To Read, or Not To Read

The Golden Hour by Malia Zaidi Publication Date: March 26, 2019 BookBaby eBook & Paperback; 398 Pages Genre: Historical Mystery Series: Lady Evelyn Mystery, Book 4 Lady Evelyn Carlisle has barely arrived in London when familial duty calls her away again. Her cousin Gemma is desperate for help with her ailing mother before her imminent wedding, which Evelyn knew nothing about! Aunt Agnes in tow, she journeys to Scotland, expecting to find Malmo Manor in turmoil. To her surprise, her Scottish family has been keeping far more secrets than the troubled state of their matriarch. Adding to the tension in the house a neighbor has opened his home, Elderbrooke Park, as a retreat for artistic veterans of the Great War. This development does not sit well with everyone in the community. Is the suspicion towards the residents a catalyst for murder? A tragedy at Elderbrooke Park's May Day celebration awakens Evelyn's sleuthing instinct, which is strengthened when the

The True Queen (Sorcerer Royal #2) by Zen Cho Paperback, 384 pages Published March 12th 2019 by Ace Books 9780425283417 Summary When sisters Muna and Sakti wake up on the peaceful beach of the island of Janda Baik, they can’t remember anything, except that they are bound as only sisters can be. They have been cursed by an unknown enchanter, and slowly Sakti starts to fade away. The only hope of saving her is to go to distant Britain, where the Sorceress Royal has established an academy to train women in magic. If Muna is to save her sister, she must learn to navigate high society, and trick the English magicians into believing she is a magical prodigy. As she's drawn into their intrigues, she must uncover the secrets of her past, and journey into a world with more magic than she had ever dreamed. My Thoughts *I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review purposes. It has in no way influenced my opinion. Last week I reviewed Sorcerer

Josephine's Daughter by A.B. Michaels Publication Date: March 10, 2019 Red Trumpet Press eBook; 395 Pages What's worse than a mother like Josephine? Turning out to be just like her. In the late nineteenth century, wealthy and headstrong Kit Firestone chafes under the strictures of the Golden City’s high society, especially the interference of her charming but overbearing mother, Josephine. Kit’s secret rebellion leads to potentially catastrophic results and keeps her from finding true happiness. When her brother nearly dies from a dangerous infection, Kit defies convention and becomes a working nurse. Through her troubled romance with a young doctor and a series of dramatic events, including a natural disaster and her mother’s own critical illness, Kit begins to understand who her mother truly is and what their relationship is all about. She may not get the chance to appreciate their bond, however, because, through no fault of her own, a madman has

Sorcerer to the Crown (Sorcerer Royal #1) by Zen Cho  Paperback, 384 pages Published July 12th 2016 by Ace 9780425283400 Summary At his wit’s end, Zacharias Wythe, freed slave, eminently proficient magician, and Sorcerer Royal of the Unnatural Philosophers—one of the most respected organizations throughout all of Britain—ventures to the border of Fairyland to discover why England’s magical stocks are drying up. But when his adventure brings him in contact with a most unusual comrade, a woman with immense power and an unfathomable gift, he sets on a path which will alter the nature of sorcery in all of Britain—and the world at large…  My Thoughts *I received a copy of this book from Ace for reviewing purposes. This in no way influenced my opinion. Tor.com describes this book as Jane Austen crossed with Susanna Clarke and Ignatius Sanco. Their blurb sold me on this book. I'm a huge Austen fan, but I also love a good fantasy. Magic and political intrig

LEADING MEN By Christopher Castellani Viking Hardcover On Sale: February 12, 2019 ISBN: 9780525559054 Price: $27.00  CONVERSATION WITH CHRISTOPHER CASTELLANI 1. LEADING MEN is based on the real-life love affair between legendary playwright Tennessee Williams and Frank Merlo. What first attracted you to their love story, and why did you decide to explore it in the form of a novel? I’d always been a fan of Williams’s plays—especially Suddenly, Last Summer and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof—but I didn’t know much about his life until I stumbled upon Dotson Rader’s 1985 memoir, Tennessee: Cry of the Heart at a used bookstore in 1997. It was in those pages where I first met Frank Merlo, this working-class gay Italian guy from Jersey who’d been Williams’s longtime lover, and who died at forty after days of waiting for one last visit from him. I myself was a twenty-five year-old working-class gay Italian guy from Delaware with dreams of being a writer, feeling an instant kinshi

Brandon - Tudor Knight by Tony Riches Publication Date: December 3, 2018 Preseli Press eBook; ASIN: B07L3YGBWJ Genre: Historical/Tudor/Biographical From the author of the international bestselling Tudor Trilogy comes a true story of adventure, courtly love and chivalric loyalty. Handsome, charismatic and a champion jouster, Sir Charles Brandon is the epitome of a Tudor Knight. A favourite of King Henry VIII, Brandon has a secret. He has fallen in love with Henry’s sister, Mary Tudor, the beautiful widowed Queen of France, and risks everything to marry her without the King’s consent. Brandon becomes Duke of Suffolk, but his loyalty is tested fighting Henry’s wars in France. Mary’s public support for Queen Catherine of Aragon brings Brandon into dangerous conflict with the ambitious Boleyn family and the king’s new right-hand man, Thomas Cromwell. Torn between duty to his family and loyalty to the king, Brandon faces an impossible decision: can he accept Anne Bol

The Lost History of Dreams by Kris Waldherr Publication Date: April 9, 2019 Atria Books Hardcover & eBook; 320 Pages Genre: Historical/Gothic/Mystery A post-mortem photographer unearths dark secrets of the past that may hold the key to his future, in this captivating debut novel in the gothic tradition of Wuthering Heights and The Thirteenth Tale . All love stories are ghost stories in disguise. When famed Byronesque poet Hugh de Bonne is discovered dead of a heart attack in his bath one morning, his cousin Robert Highstead, a historian turned post-mortem photographer, is charged with a simple task: transport Hugh’s remains for burial in a chapel. This chapel, a stained glass folly set on the moors of Shropshire, was built by de Bonne sixteen years earlier to house the remains of his beloved wife and muse, Ada. Since then, the chapel has been locked and abandoned, a pilgrimage site for the rabid fans of de Bonne’s last book, The Lost History of Dreams . How

Shakespeare's Witch by Samantha Grosser Publication Date: March 20, 2019 Sam Grosser Books Genre: Historical Fiction Love, Witchcraft, Sorcery, Madness. A fortune told … When Sarah Stone foresees Will Shakespeare’s latest play has opened doors to evil, she begs the playwright to abandon it. But Will refuses, aware the play is one of his best. And so rehearsals for Macbeth begin. Forbidden desires … After her vision, Sarah fears for her life – she has never known the shewstone to lie, and she turns to her brother Tom for comfort. A strange darkness seems to haunt the playhouse, and when Tom sets out to seduce John Upton, the boy actor who plays Lady Macbeth, the boy sees the hand of witchcraft in his own forbidden desires for men. Then Sarah weaves a spell to win the love of the new lead actor, and John, terrified for the safety of his soul, begins to make his accusations. The Spirits have spoken … As rehearsals continue, Sarah and Tom must struggle to conv

Claiming My Place By Planaria Price with Helen Reichmann West Publication Date: March 13, 2018 Farrar, Straus and Giroux Hardcover, eBook, AudioBook Genre: YA/NF/History/Holocaust/WWII A Junior Library Guild selection Claiming My Place is the true story of a young Jewish woman who survived the Holocaust by escaping to Nazi Germany and hiding in plain sight. Meet Gucia Gomolinska: smart, determined, independent, and steadfast in the face of injustice. A Jew growing up in predominantly Catholic Poland during the 1920s and ’30s, Gucia studies hard, makes friends, falls in love, and dreams of a bright future. Her world is turned upside down when Nazis invade Poland and establish the first Jewish ghetto of World War II in her town of Piotrkow Trybunalski. As the war escalates, Gucia and her family, friends, and neighbors suffer starvation, disease, and worse. She knows her blond hair and fair skin give her an advantage, and eventually she faces a harrowing choice: