Reading With Monie: 2019

Showing posts with label 2019. Show all posts

April 17, 2020

Review: Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier

Product Description:

All it takes to unravel a life is one little secret...

Marin had the perfect life. Married to her college sweetheart, she owns a chain of upscale hair salons, and Derek runs his own company. They're admired in their community and are a loving family—until their world falls apart the day their son Sebastian is taken.

A year later, Marin is a shadow of herself. The FBI search has gone cold. The publicity has faded. She and her husband rarely speak. She hires a P.I. to pick up where the police left off, but instead of finding Sebastian, she learns that Derek is having an affair with a younger woman. This discovery sparks Marin back to life. She's lost her son; she's not about to lose her husband, too. Kenzie is an enemy with a face, which means this is a problem Marin can fix.

Permanently.

My Thoughts:

I was absolutely hooked from page 1. A parent's worst nightmare befalls Marin and now she has to figure out how she can keep going. A year goes by with no sign of her son and as her marriage is falling apart she's struck by another blow.

This is the perfect scenario for a great suspense thriller. Little bits and pieces are revealed at the right time that keep you on the edge of your seat, reading well into the night. Each twist was a new path that lead to the truth which I would have never guessed. Amazing!

My Recommendation:
I recommend this to anyone who loves the perfect edge of your seat thriller.

January 5, 2020

Review: Camp Lake by John A. Heldt

Product Description:
Phoenix, Spring 1983. For the Carsons, five siblings from the present day, it has come down to this. Find the parents they have chased through time for more than two years or go home and resume their lives without them.

While Adam and Greg remain in Arizona and Natalie searches the country for leads, Cody and Caitlin travel to a summer camp in Maine, where their mother and father met as counselors. The twins, now 19, hope to intercept the older versions of their parents even as they work beside the younger ones.

All of the Carsons prepare for a reunion that seems inevitable. Then tragedy strikes one family member and seductive strangers pull two others in unhelpful directions as a summer of promise turns into one of uncertainty and sacrifice.

Filled with humor, romance, and heartbreak, CAMP LAKE, the poignant conclusion of the Carson Chronicles series, follows the lives of several spirited adults as they confront choices and change the era of big hair, space shuttles, and video arcades.

My Thoughts:
Camp Lake is the final installment of a 5 book series and I'm kinda sad about that. I've grown to love the Carson clan, their ever growing family and their time-traveling adventures. In each book there are plenty of surprises along the way and this is no exception. It kind of gave me a Back To The Future vibe when the twins become friends with their young parents but that only added to the enjoyment of the story's conclusion.

I'm happy that throughout the books each of the Carsons find love and even though I knew it was coming, seeing the way everything played out for Cody Carson made me happy. It's the perfect ending to the series that I will greatly miss now that it's completed.

Seeing that Heldt is the author of three different time travel series, I can only hope that I'm soon introduced to a new set of characters that I can go on more fun journeys with.

My Recommendation:
I recommend this book, series and author to anyone who loves time travel with a little splash of romance.

January 4, 2020

Review: A Night at the Movies by H.A. Price

Product Description:
Twenty-year-old Verona Hamlin has been working for the past four years at the theater. She’s growing restless, but the one thing that keeps her sane is her coworker Dave, a prankster who takes to mutilating movie posters, laughing at patrons, and quoting The Simpsons to keep him and Verona entertained.

But when Verona decides she’s had enough, her life takes some unexpected turns.

A hilarious and compelling depiction of life behind the movie theater concession stand.

My Thoughts:
As a teen I worked at an amusement park for 3 seasons. When I read the description of A Night At The Movies it sounded just like the atmosphere working there had so I was really excited to read this. Other than Dave, Verona and her friends were a little more well behaved than my bunch but it brought back so many fun memories.

I enjoyed the book and the characters overall but at the end of the day I was expecting a little more in the storyline. It kind of remained flat and I kept expecting something major to happen but when the story played out it was just a little bump that didn't move me very much.

My Recommendation:
I recommend this to anyone who loves humorous fiction and anyone who has worked in any type of entertainment facility.

April 15, 2019

Review: Come and Get Me: A Caitlin Bergman Novel by August Norman

Product Description:
At Indiana University, someone’s been studying the female student body: their dating customs, nocturnal activities—and how long they can survive in captivity.

When award-winning journalist Caitlin Bergman is invited back to campus to receive an honorary degree, she finds an opportunity for a well-earned victory lap—and a chance to face the trauma that almost destroyed her as an undergrad. But her lap becomes an all-out race when a student begs her to probe an unsolved campus disappearance: Angela Chapman went out one Friday night and never came back.

To find the missing woman, Caitlin must join forces with a local police detective and the department that botched her own case so long ago. But while Caitlin follows the clues behind Angela’s disappearance, someone else is following her…

Unearthing secrets hidden beneath an idyllic Midwestern college town, Caitlin must expose what really happened to Angela—before she herself becomes the newest addition to a twisted collection.

My Thoughts:
I am a huge fan of suspense thrillers but as much as I tried I could not get into this book at all. From the very beginning I just wasn't pulled into the story but I was committed to a review so I kept reading. About a third of the way in I just said screw it and skipped the whole next third of the book and picked up at about the last third. Honestly other than some minor details of what went on, I wasn't at all lost and just kept right on reading. Luckily the last third had a little more action to sustain the book but at the end of the date the book isn't one that I'd recommend.

My Recommendation:
Sadly, I say pass on this one. There are way too many books out there to waste time with this one.

January 1, 2019

Review: Indian Paintbrush (Carson Chronicles Book 3) by John A. Heldt

Product Description:
Arizona, December 1943. After surviving perilous six-month journeys to 1889 and 1918, the Carsons, five siblings from the present day, seek a respite in their home state. While Adam and Greg settle down with their Progressive Era brides, Natalie and Caitlin start romances with wartime aviators and Cody befriends a Japanese family in an internment camp. The time travelers regroup, bury some ghosts, and continue their search for their missing parents. Then old problems return, new ones emerge, and a peaceful hiatus becomes a race for survival. In INDIAN PAINTBRUSH, the sequel to RIVER RISING and THE MEMORY TREE, several young adults find love and adventure as they navigate the home front during the height of World War II.

My Thoughts:
By this third book in the Carson Chronicles I feel like the characters are some of my favorites to read about. They all have their distinct personalities and I feel invested in what happens to them. In each of the books there have been emotional ups and (surprisingly low) downs and I think this is what helped solidify that relationship for me.

In Indian Paintbrush the family travels to 1943/1944. Here the men have to deal with the WWII draft, newly acquired brides and the continued search for their parents. The ladies both meet dashing men that sweep them off their feet but then they face the ultimate decision... to keep their secret or risk sharing it and put their family's safety on the line.

While this book in the series covers some of the events in World War II and gives us a look into a Japanese internment camp, it doesn't have as much historical knowledge as other time travel books I've read and absolutely loved by Heldt. With that being said it's still a fantastic story that leaves me anxiously awaiting the next book in the Carson Chronicles.

My Recommendation:
I recommend this for anyone who loves romantic time travel books.

Books I've Read in 2019

Books
January

Winter's Web by Jennifer Estep
Witch is How The Tables Turned by Adele Abbott
Frill Kill by Laura Childs

February

Whoops! We’re In Big Trouble Now by Adele Abbott
You Dropped a Blonde on Me by Dakota Cassidy

March

Witch is How The Drought Ended by Adele Abbott
Murder with All the Trimmings by Elaine Viets
Witch is How the Dice Fell by Adele Abbott

April

Burning Down the Spouse by Dakota Cassidy
Murder On Account by Adele Abbott

May

The Fashion Hound Murders by Elaine Viets
Death Swatch by Laura Childs
Something Like Gravity by Amber Smith

June

Caitlin's Song by John A. Heldt
The Warehouse by Rob Hart

July

The Escape Room by Megan Goldin
Witch is How The Biscuits Disappeared by Adele Abbott

August

The After Days by Amy Ginsburg

September

The Passengers by John Marrs

October

Witch Is How Dreams Became Reality By Adele Abbott
Ashlords by Scott Reintgen
Randomize by Andy Weir

November

Witch is How Bells Were Saved by Adele Abbott

December

A Night at the Movies by H.A. Price
Camp Lake by John A. Heldt
Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier

Audiobooks

January

Shoe Dog by Phil Knight
Lock in by John Scalzi
Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel
Circe by Madeline Miller
Killing Floor by Lee Child
Sellevision by Augusten Burroughs
Year One by Nora Roberts
Dead on Arrival by Matt Richtel
The Dreamers by Karen Thompson Walker