughts:

Absolutely stunning! I was browsing Edelweiss when I remembered that I had to do my cover crush for this week and then I saw this book and it must have been fate. Love the colors in the forest. It's definitely a luminous cover. 

Check out what my friends have picked for Cover Crush's this week:

Stephanie @ Layered Pages

Heather @ The Maiden's Court

Holly @ 2 Kids and Tired Books

Colleen @ A Literary Vacation

Meghan @ Of Quills & Vellum

Erin @ Historical Fiction Reader

#BookReview The Last Thing She Told Me by Linda Green @LindaGreenisms @QuercusBooks @MillsReid11 #TheLastThingSheToldMe

The Last Thing She Told Me by Linda Green
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Even the deepest buried secrets can find their way to the surface...

Moments before she dies, Nicola's grandmother Betty whispers to her that there are babies at the bottom of the garden.

Nicola's mother claims she was talking nonsense. However, when Nicola's daughter finds a bone while playing in Betty's garden, it's clear that something sinister has taken place.

But will unearthing painful family secrets end up tearing Nicola's family apart?

The new emotionally-charged suspense novel from Linda Green, the bestselling author of While My Eyes Were Closed and After I've Gone

*********

The last thing Nicole's grandmother Betty told her before she died is to take care of the babies at the bottom of the garden. This bewilders Nicole, but since there are two fairy statues at the bottom of the garden could it perhaps be them her grandmother talked about. But, Nicole starts to think that something is very wrong when her youngest daughter finds something by one of the fairies.

THE LAST THING SHE TOLD ME is a story about secrets, about mother and daughter relationships. And, about suffering. This is a generation story where we get to learn more about Nicole, her mother, and grandmother. All three women have gone through traumatic experiences and are keeping secrets. Betty almost took hers to the grave, but her last words lead Nicole to not only discover her grandmother's secret, but her mother. And, she is also ready to reveal her own dark secret.

This is the first book I have read by Linda Green and I found the concept to be intriguing. It's a heartbreaking story, but also a book about finding the strength to confront the past and move on. I found the book to be a bit hard to read now and then, I had some trouble to truly enjoy the whole story. The youngest daughter Maisie grated on my nerves and she felt much younger in her ways than her years. However, I did love Ruby, Nicole's oldest daughter. She has to deal with a lot of difficult stuff and I thought of all the character, was she the one I liked the best. I liked the book and I will definitely read more by Linda Green.

I want to thank Quercus for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#BookReview Women of the Dunes by Sarah Maine @SarahMaineBooks @AtriaBooks @FreshFiction #FFreview

Women of the Dunes by Sarah Maine
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

From the author of the acclaimed novels The House Between Tides and Beyond the Wild River, a rich, atmospheric tale set on the sea-lashed coast of west Scotland, in which the lives of a ninth-century Norsewoman, a nineteenth-century woman, and a twenty-first-century archeologist weave together after a body is discovered in the dunes.

Libby Snow has always felt the pull of Ullanessm a lush Scottish island enshrouded in myth and deeply important to her family. Her great-great-grandmother Ellen was obsessed with the strange legend of Ulla, a Viking maiden who washed up on shore with the nearly lifeless body of her husband—and who inspired countless epic poems and the island’s name.

Central to the mystery is an ornate chalice and Libby, an archaeologist, finally has permission to excavate the site where Ulla is believed to have lived. But what Libby finds in the ancient dunes is a body from the Victorian era, clearly murdered…and potentially connected to Ellen.

What unfolds is an epic story that spans centuries, with Libby mining Ellen and Ulla’s stories for clues about the body, and in doing so, discovering the darker threads that bind all three women together across history.

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The first book I read by Sarah Maine was THE HOUSE BETWEEN TIDES and I was blown away by the wonderful story and the atmospheric setting. I was eager to find out if WOMEN OF THE DUNES would be as good. And it was!

To be able to effortlessly write a book with three different storylines without confusing or making any of the storylines less interesting than the others is a gift and I think that Sarah Maine has this gift. I'm so used to dual storylines that getting one with three storylines feels like an oddity, in a good way.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview The Summer Wives by Beatriz Williams @authorbeatriz @WmMorrowBooks

The Summer Wives by Beatriz Williams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

New York Times bestselling author Beatriz Williams brings us the blockbuster novel of the season—a spellbinding novel of romance, murder, class, power, and dark secrets set in the 1950s and ’60s among the rarified world of a resort island in the Long Island Sound...

In the summer of 1951, Miranda Schuyler arrives on elite, secretive Winthrop Island in Long Island Sound as a naive eighteen year old, still reeling from the loss of her father in the Second World War. Although a graduate of the exclusive Foxcroft Academy in Virginia, Miranda has always lived on the margins of high society. When her beautiful mother marries Hugh Fisher, whose summer house on Winthrop overlooks the famous lighthouse, Miranda is catapulted into a heady new world of pedigrees and cocktails, status and swimming pools. Isobel Fisher, Miranda’s new stepsister—all long legs and world-weary bravado, engaged to a wealthy Island scion—is eager to draw Miranda into the arcane customs of Winthrop society...

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What I love about Beatriz Williams books are how they are all connected to the Schuyler family, one way or another. This didn't I know when I started to read the books. So, it was with delight that I discovered that the books even when they are not part of a series are in some way connected. I have yet to read Overseas, Fall of Poppies and The Forgotten Room (there is a Schuyler in this one woohoo), but I will get to them soon I hope! Also, I'm dying to read the upcoming book: The Wicked Redhead!

THE SUMMER WIVES have three different storylines, first, we have the 30s with Bianca Medeiro. Then, we have Miranda Schuyler in the 50s and finally Miranda again in the 60s storyline. These three storylines are interwoven in the book, and slowly they will reveal the connection. Bianca Medeiro story is the one that feels a bit like an outsider since both other stories are from Miranda's POV. However, Bianca's story is a vital part of the story.

One thing I truly love about THE SUMMER WIVES are all the characters. Williams always writes such wonderful characters and I'm not even a big fan of romance stories. But, I think her ability to write characters with such depth and also her way of creating a story that engrosses you is the key to her success. You like the characters, they have weakness and are portrayed as human. Every time I finish a book is it with a bit of sadness because I just love the characters. This is why I love it when a Schuyler pops up in another book.

THE SUMMER WIVES is a marvelous book, and I recommend it warmly. To be honest, I recommend all the book by Williams!

I want to thank William Morrow for providing me with a free copy through Edelweiss for an honest review!

#BookReview The Shimmer by Carsten Stroud @HarlequinBooks @FreshFiction #HarlequinMira

The Shimmer by Carsten Stroud
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

How do you hunt a killer who can go back in time and make sure you're never born?

A police pursuit kicks Sergeant Jack Redding of the Florida Highway Patrol and his trainee, Julie Karras, into a shoot-out that ends with one girl dead and another in cuffs, and the driver of the SUV fleeing into the Intracoastal Waterway. Redding stays on the hunt, driven by the trace memory that he knows that running woman--and he does, because his grandfather, a cop in Jacksonville, was hunting the same woman in 1957.

Redding and his partner, Pandora Jansson, chase a seductive serial killer who can ride The Shimmer across decades. The pursuit cuts from modern-day Jacksonville to Mafia-ruled St. Augustine in 1957, then to the French Quarter of New Orleans in 1914. The stakes turn brutal when Jack, whose wife and child died in a crash the previous Christmas Eve, faces a terrible choice: help his grandfather catch the killer, or change time itself and try to save his wife and child.The Shimmer is a unique time-shifting thriller that will stay with you long after its utterly unforeseen and yet perfectly diabolical ending.

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You know what I like? Books about time travel. So, when I read the description of this book about a serial killer that can move through time, I knew I had to read it.

THE SHIMMER starts off strong with Sergeant Jack Redding of the Florida Highway Patrol and his trainee, Julie Karras, chasing a car that belongs to a family who has gone missing. When the woman driving the car takes off running from the car after it stopped, Jack is hot in pursuit. However, she manages to get away and Jack is left with a feeling that he has seen the woman before... but where? What he doesn't know then is that his grandfather hunted the same woman in 1957, but how can the same woman still be alive and look the same as she did back then? And, what happened to the family that owned the car?

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview The Dante Chamber by Matthew Pearl @penguinpress @FreshFiction

The Dante Chamber by Matthew Pearl
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

From Mathew Pearl, the bestselling author of The Dante Club, a masterful tale of literature, obsession, and murder

The year is 1870. Five years after a series of Dante-inspired killings disrupted Boston, a man is found murdered in the public gardens of London with an enormous stone around his neck etched with a verse from the Divine Comedy. When more mysterious murders erupt across the city, all in the style of the punishments Dante memorialized in Purgatory, poet Christina Rossetti fears her brother, the Dante-obsessed artist and writer Gabriel Rossetti, will be the next victim.

Christina enlists poets Robert Browning and Alfred Tennyson, and famous scholar Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, to assist in deciphering the literary clues. Together these unlikely investigators rush to unravel the secrets of Dante's verses in order to find Gabriel and stop the killings. Racing between the shimmering mansions of the elite and the dark corners of London's underworld, they descend further and further into the mystery. But when the true inspiration behind the gruesome murders is finally revealed, Christina realizes that the perpetrator has even bigger and more horrific plans than she had initially thought.

**********

It's been several years since I read THE DANTE CLUB, but I still remember how engrossed I was with the book, even though the details of the book is a bit hazy. Nevertheless, reading THE DANTE CHAMBER brought some memories back of what happened in THE DANTE CLUB.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#CoverCrush The Trial of Lizzie Borden by Cara Robertson

For new visitors do I want to explain that Cover Crush is something that my friend Erin over at Historical Fiction Reader came up with and I adopted the idea together with some other friends. And, now we try to put up a Cover Crush every week. You can check below my pick of the week for their choices this week!

The remarkable new account of an essential piece of American mythology—the trial of Lizzie Borden—based on twenty years of research and recently unearthed evidence.

The Trial of Lizzie Borden tells the true story of one of the most sensational murder trials in American history. When Andrew and Abby Borden were brutally hacked to death in Fall River, Massachusetts, in August 1892, the arrest of the couple’s younger daughter Lizzie turned the case into international news and her trial into a spectacle unparalleled in American history. Reporters flocked to the scene. Well-known columnists took up conspicuous seats in the courtroom. The defendant was relentlessly scrutinized for signs of guilt or innocence. Everyone—rich and poor, suffragists and social conservatives, legal scholars and laypeople—had an opinion about Lizzie Borden’s guilt or innocence. Was she a cold-blooded murderess or an unjustly persecuted lady? Did she or didn’t she?

The popular fascination with the Borden murders and its central enigmatic character has endured for more than one hundred years. Immortalized in rhyme, told and retold in every conceivable genre, the murders have secured a place in the American pantheon of mythic horror, but one typically wrenched from its historical moment. In contrast, Cara Robertson explores the stories Lizzie Borden’s culture wanted and expected to hear and how those stories influenced the debate inside and outside of the courtroom. Based on transcripts of the Borden legal proceedings, contemporary newspaper accounts, unpublished local accounts, and recently unearthed letters from Lizzie herself, The Trial of Lizzie Borden offers a window onto America in the Gilded Age, showcasing its most deeply held convictions and its most troubling social anxieties.

Thoughts:

I think the cover speaks for itself. The woman in profile is obvious Lizzie Borden. Yet you can't really see her face because of the hat. You can see her, but not the whole of her. Like the story about Lizzie Borden, so well known, but what is really true? What is her true face? A coldblooded killer or a victim? 

Check out what my friends have picked for Cover Crush's this week:

Stephanie @ Layered Pages

Heather @ The Maiden's Court

Holly @ 2 Kids and Tired Books

Colleen @ A Literary Vacation

Meghan @ Of Quills & Vellum

Erin @ Historical Fiction Reader

#BookReview Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik @delreybooks @FreshFiction

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Miryem is the daughter and granddaughter of moneylenders, but her father’s too kind-hearted to collect his debts. They face poverty, until Miryem hardens her own heart and takes up his work in their village.

Her success creates rumours she can turn silver into gold, which attract the fairy king of winter himself. He sets her an impossible challenge – and if she fails, she’ll die. Yet if she triumphs, it may mean a fate worse than death. And in her desperate efforts to succeed, Miryem unwittingly spins a web which draws in the unhappy daughter of a lord.

Irina’s father schemes to wed her to the tsar – he will pay any price to achieve this goal. However, the dashing tsar is not what he seems. And the secret he hides threatens to consume the lands of mortals and winter alike.

Torn between deadly choices, Miryem and Irina embark on a quest that will take them to the limits of sacrifice, power and love.

In this fairy tale-inspired novel, Naomi Novik weaves a rich, multi-layered tapestry that is a joy to read.

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Once upon a time, I read a book called UPROOTED and I found it to be a fabulous novel. So, I was thrilled to get the chance to read SPINNING SILVER, a new novel by Naomi Novik. Now this novel is a stand-alone fantasy novel that in some ways feels like a retelling of Rumpelstiltskin.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview Double Blind by Iris Johansen @StMartinsPress

Double Blind by Iris Johansen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Kendra Michaels, formerly blind and now a hired gun for law enforcement agencies who relies on her razor-sharp powers of observation, is reluctant to help the FBI with the most recent case they’ve brought to her. But then she hears the details: the body was found just blocks away from Kendra’s condo. The young woman was carrying an envelope with Kendra’s name on it, and inside was an SD card with what appears to be an innocuous video of a wedding reception. The woman died trying to get the video to Kendra, but for what purpose? Before Kendra and the FBI can answer that question, the bride is abducted from her suburban home.

And so the hunt is on for a killer whose nightmarish plan is slowly becoming clear. A plan that involves a powerful law firm and a multi-billion dollar corporation. As the body count rises, Kendra joins forces with private investigator Jessie Mercado and agent-for-hire Adam Lynch to stop the plot as it grows ever closer to its terrifying conclusion.

In Double Blind, Iris and Roy Johansen deliver an emotional, gripping new entry in the bestselling Kendra Michaels series.

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It's just a couple of years ago that I read my first Iris Johansen book. It was an Eve Duncan book and I just loved it since then have I read several from that series and some from this the Kendra Michael series. 

Kendra Michaels was born blind, but she got her sight back as an adult and she has a keen sense for details that other miss which help a lot when FBI needs her help. Like this time when a woman is killed just a couple of blocks from Kendra's Condo. A woman carrying an envelope with Kendra's name on it.

The beginning of the book was intriguing. Kendra was given a video of a wedding and she has no clues as to why since she doesn't know who the woman who was killed. Nor does she recognize anyone at the wedding. So, first, must they figure out who the people at the wedding are.

Beside the case is Kendra dealing with her "relationship" with Adam Lynch. The attraction is there, but she has trouble giving in to him. Perhaps this case will bring them together. I love that private investigator Jessie Mercado has a part in this story. I would love to see her get her own book (or series) someday.

The case was the best when everything was still unknown. The reason for the death of the woman (and the later ones killed) was a bit of a disappointment. I was hoping for a more conspiratorial angle rather than the one that the book presented. Still, I liked the book and I'm looking forward to the next one!

I want to thank St. Martin's Press for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#BookReview Island of the Mad by Laurie R. King @LaurieRKing @mary_russell @randomhouse @FreshFiction

Island of the Mad by Laurie R. King
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A June summer's evening, on the Sussex Downs, in 1925. Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes are strolling across their orchard when the telephone rings: an old friend's beloved aunt has failed to return following a supervised outing from Bedlam. After the previous few weeks--with a bloody murder, a terrible loss, and startling revelations about Holmes--Russell is feeling a bit unbalanced herself. The last thing she wants is to deal with the mad, and yet, she can't say no.

The Lady Vivian Beaconsfield has spent most of her adult life in one asylum after another, yet he seemed to be improving--or at least, finding a point of balance in her madness. So why did she disappear? Did she take the family's jewels with her, or did someone else? The Bedlam nurse, perhaps?

The trail leads Russell and Holmes through Bedlam's stony halls to the warm Venice lagoon, where ethereal beauty is jarred by Mussolini's Blackshirts, where the gilded Lido set may be tempting a madwoman, and where Cole Porter sits at a piano, playing with ideas...

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I have to admit that having Mary Russell's old friend Veronica Beaconsfield making an appearance in this book brought back a lot of fond memories from the earlier books. Yeah, I got nostalgic and all remembering Mary and Veronica's school days not to mention the religious sect "The New Temple of God" that Veronica was involved with that turned out to be quite an adventure for Mary.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BlogTour The Secret Life of Mrs. London by Rebecca Rosenberg @MrsLondonsLover @NEBookPromotion

San Francisco, 1915. As America teeters on the brink of world war, Charmian and her husband, famed novelist Jack London, wrestle with genius and desire, politics and marital competitiveness. Charmian longs to be viewed as an equal partner who put her own career on hold to support her husband, but Jack doesn’t see it that way…until Charmian is pulled from the audience during a magic show by escape artist Harry Houdini, a man enmeshed in his own complicated marriage. Suddenly, charmed by the attention Houdini pays her and entranced by his sexual magnetism, Charmian’s eyes open to a world of possibilities that could be her escape.

As Charmian grapples with her urge to explore the forbidden, Jack’s increasingly reckless behavior threatens her dedication. Now torn between two of history’s most mysterious and charismatic figures, she must find the courage to forge her own path, even as she fears the loss of everything she holds dear.

Guest Post: 

The Devil is in the Details 

By Rebecca Rosenberg

Devilish good details…Most writing workshops focus on writing interesting characters, or a riveting plot rife with conflict, or the structure… all very important in crafting a story. But perhaps for historical novel readers, it is the spicy details that change our experience from commonplace to a story that transports us to a time long ago.

How does the author come up with these bits of intrigue that bond us to the character? Traveling to the locale, antique stores, searching old maps, scanning odd books or the internet? Yes.

In THE SECRET OF MRS. LONDON, I used the Remington typewriter, the mimeograph, and the ediphone to illustrate the tools of the writing trade in the 1915-1917 period covered in the book. My characters, Charmian and Jack London actually used these apparatuses in their writing and they portray these characters and even what is happening in the story.

Charmian London typed on the Remington, as Jack London dictated his stories! She typed 100 words a minute. How is that even possible pushing those mechanical keys? The “prop” of the Remington, illustrates Charmian London’s education as a typist and working at Overland Journal. It characterizes her as an industrious, serious worker that pushes herself, not the norm of the day in 1915. But it occurs to me writing this blog, that the Remington typewriter also indicates a subservience to her husband Jack, because she it typing his words.

I was amazed to find out that Charmian actually copied Jack London’s manuscripts on an early mimeograph, invented by Edison in 1876. Each page had to be fed through and the ink dried. Within the manuscript, using the mimeograph showed the tedious, labor intensive process of creating a manuscript, which Charmian often did, since Jack London produced more than twenty novels in the fifteen years they worked together. Not to mention the articles and letters they wrote! Mountains of typing and mimeographing!

When the London’s bought an ediphone it marked a stark break in their togetherness. Jack could speak into the ediphone by himself, and later Charmian would type it up. Jack was no longer telling his stories to Charmian and watching her make them come alive on the page. And Charmian now had the freedom to spend time on her own writing. In fact, in later years, they hired a typist to transpose Jack’s ediphone recordings.

Other examples of how props are used to depict character traits and state of being, from my favorite authors:

From Kay Bratt, author of THE PALEST INK. The title comes from an old Chinese proverb that says 'The Palest Ink is better than the best memory'. She chose it because during the Cultural Revolution, people were not allowed to keep any sort of records or photos about what was really going on. Media was twisted to make those in power look good, and tragedies and truths were concealed. The most important object was Mao's Little Red Book. It is rumored to have landed in the hands of billions of people. During the Cultural Revolution in China, it was an unofficial requirement for every Chinese citizen to own, to read, and to carry it at all times. For their own safety, people memorized segments of it, to prove their loyalty and avoid persecution or death. Later, after the Cultural Revolution was shut down, Mao was exposed as a madman and the cause of millions of tragic deaths throughout China.

From Camille Di Maio, author of BEFORE THE RAIN FALLS. One of her characters, Della Lee Trujillo, is in a Texas women's prison in the 1940s, convicted for the murder of her sister. As she is being driven to the prison from the courthouse, she clings to a rosary that had been her mother's. Her mother deserted the family when she ran off with her lover, so Della begins to fear that it is tainted by her mother's sin. As she prays, the words "Forgive us our trespasses..." plays in her mind and she recalls all the events that led up to that moment.

So what objects can best describe your character, and what she is going through? The use of unique props is a great example of a writer’s mantra: Show. Don’t Tell.

Rebecca Rosenberg writes biographical historical fiction. The Secret Life of Mrs. London, published by Lake Union, is her debut novel, following her non-fiction, LAVENDER FIELDS OF AMERICA She can be contacted on Facebook and Goodreads or on her website, www.rebecca-rosenberg.com https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Life-Mrs-London/dp/1542048737

About the Author:

California native Rebecca Rosenberg lives on a lavender farm with her family in Sonoma, the Valley of the Moon, where she and her husband founded the largest lavender product company in America, Sonoma Lavender. A long-time student of Jack London’s work and an avid fan of his daring wife, Charmian, Rosenberg is a graduate of the Stanford Writing Certificate Program. THE SECRET LIFE OF MRS. LONDON is her first novel, following her non-fiction, LAVENDER FIELDS OF AMERICA.

Rebecca Rosenberg’s next historical novel is GOLD DIGGER the story of BABY DOE TABOR.

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Blog Tour Schedule:

July 9th- Book Review - Kate Braithwaite

July 10th – Book Excerpt – Just One More Chapter 

July 11th -Book Spotlight and Highlighted Reviews – before the second sleep

July 12th- Book Review -Book Babble

July 13th – Book Review - Strange & Random Happenstance

July 14th – Book Spotlight – Fictionophile

July 15th - Book Spotlight- Layered Pages

July 16th – Book Spotlight & Book Review – Svetabooks

July 17th- Book Spotlight – A Bookish Affair

July 18th – Guest Post – A Bookaholic Swede

#BookReview In the Vines by Shannon Kirk @amazonpub

In the Vines by Shannon Kirk
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Family ties so strong you can’t escape…

Mary Olivia Pentecost, known as Mop, was born into one of the wealthiest families in the country—and one of the most guarded. Now, two years after her mother’s mysterious death, Mop is seeking closure on the disquieting tragedy by returning to the New England seaside estate of her cloistered Aunty Liv—once her closest relative and confidante.

But behind the walls of the isolated estate, the shadows of the past are darker than Mop imagined. The puzzles of the family history are not to be shared, but unearthed. With each revelation comes a new, foreboding threat—and for Mop, the grave suspicion that to discover Aunty Liv’s secrets is to become a prisoner of them.

How well do we know the people we love? How well do we want to know them? The answers are as twisted as a tangle of vines in this throat-clutching novel of psychological suspense.

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Sometimes a book just doesn't work for me. I want to like it, but the story just doesn't rock my boat. Unfortunately, In the Vines is one of them. I was really looking forward to reading the book, however, from the start did I feel a bit confused when it came to the story, with the jumping between present and past.

We have the story from two years earlier with Mop's aunt having an affair with a married man. She's waiting for him to reveal this to his wife, but things go a bit wrong there. In the present story, we get Mop's situations as she is hiding from a crazy person with her "companion". These stories are interwoven until the end when Mop's situation is explained.

I think my problem was that the story just didn't live up to my expectations, I wanted a creepy family story, and this one was more puzzling. I wanted to know the truth, why is Mops hiding from someone that wants to kill her? But, her aunt's storyline failed to impress me. On the plus side was Mops storyline better, her arriving at her aunt's place for the first time in two years and finding out that her aunt is a bit ... odd...

In the Vines is a book that, if you are engrossed in the story will thrill you. The mystery is interesting. However, I admit that I speed read now and then towards the end. I liked the flashbacks to Mops growing up and I also found the beginning (the restaurant scene) pretty cool. I just wished I had like the story a bit more...

I want to thank Thomas & Mercer for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#BlogTour An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena @sharilapena @annecater #RandomThingsTours

An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

We can’t choose the strangers we meet.

As the guests arrive at beautiful, remote Mitchell’s Inn, they’re all looking forward to a relaxing weekend deep in the forest, miles from anywhere. They watch their fellow guests with interest, from a polite distance.

Usually we can avoid the people who make us nervous, make us afraid.

With a violent storm raging, the group finds itself completely cut off from the outside world. Nobody can get in – or out. And then the first body is found . . . and the horrifying truth comes to light. There’s a killer among them – and nowhere to run.

Until we find ourselves in a situation we can’t escape. Trapped.

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I try to just do blog tours nowadays for books I really want to read. So, when I got the chance to be part of this blog tour did I jump at the chance. I read The Couple Next Door by the author some years ago and I loved the book. Also, this book's blurb about strangers being trapped in an inn without having a chance to get from the place, with a murderer? I was sold!

My only regret with this book is that I wanted to read the book in the middle of the winter, hopefully with a blizzard outside. Instead, I read it in the middle of one of the hottest summer ever. Not that the outside climate affects the story of the book. It was just that I wanted to get in the mood...;)

My favorite kind of stories crime stories are where there are plenty of suspects and you try to figure out who's the killer. And, in An Unwanted Guest have we plenty of suspects to choose from. All of them seem to have secrets they try to keep hidden. I have not read Agatha Christie's books, but I have set plenty of the movies and TV series and this book felt like one of her stories. We even had our own "Poirot" trying to figure out who the killer is. Although we couldn't be sure that he was not the guilty one.

Shari Lapena has become a favorite author of mine. I have yet to read A Stranger in the House by her, but it's high on my list of books to read. An Unwanted Guest is an excellent whodunnit book that will keep you guessing right until the end!  

#BookReview The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware @vintagebooks @RuthWareWriter @HarvillSecker

The Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

-- From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of In a Dark, Dark Wood, The Woman in Cabin 10, and The Lying Game comes Ruth Ware’s highly anticipated fourth novel.

On a day that begins like any other, Hal receives a mysterious letter bequeathing her a substantial inheritance. She realizes very quickly that the letter was sent to the wrong person—but also that the cold-reading skills she’s honed as a tarot card reader might help her claim the money.

Soon, Hal finds herself at the funeral of the deceased…where it dawns on her that there is something very, very wrong about this strange situation and the inheritance at the center of it.

Full of spellbinding menace and told in Ruth Ware’s signature suspenseful style, this is an unputdownable thriller from the Agatha Christie of our time.

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Who doesn't dream about getting an unexpected inheritance? In this case is the letter Hal gets truly unexpected. Since she's not the right person. Although she desperately needs the money. So, why not try to impersonate the true Harriet, since no one seems to know anything about her? Great plan, until Hal realize that perhaps she has stepped into a nest of vipers. Although the family seems awfully nice at first. It's just that there seem to be something wrong that her arrival has turned the table...

The Death of Mrs. Westaway is a thrilling suspense novel with an excellent nervewracking ending. I found the story to be refreshingly new. I read a lot of thrillers so I'm always glad when I get a book that keeps me on my toes and keeps surprising me. The Death of Mrs. Westaway is a book that gives some clues here and there, and you have to together with Hal try to figure out the mystery at the house with her new "relatives". And, it's bloody hard to write anything without spoiling the book. So, I will just say that the book is compelling from the start and will keep the reader hooked until the end. 

I have previously read In a Dark, Dark Wood by the author, but I have still The Woman in Cabin 10 to read and I'm really looking forward to doing that!

I want to thank Harvill Secker for providing me with a free copy through NetGalley for an honest review!

#BookReview A Gathering of Secrets by Linda Castillo @LindaCastillo11 @MinotaurBooks @FreshFiction

A Gathering of Secrets by Linda Castillo
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A deadly fire exposes the dark side of Amish life in this harrowing new thriller in the New York Times bestselling series.

When a historic barn burns to the ground in the middle of the night, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder is called in to investigate. At first, it looks like an accident, but when the body of eighteen-year-old Daniel Gingerich is found inside—burned alive—Kate suspects murder. Who would want a well-liked, hardworking young Amish man dead?

Kate delves into the investigation only to find herself stonewalled by the community to which she once belonged. Is their silence a result of the Amish tenet of separation? Or is this peaceful and deeply religious community conspiring to hide a truth no one wants to talk about? Kate doubles down only to discover a plethora of secrets and a chilling series of crimes that shatters everything she thought she knew about her Amish roots—and herself.

As Kate wades through a sea of suspects, she’s confronted by her own violent past and an unthinkable possibility.

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I read SWORN TO SILENCE , the first book in the Kate Burkholder series some years ago and loved it. After reading it, I did get several of the books in the series and planned to read them. I still plan to read them, even more so after finishing A GATHERING OF SECRETS, book ten in the series.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview April in Paris, 1921 by Tessa Lunney @TessaWynn @Pegasus_Books @FreshFiction #FFreview

April in Paris, 1921 by Tessa Lunney
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Paris in 1921 is the city of freedom, where hatless and footloose Kiki Button can drink champagne and dance until dawn. She works as a gossip columnist, partying with the rich and famous, the bohemian and strange, using every moment to create a new woman from the ashes of her war-worn self.

While on the modelling dais, Picasso gives her a job: to find his wife’s portrait, which has gone mysteriously missing. That same night, her spymaster from the war contacts her—she has to find a double agent or face jail. Through parties, whisky, and seductive informants, Kiki uses her knowledge of Paris from the Great War to connect the clues.

Set over the course of one springtime week, April in Paris, 1921 is a mystery that combines artistic gossip with interwar political history through witty banter, steamy scenes, and fast action.

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What a deliciously decadent story! As a big fan of historical fiction set in the 1920s, was I instantly intrigued by the story of APRIL IN PARIS, 1921 by Tessa Lunney, and I was thrilled to discover how wonderful the book was right from the very start. Let's start with the fact that very early on in the book there is a ménage à trois between our heroine, Kiki Button, Picasso and another woman. I'm not a fan of reading about very lengthy sex scenes, but Tessa Lunney manages to write this part and other parts with enough sensuality and without being too graphic that even I liked them. Now, this is not a story about just sex, but it's part of the story since Kiki Button is, how shall I put it, not a prude and it's the 20s in Paris.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#BookReview The Woman in the Woods by John Connolly @jconnollybooks @AtriaBooks @FreshFiction

The Woman in the Woods by John Connolly
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

From internationally bestselling author and “creative genius who has few equals in either horror fiction or the mystery genre” (New York Journal of Books) comes a gripping thriller starring Private Investigator Charlie Parker. When the body of a woman—who apparently died in childbirth—is discovered, Parker is hired to track down both her identity and her missing child.

In the beautiful Maine woods, a partly preserved body is discovered. Investigators realize that the dead young woman gave birth shortly before her death. But there is no sign of a baby.

Private detective Charlie Parker is hired by a lawyer to shadow the police investigation and find the infant but Parker is not the only searcher. Someone else is following the trail left by the woman, someone with an interest in much more than a missing child…someone prepared to leave bodies in his wake.

And in a house by the woods, a toy telephone begins to ring and a young boy is about to receive a call from a dead woman.

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Someday must I take time off from my busy reading schedule to re- read the Charlie Parker series. It's such a fabulous series and I envy those that have yet read a single book and will discover just how great the books are and have 16 (as of now) books to read. Do you need to read the previous books in this series before you read THE WOMAN IN THE WOODS? No, the books can be read as stand- alone, however, there is a theme running through the books that all starts in the first book when Charlie Parker's wife and daughter are murdered. That event starts off everything and reading this book will give you a hint of past events. To get the full story you do need to start from the beginning, but it doesn't take away from reading this book on its own.

READ THE REST OF THE REVIEW OVER AT FRESH FICTION!

#CoverCrush The Melody of Secrets Jeffrey Stepakoff

For new visitors do I want to explain that Cover Crush is something that my friend Erin over at Historical Fiction Reader came up with and I adopted the idea together with some other friends. And, now we try to put up a Cover Crush every week. You can check below my pick of the week for their choices this week!

An epic love story set against the 1960s U.S. space program, when deeply-buried secrets could threaten not just a marriage, but a country

Jeffrey Stepakoff's The Melody of Secrets is an epic love story set against the 1960s U.S. space program, when deeply-buried secrets could threaten not just a marriage, but a country.

Maria was barely eighteen as WWII was coming to its explosive end. A brilliant violinist, she tried to comfort herself with the Sibelius Concerto as American bombs rained down. James Cooper wasn't much older. A roguish fighter pilot stationed in London, he was shot down during a daring night raid and sought shelter in Maria's cottage.

Fifteen years later, in Huntsville, Alabama, Maria is married to a German rocket scientist who works for the burgeoning U.S. space program. Her life in the South is at peace, purposefully distanced from her past. Everything is as it should be--until James Cooper walks back into it.

Pulled from the desert airfield where he was testing planes no sane Air Force pilot would touch, and drinking a bit too much, Cooper is offered the chance to work for the government, and move himself to the front of the line for the astronaut program. He soon realizes that his job is to report not only on the rocket engines but also on the scientists developing them. Then Cooper learns secrets that could shatter Maria's world...

Thoughts:

What intrigues me with this cover? The notes at the top and bottom of the cover, the woman with the violin standing ready to open a door. All this makes me curious to know more about the book.  

Check out what my friends have picked for Cover Crush's this week:

Stephanie @ Layered Pages

Heather @ The Maiden's Court

Holly @ 2 Kids and Tired Books

Colleen @ A Literary Vacation

Meghan @ Of Quills & Vellum

Erin @ Historical Fiction Reader