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The Magnolia Palace by Fiona Davis

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  To order from Amazon, click here  It feels like I've been missing a lot of historical fiction in the past year, when it used to make up a large portion of my monthly reading.  Fiona Davis' The Magnolia Palace got me off to a good start in 2022. I always enjoy her novels, set in New York City and centered around famous New York City landmarks. It's a great combination of fiction and history; you can tell Fiona Davis does her research.  This novel takes us to 1919 New York City--but also 1966 New York City. What links the two periods together? Henry Clay Frick and his family, and art.  The 1919 story centers around Lillian Carter, who is an artist's model that is known as "Angelique". Her face and body are on numerous statues, monuments, and sculptures all around New York City. Lillian's mother has just died, and without her guidance, she's a bit lost--and broke.  Lillian quickly finds herself in trouble with the police and, after spending the nig...

The Maid by Nita Prose

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  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...

I Finally Read a Taylor Jenkins Reid Novel: Malibu Rising

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  To order from Amazon click here   I'll admit sometimes I stubbornly refuse to read an author right out of the gate--mostly because there's so much praise about the novels that I have to take a step back and not rush to jump on the bandwagon. I don't want to read something just because everyone else is--I'd rather come around in my own time.  So, I ordered Malibu Rising from BOTM and decided to give it whirl. I was looking to read something very different after reading my Christmas novels in December. This fit the bill! Yeah, I loved it. I don't know if it was the setting: Malibu in the early 1980's; or the characters, or reading a novel set by the Pacific Ocean in the warm California sun. All of it combined to create a read that I simply couldn't put down.  So, the Riva family: Nina, Jay, Hud, and Kit. Children of singer Mick Riva (I kept picturing Dean Martin), who was a famous crooner in the 1950's, all the way up to the early 1980's. He ...

The Bone Cay by Eliza Nellums

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  To purchase, click here This novel wasn't on my TBR list until I came across it at work. A quick glance at the cover had me quickly checking it out and taking it home. Magda Trudell is the caretaker of the Whimbrel Estate in Key West, the home of poet Isobel Reyes. Isobel famously walked off the dock near her home in 1918, drowning in the ocean. Her body was never found. Now, that reputation has people visiting the area to also end their lives. Magda makes it part of her duties to walk the beach and check the mangroves to see if any bodies appear. Not exactly what a caretaker should be doing on a daily basis.  Madga has fought and fought to get extra funding for the Whimbrel Estate. She's poured all her love and admiration for Isobel's poetry into her life and is an expert on Isobel's poetry. She's been caretaker of the estate for ten years, and has fought tooth and nail to preserve the gorgeous estate and bring a historic landmark designation to it. Unfortuna...

The Bookalicious Babe's Top Ten Books of 2021

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       It's here! My Top Ten! Where did this year go? I think I'd like to just blank out 2020 & 2021 and jump right to 2022.  Only problem is then I would have to forget all the wonderful books I saw, touched, read, and yes, dreamed about reading.  The end of the year is always a time of reflection for me as I look back and think about my DNF's, titles I bought and are still sitting on a shelf (or in a pile on the floor); the books I said I'd read and review and didn't. I look at other bloggers and sometimes feel like I'm not reading the books I should be reading. It can all become a downward spiral pretty quickly, until I stop myself and think about why I've been blogging for over 11 years.  I do it because I like to talk about what I've been reading. Sometimes I read the popular books, and other times I like to read books that didn't get the spotlight but are absolutely wonderful reads. Sometimes I get on a kick and only read one type o...

Christmas by the Book by Anne Marie Ryan

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  To purchase from Amazon, click here   There's nothing I like better than to recommend books to people. It's no surprise, then, that this novel gave me all the feels and a lot of sighing over my "if I could do it all over again" wish to own a bookstore in a small town.  Nora and Simon operate a small bookstore in the village of Stowford, England. Nora inherited the shop from her mother, and they've been a cornerstone of the village for thirty years.  Unfortunately, unpaid taxes and a slowdown in sales has meant Nora is keeping some important news from Simon: they are in danger of losing the shop if payments aren't brought up to date by the end of the year.  Simon is oblivious to the financial pickle they're in because Nora is worried about his heart (he had a minor heart episode previously) and won't let him help much in the shop.  An elderly man stops in and purchases a special book--it's the one book that has gone unsold in the shop for thirty...

A Magical New York Christmas by Anita Hughes

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To purchase from Amazon, click here  I've read quite a few Anita Hughes novels and she has a way of putting me right into glamorous places that I'm pretty sure I won't have a chance to experience in my real life. And that's exactly what I enjoy about her novels.  This one is particularly interesting because it takes place over the Christmas holiday at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. It also involves the author of the Eloise books, Kay Thompson. A little bit of literary history tossed in with the magic of New York City at Christmas time--and romance, too. Sabrina is a struggling writer who is just scraping by when she gets hired by renowned art dealer Grayson Prescott to help write his memoir. Part of the deal is staying at the Plaza Hotel for six days and nights on his dime. Sabrina is thrilled not only for the paycheck, but also because Eloise is her favorite heroine from childhood.  What makes it even more appealing   are Grayson's stories of his time as a b...