‘Moonshiners’ as an occupation makes me think of the 1920s and 1930s, so I was interested in White Whiskey Bargain, a book about moonshine making in the twenty-first century. Hannah Hawkins has inherited the family business – a long-running distillery – from her mother, just in time to face the wealthy Ward family’s attempt to…
Some books need more suspension of disbelief than others and The Third Mrs. Durst is definitely one of those novels. The tale of a ‘hillbilly’ getting her revenge against a rich, powerful man, it bends reality pretty close to the breaking point – but it has fun getting there. Marlena Altizer hadn’t even graduated from…
Stay and Fight is a powerful novel that haunts yet has derivative features that may give the reader pause. But overall, it provides a thought-provoking experience. Helen Conley arrived in Appalachian Ohio fully in love with her boyfriend’s ideas about living off of the grid. After all, if things don’t work out they can always…
I’m a big fan of the TV show Call the Midwife, so, when These Healing Hills became available for review, I figured it would be right up my alley. It’s set in the Appalachian mountains of Kentucky right after World War II comes to an end, a time and setting I was sure I’d love,…
One of the best things about this stellar book is the fact that it’s told from Levi Grainger’s PoV. Hiking the Appalachian Trail in honor of his sister, who was recently killed in action, Levi runs into all sorts of issues expected of a novice hiker. He also runs into Thad Connors, a withdrawn but…
My favorite heroines are readers. Jo from Little Women. Elizabeth from Pride and Prejudice. Belle from Beauty and the Beast. I relate to a gal who reads. I share her passion and admire her for it. It is with great pleasure that I add a new heroine to the long list of female readers I…
I voted for LuAnn McLane’s Dancing Shoes and Honky-Tonk Blues as best contemporary romance in AAR’s 2007 Annual Poll, so was very eager to read her latest release. While I enjoyed reading A Little Less Talk and a Lot More Action, in the end, I could have done with a little more talk between the…
Wow, I loved this one. Reality TV has landed in Misty Creek, Kentucky by way of Dancing with the Rednecks, a spoof on the popular Dancing with the Stars, produced by the Comedy Corner network (read: the fictional version of Comedy Central). Twelve Average Joes will compete for the grand prize of $50,000, each with…
The number of series romance authors who are auto buys for me is shrinking down to a very few, but Marilyn Pappano is still one of them. When I saw Somebody’s Hero on the shelf, I snapped it up immediately. It is very loosely connected to two of her earlier titles, Somebody’s Baby and Somebody’s…
When Venus Fell is one of the best books I’ve read all year. Venus Arinelli, former child prodigy and concert pianist, now plays in dives all around the country, lives in an RV and avoids the government. She also protects her fragile sister Ella. Venus distrusts the government because her father felt that it had…