Review: Crime and Periodicals (Green Valley Library Series Book 2) by Nora Everly

Crime and Periodicals by Nora Everly
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Hot Cop and the Shy Librarian

This is the second book in this series of connected books, which stand alone. The books all contain the same characters and they all have shared history, but the other books aren’t required to make sense of this one. The series is a spin-off from Penny Reid’s Winston Brother Series, and is written by different authors.

I really enjoyed the first book in this series and was intrigued by the characters selected for this book and decided to give it a go despite never having read anything by this author before. I’m glad I gave it a chance because I enjoyed it a lot.

Sabrina is incredibly shy and suffers from anxiety and panic attacks. She is an assistant librarian and hides from nearly everyone, even at work. She lost her mother when she was a young child and later lost her sister when she was 17. Since the death of her sister, she has raised her sister’s children along with her father at the family ranch. Sabrina's father is a pretty famous surgeon and popular in the small town where they live. The two eldest children they are raising are now in their teens and will graduate in the next couple of years. They are happy and well adjusted young people. Harry the youngest was born the day his birth mother died and sees Sabrina as his mother, he is also
on the autistic spectrum.

Wyatt is one of four brothers and is the odd one out. The others all work for the family construction firm but after he got injured and couldn’t play football anymore he became a cop in Nashville, where he attended university. He recently moved back to Green Valley and became a deputy sheriff after his now ex-wife left him for a country music star and decided she didn’t want anything to do with their adorable daughters. In Green Valley, he gets help from his mother and his new job allows him greater flexibility to be a parent.

When Wyatt bumps into Sabrina on a traffic stop he falls for her instantly. He’s great with Harry and later on his daughters are also great with him. When he asks her for a date her shyness overwhelms her, but he is kind and gently persistent.

This is a very sweet love story that is as much about Sabrina becoming less afraid of the world and the people in it as it is about the romance. It’s also not surprising that the children are a big part of the story and they are incredibly sweet and funny.

I like that there is great family support for Sabrina. Her relationship with her 16-year-old, highly intelligent niece is more like a friendship than that of a parent and daughter. Sabrina also starts to find friendship outside her family because of the strides she makes in facing the world.

It’s a really lovely story and I’ll definitely be looking for other books by this author.

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Bourbon Bliss (Bootleg Springs Series Book 4) by Claire Kingsley and Lucy Score

Bourbon Bliss by Claire Kingsley & Lucy Score
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Genius and The Football Player

I’d probably give this book 4.5 ⭐️ if I could.

This is the fourth book in a continuing series and you need to read the previous books in order to understand the overarching plotlines, even if each book covers one couple’s story. The previous books will also give a deeper insight into the characters, who all know each other or are related, their shared history and the history of the very quirky town in which they live. The couple gets their HEA by the end of the book, but the overarching plot continues in future books.

June Tucker is a genius. She works as an actuarial consultant and finds numbers so much easier to understand than people and their emotions. Her father is the town sheriff and her sister is a sheriff’s deputy. June is seen as ‘odd’ in a town of quite strange people. Though it doesn’t explicitly state it, there are very strong hints that June is neurodivergent. She comes across as cold and analytical and though the latter part of that statement is true, the former part is not. June feels things deeply but doesn’t know how to process those feelings or understand other people’s feelings. She asks questions when she doesn’t understand and that emphasises her ‘odd’-ness.

In a town filled with unusual characters, she is more widely accepted than she would be elsewhere, especially as her sister loves her and Cass and Scarlett, Cass’ best friend, have always included June in their social activities to the extent if she was invited, they wouldn’t go. Their loyalty has led to a widespread acceptance of June and her unusual ways amongst the townspeople. June is incredibly grateful for her acceptance and has invested heavily in Bootleg Springs, using her logical and analytical mind and high earnings to bring small businesses to the town, and help them grow.

One of June’s obsessions is sports statistics, especially football stats and has run a fantasy football league for years, alway winning because of her in depth understanding of statistics. One of her favourite players has always been George Thompson, a wide receiver. When he hurts his knee and is forced to retire she doesn’t win the league for the first time. When he walks into Bootleg Springs she is stunned and very very attracted to him, which takes her by surprise. What surprises her, even more, is that he seems to feel the same way about her.

George has had a very successful career until his knee injury and has earned enough to retire comfortably, so when his sister visits an unusual town called Bootleg Springs and tells him about it and the healing reputation of their hot springs he decides to go and visit her there and try out the benefits of the springs. When he meets June is he knocked for six by the unusual and intriguing woman and he can’t decide if he finds her intelligence or her bluntness more fascinating. As a successful and popular football player most of his life he has been targeted by the kind of women who like to have expensive things and are willing to do anything, including pretend to have feelings they don’t, to get them. He has never truly trusted a girlfriend but knows that June won’t lie about her feelings right from their initial meeting.

If you’ve read my reviews before you will know that I enjoy reading about neurodivergent people, especially those in romance novels because I know and love several people who think in this way. I really enjoyed that George accepted June exactly as she was straight away. He never believed that she should change who she was or how she saw things unless it made her unhappy. He was able to help her understand herself and her experience of life in a way no one else ever had because he accepted her and cared about her. The scene where he explained why dancing is one of his favourite activities and got her to appreciate it too is a particularly good example of why I loved his character.

George is by no means perfect and messes up a couple of times, but the people of Bootleg Springs like him enough to help him out when he’s a bit lost. He is accepted by the town really quickly because they know he appreciates the way things are in Bootleg Springs. He is embraced by the Bodine and Tucker families very quickly because of June.

As well as the romance the overarching plot regarding the missing girl from 12 years ago has a few major twists in this book. By the end of the book, you are scratching your head much more than at the start of it. It’s this aspect of the series that keeps me reading each book because I really want to know what happens next.

I really do enjoy this series and each book I read emphasises why.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Pandemonium (World Fallen Series Book 1) by Susanna Strom

Pandemonium by Susanna Strom
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Devastating Pandemic

I’d probably give this book 4.5 ⭐️ if I could.

This is the first book in a continuing series. The book ends at a natural break, but there is definitely a lot more story to tell in future books.

I wasn’t sure about this book because it’s about a dystopia that was brought about by a flu pandemic. This is still a little close to home, even with the vaccine and life starting to get a little bit more normal again. However, the flu is different enough for it not to cause me nightmares (I have Long Covid). However if the pandemic has caused you emotional difficulties beyond going stir crazy, this might trip your triggers. The author wrote this book in 2019 so it’s not based on actual events.

When the governor closes down everything in the state due to a flu pandemic, MacKenzie decides to go to her cousin’s house. He is a neurodivergent prepper and they don’t have anyone else except each other. Kenzie’s ex-boyfriend, best friend and her boyfriend head off to their parent’s houses as they all live in the same gated community and believe they will be safe there.

When Kenzie gets to her cousin, Miles’, house she finds him behind his high fenced garden and house with vegetables, chickens and everything he can find to make things easier for them both in the event of everything shutting down. He has been meticulous in his preparations. He also has a neighbour who has been helping him, Ripper, who is a biker. He’s also an ex-army ranger. He’s tough, determined and ruthless. He’s also incredibly kind and gentle with Miles and he and Kenzie click immediately.

This is not a happy book. It’s filled with death, danger and sickness. However, it’s also got affection, loyalty and family. There are some quite emotionally challenging parts to the book and not all the characters we meet make it. This book is equal parts emotionally challenging and gripping. I couldn’t stop reading it because I needed to know what happened to them all next.

As the characters find their way in a difficult world, they also reveal parts of themselves to each other. They talk about their childhoods and their loved ones and we hear about why they react the way they do to certain things. Each of the characters is fully realised and behaves consistently with their history and personalities, which is always something I look for, particularly with a book like this. I really liked all the characters, even when they weren’t behaving perfectly they behaved in a way I understood, even if I didn’t like it.

The book was really well-paced and structured. It’s told from multiple points of view so we get to see the events that happen away from the compound. This also helps us to understand the characters a little better as we see things through their eyes and also see the other characters from the outside to give us a different view of them and their behaviour.

This is a really good book and I can’t wait to read the next one in the series.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Forty (Steel Bones Motorcycle Club Series Book 5) by Cate C Wells

Forty by Cate C. Wells
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Second Chances

This book is part of a continuing story arc and there is information in it that helps move that story on. However, it could probably be read as a standalone with only a little bit of confusion in a couple of places.

This book needs a caution warning, there are descriptions of sexual abuse of a teenager which may cause emotional disturbance. If this is the case, you might want to skip this book.

Neveah has only ever had one good thing in her life, Forty. She had him for three years when she was a teenager and then he left her to go into the army, not realising what he was leaving her to. She acted up and got cut out of the Steel Bones MC family and was forced to leave. It’s been 10 years and she’s had to come back to the only family she’s got that’s worth anything, her half brother Lou. She’s running from one of her many bad choices in men, only this one happens to work for a mob family.

Forty had a pretty rubbish upbringing. The club practically raised him. He went into the army so he could give Neveah everything. He wanted a home and a family and he didn’t think he could do it without some qualifications and the army would give him those. Only when it all fell apart with Neveah he had nothing so he became a ranger, until he was medically discharged. Now he’s looking to make that family he’s always longed for and he can’t find the right woman. Then Neveah comes back and the club hates her.

Neveah is a bundle of energy, bouncing and fizzing through life. Diagnosed ADHD, but unmedicated Neveah can’t focus properly and gets bored, all of which leads her into trouble. Once more this author gets inside the head of her characters, drawing them beautifully for us to be captivated by. She writes a neuroatypical person incredibly well, so you begin to understand a little of what their brains are like.

Forty is the loyal soldier, who always puts other’s first, especially the club. He’s stoic and pensive and always thinks before he speaks. Neveah is his opposite who draws out his smiles. It hurt when it imploded before but something still draws him to her smile.

This book tells the story of how painful subjects can twist you up and force you to keep secrets. Those secrets multiply until you can’t tell anyone what’s going on and things whirl out of control. It tells of being set against the people you love because you can’t bear that they might think less of you. Where you would rather be hated for a lie, than for the truth.

I am really enjoying this series and this author’s way of looking at the world.

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Erratic (Arcane Mage Series Book 3) by TS Snow

Erratic by T.S. Snow
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Plot Thickens

This book is mainly about Char, her relationships, the men who surround her and their feelings towards her. We also get to learn a bit more about Bastille and the Necromancers, though there is still tonnes of information about them and their abilities still to be uncovered. Whilst finding out about the necromancers Char finds out there is an awful lot about her world that she didn’t really understand because of the stranglehold the houses have over information.

Whilst Char’s magic has gone on the fritz, she has to remain in hiding. She’s also trying to keep her head down at work because she broke protocol to rescue one of the house heirs, without backup, from a murderous relative whilst having erratic magic.

I really enjoyed the way that this book contributed to the layers of information and character building that has gone on in the series so far. The plot, world-building and character development are woven together cleverly. Whilst I’m enjoying the slow build, the plot was a little slow in this book, which often happens even in the best series because other stuff needs to be focused on, in this case, the relationships and world-building.

I have to say that I really like Bastille. I think he’s a fantastic character and a great bedrock for Char, who to be honest needs someone to bring her down to earth. Bastille seems to be the mage for the job as he’s endlessly patient with her. To be honest, as much as I love Char as a character I think I’d want to bash my head against a brick wall if I spent too much time with her in real life because focusing seems to be a skill she is lacking unless she’s sat in front of a computer.

I’m looking forward to the next book because we still have much to learn about the problems in the Arcane world. We don’t know who is running the Rebellion, who has been targeting Char and who killed Annie. So much information, so little time!

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Atlas & Addie (Rojo, TX Series Book 2) by Cee Bowerman

Atlas & Addie: Rojo, TX Book 2 by Cee Bowerman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Nerd and The Social Worker

It probably helps understand this story if you’ve read the Texas Knights MC and Texas Kings MC books. There is also a cross over character from Conner Brothers Construction so essentially this is a book you will understand more of if you have read all of the author’s previous works.

Atlas is the stepson of Grunt, the brother in law of Lout and Summer and Willow’s brother. He is referred to in other books but was more of a background character. He is a nerd, he writes and sells computer programs, loves playing online games throughout the night and doesn’t really socialise much outside of his family (which admittedly is large).

Addie is a social worker. She’s also the sister of Lisa who stayed behind in Utah when Lisa left. Her father was a polygamist and she was one of 11 children. Her mother got her out when she was still quite young and it’s what led her into social work. After problems back home, she and her brother Warren, Lisa’s twin brother, have decided to join Lisa in Rojo to start afresh. They move into a house near Atlas and he and Addie are immediately attracted.

It’s a typical Cee Bowerman story filled with sweet chaos, a little bit of danger and some passion. There is also a man being dumb 🤦‍♀️ However, there is the usual HEA and a really sweet epilogue.

I really enjoyed getting to see more about Warren and his relationship with his biological daughter, and how people interacted with him when his behaviour was atypical. I really liked seeing him interact with Atlas’ genius siblings.

I did feel at times that this book was just one huge intersection of books because of the storylines that were discussed during the course of the book, from previous books/series. It did detract a little from the pace of the narrative, but it will appeal to the fans who get to nerd out over all the other people they’ve already read about.

I did enjoy the book, maybe slightly less than others by this author, but it was still entertaining enough to give it 4 ⭐️ and know I’ll get the next book in the series.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Hitting the Wall (Stonecut County Series Book 1) by Cate C Wells

Hitting the Wall by Cate C. Wells
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Even Better Than The Blurb

I decided to try this book, based purely on the blurb because I’d never read anything by this author before. I thought it would be your standard small-town romance but it was so much more than I thought it would be. If you read a lot (and I do) you read the signals given in the blurb in a certain way. Your brain takes shortcuts and decides what a book is going to be like and if it fits your criteria you download it. This book ticked boxes for the mood I was in and when I read it got something a lot more than I was expecting.

This is a small town second chance romance, but it’s also about Shay, a mother who has been forced to step up to the plate at a really young age to fight for everything her daughter needs. She was run out of town, aged 17 and pregnant, and forced to go back to her neglectful mother. 7 years later circumstances are such that she feels forced to return to her deceased grandfather’s trailer to live for a few months whilst she saves up enough money to start again somewhere fresh.

A few weeks into her return the father of her daughter, deputy sheriff and town golden boy, Kellum, sees them and recognises his daughter. A daughter he didn’t know existed. Kellum is divorced from his high school sweetheart and his boss and godfather is under investigation by the FBI. The shine is starting to tarnish on his golden life and when he finds his daughter and Shay he grabs onto his chance of real happiness with both hands.

See it all sounds good doesn’t it. Except it isn’t, because the men who ran Shay out of town are still there, still doing the same sorts of things and these men are Kellum’s beloved family. Shay doesn’t trust the situation and even though all she wants is her daughter’s happiness, she can’t help but want a little happiness too, but she doesn’t trust she’ll be allowed to have and keep it.

I love how nuanced this book is. There are so many layers peeled back on small-town living and how different the experience is for those who have money and power and those who do not. It explores how hard things are when good people in power do nothing and let the bad people rule the roost. It explores how different the experience is of having a child with special needs when you have money and power and when you do not, even in a small town where resources are not as stretched as in a big city.

I think this book especially resonated with me because my family has experience with facing the educational establishment with special needs children. I recognised some of the battles Shay fought, even though I’m in a different country. I’ve also been the poor person surrounded by people with money and power and it’s an uncomfortable place to be, even when those people are good.

This book isn’t just a small-town romance it’s much more layered and challenging. I couldn’t stop reading it, it sucked me it and my brain won’t stop whirring with it. I’m so glad this is the start of a series, I’m definitely reading the rest of it because this book starts a chain of events I can’t wait to see resolved. The characters are amazingly complex and layered and the supporting characters are still convincing and obviously will come into their own in future books.

Now I have to go back and read all about Kellum’s older brother who’s a member of an MC (another of my favourite genres) as I’m intrigued to know how the author has made that genre much more than usual.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Always Only You (Bergman Brothers Series Book 2) by Chloe Liese

Always Only You by Chloe Liese
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Inclusionary Romance Done Well

I’d probably give this book 4.5 ⭐️ if I could.

I’ll start off by saying I am very impressed with how well this author wrote about disability. As a woman who became disabled in my 20s I can understand the FMC, Frankie, and how she views living with an invisible illness and how people view her. I also love several neurodivergent people and seeing how well this author described living with having a different view of the world and how it affects themselves and those around them I was elated. This book reveals so well how people whose bodies and brains work differently from the norm are whole and worthy of love.

On top of all that, the disability isn’t the star of the show. The FMC has let how people have treated her in the past alter the way she views people who may have the power to hurt her in the future, but we all do that to a certain extent. The way her brain works differently also affects the way she approaches relationships because she’s unable to comprehend the more nuanced expressions of other people’s emotions.

Setting these facts aside, this is actually a really sweet love story. Frankie is smart and resourceful. She’s always on point with her job, which she adores, and though she only has a couple of close friends, she loves them fiercely. I love her brilliant mind and her determination to work through her body’s limitations.

The MMC, Ren, is a star ice hockey player, for the team that Frankie does the social media for. He’s always smiling, he’s kind, incredibly professional,, adores his huge Swedish-American family and has has an unrequited crush on Frankie since he met her 3 years ago, but his professionalism prevents him from making a move on her.

When Frankie gets the opportunity to leave her job to go to law school things shift. Things happen to make her see Ren in a slightly different light and Ren finally sees his opportunity to make a move.

I adored Ren, he’s an amazing character. He’s sweet, funny, kind and patient. He’s this fantastic blend of a physically powerful and competent hockey player, with a shy sweet nerd who loves Shakespeare.

Both these characters are utterly unique and I loved them both. When you love characters this much the plot almost doesn’t matter, but I like the way this book was paced. This was completely about their feelings for one another and working their way together. There were no big dramas with exes or families, no huge misunderstandings, just two people working through their emotions and history to reach each other.

This book reminds me a little of Mariana Zapata’s work. It’s a little spicier than Zapata’s work, but it has the same deft hand at character building and emotional layering.

This is the first book I’ve read by this author and I will be reading more.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.

Review: Ford's Rise: Party time with Ford Brothers, Alpha-Bits and Alexia (Badass Security Council Series Book 11) by L Ann Marie

Ford's Rise: Party time with Ford Brothers, Alpha-Bits and Alexia (Badass Security Council) by L. Ann Marie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Web’s Story

For those of us who have been on the long journey through the BSC books, you will probably feel like I do about Web. He’s a wonderfully empathetic character. He’s kind, sweet and enormously intelligent. He’s also sacrificed everything willingly for his young charges, the Alpha-Bits. I love that he finally gets his ‘One’ in this book.

Web is not exactly a straight forward understandable guy. He’s highly intelligent but grew up in a orphanage and therefore didn’t really learn how to make family connections because he was outside of the normal parameters of the other inhabitants of his group home. He has always stated that when he took on the care of the Alpha-Bits he learnt about family from them and he has always put them before his own happiness, though much of his happiness has been derived from their happiness. It’s no surprise that his ‘One’ is slightly atypical.

We first met Alexia in her role at EROPs, with the FBI. She is neurodiverse and diagnosed as having Asperger’s Syndrome, or high functioning Autism (which are basically the same thing). She has lived a life of isolation and hasn’t really had any support from her family, in fact she didn’t believe she had any. Becoming involved with BSC was the first time she felt really part of a family, though she had friends that she worked with in the past. It’s only once she joins BSC that she starts to form true connections.

As is often the case with these books, Alexia and Web getting together is pretty straight forward. The romance part of these books often takes a back seat to personal growth. The relationship is part of that growth and this is why it’s important. Learning to be part of a community and family is just as important as forming a romantic bond.

In this book we see Web really grasp hold of his family of blood and choice and accept that his role is important to many people. We also see more of the Alpha-Bits come into their own, especially Alder who really steps up into his role as Little Pres.

I enjoyed the slower pace of this book, as it was much less high octane than usual, but I did find it difficult to process some of the speech patterns that the author often uses for the Alpha-Bits and also, in this case, for Alexia. The choppy way of speaking with incorrect grammar is definitely a stylistic choice, but it is sometimes hard to process, especially when the majority is written in this way. However, I do love the Alpha-Bits so waded through it and still found pleasure in the book. I just wish that the author could accept that highly intelligent Alpha-Bits would learn how to speak more fluidly several years into being found and become more active socially.

Borrow Free From Kindle Unlimited

Buy From Amazon UK

Buy From Amazon US

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, made after using the above links.