k2reader January 30, 2023

A Light in the Forest by Melissa Payne #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

Thank you Brilliance Audio for the ALC and Get Red PR , #partner, for the advanced copy of A Light in the Forest in exchange for my honest review. Publisher: Lake Union Publishing / Brilliance Audio Published: December 13, 2022   Summary: From Melissa Payne, bestselling author of The Night of Many Endings, comes an emotional and suspenseful novel about the weight of secrets and the healing power of friends and…

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k2reader January 26, 2023

Sam by Allegra Goodman #bookreview

I purchased this book for my own personal collection. Publisher: Dial Press Published: January 3, 2023   Summary: What happens to a girl’s exuberance and wonder as she becomes a woman? This unforgettable portrait of coming-of-age offers a powerful reflection on class, addiction, parenthood, longing, and ambition. There is a girl, and her name is Sam. She adores her father, though he isn’t around much. Her mother, Courtney, struggles to…

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k2reader December 19, 2022

The Unknown Beloved by Amy Harmon #bookreview #audiobook

Thank you Brilliance Audio, #partner for the ALC of The Unknown Beloved in exchange for my honest review.  I purchased the print copy. Publisher: Brilliance Audio / Lake Union Publishing Published: April 19, 2022   Summary: From the bestselling author of Where the Lost Wander and What the Wind Knows comes the evocative story of two people whose paths collide against the backdrop of mystery, murder, and the Great Depression.…

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k2reader November 14, 2022

We Are the Light by Matthew Quick #bookreview #audiobook

Thank you Simon & Schuster Audio for the ALC and Avid Reader Press #partner, for the advanced copy of We Are the Light in exchange for my honest review.  Publisher: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster ALC Published: November 1, 2022   Summary: From Matthew Quick, the New York Times best-selling author of The Silver Linings Playbook, made into the Academy Award-winning movie starring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper, comes a poignant…

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k2reader October 31, 2022

Hester by Laurie Lico Albanese #bookreview #audiobook

Thank you Macmillan Audio/Netgalley for the ALC and St. Martin’s Press #partner, for the advanced copy of Hester in exchange for my honest review.  Publisher: St. Martin’s Press / Macmillan Audio Published: October 4, 2022   Summary: A vivid reimagining of the woman who inspired Hester Prynne, the tragic heroine of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, and a journey into the enduring legacy of New England’s witchcraft trials. Who is the real Hester Prynne?…

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k2reader October 6, 2022

The Winter Orphans by Kristin Beck #bookreview #audiobook

I purchased both this book and audiobook for my own collection. Publisher: Berkley Books / Penguin Audio Published: September 13, 2022   Summary: A poignant and ultimately triumphant novel based on the incredible true story of children who braved the formidable danger of guarded, wintry mountain passes in France to escape the Nazis, from the acclaimed author of Courage, My Love. In a remote corner of France, Jewish refugee Ella Rosenthal…

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k2reader September 28, 2022

Double Exposure by Jeannee Sacken #bookfeature #authorinterview

Thank you GetRedPrBooks & Ten16Press #partner, for the advanced copy of Double Exposure in exchange for this feature. Today, I’m happy to be featuring this book, which published yesterday. Please see what others have said about the book and learn the inspiration behind the book. And if you check out my instagram post for today, you will see that this is our October #GetRedPRBookclub Pick…if you would like to join,…

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k2reader September 27, 2022

The Cicada Tree by Robert Gwaltney #bookreview #bookclub

Thank you to GetRedPR, #partner, for a finished copy of The Cicada Tree in exchange for my honest review. Publisher: Moonshine Cove Publishing Published: February, 2022   Summary: The summer of 1956, a brood of cicadas descends upon Providence Georgia, a natural event with supernatural repercussions, unhinging the life of Analeise Newell, an eleven-year-old piano prodigy. Amidst this emergence, dark obsessions are stirred, uncanny gifts provoked, and secrets unearthed. During…

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k2reader September 22, 2022

The Thread Collectors by Shaunna J. Edwards & Alyson Richman #bookreview

Thank you HTP Books / Graydon House, #partner, for the advanced copy of The Thread Collectors in exchange for my honest review.  Publisher: Graydon House Published: August 30, 2022   SUMMARY: 1863: In a small Creole cottage in New Orleans, an ingenious young Black woman named Stella embroiders intricate maps on repurposed cloth to help enslaved men flee and join the Union Army. Bound to a man who would kill her if…

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k2reader August 28, 2022

The Violin Conspiracy by Brendan Slocumb #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

I purchased both this book and audiobook for my own collection. Publisher: Anchor Books / Random House Audio Published: February 1, 2022   Summary: A mystery about a Black classical musician whose family heirloom violin is stolen on the eve of the most prestigious classical music competition in the world. Ray McMillian loves playing the violin more than anything, and nothing will stop him from pursuing his dream of becoming…

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k2reader August 17, 2022

She’s Up to No Good by Sara Goodman Confino #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

Thank you Brilliance Audio for the ALC and GetRedPR and the author, #partner, for the finished copy of She’s Up to No Good in exchange for my honest review. Publisher: Lake Union Publishing / Brilliance Audio Published: August 1, 2022   Summary: For two women generations apart, going home will change their lives in this funny, poignant, and life-affirming novel about family, secrets, and broken hearts by the author of For the…

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k2reader August 13, 2022

A Little Hope by Ethan Joella #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

This book is from my personal collection. I borrowed the audiobook from the library. Publisher: Scribner / Simon & Schuster Audio Published: November 16, 2021   Summary: An “immersive…illuminating” (Booklist) and life-affirming novel following the residents of an idyllic Connecticut town over the course of a year, A Little Hope explores the intertwining lives of a dozen neighbors as they confront everyday desires and fears: a lost love, a stalled career, an…

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k2reader August 1, 2022

The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

Thank you Libro.fm, #partner for the ALC of The Woman in the Library in exchange for my honest review. I purchased this book for my own collection. Publisher: Poisoned Pen Press / Dreamscape Media Published: June 7, 2022   Summary: In every person’s story, there is something to hide… The ornate reading room at the Boston Public Library is quiet, until the tranquility is shattered by a woman’s terrified scream.…

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k2reader August 1, 2022

Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez #bookreview #audiobook

I purchased both this book and audiobook for my own collection. Publisher: Berkly Books / Penguin Audio Published: April 12, 2022   Summary: Inspired by true events that rocked the nation, a profoundly moving novel about a Black nurse in post-segregation Alabama who blows the whistle on a terrible wrong done to her patients, from the New York Times bestselling author of Wench. Montgomery, Alabama 1973. Fresh out of nursing school, Civil Townsend…

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k2reader July 31, 2022

Iris in the Dark by Elissa Grossell Dickey #bookreview #audiobook #bookclub

Thank you Lake Union Publishing #partner, for the finished copy of Iris in the Dark in exchange for my honest review. The audio copy is via my Kindle Unlimited subscription. Publisher: Lake Union Publishing / Brilliance Audio Published: June 7, 2022   Summary: A single mother faces her worst fear—the past—in a provocative novel of suspense by the author of The Speed of Light. Iris Jenkins knows that bad things happen.…

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k2reader July 28, 2022

Woman of Light by Kali Fajardo-Anstine #bookreview #bookclub

Thank you Libro.fm, #partner for the ALC of Woman of Light in exchange for my honest review. I purchased this book for my own collection.  Publisher: One World / Random House Audio Published: June 7, 2022   Summary: A dazzling epic of betrayal, love, and fate that spans five generations of an Indigenous Chicano family in the American West, from the author of the National Book Award Finalist Sabrina & Corina…

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k2reader July 27, 2022

A Letter in the Wall by Eileen Brill #bookreview #bookclub

Thank you to GetRedPR, #partner, for an advanced copy of The Letter in the Wall in exchange for my honest review. Publisher: Spark Press Published: May 24, 2022   Summary: It’s 1971, and Joan Dumann fears her former business partner wants her dead—but her anxiety is less about dying than it is about feeling disrespected and invalidated. As she constructs a letter about her predicament, she revisits her past. Born…

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k2reader July 14, 2022

The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis #bookreview #audiobook

Thank you Dutton, #partner, for the advanced copy of The Magnolia Palace in exchange for my honest review. I purchased the audiobook via my subscription with libro.fm. Publisher: Dutton / Penguin Audio Published: January 25, 2022   Summary: Fiona Davis, New York Times best-selling author of The Lions of Fifth Avenue, returns with a tantalizing novel about the secrets, betrayal, and murder within one of New York City’s most impressive Gilded Age mansions.…

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k2reader July 6, 2022

The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden #bookreview #audiobook #seriesreview

I purchased this book for my own personal collection. I borrowed the audiobook from the library. Publisher: Del Rey Books / Random House Audio Published: Paperback – June 27, 2017 / Audio – January 10, 2017   Summary: At the edge of the Russian wilderness, winter lasts most of the year and the snowdrifts grow taller than houses. But Vasilisa doesn’t mind–she spends the winter nights huddled around the embers…

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k2reader June 5, 2022

The Lost Summers of Newport by Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, Karen White #bookreview #audiobook

Thank you Harper Audio for the ALC and William Morrow #partner,  for the finished copy of The Lost Summers of Newport in exchange for my honest review.  Publisher: Harper Audio / William Morrow Published: May 17, 2022   Summary: From the New York Times bestselling team of Beatriz Williams, Lauren Willig, and Karen White–a novel of money and secrets set among the famous summer mansions of Newport, Rhode Island, spanning over a…

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k2reader May 22, 2022

Review: The Good Left Undone by Adriana Trigiani (audio)

Publisher: Dutton / Penguin Audio Published: April 26, 2022 Source: Print – Hardcover via Dutton / Audio via Library   Summary: From Adriana Trigiani, “a master of visual and palpable detail” (The Washington Post), comes a lush, immersive novel about three generations of Tuscan artisans with one remarkable secret. Epic in scope and resplendent with the glorious themes of identity and belonging, The Good Left Undone unfolds in breathtaking turns. Matelda, the…

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k2reader May 18, 2022

Review: Bomb Shelter: Love, time & Other Explosives by Mary Laura Philpott (audio)

Publisher: Atria Books / Simon & Schuster Audio Published: April 12, 2022 Source: Print – ARC E-copy via Netgalley / Audio – ALC via Simon & Schuster Audio   Summary: From the bestselling author of I Miss You When I Blink comes a poignant and powerful new memoir that tackles the big questions of life, death, and existential fear with humor and hope. A lifelong worrier, Philpott always kept an eye out…

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k2reader April 5, 2022

Review: Caul Baby by Morgan Jerkins

Publisher: Harper Published: April 6, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: New York Times bestselling author Morgan Jerkins makes her fiction debut with this electrifying novel, for fans of Ta-Nehisi Coates and Jacqueline Woodson, that brings to life one powerful and enigmatic family in a tale rife with secrets, betrayal, intrigue, and magic. Laila desperately wants to become a mother, but each of her previous pregnancies has ended in heartbreak. This…

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k2reader March 22, 2022

Review: Peach Blossom Spring by Melissa Fu

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company Published: March 15, 2022 Source: Personal copy   Summary: A “beautifully rendered” novel about war, migration, and the power of telling our stories, Peach Blossom Spring follows three generations of a Chinese family on their search for a place to call home (Georgia Hunter, New York Times bestselling author). “Within every misfortune there is a blessing and within every blessing, the seeds of misfortune, and so it goes, until the end…

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k2reader March 17, 2022

Review: The Paper Palace by Miranda Cowley Heller

Publisher: Riverhead Books Published: July 6, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: It is a perfect July morning, and Elle, a fifty-year-old happily married mother of three, awakens at “The Paper Palace” — the family summer place which she has visited every summer of her life. But this morning is different: last night Elle and her oldest friend Jonas crept out the back door into the darkness and had sex…

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k2reader March 6, 2022

Review: The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd

Publisher: William Morrow Published: March 15, 2022 Source: Publisher   Summary: What is the purpose of a map? Nell Young’s whole life and greatest passion is cartography. Her father, Dr. Daniel Young, is a legend in the field, and Nell’s personal hero. But she hasn’t seen or spoken to him ever since he cruelly fired her and destroyed her reputation after an argument over an old, cheap gas station highway…

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k2reader March 4, 2022

Review: Of Women and Salt by Gabriela Garcia (audio)

Publisher: Flatiron Books / Macmillan Audio Published: March 30, 2021 Source: Print – ARC Paperback via Publisher / Audio via library   Summary: A sweeping, masterful debut about a daughter’s fateful choice, a mother motivated by her own past, and a family legacy that begins in Cuba before either of them were born In present-day Miami, Jeanette is battling addiction. Daughter of Carmen, a Cuban immigrant, she is determined to…

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k2reader March 4, 2022

Review: Sanctuary: A Memoir by Emily Rapp Black (audio)

Publisher: Random House / Random House Audio Published: January 19, 2021 Source: Print – Personal Copy / Audio via library   Summary: From the New York Times best-selling author of The Still Point of the Turning World comes an incisive memoir about how she came to question and redefine the concept of resilience after the trauma of her first child’s death. “Congratulations on the resurrection of your life”, a colleague wrote to Emily Rapp…

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k2reader February 27, 2022

Review: I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys (print/audio)

Publisher: Philomel Books / Penguin Random House Audio Published: February 1, 2022 Source: Print – Hardcopy via Publisher / Audio via library   Summary: A gut-wrenching, startling window into communist Romania and the citizen spy network that devastated a nation, from the number one New York Times best-selling, award-winning author of Salt to the Sea and Between Shades of Gray. Romania, 1989. Communist regimes are crumbling across Europe. Seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu dreams of becoming a writer,…

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k2reader February 9, 2022

Review: Her Hidden Genius by Marie Benedict

Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark Published: January 25, 2022 Source: Hardcover via Publisher   Summary: From the New York Times bestselling author of The Mystery of Mrs. Christie and The Only Woman in the Room. Rosalind Franklin has always been an outsider―brilliant, but different. Whether working at the laboratory she adored in Paris or toiling at a university in London, she feels closest to the science, those unchanging laws of physics and chemistry that guide…

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k2reader January 23, 2022

Review: The Last House on the Street by Diane Chamberlain (audio)

Publisher: St. Martin’s Press / Macmillan Audio Published: January 11, 2022 Source: Print – ARC Paperback via St. Martin’s Press / Audio via library   Summary: A community’s past sins rise to the surface in New York Times bestselling author Diane Chamberlain’s The Last House on the Street when two women, a generation apart, find themselves bound by tragedy and an unsolved, decades-old mystery. 1965 Growing up in the well-to-do town of Round Hill,…

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k2reader January 14, 2022

Review Her Body and Other Parties: Stories by Carmen Maria Machado

Publisher: Graywolf Press Published: October 3, 2017 Source: Personal copy   Summary: In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape…

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k2reader January 11, 2022

Review: The Sweetest Remedy by Jane Igharo

Publisher: Berkley Books Published: September 28, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: When a woman travels to Nigeria to attend the funeral of the father she never knew, she meets her extravagant family for the first time, a new and inspiring love interest, and discovers parts of herself she didn’t know were missing, from Jane Igharo, the acclaimed author of Ties That Tether. Hannah Bailey has never known her father, the…

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k2reader January 8, 2022

Review: A Million Things by Emily Spurr

Publisher: Berkley Published: August 24, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: A bursting, heartfelt, debut following fifty-five days in the life of ten-year-old Rae, who must look after herself and her dog when her mother disappears. For as long as Rae can remember, it’s been her and Mum, and their dog, Splinter; a small, deliberately unremarkable, family. They have their walks, their cooking routines, their home. Sometimes Mum disappears for…

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k2reader January 4, 2022

Review: The Removed by Brandon Hobson

Publisher: Ecco Published: February 2, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: Steeped in Cherokee myths and history, a novel about a fractured family reckoning with the tragic death of their son long ago—from National Book Award finalist Brandon Hobson In the fifteen years since their teenage son, Ray-Ray, was killed in a police shooting, the Echota family has been suspended in private grief. The mother, Maria, increasingly struggles to manage…

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k2reader December 23, 2021

Review: The Holiday Swap by Maggie Knox

Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons Published: October 5, 2021 Source: Personal copy   Summary: The International Bestseller–A feel-good, holiday rom com about identical twins who swap lives twelve days before Christmas–perfect for fans of Christina Lauren’s In a Holidaze and Josie Silver’s One Day in December All they want for Christmas is a different life. When chef Charlie Goodwin gets hit on the head on the L.A. set of her reality baking show, she…

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k2reader December 12, 2021

Review: Wish You Were Here by Jodi Picoult

Publisher: Ballantine Books Published: November 30, 2021 Source: ARC E-copy via Publisher/Netgalley   Summary: From the #1 New York Times bestselling author comes a deeply moving novel about the resilience of the human spirit in a moment of crisis. Diana O’Toole is perfectly on track. She will be married by thirty, done having kids by thirty-five, and move out to the New York City suburbs, all while climbing the professional…

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k2reader December 7, 2021

Review: Last One Out Shut Off the Lights by Stephanie Soileau

Publisher: Little Brown and Company Published: July 7, 2020 Source: Personal copy   Summary: This “outstanding” debut story collection from a rising star reveals Louisiana and its characters with stark honesty and empathy as they grapple with homesickness, desperation, and desire (Peter Orner). Last One Out Shut Off the Lights is a vivid portrait of the last-chance towns of southwest Louisiana, where oil development, industrial pollution, dying wetlands, and the ever-present…

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k2reader November 28, 2021

Review: The Women of Chateau Lafayette by Stephanie Dray (audio)

Publisher: Berkley Books / Penguin Audio Published: March 30, 2021 Source: Print – Personal copy / Audio – via library   Summary: An epic saga from New York Times bestselling author Stephanie Dray based on the true story of an extraordinary castle in the heart of France and the remarkable women bound by its legacy in three of humanity’s darkest hours Most castles are protected by powerful men. This one…

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k2reader November 14, 2021

Series Review: The Rainer Series by Jamie McGillen

  This month, the online bookclub I co-host, #mommaleighellenbookclub, selected In the Heart of Paradise as one of our selections. Because it is the third book in Jamie McGillen’s series and I had not read the previous two, and me being me, I knew I had to read them first and I’m so glad I did. That being said, I decided to do all three reviews in one post, rather…

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k2reader November 7, 2021

Review: The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles (audio)

Publisher: Viking Books / Penguin Audio Published: October 5, 2021 Source: Print – Personal copy via BOTM / Audio – Personal copy via Libro.fm   Summary: The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s America In June, 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of…

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k2reader October 25, 2021

Review: The Vanished Days by Susanna Kearsley

Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark Published: October 5, 2021 Source: Paperback via Publisher   Summary: In the autumn of 1707, old enemies from the Highlands to the Borders are finding common ground as they join to protest the new Union with England. At the same time, the French are preparing to launch an invasion to bring the young exiled Jacobite king back to Scotland to reclaim his throne, and in Edinburgh the…

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k2reader October 21, 2021

Review: The Stillwater Girls by Minka Kent (audio)

Publisher: Brilliance Audio Published: April 9, 2019 Source: Personal copy   Summary: Two sisters raised in fear are about to find out why in a chilling novel of psychological suspense from the author of The Thinnest Air. Ignorant of civilization and cautioned against its evils, nineteen-year-old Wren and her two sisters, Sage and Evie, were raised in off-the-grid isolation in a primitive cabin in upstate New York. When the youngest grows…

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k2reader October 5, 2021

Review: The Rose Code by Kate Quinn (audio)

Publisher: William Morrow / Harper Audio Published: March 9, 2021 Source: Print – ARC Paperback via Publisher / Audio – via library   Summary: The New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Huntress and The Alice Network returns with another heart-stopping World War II story of three female code breakers at Bletchley Park and the spy they must root out after the war is over. 1940. As England prepares to fight the Nazis, three very…

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k2reader September 23, 2021

Review: The Last Thing He Told Me Laura Dave (audio)

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio Published: May 4, 2021 Source: Publisher   Summary: We all have stories we never tell. Before Owen Michaels disappears, he manages to smuggle a note to his beloved wife of one year: Protect her. Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows exactly to whom the note refers: Owen’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child. Bailey, who wants absolutely…

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k2reader September 21, 2021

Feature: Literati Book Club

A few months ago, I decided to join @Literati, an online book club that is unlike anything I’ve been part of before. Quite a few of my bookstagram friends were already part of this and I knew how much they enjoyed it, so I finally took the plunge and I’m so glad I did. This unique book club offers 13 different clubs that you get to choose from and the…

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k2reader September 3, 2021

Blog Tour & Review: Rock Paper Scissors by Alice Feeney

Publisher: Flatiron Books Published: August 7, 2021 Source: ARC Paperback via Publisher   Summary: Think you know the person you married? Think again… Things have been wrong with Mr. and Mrs. Wright for a long time. When Adam and Amelia win a weekend away to Scotland, it might be just what their marriage needs. Self-confessed workaholic and screenwriter Adam Wright has lived with face blindness his whole life. He can’t…

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k2reader August 30, 2021

Review: The People We Keep by Allison Larkin (audio)

Publisher: Gallery Books / Simon & Schuster Audio Published: August 3, 2021 Source: Print: Personal copy via BOTM / Audio via Library   Summary: The People we Keep is about a young songwriter longing to find a home in the world. Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a run-down motorhome, flunking out of school, and picking up shifts at the local diner. But when April realizes…

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k2reader August 27, 2021

Review: We Were Never Here by Andrea Bartz (audio)

Publisher: Ballantine Books / Random House Audio Published: August 3rd, 2021 Source: Print & Audio – Personal copy   Summary: An annual backpacking trip has deadly consequences in a chilling new novel from the bestselling author of The Lost Night and The Herd. Emily is having the time of her life–she’s in the mountains of Chile with her best friend, Kristen, on their annual reunion trip, and the women are feeling closer than…

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k2reader August 23, 2021

Review: Sisters in Arms by Kaia Alderson (audio)

Publisher: William Morrow / Harper Audio Published: August 3, 2021 Source: Print – Personal Copy / Audio via Library   Summary: Kaia Alderson’s debut historical fiction novel reveals the untold, true story of the Six Triple Eight, the only all-Black battalion of the Women’s Army Corps, who made the dangerous voyage to Europe to ensure American servicemen received word from their loved ones during World War II. Grace Steele and…

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