The 13th and final installment of the book series that inspired the TV show, The Last Kingdom, is a sad but necessary conclusion to such a great and epic tale. Uhtred is now in his 70s, and while that's not impossible even for the era (average life expectancy if one survived childhood in the Middle Ages was in the 60s), it is starting to get a bit unrealistic, especially as a warrior who still engages in combat. For the last few books, I've been wondering how long Cornwell could really stretch this out, but now that it's finally come to an end, I will miss it, of course. I think that's why I ..read more

The Nature of Fragile Things by Susan Meissner  Release Date: February 2, 2021 Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a mail-order bride ad and agrees to marry a man she knows nothing about. San Francisco widower Martin Hocking proves to be as aloof as he is mesmerizingly handsome. Sophie quickly develops deep affection for Kat, Martin's silent five-year-old daughter, but Martin's odd behavior leaves her with the uneasy feeling that something about her newfound situation isn't right. (Full description at Goodreads) Th ..read more

Find Me in Havana: A Novel by Serena Burdick  Release Date: January 12, 2021 Cuba, 1936: When Estelita Rodriguez sings in a hazy Havana nightclub for the very first time, she is nine years old. From then on, that spotlight of adoration—from Havana to New York’s Copacabana and then Hollywood—becomes the one true accomplishment no one can take from her. Not the 1933 Cuban Revolution that drove her family into poverty. Not the revolving door of husbands or the fickle world of film. (Full description at Goodreads) The Children's Train: A Novel by Viola Ardone  (Author), Clarissa Bo ..read more

Our Darkest Night: A Novel of Italy and the Second World War by Jennifer Robson  Release Date: January 5, 2021 It is the autumn of 1943, and life is becoming increasingly perilous for Italian Jews like the Mazin family. With Nazi Germany now occupying most of her beloved homeland, and the threat of imprisonment and deportation growing ever more certain, Antonina Mazin has but one hope to survive—to leave Venice and her beloved parents and hide in the countryside with a man she has only just met.  (Full description at Goodreads) The Gates of Athens by Conn Iggulden   R ..read more

The Angel of Waterloo by Jackie French  Release Date: December 1, 2020 She was Henrietta Bartlett, a surgeon's daughter, a survivor of the Napoleonic Wars. But now the battlefield is just a blood-soaked memory, and Hen dreams of peace, a home, and a society that allows women to practise medicine. On the other side of the world, the newly founded colony of New South Wales seems a paradise. But Europe's wars cast long shadows ... (Full description at Goodreads) The Mermaid from Jeju: A Novel by Sumi Hahn  Release Date: December 8, 2020 In the aftermath of World War II, Goh Junja ..read more

The Forgotten Orphan by Glynis Peters  Release Date: December 1, 2020 Abandoned when she was tiny, Maisie Reynolds was separated from her twin brother and forced to grow up in Holly Bush orphanage – a place where she has never known love or kindness. But with the world at war and Hitler’s devastating bombs coming ever closer, fate has other plans for Maisie and a secret from her past changes everything. When she meets handsome Canadian paratrooper, Cam, Maisie learns that love might not be lost to her after all – but not before her past life and D Day bring a tragic twist to her happines ..read more

The Sea Gate by Jane Johnson  Release Date: November 17, 2020 After Rebecca’s mother dies, she must sort through her empty flat and come to terms with her loss. As she goes through her mother’s mail, she finds a handwritten envelope. In it is a letter that will change her life forever. Olivia, her mother’s elderly cousin, needs help to save her beloved home. Rebecca immediately goes to visit Olivia in Cornwall only to find a house full of secrets—treasures in the attic and a mysterious tunnel leading from the cellar to the sea, and Olivia, nowhere to be found. (Full description at Goodre ..read more

The Lady Brewer of London: A Novel by Karen Brooks Release Date: November 10, 2020 1405: The daughter of a wealthy merchant, Anneke Sheldrake suddenly finds her family bankrupted when her father’s ship is swept away at sea. Forced to find a way to provide for herself and her siblings, Anneke rejects an offer of marriage from a despised cousin and instead turns to her late mother’s family business: brewing ale.  (Full description at Goodreads) In the Lion's Den: A House of Falconer Novel (The House of Falconer Series Book 2) by Barbara Taylor Bradford  Release Date: November 10, 2 ..read more

The Forgotten Daughter by Joanna Goodman  Release Date: October 27, 2020 1992: French-Canadian factions renew Quebec’s fight to gain independence, and wild, beautiful Véronique Fortin, daughter of a radical separatist convicted of kidnapping and murdering a prominent politician in 1970, has embraced her father’s cause. So it is a surprise when she falls for James Phénix, a journalist of French-Canadian heritage who opposes Quebec separatism. Their love affair is as passionate as it is turbulent, as they negotiate a constant struggle between love and morals. (Full description at Goodreads ..read more

Still playing catch up on my ARCs. Release Date: May 5, 2020 A fascinating true story about how a woman turns her husband's brewing company into an empire that survives Prohibition, after he is murdered by one of his mistresses.  I knew nothing about Emma Koehler or Pearl Brewing before picking this up, but the only thing better than a dramatic story is one that's true, so I couldn't resist. It's a great story, but I think it could have been told in a slightly better way. It's as though the author attempted to tell it in dual time periods - one when Emma is elderly and hires a young w ..read more