Where Am I Now? by Mara Wilson

There is a reason that the blogs I read are talking about how much they love this book. It's fantastic. Not just a retrospective into her film history, Mara Wilson talks about her life up until now. The fun sides (getting to work with Danny DeVito) but a lot of the darker sides as well (her mother dying, her issues with OCD). Her writing flows, jumping back and forth seamlessly along her timeline. I sat down to read a few pages and resurfaced in the world a couple hours later having devoured the whole thing. It's the kind of book that makes you want to sit down with the author and see if they're really like their writing because it's just... that... good.

Five stars
This book comes out September 13

In Such Good Company by Carol Burnett

A wonderful look behind the scenes of "The Carol Burnett Show." Stories about the people (cast members, guests, friends, and those working behind the scenes), about the clothes, about the sketches... Carol includes them all. This isn't a strict biography, it's more of a stitching together of stories (some are repeated but told from different angles).
A feel-good book that is exactly what you want when reading Carol Burnett.

Five stars
This book comes out September 13

The Adventurer's Guide to Successful Escapes by Wade Albert White

I really enjoyed the world-building in this book, where orphans can't become adventurers if they have no last name (like Anvil, "Anne") or if their families are notorious (like her friend Penelope Shatterblade). But that doesn't stop Anne from applying to as many adventurer schools as possible. She's pretty much given up hope that she'll be taken before she's kicked out of the orphanage on her thirteenth birthday. Or will she? At the last moment, Anne is informed that the train will be leaving before midnight on the day before Anne's birthday rather than 10 minutes into it, which means that Anne has to stay at the orphanage for another year. But Anne has different plans. And the world has different plans for her as, while she is walking the matron's fire lizard "Dog," a woman appears and tells Anne she has been accepted into a school.
This book is all sorts of crazy sauce -- in the very best way. Just when you think you've figured out the zigs, the book zags. For instance, the headmistress of the Death Mountain Quest Academy is Her Royal Highness Princess Fluffington Whiskers of the Mousetrapper Clan. In short, a cat. There are dragons whose fireballs help aid travel, a book that becomes whatever it needs to be, and a main character who is not only female, she has dark brown skin. A fact that is only mentioned once and then briefly.

Snoopy: Contact! by Charles M. Schulz

Snoopy rides again! Mainly stories connected to the Red Baron, this is a fantastic look at the work of Charles M. Schulz. And so many of the stories still work today. Simple, awesome. Definitely worth a read.

Will come out next week, October 20.

Then Came You by Jill Shalvis

Image linked from Goodreads

This book had so many tropes that I hate in books. The heroine is all, "I can't do this - but I want to - but you're my boss - but you're so hot." So annoying. And the hero was all, "I am amused man who wants you and will have you." And, yet... I really liked this story. Really, really. I tore through it in a couple of hours, even laughing out loud a couple of times.
p. 38 "Calories." Emily said on a sigh. "The evil tiny creatures that live in my closet and sew my clothes a little tighter every night."
Emily Stevens has her life figured out. She's going to finish vet school and then continue taking care of her father and her sister while simultaneously getting her college study partner to fall in love with her. She just has to get through this internship, which is not in L.A. like she had planned. Nope, it's in Sunshine, Idaho. Well, at least it looks like it's going to be interesting, since she just walked in to the waiting room and saw "a golden retriever, a collie mix, two pissed off cats in carriers, and... a Shetland pony." (p. 9)
Too bad the guy she's going to be reporting to is her hot one-night stand from the veterinarian's conference in Reno, Dr. Wyatt Stone. He of the glasses and T-shirts with funny sayings.
Wyatt has his own issues. He lives with both his sisters and they're trying to drive him insane. Well, they're trying to help him fix up their grandparents house but it seems like they want to drop him off at Insanity along the way. It doesn't help that his hot new intern is helping him as well.
Jill Shalvis fans, rejoice. This is an excellent addition to her canon and a book not to be missed.This book had so many tropes that I hate in books. The heroine is all, "I can't do this - but I want to - but you're my boss - but you're so hot." So annoying. And the hero was all, "I am amused man who wants you and will have you." And, yet... I really liked this story. Really, really. I tore through it in a couple of hours, even laughing out loud a couple of times.
p. 38 "Calories." Emily said on a sigh. "The evil tiny creatures that live in my closet and sew my clothes a little tighter every night."
Emily Stevens has her life figured out. She's going to finish vet school and then continue taking care of her father and her sister while simultaneously getting her college study partner to fall in love with her. She just has to get through this internship, which is not in L.A. like she had planned. Nope, it's in Sunshine, Idaho. Well, at least it looks like it's going to be interesting, since she just walked in to the waiting room and saw "a golden retriever, a collie mix, two pissed off cats in carriers, and... a Shetland pony." (p. 9)
Too bad the guy she's going to be reporting to is her hot one-night stand from the veterinarian's conference in Reno, Dr. Wyatt Stone. He of the glasses and T-shirts with funny sayings.
Wyatt has his own issues. He lives with both his sisters and they're trying to drive him insane. Well, they're trying to help him fix up their grandparents house but it seems like they want to drop him off at Insanity along the way. It doesn't help that his hot new intern is helping him as well.
Jill Shalvis fans, rejoice. This is an excellent addition to her canon and a book not to be missed.

Naked Once More by Elizabeth Peters

Image from Goodreads

I know I'm in a minority but, for me, there is only one Elizabeth Peters mystery series and it's not Amelia Peabody.
Jacqueline Kirby is the woman I want to be when I grow up. Former librarian turned world famous romance writer who has a quick quip for every situation. A little brash yet able to charm. Maybe without so many dead bodies though...
I read the Kirby books about ten years ago and enjoyed them immensely. When I saw this book on NetGalley, I immediately hit 'request' to see if they were as good as I remembered.
Oh, they are. Or, at least this one is. Yes, it's a bit dated (word processors anyone?) but most of it holds up amazingly well.
Jacqueline jumps at the chance to finish the last two books in a trilogy. The author wrote one fabulously received book and then, one rainy night, vanished. Seven years later, she's now officially been declared dead and authors are vying to be the one chosen to finish out the series. Some are in deadly earnest, though that doesn't throw Jacqueline off her stride. She tries to finish the next book but is distracted by what happened to the original author. Okay, and a little distracted by the increasingly dangerous "accidents" that seem to be occurring to her.

Naked Once More

Follows Die for Love
This book came out August 1st, 1989
Borrowed from Audible Premium Plus
Five Stars

Reread as Audible Premium January 2021, October 2022

Headed for Trouble by Suzanne Brockmann

Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee...<quick pause for breath> ...eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
Okay, my perception of this book may have been colored by the fact that I got it for free from NetGalley. The description of the book is rather misleading (i.e., doesn't mention that a lot of the stories are repub) and I don't always remember to check stories before I buy books, my own fault I know, but it doesn't lessen the disappointment.  If I had paid for it and not known that a lot of the stories were repeats from the end of other books, I may have been less favorable, like, maybe only three stars instead of five.
But this is Suzanne Brockmann. One of my go-to-authors and there was a lot of added content like author commentary about how she wrote stories or where ideas came from. There were quite a few new stories including one I particularly enjoyed about Sam, Robin, and Gina being stuck with three kids and the flu in a country that has been hit by a terrorist event.
A great collection of stories and a must read that sent me back to my library to re-read the entire Troubleshooters from "The Unsung Hero" (Troubleshooters 1).

Five stars

This book came out April 28, 2013

Follows Breaking the Rules

Followed by Some Kind of Hero

Opinions are my own

Reread in June 2022