The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

Author: Taylor Jenkins Reid
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Washington Square Press, 2018
Pages: 400
Rating: Do Not Recommend

Synopsis: Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now?

Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to writer her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career.

Summoned to Evelyn's luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the '80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn's story nears its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique's own in tragic and irreversible ways.

Review: Taylor Jenkins Reid has been one of my favorite authors over the last few years, but if I'm being honest, this novel was a miss. Evelyn is not a likeable person, and each husband is just more of the same. I consider this to be TJR's least imaginative novel. It was a struggle to finish.

Other Taylor Jenkins Reid Novels:
Malibu Rising
Daisy Jones and The Six
Maybe in Another Life

Forged in Love

Author: Mary Connealy
Genre: Christian Historical Fiction
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group, 2023
Pages: 304
Rating: Recommend

Synopsis: Mariah Stove is left for dead and with no memory when the Deadeye Gang robs the stagecoach she's riding in, killing both her father and brother. As she takes over her father's blacksmith shop and tries to move forward, she soon finds herself in jeopardy and wondering - does someone know she witnessed the robbery and is still alive?

Handsome and polished Clint Roberts escaped to western Wyoming, leaving his painful memories behind. Hoping for a fresh start, he opens a diner where he creates fine dishes, but is met with harsh resistance from the townsfolk, who prefer to stick to their old ways.

Clint and Mariah are drawn together by trials they face in town, and Clint is determined to protect Mariah at all costs when danger descends upon her home. As threats pursue them from every side, will they survive to build a life forged in love.

Review: I found the premise to be a bit farfetched and the author trying just a little too hard what with a gourmet male chef on the Wyoming frontier in 1870 and a female blacksmith. However, with fiction you can take certain liberties. I enjoyed the story and the writing. 

The Five-Star Weeked

Author: Elin Hilderbrand
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Little, Brown, and Company, 2023
Pages: 384
Rating: Highly Recommend

Synopsis: Hollis Shaw's life seems picture-perfect. She's the creator of the popular food blog Hungry with Hollis and is married to Matthew, a dreamy heart surgeon. But after she and Matthew get into a heated argument one snowy morning, he leaves for the airport and is killed in a car accident. The cracks in Hollis' perfect life - her strained marriage and her complicated relationship with her daughter, Caroline - grow deeper.

So when Hollis hears about something called a "Five-Star Weekend" - one woman organizes a trip for he best friend from each phase of her life: her teenage years, her twenties, her thirties, and midlife - she decides to host her own Five-Star Weekend on Nantucket. But the weekend doesn't turn out to be a joyful Hallmark movie. 

The husband of Hollis' childhood friend Tatum arranges for Hollis' first love, Jack Finnegan, to spend time with them, stirring up old feelings. Meanwhile, Tatum is forced to play nice with abrasive and elitist Dru-Ann, Hollis' best friend from UNC Chapel Hill. Dru-Ann's career as a prominent Chicago sports agent is on the line after comments about a client's mental health issues are misconstrued online. Brooke, Hollis' friend from their thirties, has just discovered that her husband is having an inappropriate relationship with a woman at work. Again! And then there's GiGi, a stranger to everyone (including Hollis) who reached out to Hollis through her blog. Gigi embodies an unusual grace, and, as it happens, has many secrets.

Review: So much fun and the perfect summertime escapist novel. Electra Undergrove was my favorite character and a fun villain. 

Other Elin Hilderbrand Novels:
Summer of '69
The Blue Bistro
Golden Girl
The Hotel Nantucket
The Island
The Castaways

The Winter Street Series
Winter Street
Winter Stroll
Winter Storms
Winter Solstice

The Winter in Paradise Trilogy
Winter in Paradise
What Happens in Paradise
Troubles in Paradise

The Spectacular

Author: Fiona Davis
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group, 2023
Pages: 368
Rating: Highly Recommend

Synopsis: New York City, 1956: Nineteen-year-old Marion Brooks knows she should be happy. Her high school sweetheart is about to propose and sweep her off to the life everyone has always expected they'd have together: a quiet house in the suburbs, Marion staying home to raise their future children. But instead, Marion finds herself feeling trapped. So when she comes across an opportunity to audition for the famous Radio City Rockettes - the glamorous precision-dancing troupe - she jumps at the chance to exchange her predictable future for the dazzling life of a performer.

Meanwhile, the city is reeling from a string of bombings orchestrated by a person the press has nicknamed the "Big Apple Bomber," who has been terrorizing the citizens of New York for sixteen years by planting bombs in popular, crowded spaces. With the public in an uproar over the lack of any real leads after a yearslong manhunt, the police turn in desperation to Peter Griggs, a young doctor at a local mental hospital who espouses a radical new technique: psychological profiling.

As both Marion and Peter find themselves unexpectedly pulled in to the police search for the bomber, Marion realizes that as much as she's been training herself to blend in - performing in perfect unison with all the other identical Rockettes - if she hopes to catch the bomber, she'll need to stand out and take a terrifying risk. In doing so, she may be forced to sacrifice everything she's worked for, as well as the people she loves the most.

Review: I loved this book so much. I believe 2023 will be the year I have a Top 10 instead of one or two books that I remember forever.

The time period, the setting, the plot, the characters. . .everything about this book appealed to me. I was hooked on the first page all the way through the end. Why have I never read this author before? At least that's an easily remedied problem.

Now, to figure out how and when I can get to NYC this year for a show.

Update - tickets are booked to see The Rockettes in NYC this Christmas season.

Where the Sky Begins

Author: Rhys Bowen
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: Amazon Publishing, 2022
Pages: 400
Rating: Highly Recommend

Synopsis: London, 1940. Bombs fall and Josie Bank's world crumbles around her. Her overbearing husband, Stan, is unreachable, called to service. Her home, a ruin of rubble and ash. Josie's beloved tearoom boss has been killed, and Josie herself is injured, with nothing left and nowhere to go.

Evacuated to the English countryside, Josie ends up at the estate of the aristocratic Miss Harcourt, a reluctant host to survivors of the Blitz. Awed as she is by the magnificent landscape, Josie sees opportunity. Josie convinces Miss Harcourt to let her open a humble tea shop, seeing it as a chance for everyone to begin again. When Josie meets Mike Johnson, a handsome Canadian pilot stationed at a neighboring bomber base, a growing intimacy brings her an inner peace she's never felt before. Than Stan returns from the war.

Now, a threat looms larger than anyone imagined. And a dangerous secret is about to upend Josie's life again. Her newfound courage will be put to the test if she is to emerge, like a survivor, triumphant.

Review: I began reading this one cautious page at a time. It's not often I read World War II novels back-to-back. This time period and subject matter is emotionally draining. However, I love Rhys Bowen's historical fiction novels, and wanted to give it a chance since it was available at the library.

Like, The Paris Daughter, this focused on a different aspect of World War II - the families and women left behind while the men went off to fight. While I think some of the challenges were glossed over and conveniences made for the sake of the story, I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. I was rooting for Josie, and she felt real and was relatable to me.

Other Rhys Bowen Novels:
The Venice Sketchbook
Above the Bay of Angels
In Farleigh Field
The Tuscan Child

The Paris Daughter

Author: Kristin Harmel
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: Galley Books, 2023
Pages: 384
Rating: Highly Recommend

Synopsis: Paris, 1939: Young mothers Elise and Juliette become fast friends the day they meet in the beautiful Bois de Boulogne. Though there is a shadow of war creeping across Europe, neither woman suspects that their lives are about to irrevocably change.

When Elise becomes a target of the German occupation, she trusts Juliette with her most precious thing in her life - her young daughter, playmate to Juliette's own little girl. But nowhere is safe in war, not even in a quiet little bookshop like Juliette's Librairie des Rêves, and, when a bomb falls on their neighborhood, Juliette's world is destroyed along with it.

More than a year later, with the war finally ending, Elise returns to reunite with her daughter, only to find her friend's bookstore reduced to rubble - and Juliette nowhere to be found. What happened to her daughter in those last, terrible moments? Juliette has seemingly vanished without a trace, taking all the answers with her. Elise's desperate search leads her to New York - and to Juliette - and one final, fateful time.


Review: This was a different type of World War II that focused more on the aftermath for survivors, rather than the atrocities and difficulties that occurred during the war. 

The plot and, therefore time, advanced quickly and the author let the reader feel his/her own emotions, rather than projecting emotion and forcing the reader to feel any particular way.

This is the second Kristin Harmel novel I've read, and I plan to read all of them. She is a talented author.

Other Kristin Harmel Novels:
The Winemaker's Wife
The Sweetness of Forgetting

The Friendship List

Author: Susan Mallery
Genre: Fiction / Chick Lit
Publisher: Harlequin, 2020
Pages: 384
Rating: Recommend

Synopsis: Single mom Ellen Fox couldn't be more content - until she overhears her son saying he can't go to his dream college because she needs him too much. If she wants him to live his best life, she has to convince him she's living hers.

So Unity Leandre, her beat friend since forever, creates a list of challenges to push Ellen out of her comfort zone. Unity will complete the list, too, but not because she needs to change. What's wrong with a thirty-something widow still sleeping in her late husband's childhood bed?

The Friendship List begins as a way to make others believe they're just fine. But somewhere between "wear three-inch heels" and "have sex with a gorgeous guy." Ellen and Unity discover that life is meant to be lived with joy and abandon, in a story filled with humor, heartache, and regrettable tattoos.

Review: Susan Mallery is just a fun, chick-lit author and I enjoy her novels. They're light summertime novels, or little escapes in the winter. I could relate to the characters in The Friendship List and I was hooked from the first page. Super enjoyable. The second half of the book also has its steamy moments written in Mallery's typical style. This book is an all-around good time.

Other Novels by Susan Mallery:
The Sister Effect
The Christmas Wedding Ring

Wishing Tree Series
The Christmas Wedding Guest
Home Sweet Christmas

Mischief Bay Novels
The Girls of Mischief Bay
The Friends We Keep
A Million Little Things

Montauk

Author: Nicola Harrison
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group, 2020
Pages: 416
Rating: Recommend

Synopsis: Montauk, Long Island, 1938.

For three months, this humble fishing village will serve as the playground for New York City's wealthy elite. Beatrice Bordeaux was looking forward to a summer of reigniting the passion between her and her husband, Harry. Instead, tasked with furthering his investment interest in Montauk as a resort destination, she learns she'll be spending twelve weeks sequestered with the high society wives at The Montauk Manor - a two hundred room seaside hotel - while Harry pursues other interests in the city.

College educated, but raised a modest country girl in Pennsylvania, Bea has never felt fully comfortable among these privileged women, whose days are devoted not to their children but to leisure activities and charities that seemingly benefit no one but themselves. She longs to be a mother herself, as well as a loving wife, but after five years of marriage she remains childless while Harry is increasingly remote and distracted. Despite lavish parties at the Manor and the Yacht Club, Bea is lost and lonely and befriends the manor's laundress whose work ethic and family life stir memories of who she once was.

As she drifts further from the society women and their preoccupations and closer toward Montauk's natural beauty and community spirit, Bea finds herself drawn to a man nothing like her husband - stoic, plain spoken, and enigmatic. Inspiring a strength and courage she had almost forgotten, his presence forces her to face a haunting tragedy of her past and question her future.

Review: This wasn't the fastest, most absorbing read, but I did enjoy it. The ending was "argh." 

Also by Nicola Harrison:
Hotel Laguna