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The Rural Diaries: Love, Livestock, and Big Life Lessons Down on Mischief Farm by Hilarie Burton Morgan

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  I cannot resist reading about women who move to the country and live a farming life. I guess it's because I think they're very brave. And they're so darn handy at creating something out of nothing, or using very little to create that something. Hilarie Burton Morgan joins my list of women I admire, who roll up their sleeves and jump in with a brave heart.  The Rural Diaries  is about Hilarie and Jeffrey Dean Morgan (you know, that heartthrob of a guy from Grey's Anatomy, and the nasty Negan from The Walking Dead), and their decision to move to Rhinebeck, New York and live on a farm.  After meeting in L.A. through mutual friends, their connection was pretty quick and deep. Driving through Rhinebeck, they immediately felt at home and wanted to put down roots away from the craziness of Hollywood. And so they did.  But this story is not all fairy tale and happy ending; at least not for a few years. Hilarie recounts their beginnings, with their young son Gus, ...

The Last Garden in England by Julia Kelly

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  I needed to escape from my October reading for a bit and found the perfect book to do just that. This novel will be out in January, 2021 so if you're a fan of Julia Kelly you'll have a few months to wait.  I'm one of those people who love all things gardening-especially flower gardens. I am, however, not one to be out in a garden working on it every chance I get. I love the results, but not so much all the work to get there. I used to have a lot of flowers in my yard, but I've scaled back massively the past few years because I don't have the time, and I've realized that whomever follows me in my house may not want a lot of flower beds around. I still have perennials, but I've gone to simple, easy to care for summer flowers and plants in pots. I still have a wish for a forever home with a field of wildflowers somewhere on the property. My partner has agreed on this, so hopefully in the future I'll have that gardening wish come true.  This novel has quit...

The Garden of Small Beginnings by Abbi Waxman

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This book has been so patient with me. I bought it in 2017, and it has had a place of prominence on my bookcase. The bookcase that I walk past multiple times a day; the one just outside my kitchen. The bright cover always catches my eye, and I think "I've got to read that someday".  It took a pandemic, but here we are--it's read, and I'm so glad I waited until now to dive into it.  I read Abbi's novel The Bookish Life of Nina Hill    last August (click on the title for my review) and loved Abbi's style of writing: a bit of snark, a bit of humor, and a whole lot of heart. Contemporary women's fiction that I really enjoy, and sometimes have a hard time finding just the right fit. Abbi's writing fits me perfectly. So when I realized this was the same author, I really wanted to read it--and I needed something a bit lighter, and something that had to do with gardening.  Lilian Girvan is a single mother of two young girls: Annabel and Clare. Her hu...

The Wisdom of Sally Red Shoes by Ruth Hogan

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I was surprised and super happy to have this novel arrive in my mail from Crooked Lane Press. I always say books find people at the right moments, and somehow, the folks at Crooked Lane Press knew I needed this book. Never doubt the magic of books. Ruth Hogan's first novel, The Keeper of Lost Things , was published in 2017 and I happily reviewed it. She has a remarkable gift for writing that captivated me, and I'm happy to say her second novel cast a similar spell over me. Whomever designs her book covers, sheesh! They are amazingly beautiful. Can't help but pick it up just based on the cover art.  Masha is a woman who lives with grief. Twelve years before, she lost her toddler son, Gabriel, in a freak accident. More horribly, his body was never recovered from the little creek it was presumed he fell into and drowned. Masha punishes herself by going to the local swimming pool all year round (it's outside) and dives into the deep end and holds her breath. She wants to f...

Flowers and Foul Play: A Magic Garden Mystery by Amanda Flower

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The theme for January's book club is Mystery.  We can read any mystery we want, and when you think about it, there's an overwhelming amount of mysteries to choose from, and it can be hard to decide. Do you go classic, with Agatha Christie, or Sherlock Holmes? Do you go with historical, or contemporary? Cozy, noir, or police procedural? What if you just want to read a stand alone mystery? Do they even exist anymore, in a genre that is mostly built on series?  Phew. A lot to think about. I started reading the second in Louise Penny's series, after reading Still Life last year and falling in deep like with everything about her writing and storyline. Then I was perusing through my stacks of books, and found a few cozy mysteries that I had received from a publisher last year and hadn't read yet. So I read Bad Neighbors by Maia Chance and it got me on the cozy mystery bandwagon. I've read them before, but mysteries have never been a huge part of my reading life. ...