My Last Duchess by Eloisa James

Hugo Wilde, the Duke of Lindow, has just received his divorce decree. His faithless second wife is no longer "his wife." His twin sister is encouraging him to go to London and try to find a third wife. Hugo is not excited at the thought but he is realistic. While his oldest four children are close to grown, his younger four will definitely need a mother. At his first ball, he spots Ophelia, Lady Astley and falls immediately in love. And for the purposes of the novella, it is a pretty true love but when she says to back off, he does (what? I love it!) because the course to true love can't run smooth even for a duke in a novella. 

This was a fast and fun read even with one of my least favorite tropes (love at first sight). Getting to see how Hugo convinced Phee to marry a man with eight children (though his kids seemed to do most of the convincing) was the light story that I needed right now.

Four stars

This book comes out October 27th

Prequel to Wilde in Love

ARC kindly provided by HarperCollins Publishers

Opinions are my own

One True Pairing by Cathy Yardley

Hailey Frost loves Mystics, a sci-fi TV show with three male leads, but that doesn't mean that she expects Jake Reese to wander into her second job, hiding from a horde of screaming, clothes-ripping fans. Nor does she expect that she will enter into a mutually beneficial fake relationship with him; she'll help boost his Q store but creating a romance story between a star and his fan while he'll boost her family's failing bookstore.

A fun and quirky story with characters that were easy to relate too. Hailey might have been a little too prickly and Jake just a little too cinnamon roll but I did get past that eventually.

Fours stars

Followed by Game of Hearts

This book came out July 25th, 2017

Borrowed as an audiobook from Audible Escape

Opinions are my own

The Real Lolita by Sarah Weinman

 I've had mixed results reading the books off the NPR's Book Concierge. I had read Lolita in high school and reading about the story behind the book seemed interesting. 
The book is an okay read if you can past the subject matter (for instance, I could only read this during daylight hours). There's not a lot of focus on the story and Weinman talks a lot about the lack of information surrounding the case. Instead, we get quite a bit of speculation. Which, to be fair, she does clearly state when it's happening.

Three stars

This book came out September 11th, 2018

Borrowed as a hard copy from the library

Opinions our my own

Squeeze Me by Carl Hiaasen

 The President is in town and that means his most ardent supporters, including a group of wealthy white women known as the POTUSussies. Too bad one of them has disappeared... and in a truly gruesome manner. What follows is a classic Hiaasen romp with a story that layers upon itself in delightful ways. You've got a one-handed, vindictive poacher who is chasing down the person we follow most in this series, Angela 'Angie' Armstrong, former felon and vet student, now someone who comes in and cleans out the animals you don't want in your home. Or on your golf course...

If you like Hiaasen, you will enjoy seeing characters from earlier books in the series. If you've never read Hiaasen but enjoy a good political satire, this is also going to be the book for you.
Four stars

This book came out September 29th, 2020
Borrowed as a hard copy from the library
Opinions are my own

The Vampire’s Fake Fiancée by Kristen Painter

This was one of my favorite books in the series with a heroine who hides her light under the bushel of being a librarian. She does love books but part of that is an effort to run away from what she was born to be, a Valkyrie. But right now, she’s a fake fiancée.
Sebastian Ellingham promised his mentor that he would marry the man’s daughter, a cosseted brat who didn’t get any better once she was turned into a vampire. Now, she’s back in town but Sebastian just wants one thing, to get a divorce. That’s where Tessa Blythe comes in. He needs a fiancée, she needs a job. It turns out he has a job to offer if she can pretend to be his lady love until his wife leaves.



Three stars
Follows The Werewolf's Christmas Wish
Followed by A Vampire's Valentine Surprise

Borrowed as an audiobook from Audible
This novella came out February 8th, 2016
Opinions are my own

The Convivial Codfish by Charlotte MacLeod

Not a lot of Sarah in this book and I definitely felt her absence. Instead, the focus is Max as he infiltrates a Christmas party hosted by one of the men in the Comrades of the Convivial Codfish, Tom Tolbathy. He does it to help out one of Sarah’s many uncles, Jeremy. It seems that Jeremy, who is the current Exalted Chowderhead, lost the ceremonial chain at a recent Dickens Christmas Carol dinner. Jem can’t go to the party himself because he fell down the stairs at his house and broke his hip, very nearly his head. Max is sent in his place to see if he can recognize the chain. And he does but the party (on a train, by the way, so cool) goes horribly wrong when the train stops suddenly. Tom’s brother is found dead and the rest of the party starts failing, a result of poisoning. 

Lots of big words which are great for vocabulary building and a good story but not fairly clued - even the last big hint is kept cloaked. And the relationship between Sarah and Max is one of the draws of the series but it was almost nonexistent in the book.

Three stars
Follows The Bilbao Looking Glass
Followed by The Plain Old Man
This book came out 1984
Borrowed this book from the library
Opinions are my own

Brave, Not Perfect: Fear Less, Fail More, and Live Bolder by Reshma Saujani

 This is a message that has come out more and more since 2012; women have been taught to be perfect but we really need to be more brave. And that's hard because a lot of society doesn't want us to be. But there are ways to train ourselves (and upcoming generations) on how to makes sure that our sense of needing to be 100%before we try to be outweighed by our need to do the fun thing, the scary thing, the things that frighten us. 
For me, the most useful section was the one on ways to be braver. There are the ones that are obvious (at least to me) about taking care of yourself and examining which outcomes scare you more. Then there are the ones that scare me: asking for criticism and surrounding yourself with rejection. Ufda.

Four stars
This book came out February 5th, 2019

Borrowed as an ebook from the library

Opinions are my own