The Start of Us (A Change in Plans #1) by Rachel John

  

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre:  Romance
Content: Clean

 

When Corrie Windsor's roommate dies in a car accident, she leaves behind her four-year-old daughter, Ella. Corrie loves the little girl and hopes to adopt her, but instead, she’ll have to stand by while Ella’s uncle steps in to take custody. If things aren’t awkward enough, there’s a chemistry between them that neither wants to acknowledge.

Preston Ford can’t imagine instant parenthood, especially considering he just chickened out of proposing to his girlfriend. However, once he meets Ella, there’s no other choice. The time he spends with her and Corrie solidifies an alliance between the three of them, a plan to give Ella the stability she needs. But reality can sometimes turn the best of plans upside down.

With more than one heart hanging in the balance, how long can their platonic teamwork really last? Romance has never been this complicated.

 

(This book is also titled An Unlikely Alliance) I've read quite a few romances over the last few months and this one is probably my favorite of them all. I loved the characters Corrie, Preston, and Ella. I loved the way Corrie was willing to uproot her life in order to put the child, Ella's needs first. I loved their relationship. I loved that Preston also put Ella's needs first. It was nice that they didn't make it about themselves the way lots of people would. I loved the progression of the relationship between Corrie and Preston and how it played out. Mostly. The drama with the girlfriend/fiance Nicole was frustrating at times, as well as the conclusions Preston jumped to about needing to get married to her, even though he wasn't really that into the idea. Overall, though, this was a heartwarmingly sweet romance, and I definitely want to read more of this series.

The Crumbly Old Castle (The Irish Escape #1) by B.E. Baker

  

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre:  Women's Fiction
Content: Clean

 

Three best friends. Two crumbling estates. And one trip that changes everything.

When three barn besties escape for a girls’ trip to Ireland, they expect a lot of fun. They don’t expect to want to stay… forever.

Natalie was always the responsible one, the organized one, the together one. But when she inadvertently leaves one day early for their vacation and comes home pink-cheeked with embarrassment, the last thing she expects to find is her husband. . .in their bed with another woman. Luckily, they don’t notice her, and she takes the trip as a time-out to figure out what to do.

Samantha’s marriage has never been full of fireworks and trips to Cabo, but they were making it work. At least, she thought they were. When an unreasonable ultimatum sends her into a tailspin just before the trip, she takes the time to reevaluate what matters and what she wants out of life and love.

Vanessa’s husband passed a few years before, and she’s been soldiering on. Moments away from her job and responsibilities as a mother of three have been rare, but she has no plans of uprooting their life in Colorado. At least, not until someone she trusts betrays her in a big way. That wound makes her question everything about her own value and her family’s future.

Can these three friends help each other find firm ground in a world that seems to be unsafe, unsteady, and unhappy? And can found family really be what they all need when the going gets tough?

 

I've really enjoyed all of B.E. Baker's women's fiction, so of course I was excited to read this new series, and of course I ended up loving this book! All three of the women in this book were so likable and relatable in many ways. I have to say that I feel like I identify most with Vanessa's personality. The thing I appreciated most about this book is the way the three women supported and helped each other through the hard times and changes they were each going through. It had me thinking about my bestie often and the many ways she's been helpful and supportive in my life. I hope that I've been just as supportive of her.

 "People aren't objects, and that means we're all in a constant state of flux. We all know it, but then we act terribly surprised when other people change."

I love that quote. It's so true. We often view the people around us as always staying the same, even though they don't. Sometimes that change is for the better and some times it isn't. It can be hard when it isn't, and that's what happens in this book. 

I really liked the Irish setting in this book. I've never been to Ireland, but I felt like I was there visiting along with these characters. The author did a lot of research for this book, especially about the locations that are visited in it, and I particularly liked the photos of the real places that were included in the book. I also enjoyed the different people the ladies meet in the book, particularly a few of the men. There isn't really any romance in this book, as it wouldn't have made sense for there to be at this point in the series. However, there is some set up in it for future relationships that I'm looking forward to exploring in the rest of the series. 

If you've never read anything by this author, I think this book would be a good place to start, or her Birch Creek Ranch series.

Thanks to the author for providing me with an ARC of this book.

 

Silenced Girls (Agent Tori Hunter #1) by Roger Stelljes

  

My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre:  Mystery, Suspense, Thriller
Content: Strong language, We get the perspective of a serial killer but nothing too detailed, Fade to black sex

 

She moved far away to try and forget her past. A past that would seep back in when she least expected it and crushed her soul over and over. She tried to keep the evidence packed away in boxes high up on a closet shelf like carefully packing away a tragic part of her life. As if sealing the boxes, was sealing away a time in her life she desperately wanted to go back and change. Until one day a mysterious letter arrives from an unknown sender that unravels everything.

FBI Special Agent Tori Hunter returns to her hometown of Manchester, Minnesota for the first time in twenty years to investigate the disappearance of a woman who is gone without a trace. She is desperate to solve a case that will cause her to confront her own painful past and question the motives of friends she thought she knew and trusted. It will plunge her and the other detectives into the crosshairs of a dangerous killer while in search of the truth.

 

This was a good start to the series. In the beginning I struggled to like the main character. Some of her behavior annoyed me, but she eventually grew on me, and grew as a character by the end of the book. I liked Braddock right off the bat though. He was definitely the smartest person in the book. I had some issues with the way the investigation went and some of the assumptions that were made by Braddock's superiors. They kept saying they knew things that were only assumptions, but that they had no proof to back up. Despite those minor annoyances, I enjoyed this and found it entertaining. I think it's comparable to the Tracy Crosswhite series by Robert Dugoni, so if you like that series give this one a try. 

The Billionaire's Secret Marriage (Limitless #1) by Tamie Dearen

 

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre:  Romance
Content: Clean

 

Stephanie Caldwell made the classic mistake… she fell in love with her boss.
The fact that Bran is blind makes no difference to Steph—she thinks he’s the most handsome man she’s ever laid eyes on. If only she didn’t have to see him every day, she could force herself to give up her pipe dreams. But she can’t quit--she needs this job to pay for her daughter’s medical treatment. To make things worse, he just got engaged!

Billionaire Branson Knight is pragmatic about his love life. He knows women don’t see him as a man, but as a blind person, worthy of pity. His only value lies in his wealth. So his engagement is merely a means to an end. But the last thing he wants to end is his relationship with Stephanie--he’s become dangerously dependent on his efficient personal assistant.

When Bran’s friends drag him off to Las Vegas, he convinces Steph to go along, to prevent him from panicking in the noisy, crowded environment. His fiancée, however, sees the trip as the perfect opportunity to coerce Bran into a quickie wedding. Steph and his friends are determined to prevent the disastrous union. But everyone has a secret…  

 

This was my pick it for me book for January. I stuck it on my list even though billionaire romance isn't a trope I like all that much. The reason this one caught my interest was because the billionaire is blind and I thought it would be a nice change to read a book with a blind character who is the love interest. I liked the forward the author wrote in the book about why she chose to include a blind character, and how she came about writing the character based on a relative. 

Overall, I thought this was entertaining and I liked the main couple a lot. I do wish that there weren't quite so many misunderstandings between them, and that they had just spoken up and said how they really felt a lot sooner. This is a thing in romance that can drive me crazy at times. I'm not sure if I'll read any of the other books in this series, but I might eventually try some of the author's other books.

January 2025 Book Club: Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre:  Magical Realism, General Fiction
Content: Strong Language

 

After Tova Sullivan's husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she's been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago.

Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn't dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors--until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova.

Ever the detective, Marcellus deduces what happened the night Tova's son disappeared. And now Marcellus must use every trick his old invertebrate body can muster to unearth the truth for her before it's too late.

Shelby Van Pelt's debut novel is a gentle reminder that sometimes taking a hard look at the past can help uncover a future that once felt impossible.

 

This isn't my usual type of book, so I'm really surprised at how much I enjoyed it. I loved Marcellus and Tova. An octopus nearing the end of his life, and a woman in her twilight years befriending each other sounds like a very weird type of book, but it worked. This was such a charming and heartwarming story, that had me tearing up near the end. It hit me in the feels in certain ways because of the subject matter of an older person losing a spouse and having to make choices about where to go from there. There were some coincidences in this that could possibly be a problem for some readers, but I just enjoyed the story anyway.

For book club I made a couple of octopus themed refreshments and served shrimp which was a big part of Marcellus's diet in the book.