Novelas Romanticas Gratis

  I had to put the books I've been reading on hold this last week so I could read Heather Gudenkauf's latest--I had a 10 day check out from the library so I couldn't dither! It wasn't hard to do, because this novel grabbed me from the first few pages and I quickly became completely invested in the characters and the plot. Wylie Lark is a true crime writer, and she's come to Burden, Iowa to stay in an isolated farmhouse to finish her latest book. A big blizzard is heading quickly towards town, and Wylie heads to the farmhouse to huddle up and wait out the storm.  Twenty years before, young Josie Doyle and her friend Becky were spending a last summer night together out at Josie's parent's farm. It was hot and hard to sleep. The girls slip out to jump on the trampoline outside, and hear gunshots in the house. Running towards the house, the girls quickly realize their mistake and turn around to flee into the cornfields.  Josie makes it into the field to hide, bu...

  To order, click here   This delightful mystery has been getting all the buzz lately, and I couldn't wait to read it.  Molly Gray is a maid at the Regency Grand Hotel, and she takes her job very, very seriously. She will not leave a hotel room less than perfect for a hotel guest. Her tag line: "I am here to restore your room to a state of perfection".  Molly is a character that is certainly memorable. She has trouble reading social cues and takes everything people say literally. She's painfully honest, too. Sadly, she's a loner amongst the hotel employees, and of course they make fun of her. Yet she is the sweetest, most honest person around.  One day, Molly returns to the hotel suite of the Blacks, a rich couple who frequent the hotel. Molly doesn't care for Mr. Black, as he's rude, crude, and treats his young second wife badly. He's been known to be mean to hotel staff, too. Molly had already been in the suite once that morning, but had to leave bef...

  This book came out of nowhere thanks to an invite to read and review it (thank you Dutton/Penguin/Random House).  I just got back from vacation and found it in a pile of books while I was unpacking and immediately started reading it. I'm not exaggerating when I say I couldn't put it down. I spent quite a bit of Sunday on the couch reading this historical novel that bounced between 1920's New York ad 1945 San Francisco.  Ellie Morgan is a secretary at the San Francisco Chronicle and has recently become engaged to a handsome officer stationed in San Francisco as World War 2 rages on. She chafes against societal rules that keep her career limited to housewife or secretary--when all she wants to do is write for the newspaper and wear trousers like Katherine Hepburn.  However this all falls to the wayside with a telegram stating that her father, a pilot, is missing and presumed dead over the Adriatic Sea near Italy in December, 1944. Devastated, she refus...

  Buy Here:  https://amzn.to/3m1SPH3 I knew I'd love this book when it first was out in hardcover last year (2020) and it was getting so many great reviews. It took me a year but I finally bought it in paperback and vowed I would read it this month. This is a sweet, special story.  Linus Baker is living a life as dull and grey as the weather in London. He is in his early forties and every day he works at the Department in Charge of Magical Youth. He travels to orphanages and checks to make sure the magical children at each location are being properly cared for--and he takes his job very seriously. He's been doing the same job for seventeen years. His routine is the same every day: get up, go to work, come home and feed his cat, eat a sad salad, and listen to records. No friends, nothing. He's fully aware his life is not the best, but he's just too tired to do anything about it.  He gets a special assignment from the Extremely Upper Management--a case that i...

I've read quite a few of Jojo Moyes' novels and haven't been disappointed in any of them. I have to say, however, The Peacock Emporium fell a bit flat for me. It was a novel I've had on my shelf for about a year, and after clearing off my bookcases, I found it again and added it to my summer reading list. But darn it all, it was a struggle to read and I'm still scratching my head over it after finishing it late tonight.  Reading the back cover, I thought this would be about a delightful young woman running a shop and dealing with a mother who is a bit overbearing. The delightful young woman would find her way by being a successful shop owner, and eventually connect with her mother. That's what I got out of reading the back cover.  Oh heck no, I was waaaay off. Honestly, I spent a lot of my time a bit confused as to where this plot was going. It seemed to be a jumble, as if the author couldn't decide which set of characters to concentrate on, so she tried to...

I'll confess I've wanted to visit Key West for many years, and I've yet to get there. When I saw this novel set in Key West in the 1930's, I had to pick it up. Add to the plot a devastating hurricane over Labor Day Weekend, 1935, and I grabbed a copy to read on my last few days of a short staycation.  The plot revolves around three women who are in Key West and the surrounding area over the Labor Day Weekend. It's 1935, and the southern most tip of Florida is a pretty rough place--not the tourist destination it is today. The Florida East Coast Railway had finally been built to bring passengers all the way to Key West. World War One vets were living in pretty miserable camps while they worked on building and extending the railroad. No one wanted to deal with vets returning from the Great War that had left them damaged with PTSD; it was easy to ship them down to Florida and forget about them. Wow. Do we never learn from past mistakes?!  Anyhow. Three women: Helen, Eli...

Summer. It's here. It took me a few months to get back into my reading groove, and I think I'm almost there again, thankfully.  The world is a hurting place, and I, along with so many others, are self-reflecting on my place in it, and my responsibility towards living a life of peace and love. I have always looked to the stories that books tell-whether they are fiction or non-fiction-to help me understand where the world was, and how we came to be where we are now. How others live; their cultures, the barriers they face, and the ugly and brutal things we do to each other out of fear and just plain ignorance.  I will continue to read stories, memoirs, and history books that will help me understand the beautiful, magnificent, deeply troubled and damaged world we live in and call our home. And I hope I can, in some way, make it better. I may not be out protesting, but I will vote for change, and donate to causes I feel are important. We all do what we can.  I saw a quote...

This was one of those books I spotted at the bookstore and it immediately caught my eye. I bought it and promptly added it to a stack of books to be read...in 2018. Well, I'm a few years off, but I finally read it, and am annoyed with myself for waiting so long to finally get to it. I love reading historical fiction that teaches me something I didn't know anything about before i picked up the book. In this case, it's all about the Dutch pottery industry in the 1650's. Add that to a soap opera worthy story with a smart, capable lead female character, and this was a thoroughly enjoyable read.  Catrin has just lost her husband to a sudden illness, and she is a widow at 25. She decides to sell the farm, leave her small village, and makes her way to Amsterdam and a new life. There, she has a chance to learn a bit more about painting-something she loved to do on bits of furniture and pottery, but was never able to fully explore. Just when it looks like Catrin is ...

Sandra Dallas knocked it out of the park again with her latest novel about women pioneers, Westering Women.  I've had the pleasure of meeting Sandra, and I've read pretty much all of her novels over the years. I'm never disappointed.  One of my favorite history subjects is pioneering women. I've always been fascinated by these incredible women, who gave up everything they knew and loved to follow their husbands out West to start new lives. Imagine walking from St. Louis to California. In a dress. No A/C, no iced coffee, no comforting hotel to sleep in at night. Maybe giving birth while out in the middle of nowhere. Losing children and husbands to cholera, accidents, drowning. When I think of these women, I can't help but admire their tenacity, strength of mind, and downright badassery . I wonder if I would have been able to do what they did; if I had the hardcore toughness, and grace, to make it West and start a new life. This is what Sandra's novel had me think...

My last read of January. I finished it at about 2:30 this morning, after falling asleep by 9 PM and then being WIDE awake in the middle of the night. Apparently I'd had enough sleep.  I suspect I'll be on the downslide by about 10 AM this morning. Just in time for my second round of coffee.  This was a quick read, and I wasn't quite sure where it was headed as I was reading about Maeve and her new life in a small town. It felt like the author wasn't quite sure which themes she wanted to focus on and I just figured it would all shake out. After all was said and done, I was happy with where the author was going and satisfied with the whole shebang.  Maeve has just lost her job as a sports journalist (and not a very good one, as she says), and her semi-famous baseball playing boyfriend has just humiliated her with a YouTube video of him smooching on another woman. Broke, she moves back in with her parents, and contemplates her mess of a life. Everything changes whe...

I zipped through this novel in a day--my first of 2020. It read very quickly, and I had a hard time putting it down.  Why was it so compelling? I'm not sure. It's a dual storyline, between two women: Nellie in 1956, and Alice in 2018. Both are living in the same home, and married. Nellie is married to a man who swept her off her feet, and she quickly realizes he's not a nice man. Not nice at all. He wants a wife who is pretty, looks perfect all the time, cooks, cleans, and has babies. He's not afraid to use some physical force to keep her in line.  Alice is a modern woman, who recently left her job in New York City under a cloud--although she's kept that bit of information from her husband Nate. He thinks she quit. Nate wants to move out of the city and start a family in a home set in the suburbs. Alice, very reluctantly, agrees. She's a big city lady, and used to working a lot. Nate makes enough money that she can stay home and write her novel. Alice and Nate b...

I was excited to finally dig into this novel, the second by Hester Fox. Her first novel, The Witch of Willow Hall , was published last year, and it was outstanding. So of course I expected her sophomore novel to be just as good.  While I did enjoy reading The Widow of Pale Harbor, it didn't match my expectations. Gothic, yes, certainly. A small town--Pale Harbor, Maine is the backdrop for this tale of a woman who lives in a large mansion, alone with her companion Helen, who is reviled and treated poorly by the townspeople. Four years before, Sophronia's husband Nathan had died in a carriage accident, and the town blamed her for his death. The town didn't know Nathan was a cruel, vicious husband.  It's 1846, and Edgar Allan Poe's short stories are wildly popular. Sophronia has taken over running her late husband's magazine, and deciding which stories will be published. So many Poe copy cats are out there, trying to make it into this popular magazine, and Sophroni...

My top ten reads list for 2019 is filling up fast and I've still got 5 months to go. This book is definitely on the list. It's a novel I've had my eye on since it first came out in hardcover; but as you know, other books crowd in and it's soon pushed waaaay back on the list. So far back that even buying the paperback earlier this year still didn't push it to the top of my TBR list.  However, on Instagram I follow Penguin Random House, and they've been showing a new book bag that features Eleanor Oliphant. I really would like that bag! But their Instagram did what it was supposed to do, and it had me looking through my bookcases at home to find my copy. There were a few moments of "I'm pretty sure I bought a copy...I'm pretty sure...I think..." and yes, I was right. I did have a copy tucked away. I spent Sunday afternoon diving into Eleanor's world, and I was immediately captivated.  Eleanor is the voice inside your head that says everything...

I'm diving back into reading again with some great historical novels this month. In a previous post, I talked about discovering Nicola Cornick's historical fiction, and checked out all three of her latest paperback novels from the library. The Woman in the Lake is her newest, just published this year.  At first, I was a little confused as I was reading, trying to get all my ducks in a row. It took about 40 pages before I felt on solid ground with this plot. One of my favorite plot devises is dual timelines and this one bounces from 1765 to 2014 and involves spousal abuse, love affairs, murder, and smuggling. And the one thing that links both timelines is a golden gown that has a dark power over anyone who possesses it.  1765: Lady Isabella Gerard has just been viciously assaulted by her husband after refusing to wear his latest gift: a golden gown he had made special for her. Their marriage is downright toxic; he is always parading mistresses and spending m...

I had heard buzz about this novel and decided to place a hold at my library, then promptly forgot about it during the holidays. A handy email reminder from my library that it was being held for me jolted my memory--another book I've managed to start since January 1st.  I have, however, finished this one; it's a pretty quick read and you can read it in an afternoon. It's also pretty darn good, in a serial killer kind of way.  Korede is a nurse at a local hospital, and she's been in love with Tade, a handsome doctor she works with, for months. Korede is the elder sister to Ayoola, who is physically the exact opposite of Korede: small, trim, and stunning. Her looks make men stare, and she's used her power over men to get her way in practically everything. She's even gotten away with murder.  Korede knows her sister is a serial killer; after all, she's "accidentally" stabbed three boyfriends, and left Korede to clean up the messes. She's an expert ...

This is a book that I've picked up numerous times over the past ten years, but I never could read it  for one reason or another.  I was finally compelled to read it because the sequel The Fifth Petal , is coming out in January, and I wanted to read the sequel.  Reading reviews online had me all set for a novel that I was sure to enjoy.  I was wrong.  I'm really bummed I didn't much like The Lace Reader .  I so wanted to enjoy it, and rave about it.  But I can't.  It took me weeks to finish it, which is usually not a good sign for me.  I wasn't pushed to really sit down and dive into the story of Towner and her mother May and Aunt Eva no matter how hard I tried.  And this book takes place in Salem for pete's sake!  A book set in Salem, MA is always a winner for me.  But not this one.   So why didn't I like The Lace Reader?   I felt like I was doggie paddling in a circle most of the time.  I couldn't tell wha...