Soniah Kamal knows how to write sympathetic, beautifully thought-out romances. Unmarriageable, her modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice, is a lovely read, but it clings so closely to its Austenian roots, that there is no room for the author to fully put her own stamp on the novel, or to make any narrative deviations from…
Sweet, candid and poignant First Comes Marriage: My Not-So-Typical American Love Story is part biography, part love story, part cultural narrative and altogether delightful. This charming tale of love not-so-American style does a fabulous job of introducing readers to the idea that not all romances must follow the path pushed upon us by Hollywood. I…
Sink or Swim – is the first novel I have read by L.A. Witt in a long time, and when I read that it is concerning a gay romance between a Muslim and a U.S. Navy chaplain, I had high expectations. This is, apparently, the eighth novel in a series about a town with a…
Kelley Armstrong’s Aftermath takes us into the dark world of school shootings, shattered friendships and redemption. It’s an emotional tale that will keep you thinking about it long after you put the book down. There was nothing ordinary about that day; it had been both the most glorious and most horrific of her young life….
Original Review: December 2015 Revised: March 2018 After having read more small English village stories and a few mid-20th century stories and then re-reading this book, I felt I came away understanding Major Pettigrew’s character in more depth. Thus my assessment of him and the novel changed from a B- to a B+. The Major…
I truly enjoy historical novels where I’m not only entertained by a well-written story, but I also learn about a part of history of which I had no prior knowledge. So I really appreciated seeing a bibliography at the end of three of the stories in this anthology – a welcome first, because I’m interested…
Location, location, location. That’s a popular mantra which discusses what is believed to be the most important selling point of any piece of property. I can’t speak to the effectiveness of it in terms of real estate sales but it‘s certainly an important selling point to me vis-à-vis book buying. That’s because I love armchair…
A North Africa-set sheikh romance with a heroine who is also Arab? Sign me up! Alim El-Kanar, sheikh of Abbas Al-Din, has spent the years since his older brother’s tragic death driving medical supplies through a war-torn region of the Sahel desert in northern Africa. Hana al-Sud, from Alim’s country but raised in Australia, is…
I read that Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand was set in a small village in England, and I didn’t read any further before getting the book. I’m a huge fan of Cranford and Grantchester and so many lovely small-village stories that the BBC is so good at producing. And Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand does not disappoint….
Pakistani-American Naila is in love with her classmate Saif, but because her parents don’t approve, she hasn’t been able to do more than see him at school. When, frustrated by these restrictions, she rebels and sneaks off to prom, her parents panic that the family’s reputation will be destroyed. They take her to Pakistan on…