Skip to main content

Reviews

Reviews

by Jamie Brenner - Fiction, Women's Fiction

For decades, the Hollander Estates winery has been the premier destination for lavish parties and romantic day trips on the North Fork of Long Island. But behind the lush vineyards and majestic estate house, the Hollander family fortunes have suffered, and the threat of a sale brings old wounds to the surface. For matriarch Vivian, she fears that selling their winery to strangers could expose a dark secret she's harbored for decades. Meanwhile, her daughter, Leah, finds her marriage at a crossroads and returns home for a sorely needed escape. And granddaughter Sadie runs to the vineyard looking for inspiration. But when Sadie uncovers journals from Vivian's old book club dedicated to scandalous novels of decades past, she realizes that this might be the distraction they all need.

by Christine Mangan - Fiction, Historical Fiction, Historical Thriller, Literary Fiction, Psychological Suspense, Psychological Thriller, Suspense, Thriller

It’s 1966, and Frankie Croy retreats to her friend’s vacant palazzo in Venice. Years have passed since the initial success of Frankie’s debut novel, and she has spent her career trying to live up to the expectations. Now, after a particularly scathing review of her most recent work, she needs to recharge and get re-inspired. Then Gilly appears. A precocious young admirer eager to make friends, Gilly seems determined to insinuate herself into Frankie’s solitary life. But there’s something about the young woman that gives Frankie pause. How much of what Gilly tells her is the truth? As a series of lies and revelations emerge, the lives of these two women will be tragically altered as the catastrophic 1966 flooding of Venice ravages the city.

by Brittany Ackerman - Fiction, Women's Fiction

They're not the most popular freshmen at their Florida prep school, but at least everyone knows their name(s). The Brittanys. Brittany Rosenberg drives her golf cart around her subdivision to meet boys. Brittany Gottlieb insists you can't lose your virginity if you haven't gotten your period. (She heard it somewhere!). Brittany Tomassi is from New York. Brittany Jensen once threw her tampon into a stranger's swimming pool. She is the greatest person in the whole wide world --- at least as far as the fifth Brittany, our narrator, is concerned. Even within their friend group, she and Jensen are a duo. But Jensen's interests may be diverging from her friends'. And within our narrator's own family, life-changing events may be taking shape --- events that only years later, she has the perspective to see.

by Kristen Arnett - Fiction

If she’s being honest, Sammie Lucas is scared of her son. Working from home in the close quarters of their Florida house, she lives with one wary eye peeled on Samson, a sullen, unknowable boy who resists her every attempt to bond with him. Uncertain in her own feelings about motherhood, she tries her best while growing increasingly resentful of Monika, her confident but absent wife. As Samson grows from feral toddler to surly teenager, Sammie’s life begins to deteriorate into a mess of unruly behavior, and her struggle to create a picture-perfect queer family unravels. When her son’s hostility finally spills over into physical aggression, Sammie must confront her role in the mess --- and the possibility that it will never be clean again.

by Kiese Laymon - Fiction

In 2013, after an on-stage meltdown during a nationally televised quiz contest, 14-year-old Citoyen “City” Coldson becomes an overnight YouTube celebrity. The next day, he’s sent to stay with his grandmother in the small coastal community of Melahatchie, where a young girl named Baize Shephard has disappeared. Before leaving, City is given a strange book called Long Division, which is set in 1985. This version of City travels into the future, and steals a laptop and cell phone from an orphaned teenage rapper called Baize Shephard. They take these items with them to 1964 to help another time-traveler they meet to protect his family from the Ku Klux Klan. City’s two stories converge in the work shed behind his grandmother’s house, where he discovers the key to Baize’s disappearance.

by Ava Reid - Fantasy, Fiction, Historical Fantasy, Historical Fiction

In her forest-veiled pagan village, Évike is the only woman without power, making her an outcast clearly abandoned by the gods. The villagers blame her corrupted bloodline --- her father was a Yehuli man, one of the much-loathed servants of the fanatical king. When soldiers arrive from the Holy Order of Woodsmen to claim a pagan girl for the king’s blood sacrifice, Évike is betrayed by her fellow villagers and surrendered. But when monsters attack the Woodsmen and their captive en route, slaughtering everyone but Évike and the cold, one-eyed captain, they have no choice but to rely on each other. Except he’s no ordinary Woodsman --- he’s the disgraced prince, Gáspár Bárány, whose father needs pagan magic to consolidate his power.

by Colleen Oakley - Fiction, Women's Fiction

Piper Parrish's life on Frick Island --- a tiny, remote town smack in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay --- is nearly perfect. Well, aside from one pesky detail: Her darling husband, Tom, is dead. When Tom's crab boat capsized and his body wasn't recovered, Piper did a most peculiar thing: carried on as if her husband was not only still alive, but right there beside her. Anders Caldwell’s career is not going well. But when he gets an assignment to travel to the remote Frick Island and cover their boring annual Cake Walk fundraiser, he stumbles upon a much more fascinating tale: an entire town pretending to see and interact with a man who does not actually exist.

by Zakiya Dalila Harris - Fiction, Suspense, Thriller, Women's Fiction

Twenty-six-year-old editorial assistant Nella Rogers is tired of being the only Black employee at Wagner Books. Fed up with the isolation and microaggressions, she’s thrilled when Harlem-born and bred Hazel starts working in the cubicle beside hers. They’ve only just started comparing natural hair care regimens, though, when a string of uncomfortable events elevates Hazel to Office Darling, and Nella is left in the dust. Then the notes begin to appear on Nella’s desk: LEAVE WAGNER. NOW. It’s hard to believe Hazel is behind these hostile messages. But as Nella starts to spiral and obsess over the sinister forces at play, she soon realizes that there’s a lot more at stake than just her career.

by Elyssa Friedland - Fiction, Humor, Women's Fiction

In its heyday, The Golden Hotel was the crown jewel of the hotter-than-hot Catskills vacation scene. For more than 60 years, the Goldman and Weingold families have presided over this glamorous resort that served as a second home for well-heeled guests and celebrities. But the Catskills are not what they used to be --- and neither is the relationship between the Goldmans and the Weingolds. As the facilities and management begin to fall apart, a tempting offer to sell forces the two families together again to make a heart-wrenching decision. Can they save their beloved Golden, or is it too late? Long-buried secrets emerge, new dramas and financial scandal erupt, and everyone from the traditional grandparents to the millennial grandchildren wants a say in the hotel’s future.

by Alexandria Bellefleur - Comedy, Fiction, Romance

Brendon Lowell loves love. It’s why he created a dating app to help people find their one true pairing and why he’s convinced “the one” is out there, even if he hasn’t met her yet. When his sister's best friend turns up in Seattle unexpectedly, Brendon jumps at the chance to hang out with her. Annie booked a spur-of-the-moment trip to Seattle to spend time with friends before moving across the globe. She’s not looking for love, especially with her best friend’s brother. Getting involved would be a terrible idea --- her stay is temporary and he wants forever --- but when Brendon learns that Annie has given up on dating, he’s determined to prove that romance is real.