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Today is my stop on the blog tour for The Winter Cottage by Rachael Lucas, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take port and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages:264

Synopsis: When Rilla Clark’s long lost father dies, she leaves New England and heads to his cottage in the Scottish Highlands to sort out his affairs. Rilla’s determined that her visit will be a fleeting one. The little village of Applemore holds a lot of memories for her, but looking back might just open up her heart, which she’s kept well-guarded until now.

Lachlan Fraser is less than delighted with his inheritance. He left the grand, crumbling Applemore House as soon as he could, and he can’t see why his three sisters love it so much. Gathered together at their family estate, the battle of wills over what to do with the house is just beginning when into their life walks Rilla, who they haven’t seen for over fifteen years…

Old friendships and long-hidden emotions are rekindled as the romance of a Highland winter works its magic – will Rilla and Lachlan discover that home isn’t a place, but a feeling?

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: this was the perfect winter/Christmas romance,

Rilla has to return to her dads old home in the Scottish highlands, he’s recently passed away and it’s time to clear out his cottage before his lease ends in 3 months time! – she’s expecting it to be hard and emotional but what she’s not expecting is to be thrown 15 years into the past!

Lachlan Fraser owns Applemore House, after the recent death of his dad too, he returns home to see how much work has to be put into the property in order to sell it! – what he didn’t bargain for was his sisters being so dead set on keeping the house, forgetting the inheritance tax and just fixing it up and keeping it in the family!

Then to make matters worse he’s really thrown for a loop when he hears that the loved of his life Rilla is also back for a while, he’s mortified but happy at the same time, could this be his chance to rectify his mistakes from 15 years ago?

Throw in an old family friend of their dads, friends who think they know what’s best, 3 spaniels and a 20 year old secret that has linked both families in a way that none of them could’ve imagined and what you’ve got is a story that is incredibly hard to put down and made me look forward to the Christmas season that will be here before we all know it.

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Today I’m on the blog tour for One More Christmas at the Castle by Trisha Ashley, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 523

Synopsis: This Christmas will be the most special of them all…

Elderly widow Sabine knows this will be her last Christmas in her beloved home, Mitras Castle. Determined to make it just like the ones she remembers from her childhood, she employs Dido Jones of Heavenly Houseparties to help with the big day.

Dido is enchanted by the castle as soon as she steps through the imposing front door. And as Christmas day approaches, her feeling of connection to the old house runs deeper than she first thought. But when the snow begins to fall and Sabine’s family arrive at the house – including Dido’s teenage crush Xan – tensions rise around the castle’s future and long-buried mysteries begin to unravel…

As past secrets come to light, can this still be a magical Christmas to remember?

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧.5

My Thoughts: I enjoyed this, it was a lovely read that warmed the heart but also tugged at the heart strings too!

We’re following Sabine, who knows that due to illness this will be her last Christmas, so she invites her close family and friends to celebrate with her and hires a party company to help her recreate the Christmases of her childhood – a task that she makes far from easy but they exceed her expectations every single time!

This story felt really slow in places and I think it’s because it was character driven rather than plot driven so at times we were left feeling like nothing really happened (not a criticism) but before you knew it you were so deep into the story that you needed to know what happened!

There were times where I felt like there was more to it all that Sabine had actually let on and the secrets and hidden aspects did not disappoint!

This was the perfect Christmas read for early in the season because it focussed more on the buildup rather than the big day so it wasn’t festive heavy!

This is the second book I’ve read by Trisha Ashley and so far I’ve loved them both!

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Today I’m on the book tour for The Lie She Told by Catherine Yaffre, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos book tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 323

Synopsis: All Kate Wanted Was A Peaceful Life.
All Ryan Wanted To Do Was Destroy it.
Living in the remote Scottish Highlands under Witness Protection, life is finally happy for Kate Ward and her young son Joe, until someone from Kate’s past appears. Ryan Albright is the only person that knows all of Kate’s secrets, and what she had to do to escape her previous abusive relationship. Ryan is determined to complete the mission set for him by Kate’s ex-husband. Systematically and violently, he pulls Kate’s new world apart with devastating consequences for everyone around him, including Kate who must face up to the lie she told.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: this was such a thrilling read that I devoured it in one sitting, Kate has fled to Scotland to escape her past with her little boy Joe, although we don’t know what she’s running from we get the feeling it’s something huge.

One day someone stops her at the side of the road it’s only once she starts talking to him that she realises that her past has started to catch up with her… or so she thinks.

Ryan soon convinces her that although he had been in contact with her ex husband they’re no longer friends and he manages to worm his way into her life..

Soon things start going wrong around her, her friends are being hurt and things are going missing. Everyone is pointing the finger at Ryan which leads her to stop trusting everyone around her.

Then the worst happens and her son disappears, can they help Kate see sense before it’s too late and she never sees her son again?

I promise you won’t be disappointed if you pick this one up!

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Today I’m on the blog tour for Bright Lies by A.A. Abbott, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and the n you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Synopsis: She thought she had the perfect stepfather. So why is she running for her life?

Emily longs to be an artist. So she’s thrilled when her famous and talented stepfather offers to act as her mentor. But when his teachings take a darker turn, she flees his fancy home.

Bad boy Jack has made good as a hot DJ. Then he sees thugs attack a rough sleeper, and shocking memories spur him to her rescue. He doesn’t know she’s only 15 and running from a deadly predator.

Emily’s hopes of safety are crushed when her stepfather hunts her down. Now Jack faces the hardest choice of all. If he protects Emily from the fiend who’s stolen her childhood, he’ll kiss goodbye to his future.

What would you sacrifice to save a life?

If you enjoy nail-biting suspense, slow-burning secrets and dark domestic noir, you’ll love AA Abbott’s chilling psychological thriller.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: my god this book gave me the creeps, it made me feel so uncomfortable but in the best way.

It’s a dark twisty psychological thriller that really gets under your skin, it opens up with Emily confronting something with her mum, at the time we don’t know what it is but we do know that it’s something she’s not happy about.

Then the story goes back to Emily as a young teenager, her mum has found a new partner so she now has a new stepfather who is seemingly setting them up for a better life, but is it all it’s cracked up to be?

We soon learn that her stepfathers intentions aren’t as sweet and innocent as we first thought, things happen that leave Emily feeling like she has no choice but to run away!

It’s whilst she’s on the streets that she meets Jack an aspiring DJ, Could he be the salvation she needs? is he willing to put his ambitions on hold to save the young girl who has appeared in his life?

The audiobook for this added a whole new element to the story. I don’t know if I’d have been as hooked as I was if I’d read the words rather than listen to it!

I cannot recommend this one enough!

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Today I’m on the blog tour for The Women of Blackmouth Street by Thea Sutton, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part! – today I have an extract for you, but let me tell you a little about the book and the author first.

Synopsis: A gifted psychologist is forced to hunt a serial killer or risk having a dark chapter of her past exposed-but her mission may mark her as the next victim…

1890s London. Strong-willed Georgia Buchanan, a mind doctor and heiress, spends her time with the mad, the bad, and devils incarnate, armed only with her expert understanding of the human psyche. 

But when her young, high-profile patient unexpectedly commits suicide, Georgia leaves Boston under a cloud of guilt. Lured to London’s notorious Bedlam asylum, she’s trapped by a vengeful detective and a dangerous anarchist-who know too much about her-into tracking a serial killer of women in the city’s East End.

As Georgia struggles to prevent more women from meeting a violent end, her own secrets and closest ties are stripped bare… With her Harvard mentor, William James, and his sister. With her wealthy, scandalous father. With a troubled patient. All the while the city’s streets reel with carnage and social unrest. Alone and questioning her abilities as the killer closes in, Georgia has one last chance to save the innocent before she confronts the most devastating truth yet.

A shocking, fast-paced period thriller, The Women of Blackmouth Street conjures a lush and gritty world of psychological profiling, political upheaval, and women on the edge of madness.

About The Author: Thea Sutton has a Ph.D in English literature with books and articles to her credit. She has worked in marketing and communications while dividing her time between Toronto and Southern California.

Extract: PROLOGUE

‘Hysteria.” The doctor drew out the syllables. “From the Greek, hysterikos. Of the womb. Or rather, suffering from the womb, as the meaning has evolved in our time.”

He turned, bearded chin tilting to his audience, from the young woman strapped to the metal table beside him. The bowl of the theater pulsed a dazzling white in contrast to the wooden church- like pews where the medical students sat, eyes locked on the creature before them.
She could be a corpse but for the rise and fall of her chest, the sliver of lids over fixed eyes.

“What you will witness today are the four stages of hysteria.” On a tray behind the doctor lay a leather-covered box with red-velvet lining in which nestled a cranial drill, silver-plated with a shiny round topknot handle.
“You will see that at the beginning of an attack, the patient’s mouth is wide as if she is screaming.”
The doctor ambled around the table taking a leisurely stroll but, like the best of impresarios, never losing eye contact with his audience, as though daring them to turn away from his spectacle.
“Then you will observe the epileptoid phase or tonic rigidity where the young lady’s muscles will contract, her neck twist, her legs thrash in counter rhythm to the gyration of her fists outwards.”
A few men in the front row shifted in their seats, pens targeting notebooks, faces reflecting the yellow-green cast of the encircling walls.
The doctor smiled his satisfaction. “I don’t suppose any of you has ever witnessed this progression?” A rhetorical question. “The chronic spasms are followed by extreme emotional states such as lust, hate and fear. What we can expect is for our patient to slip into delirium or a hallucinatory state. She may plead, choke, howl her pain.”
Presenting his back to his disciples for the first time, the doctor picked up the cranial drill from its pocket of red velvet. Holding it up like a chalice to the light buzzing overhead. The bare leg—a gleaming white ankle manacled by a black strap—twitched.
Vision blurring, I turned away. When I looked up again, the dimensions of the lecture hall stretched and contracted. To the rear of the theater, a flight of stairs and a row of doors, blistered paint chipping from the frames. I rose and began the climb, each step lengthy and impossible. Until I reached the first door, slightly ajar.
In the slant of light, a woman with greying hair waited, it seemed, just for me, yellow bed jacket over her shoulders. Her lips crooked upwards in a relieved smile at my entrance, features patrician save for the nose eaten away by the pox. Behind her sat a girl on a faded pink divan. Her pale fingers played with the long tassels of a scarf on her lap until, as though coming to a decision, she lifted the fabric to her head like a crown before slipping, then looping, then tightening it around her neck.
The world spun. My mouth swamped with the taste of metal, dull and bitter, an instant before vision narrowed to a pinpoint of black.

If you like the sound of this it can be bought Here

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Today I’m on the book tour for Bare Lies by Nick Rippington, thank you to Zoé at Zooloos Book Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 419

Synopsis: Flashback to the Millennium and In book No. 4 of the Boxer Boys series, enforcer Chuck Dolan and his brother Sly are out to prove there’s a new gang in town.
But when a raid on a drug rival’s nightclub goes tragically wrong, the two Boxer Boys flee to their granddad Billy’s villa on Spain’s Costa Blanca.
Their first impression of Billy is of an old man seeing out his days in the sun, but it’s quickly shattered when he introduces them to his ‘business partners’ – a murderous Colombian cartel boss and a sadistic former Irish paramilitary.
And though things look up for Chuck when ex-girlfriend Abby re-enters his life, Billy’s own relationships quickly turn sour and the prospect of a gang war on the Costas looms large.
As the brothers prepare for trouble, little do they realise there’s an even bigger danger hiding in Billy’s past: one which threatens their future, their loved ones and their very lives.

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧.5

My Thoughts: Firstly let me apologise if my review doesn’t do this book justice, I didn’t realise it was book 4 in a series! – totally my fault but for this reason I did feel like I was missing vital parts of the bigger picture 🤦🏻‍♀️

That being said I did enjoy this, I love a Gangland crime novel, they tend to be on the darker more brutal side of crime novels and sometimes that’s just what a girl needs, they’re so far removed from my everyday life that they’re just so easy to get lost in and devour. Bare Lies was no exception!

Chuck and Sly land themselves in trouble when someone brings a grenade to what should have been a routine job, there’s a big explosion (obviously🤣) and people die, now because that wasn’t part of the plan they now need to escape, find somewhere to lay low until it all blows over…

Their Grandad Billy Dolan otherwise known as Billy The Kid steps in and gives them somewhere to stay, with him in Spain as long as they do some work for him! – now as you can imagine this doesn’t actually go as smoothly as they’d like, Chuck has a temper that very quickly lands him in more trouble with a business associate of Billy’s and Sly can’t seem to keep it in his pants!

Soon Billy’s past comes back to haunt him too as if they don’t have enough to deal with! – can they get to the bottom of everything before it’s too late and someone ends up dead?

There were moments where I laughed out loud whilst reading, moments that made me bury my head in my hands and moments that had me on the edge of my seat! – it was fast paced and definitely kept me on my toes, I just now feel like I have to go to book one and start it all from the beginning!

If you’re a fan of gangland crime I can highly recommend this one.

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Today I’m on the blog tour for Christmas at Fox Farm by Helen Pollard, thank you to Sarah at Bookouture for organising it and inviting me to take part & thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 306

Synopsis:Daisy is preparing to spend her first Christmas in the only place she’s ever really felt at home: beautiful Fox Farm. But when tragedy strikes, she will need all her festive cheer, and all the mulled wine, to keep Christmas from being cancelled…

Living at Fox Farm, with its cosy café and charming pottery workshop, is a dream come true for thirty-one-year-old Daisy. The kindly owner, Jean, and the close-knit village feel like the family Daisy has never had. She’s been looking forward to finally having people to buy gifts for and to share cookies with in front of the fire after too much Christmas dinner.

When Jean suddenly falls ill, Daisy is the first to lend a hand in organising the holiday celebrations. She ropes in Alex – Jean’s handsome Scrooge of a nephew – to help her. From the get-go Daisy and Alex cannot agree on anything, butting heads through decorating disasters and tripping over each other at the holiday barn dance. Alex hates Christmas, and Daisy is feeling so festive she might as well be the fairy on top of the ten-foot tree. Can Daisy melt Alex’s icy exterior and prove to him just how magical Christmas can be?

But then Alex discovers Fox Farm is almost bankrupt, and suddenly its whole future is in jeopardy. They need a plan, and quickly, if Jean is to have a place to come back to this Christmas. Will Daisy be able to save the only real home she’s ever had? And might this Christmas be the beginning of something special?

My Rating 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: now I’ll going to be 100% honest here and admit that I haven’t actually finished the book yet, life has got ahead of me and I’ve struggled 😬

That being said though I’m 75% of the way through and didn’t want to miss my spot so I’ll review what I’ve read so far.

This is such a cosy heartwarming story that on the surface reads like a romance but once you delve a bit deeper you see that there is so much more to the story!

Fox farm has always been Alex’s home, although it’s owned by his Aunt Jean a lot of his happiest memories as a child were experienced here! – all school holidays (except Christmas) were spent here with his Aunt and uncle and we doing learn that he’s there to escape a turbulent home life.

He loved it so much that he’s opened his own business just down the road!

Daisy is currently the resident artist at Fox Farm and for the first time feels like she’s found where she belongs, she feels at home and although the living quarters are small, it’s perfect for her!

The book opens with all the members of the fox farm team carving pumpkins getting ready for their Halloween event and it’s decided that in the morning Daisy will go round to Jeans and help lay the pumpkin trail, unfortunately things don’t quite go to plan as when Daisy turns up she finds Jean slumped in a chair looking like she hasn’t moved all night! – with Jean is hospital and it being unknown when she’ll be home again can they all pull together to make Christmas at fox farm run smoothly without her?

There was an absolute pick’n’mix of characters in this story, some that pulled at your heartstrings like Jean, some like Daisy and Alex who went completely out of their way to make everything perfect. But then you got characters like Sebastian who just rubbed me up the wrong way from the beginning – he was just out for what he could get!

But then characters like Mr Giles are weird, wacky and just absolutely hilarious, he had me laughing on more than one occasion!

I cannot wait to see how this story wraps up, in fact I’ll probably finish it before I go to bed tonight. but this is definitely a read that needs adding to your TBR.

It’s Christmassy enough to get you feeling all warm and fuzzy and looking forward to the festive season but not too Christmassy for an October read.

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Today is my stop on the book tour for Her Wolves by G. Bailey, thank you to Kelly at Love Books Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part & thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 352

Synopsis: I knew nothing about mates until the alpha rejected me…

Growing up in one of the biggest packs in the world, my life is planned out from the second I turn eighteen and find my true mate in the moon ceremony.

Finding your true mate gives you the power to share the shifter energy they have, given to the males of the pack by the moon goddess herself. The power to shift into a wolf.

But for the first time in the history of our pack, the new alpha is mated with a nobody. A foster kid living in the packs orphanage with no ancestors or power to claim.

Me.

After being brutally rejected by my alpha mate, publicly humiliated and thrown away into the sea, the dark wolves of the Fall Mountain Pack find me.

They save me. The four alphas. The ones the world fears because of the darkness they live in.

In their world? Being rejected is the only way to join their pack. The only way their lost and forbidden god gives them the power to shift without a mate.

I spent my life worshipping the moon goddess when it turns out my life always belonged to another..

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: this was a good opener to a new fantasy RH series! The writing gripped me straight away.

We following Irin, who is a foster kid within one of the biggest wolf packs in the world, but then she’s a nobody, living in the orphanage because it is pack law that females don’t get killed, they’re too rare!

Irin knows roughly how her life will pan out, once she turns 18 she will take part in the moon ceremony and will be mated to another member of the pack, unfortunately when that day arrives it doesn’t go as planned, the moon goddess has spoken and Irins fates mate is the Alpha of the pack, he can’t be seen with a nobody so he rejects her, his inner wolf won’t let him kill her though so he throws her over the edge of the cliff and let’s the sea do the job for him… or so he thought!

Irin is found on the beach by one of the 5 alphas of the Fall Mountain pack close to death he makes the decision to make her one of their pack (a decision that should be made by all 5 of them together)

You soon get the feeling that there is more to the story, like maybe the Alpha knows who she is even though she doesn’t really know herself?

What follows is a story of acceptance and learning to adapt to new surroundings, there wasn’t really a lot to this story (not a criticism) it was more introduction of characters and world building!

There was a definite mystery element to it and I can’t wait to learn more about Mai and her past, as well as joining her in the discovery of all these alpha males and what they might be to her in the future!

There was a lot of hinted at sexual tension although there was no smut in this book – I’m sure that will appear in the next one!

I can’t wait to see where the next book takes us because this one ended on one hell of a cliff hanger!

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T

Pages: 368

Synopsis: What if the Lift driver who finds your cheating boyfriend’s phone holds the directions to true love?

‘Who are you and why do you have my boyfriend’s phone?’

‘He left it in my car. You must be the blonde in the red dress? I’m the Lift driver who dropped you two off earlier.’

And with these words, the life of the brunette and t-shirt wearing Maya Maas is turned upside down. Having planned to surprise her boyfriend, she finds herself single and stranded in an unknown city on her birthday.

So when the mystery driver rescues Maya with the suggestion that she cheers herself up at a nearby beach town, she jumps at the chance to get things back on track. She wasn’t expecting a personalised itinerary or the easy companionship that comes from opening up to a stranger via text, let alone the possibility it might grow into something more..

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: Having not actually read the synopsis for this book I didn’t really know what to expect, I got the gist of it being a love story but I didn’t know that poor Maya was going to have her heart broken in the beginning! – but once we met Max I was here for the whole thing!

My favourite part of the book was the interaction between Maya and ‘max’ solely through text, the fact that he was trying his best to make her birthday special when he didn’t even know her made my heart feel all warm and fuzzy! & Maya’s too, has she really found the love of her life on the same day she found out her boyfriend has been cheating on her?

Obviously there’s a spanner in the works when her boyfriend Davis turns up claiming that he hadn’t cheated on her and the guy she’s be be texting all day was just having a laugh so she goes back home with him!

A year later she’s back in Carmel by the Sea, having finally leaving David because someone here has written a book about that very day she spent here the year before & she’s always wondered who ‘Max’ really was – could this be her chance to find out?

This book was SO MUCH FUN and one of those I wish I could experience for the first time all over again.

I did work out who Max was quite early on, but got me that added to the enjoyment of it, almost like I knew something Maya didn’t 🤣

If you’re a fan of romance that takes a little time and work to get there I promise this one won’t disappoint.

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Today is my stop on the blog tour for The Family Man by Kimberley Chambers, thank you to Anne at Random Things Tours for organising it and inviting me to take part and thank you to the author and the publisher for my copy.

Pages: 486

Synopsis: Kenny Bond. A murderer. A gangster. A good family man.
Meet the Bonds

Kenny Bond is finally out of prison after doing a long stretch for killing a copper, and is determined to get back to life on the straight and narrow.

A family like no other

Kenny’s son Donny might lack his father’s edge but his twin grandsons, Beau and Brett – well, they are Bonds through and through. Like him, they won’t let anyone stand in their way.

But they’re about to meet their match

Family comes before everything else for Kenny, but there’s a feud brewing that could cause murder, and a new family on Dark Lane might bring the Bonds to their knees. Kenny’s determined that nothing, and no one, will threaten his family. But can the Bonds stick together when someone’s out to take them down?

Meet THE BONDS.
You don’t want to be on the wrong side of this family.
A brand-new series from the queen of gangland crime

My Rating: 🐧🐧🐧🐧

My Thoughts: this is the first book of Kimberleys that I’ve picked up and bloody hell did I pick a good one to start with!

When I’d finished it my boyfriend asked if I’d enjoyed it and I said “it was brilliant, it was shocking and brutal but it was SO good!” And that pretty much sums it up.

We’re following Kenny Bond who is the top dog in the Bond family along with his wife Sharon, his children and even his grandchildren and a few other family friends along the way we’re really thrown into the world of gang land crime! I don’t want to give too much away because part of the enjoyment of the story for me was the shock factor, I lost count of the amount of times I gasped or said “no way!!” whilst reading this I was totally hooked and at times scared to put the book down for fear of missing out on the next twist!

I will warn you though, aspects of this story were not an easy read, there’s drugs, sexual assault, rape of a child (although not too much detail, it happens and you’re made very aware of the fact!) I didn’t want it to end but at the same time couldn’t wait to finish it to see how it wrapped up. I was definitely happy with the ending although felt that not all of the “loose ends” had been tied up so I can’t wait to see what happens in the next instalment of this totally gripping series!

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