I’ve been out of town for work and working overtime, so I didn’t post much last week. I still have some reviews to post that I was going to do last week.
It’s Sunday, my one day off this week so I am going to rest all day, as Doug and I always try to do on Sunday.
This is my plan today. Harold is a good rester. I return home Friday, when things should go back to normal.
Last week on the blog I only had time for Book Blogger Hop, where I answered the question: Do you have a reading routine?
Next week I have a blog stop for Zooloo’s Book Tours and I hope to get two reviews up that I was going to do last week.
BOOK HAUL
The Princess is a story about Diana Spencer before she became Princess Diana. Thank you Tessa at TessaTalksBooks for letting us know about this one.
The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard: In 1917 Mizza Bricard is fighting for a career as a fashion designer. In the 1970s, Astrid Bricard is a fashion designer competing in the famous Battle of Versailles fashion show. She is trying to stay out of the shadow of her famous mother. Then she simply disappears. In the present day, Blythe Bricard is not interested in a fashion career at all, but then she learns more about her legendary mother and grandmother.
I Used to Be: This is a Christian book from Revell about navigating losses in your life.
It was a busy week, as I was trying to finish my work up here in preparation for a work trip to Missouri for the next two weeks. I leave tomorrow. I just realized I haven’t been on a flight in five years! That’s hard to believe. A lot changed after COVID.
Doug has been busy working on the house in Bryson City and in 8 days I will be one year away from retirement. He is trying to get it all done by then, and I’m sure he will.
There was some excitement in the mountains when two of our dachshunds, Hermann and Harold, found a turtle under the steps. As a result, Harold, our wire-haired dachshund, won’t go anywhere near the steps. He’s walking all the way down our road before he will venture into the yard. It probably scared the turtle more than him. (No dachshunds or turtles were harmed during this event.) Doug later saw the turtle up near our branch (creek). Harold also has very dramatic reactions to road trips, and it takes him a long time to forgive us for making him ride in the car.
Harold recovering from his latest trauma. 2. The scary turtle.
I will be participating in Book Blogger Hop if time permits. This week’s question is: Do you have a routine for getting ready to read?
And I will provide spotlights for some great Indie books on Indie Weekend.
BOOK HAUL
All the Dead Shall Weep is Book 5 of the Gunnie Rose trilogy by Charlaine Harris. The Wilderness Way
Wilderness Way: When Declan Conaghan and his family are thrown off their land in Ireland by an evil landlord, he is given a second chance through an offer to come to America, join the US Army, and fight for Abraham Lincoln.
The Legacy of Longdale Manor: In 2012, an art historian travels to Longdale Manor and stumbles upon a 100-year-old journal and a carved shepherd’s staff similar to one in a family photo. In 1912, Charlotte Harper uncovers a painful family secret and travels to Longdale Manor in hopes to find a home there.
Snow Place for Murder: This is Book 3 of the Mountain Lodge Mysteries. After a blizzard, a body is discovered. It belongs to a British developer who was staying at Mountaintop Lodge and had hoped to open an exclusive mountain resort for wealthy guests. Will Misty Murphy, owner of the lodge, find the killer?
The Family on Smith Street: There is a killer on Smith Street. They have already kidnapped me. Is my daughter next?
That’s how my week went. I hope you all have a wonderful week!
I didn’t get an update done last week, but the last two weeks have been busy. Doug came back home from working on the house in Bryson City, and he’ll be going back next week. I’ve been working hard at my day job as usual. I’m back to getting a normal amount of sleep. It’s harder to sleep soundly when Doug is gone. I hear every noise when I’m in the house alone.
Things are moving right along, and in honor of the “Full Steam Ahead” title, here is a picture of the Steam Train in Bryson City at Smoky Mountain Railroad.
I finished my excerpts for the first round of the Book Bloggers Novel of the Year (BBNYA) Award. I’m looking forward to seeing which ones made it to the second round.
I’m trying still to catch up and organize all of my submissions for Indie Weekend, so bear with me.
Tomorrow I will post my thoughts about AI in “writing.” I went to Chat GPT and asked the AI to write a story, and what I got back was interesting to say the least, and definitely supported my thoughts on the subject. This all stemmed from a Twitter discussion (argument) about whether AI was real writing.
On Tuesday I will participate in Top Ten Tuesday and take on the topic: Ten Most Recent Books I Did Not Finish.
On Wednesday I will post a review of The Bitter Past by Bruce Borgos.
On Thursday I will post a review of Must Love Flowers by Debbie Macomber.
On Friday I will participate in Book Blogger Hop and answer the question: Do you enjoy reading memoirs?
And I will review two books for Indie Weekend.
BOOK HAUL
I took on a lot of new books in the last two weeks! Three of them are audiobooks so I can listen to them while driving for work.
Audiobooks
Hardcover Books
Yep, I got this book in hardcover too! Forge had sent me an email a while back asking if I wanted a finished copy and I said “Sure!” and forgot about it. Then I requested and got approved for the audiobook, and the next day the hardcover shows up. So I got it twice. lol.
My vacation has started! I’m relaxing in Bryson City for a whole week. I plan to do lots of reading, and I will enjoy the view as always. I’m going to venture out for a pedicure and maybe some shopping early in the week.
That view always takes the stress out. This is cloudy morning sunrise.
Tuesday I will participate in Top Ten Tuesday. Tuesday falls on the Fourth of July, and the topic is: Book Covers in the Colors of Your Country’s Flag.
Wednesday I will review Hotel Laguna by Nicola Harrison
And on Indie Weekend I will review and spotlight Indie books.
BOOK HAUL
I picked up two historical romances via The Historical Novel Society to review for their November magazine. I don’t read a lot of romance, but these two looked interesting.
Step into the Roaring 20’s Parisian music scene.
New York darling Elizabeth Van Hoeven has everything…except freedom. But now Eliza’s traveling to study piano at the Paris Conservatoire and falling for jazz prodigy Jack Coleman in the process! A love like theirs is forbidden back home, and as they make beautiful music together under the Parisian lights, Eliza and Jack face a difficult choice: the life they’ve always known, or the possibility of a life they never could have imagined…
Manchester, England, 1857
Rosanna Hawkins is one of Manchester’s finest artists, even though no one knows her name. She reproduces “parlor versions” of classic masterpieces with near-perfect precision, which her employer then sells to the emerging upper-middle class families.
When the largest art exhibition ever to be held in England opens in Manchester, Rosanna is excited to visit. She meets the handsome Inspector Martin Harrison, who is head of security, and is immediately intrigued by his charm, confidence, and portrait-worthy good looks. The two spend many a flirtatious afternoon exploring the exhibition hall, discussing art, and sharing their secret hopes.
But when they discover the theft of some of the paintings―and all the evidence points to Rosanna―she must convince Inspector Harrison she is innocent and proposes a plan to capture the real art thief.
It is a daring race to catch the criminal before he disappears with the most priceless piece in the collection―Michaelangelo’s The Manchester Madonna. If Rosanna and Inspector Harrison fail, not only will the painting be lost forever but so will their chance to paint their own happily ever after.
Have a great Fourth of July holiday and a wonderful week!
Last week was basically taken up with working and blogging. I was supposed to make sauerkraut (fermented) yesterday but the Farmer’s Almanac says it’s a bad day for that, and my Mom went by that religiously. I’m going to stick by that since she made the best sauerkraut ever. There really isn’t a good day for making sauerkraut until next month, so I’m going to be eating a lot of sauteed cabbage for a while. I should have checked the almanac before I bought four heads of cabbage. Anyone with cabbage recipes, let me know!
Today I will be posting an Indie Weekend review of Darlene Foster’s You Can Take The Girl From The Prairie, as well as a Q&A with the author.
Tomorrow I’m posting a review of the audiobook of Gail Meath’s Songbird, the first book of her Jax Diamond series, which is now on audio.
Next Week I will participate in Top Ten Tuesday and Book Blogger Hop if time permits. I’m also going to review Zero Days by Ruth Ware.
BOOK HAUL
Lost Hours: A year after arriving in Benedict, Beth Rivers is feeling very at home in Alaska, even as outsiders are starting to return to enjoy the brief summer perfection. Beth feels like she’s finally let go of most of her demons. She’s even found her father, Eddy Rivers—or, rather, he found her—and she’s trying to find the middle ground between anger and forgiveness.
One sunny July day, Beth boards a tourist ship to see the glaciers, the main reason visitors venture to the area, and something Beth hasn’t attempted until now. But when the captain has to navigate to an island, a bloodied woman is found standing on the shore, waving for help. When she’s brought aboard, she claims she was kidnapped from her home in Juneau three days earlier, and that a bear on the island killed her captor. She, however, is unharmed.
The woman, Sadie, finds a sympathetic ear in Beth. She tells her that she’s been in Juneau under witness protection, and that the Juneau police don’t like her. When another kidnapping occurs, Beth and police chief Gril can’t help but think the two cases are interwoven, though the clues to solving them will be harder to unravel.
Case of the Bleus: Cheesemongers from across the Northwest have come to the Sonoma Valley for the Northwest Cheese Invitational. As owner of the local cheese shop, Curds & Whey, Willa Bauer loves it. The event showcases custom cheese creations, and it’s the perfect time to gather with old colleagues to honor her former boss, the late and grate cheese legend, Max Dumas. He was famous for journeying into the wild bleu yonder to where he aged his award-winning custom Church Bleu. Only Max knew the recipe and location to his beloved cheese, and many are eager to have these revealed at his will reading.
But instead of naming someone to inherit his cheese and its secrets, Max stuns everyone with one cryptic clue. When a fellow cheesemonger dies under mysterious circumstances––the woman they all thought would get the secrets to Max’s prized possession––everyone falls under suspicion. Willa adores Church Bleu as much as the next cheese connoisseur, but it’s not to die for. Is a killer trying to get away with murder…and the cheese?
That’s it for my week. Hope you have a great coming week.
This past week was a whirlwind of reading and reviewing when I wasn’t working my day job. I finished up my reviewing for The Historical Novel Society, but I can’t post any of those eight reviews until they are published in their magazine on August 1st. I have begun reading submissions for the Book Bloggers Novel of the Year Award (BBNYA) panel, and I’m enjoying it! I’m also trying to catch up on Netgalley!
Today is Father’s Day! Happy Father’s Day to my Dad in Heaven, and to my husband Doug, a great husband, father, grandfather, and dog dad! Happy Father’s Day to all the other Dads out there.
I made Doug a pineapple upside down cake for Father’s Day, and he has requested chicken fried steak for dinner.
Last week was a quiet one on the blog. I participated in Top Ten Tuesday and Indie Spotlight, but that is all I could fit in due to all the reading.
Next Week
On Monday, I will be one of the last stops on a blog tour for Austenprose. I’ll be reviewing A Shadow in Moscow by Katherine Reay.
Tuesday I will participate in Top Ten Tuesday. The topic is: “Books On My Summer 2023 to Read List.”
That’s as far as I’ve gotten in planning my week, but more reviews are coming!
BOOK HAUL
A collection of stories about horses and humans, and how they help each other get second chances.
It’s been a long week as I was working overtime here, but now is a chance to rest. Doug is back home from working on the house in North Carolina for almost a month, and it’s good to have him back. He brought our three dachshunds home with him of course and the house here in Tennessee is beginning to feel normal again.
Tomorrow is Memorial Day, and it’s time to recognize our loved ones who sacrificed everything. My Uncle, Wayne D. Jenkins, died in Vietnam in 1968. He was in the 1st Infantry Division, 1st Battalion, 28th Infantry, E Company. He was Killed in Action near Loc Ninh Sf Camp, South Vietnam, Binh Long province on September 12, 1968. He was four days away from his 21st birthday. His Find-A-Grave page is here. He’s buried in our family cemetery in Bryson City, NC. He is a hero and his sacrifice will always be remembered, every day of every year.
I’ve got a lot of books to read for the August edition of Historial Novels Review, the magazine of The Historical Novel Society. My next reviews are due June 15th, so I’m going to post some of the reviews I did for the May edition this week. I also have a couple of mini-reviews I’m going to share and I will be participating in Top Ten Tuesday and Book Blogger Hop.
BOOK HAUL
As I’m driving a lot more for work now, I have been requesting more audiobooks. I was approved for two last week. They are:
I also got a widget from St. Martin’s Press and Minotaur Books for:
How was your week? I hope the next one is even better.
So many books, so little time! I’m concentrating right now on the eight books I have to read for the Historical Novel Society. Those are due June 15th. I often start several books at a time, but I’m thinking of changing that. What do you all think? Do you completely finish one book before starting another?
My husband Doug is down in Bryson City working on our house. Here is a video of my bathroom, which is almost finished. He did a lot with a tiny space.
There’s still some painting and trim that needs to be finished, and the ugly shower curtain is only temporary. lol
I’m trying to be quite organized today and pre-schedule all of next week’s posts so I’ll update this later. I’ll also be visiting/reading/commenting on other blogs today. I haven’t had as much time to do that lately and it’s important. I love visiting my blogger friends.
BOOK HAUL
Picked up an audiobook this week.
1920s London isn’t the ideal place for a brilliant woman with lofty ambitions, but research assistant Saffron Everleigh is determined to beat the odds in a male-dominated field at the University College of London. She embarks on her first research study alongside the insufferably charming Dr. Michael Lee, traveling the countryside with him in response to reports of poisonings. But when Detective Inspector Green is given a case with a set of unusual clues, he asks for her assistance.
The victims, all women, received bouquets filled with poisonous flowers. Digging deeper, Saffron discovers that the bouquets may be more than just unpleasant flowers—there may be a hidden message within them, revealed through the use of the old Victorian practice of floriography. And it’s a dire message indeed, as each woman who received the flowers has turned up dead. Alongside Dr. Lee and her best friend, Elizabeth, Saffron trails a group of suspects through a dark jazz club, a lavish country estate, and a glittering theatre, delving deeper into a part of society she thought she’d left behind forever.
Will Saffron be able to catch the killer before they send their next bouquet, or will she find herself with fatal flowers of her own?
Now I’m off to catch up on reading and posting. Have a great week!
Yesterday was the Kentucky Derby. My Dad loved to go to the track when I was a kid in Cincinnati, which is right across the river from Kentucky. He used to always say that we should only bet what we can afford to lose, and I’ve kept that philosophy to this day. I bet $140 yesterday on many various combinations of horses and ended up hitting on an exacta (that’s choosing the first two horses in order of finish) and I won $330 on that, and another $16 on a $2 win bet for the winning horse, Mage. So I came out ahead for the day. The Kentucky Derby always makes me think of my Dad, who passed in 2019. I usually only bet a few times a year, and usually only on Triple Crown races.
The first two days of the week were sad ones as I went to visit my wonderful aunt who is home on hospice and expected to pass away. I’m glad I got to say goodbye.
It’s quiet here in the house because Doug is in Bryson City doing more home renovation. But on Friday I’ll have all three of my grandkids for four days and I’ll be wishing for quiet. lol.
I can now post the reviews I did earlier this year for the May edition of Historical Novels Review, the Magazine of the Historical Novel Society. I’ll be posting three of them next week:
I’ll also be posting a review of Gail Meath’s newest book in the Jax Diamond series, Blackjack. It releases on May 10th.
BOOK HAUL
*West Heart Kill was Read Now on Netgalley yesterday. I’m not sure if it still is. It’s supposed to be a unique approach to a murder mystery.
Update: Super busy here as I’m editing the next book in the Jax Diamond series by the wonderfully talented Gail Meath. It’s called Blackjack. It’s fun work, though. Wanted to send a quick weekly update.
Saturday Doug and I went to Elizabethton, TN, to Carter County’s Carter Mansion, where they were exhibiting a little history. Doug took some photos here. It’s interesting that what was thought to be a mansion in the late 1770s looks like a pretty average house today.
NEXT WEEK ON THE BLOG
I’m going to put up a review tonight of The Ashen War for Indie Weekend.
I’m going to post a review of Mastering the Art of French Murder tomorrow. It’s not published until April 25th so I’ve been holding off.
I’m also going to do some mini reviews of some other books I’ve sent in to Netgalley recently.
And next week I’ve going to review Fixed Moon for Indie Weekend.
BOOK HAUL
I got the audiobook for No Two Persons. I had received the ebook last week.
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