Below Zero by Ali Hazelwood

Hannah has found herself a niche and a dream of working for NASA. She's finally going to have a project except that everyone but one person has okayed it. And that person is Ian, a man with whom she has a past. They never hooked up but they got darn close. Is that why he vetoed her project? If so, why is he now coming to find her in a blizzard? In Norway?

There was so much time jumping in this book it made me a little dizzy. Hannah and Ian seemed nice enough but there wasn't enough about either to get invested. The story was fine but similar to two of the Hazelwood books I've read where it's a woman in STEM, falling in love with a man in STEM, while there's another male who seems nice enough but is really the villain.

Three stars

This book came out April 5, 2020

Follows Stuck on You

Borrowed as ebook from Libby

Opinions are my own

State of the Union by Marie Force

There are SO MANY PEOPLE in this series which can be good but I think Force tried to catch up with every single one of them in this book and it got overwhelming and repetitive (even some of the dialogue, while true to life, was repeated.) The mystery suffered a bit because of it as well.

A young woman has been raped and murdered in a DC park. Sam is not at full speed after falling on some ice and fracturing her hip. All she had wanted to do was enjoy a vacation with her family at Camp David and she still got called back to work where the storm of the season took her out. 

Nick is dealing with his own problems trying to get the Vice President into office and write his first State of the Union address. I really hope we find out soon why Sam's radar went off around Gretchen as it has been discussed so many times.

Three stars

This book came out September 20, 2022

Follows State of Grace

Followed by State of Shock

Borrowed as ebook from Libby

Opinions are my own

October 2022 monthly rereads

As always, all opinions are my own

Die for Love by Elizabeth Peters

Jacqueline Kirby #3

Four stars

Follows The Murders of Richard III
Followed by Naked Once More
This book came out January 1st, 1974
Audiobook from Audible Premium Plus

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Naked Once More
Jacqueline Kirby #4
Five stars
Follows Die for Love
This book came out August 1st, 1989
Borrowed from Audible Premium Plus

Lord of Scoundrels by Loretta Chase

Four and a half stars
Originally published January 1, 1995

Follows Captives of the Night

Followed by the Mad Earl's Bride

Listened to this book on Audible Escape
Opinions are my own

Lord of the Wings by Donna Andrews

Meg Langslow #19

This book came out August 4, 2015

Follows The Nightingale Before Christmas

Followed by Die Like an Eagle

Audiobook from Audible

The Cloisters by Katy Hays

Ann Stillwell is delighted to leave Washington, leave behind her grieving mother and the memories of her father. When she gets to New York however, all of her dreams are dashed. The man she was supposed to work under has left the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the summer. Luckily, even as her heart is falling from the news she's just gotten from the Director of Human Resources, hope springs. Patrick Roland, the curator at The Cloisters, needs help and, well, Ann is available. While slightly disappointed that the job isn't going to be what she expected, at least she has a job.

It's this job that introduces her to not only Patrick but Rachel and Leo as well as a handful of other people but those are the two that are going to affect her the most deeply as she is dragged into theories of 15th-century fortune telling. Could a deck of cards really tell the future? Especially a particular set of cards? And what does it have to do with her father's work? And her mentor's?

When their work leads to someone dying, Ann suddenly has to decide what she believes in and how much fate really does play a hand in our lives. 

I am not usually a reader of darker books like this but around the Halloween season, I often turn towards these and this was a perfect book for this time of year. 

Four stars

This book comes out November 1, 2022

ARC kindly provided by Atria Books and NetGalley

Opinions are my own

Station Eternity by Mur Lafferty

I am not a huge fan of time jumping stories. And this one was especially dizzying since you go into so many different characters' points of view. However, this is still a really fun book that I absolutely devoured.

Mallory has been surrounded by death her entire life. And not just death but murders. No, seriously, she's been in the vicinity of no fewer than fifteen murders in her life. That's way too many. So, when the aliens arrived, she got herself up to a space station in the hopes that not being around other humans would mean that there would be no more murders. Eternity (the sentient space station) has allowed her to stay and Mallory is figuring out her life even as the aliens around her are figuring out her and the other two humans on board. Well, the one ambassador sanctioned by earth and the one who is somewhat AWOL from the American military. However, that is not going to be the case for long since there is currently a shuttle full of humans on its way up to Eternity, one filled with people who have connections to either Mallory or Xan (the military guy.) But right before their ship docks, the sentient being attached to Eternity is murdered and the station freaks out, whacking the shuttle and sending a number of people hurtling into space. It's up to Xan and Mallory to first rescue the survivors and then figure out just what the heck all of these people are doing up in space.

Four stars

This book came out October 4, 2022

Followed by Chaos Terminal

ARC kindly provided by Berkley Publishing Group and NetGalley

Opinions are my own

Agnes and the Hitman by Jennifer Crusie

Probably Crusie's best story. Or at least my favorite.

Agnes Crandall's life seems like it should be perfect, she's got the house of her dream, a great-looking fiancé, her best friend's daughter is getting married with Agnes providing the food, and her Cranky Agnes food column has spawned her one bestselling cookbook with another in the works. But lately, her writing is about the only thing that seems to be going well. Her fiancé is being evasive and the wedding on which her keeping her house hinges, is threatening to implode. But the worst happens in the opening scene of the book when an armed intruder comes into the house wanting to kidnap her dog. Agnes has a history of violence and it comes to good use when she smacks the intruder with a frying pan and he flies through a previously hidden door into the unknown basement, breaking his neck.

Opening up this basement opens a door to the past, when Joey, her cooking mentor, and Frankie Fortunato along with another man robbed a train of five million dollars. But then Frankie disappeared with the money and the basement was covered up. 

Joey immediately calls in his nephew Shane to protect "Little Agnes." Shane is on another job but he immediately comes back to his hated hometown to help his uncle. The situation is not one that he's excited about but he is excited about Agnes. He likes her disposition as well as her figure. When Agnes' fiancé turns out to be a total jerk, Shane is there to help her get over her disappointment.

I just got this as an audiobook and was really disappointed. The points when we get to hear Agnes's thoughts are faded and a completely different volume than the rest of the story. And that happens a lot in this book. 

Five stars as hard copy; three and a half as audio

This book came out August 21, 2007

Audible book I own

Opinions are my own

A Restless Truth by Freya Marske

Maud is just trying to help her brother and his partner. She knows that going on a voyage across the ocean will help them. She also knows that she's going to meet some people on the way who will help her. It's too bad that the woman she's traveling with dies so soon into the journey. Maud is launched into a world of magic that she barely realizes exists and definitely doesn't understand. Now she's working with an aristocrat, a thief, and a notorious actress to try and stop a conspiracy that began over a hundred years ago. 

I suspect some people may not like the ending but I actually did. It made sense to me. 

Four stars

This book comes out November 1, 2022

Follows A Marvelous Light

ARC kindly provided by Macmillan-Tor/Forge and NetGalley 

Opinions are my own