WHERE I BELONG (Pine Valley #2) Heather B Moore

Jane Morris makes a living by cleaning the houses of the wealthy residents of Pine Valley, and she tries hard not to judge their extravagant lifestyles. But when one of her clients goes through a devastating breakup with his fiancé, Jane finds herself in the middle of his emotional mess. She wants to help him, but Cameron Vance is a man she could easily lose her heart to. Jane agrees to be his date to the charity event of the year, organized by Cameron’s mother. But the magical night shows Jane that if she’s a Cinderella, then Cameron is definitely a candidate for Prince Charming.

Books in the Pine Valley series:

Worth the Risk
Where I Belong
Say You Love Me
Waiting for You


 Opening line:
""Wow, this is the set-up."

Yay! Another book in the Pine Valley series by Heather B. Moore!

This one is like a Cinderella story, complete with a women who cleans, a charming man, a wicked woman who thinks she is queen and a ball.

AS BRIGHT AS HEAVEN by Susan Meissner

In 1918, Philadelphia was a city teeming with promise. Even as its young men went off to fight in the Great War, there were opportunities for a fresh start on its cobblestone streets. Into this bustling town, came Pauline Bright and her husband, filled with hope that they could now give their three daughters--Evelyn, Maggie, and Willa--a chance at a better life.

But just months after they arrive, the Spanish Flu reaches the shores of America. As the pandemic claims more than twelve thousand victims in their adopted city, they find their lives left with a world that looks nothing like the one they knew. But even as they lose loved ones, they take in a baby orphaned by the disease who becomes their single source of hope. Amidst the tragedy and challenges, they learn what they cannot live without--and what they are willing to do about it.

As Bright as Heaven is the compelling story of a mother and her daughters who find themselves in a harsh world, not of their making, which will either crush their resolve to survive or purify it.


  Opening line:
"Morning light shimmers on the apricot horizon as I stand at the place where my baby boy rests."

AS BRIGHT AS HEAVEN is a story of family, love and death set during WWI. I became fascinated by WWI and the Spanish Flu a few years ago and I will be adding this book to my growing WWI shelf.
Told from the different perspectives of the Bright women, we get a unique view from different ages and personalities into their lives and what it was like to live through the worse pandemic in history.
An uncle in Philadelphia has no children, no heirs, and wants to leave everything to Mr. Bright. He is an undertaker and wants to teach him the business and pass it on. He takes the family from country life and introduces them to city life.
Pauline is the mother and fiercely protective of her daughters, especially after having lost a baby son.
Evie is the oldest and the pragmatic one.
Maggie is sensitive, wants answers but leads with her heart.
Willa is the youngest and is headstrong and lets her emotions out.
There are so many intriguing threads that weave together nicely, and sometimes a little tangled, in this story. The story setting, the characters, the POVs kept me reading all day, wanting to know what would happen to this family.
The story also teaches there is more than one way to be a family--being needed is one of them. The neighbors, the orphaned baby, even speakeasy owners can all become family..

Ten swear words (damn and hell); one scene where an unmarried woman and married man had sex but I wasn't totally sure and had to reread the passage a couple of times. It's very subtle and vague. War, death, sickness is talked about and seen throughout the book.

Thanks to netgalley for the read!
 

THE LEAVING by Tara Altebrando

Eleven years ago, six kindergarteners went missing without a trace. After all that time, the people left behind moved on, or tried to.

Until today. Today five of those kids return. They're sixteen, and they are . . . fine. Scarlett comes home and finds a mom she barely recognizes, and doesn't really recognize the person she's supposed to be, either. But she thinks she remembers Lucas. Lucas remembers Scarlett, too, except they're entirely unable to recall where they've been or what happened to them. Neither of them remember the sixth victim, Max. He doesn't come back. Everyone wants answers. Most of all Max's sister Avery, who needs to find her brother--dead or alive--and isn't buying this whole memory-loss story.




Opening line:
"The lights hurt my eyes and Mommy is crying and not looking at me." 

THE LEAVING is a story about returning. Six kids are abducted, five return. The story is told between three teens, two of the returned and one sister, and is hard to put down! I wanted to know what was going on, if they would catch the nut who held them and what would happen to the families. I'm still not sure if the kidnapping was ever resolved...

VERY, VERY, VERY DREADFUL: The Influenza Pandemic of 1918

From National Book Award finalist Albert Marrin comes a fascinating look at the history and science of the deadly 1918 flu pandemic--and the chances for another worldwide pandemic.

In spring of 1918, World War I was underway, and troops at Fort Riley, Kansas, found themselves felled by influenza. By the summer of 1918, the second wave struck as a highly contagious and lethal epidemic and within weeks exploded into a pandemic, an illness that travels rapidly from one continent to another. It would impact the course of the war, and kill many millions more soldiers than warfare itself.

Of all diseases, the 1918 flu was by far the worst that has ever afflicted humankind; not even the Black Death of the Middle Ages comes close in terms of the number of lives it took. No war, no natural disaster, no famine has claimed so many. In the space of eighteen months in 1918-1919, about 500 million people--one-third of the global population at the time--came down with influenza. The exact total of lives lost will never be known, but the best estimate is between 50 and 100 million.

In this powerful book, filled with black and white photographs, nonfiction master Albert Marrin examines the history, science, and impact of this great scourge--and the possibility for another worldwide pandemic today.

Opening line:
"If you are into the business of infectious disease epidemics, you can't ignore the 1918 flu--it's the great granddaddy of them all." 

Since I wrote a historical romance set during WWI, I have a crazy obsession about reading all the books I can get my hands on about this time in history. 
This book is fascinating. If you want to know everything about this flu, The Spanish Lady or a host of other names, this book is for you.

CHANGE OF HEARTH (Lobster Cover #1) by Jennifer Moore

This summer, Nathaniel Cavanaugh vacations in Lobster Cove to spend quality time with his kids after his estranged wife’s tragic death. Successful and well-connected, he is on the fast-track to the highest legal positions in the country, but his family life suffers. After an accident throws Val nearly into his lap and costs her a job opportunity, Nathaniel surprises himself by overlooking her outlandish appearance and lack of qualifications to offer her a job as his nanny for the summer.

Valdosta McKinley wishes for an internship at a Paris Art Institute to use her newly acquired art-history skills. She knows Nathaniel could never develop feelings for a girl from a trailer in a rural West Virginia holler—a lesson she learned the hard way years earlier.

Will pursuit of their professional goals require Nathaniel and Val to give up the dream of being a family?


Opening line:
"Nathianl ignored the buzzing in his pocket and gazed across the park where the morning sun simmered on the waves in the harbor."

 
If you love a sweet, satisfying romance, read this book!I proclaim this an excellent beach read!!

THE DISAPPEARANCES by Emily Bain Murphy

 What if the ordinary things in life suddenly…disappeared?

Aila Quinn’s mother, Juliet, has always been a mystery: vibrant yet guarded, she keeps her secrets beyond Aila’s reach. When Juliet dies, Aila and her younger brother Miles are sent to live in Sterling, a rural town far from home--and the place where Juliet grew up.

Sterling is a place with mysteries of its own. A place where the experiences that weave life together--scents of flowers and food, reflections from mirrors and lakes, even the ability to dream--vanish every seven years.

No one knows what caused these “Disappearances,” or what will slip away next. But Sterling always suspected that Juliet Quinn was somehow responsible--and Aila must bear the brunt of their blame while she follows the chain of literary clues her mother left behind.

As the next Disappearance nears, Aila begins to unravel the dual mystery of why the Disappearances happen and who her mother truly was. One thing is clear: Sterling isn’t going to hold on to anyone's secrets for long before it starts giving them up.


Opening line:
"I want something of hers."

Aila Quinn's mother died.
Her father was going to war.
Aila and her brother Miles had nowhere to go.
A stranger, a friend of their mother, takes them in. They knew they would not like Sterling but little did they know that the town was surrounded by mystery and the citizen's didn't have a future...at least that is what they believed.
Sterling is the city of The Disappearances. Reflections are missing in windows and mirrors; scents have disappeared; coloring with crayons only produces grey. Every seven years something new goes missing and every seven years the townspeople hope and pray that the curse will end.
Aila and Miles are thrust into the middle of the curse. The only clue Aila has is in the underlined passages in a volume of Shakespeare's works.
This was a fun and intriguing read! I wanted to know if Aila and her friends could figure out how to break the curse. It was fun to read Shakespeare too!
I loved the writing and here are a few quotes:

"I want to ask George, How can you be so unafraid of the truth? Even truth that is inconvenient or damning or not what you want it to be?"

"The Clifftons, whether they are trying to or not, are making inroads straight across each fault line of my heart."

"And I think that for the rest of my life I will never forget this night--when under an empty ink sky, a boy who shone brighter than the stars stopped long enough to smile at me."

BEFORE WE WERE YOURS by Lisa Wingate

Two families, generations apart, are forever changed by a heartbreaking injustice in this poignant novel, inspired by a true story, for readers of Orphan Train and The Nightingale.

Memphis, 1939. Twelve-year-old Rill Foss and her four younger siblings live a magical life aboard their family’s Mississippi River shantyboat. But when their father must rush their mother to the hospital one stormy night, Rill is left in charge—until strangers arrive in force. Wrenched from all that is familiar and thrown into a Tennessee Children’s Home Society orphanage, the Foss children are assured that they will soon be returned to their parents—but they quickly realize that the truth is much darker. At the mercy of the facility’s cruel director, Rill fights to keep her sisters and brother together—in a world of danger and uncertainty.

Aiken, South Carolina, present day. Born into wealth and privilege, Avery Stafford seems to have it all: a successful career as a federal prosecutor, a handsome fiancé, and a lavish wedding on the horizon. But when Avery returns home to help her father weather a health crisis, a chance encounter leaves her with uncomfortable questions—and compels her to take a journey through her family's long-hidden history, on a path that will ultimately lead either to devastation or redemption.

Based on one of America’s most notorious real-life scandals—in which Georgia Tann, director of a Memphis-based adoption organization, kidnapped and sold poor children to wealthy families all over the country—Wingate’s riveting, wrenching, and ultimately uplifting tale reminds us how, even though the paths we take can lead to many places, the heart never forgets where we belong.

 Opening line:
"My story begins on a weltering August night, in a place I will never set eyes upon."

This story was written so beautifully that I wanted to cry and cheer and throw something. The characters, settings, the story lines...all masterfully penned.

A favorite quote:
"A woman's past need not predict her future. She can dance to new music if she chooses. Her own music. To hear the tune, she must only stop talking. To herself, I mean."

I want to believe that such an atrocity as baby brokering didn't happen in America, but it happen then and it still happens now. Just over fifteen years ago, a friend had her adopted baby taken from her as it came to light that the mother, from the Marshall Islands, realized her baby was taken for adoption and would not be back at age 18. This opened the sinister side of adoption: greed.

But this story, of the Tennessee home and Ms. Tann, is disturbing as thousands of children were whisked from homes and hospitals without consent, and hundreds died. This was in an era where families lost everything and feeding a family was a burden so they sent their children to orphanages in the hopes that they would be taken care of and sent to families who could provide for them. But that was a very small number compared to the kidnappings.
I was heart sick for the parents who lost their children to this system and sick that they never got the chance to be reunited.

Another favorite quote:

"Life is not unlike cinema. Each scene has its own music, and the music is created for the scene, woven to it in ways we do not understand. No matter how much we may love the melody of a bygone day or imagine the song of a future one, we must dance within the music of today, or we will always be out of step, stumbling around in something that doesn’t suit the moment.”


There two possible scenes of rape but they are vague.

Summer TBR Wipeout 2018 READING!

I decided to do The Candid Cover Summer TBR wipeout again this summer! I was a great way to motivate me to get my pile of books whittled down. 

Here's a little bit about the fun:

The Summer TBR Wipeout 2018 summer reading challenge sign-ups are now open! ! I hope that you can join us in our low-key challenge that will help to wipe some of those books off of your ever growing TBR. It is always a fun part of my summer and I look forward to finding out what everyone else is reading this year.


To make the Summer TBR Wipeout 2018 simple and inclusive to everyone, I am opening this up to anyone who wants to participate. You do not have to run a book blog or a website for that matter. All that I ask is that you create your posts on some sort of social media website, such as Instagram, Facebook or Tumblr, etc. You can also read backlist books, ARCs, new releases, audiobooks,  or anything else that has been beckoning you to read it. There will be 4 posts in total that you can link up to here on The Candid Cover.

Here's the schedule:

SCHEDULE:

June 3- July 5: Sign-ups open!
Week of July 1st: Introductory post- What books are you planning to read this summer?
Week of July 15th: Update post #1- Tell us how your reading has been going so far. What books have you read? Were they enjoyable? What’s next on your TBR? Etc.
Week of July 29th: Update post #2
Week of August 12th: Wrap-up post- How did your summer reading go? Did you wipeout some books from your summer TBR?

Don’t forget to check back during the event to link up your posts and earn more points for the giveaway! I am looking forward to this summer reading challenge and I can’t wait to find out what books you are reading this year.

WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO READ THIS SUMMER?

Even if you don't want to do this challenge, tell me what you plan to read! 

I'll be back July 1st with my summer TBR list.

 

June #TBR

Can you believe it's JUNE??? Where did April go? Did we have April?

What do you plan to read this month?

I always make plans and end up reading a ton of other books instead of those on my TBR. BUT, at least I'm reading and loving it! Right?!

 

(I should read ILLUMINAE first...).

I'm also adding:

 

 

May reads and other stuff

How did May treat you?

We were so busy!

I went to a writer's conference and got pulled into going to Hamilton (which was a amazing).

I wrote THE END on the current MS I'm writing. Contemp Romance. Go figure.

The end of May is full of school related activities and ours ended with a bang and one of ours graduating from high school.

 What did you get read in May??
I was able to finish 2 books yesterday and got my May read to 17!! WAHOO!
My favorite 4 from May:

 Uncover the sisters’ origins, dive deep into the catastrophic reign of the Oracle Queen, and reveal layers of Fennbirn’s past, hidden until now.

I LOVED this look into the queen's past. Now I NEED the next book in the THREE DARK CROWNS series!

In the final volume of The Hundredth Queen Series, Kalinda will risk everything to save the man she loves.

I'm sad to see this series come to an end! BUT Emily has a new book coming out soon!

OND ELDR. BREATHE FIRE.

PLEASE CAN I READ THE NEXT ONE PLEASE?!

 



Owen must win the vengeful king’s favor by proving his worth—through extraordinary means.

I  listened to this one and loved it.