CW: emotional abuse by parents The first thing you need to know about Sophie Go’s Lonely Hearts Club is that it will make you hungry. Sophie is a matchmaker in Toronto, and she loves food even more than romance. Sophie and her clients eat their way across the city, evocatively describing curry buns, guava candies, duck egg congee, nasi goreng, fruity pavlovas, and Krispy Kreme donuts. The second thing you should know is that while … Continue reading Sophie Go’s Lonely Hearts Club by Roselle Lim →
The Royal Holiday by Jasmine Guillory had me smiling from page one and kept me delighted all the way through. My joy was so palpable that I had coworkers asking me during my lunch break what I was reading because I don’t usually spend my lunch so lovingly enraptured by my cell phone. An extremely charming romance centered around two Black adults in their 50s who are thrown together during Christmas, The Royal Holiday is … Continue reading Royal Holiday by Jasmine Guillory →
A C is a weird grade for a book that I read compulsively, especially since I remain very curious about the next one, but while the set up, the action, and the ensemble were a lot of fun to read, the more I thought about it, the more I found myself thinking, “But, wait…” I have a stack of “But, waits” regarding the character development and emotional pivots, and they began to accumulate from about … Continue reading American Witch by Thea Harrison →
This guest review is from Aarya Marsden. Aarya Marsden is a pseudonym for an Indian-American college student and long-time romance reader. Her favorite authors include Ilona Andrews, Nalini Singh, Lucy Parker, Kresley Cole, Alisha Rai, Lisa Kleypas, Alyssa Cole, Tessa Dare, Meredith Duran, Mina V. Esguerra, Kate Clayborn, and many more. You can follow @Aarya_Marsden on Twitter, where she gushes about romance novels and is a firm advocate for a happily-ever-after. … Here’s my elevator … Continue reading Teach Me by Olivia Dade →
This guest review is by Claudia. A bit about Claudia: “At sixteen, I found my older cousin’s stash of Barbara Cartlands and assorted Harlequin-type romance housed in an old sewing cabinet and life was never the same! I love history, so I mostly read historical romance. Favorite authors include Meredith Duran, Mary Balogh, Miranda Neville, Elizabeth Kingston, and Rose Lerner.” (An earlier bio mis-attributed, and is totally the fault my non-caffeinated, mixed-up brain. Sorry! – Sarah) … Continue reading Guest Review: At Your Service by Sandra Antonelli →
Hey there! It’s April! For me, that means gearing up for allergy season. Has spring sprung where you are? Or is winter still desperately holding on? We also hope you all enjoyed this year’s April Fool’s joke. Brainstorming copy for it was so much fun. … Have you subscribed to our Books on Sale newsletter yet? The newsletter goes out every Friday morning, eastern time. You can sign up here! … Author Karen Booth is … Continue reading Links: Spooky Cabins, Seasoned Romance, & More →
This guest review is by Catherine Heloise. Previously, Catherine ranted about Shakespearean rockstars and loved Chase Me by Laura Florand. She has a food blog called Cate’s Cates, where she creates allergy-friendly treats, and she also runs the Stories Under Paris website, where she creates fictional stories based on the names of Paris Metro stations. How cool is that? … This novella gets an A for all the fun. Courtney Milan’s new novella, Mrs Martin’s Incomparable … Continue reading Guest Review: Mrs Martin’s Incomparable Adventure by Courtney Milan →
Sometimes a book just makes me sit back and sigh a happy sigh. Only Beloved is one of those books. It left me in an unexpected and rare place of peacefulness. Every time I think about it I feel calm – not bored, not “meh,” not analytical, but truly, happily, peacefully calm. This book is the culmination of a series in which people learn to come to terms with trauma, and it’s a lovely, gentle … Continue reading Only Beloved by Mary Balogh →
Here are some things that might make some of you grab this book immediately: It’s a novella. The hero, the Duke of Olympia, is in his 70s. He’s also a spy, but he’d probably get very sniffy if you called him that. The heroine, Mrs. Penelope Schuyler, is in her 50s, and is an American widow and now paid companion to a young heiress named Ruby. They’re on a steamer ship crossing the Atlantic, and there’s caper-ing and … Continue reading The Duke of Olympia Meets His Match by Juliana Gray →
