Books

Book 1,024: Planes, Trains, and Hurricanes – Eli Easton

Book cover of "Planes, Trains, and Hurricanes" with Amazon Affiliate link.I grabbed this one over winter break from Kindle Unlimited, because I wanted to read a MM Holiday Romance and Eli Easton is one of those MM Romance authors who writes good stories, they’re not the best, but I do enjoy them. And growing up in the hurricane belt (Southeastern NC) I was interested in finding out WTF was happening in this novel.

Planes, Trains, and Hurricanes is the story of Joe, NYC hotshot with a rich future father in law trying to navigate the world of money having grown up relatively poor, and Remy, a southern do-gooder who has dedicated his time to educating and housing orphans and making the world a better place in general.

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Books

Book 741: On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous – Ocean Vuong

Book cover of "On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous" with Amazon Affiliate LinkI have no idea where this book came from. I was 100% certain it was a recommendation by Kat Chow on the NPR podcast Pop Culture Happy Hour, but I can’t find a reference to it anywhere. I did, however, find this wonderful story (profile?) in The Atlantic written by Kat about spending an afternoon with Vuong, who happened to be a few years ahead of her in high school.

No matter where it came from I’ve been trailing this book from the BPL for months. I was on hold for a long time and then it finally came available at the same time they offered the ability to delay claiming the book, so I delayed for weeks. I knew I needed to be in the right mindset to read it, but I couldn’t remember why. Well, I finally felt ready to read it and I’m SO glad I waited.

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Books

Book 736: Romantic Renovations – Blake Allwood

Book cover of "Romantic Renovations" with Amazon Affiliate link"I stumbled across Blake Allwood on the MM Romance Reader blog with their review of Love by Chance and thought I’d give him a chance (ha!). Allwood isn’t a five-star read for me yet, but there is a lot of potential. I will say though, if he doesn’t hire better developmental and copy editors and proofreaders he’ll never get there for me.

Rather than diving directly into the Chances series that MM Romance Reader reviewed I thought I’d start with a stand-alone. It didn’t hurt that this one was set on a home renovation show.

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Books

Book 735: The Jane Austen Society – Natalie Jenner

Cover art of Talk about a change of pace! I kept putting this off when it came up from my library. I was loving all the MM romance and young adult books I’ve been reading, but I finally just said okay. It was 100% worth it to slow down and take the village life pace to read this and not rush through it like some of the high-intensity romances I’ve read recently.

I’m pretty sure I stumbled across this on bookstagram and new I’d get to it eventually. I don’t discriminate between books inspired by Austen’s works, life or legacy—they’re all fair game to me and each new one I read adds a new dimension to my understanding/enjoyment of Austen and her continued impact on society.

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ARC, Books

Book 654: Law and Addiction – Mike Papantonio

"Law and Addiction" book coverUnlike, Off the Grid, this book was worth saying yes to the publicist.* This book was engaging, a fast read, and had characters that were written well and believably realistic from the newly minted idealist lawyer Jake Rutledge to the West Virginia county chief prosecutor Eva Whistler, all of these characters felt real.

Law and Addiction is the story of Jake Rutledge and his battle against the opioid epidemic and big pharma after his twin brother dies of an opioid overdose. And, honestly, you couldn’t get more timely with a book release with all of the news stories about Purdue Pharma (Google news search) and the crackdowns in Boston after a corrections officer was attacked (Boston 25 News).

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