Book Review Groups

The Summer Diary by Elyse Douglas

The Summer Diary by Elyse Douglas was a good book.  I did have trouble getting into the story but after the first chapter it got easier for me and by the end of the book I really enjoyed the story and the author writing.  This is the first book that I have read by this author or at least I think it is and she is another one that I want to check out more books by her in the future.   I felt bad for Keri because of some of things that her “best friend” did to her that she found out after her friend past away.  I love following along as Keri looked for the mysterious Ryan and as she learned about herself.  I love all the emotions that the author was able to make you feel as you were reading the story.  I also love how the author made me understand why the characters felt the way they did and why they made the choices that they made.  I could totally related to the characters which is always a great thing to me.  I hate when I read books where I can’t relate to the characters or where I don’t understand why the make the choices that they make.  This was a sweet summer read and a book that I would recommend to anyone who is looking for a sweet summer romance novel to read.

The Summer Diary by Elyse Douglas About The Book

Contemporary Romance

Date Published: May 7, 2015

After her best friend and her husband are killed in a private airplane crash, Keri finds some of her friend’s personal effects, one of which is a diary. When Keri reads it, she discovers her friend had been secretly in love with another man, a soldier. Keri knew nothing about the relationship, even though she and her friend were as close as sisters.

Determined to find the secret lover, Keri sets off on a journey and discovers the key to her destiny.

Elyse Douglas

About The Author

Elyse Douglas is the pen name for the married writing team Elyse Parmentier and Douglas Pennington. Elyse grew up near the sea, roaming the beaches, reading and writing stories and poetry, receiving a Degree in English Literature.  She has enjoyed careers as an English teacher, an actress and a  speech-language pathologist.  She and her husband, Douglas Pennington, have completed five novels: The Other Side of Summer, Christmas for Juliet, Wanting Rita, Christmas Ever After, The Christmas Town and The Christmas Diary.

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Summer At Sea by Beth Labonte

Book Review

Summer At Sea by Beth Labonte was a fun story.  From the first page I was hooked and didn’t want to put the book down.  I really loved Summer throughout the entire story and her parents always made me laugh because of how they acted.  I also could see my grandparents acting like her parents do and I loved it.  I loved that this book kept me smiling throughout the entire book and it was a nice change from some of the books that I have been reading lately.  I really can’t say anything bad about this book because it was such a great summer read and something that I think everyone would enjoy.

Summer At Sea by Beth Labonte

About The Book

Four jackets of varying weights, enough socks for the entire Confederate Army, three umbrellas, most of the antacid aisle from the local pharmacy, and six pairs of old people sneakers that all look exactly the same.

Have you ever helped your parents pack for a weeklong cruise?

No? I didn’t think so. So shut it.

So begins vacation for Summer Hartwell – twenty-six years old, living with her anxiety-ridden parents, and unwillingly booked by her brother on a weeklong cruise to Bermuda. Despite the nightmare of being trapped aboard a cruise ship with Mom and Dad, Summer sees a rare opportunity to fulfill The Prophecy – her mother’s declaration that she will live at home until she gets married. With two thousand passengers onboard, at least one of them must be husband material, right?

The only problem is Graham Blenderman – her brother’s best friend who is joining them for the week, in all of his tall, blonde, extroverted glory. Graham doesn’t believe Summer needs a husband in order to break free from her parents. He thinks she just needs a little bit of nerve. And to Summer’s introverted horror, he’s willing to spend the entire week proving that he’s right.

Beth Labonte

About The Author

Beth Labonte was born in Salem, Massachusetts and received a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2001. Currently working as an Administrative Assistant, she has taken to writing as her creative outlet in an excruciatingly mundane corporate world. Beth resides outside of Worcester, Massachusetts with her husband, son, and two cats. Visit her author website at http://www.bethlabonte.com or her Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/bethlabontebooks

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Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2015 Margaret Margaret

Getting It Right The Second Time Around by Jennifer Frank

Book Review

Getting It Right The Second Time Around by Jennifer Frank was a great book.  I loved the characters in this book.  I just smiled when they were reading Alison’s aunts will.  I have to wonder if people actually do things like this because I think it is a great idea and something I may do when I am older.  Anyway I loved everything about this book and I think it helped that I have a cat named Elinor so I instantly love her.  I loved reading as Alison gets her second chance and get to re-do things.   I am sitting here thinking about this book and trying to write this review I just keep thinking about how much I love aunt Elinor and how I wished she had been around more during this story.  I loved this book and I can’t wait to read more stories by this author in the future.

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About The Book

If you had a chance to do over your biggest regret, would you take it? When Alison learns the terms of her aunt’s will require that she reverse her life and take the road she rejected six years ago, she has to determine if she can trust herself to make the right decision or if she will be pressured once again to allow someone else to choose for her.

Alison lives a comfortable, safe, life advocating for women at the domestic violence shelter where she works and being bossed around by her cat. When her dynamic Aunt Elinor decides to tie Alison’s inheritance to successfully completing law school, Alison confronts the past that led her to choose love over the law – and lose at both.

As Alison battles through law school admissions, the challenges mount both personally and professionally. Will she sacrifice her dreams again to satisfy her new love, Ryan, and her Aunt Elinor?

Jennifer Frank

About The Author

Physician by Day…Writer by Night. My love of writing grew out of the many meaningful moments I’ve shared with patients – some joyful, often emotional, always special. My initial essays, appearing in medical journals and literary magazines, allowed me to work through the ups and downs of a medical life.

As an avid reader, I adore a great story. Eventually, I decided to create my own. Not a planful writer, instead my story develops as I write, so I am often as engrossed with what will happen next as if I was reading a book created by someone else. My characters are my favorite part of any story I write. Too bad I will never meet them in real life!

When I’m not stamping out disease or coaxing patients to eat their veggies and not composing the next scene, I am kept busy with my four crazy nutballs – my children and my wonderful and supportive husband.

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Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2015 Margaret Margaret

A Bride At Last by Melissa Jagears

Book Review

A Bride At Last by Melissa Jagears was a great story to read.  Now that I am done with this book I have to say that I love Anthony the most out of all the characters which makes me smile because he is just a child in this book and most of the time I love the female characters. I think I liked him the most because I had a rough childhood and he reminded me a lot of myself when I was younger.  I also really like Silas as well and to be honest I am not 100% sure why I liked him so much but I did.  The book was stressful at times because of the whole custody case and me wondering who will get Anthony and how will this all work out in the end.  I loved the dynamic between all of the characters and it was a book I didn’t want to put down because I had to know it ended and how things worked out for all of the characters.  If you love historical novels that have a love story throw in than I know you will love this book just as much as I did.

A Bride at Last

About The Book

Silas Jonesey’s life in Salt Flatts, Kansas, has not followed the course he imagined. After his mail-order bride, Lucinda, abandoned him, it was an uphill battle to recover from a pattern of poor choices and sour moods. Now his prayers for reconciliation have finally come true; his estranged wife has contacted him after ten years of silence to tell him of her whereabouts.

Kate Dawson was supposed to be a mail-order bride, but after realizing she had been deceived about her intended groom she never went through with the marriage. Settling into life as a schoolteacher, she’s spent her spare time the past few years helping her student, Anthony, and his sick mother. When Lucinda passes away, Kate is ready to fulfill the woman’s wish that she take care of nine-year-old Anthony–until a man shows up in town asking about Lucinda and claiming he was married to the woman ten years ago.

Silas and Kate disagree over who should raise young Anthony, who has opinions of his own about his future. After being forced to come together for the good of Anthony, Silas and Kate begin to see another side to each other and the possibility of a united future despite all that stands between them. When Kate’s past comes to light, Silas’s feelings about women who abandon their grooms immediately throw the walls right back up between them. Can Silas, Kate, and Anthony’s wounded souls bind them together as a family, or will past hurts and new resentments leave them lonely forever?

Melissa Jagears

About The Author

Melissa Jagears, an ESL teacher by trade and the author of A Bride for Keeps and A Bride in Store, is a stay-at-home mother on a tiny Kansas farm with a fixer-upper house. She’s a member of ACFW and CROWN fiction marketing, and her passion is to help Christian believers mature in their faith and judge rightly.

Find Melissa online: website, Facebook

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Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2015 Margaret Margaret

The Bookshop Hotel by A. K. Klemm

Book Review

The Bookshop Hotel by A. K. Klemm was a very uplifting story to read.  I loved how AJ used the talents of people in the town to help build her bookstore and also re-invent the town.  I love how she would put ideas in peoples heads and once they thought about them for awhile they would do what she suggested.  This was another short story which I loved because they are something that I can get through in a day and with everything going on right now that is perfect.  I can’t say enough great things about this story and this author.  If you love sweet short stories I would tell you to check out this book because it was amazing!

The Bookshop Hotel

About The Book

After returning to her hometown of Lily Hollow, AJ Rhys sets to fulfilling her childhood dream of restoring the old hotel on Aspen Court. With nothing but the legacy of her great grandfather and the help of two dedicated strangers, AJ begins transforming the once grand hotel into her ideal bookshop and refuge. Only after the renovations are in full swing does it become apparent that the hotel is having an effect on the town and everyone in it. The memory of a past that still haunts both AJ and Lily Hollow finally begins to release its grip as the Bookshop Hotel becomes the tie that binds its patrons together. A story of family, tragedy, forgiveness and the power of books, The Bookshop Hotel is an intriguing introduction to the residents of a small town where the past is never far away and secrets remain just below the surface.

A.K. Klemm

About The Author

A.K. Klemm is an avid book blogger and event coordinator. She lives with her husband, daughter, and three hounds in Spring, Texas. The Bookshop Hotel is an ode to her years spent shelving fiction and creating displays at Half Price Books in Humble, as well as to one of her favorite stores called Good Books in the Woods located in the Spring/Woodlands area.

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Picture Perfect Love by Melissa McClone

Book Review

Picture Perfect Love by Melissa McClone was a sweet story.  This is a novella so I was able to read it in a few hours which I am sure by now you all know that this is my favorite kind of  book.  That being said I did love these characters enough that I wished it had been longer but I still liked it this way.   I loved watching how Jenna worked through her emotions having to deal with Ashton.  I loved how she leaned on her new church as she got through everything she had to do as well.  This is the first book I have read by this author and I have added her on my list of authors to check out more books by them.

Picture Perfect Love

About The Book

Picture Perfect Love (Zondervan, May 2015)

When image becomes everything, it’s up to love to refocus the heart.

Photographer Jenna Harrison wants every bride and groom to look picture perfect on their special day, putting her heart into every wedding to give the couple memorable images of their love. But her own heart is still broken, the unworn wedding dress hanging in her closet a reminder that relationships aren’t always as perfect as they look through her camera lens. But Jenna has faith that she will find true love. Until then, she must be patient and trust in God’s plan and His perfect timing.

Attorney Ashton Vance is the one that got away. When an embarrassing Photoshopped picture of put an end to his political aspirations, he blamed Jenna. So what if the photo led to his being offered a dream job and changing his life for the better? Jenna betrayed his trust, and two years later, Ashton’s heart still hasn’t recovered.

It was me. His younger sister’s three words turn Ashton’s world upside down. He must ask Jenna’s forgiveness, but can he risk his heart a second time? Even if Jenna can forgive him, dare he hope for a second chance at her love?

Melissa McClone

About The Author

Melissa McClone has published more than thirty novels with Harlequin and Tule Publishing Group. She has also been nominated for Romance Writers of America’s RITA® award. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, three school-aged children, two spoiled Norwegian Elkhounds and cats who think they rule the house.

Find Melissa online: website, Twitter, Facebook

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Digiprove sealCopyright secured by Digiprove © 2015 Margaret Margaret