Book Review: "Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead" by Elle Cosimano

The second book in Elle Cosimano's mystery series is a little zany, a little crazy, a little romantic…and a lot of fun!!

Your favorite duo of novelist Finlay Donovan and her nanny/sidekick Vero return for another set of madcap adventures! After being mistaken for a hit-woman and getting tangled up with the Russian mob, she’s trying to get her life on track and get her latest book finished.

And then she finds out that someone wants her ex-husband Steven dead, and they have gone looking online for someone to carry out the hit. Have there been lots of times Finlay has wanted to kill Steven? Sure, but she doesn’t really want him dead; her kids need their father, too.

So Finlay needs to figure out who wants Steven dead, and find who agreed to carry out the hit before it’s too late. In the meantime, she’ll have to cozy back up with the Russians, contend with Vero’s weird behavior, and deal with Detective Nick coming back around, not to mention Julian, the bartender/law student—and get her book in on time! That’s a lot for one person!

This really is such a fun series. It’s truly a source of sunshine and laughs amidst heavier books. Sure, it can be a little outlandish at times, but does it really matter?

BookSparks, Elle Cosimano, and Minotaur Books provided me with a complimentary copy of the book as part of #WRC2022. Thanks for making it available!

Book Review: "Run, Rose, Run" by Dolly Parton and James Patterson

With Run, Rose, Run, the queen of country music teams up with the king of thrillers!!

AnnieLee Keyes has dreamed of being a country singer for as long as she can remember. “She’d been writing songs since she could talk and making melodies even before that.” She hears a song in just about everything.

She heads to Nashville to seek her chance at fame. She’ll do everything she needs to get there, and she’s bound and determined to make it big once she does. And after performing at a few bars starts to catch people’s attention, she finally gets her big break when the legendary Ruthanna Ryder hears her play. But when Ruthanna offers to help her, why won’t AnnieLee take advantage of this opportunity at first?

As determined as AnnieLee is to become a star, she’s also determined to outrun whomever and whatever it is that is chasing her, causing her to wake up in the midst of night terrors, calling out a name.

Will AnnieLee achieve stardom? Can she survive whatever it is that wants to destroy her?

I thought Run, Rose, Run was entertaining. It’s about 95% fiction and 5% thriller, but it feels tremendously authentic on the musical aspects, given Dolly’s involvement. As a thriller, however, it's immensely formulaic.

I’ve heard the audiobook is great because Dolly is part of the cast, but I’m not an audiobook kind of guy, and Dolly also recorded an album inspired by the book.

Book Review: "The Suite Spot" by Trish Doller

In Trish Doller's newest rom-com, The Suite Spot, sometimes you find what you need most where you least expect it.

Rachel is a night concierge at one of the most exclusive hotels in Miami Beach. She’s been a hard-working, loyal employee for years, until she’s unjustly fired for standing up for herself. A single mom to four-year-old Maisie, she knows she needs a new job fairly quickly, but it’s tough to find an opportunity like the one she had and loved.

When a friend tells her about a job managing a boutique hotel at a brewery in Ohio, it sounds like a dream. It is on Kelleys Island, a remote island in Lake Erie. So despite the grumpiness of her new boss over the phone, she packs up Maisie and moves to Ohio.

What she finds when she arrives is not what she’s been led to believe. The brewery is starting to run but the hotel isn’t built yet, although the owner, Mason, will give Rachel carte blanche to design and run the hotel the way she wants, which has been a dream of hers. It’s a difficult decision given the work ahead, but she decides to give it a try.

Rachel soon finds that Mason is a beer expert but running a hotel was never really his dream. And it’s not long before the two discover a fondness for one another, but both need to rebuild their lives. Can the hotel give them the chance they need for a fresh start, or will obstacles stand in their way?

I loved this book so much! Rachel is the sister of Anna, the protagonist from Doller’s last book, Float Plan (which I loved, too), but this book isn’t as sad. It’s just a sweet, romantic story of getting a second chance at happiness in an idyllic setting. I devoured it!!

Book Review: "It Happened One Summer" by Tessa Bailey

Oh, so this is what everyone has been talking about!! It Happened One Summer was on my stack for a while and I’m glad I finally got to it! It was fun, sweet, romantic, and steamy.

Piper thrives on being the center of attention. She’s always in the middle of the hottest parties, wearing the hottest clothes, spending tons of money, and she even has a verified Instagram profile. But she’s never had to work a day in her life, and she’s never really thought about money, much less anything beyond herself.

When an after-hours party she throws turns raucous and she gets arrested, it’s the last straw for her wealthy stepfather. He and Piper’s mother decide she needs to learn responsibility, so they cut off her money and send her to the beach town of Westport, Washington, where she and her sister lived until their fisherman father died. Her father owned a bar there and Piper will have to run it for three months before she can come home again. (Luckily, her sister agrees to accompany Piper to Washington.)

Needless to say, Westport is a far cry from glitzy Los Angeles. And no one knows what to make of Piper, especially Brendan, the big, bearded (and sexy) captain of a fishing boat. He doesn’t think she’ll last in Westport—but of course, he can’t take his eyes off her, either.

Small towns being what they are, they’re constantly running into one another, trading banter…which turns to flirtation. But Brendan has his own issues to deal with, and Piper is just in town for as long as she has to be, so there’s no use in catching feelings for each other, right?

Well, you know what happens. I was there for all of it. I loved these characters and the small town and the banter and the steam (and there is STEAM). While I didn’t get as much of a Schitt’s Creek vibe as others have said they did, this book had heart and humor and romance, and it was just great.

Book Review: "Full Flight" by Ashley Schumacher

Seriously, y’all, Full Flight broke me a bit emotionally. But I really loved the story.

In Enfield, Texas, high school football is a big deal, but the marching band is often the center of attention as well, especially in state competition years. For Anna, the first-chair saxophonist, there’s tremendous pressure to get a key duet nailed down; if she fails, the opportunity will be given to someone else and she’ll let a lot of people down.

She decides to ask her duet partner, mellophone player Weston Ryan, for help. (Note: I had no idea what a mellophone was. Who said you don't learn from reading?) Weston is a talented musician yet the whole town thinks he’s a troublemaker, convinced he’s guilty of something he didn’t do. Weston feels an automatic connection with Anna but is afraid to let her in because he’s afraid he’ll ruin her.

The more Anna and Weston get to know each other, the more they see each other’s struggles and joys. But she has to hide their relationship from her strict parents, and that deception can only last so long. When their secret is discovered, Anna and Weston have to fight to stay together and show everyone around them how much brighter they are when they’re together. And then tragedy strikes.

I love YA romances when the characters each have secrets and each are struggling, but they find strength in their relationship. These characters were amazing; even though it's a conservative, religious town, not all of the characters were painted as close-minded or one-dimensional. To top it off, there are literally sentences in this book that took my breath away.

Full Flight is a beautiful story about love, friendship, music, survival, and hope.

Book Review: "A Brush with Love" by Mazey Eddings

I loved A Brush with Love, even if it reminded me that I need to schedule a dentist’s appointment!

Harper is determined to be at the top of her class in dental school so she can hopefully get the oral surgery residency she wants. She studies HARD—it’s practically all she does.

One day she bumps into Dan, a handsome, first-year dental student. And she literally bumps into him—on a rainy day, she slips down some stairs and directly into him. They immediately feel an intense connection for one another, but Harper does not want any distractions from her career goals, so she decides they can only be friends. As much as that’s the last thing Dan wants to be, he’d rather have Harper as a friend than nothing at all.

But the more time they spend together—even as friends—the more that Harper is distracted by her feelings for Dan. Harper’s life is carefully ordered for a reason, to help her keep her intense anxiety and claustrophobia at bay. Will letting him in throw her into disarray that badly? And Dan is dealing with his own issues—he’s only in dental school because of parental pressure, and he has a lot of resentment and damage because of that.

Can two people struggling to stay afloat in so many ways find strength in being together? Or will Harper’s fears and need for control doom them?

There is so much to love in A Brush with Love—neurodiversity, the banter between Harper and Dan and with their friends (their friends cracked me up), even the Jewish representation. I don't know that I've ever read a rom-com that took place in dental school! This was really a memorable story for so many reasons.

Book Review: "Love, Hate & Clickbait" by Liz Bowery

They say politics makes strange bedfellows, and they sure do take that old adage far in Love, Hate & Clickbait, another book title crying out for an Oxford comma!

Thom is a highly ambitious political consultant working for the California governor’s imminent presidential campaign. He’s never met a person or situation he can’t use to his best advantage or the advantage of the candidate for which he works.

The one person who constantly gets under his skin is Clay, the campaign’s data analyst. Although Clay is smart, he's always a bit clueless, yet at the same time, he’s full of himself, and his lack of awareness—not to mention his messy appearance—drives the impeccably groomed Thom up a wall. When a photograph is taken of Thom confronting Clay in a heated moment, to the naive eye it looks like they’re in the midst of a romantic moment. And when the governor makes a homophobic gaffe, she convinces Thom and Clay to pretend they’re dating, to divert attention from the scandal.

Despite Thom’s dislike of Clay (and the fact that Thom is straight), he’s a good soldier and wants to run the governor's presidential campaign, so they agree to the fake relationship. (Clay, who is gay, just seems to go along for the ride.) But the more convincing the governor and her team want them to be, will fake feelings turn real? What’s the likelihood of someone—or the campaign—getting hurt?

This book has its cute and (quite) steamy moments. But Thom is a really horrible person for a significant portion of the book—he’s downright mean to Clay—and the governor and her team are pretty odious, too. And the whole scheme really seemed just a little too much, even though I don’t doubt it’s happened.

Still, fake dating is always a trope I enjoy in rom-coms. Love, Hate & Clickbait publishes 4/26/22!