Book Review, Fiction, thriller

The Housemaid by Freida McFadden ~ Book Review

Morgan

Thriller
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

The Housemaid is a pretty standard domestic thriller, but man did it suck me in. Millie, recently out of prison, is desperate to find employment and thinks she hit the jackpot when Nina Winchester hires her as a live-in housemaid. Although her attic room that has a lock on the outside is a littttle concerning, Millie’s just thankful to not be living in her car anymore. Soon, Nina’s unpredictable cruelty begins to weigh on Millie.

This was the kind of thriller where I knew things were not as they seemed, but I was always one step behind. I had a general sense that the relationships within the household were being influenced by something I was in the dark about and I couldn’t stop reading until I knew more. There’s a perspective shift from Millie to Nina partway through the book that I was not expecting but loved. Getting the opposite perspective put the first half of the book wonderfully into perspective.

Ultimately, the ending of this book really sealed the deal for me. Even though we did get some different points of view throughout, the ending showed just how much calculation and manipulation were going on behind the scenes and it was so satisfying. I will definitely be reading more Freida McFadden!

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Book Review, Fiction

Silver Girl by Elin Hilderbrand ~ Book Review

Morgan

My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪
Fiction

When Meredith finds out that her husband cheated his investors out of billions of dollars, her world is turned upside down. Meredith was truly in the dark about her husband’s crimes, but finds herself struggling to convince anyone or to know who to trust. When Meredith hears from her old friend Connie with an offer to stay with her on Nantucket, it seems like the perfect place to escape and regroup.

This was one of Elin Hilderbrand’s less standout stories for me. The Nantucket setting was, as ever, beautifully depicted, and I appreciated the emotional depth of Meredith’s character and her attempts to pull her life back together. The backlash Meredith received and her trying to sort through how to deal with her situation made for a really compelling story and I appreciated the premise a lot. Because this story was so focused on Meredith and Connie’s emotional states, I found the actual plot and action to be a bit lacking, especially for such a long book.

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Book Review, thriller

The Senator’s Wife by Liv Constantine ~ Book Review

Morgan

Thriller
My Rating: 🍪

When Sloane and Whit tragically lose their spouses, they find themselves turning to each other for comfort. Although they’ve long been friends, they never expected to become romantically involved, but years later they are married. Sloane is struggling with Lupus and they decide to hire a home health aid, Athena, to help her out physically and with her work. Soon however, Sloane begins to question Athena’s true motives.

Okay, I loved previous books by Liv Constantine, but the writing style in this one KILLED me. There was so much telling rather than showing and certain characters’ supposed secrets or guilt were ‘hinted’ at so many times that it was painful to keep reading over and over again. This kind of insistence did not feel organic and made it nearly impossible for me to become immersed in the story. I also found all of the characters fairly shallow and unlikable and overall just could not get invested in their lives.

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Buy The Senator’s Wife at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction

How to Walk Away by Katherine Center ~ Book Review

Morgan

Fiction
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

After a horrible accident leaves her paralyzed, Margaret is forced to reconsider what she truly values in life and how she can move forward. She is on the brink of starting her career, with a prestigious job already secured, and recently engaged. The curated future she imagined for herself is not only suddenly much less attainable, but she’s also not so sure it’s what she wants.

The relationships in this book made it a standout for me. Margaret’s family dynamics are by no means perfect, but the way that her family steps up to support her and do everything they can in the face of tragedy was so heartwarming. Each character was believably flawed, but wonderfully vivid. I loved seeing the ways that they were brought together and each of their approaches to Margaret’s situation.

The romance was a slowww burn but I truly savored every minute of it. I knew what was coming and I didn’t mind the wait to get there. I was shocked that a story that took place primarily in a hospital somehow flew by.

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Buy How to Walk Away at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, Romance

Happy Place by Emily Henry ~ Book Review

Morgan

Romance
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪

I wanted to love this book so much (and expected to!) but for some reason it never really clicked for me. It’s told in dual timeline. The earlier timeline explores the time period when Harriet meets her college friends Cleo and Sabrina, and then their friend Wyn who she goes on to date and get engaged to. The later part of the storyline is the present. She and Wyn broke up six months previously, but have yet to tell their friends. I found the bouncing back between these narratives to be hard for me to follow, which got frustrating.

The premise of the group all coming back together to their ‘happy place’ one last time had a lot of potential, but my issues were with the characters themselves. Although they were self-professed best friends, none of them seemed to actually communicate with one another, whether they be platonic or romantic relationships. It felt like a lot of pain, confusion, and drama could have been avoided if everyone was just open and honest with this group of people who they supposedly loved so much. The dysfunction made it hard for me to deeply care about them.

I enjoyed the actual second chance romance happening and the build-up and chemistry, but that was not a huge focus of the book. It felt to me like the balance of which relationships were supposed to be at the forefront was off. There was a lot of potential here, but it wasn’t quite there for me.

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Buy Happy Place at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, thriller

Stone Cold Fox by Rachel Koller Croft ~ Book Review

Morgan

Thriller
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪.5

Stone Cold Fox has all the makings of the kind of thriller that I love, including a conniving female protagonist manipulating a man to get what she wants. Bea is both a high powered career woman and *this close* to marrying into Collin Case’s wealthy family. Bea grew up watching her mom use and be used by men in an attempt to get ahead in life and it is clear that Bea learned a lot from her, but holds a lot of resentment for the things her mom made her do, which slowly come to light throughout Bea’s story.

I devoured this book, but I had some trouble with Bea’s main conflict with Collin’s childhood best friend Gale, who has it out for her. There interactions didn’t seem realistic and felt forced into the narrative to me. I can’t exactly pinpoint what it was about them, but this part of the story– and particularly how it ended– left something to be desired.

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Buy Stone Cold Fox at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Romance

Georgie, All Along by Kate Clayborn ~ Book Review

Morgan

Romance
My Rating: 🍪🍪

When Georgie loses her fast-paced personal assistant job in LA, she goes back to her small hometown, where her best friend is expecting a baby, and settles in to reassess her life. Feeling unmoored in her new circumstances, Georgie is drawn to a diary she wrote in high school, outlining all the things she wanted to accomplish during that time in her life. The simplicity of each goal makes Georgie decide to pick it up where she left off and so she finds herself on a series of mini adventures as she tries to figure herself out. Along the way, Georgie finds an unexpected comrade in former bad boy Levi, the brother of her childhood crush.

The premise of Georgie’s confusion about what to do next with her life and trying to rediscover it through the lens of her past self was really unusual and intriguing. Unfortunately, the book was so slow and repetitive that I could not enjoy it. I felt like the same scenes were playing over and over on loop and I knew what they were all leading to miles in advance.

Check out my bookstagram: @Treat.your.shelf
Buy Georgie, All Along at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction

The Identicals by Elin Hilderbrand ~ Book Review

Morgan

Fiction
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

The Identicals tells the story of Harper and Tabitha, grown identical twins who are estranged. They live on Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard and could not be more different. After their father’s death, the two come back together for the first time in years and are forced to face the past that they’ve ignored for so long.

The two sisters decide to temporarily switch places and I really enjoyed seeing the ways that they tried to fit into the other person’s life. The dual settings with very different narratives were both equally interesting and had Hilderbrand’s classic beach-read style that made me yearn for summer.

There are some storylines in this book (particularly about the girls’ childhood) that I found fairly unbelievable and threw me off a bit. Overall though, I enjoyed the switching places style of storytelling and found this to be a fast and enjoyable read.

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Buy The Identicals at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, Romance

Secretly Yours by Tessa Bailey ~ book Review

Morgan

Romance
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪

I raced through this book in a few days, mostly because it was due back at the library, and it was a pretty classic, cute romance. Hallie’s childhood crush, Julian, returns to their hometown for the summer and Hallie wonders if she’ll finally get the chance to shoot her shot. When she’s hired to work on the gardens at his family’s vineyard, she feels like she just might have a chance. In classic grumpy sunshine fashion, Julian doesn’t even remember her.

There was a subplot about Hallie’s recently passed grandmother two feuding wine shops in town that had a lot of potential, but ultimately just felt super cheesy to me. I liked how it tied into her relationship with Julian but his rage about the situation wasn’t realistic.

If you’re in the mood for an easy, steamy romance, Secretly Yours will scratch that itch, but I don’t think I’ll remember the details of the plot in a few weeks.

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Buy Secretly Yours at an indie bookstore near you
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Book Review, Fiction, Romance

Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez ~ Book Review

Morgan

Romance
My Rating: 🍪🍪🍪🍪

Briana is eagerly awaiting a promotion as all other aspects of her life seem to be falling apart. When a new doctor, Jacob, threatens to steal it out from under her nose, Briana is livid. That is, until he writes her a letter that lets her in to see more of who he is at his core – and she likes it.

This is a classic fake dating romance. I loved the connection between Briana and Jacob – especially the way their relationship began with letter writing and lunches in the closet at the hospital. The workplace setting added an extra wrinkle in their fake dating scheme and made their story stand out from others in the genre.

Both main characters were really likable and layered. Jacob was such a sweetheart and the way he melted Briana’s heart was easily believable. I also especially appreciated the depiction of Jacob’s social anxiety, the way Briana supported him through it, and his recollection of how past partners had not made the effort to understand it.

Buy Yours Truly at an indie bookstore near you
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