Tag: Contemporary fiction

Book Review: Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane

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“You wear a suit of armor to protect yourself from getting hurt…when was the last time you were in love with someone?”

Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane by Belle Calhoune

Tittle: Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane

Author: Belle Calhoune

Release Date: February 21, 2023

Mistletoe, Maine Series Book 3

Will a big-city veterinarian give this small town—and the single dad who’s caught her heart—a chance?

Veterinarian Harlow Jones knew returning to small-town life, even temporarily, would be a disaster. She just never guessed it would start that way—with her car skidding off the road outside Mistletoe, Maine. And while her rescuer is both charming and handsome, Harlow isn’t about to get involved with a local. She’s in town for one reason only—to pay off her vet school bills—and then she’s back to her real life in Seattle. Nick Keegan knows all about unexpected, life-altering detours. He lost his wife in the blink of an eye, and he’s spent the years since being the best single dad he can be. He’s also learned not to take anything for granted, so when sparks start to fly with Harlow, Nick is all in. He senses Harlow feels it too, but she insists romance isn’t on her agenda. He’ll have to pull out all the stops to show her that love is worth changing the best-laid plans.

Book Review

Set in the small town of Mistletoe in Maine, Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane is a quintessential romantic book that is perfect for a nice, relaxing summer read. The story follows the life of Harlow Jones, a veterinarian from Seattle who had a rough experience growing up in a small town. Harlow meets Nick, a ruggedly handsome, completely down-to-earth, and wholesome single father, in a tense and unexpected rescue on her first day in town. Although Harlow is closed off romantically, she can’t seem to help herself from being pulled in by Nick’s charm and ease. The same can be said for Nick, who is immediately drawn to Harlow’s beauty and charming personality.

Nick has come to terms with the loss of his first love, wife, and mother of his son. He is open to the idea of being romantically involved with Harlow and taking the next step with her without any hesitation or questions. As the two slowly begin to get to know each other, Harlow is adjusting to the small town of Mistletoe against her better judgment, and readers get to see an authentic relationship and bond form between these two lovable characters.

This is Belle Calhoune’s first book that I have read, and although it is a standalone in a series, I’m really eager to see the romantic stories and beginnings of the other couple pairings of Nick’s brother and his best friend. While reading Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane, I could vividly picture the story unfolding in a movie, setting kind of like a Hallmark movie very clearly.

As a fur-baby mom, I was really invested in Harlow’s character and her life as a veterinarian. I loved the elements of the dogs mentioned in the book and Harlow’s work as a veterinarian in this story. It was apparent that Mistletoe really needed her input and guidance when it came to the animal community in the town, and I loved how everyone was immediately welcoming of her. And as a distinguished black, female veterinarian? Chef’s kiss.

My similarities to Harlow don’t end with her love for animals and dogs; I, too, am a fraternal twin who has an aversion to relationships and the overwhelming feeling of being tied down to one place — in her case, it’s Mistletoe — for too long. But like Harlow, maybe that’s something I can overcome, right?

This book made me, as the reader, feel invited, and it allowed me to fall in love with this quaint, close-knit town just like she was as the story progressed. I found that Harlow’s character went through a sort of metamorphosis when she moved to the town as she grappled with her past and trauma with old towns when it came to her family and how she tried to navigate this new life she was building for herself, this new love interest, as well as the issues with her mother (spoiler-free here).

An element of the book that I really liked, which might be related to the author on a personal level, was the nods to movie classics and black-and-white films. Does that count as another bias? I’m not sure 🤔. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed reading Falling in Love on Sweetwater Lane.

If cozy romances in small towns with dogs are your kind of story, then this book is something you should consider reading this summer. It is a heartwarming story of love, growth, and acceptance that will surely touch your heart.

About Belle Calhoune

Publisher’s Weekly Best Selling Author Belle Calhoune was born and raised in Massachusetts, one of five children. Growing up across the street from a public library fed her hunger for books, particularly romance novels and mysteries.

A member of the RWA (Romance Writers of America) Honor Roll, Belle has written over 40 books.

Her novel, An Alaskan Christmas, has been made into a television movie by Brain Power Studios, featured on UPtv in October of 2019.

Thanks for reading!

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Lona Chang: A Superhero Detective Story by: AshleyRose Sullivan | Review

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Lona Chang: A Superhero Detective Story
Genre: Mystery, Supernatural, Contemporary Fiction
Rating: (it was okay)
Release Date: September 8, 2017
Publisher: Seventh Star Press
Arc Received From Author In Exchange For An Honest Review.
Synopsis:
 When one of the world’s greatest superheroes dies in her arms, Lona Chang takes it upon herself to investigate his murder.  Armed only with a power she barely understands and a mysterious coded book, Lona begins a quest for answers that leads her down a dark rabbit hole of secrets—secrets the ancient organization known as the Guild is determined to keep hidden at all costs.

Meanwhile, when a new threat descends upon Arc City, Lona’s soulmate (and freshly minted superhero) Awesome Jones defies the Guild, dons the cape and cowl of his father and finds a group of unlikely allies. But can Awesome trust them—or himself? He’ll have to fight his own demons first if he has any hope of defending the town–and the people–he loves.

As tensions rise between the Guild, Lona, Awesome, his allies and Arc City’s criminal underground, Lona realizes that life, and the answers to its questions, are never as simple as they seem in comic books.

Book Review:

First Impression:

My first impressions about this book were that the story made me thinks about Superman and Lois Lane which and that Lona and Awesome, at first glance, seemed to be paired off pretty well. Likewise, I did like Lona’s overall character in the narrative. She’s very down to earth; if a bit too critical of herself for just being “ordinary” and a “normal” person especially because of her unique ability.

As her character is very perceptive, smart and a natural people-person. I also thought the big reveal regarding the Guild and Pythia’s secret operations under the guild’s noises. This gave the story a bit of dark theme to it which was a niche surprise in this book.

The Things I Struggled With The Most While Reading This Book:

After having read portions of the first book for a bit more context regarding Lona’s adoptive parents, and discovering the apparent instructions left behind by her birth father for his former butler and maid to adopt his daughter. It made it seem as though her adoptive parents didn’t have a choice in the matter. As if the two weren’t truly parenting her, but doing another form of service.

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Dear Martin By: Nic Stone | Review & Reaction

Dear Martin COVERDear Martin
Genre: YA Fiction, Contemporary Fiction, Social Issues
Rating: 5 stars
Release Date: October 17th 2017
Publisher: Crown Books for Young Readers
I received this ARC in a giveaway &
it in no way affects my review or unbiased opinion of this book.

Goodreads | B&N | Amazon | B&D | IndieBound

Synopsis:

Raw, captivating, and undeniably real, Nic Stone joins industry giants Jason Reynolds and Walter Dean Myers as she boldly tackles American race relations in this stunning debut.

Justyce McAllister is top of his class, captain of the debate team, and set for the Ivy League next year—but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. He is eventually released without charges (or an apology), but the incident has Justyce spooked. Despite leaving his rough neighborhood, he can’t seem to escape the scorn of his former peers or the attitude of his prep school classmates. The only exception: Sarah Jane, Justyce’s gorgeous—and white—debate partner he wishes he didn’t have a thing for.

Struggling to cope with it all, Justyce starts a journal to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. But do Dr. King’s teachings hold up in the modern world? Justyce isn’t so sure.

Then comes the day Justyce goes driving with his best friend, Manny, windows rolled down, music turned up. Way up. Much to the fury of the white off-duty cop beside them. Words fly. Shots are fired. And Justyce and Manny get caught in the crosshairs. In that media fallout, it’s Justyce who is under attack. The truth of what happened that night—some would kill to know. Justyce is dying to forget.

My Reaction:

I call this “my reaction” because it not only took me a bit to type up my review for the book itself, but also all of the thoughts, feelings and memories this book made me think of.  Although this book left my mind and heart just all over the place, I truly loved it and I am grateful I was given the opportunity to read this ARC  because it had such a huge affect on me and it is something that I look forward to sharing with my family and friends.

From the moment I started reading, I was able to connect with Justyce’s character—from his thoughts, concerns, fear and anxiousness. And his attempt at trying to make sense of himself and the rest of the world through a method inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. teachings following the fall out of his wrongful arrest. It was just all so real, raw, insightful and moving.

One of the many things I loved and appreciated about this book was the way Nic Stone keeps the narrative objective because it makes it so connectable to other readers, whether they are allies, individuals who have experienced some of the same situations Justyce has faced or others ignorant of the seriousness and dangers African Americans and other POC face every day when it comes to racism.

I pondered if I wanted to focus on the situation regarding Justyce and his arrest as being the main focal points I discussed for this book, but in all honesty, it is so much more than racial profiling from authorities. The political, inaccurate and discriminatory stories spun by a lot of the media outlets and the prejudices of people—it all just hits home.

There wasn’t an instance when I did not imagine my brothers or my uncles in situations close to Justyce’s and it shook me.  However, choosing LOVE over HATE. Recognizing that we still have such a far way to go. Accepting that we can’t do it on our own. Knowing that importance of sticking together, speaking together and moving together is the only way forward. And being strong enough to face it all head on.

Even before last week’s protest in Charlottesville, VA, I was struggling to come up with the right words for how moving and important this book is to all readers, young or old, because I was hung up on how real and close to our reality it was. Of course, as an African-American woman, it was impossible not to see my brothers or my uncles and even myself in the situations that Justyce was dealing with in this book and that become such a jarring feeling.

Aside from being raised by a single parent, Justyce and I represent two completely different worlds, but regardless, I know that a POC’s story and life is hardly ever taken into account when they are profiled, victimized or harmed. With this, I am trying to choose my words so carefully here because with the weight and present state of our world weighing down on my heart and everything just feeling so wrong and backwards these days.

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Absolutely, Almost, Perfect By: Lissa Reed | Book Review, Q&A (+Giveaway)

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Absolutely, Almost, Perfect (Sucre Coeur Series #3)
By: Lissa Reed
Genre: M/M Romance, LGBTQ+, Contemporary Fiction, Rom/Com Fiction
Rating: 4 stars
Release Date: August 3, 2017
Publisher: Duet Books/ Interlude Press
Received an ARC copy from publisher in exchange for an honest review

Craig Oliver and Alex Scheff lead a charmed life. Craig is part owner of Sucre Coeur, the bakery he’s loved and managed for years. Alex is an up-and-coming Seattle photographer. Their relationship has been going strong for a year, and everything is absolutely perfect—right up until Craig receives a wedding invitation from his long-estranged brother.

As Craig grows tense over seeing his brother for the first time in years, Alex can’t control his anxiety over meeting Craig’s family. At the wedding in an English hamlet, boisterous Scottish mothers, smirking teenage sisters, and awkward ex-boyfriends complicate the sweet life they lead.

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The Lost Ones By: Sheena Kamal | Book Review

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The Lost Ones
By: Sheena Kamal
Genre: Contemporary, Suspense, Mystery/Thriller Fiction
Rating: 4 stars
Release Date: July 25, 2017

 

HarperCollins | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Synopsis: “A brave, unflinching heroine and brave, unflinching writing add up to an extraordinary debut–highly recommended.”–Lee Child

A dark, compulsively readable psychological suspense debut, the first in a new series featuring the brilliant, fearless, chaotic, and deeply flawed Nora Watts—a character as heartbreakingly troubled, emotionally complex, and irresistibly compelling as Stieg Larsson’s Lisbeth Salander and Jo Nesbø’s Harry Hole.

It begins with a phone call that Nora Watts has dreaded for fifteen years—since the day she gave her newborn daughter up for adoption. Bonnie has vanished. The police consider her a chronic runaway and aren’t looking, leaving her desperate adoptive parents to reach out to her birth mother as a last hope.

A biracial product of the foster system, transient, homeless, scarred by a past filled with pain and violence, Nora knows intimately what happens to vulnerable girls on the streets. Caring despite herself, she sets out to find Bonnie with her only companion, her mutt Whisper, knowing she risks reopening wounds that have never really healed—and plunging into the darkness with little to protect her but her instincts and a freakish ability to detect truth from lies.

The search uncovers a puzzling conspiracy that leads Nora on a harrowing journey of deception and violence, from the gloomy rain-soaked streets of Vancouver, to the icy white mountains of the Canadian interior, to the beautiful and dangerous island where she will face her most terrifying demon. All to save a girl she wishes had never been born.

 

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Like A Fly On The Wall By: Simone Kelly | Book Review

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Like A Fly On The Wall
By: Simone Kelly
Genre: Contemporary, New Adult Fiction
Rating: 3 stars
Release Date: July 11, 2017

 

Synopsis:

From talented debut author Simone Kelly comes this suspenseful novel that crackles with intrigue, sex, and plenty of surprises—perfect for fans of Eric Jerome Dickey and Carl Weber.

Meet Jacques Berradi. Moroccan-born and Manhattan-raised, his genuine, sexy-smooth allure goes hand in hand with a unique gift. Since Jacques was young, he has had the ability to read peoples’ energies, communicate with spirit guides, and even catch glimpses of people’s futures. Now a professional “intuitive counselor,” Jacques’s clients pay him handsomely for his insight. Unfortunately, Jacques’s psychic abilities don’t come with an off switch to tune out the world’s noise, nor do they always provide him with easy answers; recently Jacques has begun having dark, alarming dreams about his beloved father, a Moroccan immigrant who died when he was a boy.

Meet Kylie Collins, an adventurous, Miami twentysomething who is trying to find her footing after being laid off from a cushy music industry job. When a mishap brings them together, Kylie is instantly mesmerized by Jacques’s cool demeanor and intuitive abilities, and he’s captivated by her outgoing charm and breezy good looks. Seeking to learn more about her family history—including the identity of the father she’s never known—Kylie visits Jacques’s office to gain some insight about her future, and about her free-spirited and headstrong Jamaican mother, True.

But on the night that they meet, a rolling blackout cuts off power throughout Miami. Kylie and Jacques, and a few of his clients, head to the only place in the neighborhood with enough light to see: Like a Fly on the Wall Detective Agency. There, Kylie serendipitously lands herself the perfect new job as an apprentice private eye.

As partners, Jacques and Kylie are an unstoppable duo. Can Jacques’s intuition reveal the scandalous history of Kylie’s mother and father? Will Kylie’s newfound detective skills uncover evidence about the death of Jacques’s father? And will the chemistry that charges their friendship bubble over into something much, much hotter…?

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A House Without Windows By: Nadia Hashimi | Review

A House Without Windows
By: Nadia Hashimi
Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Culture, Mystery, Family, Friendship
Rating: 4 stars
Reprint release Date: May 16, 2017
Publisher: William Morrow Paperbacks/ Harper Collins

Synopsis:

A vivid, unforgettable story of an unlikely sisterhood—an emotionally powerful and haunting tale of friendship that illuminates the plight of women in a traditional culture—from the author of the bestselling The Pearl That Broke Its Shell and When the Moon Is Low.

For two decades, Zeba was a loving wife, a patient mother, and a peaceful villager. But her quiet life is shattered when her husband, Kamal, is found brutally murdered with a hatchet in the courtyard of their home. Nearly catatonic with shock, Zeba is unable to account for her whereabouts at the time of his death. Her children swear their mother could not have committed such a heinous act. Kamal’s family is sure she did, and demands justice.

Barely escaping a vengeful mob, Zeba is arrested and jailed. As Zeba awaits trial, she meets a group of women whose own misfortunes have also led them to these bleak cells: thirty-year-old Nafisa, imprisoned to protect her from an honor killing; twenty-five-year-old Latifa, who ran away from home with her teenage sister but now stays in the prison because it is safe shelter; and nineteen-year-old Mezhgan, pregnant and unmarried, waiting for her lover’s family to ask for her hand in marriage. Is Zeba a cold-blooded killer, these young women wonder, or has she been imprisoned, as they have been, for breaking some social rule? For these women, the prison is both a haven and a punishment. Removed from the harsh and unforgiving world outside, they form a lively and indelible sisterhood.

Into this closed world comes Yusuf, Zeba’s Afghan-born, American-raised lawyer, whose commitment to human rights and desire to help his motherland have brought him back. With the fate of this seemingly ordinary housewife in his hands, Yusuf discovers that, like Afghanistan itself, his client may not be at all what he imagines.

A moving look at the lives of modern Afghan women, A House Without Windows is astonishing, frightening, and triumphant.

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Symphony Of Fates (Dragon Songs Saga #4) by J.C. Kang | Book Blast

Hello Again, Book-Peeps:

Before we get into the weekend, I have a quick little post for ya! It’s the fourth and final book in the Dragon Songs Saga by JC Kang,  previously known as The Daughter Of The Dragon Throne, re-release book-day today! ^_^  Symphony of Fates takes readers on the final journey of Princess Kaiya as she fights to protect and restore the realm she loves. This historical, mythological, epic-high fantasy/adventure, sorcery fiction series is one you’re gonna want to jump into.  Here’s a bit about Symphony Of Fates:

Kaiya escapes her ordeal at the hands of the Teleri Emperor, only to return to a homeland beset by enemies on all sides, and crumbling from within.

As a teenager, she quelled a rebellion with the Dragon Scale Lute. As a young adult, she vanquished a dragon with the power of her voice.

Now, robbed of her magic by grief, Kaiya must navigate a web of court intrigue to save the realm before it falls. Only she can lay claim to the Dragon Throne on behalf of her unborn sons—whether the father is the lover who perished rescuing her, or the hated enemy who killed him.

In the final story in Kaiya’s saga, she must rally a nation, repel invaders, and prove to the world why her family alone holds the Mandate of Heaven.

And now… The moment we’ve been waiting for…

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