en-US Wed, 14 May 2025 00:03:34 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 214151571 From the instant New York Times bestselling author of The Writing Retreat, a white-knuckled locked-room thriller about a social worker who, after coming face-to-face with her dark past, must infiltrate a mysterious wellness center in the deserts of New Mexico.

When a catatonic woman shows up at the psychiatric unit, social worker Thea swears she knows her from somewhere. She’s shocked to discover the patient holds a link to a traumatic time in her past. Upon regaining lucidity, the patient claims she can’t remember the horrific recent events that caused her brain to shut down. Thea’s at a loss—especially when the patient is ripped away from her as suddenly as she appeared.

Determined to find her, Thea follows a trail of clues to a remote center in Southwestern New Mexico, where a charismatic couple holds a controversial monthly retreat to uncover attendees’ romantic and sexual issues. Forced to participate in increasingly intimate exercises, Thea finds herself inching closer not only to her missing patient, but also to tantalizing answers about her harrowing past. However, time is running out, and if she stays for the last session, she too might lose her mind…or worse.]]> 368 Julia Bartz 1982199490 Lori 0 currently-reading 3.01 2025
author: Julia Bartz
name: Lori
average rating: 3.01
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/14
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> 57390604
Now Salama volunteers at a hospital in Homs, helping the wounded who flood through the doors daily. Secretly, though, she is desperate to find a way out of her beloved country before her sister-in-law, Layla, gives birth. So desperate, that she has manifested a physical embodiment of her fear in the form of her imagined companion, Khawf, who haunts her every move in an effort to keep her safe.

But even with Khawf pressing her to leave, Salama is torn between her loyalty to her country and her conviction to survive. Salama must contend with bullets and bombs, military assaults, and her shifting sense of morality before she might finally breathe free. And when she crosses paths with the boy she was supposed to meet one fateful day, she starts to doubt her resolve in leaving home at all.

Soon, Salama must learn to see the events around her for what they truly are—not a war, but a revolution—and decide how she, too, will cry for Syria’s freedom.]]> 417 Zoulfa Katouh 0316351377 Lori 0 to-read 4.48 2022
author: Zoulfa Katouh
name: Lori
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 205478762 The Overstory at the height of his skills. Twelve-year-old Evie Beaulieu sinks to the bottom of a swimming pool in Montreal strapped to one of the world’s first aqualungs. Ina Aroita grows up on naval bases across the Pacific with art as her only home. Two polar opposites at an elite Chicago high school bond over a three-thousand-year-old board game; Rafi Young will get lost in literature, while Todd Keane’s work will lead to a startling AI breakthrough.

They meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, whose deposits of phosphorus once helped to feed the world. Now the tiny atoll has been chosen for humanity’s next adventure: a plan to send floating, autonomous cities out onto the open sea. But first, the island’s residents must vote to greenlight the project or turn the seasteaders away.

Set in the world’s largest ocean, this awe-filled book explores that last wild place we have yet to colonize in a still-unfolding oceanic game, and interweaves beautiful writing, rich characterization, profound themes of technology and the environment, and a deep exploration of our shared humanity in a way only Richard Powers can.]]> 381 Richard Powers 1324086033 Lori 3 literary_fiction 4.15 2024
author: Richard Powers
name: Lori
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/13
date added: 2025/05/13
shelves: literary_fiction
review:

]]> 212276037
Brother Diaz has been summoned to the Sacred City, where he is certain a commendation and grand holy assignment awaits him. But his new flock is made up of unrepentant murderers, practitioners of ghastly magic, and outright monsters. The mission he is tasked with will require bloody measures from them all in order to achieve its righteous ends.

Elves lurk at our borders and hunger for our flesh, while greedy princes care for nothing but their own ambitions and comfort. With a hellish journey before him, it's a good thing Brother Diaz has the devils on his side]]> 592 Joe Abercrombie Lori 0 to-read 4.37 2025
author: Joe Abercrombie
name: Lori
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 60865821
Dealing with a pirate ship full of demons that just moved into town was hard enough. Now on top of it, I have to convince a werewolf that I'm not his fated mate, he's just drugged. Easier said than done.

Though I have to say, having a gorgeous man show up and do all of your chores while telling you you're beautiful isn't the worst thing to happen to a girl.]]> 204 Kimberly Lemming Lori 0 currently-reading 4.04 2022
author: Kimberly Lemming
name: Lori
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/07
shelves: currently-reading
review:

]]> 43884209
• Enjoy a drunken night out.
• Ride a motorcycle.
• Go camping.
• Have meaningless but thoroughly enjoyable sex.
• Travel the world with nothing but hand luggage.
• And... do something bad.

But it’s not easy being bad, even when you’ve written step-by-step guidelines on how to do it correctly. What Chloe needs is a teacher, and she knows just the man for the job.

Redford ‘Red’ Morgan is a handyman with tattoos, a motorcycle, and more sex appeal than ten-thousand Hollywood heartthrobs. He’s also an artist who paints at night and hides his work in the light of day, which Chloe knows because she spies on him occasionally. Just the teeniest, tiniest bit.

But when she enlists Red in her mission to rebel, she learns things about him that no spy session could teach her. Like why he clearly resents Chloe’s wealthy background. And why he never shows his art to anyone. And what really lies beneath his rough exterior…]]> 384 Talia Hibbert 0062941208 Lori 2 romance 3.78 2019
author: Talia Hibbert
name: Lori
average rating: 3.78
book published: 2019
rating: 2
read at: 2025/05/06
date added: 2025/05/07
shelves: romance
review:

]]> 217171544 Shield of Sparrows is a slow-burn, high-stakes romantasy perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros―where enemies become lovers, monsters stalk a cursed realm, and a forgotten princess finds the strength to tear off her crown and become the warrior she was never meant to be.

The gods sent monsters to the five kingdoms to remind mortals they must kneel.

I’ve spent my life kneeling―to their will and to my father's. As a princess, my only duty is to wear the crown and obey the king.

I was never meant to rule. Never meant to fight. And I was never supposed to be the daughter who sealed an ancient treaty with her own blood.

But that changed the fateful day I stepped into my father’s throne room. The day a legendary monster hunter sailed to our shores. The day a prince ruined my life.

Now I’m crossing treacherous lands beside a warrior who despises me as much as I despise him―bound to a future I didn’t choose and a husband I barely know.

Everyone wants me to be something I’m not―a queen, a spy, a sacrifice.

But what if I refused the role chosen for me? What if I made my own rules? What if there’s power in being underestimated?

And what if―for the first time―I reached for it?]]> 528 Devney Perry 1649378513 Lori 0 to-read 4.48 2025
author: Devney Perry
name: Lori
average rating: 4.48
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 220165542
The house is the kind of wrong place where you can lose yourself and find things you'd rather not have. Over the course of a few nights, the boy tries to map out his house in an effort that puts his little brother in the worst danger, and puts him in the position to save them . . . at terrible cost.]]> 112 Stephen Graham Jones 1250406021 Lori 0 to-read 3.48 2017
author: Stephen Graham Jones
name: Lori
average rating: 3.48
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/05
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214229691 From an outstanding new voice in cozy fantasy comesĚýGreenteeth,Ěýa Ěýtale of fae, folklore, and found family, narrated by a charismatic lake-dwelling monster with a voice unlike any other, perfect for fans of T. Kingfisher.

Beneath the still surface of a lake lurks a monster with needle sharp teeth. Hungry and ready to pounce.

Jenny Greenteeth has never spoken to a human before, but when a witch is thrown into her lake, something makes Jenny decide she's worth saving. Temperance doesn't know why her village has suddenly turned against her, only that it has something to do with the malevolent new pastor.

Though they have nothing in common, these two must band together on a magical quest to defeat the evil that threatens Jenny's lake and Temperance's family, as well as the very soul of Britain.]]> 304 Molly O'Neill Lori 5 3.98 2025
author: Molly O'Neill
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/05/04
date added: 2025/05/04
shelves: literary_fiction, magic_and_supernatural, sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 219542927 Seven authors enter the manor

Can they survive the story within?

When legendary horror author Mortimer Queen passes, a group of writers find themselves invited to his last will and testament reading expecting a piece of his massive fortune. Each have their own unique connection to the literary icon, some known, some soon to be discovered, and they've been waiting for their chance to step into the author's shoes for some time.

Instead, they arrive at his grand manor and are invited to play a game. The rules are simple, solve the riddle and progress to the next room. If they don't, the manor will take one of them for itself.

You see, the Queen estate was built on the bones of Mortimer's family, and like any true horror story, the house is still very, very hungry.

With the clever, locked-room thrills of Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone with the ghostly horror of The Fall of the House of Usher, How to Survive a Horror Story is a bright, biting, thrill-ride that begs us to contemplate how the best horror stories come to be.]]> 368 Mallory Arnold 1464227403 Lori 0 to-read 3.72 2025
author: Mallory Arnold
name: Lori
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199797612 A deliciously haunting debut for fans of Sarah Waters and Sarah Penner set in 19th-century Paris, blending gothic mystery with a captivating sapphic romance as two estranged sisters—celebrated (and fraudulent) spirit mediums—come back together for one last con.

Paris, 1866. When Baroness Sylvie Devereux receives a house call from Charlotte Mothe, the sister she disowned, she fears her shady past as a spirit medium has caught up with her. But with their father ill and Charlotte unable to pay his bills, Sylvie is persuaded into one last con.

Their marks are the de Jacquinots: dysfunctional aristocrats who believe they are haunted by their great aunt, brutally murdered during the French Revolution.

The scheme underway, the sisters deploy every trick to terrify the family out of their gold. But when inexplicable horrors start to happen to them too, the duo question whether they really are at the mercy of a vengeful spirit. And what other deep, dark secrets may come to light?]]> 304 Carmella Lowkis 1668024950 Lori 3 3.46 2024
author: Carmella Lowkis
name: Lori
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/05/02
date added: 2025/05/02
shelves: literary_fiction, magic_and_supernatural
review:

]]> 229116047
More than forty years later, Lulu Muñoz is dodging chaos at every turn: her troubled father’s moods, his rules, her secret life as singer in a punk band, but most of all her upcoming quinceañera. When her beloved grandmother passes away, Lulu finds herself drawn to the glamorous stranger who crashed the funeral and who lives alone and shunned on the edge of town.

Their unexpected kinship picks at the secrets of Lulu’s family’s past. As the quinceañera looms—and we move between these two strong, irascible female voices—one woman must make peace with the past, and one girl pushes to embrace her future.

Rich with cinematic details—from dusty rodeos to the excitement of a Selena concert and the comfort of conjunto ballads played at family gatherings—this memorable debut is a love letter to the Tejano culture and community that sustain both of these women as they discover what family means.]]> 384 Marcela Fuentes 059365580X Lori 0 to-read 0.0 2024
author: Marcela Fuentes
name: Lori
average rating: 0.0
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/05/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 216351856 When a daring art heist takes place at the Regency Grand, Molly’s life is threatened. The question is who’s out to get her, and why? Long-buried secrets will be revealed in this intriguing and heartwarming novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Maid and The Mystery Guest

A wedding. A heist. A secret.

Molly Gray’s life is about to change in ways she could never have imagined. As the esteemed Head Maid and recently promoted Special Events Manager of the Regency Grand Hotel, good things are just around the corner, including her marriage to her beloved fiancĂŠ, Juan Manuel, only two months away.Ěý

But Molly’s entire existence is upended when a film crew descends upon the hotel to shoot the hit reality TV show Hidden Treasures, starring popular art appraisers Brown and Beagle. On a whim, Molly brings in a shoebox containing a few of her gran’s old things for appraisal, and much to everyone's surprise, one item turns out to be a rare and priceless treasure. Instantly, Molly is both a multi-millionaire and a media sensation—the world’s rags-to-riches darling—until the priceless piece vanishes from the hotel in the boldest, brashest antiquities heist in recent memory.

The key to the mystery lies in the past, in a long-forgotten diary written by Molly’s gran. For the first time ever, Molly learns about Gran’s true-to-life fairytale, a young girl to the manor born, the only child of a wealthy magnate. But when Gran falls head over heels in love with a young man her parents deem below her station, her life is thrown into turmoil. As fate would have it, the greatest love of Gran’s life is someone Molly knows quite well….

Together with her friends, Molly combs the past and the present to catch the thief before looming threats against her become real.

A spirited heist caper and an epic love story, The Maid’s Secret is a spellbinding whodunnit that will capture and warm your heart.]]> 336 Nita Prose 0593875419 Lori 3 literary_fiction 3.90 2025
author: Nita Prose
name: Lori
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/27
date added: 2025/04/27
shelves: literary_fiction
review:

]]> 219398273 Bi king x genderfluid princess fantasy romance

When my mother betrothed me to a murderous tyrant, I used my magic to disguise myself as a man and run away to his court to prove he’s a monster.But instead, I found a broken king.

I didn’t expect him to fall for me as a man, and I’m falling for him, too.

He’s been betrayed before—should I tell him who I am and be his queen who broke his heart?

Or should I love him as his king?

The King’s Weaver is a bisexual mistaken identity fantasy romance with a genderfluid awakening.]]> 339 Novae Caelum 1958696358 Lori 0 to-read 3.98
author: Novae Caelum
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 222348800 An alternative cover edition for this ISBN 9781250899576 can be found here.

A propulsive and uncommonly wise novel about one unexpected wedding guest and the surprising people who help her start anew.

It’s a beautiful day in Newport, Rhode Island, when Phoebe Stone arrives at the grand Cornwall Inn wearing a green dress and gold heels, not a bag in sight, alone. She's immediately mistaken by everyone in the lobby for one of the wedding people, but she’s actually the only guest at the Cornwall who isn’t here for the big event. Phoebe is here because she’s dreamed of coming for years—she hoped to shuck oysters and take sunset sails with her husband, only now she’s here without him, at rock bottom, and determined to have one last decadent splurge on herself. Meanwhile, the bride has accounted for every detail and every possible disaster the weekend might yield except for, well, Phoebe and Phoebe's plan—which makes it that much more surprising when the two women can’t stop confiding in each other.

In turns absurdly funny and devastatingly tender, Alison Espach’s The Wedding People is ultimately an incredibly nuanced and resonant look at the winding paths we can take to places we never imagined—and the chance encounters it sometimes takes to reroute us.]]> 367 Alison Espach 1250899575 Lori 0 to-read 4.13 2024
author: Alison Espach
name: Lori
average rating: 4.13
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 59808316 In the vein of Educated and The Glass Castle, Daniella Mestyanek Young's Uncultured is more than a memoir about an exceptional upbringing, but about a woman who, no matter the lack of tools given to her, is determined to overcome.

Behind the tall, foreboding gates of a commune in Brazil, Daniella Mestyanek Young was raised in the religious cult The Children of God, also known as The Family, as the daughter of high-ranking members. Her great-grandmother donated land for one of The Family’s first communes in Texas. Her mother, at thirteen, was forced to marry the leader and served as his secretary for many years. Beholden to The Family’s strict rules, Daniella suffers physical, emotional, and sexual abuse—masked as godly discipline and divine love—and is forbidden from getting a traditional education.

At fifteen years old, fed up with The Family and determined to build a better and freer life for herself, Daniella escapes to Texas. There, she bravely enrolls herself in high school and excels, later graduating as valedictorian of her college class, then electing to join the military to begin a career as an intelligence officer, where she believes she will finally belong.

But she soon learns that her new world—surrounded by men on the sands of Afghanistan—looks remarkably similar to the one she desperately tried to leave behind.

Told in a beautiful, propulsive voice and with clear-eyed honesty, Uncultured explores the dangers unleashed when harmful group mentality goes unrecognized, and is emblematic of the many ways women have to contort themselves to survive.]]> 339 Daniella Mestyanek Young 1250280117 Lori 3 non-fiction 4.11 2022
author: Daniella Mestyanek Young
name: Lori
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/23
date added: 2025/04/23
shelves: non-fiction
review:

]]> 231233751
For as long as Selene remembers, she's only wanted one thing: to sing the boldest, brightest magic into existence and win L′Opéra du Magician. To the winner goes the spoils of being declared King′s Mage, a position her father held years ago, before he lost control of his magic and spiraled into madness, leaving Selene an orphan.

But when the competition turns cutthroat and a competitor steals Selene′s song, the chance to redeem her father's legacy begins to slip through her fingers. Until, in the depths of the opera house, she discovers a mysterious and beautiful man trapped within a mirror. He offers not only the magic of music, but a darker sorcery of shadow, blood, and want. He can help Selene if she helps him in return—but his forbidden magic may not be worth the cost.

As the competition continues and mages are driven to ruin competing for the king′s favor, Selene must navigate betrayal, the return of childhood love, and the price of ambition.]]> 304 Megan Jauregui Eccles 1961795582 Lori 0 to-read 4.26
author: Megan Jauregui Eccles
name: Lori
average rating: 4.26
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 217432776
Instead, a girl from the Giveaway, Samantha White Tail, is found murdered.

Because the four members of the Giveaway group were the last to see Samantha alive, each becomes a person of interest in the investigation. And all of them—Mara, Loren, Brody, and Eli—have a complicated history with Samantha.

Despite deep mistrust, the four must now take matters into their own hands and clear their names. Even though one of them may be the murderer.]]> 416 K.A. Cobell 0063318687 Lori 0 to-read 4.25 2024
author: K.A. Cobell
name: Lori
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 35540247 Meet Greta Helsing, fast-talking doctor to the undead. Keeping the supernatural community not-alive and well in London has been her family's specialty for generations.

Greta Helsing inherited the family's highly specialized, and highly peculiar, medical practice. In her consulting rooms, Dr. Helsing treats the undead for a host of ills - vocal strain in banshees, arthritis in barrow-wights, and entropy in mummies. Although barely making ends meet, this is just the quiet, supernatural-adjacent life Greta's been groomed for since childhood.

Until a sect of murderous monks emerges, killing human and undead Londoners alike. As terror takes hold of the city, Greta must use her unusual skills to stop the cult if she hopes to save her practice, and her life.]]> 353 Vivian Shaw 0356508870 Lori 0 to-read 3.74 2017
author: Vivian Shaw
name: Lori
average rating: 3.74
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 49976087 Talia Hibbert returns with another charming romantic comedy about a young woman who agrees to fake date her friend after a video of him “rescuing” her from their office building goes viral...

Danika Brown knows what she wants: professional success, academic renown, and an occasional roll in the hay to relieve all that career-driven tension. But romance? Been there, done that, burned the T-shirt. Romantic partners, whatever their gender, are a distraction at best and a drain at worst. So Dani asks the universe for the perfect friend-with-benefits—someone who knows the score and knows their way around the bedroom.

When brooding security guard Zafir Ansari rescues Dani from a workplace fire drill gone wrong, it’s an obvious sign: PhD student Dani and ex-rugby player Zaf are destined to sleep together. But before she can explain that fact, a video of the heroic rescue goes viral. Now half the internet is shipping #DrRugbae—and Zaf is begging Dani to play along. Turns out, his sports charity for kids could really use the publicity. Lying to help children? Who on earth would refuse?

Dani’s plan is simple: fake a relationship in public, seduce Zaf behind the scenes. The trouble is, grumpy Zaf’s secretly a hopeless romantic—and he’s determined to corrupt Dani’s stone-cold realism. Before long, he’s tackling her fears into the dirt. But the former sports star has issues of his own, and the walls around his heart are as thick as his... um, thighs.

Suddenly, the easy lay Dani dreamed of is more complex than her thesis. Has her wish backfired? Is her focus being tested? Or is the universe just waiting for her to take a hint?]]> 400 Talia Hibbert 0062941259 Lori 0 to-read 3.98 2020
author: Talia Hibbert
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2020
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 51824384
Jacob Wayne is in control. Always. The bed and breakfast owner’s on a mission to dominate the hospitality industry—and he expects nothing less than perfection. So when a purple-haired tornado of a woman turns up out of the blue to interview for his open chef position, he tells her the brutal truth: not a chance in hell. Then she hits him with her car—supposedly by accident. Yeah, right.

Now his arm is broken, his B&B is understaffed, and the dangerously unpredictable Eve is fluttering around, trying to help. Before long, she’s infiltrated his work, his kitchen—and his spare bedroom. Jacob hates everything about it. Or rather, he should. Sunny, chaotic Eve is his natural-born nemesis, but the longer these two enemies spend in close quarters, the more their animosity turns into something else. Like Eve, the heat between them is impossible to ignore—and it’s melting Jacob’s frosty exterior.]]> 400 Talia Hibbert 0062941283 Lori 0 to-read 4.06 2021
author: Talia Hibbert
name: Lori
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 158649513 Orphan Train meets Before We Were Yours meets Water for Elephants in this compelling multigenerational novel of survival, love, and the families we make.

In 1924, four-year-old Cecily Larson’s mother reluctantly drops her off at an orphanage in Chicago, promising to be back once she’s made enough money to support both Cecily and herself. But she never returns, and shortly after high-spirited Cecily turns seven, she is sold to a traveling circus to perform as the “little sister” to glamorous bareback rider Isabelle DuMonde. With Isabelle and the rest of the circus, Cecily finally feels she’s found the family she craves. But as the years go by, the cracks in her little world begin to show. And when teenage Cecily meets and falls in love with a young roustabout named Lucky, she finds her life thrown onto an entirely unexpected—and dangerous—course.

In 2015, Cecily is now 94 and living a quiet life in Minnesota, with her daughter, granddaughter, and great-grandson. But when her family decides to surprise her with an at-home DNA test, the unexpected results not only bring to light the tragic love story that Cecily has kept hidden for decades but also throw into question everything about the family she’s raised and claimed as her own for nearly seventy years. Cecily and everyone in her life must now decide who they really are and what family—and forgiveness—really mean.

Sweeping through a long period of contemporary history, The Hidden Life of Cecily Larson is an immersive, compelling, and entertaining family drama centered around one remarkable woman and her determination to survive.]]> 384 Ellen Baker 0063351196 Lori 3 literary_fiction 3.84 2024
author: Ellen Baker
name: Lori
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/19
date added: 2025/04/19
shelves: literary_fiction
review:

]]> 198902277 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9781250899576.

A propulsive and uncommonly wise novel about one unexpected wedding guest and the surprising people who help her start anew.

It’s a beautiful day in Newport, Rhode Island, when Phoebe Stone arrives at the grand Cornwall Inn wearing a green dress and gold heels, not a bag in sight, alone. She's immediately mistaken by everyone in the lobby for one of the wedding people, but she’s actually the only guest at the Cornwall who isn’t here for the big event. Phoebe is here because she’s dreamed of coming for years—she hoped to shuck oysters and take sunset sails with her husband, only now she’s here without him, at rock bottom, and determined to have one last decadent splurge on herself. Meanwhile, the bride has accounted for every detail and every possible disaster the weekend might yield except for, well, Phoebe and Phoebe's plan—which makes it that much more surprising when the two women can’t stop confiding in each other.

In turns absurdly funny and devastatingly tender, Alison Espach’s The Wedding People is ultimately an incredibly nuanced and resonant look at the winding paths we can take to places we never imagined—and the chance encounters it sometimes takes to reroute us.]]> 384 Alison Espach Lori 0 to-read 4.10 2024
author: Alison Espach
name: Lori
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 220160175 This epic, dazzling tale based on true events illuminates a woman of color’s rise to power as one of the few purported female pirate captains to sail the Caribbean, and the forbidden love story that will shape the course of history.In the tumultuous town of Yáquimo, Santo Domingo, Jacquotte Delahaye is an unknown but up-and-coming shipwright. Her dreams are bold but her ambitions are bound by the confines of her life with her self-seeking French father. When her way of life and the delicate balance of power in the town are threatened, she is forced to flee her home and become a woman on the run along with a motley crew of refugees, including a mysterious young woman named Teresa. Jacquotte and her band become indentured servants to the infamous Blackhand, a ruthless pirate captain who rules his ship with an iron fist. As they struggle to survive his brutality, Jacquotte finds herself unable to resist Teresa despite their differences. When Blackhand hatches a dangerous scheme to steal a Portuguese shipment of jewels, Jacquotte must rely on her wits, resourcefulness, and friends to survive. But she discovers there is a grander, darker scheme of treachery at play, and she ultimately must decide what price she is willing to pay to secure a better future for them all. An unforgettable tale told in three parts, The Ballad of Jacquotte Delahaye is a thrilling, buccaneering escapade filled with siege and battle, and is also a tender exploration of friendship, love, and the search for freedom and home.]]> 368 Briony Cameron 1668051036 Lori 0 to-read 4.33 2024
author: Briony Cameron
name: Lori
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214329001 The future of storytelling is here.

Life has thrown Zelu some curveballs over the years, but when she's suddenly dropped from her university job and her latest novel is rejected, all in the middle of her sister's wedding, her life is upended. Disabled, unemployed and from a nosy, high-achieving, judgmental family, she's not sure what comes next.

In her hotel room that night, she takes the risk that will define her life - she decides to write a book VERY unlike her others. A science fiction drama about androids and AI after the extinction of humanity. And everything changes.

What follows is a tale of love and loss, fame and infamy, of extraordinary events in one world, and another. And as Zelu's life evolves, the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur.

Because sometimes a story really does have the power to reshape the world.]]> 448 Nnedi Okorafor 0063391155 Lori 0 to-read 4.03 2025
author: Nnedi Okorafor
name: Lori
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 58648147
After saving the demon Fallon in a wine-drunk stupor, all he wanted to do was kill an evil witch enslaving his people.

I mean, I get it, don't get me wrong. But he's dragging me along for the ride, and I'm kind of peeved about it. On the bright side, he keeps burning off his shirt.]]> 260 Kimberly Lemming Lori 5 romance, sci-fi_and_fantasy 3.87 2021
author: Kimberly Lemming
name: Lori
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2021
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/14
date added: 2025/04/14
shelves: romance, sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 213243937 An exclusive thriller writer’s retreat hosted on a private island turns lethal when one of the authors is found murdered in this twisty locked room mystery.

When renowned anonymous author J. R. Alastor hires former aspiring writer Mila del Angél to host a writing retreat at his private manor off the coast of Maine, she jumps at the chance—particularly since she has an ax to grind with one of the invitees. The guest list? Six thriller authors, all masters of deceit, misdirection, and mayhem.

Confess the crimes, survive the tropes.

Alastor and Mila have masterminded a week of games, trope-fueled riddles, and maybe a jump scare or two—the perfect cover for Mila to plot a murder of her own. But when a guest turns up dead—and it’s not the murder she planned—Mila finds herself trapped in a different narrative altogether.

One by one, you’ll lose your turn.

With a storm cutting off the island, and the body count rising, Mila must outwit a killer who knows literally every trick in the book.

Until only one of us remains…]]> 371 Ande Pliego 059387157X Lori 4 thriller 3.57 2025
author: Ande Pliego
name: Lori
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/13
date added: 2025/04/13
shelves: thriller
review:

]]> 212342605 HungerstoneĚýis a thrillingly seductive sapphic romance for fans of S.T. Gibson’sĚýA Dowry of BloodĚýand Emilia Hart’sĚýWeyward.

For what do you hunger, Lenore?

Lenore is the wife of steel magnate Henry, but ten years into their marriage, the relationship has soured and no child has arrived to fill the distance growing between them. Henry's ambitions take them out of London and to the imposing Nethershaw manor in the countryside, where Henry aims to host a hunt with society’s finest. Lenore keeps a terrible secret from the last time her husband hunted, and though they never speak of it, it haunts their marriage to this day.

The preparations for the event take a turn when a carriage accident near their remote home brings the mysterious Carmilla into Lenore's life. Carmilla who is weak and pale during the day but vibrant at night; Carmilla who stirs up a hunger deep within Lenore. Soon girls from local villages begin to fall sick before being consumed by a bloody hunger.

Torn between regaining her husband's affection and Carmilla's ever-growing presence, Lenore begins to unravel her past and in doing so, uncovers a darkness in her household that will place her at terrible risk . . .

Set against the violent wilderness of the moors and the uncontrolled appetite of the industrial revolution,ĚýHungerstoneĚýis a compulsive feminist reworking ofĚýCarmilla, the book that inspiredĚýDracula: a captivating story of appetite and desire.]]> 336 Kat Dunn 1638932166 Lori 4 horror, literary_fiction 4.01 2025
author: Kat Dunn
name: Lori
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2025
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/10
date added: 2025/04/10
shelves: horror, literary_fiction
review:

]]> 30753704
But hidden inside the socially awkward, fussy busybody is a woman who has more imagination, bigger dreams, and a warmer heart that anyone around her realizes.

When Britt-Marie walks out on her cheating husband and has to fend for herself in the miserable backwater town of Borg—of which the kindest thing one can say is that it has a road going through it—she finds work as the caretaker of a soon-to-be demolished recreation center. The fastidious Britt-Marie soon finds herself being drawn into the daily doings of her fellow citizens, an odd assortment of miscreants, drunkards, layabouts. Most alarming of all, she’s given the impossible task of leading the supremely untalented children’s soccer team to victory. In this small town of misfits, can Britt-Marie find a place where she truly belongs?

Funny and moving, sweet and inspiring, Britt-Marie Was Here celebrates the importance of community and connection in a world that can feel isolating.

The New York Times bestselling author of A Man Called Ove and My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry “returns with this heartwarming story about a woman rediscovering herself after a personal crisis… fans of Backman will find another winner in these pages.”]]> 324 Fredrik Backman 1501142542 Lori 0 to-read 4.12 2014
author: Fredrik Backman
name: Lori
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 215509873 Three siblings reckon with the darkness hidden within their family after multiple graves are discovered behind their childhood home.

When the Rawlins family matriarch unexpectedly dies, all three adult children rush home. What they find is a house bursting with grief, dark memories surfacing around each corner, and multiple bodies buried deep in the woods. The Rawlinses want to believe these discoveries point to a crime long past. But one of the graves behind Teague House is fresh, the earth disturbed just that week—and its inhabitant is a local woman they knew.

Is the youngest Rawlins sibling with something to hide guilty of her murder? Is his sister experiencing false memories of her late father digging near the graves? Why is their aunt in such a rush to leave town after her sister's funeral?

Enter private detective Maddie Reed, who has her own reasons for being curious about the bodies buried behind Teague House. Detective Reed sets out to unmask a killer—one she may have been hunting all her life.]]> 432 Stacy Johns 1464230935 Lori 0 to-read 3.56 2025
author: Stacy Johns
name: Lori
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 198902287 REESE'S BOOK CLUB MAY 2023 PICK

BOOK OF THE MONTH MAY 2023 PICK

A multigenerational saga that traverses the glamour of old Hollywood and the seductive draw of modern-day showbiz

When Kitty Karr Tate, a White icon of the silver screen, dies and bequeaths her multimillion-dollar estate to the St. John sisters, three young, wealthy Black women, it prompts questions. Lots of questions.

A celebrity in her own right, Elise St. John would rather focus on sorting out Kitty’s affairs than deal with the press. But what she discovers in one of Kitty’s journals rocks her world harder than any other brewing scandal could—and between a cheating fiancé and the fallout from a controversial social media post, there are plenty.

The truth behind Kitty's ascent to stardom from her beginnings in the segregated South threatens to expose a web of unexpected family ties, debts owed, and debatable crimes that could, with one pull, unravel the all-American fabric of the St. John sisters and those closest to them.

As Elise digs deeper into Kitty's past, she must also turn the lens upon herself, confronting the gifts and burdens of her own choices and the power that the secrets of the dead hold over the living. Did You Hear About Kitty Karr? is a sprawling page-turner set against the backdrop of the Hollywood machine, an insightful and nuanced look at the inheritances of family, race, and gender—and the choices some women make to break free of them.]]> 416 Crystal Smith Paul 1250349028 Lori 0 to-read 3.69 2023
author: Crystal Smith Paul
name: Lori
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 30278755 The instant #1 NEW YORK TIMES Bestseller

"A must read for anyone hoping to live a creative life... I dare you not to be inspired to be brave, to be free, and to be curious." --PopSugar

From the worldwide bestselling author of Eat Pray Love and City of Girls the path to the vibrant, fulfilling life you've dreamed of.

Readers of all ages and walks of life have drawn inspiration and empowerment from Elizabeth Gilbert's books for years. Now this beloved author digs deep into her own generative process to share her wisdom and unique perspective about creativity. With profound empathy and radiant generosity, she offers potent insights into the mysterious nature of inspiration. She asks us to embrace our curiosity and let go of needless suffering. She shows us how to tackle what we most love, and how to face down what we most fear. She discusses the attitudes, approaches, and habits we need in order to live our most creative lives. Balancing between soulful spirituality and cheerful pragmatism, Gilbert encourages us to uncover the "strange jewels" that are hidden within each of us. Whether we are looking to write a book, make art, find new ways to address challenges in our work, embark on a dream long deferred, or simply infuse our everyday lives with more mindfulness and passion, Big Magic cracks open a world of wonder and joy.]]> 276 Elizabeth Gilbert 1594634726 Lori 0 to-read 4.11 2015
author: Elizabeth Gilbert
name: Lori
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211004131 A dark and enchanting fairy tale-inspired historical fantasy combining elements of "The Little Mermaid" and "Cinderella" into a wholly original tale of love, power, and betrayal.

Saint-Malo, Brittany, 1758.
For Lucinde Leon, the youngest daughter of one of Saint-Malo's wealthiest ship-owners, the high walls of the city are more hindrance than haven. While her sisters are interested in securing advantageous marriages, Luce dreams of escaping her elegant but stifling home and joining a ship's crew. Only Samuel—Luce's best friend and an English smuggler—understands her longing for the sea, secretly teaching her to sail whenever she can sneak away. For Luce, the stolen time on the water with Samuel is precious.

One stormy morning, Luce's plans are blown off course when she rescues Morgan de Chatelaine, the youngest son of the most powerful ship-owner in Saint-Malo, from the sea. Immediately drawn to his charm and sense of adventure, she longs to attend the glittering ball held in honor of his safe return and begins to contemplate a different kind of future for herself.

But it is not only Luce's hopes at stake—the local fae are leaving Brittany and taking their magic with them, while the long-standing war with the English means Saint-Malo is always at risk of attack. As Luce is plunged into a world of magic, brutality, and seduction, secrets that have long been lost in the shadowy depths of the ocean begin to rise to the surface. The truth of her own power is growing brighter and brighter, shining like a sea-glass slipper.

Or the scales of a sea-maid's tail.]]> 432 Kell Woods 125085251X Lori 5 4.29 2025
author: Kell Woods
name: Lori
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/04/05
date added: 2025/04/05
shelves: literary_fiction, magic_and_supernatural, sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 213263148
This is a story about hunger.
1532. Santo Domingo de la Calzada.
A young girl grows up wild and wily—her beauty is only outmatched by her dreams of escape. But María knows she can only ever be a prize, or a pawn, in the games played by men. When an alluring stranger offers an alternate path, María makes a desperate choice. She vows to have no regrets.

This is a story about love.
1827. London.
A young woman lives an idyllic but cloistered life on her family’s estate, until a moment of forbidden intimacy sees her shipped off to London. Charlotte’s tender heart and seemingly impossible wishes are swept away by an invitation from a beautiful widow—but the price of freedom is higher than she could have imagined.

This is a story about rage.
2019. Boston.
College was supposed to be her chance to be someone new. That’s why Alice moved halfway across the world, leaving her old life behind. But after an out-of-character one-night stand leaves her questioning her past, her present, and her future, Alice throws herself into the hunt for answers . . . and revenge.

This is a story about life—
how it ends, and how it starts. ]]> 544 Victoria E. Schwab 1250320526 Lori 0 to-read 4.51 2025
author: Victoria E. Schwab
name: Lori
average rating: 4.51
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213075628 In Coney Island, true love rises to the surface. With lush illustrations and buoyant prose, Venessa Vida Kelley forges an unforgettable New York fairytale.

Benigno “Benny” Caldera knows an orphaned Boricua blacksmith in 1910s New York City can’t call himself an artist. But the ironwork tank he creates for famed Coney Island playground, Luna Park, astounds the eccentric sideshow proprietor who commissioned it. He invites Benny to join the show’s eclectic cast and share in their shocking secret: the tank will cage their newest exhibit, a live merman stolen from the salty banks of the East River.

More than a mythic marvel, Benny soon comes to know the merman Río as a kindred spirit, wise and more compassionate than any human he’s ever met. Despite their different worlds, what begins as a friendship of necessity deepens to love, leading Benny’s heart into uncharted waters where he can no longer ignore the agonizing truth of Río’s captivity—and his own.

Releasing Río could mean losing his found family, his new home, and his soulmate forever. Yet Benny’s courageous choice may just reveal a love strong enough to free them both.]]> 464 Venessa Vida Kelley 1645661539 Lori 0 to-read 4.40 2025
author: Venessa Vida Kelley
name: Lori
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 216971219 A group of friends investigates the mystery of a strange staircase in the woods in this mesmerizing horror novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Book of Accidents.

Five high school friends are bonded by an oath to protect one another no matter what.

Then, on a camping trip in the middle of the forest, they find something a mysterious staircase to nowhere.

One friend walks up—and never comes back down. Then the staircase disappears.

Twenty years later, the staircase has reappeared. Now the group returns to find the lost boy—and what lies beyond the staircase in the woods. . . .]]> 388 Chuck Wendig 0593156560 Lori 0 to-read 3.75 2025
author: Chuck Wendig
name: Lori
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 218185743
These days nobody can reach Cora: not her aunt, who wants her to prepare for the Hungry Ghost Festival; not her weird colleagues; and especially not the slack-jawed shadow lurking around her door frame. After all, it can't be real—can it? After a series of unexplained killings in Chinatown, Cora believes someone might be targeting East Asian women, and something might be targeting Cora herself.]]> 304 Kylie Lee Baker 0778368459 Lori 0 to-read 4.22 2025
author: Kylie Lee Baker
name: Lori
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 212431583 A haunting novel about the boundaries people will cross to keep their dreams alive.

A mysterious stranger shows up at Riccardo’s apartment with some news: his grandmother Perihan has died, and Riccardo has inherited her villa in Milan along with her famed butterfly collection.

The struggling writer is out of options. He’s hoping the change of scenery in Milan will inspire him, and maybe there will be some money to keep him afloat. But Perihan’s house isn’t as opulent as he remembers. The butterflies pinned in their glass cases seem more ominous than artful. Perihan’s group of mysterious old friends is constantly lurking. And there’s something wrong in the greenhouse.

As Riccardo explores the decrepit estate, he stumbles upon Perihan’s diary, which might hold the key to her mysterious death. Or at least give him the inspiration he needs to finish his manuscript.

But he might not survive long enough to write it.

]]> 320 Yiğit Turhan 0778368270 Lori 0 to-read 3.32 2025
author: Yiğit Turhan
name: Lori
average rating: 3.32
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214151601 The long-awaited new novel from the author of global sensation Tender Is the Flesh: a thrilling work of literary horror about a woman cloistered in a secretive, violent religious order, while outside the world has fallen into chaos.

From her cell in a mysterious convent, a woman writes the story of her life in whatever she can find—discarded ink, dirt, and even her own blood. A lower member of the Sacred Sisterhood, deemed an unworthy, she dreams of ascending to the ranks of the Enlightened at the center of the convent and of pleasing the foreboding Superior Sister. Outside, the world is plagued by catastrophe—cities are submerged underwater, electricity and the internet are nonexistent, and bands of survivors fight and forage in a cruel, barren landscape. Inside, the narrator is controlled, punished, but safe.

But when a stranger makes her way past the convent walls, joining the ranks of the unworthy, she forces the narrator to consider her long-buried past—and what she may be overlooking about the Enlightened. As the two women grow closer, the narrator is increasingly haunted by questions about her own past, the environmental future, and her present life inside the convent. How did she get to the Sacred Sisterhood? Why can’t she remember her life before? And what really happens when a woman is chosen as one of the Enlightened?

A searing, dystopian tale about climate crisis, ideological extremism, and the tidal pull of our most violent, exploitative instincts, this is another unforgettable novel from a master of feminist horror.]]> 192 Agustina Bazterrica 1668051885 Lori 0 to-read 3.63 2023
author: Agustina Bazterrica
name: Lori
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 215362027 A woman dives into her husband's memories to uncover a decades-old feud threatening reality itself in this staggering technothriller from the bestselling author of Ascension.

Maggie Webb has lived the last decade caring for elderly husband, Stanley, as memory loss gradually erases all the beautiful moments they created together. It's the loneliest she's ever felt in her life.

When a mysterious stranger named Hassan appears at her door, he reveals a shocking truth: Stanley isn't losing his memories. Someone is actively removing them to hide a long-buried secret from coming to light. If Maggie does what she's told, she can reverse it. She can get her husband back.

Led by Hassan and his technological marvels, Maggie breaks into her husband's mind, probing the depths of his past in an effort to save him. The deeper she dives, the more she unravels a mystery spanning continents and centuries, each layer more complex than the last.

But Hassan cannot be trusted. Not just memories are disappearing, but pieces of reality itself. If Maggie cannot find out what Stanley did all those years ago, and what Hassan is after now, she risks far more than her husband's life. The very course of human history hangs in the balance.]]> 384 Nicholas Binge 0593852168 Lori 0 to-read 4.11 2025
author: Nicholas Binge
name: Lori
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214151232 A highly anticipated, sweeping debut set in a unified Korea that tells the story of three estranged siblings—two human, one robot—as they collide against the backdrop of a murder investigation to settle old scores and make sense of their shattered childhood, perfect for fans of Klara and the Sun and We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves.

In a reunified Korea of the future, robots have been integrated into society as surrogates, servants, children, and even lovers. Though boundaries between bionic and organic frequently blur, these robots are decidedly second-class citizens. Jun and Morgan, two siblings estranged for many years, are haunted by the memory of their lost brother, Yoyo, who was warm, sensitive, and very nearly human.

Jun, a war veteran turned detective of the lowly Robot Crimes Unit in Seoul, becomes consumed by an investigation that reconnects him with his sister Morgan, now a prominent robot designer working for a top firm, who is, embarrassingly, dating one of her creations in secret.

On the other side of Seoul in a junkyard filled with abandoned robots, eleven-year-old Ruijie sifts through scraps looking for robotic parts that might support her failing body. When she discovers a robot boy named Yoyo among the piles of trash, an unlikely bond is formed since Yoyo is so lifelike, he’s unlike anything she’s seen before.

While Morgan prepares to launch the most advanced robot-boy of her career, Jun’s investigation sparks a journey through the underbelly of Seoul, unearthing deeper mysteries about the history of their country and their family. The three siblings must find their way back to each other to reckon with their pasts and the future ahead of them in this poignant and remarkable exploration of what it really means to be human.]]> 391 Silvia Park 1668021668 Lori 0 to-read 3.76 2025
author: Silvia Park
name: Lori
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 220161226 What if you could have one last meal with someone you’ve loved, someone you’ve lost? Combining the magic of Under the Whispering Door with the high-stakes culinary world of Sweetbitter, Aftertaste is an epic love story, a dark comedy, and a synesthetic adventure through food and grief.

Konstantin Duhovny is a haunted man. His father died when he was ten, and ghosts have been hovering around Kostya ever since. Kostya can’t exactly see the ghosts, but he can taste their favorite foods. Flavors of meals he’s never eaten will flood his mouth, a sign that a spirit is present. Kostya has kept these aftertastes a secret for most of his life, but one night, he decides to act on what he’s tasting. And everything changes.

Kostya discovers that he can reunite people with their deceased loved ones—at least for the length of time it takes for them to eat a dish that he’s prepared. He thinks his life’s purpose might be to offer closure to grieving strangers, and sets out to learn all he can by entering a particularly fiery ring of Hell: the New York culinary scene. But as his kitchen skills catch up with his ambitions, Kostya is too blind to see the catastrophe looming in the Afterlife. And the one person who knows Kostya must be stopped also happens to be falling in love with him.

Set in the bustling world of New York restaurants and teeming with mouthwatering food writing, Aftertaste is a whirlwind romance, a heart-wrenching look at love and loss, and a ghost story about all the ways we hunger—and how far we’d go to find satisfaction.

Lavelle’s debut is a multi-course tasting menu of a book that will sate, delight, excite, comfort, and inspire even the pickiest of readers.]]> 400 Daria Lavelle 1668061597 Lori 0 to-read 4.16 2025
author: Daria Lavelle
name: Lori
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 210693153 In the beloved tradition of Howl’s Moving Castle, a whimsical and unforgettable story of fantastic adventure, common sense, and the power of love to overcome the greatest of obstacles . . .

Before Foss Butcher was Snagged, she thought no more of the magic-users than did anyone else in her tiny village. Sometimes gorgeous women in impossible carriages rolled into town and took bits of people’s hearts. Everyone knew hearts fueled their magic. But Foss, plain, clumsy, and practical as a boot, never expected anyone would want hers.

True enough, when the only sorcerer in the kingdom stepped from his glossy carriage, he didn’t intend to hook Foss. Sylvester’s riot of black curls and perfectly etched cheekbones caught her eye a moment too long, that was all. Suddenly, Foss is cursed and finds herself stomping toward the grand City to keep his enchanted House, where her only friend is a talking cat and the walls themselves have moods.

But as Foss learns the ways of magic, she realizes she’s far from its only unwilling captive. Even Sylvester is hemmed in by spells and threats. It’s said this sorcery protects king, country, and order for thousands. If Foss wants to free herself—and, perhaps, Sylvester—she’ll have to confront it all . . . and uncover the blight nestled in the heart of the kingdom itself.]]> 448 Andrea Eames 1645661881 Lori 0 to-read 3.57 2025
author: Andrea Eames
name: Lori
average rating: 3.57
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 207611566 There’s power in a book…

They call them wayward girls. Loose girls. Girls who grew up too fast. And they’re sent to the Wellwood Home in St. Augustine, Florida, where unwed mothers are hidden by their families to have their babies in secret, give them up for adoption, and most important of all, to forget any of it ever happened.

Fifteen-year-old Fern arrives at the home in the sweltering summer of 1970, pregnant, terrified and alone. Under the watchful eye of the stern Miss Wellwood, she meets a dozen other girls in the same predicament. There’s Rose, a hippie who insists she’s going to find a way to keep her baby and escape to a commune. And Zinnia, a budding musician who knows she’s going to go home and marry her baby’s father. And Holly, a wisp of a girl, barely fourteen, mute and pregnant by no-one-knows-who.

Everything the girls eat, every moment of their waking day, and everything they’re allowed to talk about is strictly controlled by adults who claim they know what’s best for them. Then Fern meets a librarian who gives her an occult book about witchcraft, and power is in the hands of the girls for the first time in their lives. But power can destroy as easily as it creates, and it’s never given freely. There’s always a price to be paid…and it’s usually paid in blood.

In Witchcraft for Wayward Girls, the author of How to Sell a Haunted House and The Final Girl Support Group delivers another searing, completely original novel and further cements his status as a “horror master” (NPR).]]> 482 Grady Hendrix 0593548981 Lori 5 3.99 2025
author: Grady Hendrix
name: Lori
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/27
date added: 2025/03/27
shelves: literary_fiction, magic_and_supernatural
review:

]]> 217388302 DELUXE EDITION—a gorgeous hardcover edition featuring bright green sprayed edges, a foil stamp on the casing, and custom endpapers illustrated by the author.

From New York Times bestselling and Hugo Award-winning author T. Kingfisher comes Hemlock & Silver, a dark reimagining of “Snow White” steeped in poison, intrigue, and treason of the most magical kind

Healer Anja regularly drinks poison.

Not to die, but to save—seeking cures for those everyone else has given up on.

But a summons from the King interrupts her quiet, herb-obsessed life. His daughter, Snow, is dying, and he hopes Anja’s unorthodox methods can save her.

Aided by a taciturn guard, a narcissistic cat, and a passion for the scientific method, Anja rushes to treat Snow, but nothing seems to work. That is, until she finds a secret world, hidden inside a magic mirror. This dark realm may hold the key to what is making Snow sick.

Or it might be the thing that kills them all.]]> 368 T. Kingfisher 1250342031 Lori 0 to-read 4.30 2025
author: T. Kingfisher
name: Lori
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 162693947 A snowstorm. A country house. Old friends reunited. It's going to be murder...

Torben Helle - art historian, Danish expat and owner of several excellent Scandinavian jumpers - has been dragged to a remote snowbound Northumbrian mansion for a ten-year reunion with old university friends. Things start to go sideways when their host, a reclusive and irritating tech entrepreneur, makes some shocking revelations at the dinner table. And when these are followed by an apparent suicide, the group faces a test of their wits... and their trust.

Snowed in and cut off, surrounded by enigmatic housekeepers and off-duty police inspectors, not to mention a peculiar last will and testament, suspicion and sarcasm quickly turn to panic. As the temperature drops and the tension mounts, Torben decides to draw upon all the tricks of Golden Age detectives past in order to solve the how much money would it take to turn one of his old friends into a murderer? But he'd better be quick, or someone else might end up dead...

This witty murder mystery puts a modern spin on the classic country house whodunnit. A must-read for fans of Agatha Christie, Richard Osman and Janice Hallett.]]> 334 Oskar Jensen 1800811756 Lori 3 literary_fiction 3.43 2024
author: Oskar Jensen
name: Lori
average rating: 3.43
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: literary_fiction
review:

]]> 211004085
But when town gossip Mina Jean Murphy’s body is brought in for a regular burial and she rises from the dead instead, it’s clear that the Strigoi―the original vampire―are back. And the Evans women are the ones who need to fight back to protect their town.

As more folks in town turn up dead and Deputy Roger Taylor begins asking way too many questions, Ducey, Lenore, Grace, and now Luna, must take up their blades and figure out who is behind the Strigoi’s return. As the saying goes, what rises up, must go back down. But as unspoken secrets and revelations spill from the past into the present, the Evans family must face that sometimes, the dead aren’t the only things you want to keep buried.

A crackling mystery-horror novel with big-hearted characters and blood-soaked Southern charm, Bless Your Heart is a gasp-worthy delight from start to finish.]]> 320 Lindy Ryan 1250888905 Lori 0 to-read 3.68 2024
author: Lindy Ryan
name: Lori
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 60778947 From the creators of The Haunting Season comes a dazzling collection of never-before-seen ghostly tales.

The tradition of a haunted tale at Christmas has flourished across the centuries. These twelve stories, authored by some of today's most loved and lauded writers of historical and gothic fiction, are all centered on Christmas or Advent, boldly and playfully re-imagining a beloved tradition for a modern audience. Taking you from a haunted Tuscan villa to a remote Scottish island with a dark secret, these stories are your ultimate companion for frosty nights.

Featuring new and original stories from Bridget Collins, Imogen Hermes Gowar, Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Andrew Michael Hurley, Jess Kidd, Natasha Pulley, Elizabeth Macneal, Laura Purcell, Susan Stokes Chapman, Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Stuart Turton, and Catriona Ward.]]> 464 Bridget Collins Lori 4 horror 3.97 2023
author: Bridget Collins
name: Lori
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/16
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: horror
review:

]]> 221441038
Massachusetts, 1836. Young, brazen, beautiful, and unapologetically brilliant, Margaret Fuller accepts an invitation from Ralph Waldo Emerson, the celebrated “Sage of Concord,” to meet his coterie of enlightened friends shaping a nation in the throes of its own self-discovery. By the end of her stay, she will become “the radiant genius and fiery heart” of the Transcendentalists, a role model to young Louisa May Alcott, an inspiration to Nathaniel Hawthorne and his scandalous Scarlet Letter, a friend to Henry David Thoreau as he ventures into the woods of Walden Pond . . . and a muse to Emerson himself. But Margaret craves more than poetry and interpersonal drama, and she finds her restless soul in need of new challenges and adventure.

And so she charts a singular course against a backdrop of dizzying historical drama: From Boston, where she hosts a women-only literary salon for students like Elizabeth Cady Stanton; to the editorial meetings of The Dial magazine, where she hones her pen as its co-founder; to Harvard’s library, where she is the first woman to study within its walls; to the gritty New York streets where she spars with Edgar Allan Poe and reports on the writings of Frederick Douglass. Margaret defies conventions time and again as an activist for women and an advocate for humanity, earning admirers and scathing critics alike.

When the legendary Horace Greeley offers an assignment in Europe, Margaret again makes history as the first female foreign news correspondent, mingling with luminaries like Frederic Chopin, Walt Whitman, George Sand, and more. But it is in Rome where she finds a world of passion, romance, and revolution, taking a Roman count as a lover—and sparking an international scandal. Evolving yet again into the roles of mother and countess, Margaret enters a new fight for Italy’s unification.

With a star-studded cast and epic sweep of historical events, this is a story of an inspiring trailblazer, a woman who loved big and lived even bigger—a fierce adventurer who transcended the rigid roles ascribed to women, and changed history for millions, all on her own terms.]]> 432 Allison Pataki 0593600258 Lori 0 to-read 3.83 2024
author: Allison Pataki
name: Lori
average rating: 3.83
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 32805475
Whether you’re writing your first novel or your seventeenth, Save the Cat! breaks down plot in an easy-to-follow, step-by-step method so you can write stories that resonate! This book can help you with any of the following:

Outlining a new novel
Revising an existing novel
Breaking out of the dreaded “writer’s block”
Fixing a “broken” novel
Reviewing a completed novel
Fleshing out/test driving a new idea to see if it “has legs”
Implementing feedback from agents and/or editors
Helping give constructive feedback to other writers

But above all else, SAVE THE CAT! WRITES A NOVEL will help you better understand the fundamentals and mechanics of plot, character transformation, and what makes a story work!]]> 320 Jessica Brody Lori 4 non-fiction 4.49 2018
author: Jessica Brody
name: Lori
average rating: 4.49
book published: 2018
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/12
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: non-fiction
review:

]]> 35503141 273 J.D. Vance Lori 1 non-fiction 4.09 2016
author: J.D. Vance
name: Lori
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2016
rating: 1
read at: 2017/09/29
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: non-fiction
review:

]]> 53028034
For thousands of years myth and folklore have celebrated its cunning intelligence. Today the red fox is the nature’s most populous carnivore, its dancing orange tail a common sight in backyards. Yet who is this wild neighbor, truly? How do we negotiate this uneasy new chapter of an ancient relationship? Join British ecologist Adele Brand on a journey to discover the surprising secrets of the fabled fox, the familiar yet enigmatic creature that has adapted to the human world with astonishing—some say, unsettling—success.]]> 223 Adele Brand Lori 0 to-read 4.06 2019
author: Adele Brand
name: Lori
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 209492361 A haunted woman stalked by a serial killer confronts the horrors of fairy tales and the nightmares of real life in a breathtaking novel of psychological suspense by a Bram Stoker Award–winning author.

It started the night journalist Briar Thorne’s mother died in their rambling old mansion on Chicago’s South Side.

The nightmares of a woman in white pleading to come home, music switched on in locked rooms, and the panicked fear of being swallowed by the dark…Bri has almost convinced herself that these stirrings of dread are simply manifestations of grief and not the beyond-world of ghostly impossibilities her mother believed in. And more tangible terrors still lurk outside the decaying Victorian greystone.

A serial killer has claimed the lives of fifty-one women in the Chicago area. When Bri starts researching the murders, she meets a stranger who tells her there’s more to her sleepless nights than bad dreams—they hold the key to putting ghosts to rest and stopping a killer. But the killer has caught on and is closing in, and if Bri doesn’t answer the call of the dead soon, she’ll be walking among them.]]> 336 Cynthia Pelayo 1662513925 Lori 0 to-read 3.35 2025
author: Cynthia Pelayo
name: Lori
average rating: 3.35
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 176443819 From Bram Stoker Award­–winning author Gwendolyn Kiste comes a chilling novel about three childhood friends who miraculously survive the night everyone in their suburban neighborhood turned into ghosts—perfect for fans of Yellowjackets.

The Velkwood Vicinity was the topic of occult theorists, tabloid one-hour documentaries, and even some pseudo-scientific investigations as the block of homes disappeared behind a near-impenetrable veil that only three survivors could enter—and only one has in the past twenty years, until now.

Talitha Velkwood has avoided anything to do with the tragedy that took her mother and eight-year-old sister, drifting from one job to another, never settling anywhere or with anyone, feeling as trapped by her past as if she was still there in the small town she so desperately wanted to escape from. When a new researcher tracks her down and offers to pay her to come back to enter the vicinity, Talitha claims she’s just doing it for the money. Of all the crackpot theories over the years, no one has discovered what happened the night Talitha, her estranged, former best friend Brett, and Grace, escaped their homes twenty years ago. Will she finally get the answers she’s been looking for all these years, or is this just another dead end?

Award-winning author Gwendolyn Kiste has created a suburban ghost story about a small town that trapped three young women who must confront the past if they’re going to have a future.]]> 246 Gwendolyn Kiste 1982172371 Lori 3 horror 3.59 2024
author: Gwendolyn Kiste
name: Lori
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/11
date added: 2025/03/11
shelves: horror
review:

]]> 220161593 In this follow-up to #1 New York Times bestselling author Ruth Ware’s multi-million copy mega-hit The Women in Cabin 10, Lo Blacklock returns to attend the opening of a luxury hotel, only to find herself in a white-knuckled race across Europe.

When the invitation to attend the press opening of a luxury Swiss hotel—owned by reclusive billionaire Marcus Leidmann—arrives, it’s like the answer to a prayer. Three years after the birth of her youngest child, Lo Blacklock is ready to reestablish her journalism career, but post-pandemic travel journalism is a very different landscape from the one she left ten years ago.

The chateau on the shores of Lake Geneva is everything Lo’s ever dreamed of, and she hopes she can snag an interview with Marcus. Unfortunately, he proves to be even more difficult to pin down than his reputation suggests. When Lo gets a late-night call asking her to come to Marcus’s hotel room, she agrees despite her own misgivings. She’s greeted, however, by a woman claiming to be Marcus’s mistress, and in life-or-death jeopardy.

What follows is a thrilling cat-and-mouse pursuit across Europe, forcing Lo to ask herself just how much she’s willing to sacrifice to save this woman…and if she can even trust her?]]> 400 Ruth Ware 1668025620 Lori 0 to-read 3.70 2025
author: Ruth Ware
name: Lori
average rating: 3.70
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 215020997
This is a story about hunger.
1532. Santo Domingo de la Calzada.
A young girl grows up wild and wily—her beauty is only outmatched by her dreams of escape. But María knows she can only ever be a prize, or a pawn, in the games played by men. When an alluring stranger offers an alternate path, María makes a desperate choice. She vows to have no regrets.

This is a story about love.
1827. London.
A young woman lives an idyllic but cloistered life on her family’s estate, until a moment of forbidden intimacy sees her shipped off to London. Charlotte’s tender heart and seemingly impossible wishes are swept away by an invitation from a beautiful widow—but the price of freedom is higher than she could have imagined.

This is a story about rage.
2019. Boston.
College was supposed to be her chance to be someone new. That’s why Alice moved halfway across the world, leaving her old life behind. But after an out-of-character one-night stand leaves her questioning her past, her present, and her future, Alice throws herself into the hunt for answers . . . and revenge.

This is a story about life—
how it ends, and how it starts. ]]> 560 Victoria E. Schwab 1035064642 Lori 0 to-read 4.40 2025
author: Victoria E. Schwab
name: Lori
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 195790870 From Chuck Tingle, author of the USA Today bestselling Camp Damascus, comes a new heart-pounding story about what it takes to succeed in a world that wants you dead.

Misha is a jaded scriptwriter who has been working in Hollywood for years, and has just been nominated for his first Oscar. But when he's pressured by his producers to kill off a gay character in the upcoming season finale―"for the algorithm"―Misha discovers that it's not that simple.

As he is haunted by his past, and past mistakes, Misha must risk everything to find a way to do what's right―before it's too late.]]> 295 Chuck Tingle 1250874653 Lori 5 Fucking brilliant 4.12 2024
author: Chuck Tingle
name: Lori
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/07
date added: 2025/03/07
shelves: horror, literary_fiction, sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:
Fucking brilliant
]]> 217005288
But then darkness from William’s past surfaces, jeopardizing not only Julia’s carefully orchestrated plans for their future, but the sisters’ unshakeable devotion to one another. The result is a catastrophic family rift that changes their lives for generations. Will the loyalty that once rooted them be strong enough to draw them back together when it matters most?]]> 416 Ann Napolitano 0593243757 Lori 0 to-read 4.11 2023
author: Ann Napolitano
name: Lori
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/06
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214537816 Four women assassins, senior in status—and in age—sharpen their knives for another bloody good adventure in this riotous follow-up to the New York Times bestselling sensation Killers of a Certain Age.

After more than a year of laying low, Billie, Helen, Mary Alice, and Natalie are called back into action. They have enjoyed their rest, but the lack of excitement is starting to chafe: a professional killer can only take so many watercolor classes and yoga sessions before she gets the itch to get back in the game. When they receive a call from Naomi Ndiaye, the head of the elite assassin organization known as the Museum, they are ready to tackle the greatest challenge of their careers.

Someone on the inside has compiled a list of important kills committed by Museum agents, all of them connected to a single, shadowy figure, an Eastern European gangster who rules her business empire with an iron fist and plays puppet master in international affairs. Naomi is convinced this criminal queen is bent upon revenge, killing off the agents who attempted to thwart her, and the aging quartet of killers is next.

Together the foursome embark on a wild ride across the globe on the double mission of rooting out the Museum’s mole and hunting down the gangster and her assassin. But their nemesis is unlike any they’ve faced before, and it will take all their experience and a whole lot of luck to get out of this mission alive.]]> 356 Deanna Raybourn 0593638514 Lori 0 to-read 3.93 2025
author: Deanna Raybourn
name: Lori
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/04
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 220652200 New York Times bestselling, acclaimed horror author Paul Tremblay delivers an unforgettable middle grade debut in this bone-chilling tale of an unsettling, unbreakable friendship.

When Casey Wilson’s parents tell him that his friend is coming for a sleepover, he has no idea who that might be. Ever since the Zoom Incident, everyone treats him like a pariah, and his tics are worse than ever.

When Morel appears, he’s not like any friend Casey has ever met. His skin is like clay, and he doesn’t speak. But Casey’s parents are charmed by the strange kid, and it’s nice to have someone to talk to besides his sister, Ally, who is away at college. As his normally loving parents grow distant from Casey, they gush and fawn over Morel. Casey knows something is wrong—but with no end in sight to the sleepover, he’s exhausted. And in the dark, out of the corner of his eye, Morel doesn’t look like a kid at all. . . .]]> 256 Paul Tremblay 0063396351 Lori 0 to-read 4.18 2025
author: Paul Tremblay
name: Lori
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/03
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213395480
Whether creeping across the moonlit lawns in her undergarments or gently tormenting the house staff, Winifred struggles at every turn to stifle the horrid compulsions of her past until her chillingly dark imagination breaches the feeble boundary of reality on Christmas morning.

Wielding her signature sardonic wit and a penchant for the gorgeously macabre, Virginia Feito returns with a vengeance in Victorian Psycho.]]> 208 Virginia Feito 1631498630 Lori 3 horror 3.61 2025
author: Virginia Feito
name: Lori
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/02
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: horror
review:

]]> 203163914 In the latest from Shirley Jackson and Bram Stoker Award-winning author of THE DEVIL TAKES YOU HOME, a group of five teenage boys, living in Puerto Rico, seek vengeance after one of their mothers is murdered; a doomed tale of devotion and the afterlife of violence. Ěý

For childhood friends Gabe, Xavier, Tavo, Paul, and Bimbo, death has always been close. Hurricanes. Car accidents. Gang violence. Suicide. Estamos rodeados de fantasmas was Gabe’s grandmother’s refrain. We are surrounded by ghosts. But this time is different. Bimbo's mom has been shot dead. We’re gonna kill the guys who killed her Bimbo swears. And they all agree.

Feral with grief, Bimbo has become unrecognizable, taking no prisoners in his search for names. Soon, they learn Maria was gunned down by guys working for the drug kingpin of Puerto Rico. No one has ever gone up against him and survived. As the boys strategize, a storm gathers far from the coast. Hurricanes are known to carry evil spirits in their currents and bring them ashore, spirits which impose their own order.

Blurring the boundaries between myth, mysticism, and the grim realities of our world, House of Bone and Rain is a harrowing coming of age story; a doomed tale of devotion, the afterlife of violence, and what rolls in on the tide.]]> 345 Gabino Iglesias 0316427012 Lori 3 3.84 2024
author: Gabino Iglesias
name: Lori
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at:
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves:
review:
DNF at around page 100. The writing is incredible. For me, there was not enough spookiness and way too much graphic violence. It may be fine for other readers but it wasn't something I could get past.
]]> 213618270 An eerie, hypnotic, darkly beautiful novel about two elderly sisters living alone at the edge of the world and how their lives unravel when their sanctum is breached, for fans of Piranesi and The Testaments.

In a place and time unknown, two elderly sisters live in a walled garden, secluded from the outside world. Evelyn and Lily have only ever known each other. What was before the garden, they have forgotten; what lies beyond it, they do not know. Each day is spent in languid service to their home: tending the bees, planting the crops, and dutifully following the instructions of the almanac written by their mother.

So when a nameless boy is found hiding in the boarded house at the center of their isolated grounds, their once-solitary lives are irrevocably disrupted. Who is he? Where did he come from? And most importantly, what does he want?

As suspicions gather and allegiances falter, Evelyn and Lily are forced to confront the dark truths about themselves, the garden, and the world as they’ve known it.]]> 320 Nick Newman 0593717732 Lori 0 to-read 3.63 2025
author: Nick Newman
name: Lori
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/02
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199465836
In the northernmost reaches of Scotland, where a string of little islands in the North Sea stretches towards Norway, lives Gertie MacIntyre, a proud island girl by birth. Her social circle is small but tight: family and friends, particularly the women in her knitting circle. In the whitewashed cottages of their hometown, everyone knows everyone, and the ladies of the knitting circle know more than most. In a place of long dark winters and geographic isolation, the knitting circle is a precious source of gossip, home, laughter, and comfort for them all. And while she knits, Gertie’s busily plotting what to do with the rest of her life.

When Gertie develops a crush on Callum Frost, who owns the local airline, she dares herself to take a job as an air stewardess on the little plane that serves the local islands. Terrifying at first, the sixteen-seat puddle jumper also offers the first taste of real freedom she’s ever known. Will Gertie’s future lie in the skies? Or will she need to go further afield to find the adventure she craves?]]> 318 Jenny Colgan 0063260565 Lori 0 to-read 3.71
author: Jenny Colgan
name: Lori
average rating: 3.71
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 63022569 336 Jenny Colgan 0063320185 Lori 4 cozy-mind-candy, romance 3.68 2024
author: Jenny Colgan
name: Lori
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/24
date added: 2025/02/24
shelves: cozy-mind-candy, romance
review:

]]> 215989058
She’s learning, too.

Doug says he loves that Annie’s artificial intelligence makes her seem more like a real woman, but the more human Annie becomes, the less perfectly she behaves. As Annie's relationship with Doug grows more intricate and difficult, she starts to wonder whether Doug truly desires what he says he does. In such an impossible paradox, what does Annie owe herself?]]> 240 Sierra Greer 0063312700 Lori 0 to-read 3.88 2024
author: Sierra Greer
name: Lori
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/24
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211399745 A poisoned chocolate. A stolen dress. An elusive catburglar. Drag’s not just dramatic, it’s deadly.

By day, Joe is a hotel accountant, invisibly sitting behind their desk and playing by the rules. By night, donned in sequins, they take to the stage as Misty Divine, a star of the London drag scene.

But when Misty’s drag mother, Lady Lady, is found dead in her dressing room beside a poisoned box of chocolates, Misty and her fellow performers become the prime suspects.

Heartbroken by the loss, and frustrated by the clear biases of the police, Misty must solve the crime before the culprit strikes again. Among the drop-dead gorgeous lurks a cutthroat killer, and Misty Divine won't rest until she finds out who it is.]]> 368 Holly Stars 0593816714 Lori 3 cozy-mind-candy 3.71 2025
author: Holly Stars
name: Lori
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2025
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/21
date added: 2025/02/21
shelves: cozy-mind-candy
review:

]]> 142392376 Get Out, Us, and Nope, and founder of Monkeypaw Productions, curates this groundbreaking anthology of all-new stories of Black horror, exploring not only the terrors of the supernatural but the chilling reality of injustice that haunts our nation.

A cop begins seeing huge, blinking eyes where the headlights of cars should be that tell him who to pull over. Two freedom riders take a bus ride that leaves them stranded on a lonely road in Alabama where several unsettling somethings await them. A young girl dives into the depths of the Earth in search of the demon that killed her parents. These are just a few of the worlds of Out There Screaming, Jordan Peele’s anthology of all-new horror stories by Black writers. Featuring an introduction by Peele and an all-star roster of beloved writers and new voices, Out There Screaming is a master class in horror, and—like his spine-chilling films—its stories prey on everything we think we know about our world . . . and redefine what it means to be afraid.

Featuring stories by: Erin E. Adams, Violet Allen, Lesley Nneka Arimah, Maurice Broaddus, Chesya Burke, P. Djèlí Clark, Ezra Claytan Daniels, Tananarive Due, Nalo Hopkinson, N. K. Jemisin, Justin C. Key, L. D. Lewis, Nnedi Okorafor, Tochi Onyebuchi, Rebecca Roanhorse, Nicole D. Sconiers, Rion Amilcar Scott, Terence Taylor, and Cadwell Turnbull.]]> 387 Jordan Peele 059324379X Lori 0 to-read 3.77 2023
author: Jordan Peele
name: Lori
average rating: 3.77
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/21
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 203579211
During a grocery run to her local shopping center, Shell Pine sees a ‘HELP NEEDED’ sign in a flower shop window. She’s just left her fiancé, lost her job, and moved home to her parents’ house. She has to make a change and bring some good into her life, so she goes inside and takes a chance. Shell realizes right away that flowers are just the good thing she's been looking for, as is Neve, the beautiful florist who wrote the sign asking for help. The thing is, Neve needs help more than Shell could possibly imagine.

An orchid growing out of sight in the heart of the mall is watching them closely. His name is Baby, and the beautiful florist belongs to him. He’s young, he’s hungry, and he’ll do just about anything to make sure he can keep growing big and strong. Nothing he eats – nobody he eats – can satisfy him, except the thing he most desires. Neve. He adores her and wants to consume her, and will stop at nothing to eat the one he loves.

This is a story about possession, and monstrosity, and working retail. It is about hunger and desire, and other terrible things that grow.]]> 288 Sarah Maria Griffin 1250910692 Lori 0 to-read 3.73 2025
author: Sarah Maria Griffin
name: Lori
average rating: 3.73
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 65212070 A folk horror epic about a ragtag posse that must track down a witch through a wild west beset by demons and ghosts―and where death is always just around the bend.

Sadie Grace is wanted for witchcraft, dead (or alive). And every hired gun in Kansas is out to collect the bounty on her head, including bona fide witch hunter Old Tom and his mysterious, mute ward, Rabbit.

On the road to Burden County, they’re joined by two vagabond cowboys with a strong sense of adventure – but no sense of purpose – and a recently widowed school teacher with nothing left to lose. As their posse grows, so too does the danger.

Racing along the drought-stricken plains in a stolen red stagecoach, they encounter monsters more wicked than witches lurking along the dusty trail. But the crew is determined to get that bounty, or die trying.

Written with the devilish cadence of Stephen Graham Jones and the pulse-pounding brutality of Nick Cutter, Red Rabbit is a supernatural adventure of luck and misfortune.]]> 455 Alex Grecian 1250874688 Lori 0 to-read 4.16 2023
author: Alex Grecian
name: Lori
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 7234875 512 Sarah Waters Lori 0 to-read 3.59 2009
author: Sarah Waters
name: Lori
average rating: 3.59
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 8913370
One day, the most beloved thief of all arrives—Gentleman, an elegant con man, who carries with him an enticing proposition for Sue: If she wins a position as the maid to Maud Lilly, a naĂŻve gentlewoman, and aids Gentleman in her seduction, then they will all share in Maud’s vast inheritance. Once the inheritance is secured, Maud will be disposed of—passed off as mad, and madeĚýto live out the rest of her days in a lunatic asylum.

With dreams of paying back the kindness of her adopted family, Sue agrees to the plan. Once in, however, Sue begins to pity her helpless mark and care for Maud Lilly in unexpected ways...But no one and nothing is as it seems in this Dickensian novel of thrills and reversals.]]> 592 Sarah Waters 1101057025 Lori 0 to-read 4.05 2002
author: Sarah Waters
name: Lori
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2002
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 203994965 A woman is accused of killing her husband, but is she actually guilty? Inspired by a true historical case.

Liverpool, England, 1889: In the shadowy streets, the air is thick with secrets and the line between guilt and innocence blurs. Twenty-six-year-old Constance Sullivan is brought to trial charged with poisoning her husband, William. But William was no ordinary victim…

As Constance's barrister fights to prove her innocence, a sinister web of deception unravels, exposing the dark underbelly of their seemingly idyllic marriage. One by one, witnesses emerge with incriminating testimony and facts about the dark side of Constance and William’s marriage are revealed. For many, the widow’s guilt seems clear. But is someone holding the key to the whole truth?]]> 334 Tonya Mitchell 1504093607 Lori 0 to-read 3.85 2024
author: Tonya Mitchell
name: Lori
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/20
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 61885029
Charlie's life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan.

Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie.

But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits. Jake had enemies, and now they're coming after Charlie. His uncle might have been a stand-up, old-fashioned kind of villain, but these are the real thing: rich, soulless predators backed by multinational corporations and venture capital.

It's up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started against a league of supervillains. But with unionized dolphins, hyperintelligent talking spy cats, and a terrifying henchperson at his side, going bad is starting to look pretty good.

In a dog-eat-dog world...be a cat.]]> 264 John Scalzi 0765389223 Lori 4 sci-fi_and_fantasy 4.09 2023
author: John Scalzi
name: Lori
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/18
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 142501887 An eerie, hypnotic, darkly beautiful novel about two elderly sisters living alone at the edge of the world and how their lives unravel when their sanctum is breached, for fans of Piranesi and The Testaments.

In a place and time unknown, two elderly sisters live in a walled garden, secluded from the outside world. Evelyn and Lily have only ever known each other. What was before the garden, they have forgotten; what lies beyond it, they do not know. Each day is spent in languid service to their home: tending the bees, planting the crops, and dutifully following the instructions of the almanac written by their mother.

So when a nameless boy is found hiding in the boarded house at the center of their isolated grounds, their once-solitary lives are irrevocably disrupted. Who is he? Where did he come from? And most importantly, what does he want?

As suspicions gather and allegiances falter, Evelyn and Lily are forced to confront the dark truths about themselves, the garden, and the world as they’ve known it.]]> 12 Nick Newman Lori 0 to-read 3.84 2025
author: Nick Newman
name: Lori
average rating: 3.84
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213861224 skeld season: one day, any woman on the islandĚýcan wake with three black lines on her forehead, the mark of a skeld. Skeld season comes around without warning, and while each window of time lasts only three months, anyone a skeld turns to stoneĚýis very much dead.

That's how Tess’s mother killed Soren’s parents. Maybe for this reason alone, Tess and Soren should not have fallen in love. Since the time her mother was a skeld, Tess has wanted to leave Stenland, to run from the windswept island, from her family and friends. She is unwilling to bear the responsibility of one day killing anyone, let alone someone she loves. Soren has been determined to stay, to live out his life in the place he knows as home, even if that life could be cut short during the latest skeld season. They cannot see eye to eye—and yet, they cannot stay apart. She tries to come back for him. He tries to leave for her. But can your love for one person outweigh everything else combined? And how do you decide how much you’re willing to risk, if it might mean destroying someone else in the process?

Laura RobsonĚýhas crafted aĚýfascinating story about the choices we make, the responsibilities we carry and the ambiguities of regret.]]> 352 Laura Brooke Robson 0778368475 Lori 0 to-read 4.24 2025
author: Laura Brooke Robson
name: Lori
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 202908611 A story about the weight of the past and the promise of the future set between rural Australia and London - from the bestselling author of The Bass Rock

Max didn’t believe in an afterlife. Until he died. Now, as a reluctant ghost trying to work out why he remains, he watches his girlfriend Hannah lost in grief in the flat they shared and begins to realise how much of her life was invisible to him.

In the weeks and months before Max’s death, Hannah is haunted by the secrets she left Australia to escape. A relationship with Max seems to offer the potential of a different story, but the past refuses to stay hidden. It finds expression in the untold stories of the people she grew up with, the details of their lives she never knew and the events that broke her family apart and led her to Max.

Both a celebration and autopsy of a relationship, The Echoes is a novel about stories and who has the right to tell them, asking what of our past can we shrug off and what is fixed forever.]]> 304 Evie Wyld 1529926998 Lori 0 to-read 3.80 2024
author: Evie Wyld
name: Lori
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/18
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 211004884 SISTERS, SECRETS, LOVE, AND MURDER... Sally Hepworth’s new novel has it all.

For as long as they can remember, Jessica, Norah, and Alicia have been told how lucky they are. As young girls they were rescued from family tragedies and raised by a loving foster mother, Miss Fairchild, on an idyllic farming estate and given an elusive second chance at a happy family life.

But their childhood wasn’t the fairy tale everyone thinks it was. Miss Fairchild had rules. Miss Fairchild could be unpredictable. And Miss Fairchild was never, ever to be crossed. In a moment of desperation, the three broke away from Miss Fairchild and thought they were free. Even though they never saw her again, she was always somewhere in the shadows of their minds. When a body is discovered under the home they grew up in, the foster sisters find themselves thrust into the spotlight as key witnesses. Or are they prime suspects?

A thrilling page-turner of sisterhood, secrets, love, and murder by New York Times bestselling author Sally Hepworth.]]> 368 Sally Hepworth 1250371708 Lori 0 to-read 3.88 2024
author: Sally Hepworth
name: Lori
average rating: 3.88
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/17
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 59949720
Gwyn Jones is perfectly happy with her life in Graves Glen. She, her mom, and her cousin have formed a new and powerful coven; she’s running a successful witchcraft shop, Something Wicked; and she’s started mentoring some of the younger witches in town. As Halloween approaches, there’s only one problem—Llewellyn “Wells” Penhallow.

Wells has come to Graves Glen to re-establish his family’s connection to the town they founded as well as to make a new life for himself after years of being the dutiful son in Wales. When he opens up a shop of his own, Penhallow’s, just across the street from Something Wicked, he quickly learns he’s gotten more than he bargained for in going up against Gwyn.

When their professional competition leads to a very personal—and very hot—kiss, both Wells and Gwyn are determined to stay away from each other, convinced the kiss was just a magical fluke. But when a mysterious new coven of witches come to town and Gwyn’s powers begin fading, she and Wells must work together to figure out just what these new witches want and how to restore Gwyn’s magic before it’s too late.]]> 309 Erin Sterling 0063027518 Lori 3 romance 3.72 2022
author: Erin Sterling
name: Lori
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/16
date added: 2025/02/16
shelves: romance
review:

]]> 40887375 A bold and searing investigation into the role of white women in the American slave economy

Bridging women’s history, the history of the South, and African American history, this book makes a bold argument about the role of white women in American slavery. Historian Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers draws on a variety of sources to show that slave-owning women were sophisticated economic actors who directly engaged in and benefited from the South’s slave market. Because women typically inherited more slaves than land, enslaved people were often their primary source of wealth. Not only did white women often refuse to cede ownership of their slaves to their husbands, they employed management techniques that were as effective and brutal as those used by slave-owning men. White women actively participated in the slave market, profited from it, and used it for economic and social empowerment. By examining the economically entangled lives of enslaved people and slave-owning women, Jones-Rogers presents a narrative that forces us to rethink the economics and social conventions of slaveholding America.]]> 320 Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers 0300218664 Lori 0 to-read 4.29 2019
author: Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers
name: Lori
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 208159162 "Like an old wives’ tale, like a piece of wisdom passed down through generations which no one questioned or even thought about too hard. Like folklore. It was just something everyone knew, a rule to be followed:

Don’t go to Almanby."

Heather, Rachel and Antonia are going to Almanby. Heather needs to find her boyfriend who, like so many, went and never came back. Rachel has a mysterious package to deliver, and her life depends on it. And Antonia—poor, lovestruck Antonia just wants the chance to spend the day with Heather.

So off they set through the idyllic yet perilous English countryside, in which nature thrives in abundance and summer lasts forever. And as they travel through ever-shifting geography and encounter strange voices in the fizz of shortwave radio, the harder it becomes to tell friend from foe.

Creepy, dreamlike, unsettling and unforgettable—you are about to join the privileged few who come to understand exactly why we don't go to Almanby.]]> 446 Adam S. Leslie 1915368480 Lori 0 to-read 3.58 2024
author: Adam S. Leslie
name: Lori
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 37034
Alas, we cannot give you Austen, but Susan Hill's remarkable Woman In Black comes as close as our era can provide. Set on the obligatory English moor, on an isolated causeway, the story has as its hero Arthur Kipps, an up-and-coming young solicitor who has come north from London to attend the funeral and settle the affairs of Mrs. Alice Drablow of Eel Marsh House. The routine formalities he anticipates give way to a tumble of events and secrets more sinister and terrifying than any nightmare: the rocking chair in the deserted nursery, the eerie sound of a pony and trap, a child's scream in the fog, and most dreadfully--and for Kipps most tragically--The Woman In Black.

The Woman In Black is both a brilliant exercise in atmosphere and controlled horror and a delicious spine-tingler--proof positive that this neglected genre, the ghost story, isn't dead after all.]]> 138 Susan Hill 1567921892 Lori 0 to-read 3.77 1983
author: Susan Hill
name: Lori
average rating: 3.77
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/16
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 56554626 New York Times bestselling author Rachel Hawkins, writing as Erin Sterling, casts a spell with a spine-tingling romance full of wishes, witches, and hexes gone wrong.

Nine years ago, Vivienne Jones nursed her broken heart like any young witch would: vodka, weepy music, bubble baths…and a curse on the horrible boyfriend. Sure, Vivi knows she shouldn’t use her magic this way, but with only an “orchard hayride” scented candle on hand, she isn’t worried it will cause him anything more than a bad hair day or two.

That is until Rhys Penhallow, descendent of the town’s ancestors, breaker of hearts, and annoyingly just as gorgeous as he always was, returns to Graves Glen, Georgia. What should be a quick trip to recharge the town’s ley lines and make an appearance at the annual fall festival turns disastrously wrong. With one calamity after another striking Rhys, Vivi realizes her silly little Ex Hex may not have been so harmless after all.

Suddenly, Graves Glen is under attack from murderous wind-up toys, a pissed off ghost, and a talking cat with some interesting things to say. Vivi and Rhys have to ignore their off the charts chemistry to work together to save the town and find a way to break the break-up curse before it’s too late.]]> 308 Erin Sterling 006302747X Lori 3 romance 3.46 2021
author: Erin Sterling
name: Lori
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/15
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: romance
review:

]]> 45046654 An explosive, edge-of-your-seat read about three friends, one murder, and a whole world of secrets...

Angela was one of the most popular girls in her high school before she disappeared without a trace. Nobody ever knew what became of her―not Georgina, her best friend, nor Kaiser, who was close with both girls. Then, fourteen years later, Angela’s remains were discovered in the woods near Geo’s childhood home and Kaiser―who became a detective with the Seattle police department―finally learned the truth: Angela was a victim of Calvin James.

To the authorities, Calvin was a notorious serial killer. But back in the day, Calvin was Geo’s first love. Their relationship bordered on obsession from the moment they met, right up until the night Angela was killed. Geo carried the secret of Calvin’s dark deeds until the evidence landed her in prison. But now, just as Geo is about to be released, new bodies start turning up―killed in the exact same manner as Angela... and soon Geo, Kaiser, and local law enforcement officials realize that what happened that fateful night is more complex and chilling than anyone could have imagined.]]> 384 Jennifer Hillier 1250154200 Lori 0 to-read 4.19 2018
author: Jennifer Hillier
name: Lori
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 220435885 In the latest thrilling suspense novel from Mary Higgins Clark Award–winning author Carol Goodman, a group of mystery authors gathers on a secluded Greek island for a writers retreat, only to discover that their enigmatic host has been murdered and everyone present is a suspect.

They’ll kill for inspiration…

Fifteen years ago, Maia Gold attended a prestigious—andĚýveryĚýexclusive—writers retreat hosted by billionaire Argos Alexander on the Greek island of Eris. It’s where she wrote her first book, the one that should have launched a brilliant career. But something dark happened on that island, a betrayal that has hung over Maia ever since.

Now, Maia finds a familiar envelope in the mail. It’s an invitation to return to Eris, and according to social media, she’s not the only one from that first retreat who’s been invited back. This could be the second chance Maia needs to jump-start her dreams. A chance for reconciliation… or revenge.

Almost all of the writers from fifteen years before have returned to Eris, bringing unresolved resentments with them. Soon, the guests learn that their illustrious host is absent, though he has left instructions for them to participate in a whoever can write the most suspenseful mystery while on the island will win a fortune and literary acclaim. But this is no harmless game—when the guests gather in the morning to share their first chapters, they find Argos Alexander, dead.Ěý

Tensions simmer as the guests try to determine who’s behind the murder, and why they’ve really been invited to the retreat. On an island full of mystery writers, anyone could be the killer—and anyone could be the next victim. Trapped together until the next boat arrives from the mainland, they must sort out old grievances and figure out how to trust one another... or die one by one.]]> 272 Carol Goodman 0063398737 Lori 0 to-read 3.61 2025
author: Carol Goodman
name: Lori
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 55302954 365 A.G. Slatter 1789094380 Lori 5 3.98 2022
author: A.G. Slatter
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2022
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/13
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: magic_and_supernatural, sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 214353924 A captivating dark gothic fantasy set in the same universe as the award-winning author's All The Murmuring Bones, The Path of Thorns and The Briar Book of the Dead. A tale of vampires, assassins, ancient witches and broken promises.

Violet Zennor has had a peculiar upbringing. Training as a fighter in underground arenas, honing her skills against the worst scum, murderers and thieves her father could pit her against, she has learned to be ruthless. To kill.Ěý

Until the day Hedrek Zennor dies. Violet thinks she’s free – a rich young heiress with a world of possibilities in front of her. Then, to her horror, Violet learns that her father planned to send her into the Darklands, where the Leech Lords reign. Where Violet’s still-born brother was taken years ago after Hedrek sold him to a man bearing the mark of the mysterious Anchorhold.

Her father’s solicitor and the city’s bishop are insistent she fulfil her duty, but Violet steadfastly refuses. Until one night two assassins attempt to slaughter her – and it becomes if she wants to enjoy a future free of the interference of either solicitors, bishops or assassins, she’s going to have to clean up the mess her father made.

On her journey, Violet seeks the help of Miren O’Malley in the hidden estate of Blackwater, whose family once produced the purest, strangest silver; Ellie Briar of Silverton, the Briar Witch who guards the gateway to the realm of the Leech Lords; and Asher Todd of Whitebarrow, who did terrible things and found The Three Who Went Beneath.

Ultimately, Violet must go alone. Into the Darklands. To the Anchorhold where it all began. Where it will all end. To do what must be done.

By turns gripping and bewitching, sharp and audacious, this mesmerising story takes you on a journey into the dark heart of Slatter's sinister and compelling fantasy world, where blood is currency and magic is a weapon.]]> 400 A.G. Slatter 1803364572 Lori 0 to-read 4.00 2025
author: A.G. Slatter
name: Lori
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213245106 A young woman forced to live with ghosts in a mansion frozen in time must decide between forbidden love and the price of freedom in this gothic fantasy where Jane Eyre meets The Haunting of Bly Manor, perfect for fans of Starling House.

At Thorne Hall, a grand estate nestled in the Berkshires, fifteen restless spirits roam, bound within the mansion’s walls since the Gilded Age. Elegy Thorne bears the weight of her family’s curse to preserve the mansion as it was in the 1890s, using ancient folk songs to keep the spirits secret and silent in order to avoid deadly consequences.

When a mischievous child spirit wreaks havoc on the manor, the Thorne family calls upon their trusted preservationist to restore the mansion. He brings along his son, Atticus – a vibrant man full of life and ideas of modernization – and Elegy is captivated by him, igniting a longing for freedom she’s never dared to embrace.

Torn between her desire to follow her heart and her duty to her family and its legacy, Elegy begins searching for a way to release the spirit collection back to the afterlife and set both herself and the ghosts free. With century-old secrets, peculiar magic, and spirits both whimsical and deadly, Thorne Hall will haunt and enrapture readers—and you might just not want to leave.]]> 320 J. Ann Thomas Lori 0 to-read 3.76 2025
author: J. Ann Thomas
name: Lori
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 213243921 A remote Scottish island hides shocking secrets in this page-turning debut mystery laced with dark folklore.

An island lost in time. A cryptic, pagan past. Some secrets should stay buried.

Eilean Eadar is a barren, windswept rock inhabited by a few hundred humans and sheep. Until now, the island was best known for the unsolved mystery of the three lighthouse keepers who vanished back in 1919. But when a young man is found dead at the base of the same lighthouse, two detective inspectors are sent from Glasgow to investigate.

Georgina ‘George’ Lennox is finally back from leave after a devastating accident and happy to be on the case with her partner, Richie Stewart. That is, until she meets the hostile islanders who seem determined to thwart their investigation, and their enigmatic, omnipresent priest who inserts himself into every interview. Then there’s Richie, who just wants to close the case and head home to his family. He doesn’t see that there is something off about the island and its tiny community. He hasn’t heard the wolves howling or seen the dark figures at their window at night. He’s too busy watching George as if waiting for her to break.

With the dark secrets of Eilean Eadar swirling around them, George and Richie must decide who to trust and what to believe as they spin closer to the terrible truth. Laced with Scottish legend, yet sharp and modern in voice, The Wolf Tree announces a spellbinding new voice in crime and mystery fiction.]]> 336 Laura McCluskey 0593852540 Lori 0 to-read 3.72 2025
author: Laura McCluskey
name: Lori
average rating: 3.72
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 127611580 Ěý
And they can’t stand each other.Ěý
Ěý
Indie singer-songwriter Lark is the sunshine and glitter that burns through every cloud and clings to every crevice that Lachlan Kane tries to hide inside. The surly older brother of her best friend’s soulmate, Lachlan thinks she’s just a privileged princess, but Lark has plenty of secrets hiding in the shadows of her bright light. With her formidable family in a tailspin and her best friend’s happiness on the line, she’s willing to make a vow to the man she’s determined to hate, no matter how tempting the broody assassin might be.Ěý

As Lachlan and Lark navigate the dark world that binds them together, it becomesĚýimpossible to discernĚýtheirĚýfake marriage from a real one. But it’s not just familiar dangers that haunt them.Ěý
There’s another phantom lurking on their doorstep.Ěý

And this one has come for blood.]]> 416 Brynne Weaver 0349441588 Lori 4 romance 3.98 2024
author: Brynne Weaver
name: Lori
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/09
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: romance
review:

]]> 127616032 Discover the serial killer romance series everyone is talking about!From the no.1 New York Times bestselling author of the genre-breaking international TikTok sensation Butcher & Blackbird and Leather & Lark comes the final book in the Ruinous Love Trilogy - a friends-with-benefits dark romantic comedy.

Murder.

Mayhem.

And spice.

Doctor Fionn Kane is running from a broken heart, one he hopes to mend in small-town Nebraska, far away from his almost-fiance and his derailed surgical career. It's a simpler head down, hard work, and absolutely no romantic relationships. He wants none of the circus he left behind in Boston.

But then the real circus finds him.

Motorcycle performer Rose Evans has spent a decade on the road with the Silveria Circus, and it suits her just fine, especially when she has the urge to indulge in a little murder when she's not in the spotlight. But when a kill goes awry and she ends up with an injured leg, Rose finds herself stuck in Nebraska, at the home of the adorably nerdy town doctor.

The problem is, not every broken heart can be sewn back together.

. . . And the longer you stay in one place, the more likely your ghosts are to catch up.

***


Friends with benefits
Small town romance
Fish out of water
Forced proximity
Hurt/care
Touch her and die]]> 416 Brynne Weaver Lori 0 to-read 4.09 2025
author: Brynne Weaver
name: Lori
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 207293850 A cozy and uplifting debut novel about three clairvoyant sisters who face an unexpected twist of Fate at the bottom of their own delicate porcelain cups.

Ever since the untimely death of their parents, Anne, Beatrix, and Violet Quigley have made a business of threading together the stories that rest in the swirls of ginger, cloves, and cardamom at the bottom of their customers’ cups. Their days at the teashop are filled with talk of butterflies and good fortune intertwined with the sound of cinnamon shortbread being snapped by laced fingers.

That is, until the Council of Witches comes calling with news that the city Diviner has lost her powers, and the sisters suddenly find themselves being pulled in different directions. As Anne’s magic begins to develop beyond that of her sisters’, Beatrix’s writing attracts the attention of a publisher, and Violet is enchanted by the song of the circus—and perhaps a mischievous trapeze artist threatening to sweep her off her feet. It seems a family curse that threatens to separate the sisters is taking effect.

With dwindling time to rewrite their future and help three other witches challenge their own destinies, the Quigleys set out to bargain with Fate. But in focusing so closely on saving each other, will they lose sight of themselves?]]> 336 Stacy Sivinski 1668058391 Lori 4 3.62 2024
author: Stacy Sivinski
name: Lori
average rating: 3.62
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/09
date added: 2025/02/09
shelves: cozy-mind-candy, magic_and_supernatural
review:

]]> 198563717
Come to Paris, August 2021, when the City of Lights was still empty of tourists, and a thirst for long overdue pleasure gripped those who wandered its streets.

After New York City emptied out in March 2020, Glynnis MacNicol, aged 46, unmarried with no children, spent 16 months alone in her tiny Manhattan apartment. The isolation was punishing. A year without touch. Women are warned of invisibility as they age, but this was an extreme loneliness no one can prepare you for. When the opportunity to sublet a friend’s apartment in Paris arose, MacNicol jumped on it. Leaving felt like less of a risk than a necessity.

What follows is a decadent, unexpected journey into one woman’s pursuit of radical enjoyment.

The weeks in Paris are filled with friendship and food and sex. There is dancing on the Seine; a plethora of gooey cheese; midnight bike rides through empty Paris; handsome men; afternoons wandering through the empty Louvre; nighttime swimming in the ocean off a French island. And yes, plenty of nudity.

In the spirit of Deborah Levy and Annie Ernaux, I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself is an intimate, insightful, powerful, and endlessly pleasurable memoir of an intensely lived experience whose meaning and insight expands far beyond the personal narrative. MacNicol is determined to document the beauty, excess, and triumph of a life that does not require permission.

The pursuit of enjoyment is a political act, both a right and a responsibility. Enjoying yourself—as you are—is not something the world tells you is possible, but it is.

Here’s the proof.]]> 288 Glynnis MacNicol 0593655753 Lori 2 non-fiction 3.39 2024
author: Glynnis MacNicol
name: Lori
average rating: 3.39
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/04
date added: 2025/02/06
shelves: non-fiction
review:

]]> 112972173
Tamsyn Bligh is not a witch, but she makes her living off of them. As a procurer and seller of magical items, Tamsyn’s business is not always above board, but she’s been trying to fix that (mostly.) Bowen is an occasional customer—as well as the star of several of Tamsyn’s dirtiest dreams—but she’s been around enough witches to know that, as a human, getting involved with one is not the smartest idea. She’s finagled an invite to the Witchy Wedding of the Century in the hopes of finally making a score big enough to retire. Just one priceless magical artifact from Tywyll House would set her up for life.

But Tamsyn isn’t the only one sneaking about in Tywyll House, and the mix of a very strong spell combined with a wedding mishap transports Bowen and Tamsyn into Tywyll House’s past, to the Yuletide Celebration of 1957. As Bowen and Tamsyn work together to get back to the present, they must also face off with the origins of Tywyll House’s haunting, the suspicions of their fellow witches…oh, and the fact that somewhere between the mistletoe and the bonfire, they might be falling in love.]]> 352 Erin Sterling 1035405342 Lori 3 romance 3.63 2024
author: Erin Sterling
name: Lori
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/06
date added: 2025/02/06
shelves: romance
review:

]]> 133938826 should feel successful—but all she feels is drained. Haunted by an abandoned dream, she takes a leap of faith and leaves her old life behind. Quitting her job and divorcing her husband, Yeongju moves to a quiet residential neighborhood outside the city and opens the Hyunam-dong Bookshop.

The transition isn’t easy. For months, all Yeongju can do is cry. But as the long hours in the shop stretch on, she begins to reflect on what makes a good bookseller and a meaningful store. She throws herself into reading voraciously, hosting author events, and crafting her own philosophy on bookselling. Gradually, Yeongju finds her footing in her new surroundings.

Surrounded by friends, writers, and the books that bind them, Yeongju begins to write a new chapter in her life. The Hyunam-dong Bookshop evolves into a warm, welcoming haven for lost souls—a place to rest, heal, and remember that it’s never too late to scrap the plot and start over.]]> 307 Hwang Bo-Reum Lori 4 literary_fiction 3.93 2022
author: Hwang Bo-Reum
name: Lori
average rating: 3.93
book published: 2022
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/04
date added: 2025/02/04
shelves: literary_fiction
review:

]]> 220687867 From the beloved New York Times bestselling author Adriana Trigiani, a “dazzling” storyteller (Washington Post), and a “comedy writer with a heart of gold” (NYT), comes a novel about one woman’s quest to build her own life before it’s too late.Ěý

Jess Capodimonte Baratta is not living the life of her dreams. Not even close.
Ěý
In blue-collar Lake Como, New Jersey, family comes first. Recently divorced from Bobby Bilancia, “the perfect husband," Jess moves into her parents’ basement to hide and heal. Jess is the overlooked daughter, who dutifully takes care of her parents, cooks Sunday dinner, and puts herself last. Despite her role as the family handmaiden, Jess is also a talented draftswoman in the marble business run by her confidant, her dapper uncle Louie, who believes she can do anything (once she invests in a better wardrobe). Ěý
Ěý
When the Capodimonte and Baratta families endure an unexpected loss, the shock unearths long-buried secrets that will force Jess to question her loyalty to those she trusted. Fueled by her lost dreams, Jess takes fate into her own hands and escapes to her ancestral home, Carrara, Italy.
Ěý
From the shadows of the majestic marble-capped mountains of Tuscany, to the glittering streets of Milan, and on the shores of enchanting Lake Como (the other one), Jess begins to carve a place in this new/old world. When she meets Angelo Strazza, a passionate artist who works in gold, she discovers her own skills are priceless. But as Jess uncovers the truth about her family history, it will change the course of her life and those she loves the most forever. ĚýIn love and work, in art and soul, Jess will need every tool she has mastered to reinvent her life.

Fed by the author’s cherished Italian roots comes a bighearted, hilarious novel of the the story of one woman’s determination to live a creative life that matters, with enough room left over for love. With a one-way ticket to Italy, Jess is determined to write a new story on her own terms--this time, in stone.]]> 416 Adriana Trigiani 0593183355 Lori 0 to-read 4.32
author: Adriana Trigiani
name: Lori
average rating: 4.32
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/02/03
shelves: to-read
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After all, she was a normal American herself, once.

That was a long time ago, of course—before the time she calls “adoption day,” when she and a dozen other children found themselves being raised by a man they learned to call Father.

Father could do strange things. He could call light from darkness. Sometimes he raised the dead. And when he was disobeyed, the consequences were terrible.

In the years since Father took her in, Carolyn hasn't gotten out much. Instead, she and her adopted siblings have been raised according to Father's ancient Pelapi customs. They've studied the books in his library and learned some of the secrets behind his equally ancient power.

Sometimes, they've wondered if their cruel tutor might secretly be God.

Now, Father is missing. And if God truly is dead, the only thing that matters is who will inherit his library—and with it, power over all of creation.

As Carolyn gathers the tools she needs for the battle to come, fierce competitors for this prize align against her.

But Carolyn can win. She's sure of it. What she doesn't realize is that her victory may come at an unacceptable price—because in becoming a God, she's forgotten a great deal about being human.]]> 390 Scott Hawkins 0553418629 Lori 4 sci-fi_and_fantasy 4.06 2015
author: Scott Hawkins
name: Lori
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2015
rating: 4
read at: 2025/01/23
date added: 2025/01/31
shelves: sci-fi_and_fantasy
review:

]]> 207677131 A woman investigates her brother's mysterious death while coming to terms with her own haunting past in this atmospheric novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Unmaking of June Farrow

The only thing James and Johnny Golden have ever had is each other. For as long as she can remember, James’sĚýdeep connection with her twin brother,ĚýJohnny,Ěýhas gone beyond intuition—she can feel what he feels.ĚýSo, when Johnny is killed in a tragic accident, James knows before her phone even rings that her brother is gone and that she’s alone—truly alone—for the first time in her life.Ěý

When James arrives in the rural town of Hawthorne, California to settleĚýher brother’sĚýaffairs,Ěýshe’sĚýforced to rehash the ominous past she and Johnny shared and finally face Micah, the only person who knows about it. He’s also the only man she’s ever loved.Ěý

But James soon discovers that the strange connection she had with Johnny isn’t quite gone, and the more she immerses herself into his world, the more questions she has about the brother she thought she knew. Johnny was keeping secrets, and he’s not the only one. What she uncovers will push her to unravel what happened in the days before Johnny’s death, but in the end, she’ll have to decide which truths should come to light, and which should stay buried forever.]]> 288 Adrienne Young 0593598709 Lori 0 to-read 3.69 2025
author: Adrienne Young
name: Lori
average rating: 3.69
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/31
shelves: to-read
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Following traces this mysterious person left behind, Jake travels from country to country gathering chilling testimonies from others who encountered her across the decades—a trail of shattered souls that eventually leads him to Theo, a dying sculptor in rural New Mexico, who knows the woman better than anyone—and might just hold the key to who, or what, she is.

Part horror, part western, part thriller, Old Soul is a fearlessly bold and genre-defying tale about predation, morality and free will, and one man’s quest to bring a centuries-long chain of human devastation to an end.]]> 336 Susan Barker 0593718291 Lori 0 to-read 3.75 2025
author: Susan Barker
name: Lori
average rating: 3.75
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

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TV writer Yara Gibson’s hometown of Palmdale, California, isn’t her first choice for a vacation. But she’s back to host her parents’ twentieth-anniversary party and find the perfect family mementos for the celebration. Everything is going to plan until Yara receives a disturbing text: I have information that will change your life.

The message is from Felicia Campbell, who claims to be a childhood friend of Yara’s mother. But they’ve been estranged for years—drama best ignored and forgotten. But Yara can’t forget Felicia, who keeps texting, insisting that Yara talk to her “before it’s too late.”

But the next day is already too late for Felicia, whose body is found floating in Lake Palmdale. Before she died, Felicia left Yara a key to a remote lakeside cabin. In the basement are files related to a mysterious tragedy, unsolved since 1998. What secrets was Felicia hiding? How much of what Yara knows about her family has been true?

The deeper Yara digs for answers, the more she fears that Felicia was right. Uncovering the truth about what happened at the cabin all those years ago will change Yara’s life—or end it.]]> 416 Rachel Howzell Hall 1542033705 Lori 0 to-read 3.86 2022
author: Rachel Howzell Hall
name: Lori
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/29
shelves: to-read
review:

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