Shelley's Book Nook

☆☆ .ePUB, 392 pages Expected Publication: July 6th 2021 by Harper 360/The Borough Press About the Book: Isobel is a journalist on the local paper in Camden. After witnessing a violent attack, she starts to investigate. But someone saw her watching, and is making themselves known in increasingly frightening ways. As Gabriela’s life begins to unravel, Isobel gets closer to the truth, and the two women’s lives converge in this deeply chilling examination of deceit. My Review: This is my second novel by Ms. Philby and my second disappointment. I thought I was getting a Spy/Espionage Thriller novel but it turned out I was wrong and that was VERY frustrating. I found the book a little long as well. There were a lot of unnecessary pages that could have been cut. And as with her last book the ending was very unsatisfying. I did like that it had two women as main characters. I especially enjoyed the fact that the two womens seem to be a totally different paths then they converge nicely at the ...

☆☆ .ePUB, 244 pages Expected publication: July 27th 2021 by Mobius Books About the Book: Thirty-two-year- old Jessica is newly divorced and has returned home to live with her parents while she puts the pieces of her life back together. But Jessica isn’t the only one with problems, as her mother Jean, has recently been diagnosed with dementia. Shortly after Jessica’s arrival, one of the neighbors falls to her death, in what appears to be a terrible accident. However, Jean claims that the woman was murdered by her husband and that she witnessed the whole thing. With Jean’s memory rapidly deteriorating, her family dismiss her story, believing Jean is confused. But when Jessica learns that the couple next door’s marriage may have been in trouble, she begins to wonder if her mother did see something after all. Jessica is determined to discover the truth, but soon uncovers much more than she bargained for. My Review: This is my third book by Karen Cole and it was such a disappointment. I fo...

☆☆☆☆ .PDF, 355 pages Expected Publication: August 10th 2021 by Quercus (US) About the Book: Margot doesn’t have time for love. Will is afraid to love. And neither of them are expecting to fall in love with Blossom: a gentle Staffy with a tragic past, a belly made for rubbing and a head the size of a football. After their first meeting at the rescue center, both Margot and Will want to adopt Blossom so reluctantly agree to share custody. But Will’s obsession for micro-managing and clear-cut boundaries and Margot’s need to smother Blossom with affection, means that soon they have a very confused and badly behaved dog on their hands. Can they put their differences aside to become successful “co-pawrents” and maybe even friends? And meanwhile, does Blossom have plans of her own? My Review: This book was so sweet it was saccharin, but that's okay cause dogs and love. I did find it went a little slow at first and was a little long. But as I started to read on it got me enthralled, espec...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 255 pages Expected publication: July 20th 2021 by Mobius Books About the Book: When Jo's teenage daughter goes missing, she feels like the world is collapsing around her. The police believe Grace is just an angry teenager, punishing her parents by hiding out at a friend's house, but Jo is terrified that her daughter is in grave danger. With so little urgency from the police, Jo decides to take matters into her own hands. But, as Jo gets closer to discovering what has happened to her daughter, a devastating secret is uncovered that threatens to destroy the family she has been trying so very hard to protect. My Review: Deliver Me was my first book by Karen Cole, I read it back in May and I SO enjoyed it. This one didn't disappoint either. I loved that this book was done in the format of two timelines. The first being Joanne looking for her missing daughter and the second is when Jo is 17 and meets her daughters father, while being a babysitter for his family no...

☆☆☆1/2 .ePUB, 350 pages Expected Publication: July 6th 2021 by Grand Central Publishing About the Book: Henry North is a down-on-his-luck cybersecurity expert from New Orleans. Adam Zhang is the cofounder of one of Austin’s most successful venture capitalist firms. These two men didn’t know each other. They had never met. Yet they died together, violently, in a place neither had any business being. When Henry doesn’t return from a business trip, his wife, Kirsten, panics—and then gets an anonymous phone call: “Your husband is dead in Austin.” Flora Zhang knew her husband was keeping secrets. She suspected an affair, but she had decided she could forgive him for his weakness—until her husband ended up dead. And with no explanation for her husband’s murder, the police begin to suspect her. Together, these two widows will face a powerful foe determined to write a false narrative about the murders. In doing so, neither Flora nor Kirsten will remain the women the world thought they were. My...

  ☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 350 pages Expected publication: July 6th 2021 by Berkley Publishing Group About the Book: After years of struggling to write following the deaths of his wife and son, English professor Connor Nye publishes his first novel, a thriller about the murder of a young woman. There’s just one problem: Connor didn’t write the book. His missing student did. And then she appears on his doorstep, alive and well, threatening to expose him. Connor’s problems escalate when the police insist details in the novel implicate him in an unsolved murder from two years ago. Soon Connor discovers the crime is part of a disturbing scandal on campus and faces an impossible dilemma—admit he didn’t write the book and lose his job or keep up the lie and risk everything. When another murder occurs, Connor must clear his name by unraveling the horrifying secrets buried in his student’s manuscript. This is a suspenseful, provocative novel about the sexual harassment that still runs rampant in academ...

☆☆☆1/2 .ePUB, 297 pages Expected Publication: September 7th 2021 by Harper 360 - Avon About the Book: On a quiet street, one house is burning to the ground…By the time sign language interpreter Paige Northwood arrives, flames have engulfed her client’s home. Though Lukas is safe, his wife is still inside. But she was dead before the fire started…Lukas signs to Paige that he knows who killed his wife. But then he goes silent – even when the police arrest him on suspicion of murder. Is he guilty, or afraid? Only Paige can help him now. My Review: He’d thought that she’d be easy to fool, and to control, because she was deaf.  In fact, she’d been completely the opposite. This one was a little different from the first two books because this time it is the suspect who is deaf. This is a dark story that deals with flawed characters. You never know what secrets people are hiding, even those closest to you. This book will keep you guessing...Just when you think you understand what’s happen...

☆☆☆ .ePUB, 295 pages Expected Publication: July 6th 2021 by Forever (Grand Central Publishing) About the Book: The Buchanan sisters share everything—including their inherited Juniper Inn. But when their mother won’t let go of a decades-long feud with their Aunt Sassy to attend the inn’s grand re-opening, the sisters decide a family reunion is long overdue. Youngest sister Rose is determined to put together an extravagant celebration. Only she needs to convince a certain surly hardware store owner to help finish the inn’s renovations. After a heartbreaking end to her marriage, Dahlia and her kids are just starting to rebuild their lives. Dahlia’s even considering opening herself up to love again, but will that upset the stability she’s worked so hard to give her children? Sassy McGrath has never stopped missing her sister, Lillian, and though they’ve both been too stubborn to reconcile, some shocking news might finally change everything. As family bonds are tested, will these two very d...

☆☆☆ ☆ ☆ .ePUB, 289 pages Expected Publication: July 2nd 2021 by Scribe UK About the Book: There's no such thing as a perfect victim. In a hotel room on a sleepy Pacific island, Judy Novak waits. And worries. It isn’t the first time 29-year-old problem child Paulina has kept her mother waiting. But Judy can’t ignore the island’s jagged cliffs and towering pines — or the dread that Paulina has finally acted on her threats to take her own life. When Paulina’s body is discovered, Judy’s worst fears seem confirmed. Only, Paulina didn’t kill herself. She was murdered. So begins a thorny investigation, wherein every man on the island is a suspect yet none are as maligned as Paulina: the captivating newcomer known for her hard drinking, disastrous relationships, and habit of walking alone. But, above all, Paulina is her mother’s daughter. And death won’t stop Judy Novak from fighting for Paulina’s life. My Review: First of all...Cover Love ❤ Second of all...the "I will find my daughte...

☆☆☆ ☆ ☆ .PDF, 288 pages Expected Publication: July 1st 2021 by Faber and Faber Ltd About the Book: How can a woman who never existed come back to haunt you? Gerry Anderson has been having trouble sleeping. He's unwell - bed-bound - and has only his night nurse and his personal assistant for company. But what's really troubling him are the phone calls. Phone calls from a woman claiming to be the 'real' Aubrey. But that can't be. Aubrey's just a character Gerry made up in a book, years ago. Can Gerry see past the ever-blurring lines of fact and fiction and figure out who is threatening him, or has his long-overdue moment of reckoning finally arrived? My Review: Dream Girl has the most simplistic plot you could imagine; the majority of the book is set in a single room and from one man's point of view. Lippman's excellent storytelling keeps you hooked from the onset and the character of Gerry is, in my opinion, the most well-developed and complex characters...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 350 pages Expected Publication: June 29th 2021 by Kensington Books About the Book: There are moments that change your entire life's direction. For Arden Bell, owner of a cherished bookstore in the seaside hamlet of Eliot's Corner, one such moment comes early on a summer day when she opens the door to Laura Huntington--the daughter she hasn't seen in thirty-seven years. Not a day has passed in which Arden hasn't thought of the baby she glimpsed only once before her wealthy, powerful parents forced her to give her up for adoption. Shy and sheltered, Arden finally mustered the courage to leave her Maine hometown of Port George, changed her name, and has barely seen her parents since. Nor has she heard from Rob, the boy she was so passionately in love with. Now Laura's arrival, and her inevitable questions, will propel both women on a journey to forge a new relationship and unravel the past. Amid revelations and discoveries--sometimes painful, often unexpec...

☆☆☆ .ePUB, 299 pages Expected Publication: September 7th 2021 by Harper 360 - Avon About the Book: Two weeks before her wedding, a stranger stops Amy in the street and warns her she’s in danger. Then that night, Matt, her fiancé, doesn’t come home. Desperate, Amy calls the police – but when Matt fails to emerge, she’s forced to call off her wedding day. Then another man is reported missing, by a woman called Fiona – a man meeting Matt’s description, who was about to leave his fiancée for her. He was supposed to be moving in with her – but instead, he’s vanished. Amy refuses to believe Fiona’s lover can be her Matt – but photos prove otherwise, and it soon becomes clear that Matt has been leading a double life. As the police dig deeper, two conflicting, yet equally plausible stories emerge from two women who allegedly have never met. The wedding day never happened. But the funeral might. My Review: This book wasn't bad. I enjoyed the writing and the plot was interesting enough. The...

☆☆☆ ☆ .ePUB, 336 pages Expected Publication: June 29th 2021 by Harper 360 About the Book: One girl jumped. And then another followed…In the city of Bristol, young women are dying in mysterious circumstances. The deaths look like suicides – but are they something more sinister? Honor is terrified that her daughter might be next. But as she looks for clues as to what really happened to the girls, she stumbles upon a link to a dark secret in her own past – one that she’s kept from her daughter. Now Honor has the chance to avenge her child for the terrible events of years ago. But how far will she go to protect her daughter and right the wrongs done to her family? My Review: Mel McGrath has created a book that lures the reader on and on, the story of college aged girls commiting suicide. What a dark tale but one we should discuss more often. After reading this book it makes me happy that I had boys, not that boys can't come to any harm and they did in this book. I thought that was ver...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 242 pages Expected Publication: June 29th 2021 by Polis Books About the Book: From an early age, Sam Mayfair knew she was different. Like any young girl, she developed infatuations and lust—but her desires were always tinged with darkness. Then, when Sam was sixteen, her life was shattered by an abuser close to her. And she made one shocking decision whose ramifications would reverberate throughout her life. Now, fifteen years later, Sam learns that her abuser has been murdered. The death of the man who plagued her dreams for years should have put an end to the torture she's endured. But when her stepbrother, Eric, becomes the prime suspect, Sam is flung back into the hell of her rural Oklahoma childhood. As Sam tries to help exonerate Eric, she must hide terrifying truths of their past from investigators. Yet as details of the murder unravel, Sam quickly learns that some people, including herself, will do anything to keep their secrets buried deep. My Review: Oh wow, ...

☆☆☆ .ePUB, 312 pages Expected Publication: June 24th 2021 by Canelo About the Book: Her sister’s boyfriend. Her worst nightmare. On the night of her mother’s wake, Ewan kisses a shocked Ruby. They both agree to pretend that the kiss never happened – in fact, according to Ewan, no one even needs to know he walked Ruby home. Because Ewan is seeing Ruby’s sister, Sophie. He’s been wonderful to Sophie, comforting her after her mother’s murder and taking care of her little kids, too. In short, he’s been the perfect boyfriend. This was just a stupid mistake. But when Ruby learns of another woman's murder close to Ewan’s route home on the night of the kiss, she fears that her lie has left her sister in terrible danger. After all, how well do the sisters really know Ewan? How well do they know each other? And are they sure they know the truth about what really happened on the day their mother died? My Review: This book was a first glimpse into this author's work and it was okay. It wa...

☆☆☆☆1/2 .ePUB, 272 pages Expected publication: June 22nd 2021 by Grand Central Publishing About the Book: Megan waits at the school gates for her six-year-old son, Daniel. As the playground empties, panic bubbles inside her. Daniel is nowhere to be found. Her darling son is missing. After years of sleepless nights and endless days of missing her son, Megan finally gets the call she has been dreaming about. Daniel has walked into a police station in a remote town just a few miles away. Megan is overjoyed—her son is finally coming home. She has kept Daniel's room, with his Cookie Monster poster on the wall and a stack of Lego under the bed, in perfect shape to welcome him back. But when he returns, there is something different about Daniel . . .According to the police, Daniel was kidnapped by his father. After his dad died in a fire, Daniel was finally able to escape. Desperate to find out the truth, Megan tries to talk to her little boy—but he barely answers her questions. Longing ...

☆☆☆ ☆ ☆ .PDF, 303 pages Expected publication: June 22nd 2021 by Little Brown Book Group UK/Sphere About the Book: You can save hundreds of lives. Or the one that matters most . . . The atmosphere on board the first non-stop flight from London to Sydney is electric. Celebrities are rumoured to be among the passengers in business class, and the world is watching the landmark journey. Flight attendant Mina is trying to focus on the passengers, instead of her troubled five-year-old daughter back at home - or the cataclysmic problems in her marriage. But soon after the plane takes off, Mina receives a chilling anonymous note. Someone wants to make sure the plane never reaches its destination. They're demanding her cooperation . . . and they know exactly how to get it. It's twenty hours to landing. A lot can happen in twenty hours . . . My Review: Oh my gosh...This book...Now that's what I call a fast paced story...Non stop thrills the entire time...Which I enjoyed from start to...

☆☆☆ ☆1/2 .ePUB, 256 pages Expected Publication: June 22nd 2021 by Random House Publishing Group About the Book: Seventeen-year-old Sarabeth has become increasingly rebellious since her parents found God and moved their family to a remote Arkansas farmstead where she’s forced to wear long dresses, follow strict rules, and grow her hair down to her waist. She’s all but given up on escaping the farm when a masked man appears one stifling summer morning and snatches her out of the cornfield. A week after her abduction, she’s found alongside a highway in a bloodstained dress—alive—but her family treats her like she’s tainted, and there’s little hope of finding her captor, who kept Sarabeth blindfolded in the dark the entire time, never uttering a word. One good thing arises from the horrific ordeal: a chance to leave the Ozarks and start a new life. Five years later, Sarabeth is struggling to keep her past buried when investigator Nick Farrow calls. Convinced that her case is connected to ...

☆☆1/2 .ePUB, 289 pages Expected Publication: June 15th 2021 by Berkley Publishing Group About the Book: In the wake of her father's death, Betty Roux doesn't allow herself to mourn. Instead, she pushes away her mother, breaks up with her boyfriend, and leaves everything behind to move to New York City. She doesn't know what she wants, except to run. When she's offered the chance to play the leading role in mysterious indie filmmaker Anthony Marino's new project, she jumps at the opportunity. For a month Betty will live in a cabin on a private island off the coast of Maine, with a five-person cast and crew. Her mother warns against it, but Betty is too drawn to the charismatic Anthony to say no. Anthony gives her a new identity--Lola--and Betty tells herself that this is exactly what she's been looking for. The chance to reinvent herself. That is, until they begin filming and she meets Sammy, the island's caretaker, and Betty realizes just how little she kno...

☆☆☆ .ePUB, 240 pages Expected publication: June 18th 2021 by HarperCollins UK/One More Chapter About the Book: Sarah and Max should never have met. She’s a shy bookworm who’s barely ever left her little village; he’s a bad boy actor with the world at his feet. But when Max crosses one line too many, he’s faced with community service in Sarah’s bookshop. With an unruly theatre group to run and a gorgeous, tattooed stranger under her roof, Sarah’s about to discover that real life is more complicated than anything she’s ever read in her beloved books. My Review: This was a nice change of characters and place and now I really want to visit the bookshop and village myself. The story was sweet and I really loved that this is a romance that takes place in a bookshop. This is a gentle story, there is drama and strife but very sympathetically described. There are sizzling moments, but just enough. The characters are believable and faults and flaws are present. The characters have you rooting f...

  ☆☆1/2 .ePUB, 272 pages Expected Publication: June 15th 2021 by Harper 360/HQ About the Book: I told my daughter a terrible lie…Lorna never told her sixteen-year-old daughter the chilling truth about her real father. But one morning, she finds Liberty missing — and realizes the teenager has left to find the man she once fled from. After sixteen years of protecting my daughter from the dark secret of her past, I wake one morning to find her room empty, rucksack gone. Most runaways return within 72 hours, but I’m not so sure. I think my daughter has gone to find her real father – the man I fled from years ago. No one knows better than me that beneath his charm lies a monster. I escaped him once. But will she see him for what he really is? After all, blood is thicker than water. My Review: This book had me flipping the pages so fast. Even though I figured out where this was going pretty quickly I enjoyed the beginning of this book SO much. The writing was captivating I could not put ...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 263 pages Expected publication: June 11th 2021 by HQ Digital About the Book: If you want to know the A-Z of love then it starts with Alice and ends with Zach. Alice is a self-confessed cynic when it comes to love. She’s never had a serious relationship herself and after supporting her best friend through a devastating break-up, she’s not about to let down her barriers anytime soon. Relationships always end badly. Zach is a romantic. Even after his parents got divorced, he still believed in love and is eager to settle down and have a family of his own. He just hasn’t met The One yet. After a chance meet-cute at an art gallery, Zach is immediately intrigued by Alice and realising their names bookend the alphabet suggests that their next date needs to begin with a B. Alice agrees to one date while Zach is determined to make her believe in love. But can love ever be as easy as abc? My Review: This book was so cute and so cheesy it was utterly saccharine at times and I really n...

☆☆☆ .ePUB, 276 pages Expected Publication: July 20th 2021 ARC provided by Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op About the Book: Housemaid wanted. Skills required: Discretion, and the willingness to go the extra mile. It seems like the perfect job. Great wages, accommodation provided, and all located within the walls of Highwood Hall, a stunning stately home owned by the Howard family. Not many little girls dream of becoming a maid, but this is an opportunity for me to get back on my feet. And for me to revisit my past...But I soon realise I've made a mistake. The strict housekeeper, Mrs Huxley, watches my every move, emerging from the shadows when least expected. Lord Howard's son, Alex, takes an interest in me, and as a former addict, I find myself drawn to him because I know he's bad for me. There's a general atmosphere of unease at Highwood Hall, from the narrow tunnels laced throughout the sprawling house, to the abandoned north wing, rumoured to be haunted. It's eas...

☆☆☆☆ ☆ .ePUB, 332 pages Expected Publication: June 3rd 2021 by Boldwood Books About the Book: Today, Maisie McTeer decides to track down the ex who jilted her at the altar. Today, she’ll find out that revisiting the past can also rewrite her future. After losing her husband, Harriet Bassett can no longer bear her lonely life. Today, a familiar face in a crowd will spark a quest to discover if there’s something and someone worth living for. Scott and Kelly Bassett’s daughter is leaving home. Today, Scott plans to tell Kelly that he’s ending their marriage to pursue his rock and roll dreams. However, Kelly, has a bombshell of her own. How will Scott react to the news that a new arrival is on the way to fill their empty nest? Between sunrise and sunset, there’s love, heartbreak, laughter and tears, but who will find happiness at the end of the day? My Review: A heart warming story of love, friendship and family. It is very well written and was an absolute pleasure to read. The characters...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 363 pages Expected Publication: June 15th 2021 by Redhook Books About the Book: In fifty years, Myrra will be free. Until then, she's a contract worker. Ever since she was five, her life and labor have belonged to the highest bidder on her contract—butchers, laundries, and now the powerful, secretive Carlyles. But when one night finds the Carlyles dead, Myrra is suddenly free a lot sooner than she anticipated—and at a cost she never could have imagined. Burdened with the Carlyles' orphaned daughter and the terrible secret they died to escape, she runs. With time running out, Myrra must come face to face with the truth about her world—and embrace what's left before it's too late. My Review: This story was so absorbing and thought provoking and I loved the author's storytelling approach, where readers become observers to what is happening. We see through the eyes of different characters and I liked the message for today's world.  Great commentary on t...

☆☆☆☆1/2 .PDF, 245 pages Expected publication: August 17th, 2021 by Mobius Books About the Book: THE PERFECT HUSBAND . . .After a difficult pregnancy, Esther is grateful that her husband Robin offers to put his career on hold so that she can return to the job she loves. But Esther finds leaving her daughter Riley behind more challenging than she'd thought. And soon the new imbalance in her relationship with Robin brings old tensions to the surface. OR A PERFECT LIE? Then one day Esther arrives home from work to find Robin and Riley are missing. As the police investigate their disappearance, it becomes clear that nothing about this modern-day family is what it seems. Is Robin the perfect father everyone thinks he is? Or was it all a perfect lie? My Review: Blood is not thicker than water. Love is thicker than everything. This is my third book by Charlotte Duckworth, I have read and enjoyed everything she has written.  The Perfect Father isn't a thriller in the usual sense, but b...

☆☆☆☆ ☆ .PDF, 217 pages Expected Publication: June 29th 2021 by Amazon Publishing UK About the Book: His dying wish was to set her free. So why does she feel so trapped? Jack had two dying wishes: that his wife scatter his ashes somewhere ‘exotic’, and that she not give up on life once he was gone. He intended to spur her on to new adventures, but despite clinging to her red suitcase, Geraldine Verne hasn’t left the house for three months. It takes an accident for Geri to accept help from her friends, but when Meals on Wheels arrive she is mortified. Yet heartbroken volunteer Lottie brings with her more than cottage pie and custard. Like Geri, she too is struggling to cut loose. As a gloriously unlikely friendship blossoms, Geraldine begins to feel a long-lost spark of life and a newfound confidence. Perhaps what both women needed most, after all, was each other. My Review: I love these types of books, sad but uplifting at the same time. Isn't that how real life really is? What a b...

☆☆☆☆ .ePUB, 290 pages Expected Publication: June 8th 2021 by Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine About the Book: Once a year, actors from across the globe descend on the smog and sunshine of Los Angeles for pilot season. Every cable network and studio is looking to fill the rosters of their new shows, enticing a fresh batch of young hopefuls—anxious, desperate, and willing to do whatever it takes to make it. Careers will be made, dreams will be realized, stars will be born. And some will be snuffed out. British star Mia Eliot has landed leading roles in costume dramas in her native country, but now it’s time for Hollywood to take her to the next level. Mia flies across the Atlantic to join the horde of talent scrambling for their big breaks. She’s a fish out of water in the ruthlessly competitive arena of back-to-back auditioning. Then one day she meets Emily, another actress from out of town and a kindred spirit. Emily is friendly and genuine and reassuringly doesn’t seem to b...