There’s something unexpected and unique about Natalie Tan’s Book of Luck and Fortune. Magical and sublime with a core that’s a real heartbreaker, it nonetheless has a few problems that keep it from being a full-out A-grade homerun. Natalie Tan once vowed to herself that she’d never return to San Francisco’s Chinatown community. After surviving…
The View from Alameda Island is a book title dear to my heart because I used to live near Mill Valley, which, in this story, is the location of Lauren Delaney’s home during her marriage. The community is a metaphor for Lauren’s stifling existence because up-market houses like hers are closed off from the street…
Any Jasmine Guillory novel is guaranteed to be a good time. The Wedding Party is another slice in that tradition; romantic, funny, sweet and easy to relate to, it’s a breezy read that will be like catnip for anyone who likes a good enemies-to-lovers story. No two ways about it – personal stylist Maddie Forest…
Here and Now and Then is a literary science fiction novel which focuses on family – how we can never have too much of it and how we will do anything to protect those we love. His mind is going, his memories fading along with it. In the year 2142 Kin Stewart is a special…
The Proposal is the sensational, charming, warm, sexy follow up to Jasmine Guillory’s The Wedding Date. While this novel contains characters from that story, you do not need to read that book to absolutely, thoroughly enjoy this one. I speak from experience. Nikole (Nik) Paterson is not enjoying spending the day at the ballpark while…
The Wedding Date tells the story of a deep-seated connection and a building of trust between two people who don’t have a history of longevity in their relationships. Is this going to last? is a question they constantly grapple with. Alexa Monroe is a lawyer and the Chief of Staff for the mayor of Berkeley,…
Based on early buzz, I had high hopes for The Wedding Date. Unfortunately, although Ms. Guillory introduces two appealing principals, the story is predictable and flat, and her characters spend too much time in their own heads and physically separated (he lives in Los Angeles, she lives in Berkeley) – doubting and second-guessing their relationship…
Julie Anne Long knocks another homer out of the park with Dirty Dancing at Devil’s Leap, the third volume in her delightful series of Hellcat Canyon novels. Ever since Avalon Harwood can remember, she’s had a crush on her childhood friend and confidant, Mac Coltrane. They more or less grew up together around his family…
As I looked back over my notes so as to be able to write this review, two words kept popping out: relatable and refreshing. Relatable because the characters are just that and refreshing because that’s how this book felt. In Dirty Dancing at Devil’s Leap, the third installment in her Hellcat Canyon series, Julie Ann…
Molly O’Keefe is an author who consistently writes original, moving, and frequently terrific romantic novels that stay with me long after I finish them. Pretty much everything she writes blows me away (although I’m not crazy about her MC stories), and somehow, without my noticing, she’s become one of my favorite writers. Her latest series,…