Darcia Helle's Blog, page 23
January 23, 2022
New Release Spotlight — THE BROKEN TOWER by Kelly Braffet
Death pulled them apart. The towers will pull them back together.
Judah the foundling has survived her own death, only to find herself in an unknown forest. Nearing a second death from exposure and exhaustion, she falls in with two vagabonds with their own mysterious pasts. Gavin and Elly, having been secretly spirited away to a deserted wilderness guildhall, are rescued in a raid, but soon find themselves surrounded by enemies, and in even more trouble. In New Highfall, the Seneschal has freed the captured Nali chieftain from prison only to force him to experiment with the creation of a new kind of bond. The Slonimi very much want to find Judah so that they can unbind the power held in the tower, even if that means sending their strongest, most ruthless Worker to dig Judah’s location out of Nate’s mind, and even if he doesn’t survive the process. All any of them want is to be left in peace. But now they all have only one choice: fight for their lives, or die.
The Broken Tower : A Novel
Kelly Braffet
On Sale Date: January 25, 2022
9780778331797
MIRA Books
Hardcover
$27.99 USD
480 pages
BUY LINKS:
Oblong Books (Signed Copies)
Bookshop.org
Amazon
B&N
Google Play
Kobo
Walmart
PROLOGUE
THE MAGUS TRAPPED JUDAH AND GAVIN IN THE tower. He wanted her to kill Gavin, to accomplish something he called the Unbinding. And obviously she refused to do that, but the only other way out of the tower had been to jump. So she’d jumped: away from Gavin and the magus and their hands that tried to grab her, through the empty space where the tower wall had been sheared away long before she’d been born, and into the clear emptiness of midair.
Where she’d had time to look down to the brush at the bottom of the light well, contemplate what she’d done, and think, Oh, no.
Then she’d seen—felt?—an enormous flash of purple, and a bizarre sense of being emptied and filled at the same time. Faces flashed through her mind: the magus’s mother and an unfamiliar old woman with flinty eyes. Then everything was white and silent and nothing and peace.
Only gradually did she become aware once more of her own existence, of the actuality of a person named Judah. Eventually she remembered her body, and at some point later, that bodies usually wore clothes; and then she was wearing her gown from Elly and Gavin’s betrothal. The gown was the pale green of new grass, the loveliest thing she had ever owned. Experimentally, she thought feet and felt the dry crunch of leaves beneath her toes. Then she thought trees, and tall smooth trunks melted into view out of the mist. She decided she’d died in the jump after all, and death was a featureless span of white from which a person could form whatever they wanted. Which was an infinitely more pleasant afterlife than any she’d ever been promised or threatened with; who could complain?
She’d kept walking through the forest where she found herself, where a great many ferns grew no higher than her ankles, and round silver-white boulders broke through the soil like fish through water. When she’d first thought trees she’d been thinking of the orchard, where the trees were short and neatly pruned and the air smelled like cider. Here, it smelled like loam and something brackish that she could taste in the back of her throat but not quite identify, something that crept over her like winter fog. The leaves on the straight, white-barked trees had a bluish cast to them, as if chilled.
Barefoot, with her shoulders exposed in the elegant dress, she realized that she was cold, too. She tried thinking coat, envisioning Gavin’s quilted riding jacket, and then boots, picturing the ones she’d adopted from Theron and then lost in the pasture with Darid. Nothing happened. Whatever power she’d had to create in the white was gone. After a while, she realized that the taste in the back of her throat and the creeping chill meant snow. Further, she realized that regardless of what had happened to her when she’d leapt from the tower, regardless of where she’d landed, regardless of whether she was alive or not, and regardless of a dozen other factors that presented themselves in fairly short order—lack of fire, lack of food, lack of shelter—regardless of all of that, she was coatless and barefoot in a strange forest, which appeared, despite all theories to the contrary, to be real. And she was wearing a ball gown. And the snow was beginning to fall.
All of which led to one final realization: she was in trouble.
Excerpted from The Broken Tower by Kelly Braffet, Copyright © 2022 by Kelly Braffet. Published by MIRA Books.
About the Author
Kelly Braffet is the author of The Unwilling, Save Yourself, Josie and Jack and Last Seen Leaving. Her writing has been published in the New York Times, Vulture.com, as well as The Fairy Tale Review, Post Road, and several anthologies. She attended Sarah Lawrence College and Columbia University and currently lives in upstate New York.
Social Links:
Author website: https://www.kellybraffet.com/
Facebook: @kellybraffetfiction
Twitter: @KellyBraffet
The post New Release Spotlight — THE BROKEN TOWER by Kelly Braffet appeared first on Quiet Fury Books.
January 21, 2022
Book Review — FOUND: The Conduit Chronicles, Book 1 by Ashley Hohenstein
Can we change our destiny or are we subject to the finality of fate?
Psychologist Ophelia Banner finds herself pondering this very question when her life changes drastically after a chance encounter with a golden-eyed stranger. Her new reality is not for the faint-hearted. Thrust straight into a conflict between gods and monsters that has raged for a millennia, she must face the fact that her gift will become the bond that puts a stop to the endless war, or the weapon that may annihilate the conduit world and humanity as we know it.
With no time to hone her skill and her heart torn between two men—the man she is destined to be with or the man she has grown to love—what chance does a simple therapist from California have to save the world?
Found is the first book in The Conduit Chronicles series in which myth and folklore weave a trail full of challenges and adversity for our protagonist, Ophelia Banner. Dive into these pages and join her on her journey.
Found opens with an action-filled scene featuring Elias and hinting at all sorts of dark magic. I was hooked. Or thought I was.
Things immediately grind to a halt as we’re introduced to Ophelia and Lucas. Content feels murky and disconnected, with more ambiguity than suspense.
Soon, all three characters and their stories converge, and suddenly the sole focus is an annoying, persistent love triangle. I mean, the entire book is all about this relationship drama. The “…conflict between gods and monsters that has raged for a millennia..” is barely background noise until we’re almost at the end of the book, when we briefly escape the mash of testosterone and the pampered love interest for a little action. Though, even here, the love triangle rears its ugly head to ensure we don’t forget.
Sadly, the promise of the gods and magic is never properly explored, though the hints are fascinating.
Then, we get to the end, and we’re left dangling off a ledge. I’m talking not one but multiple cliffhangers! We have absolutely NO resolution about anything at all, not even the nauseating love triangle.
I almost gave up not even halfway into this one. But I found the audio on Scribd, and the narrator is phenomenal. Her ability to flawlessly transition through the multiple accents and personalities was, I’m sorry to say, far more entertaining than the story itself.
Of course, all this complaining is just my opinion. If you enjoy love triangles with a vague promise of more to come, you might love this book.
*I received an ebook copy via BookishFirst.*
The post Book Review — FOUND: The Conduit Chronicles, Book 1 by Ashley Hohenstein appeared first on Quiet Fury Books.
January 20, 2022
Spotlight on THE LATE MR. CARY: A 1920s Mystery by Michael Campeta
It is January 1928. Megan Cary, a young and stylish librarian, lives with her moody but wealthy husband, Adam. Just as Meg can no longer tolerate her husband’s philandering, Adam mysteriously dies during a weekend trip to his hometown of Albany. Meg finds a suicide note, and the police want to quickly close the case. So does Adam’s mother, Helen Cary, the stern matriarch of the brownstone house she shares with her sister and brother-in-law, as well as her daughter and son-in-law. Skeptical that Adam would kill himself, Meg hires a private detective, Sloane Sheppard, whose investigation ultimately unravels family secrets as a series of surprising deaths occur over two cold and snowy weeks in Albany.
First, there is Janet Faraday, whom Meg met on a train to Albany the week before Adam’s death. On the train, Janet opens up to Meg and admits that she killed her lover six years earlier—and got away with it. On the same train ride, Meg meets Janet’s son, Ben, a handsome young man who deeply attracts Meg. During their weekend in Albany, Janet apparently falls under a trolley. Yet a witness claims she saw someone push Janet to her death. Next comes the abrupt death of Helen Cary’s maid, IDA, whose head is crushed by a sewing machine precariously stored on a high shelf in the kitchen broom closet. Soon after, a neighborhood busybody, who was present at the time of Adam’s death, falls down her cellar stairs and dies. As Meg and Ben grow closer, they wonder: Could these deaths really be accidents? If so, are they related? THE LATE MR. CARY continues to a denouement where Sloane Sheppard finally reveals the mysteries behind these violent deaths.
Meg arrived back at the apartment after five o’clock. A hectic but pleasant day at the library, busy at the reference desk and assisting patrons After preparing a light meal, she relaxed in the living room with tea and put on the radio. She decided to call Ben and as she entered the hallway, the phone rang. She was rather surprised to hear the voice of Sloane Sheppard.
“I received a call from Iris Bauer this morning,” he said rather abruptly. “She told me the maid, Ida Munson, died unexpectedly last night.”
“Iris called this morning to tell me, too,” Meg said. “Do you think it’s related to Adam’s death? And the death of Janet Faraday?”
“I don’t know yet. Iris also told me someone ripped photos of Adam as a boy, from a photo album her mother kept in her dining room.”
“Who would rip out photos of Adam as a child?” Meg wondered, surprised.
He asked Meg if Adam knew Ben or his mother.
“No, he didn’t know them. Neither did I until I came to Albany.” She related to Sloane again the circumstances when she first met Janet Faraday and Ben.
Sloane mentioned when Meg would return to Albany. “I don’t know, really,” she told him. “I’d like you to continue your investigation, of course, Mr. Sheppard—I mean, Sloane. Let me know what you find.”
Sloane told her he would be in touch soon and the called ended. Meg replaced the receiver on the candlestick phone and returned to the living room, deep in thought.
Three strange deaths in less than two weeks? And with Adam’s death dismissed by the police as suicide, Janet Faraday’s death an accident, would the police claim the same for Ida Munson? And then her mind turned again to Janet Faraday. Wasn’t she the start of all this mess? And the arsenic. It was in Adam’s coffee. How else would he have gotten it?
That rather pointed to someone who was at the table. There was a time when it was vacant, except for when she was turned watching the dancing. The poison could have been
put in the drink then. But wouldn’t she have been aware of someone at the table behind her? And there were other tables surrounding theirs. But the lights in the dining room were dim, and people were too busy enjoying themselves. It was unlikely someone from another table would have noticed anything.
The next morning, while she was preparing for work, the revelation came to her.
About the AuthorAuthor Michael Campeta is a native of Albany, New York and completed a master’s degree in Library and Information Science from the University at Albany. He is a librarian and teacher and enjoys reading, travel, architecture and history, especially the era of the 1920s. His novels are set in Albany during the jazz age of the 1920s, a fascinating period in American history. Michael Campeta displays a mastery of pace and mystery in this suspenseful and satisfying historical thriller.
The post Spotlight on THE LATE MR. CARY: A 1920s Mystery by Michael Campeta appeared first on Quiet Fury Books.
January 19, 2022
New Release Spotlight — A PROPSAL IN PROVENCE by Donna Alward
A PROPOSAL IN PROVENCE by Donna Alward (on-sale Jan.25, Harlequin Romance): In Donna Alward’s latest addition to the Heirs to an Empire miniseries, a life-altering secret is revealed. It all started with an escape from scandal…only to be rescued by the tycoon! PR assistant Anemone Jones loves working in Paris for the glamorous Pemberton family…until she discovers she is in fact their half sibling! When the scandal hits the tabloids, it’s her gorgeous boss, Phillippe Leroux, who sweeps her off to his idyllic home in Grasse. Phillippe’s proposal in Provence gives Annie breathing space to process her new life—and even find a place in his.
Release Date: January 25, 2022
ExcerptExcerpt, A PROPOSAL IN PROVENCE by Donna Alward
She was still working through a mental list when Phillipe turned up a hillside street, slowing as he drove through a residential neighborhood. The homes here were nice—stone houses with tile roofs, olive and palm trees, little gardens. Annie had never seen a palm tree in person in her life. And here she was, in the south of France, so close to the Mediterranean. Sitting in a car with the handsomest man she’d ever known.
Was it wrong that a day that was so very horrible also kind of felt like a dream come true?
“Nous sommes ici,” Phillipe said, and Annie nodded as he turned up a short drive to a welcoming-looking two-story house with wood shutters the color of whiskey barrels.
He turned off the car and let out a big breath.
“Phillipe? Before we go in, I just want to say…thank you. Thank you for caring enough to want to help me. You could have just sent me a warning, but you’re a true friend.”
He took off his seat belt and turned in his seat to face her better. “If I overstep, please tell me. I can be…bossy. Single-minded.”
That didn’t sound like the man she knew, today’s activities excepted. “I will, though I won’t have to. I just want you to know that I appreciate you so much. You have always—” Her throat tightened and she took a moment to swallow, ease the knot that had formed. “You have always treated me with caring and respect.” She gave a small, secretive smile. “Maybe more than I wanted. You’re a good man, Phillipe.”
His gaze held hers and the air in the car filled with the same delicious tension that had shimmered between them last night. But then they both sat back, knowing it would only complicate matters further if they gave in to the attraction they’d done so well ignoring all day.
“Come,” he said softly, giving her the smile she found so devastating. “Meet my parents. Be at home.”
He retrieved their bags from the back seat and then they walked up the stone path together. Phillipe lifted his hand to knock but before he could, the door swung open and a woman stood there, her smile wide, the joy in her eyes unmistakable.
“Vous êtes ici!”
He laughed, put down the bags, and pulled her into his arms.
About the Author
Donna Alward lives on Canada’s east coast. When she’s not writing she enjoys knitting, gardening, cooking, and is a Masterpiece Theater addict. While her heartwarming stories have been translated into several languages, hit bestseller lists and won awards, her favorite thing is to hear from readers! Visit her on the web at www.donnaalward.com and join her mailing list at www.DonnaAlward.com.
The post New Release Spotlight — A PROPSAL IN PROVENCE by Donna Alward appeared first on Quiet Fury Books.
January 18, 2022
Book Review — ETIQUETTE FOR RUNAWAYS by Liza Nash Taylor
1924. May Marshall is determined to spend the dog days of summer in self-imposed exile at her father’s farm in Keswick, Virginia. Following a naive dalliance that led to heartbreak and her expulsion from Mary Baldwin College, May returns home with a shameful secret only to find her father’s orchard is now the site of a lucrative moonshining enterprise. Despite warnings from the one man she trusts — her childhood friend Byrd — she joins her father’s illegal business. When authorities close in and her father, Henry, is arrested, May goes on the run.
May arrives in New York City, determined to reinvent herself as May Valentine and succeed on her own terms, following her mother’s footsteps as a costume designer. The Jazz Age city glitters with both opportunity and the darker temptations of cocaine and nightlife. From a start mending sheets at the famed Biltmore Hotel, May falls into a position designing costumes for a newly formed troupe of African American entertainers bound for Paris. Reveling in her good fortune, May will do anything for the chance to go abroad, and the lines between right and wrong begin to blur. When Byrd shows up in New York, intent upon taking May back home, she pushes him, and her past, away.
In Paris, May’s run of luck comes to a screeching halt, spiraling her into darkness as she unravels a painful secret about her past. May must make a choice: surrender to failure and addiction, or face the truth and make amends to those she has wronged. But first, she must find self-forgiveness before she can try to reclaim what her heart craves most.
You know when a debut novel blows you away, turns you into an instant fan of the author, and makes you want to stalk them (in a friendly way!) for future books? Etiquette for Runaways by Liza Nash Taylor in one such book for me.
We start in 1924, on a farm in Virginia, with May, a young woman trying to find her way in life. She’s not willing to settle down and have babies just yet, if at all. She wants something for herself first.
May takes us to New York City, then off to Paris, as she chases a dream that dangles just out of reach.
The writing is beautiful and immersive, rich in detail, while never feeling weighed down. This is the kind of story you experience right alongside the characters.
This book was released in 2020. Taylor has since released a second book, In All Good Faith, which I can’t wait to get my hands on!
*Huge thank you to Blackstone Publishing for the free copy!*
The post Book Review — ETIQUETTE FOR RUNAWAYS by Liza Nash Taylor appeared first on Quiet Fury Books.
New Release Spotlight — THE EX-HUSBAND by Karen Hamilton
It’s an offer she can’t refuse…and can’t escape.
True: Charlotte has an unsavory past. She married the wrong man, got caught up in his con artist games, took what wasn’t hers. She got out, though: divorced Sam, started fresh.
False: She left him before things went too far. Nothing bad happened.
True: Sam is missing, and before he disappeared, he left cryptic messages about someone threatening him—someone who has been threatening Charlotte, too.
True: She’s on the straight and narrow, has accepted a job as a personal assistant for an engagement party on board a private luxury cruise ship, the Cleobella.
False: No one on board knows about her past, and she’s far away from anyone who means her harm.
As the Cleobella sails through its glittering destinations—the Bahamas, Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago—increasingly sinister events haunt the guests, and the turquoise waves and sun-drenched beaches give way to something darker. Someone knows what Charlotte did. Is it the blushing bride? The seemingly placid mother-in-law? Or the mysterious heiress?
Someone knows, and someone wants revenge—before the ship reaches its final port.
The Ex-Husband
Author: Karen Hamilton
ISBN: 9781525811609
Publication Date: January 18, 2022
Publisher: Graydon House
Buy Links:
BookShop.org
Harlequin
Barnes & Noble
Amazon
Books-A-Million
Powell’s
THEN
Eighteen Months Ago
Barbados
A TIP-OFF. THAT COULD BE THE ONLY EXPLANATION.
Dreaded realization filtered through the rows of passengers and crew in the cruise terminal via mutters about delays intermingled with curiosity and general resignation at the inevitable holdup. Sickening dread roiled deep in my gut. Surreptitiously, I glanced back at the queue snaking behind me. Still no sign of Sam. Where was he?
The person in front of me took a step forward, pushing his backpack with a foot. Reluctantly, I followed.
Sam had only darted back to the ship to pick up his watch, carelessly left beside the basin in his cabin. It should have taken him fifteen minutes—twenty max. He had insisted that I save our place in the line to save time. Our flight to freedom was less than four hours away.
I messaged him.
Where the hell are you? Hurry up! I am nearly at the front of the line.
Well, not quite, but it was true enough.
No reply.
Indecision kept me rooted to the spot. Sam would be annoyed if I lost our place. It would break one of our rules about blending in. Then again, neither of us was thinking straight. Our nerves were frayed. We were both tense after a wakeful night dissecting what had gone wrong, each of us blaming the other. But he left me with no choice. We always disembarked together. We had each other’s backs. Rule number one.
I tried to calm my fears. The upheaval wasn’t necessarily anything to do with us. I was too quick to jump to worst-case scenarios, usually after my conscience had given me a good poke. Sam and I excelled at slipping beneath the radar, despite his popularity.
In the corner of the vast, high-ceilinged building, portable air-conditioning units blasted out woefully inadequate cool air. My heart pounded so hard it almost hurt. Sweat slid down my spine. I stepped out of line and walked back in the direction of the ship. James, head of the ship’s security team, was standing by the exit. Relief. He would know where Sam was.
Strangely, James didn’t acknowledge or return my greeting. His manner was uncharacteristically off. No, he said. I couldn’t go back on board.
“But Sam should have been back by now,” I said. “He only went for something he’d forgotten.”
James shrugged.
“Just wait for him in line. He’ll show up. There’s nowhere else for him to go. This is the only exit.”
“What’s going on?” I said, trying to cajole James into thawing his attitude.
I opted for a friendly, neutral tone. And why not? We were colleagues, after all. Friends, companions. Equals, really.
“There are searches, from time to time.”
“Not that I’ve ever seen,” I said. “I hope it doesn’t hold us up. What is it? Drugs? Weapons?”
I smiled, safe in the knowledge that I was carrying neither.
“Get back in the line,” said James. “Wait for Sam there.”
I had no choice. As I turned, I saw Sam up ahead. He must have joined a different line. His bag was already being searched. How the hell had we missed each other? Why hadn’t he called me? Why did he go through without me?
There was nothing I could do but rejoin the queue and watch. I couldn’t read the expression of the person searching his bag, but the body language appeared at ease. Jolly, even. Everything felt off, badly wrong. Fragmentsof our heated conversation last night started piecing together. Just wait until I get hold of Sam, I thought. I would kill him for breaking our rules and putting me through all this extra stress.
I watched as Sam exited into the outside world. I could imagine the sun brushing his face as he inhaled the warmth of the Caribbean air. I distracted myself by dissecting the type of people they were pulling over. Lone travelers. Fresh, bubbling red rage at Sam rose. I called him. Straight to voice mail.
I was now among the stragglers, recognizing some of the faces. God, this was torture. I fought the urge to push to the front, explain about Sam and ask to be whisked through so that I could catch up with him, find out what the hell he was playing at. Breathe, breathe, breathe, I repeatedover and over in my mind. I can do this. It’s all about playing the game.
A calmness descended over me as I was beckoned forward. One step after another, a neutral expression on my face. I could see the sun through the glass doors. No sign of Sam in the crowds beyond. I focused on the large brandy or whiskey I was going to order on the flight. I thought about the type of movie I would watch, a comedy or something light and easy to absorb. Or maybe I wouldn’t bother with any distractions at all. I could use the time to think.
Half a yard, then another. The man in front was pulled over to my right, with a brusque wave. A harmless-looking elderly couple was also summoned. Not me. Not yet. I was so nearly there. Please, God. I know I’ve made mistakes. I know I’ve made bad choices, but just let me keep walking and I will make amends.
“Miss?”
Shit.
“Yes?”
“Can you come over this way, please, and place your bags on the table?”
I smiled. “Yes, of course.”
Everything turned numb, as though this was happening to someone else. Invincibility was Sam’s superpower, not mine.
Victimless. That is what Sam and I had always said about the people we befriended. Relax, I told myself. They won’t find anything. I’d triple-checked, hadn’t I?
My bag felt unusually heavy as I lifted it up. It was still covered in hotel, airline and cruise stickers. Funny, the inconsequential things I focused on. Sam often told me to scrape them off. “Bland and anonymous is always best. The smallest of details can offer up rich clues to the wrong people.” He would know.
“Open your bags, please.”
“Sure.”
My mouth was dry. I rotated the combination on my lock: one, eight, eight, my birth date and month, a small act of rebellion when it came to Sam’s insistence never to do the obvious. It clicked open. Yet I couldn’t bring myself to lift the lid, to display my personal belongings ready for public inspection. It was humiliating.
The officer lost patience and did it for me. Time slowed as he unzipped the bag. Nestling on top of my favorite red blouse was something that, although familiar, didn’t belong to me.
Blind panic.
“That’s not mine.” I reached to grab it, to remove the emerald necklace from its nest among my possessions. Someone had put it there.
“Stand back, please.”
I felt the fresh horror rise inside me as two other customs officers walked over and peered at the necklace.
“I said it’s not mine. Someone has been in my bag.”
Stony faces, bland expressions, dismissive words.
I tried again.
“You need to go through the CCTV, check who entered our cabin. Someone planted this.”
I looked from face to face.
Still nothing.
I should’ve kept quiet. They’d already decided that I was guilty. A thief. Someone without rights.
Anger replaced fear as my privacy was violated. My swimwear, toiletries, underwear, shoes, travel guides, my Spanish-language course books, my costume jewelry, my every-bloody-thing was removed and examined by careless rubber-gloved hands.
A glimmer of hope ignited when their search concluded. All they had found was something that was such an obvious plant. The necklace rested on the side of the counter, taunting me. Not for the first time either. Magpie-like, the moment I had first spotted the emerald-and-diamond choker with a teardrop pendant, I longed to own it. Green was most definitely the color of envy.
“Come with us, please.”
I was shown to an interview room. I could hear a baby crying outside. Alone, without my belongings, I had time to piece things together. Grim reality, like a blast of icy water. I had been sacrificed, thrown under the bus. Sam knew. He’d been tipped off. Instead of saving the two of us, he’d chosen to save himself. “For better, for worse” clearly no longer applied. It was a final act of cruelty. A brutal end, regardless of how rocky our marriage had been. All that mattered was himself.
Time spooled and distorted. I sat, trying to appear nonchalant, yet as outraged as an innocent could be, robbed of her freedom. I felt watched. The heat stifled me. I wanted to plunge into a cold pool, swim below the surface, somehow wash away the dirty feelings that threatened to swallow me whole.
Anger took over as I sat there. I wasn’t taking the rap—no way. As two police officers walked into the room, I was prepared to embrace my inner canary. Whatever it took. But it became clear I wouldn’t need to sing that day.
I was free to go. It had all been a terrible mistake. Huge apologies. Strange, but true. My belongings—even the necklace—were returned.
Outside, despite the heat of the midday sun, I wanted to run. I had got away with it. I was free. Except… I wasn’t.
I didn’t like the person I had become—hadn’t for a long time. Something needed to change. Sam’s customary reassurances that “all would be well” had been my elixir. It smoothed away fears and doubts, the ones my conscience tried in vain to shove to the forefront of my mind during the darkest hours. The sudden and horrible unraveling of our gilded situation was the result of arrogance. His and mine.
But for now, I had to put myself first. I walked toward the shade and sat on a bench beneath a palm tree. I had less than two hours to catch my flight, but I could still make it. I sent Sam a message.
Call me. ASAP.
Nothing.
I hailed a cab to take me from the cruise terminal to the airport, deciding to make one detour to a friend’s house en route. I wanted to hide my pot of gold somewhere safe.
As we drew into the airport, fear took hold again. What if I was making a mistake? In a daze, I checked in. The airline staff wouldn’t tell me if Sam had checked in too. I called him again even though I knew, deep down, that there wouldn’t be an answer. As I placed my bag down to go through the X-ray machine, I heard my phone beep. I had to wait more painful minutes while my bag passed through the checks before I could snatch up my phone and read it. Sam!
One word.
Sorry.
What the hell was he doing?
Sam’s empty plane seat taunted me all the way to London as I planned thethings I was going to say and do when I next saw him. Because I would see him again. He wasn’t the only piece of unfinished business, because there was someone else I needed to track down too. The real owner of the necklace and the catalyst behind our downfall and the death of our marriage.
Excerpted from The Ex-Husband by Karen Hamilton, Copyright © 2022 by Karen Hamilton. Published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
About the Author
Karen Hamilton spent her childhood in Angola, Zimbabwe, Belgium and Italy and worked as a flight attendant for many years. She has now put down roots in the UK to raise her three children with her husband and she also writes full time. Her books include The Perfect Girlfriend, The Last Wife, and The Ex-Husband, out January 2022.
Social Links:
Author Website
Twitter: @KJHAuthor
Facebook: @karenhamiltonwriter
Instagram: @karenhamiltonauthor
Goodreads
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January 17, 2022
New Release Spotlight — PAY OR PLAY: A Charlie Waldo Novel by Howard Michael Gould
Blackmail, sexual harassment, murder . . . and a missing dog: eccentric, eco-obsessed LA private eye Charlie Waldo is on the case in this quirky, fast-paced mystery.
Paying a harsh self-imposed penance for a terrible misstep on a case, former LAPD superstar detective Charlie Waldo lives a life of punishing minimalism deep within the woods, making a near religion of his commitment to owning no more than One Hundred Things.
,br>At least, he’s trying to. His PI girlfriend Lorena keeps drawing him back to civilization – even though every time he compromises on his principles, something goes wrong.
And unfortunately for Waldo, all roads lead straight back to LA. When old adversary Don Q strongarms him into investigating the seemingly mundane death of a vagrant, Lorena agrees he can work under her PI license on one condition: he help with a high-maintenance celebrity client, wildly popular courtroom TV star Judge Ida Mudge, whose new mega-deal makes her a perfect target for blackmail.
Reopening the coldest of cases, a decades-old fraternity death, Waldo begins to wonder if the judge is, in fact, a murderer – and if he’ll stay alive long enough to find out.
Pay or Play is the third in the Charlie Waldo series, following Last Looks and Below the Line. Last Looks was turned into a major motion picture, starring Charlie Hunnam as the offbeat private investigator.
Genre: Thriller, Private Detective
Published by: Severn House Publishers Limited
Publication Date: December 7th 2021
Number of Pages: 224
ISBN: 0727850857 (ISBN13: 9780727850850)
Series: Charlie Waldo, #3
Purchase Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Goodreads
It wasn’t the sex that set Waldo’s woods on fire, it was the afterglow.
Surrounded by forest, nearly all its structures made of wood, his mountain town of Idyllwild had already seen five homes destroyed, the remainder evacuated. Route 243 was closed on both sides, leaving Waldo and all the other residents cut off and fearing the worst. As the record temperatures of summer 2018 scorched California, infernos blossomed up and down the state. Six people were dead in the one up north, the one called the Carr.
Watching clips of his wildfire, the Cranston, from a hundred miles away and the safety of Lorena’s house, Waldo knew it would take a miracle to keep the rest of Idyllwild from being consumed. He didn’t know whether his own cabin was already lost. He didn’t know if his chickens were still alive.
What he did know was this: the conflagration was all his fault.
Not literally, of course. It wasn’t like he’d lit the match. And he hadn’t set the tinderbox. The planet was rebelling. Climate change had made this fire season hotter and drier. Forest-management practices left more fuel on the ground, too, the unintended reper¬cussion of conscientious wildlife protection. Those were the reasons Waldo’s mountain was burning.
Those and, according to the news, arson.
But Waldo knew better. Call it karma, call it moral justice – Waldo knew his own wobbling had something to do with it, too.
Four years earlier, Waldo learned in an instant the precariousness of the world, the damage one man could do, the damage he could do, when his own zealous police work had led to the death of an innocent man. His life since had been a daily struggle not to do any more.
He had resigned from the force, ghosted his girlfriend Lorena and everyone else he knew, and bought twelve acres in Idyllwild, in the San Jacinto mountains, where he lived for three solitary years in self-sustaining austerity, making a near religion of his commitment to a zero-carbon footprint and to owning no more than One Hundred Things. And that worked for him, at least until Lorena showed up and triggered the chain of events which drew him away from his refuge and back into civilization.
She’d hoped to coax him into joining her expanding PI business, and back into their relationship, too. The latter took; the former, not so much. He did work one case with her, a missing-persons that turned rancid and left Waldo with no taste for more. She eventually stopped trying and seemed to accept the relationship as it was. He’d come down the mountain for a visit about once a month, usually for a few days when Willem – the male model she’d married during Waldo’s absence, estranged now but still her housemate – was out of town on a shoot.
It was a delicate equilibrium: less than Lorena wanted, but enough; a constant test of Waldo’s punishing minimalism, but within bounds he could handle.
Then Willem, wanting to cash in on the overheated L.A. real estate market, insisted that Lorena agree to sell their jointly owned Koreatown bungalow as a final condition of their divorce. He moved out the day the papers were signed.
The next time Waldo came to visit, the common spaces looked barren, Willem apparently the owner of most of their thousands of Things, including almost all the furniture.
Lorena looked lost in the empty house. That plucked at Waldo in ways he didn’t expect, and he ended up staying in town longer than he ever had before, almost two weeks. One night, after love-making fierce and profound even by their standards, Lorena said, ‘What if we got a place together?’
In a sense, it was reasonable to muse on.
In another, it was absurd. How could that work? In L.A., just as in Idyllwild, Waldo maintained his exacting rules for living, not allowing himself even an extra toothbrush to leave at her place. Meanwhile, in the face of his asceticism, Lorena clung to her consumerist pleasures all the harder. So, did she mean for him to give up his cabin, and to battle out all their joint decisions, item by item, precept by precept? Or did she mean for him to keep his cabin, and cohabit a second home, profligate beyond imagining?
That these questions were even on the table was a sign that
Waldo had gotten too comfortable here. His heart starting to race, he silently recited his catechism, the covenant with the world which he’d devised and repeated aloud regularly for his first few months alone on his mountain until it had become ingrained:
Don’t want, don’t acquire, don’t require.
Don’t affect.
Don’t hurt.
The answer was not complicated. It was not ambiguous. He needed to hold fast. Every time he hadn’t, every time he let his resolve slip, every time he compromised the principles which had redeemed him, something had gone wrong.
And this compromise would be bigger than anything Waldo had ever contemplated, the consequences surely bigger, too. He had to say no. Of course he had to say no.
He looked over at Lorena, her eyes closed, her lip curled in a gentle smile, and before he knew it he too was lost in the after¬glow. That ruinous afterglow.
And what Waldo said was: ‘Maybe.’
By the next afternoon, his mountain was in flames.
Four days later, alone in Lorena’s barren kitchen, Waldo scoured the internet for any morsel of new information. Evacuated – what did that actually mean? Had anyone remained to support the fire-fighters, or was it a ghost town? Not that he knew any of his fellow denizens anyway, even after four years, other than his batty neighbor Hilda Flitt, who kept an eye on his chickens when he was away. And Hilda wasn’t answering her phone.
Nor was Lorena, for that matter. He shot her another text and went back to surfing.
Surfing and blaming himself for the fire.
Not that he could talk about his guilt with Lorena. She’d already said something about him ‘getting worse’ and one time (at a downtown Szechuan restaurant, after he questioned the waiter as to why a restaurant that puts Environment Friendly! on the menu still tops the meal with plastic-wrapped fortune cookies), even asked whether he ‘ever thought about talking to somebody.’ Sure, why wouldn’t she want that? It’d be so much easier to have that ‘somebody’ browbeat Waldo into complaisance than to develop some environmentally responsible habits herself.
Maybe, though, this was what ‘getting worse’ looked like. Holding to rules was one thing, magical thinking another entirely, and after all, it was the guy with the barbecue lighter and the WD-40 who’d set the mountain ablaze, not Waldo.
Still.
It all happened just hours after Waldo’s maybe, and it was Waldo’s town about to be devoured, and Detective III Charlie Waldo had never believed in coincidences.
As the day wore on, the news from Idyllwild began to improve. Firefighters, dropping retardant from the sky, managed to cut the inferno just before it reached the Arts Academy, and suddenly they were using the words ‘mostly contained.’ Deep into the night, Hilda Flitt still wasn’t answering her phone. But the authorities had reopened 243, so Waldo could go back in the morning to see for himself whether his home was safe, whether he even had any Things left, save the ones on his back.
Waldo waited up for Lorena like he always did. He sprawled on her bed with his Kindle, chipping away at Richard White’s massive history of the late nineteenth-century United States, specifically a grim chapter about how American ‘progress’ killed off the bison and pushed the Native Americans to the reservations. Even though Waldo enjoyed the book greatly – it filled multiple lacunae in his knowledge and was peculiarly relevant to the U.S. in 2018 – tonight he struggled not to put it down.
What he itched to do instead was stream another episode of his new addiction, the sinfully titillating Judge Ida Mudge, which Lorena had told him about just this week and which instantly wormed its way into Waldo’s limbic system like none of his favorite junk television shows ever had, not even prime MTV Cribs. But he’d already watched two, using up the daily hour he allowed himself.
Waldo pushed to the end of the chapter and checked Lorena’s bedside clock. It was past midnight, later than he ever stayed up in his woods. Was his junk TV ‘day’ defined by his sleep schedule, or by the clock? That is, could he allow himself to watch ‘tomorrow’s’ Judge Idas now? If he was going to spend much of the next day traveling, he might not have time to watch anyway – so why not allow himself a smidgen of ethical squinching and stream an episode? Or two.
The sound of Lorena’s key in the door saved him from the lapse.
He went out to meet her in the living room. ‘Sorry I didn’t answer your texts,’ she said. ‘I got caught up with something.’ Her vagueness didn’t throw Waldo like it would have during the jealous years. She added, ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
He shrugged, You don’t have to.
Apparently she did, though. ‘Something with an op. I had to take over a tail.’
‘Fat Dave?’ Lorena had three part-time operatives, two LAPD washouts and a wannabe. She swore they carried their weight but he found that hard to believe. Fat Dave Greenberg, whose rep as a world-class douchebag radiated far beyond Foothill Division, was the worst of them, as far as Waldo was concerned.
She repeated, ‘I don’t want to talk about it,’ and Waldo repeated his you don’t have to shrug, but again she did. ‘Reddix,’ she said. Lucian Reddix was a young African American, the only one Waldo didn’t know from the force and the one for whom Lorena had the softest spot. ‘He was on a marital tail, followed the subject into a bar. Caught her with her boyfriend, was starting to shoot them on his phone . . . but the bartender came over and he asked for a beer.’
‘So?’
‘So they carded him. He’s not twenty-one until November.’ And this was her star. ‘It turned into a thing. Kid was sure he was made. Don’t say it.’
Waldo didn’t have to; he’d said plenty in the past. These jokers were one more reason not to enmesh himself in Lorena’s business.
‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘I went over and picked it up for him.’
‘Get what you need?’
‘And then some. Too cheap for a motel, these two. Got it on right in his car. Anyway, I wasn’t checking my texts – sorry. Listen,’ she said, changing the subject, ‘I could use a favor.’
He tensed; something in her voice told him it had to do with work. ‘Yeah?’
‘I’ve got a meeting with a prospective in a couple days. It’d help to have you there.’ It was the first time in half a year she’d tried to coax him onto a case. ‘I’m pretty sure you’d like this one.’ He’d heard that before.
Waldo said, ‘243’s open.’
‘Oh. Fire’s out?’
‘Contained enough, I guess. I’ve got to get up there.’
She drew a breath at the rejection. It had cost her something to ask again.
‘How?’ she said. ‘Not on your bike . . .?’ Since Waldo basically restricted himself to transportation that was either public or self-propelled, each trip from L.A. to Idyllwild meant a bus and then a tortuous, torturous bicycle climb. She said, ‘I could drive you.’
And then, she was no doubt thinking, she could drive him back down, once he was assured that his property was all right. Back to L.A. and her prospective client meeting. Back to L.A. and looking for a place for them to share.
He couldn’t do it. Besides, he had long ago decided that he’d grant himself a waiver to ride in a private automobile only with someone who’d already have been making the drive without him; clearly that didn’t apply here. He said, ‘I’ll be fine.’
‘With the smoke and everything? That’s so not healthy.’
She was probably right, but he tipped a shoulder anyway, a second rejection.
‘Waldo . . .’
‘I’ll be careful.’ Waldo knew he should hit her with a third, to rip off the Band-Aid quickly and tell her straight out that he wasn’t going to move in with her.
But she stopped him cold with the lopsided quarter-grin that grabbed him every time. ‘Last night in town is usually pretty good,’ she said, and headed to the bedroom, grazing the back of his neck with her fingertips as she passed.
He heard her start the shower. He knew he wouldn’t be able to tell her tonight. Not even if that meant the winds would pick up, the fire would jump the retardant line, and his woods would be imperiled all over again.
Maybe this time it would be the sex that burned it all down.
***
Excerpt from Pay or Play by Howard Michael Gould. Copyright 2021 by Howard Michael Gould. Reproduced with permission from Howard Michael Gould. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Howard Michael Gould graduated from Amherst College and spent five years working on Madison Avenue, winning three Clios and numerous other awards.
In television, he was executive producer and head writer of CYBILL when it won the Golden Globe for Best Comedy Series, and held the same positions on THE JEFF FOXWORTHY SHOW and INSTANT MOM. Other TV credits include FM and HOME IMPROVEMENT.
He wrote and directed the feature film THE SIX WIVES OF HENRY LEFAY, starring Tim Allen, Elisha Cuthbert, Andie MacDowell and Jenna Elfman. Other feature credits include MR. 3000 and SHREK THE THIRD.
His play DIVA premiered at the Williamstown Theatre Festival and La Jolla Playhouse, and was subsequently published by Samuel French and performed around the country.He is the author of three mystery novels featuring the minimalist detective Charlie Waldo: LAST LOOKS (2018) and BELOW THE LINE (2019), both nominated for Shamus Awards by the Private Eye Writers of America, and PAY OR PLAY (2021). The feature film version of LAST LOOKS, starring Charlie Hunnam and Mel Gibson and directed by Tim Kirkby, will premiere February, 2022; Gould also wrote the screenplay.
HowardMichaelGould.com
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Instagram – @howardmichaelgould
Twitter – @HowardMGould
Facebook – @HowardMGould
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January 14, 2022
Book Review — THE NIGHTINGALE by Kristin Hannah
In love we find out who we want to be.
In war we find out who we are.
FRANCE, 1939
In the quiet village of Carriveau, Vianne Mauriac says good-bye to her husband, Antoine, as he heads for the Front. She doesn’t believe that the Nazis will invade France…but invade they do, in droves of marching soldiers, in caravans of trucks and tanks, in planes that fill the skies and drop bombs upon the innocent. When a German captain requisitions Vianne’s home, she and her daughter must live with the enemy or lose everything. Without food or money or hope, as danger escalates all around them, she is forced to make one impossible choice after another to keep her family alive.
Vianne’s sister, Isabelle, is a rebellious eighteen-year-old, searching for purpose with all the reckless passion of youth. While thousands of Parisians march into the unknown terrors of war, she meets Gaëtan, a partisan who believes the French can fight the Nazis from within France, and she falls in love as only the young can…completely. But when he betrays her, Isabelle joins the Resistance and never looks back, risking her life time and again to save others.
With courage, grace and powerful insight, bestselling author Kristin Hannah captures the epic panorama of World War II and illuminates an intimate part of history seldom seen: the women’s war. The Nightingale tells the stories of two sisters, separated by years and experience, by ideals, passion and circumstance, each embarking on her own dangerous path toward survival, love, and freedom in German-occupied, war-torn France—a heartbreakingly beautiful novel that celebrates the resilience of the human spirit and the durability of women. It is a novel for everyone, a novel for a lifetime.
What can I say about The Nightingale that hasn’t already been said?
The story and characters got under my skin, making me feel all sorts of things. By the end, my eyes were doing that thing where they leaked all over my face.
I can’t come up with a handful of sentences to describe my feelings, so I’ll just go with one word: perfection. This story is like indelible ink on my soul.
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Book Review — THE LUCKY ONES by Kiersten Modglin
They were supposed to die.
Five years ago, the residents of the Gerbera subdivision in the small town of Fallen Oaks were brutally murdered in their beds. The only survivors, now called The Fallen Oaks Five, were children—practically strangers at the time, forever connected by the weight of all they witnessed.
Now grown, the anniversary of their families’ deaths approaches and the Fallen Oaks Five receive letters of warning: the killers are still out there and they aren’t finished with them.
In a race against time and murderers who remain both faceless and nameless, the Five must return to their old homes in order to piece together the events of a night they’d all rather forget. Their old town is riddled with secrets, and every person they come into contact with is a suspect. With everything at stake, can the Five solve the mystery and finally learn the truth about the night that cost them everything? Or will they find themselves victims of a fate they should’ve succumbed to years ago?
Published: January 11, 2022
My ThoughtsIs it appropriate to call a survivor of horrific violence “lucky?”
If everyone I loved was murdered, and someone called me lucky, I’d probably punch that someone in the face. Figuratively, at least, because I’m not great with my fists.
The Lucky Ones starts strong. We’re right there within the chaos and horror, and I felt the confusion and fear.
The story then becomes a puzzle for us to solve, while the five survivors search for answers before they, too, can be murdered.
Pacing is quick, with a few great twists to knock us off balance.
Some things felt improbable/implausible, such as the absolute absence of media attention. And the ending felt like too much of a stretch, while leaving loose ends. Still, I enjoyed the journey.
I listened to this on audio, which I recommend. The narration kept me fully engaged.
*I received a free audio download from OrangeSky Audio, via NetGalley.*
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January 13, 2022
New Release Spotlight — THE SHOE DIARIES by Darby Baham
THE SHOE DIARIES by Darby Baham (on-sale Jan.25, Harlequin Special Edition): It’s never too late to put your best foot forward. From the outside, Reagan “Rae” Doucet has it all: a coveted career in Washington, DC, a tight circle of friends and a shoe closet to die for. When one of her crew falls ill, however, Rae is done playing it safe. The talented but unfulfilled writer makes a “risk list” to revamp her life. But forgiving her ex, Jake Saunders, might be one risk too many.
Release Date: January 25, 2022
Amazon | Barnes and Noble | Harlequin
ExcerptExcerpt, THE SHOE DIARIES by Darby Baham
He was inches away from me when I fell into his arms and began crying. All the anger I’d felt toward him, the hurt he caused me, the stupid ways he’d played me…they all meant nothing in this moment. He was here when I needed him the most. And I could no longer hold my tears back as he stood without a word and let me soak his shirt with sobs for minutes, only occasionally rubbing my hair to bring me comfort.
“Maybe we should go for a walk,” he finally said.
“A walk sounds good.”
“Wait, what are you doing here?” I asked once I had a moment to calm down. We’d walked to Jake’s car to get some privacy while I tried drying up my tears, but the peace and quiet away from the hospital walls also brought me back to reality. It certainly didn’t help that Jake had the kind of car a man gets when he has no intention of having obligations any time soon: a two-seater, silver Jaguar F-TYPE. It was gorgeous on the outside, intimate inside and was also a stark reminder of the reason we broke up in the first place.
“Christine’s mom called me. I assume she was just going through the numbers she had of her friends, and I was still on the list.”
“Oh.”
I guess I’d forgotten that Mama Vasquez had Jake’s number from when we were in college. And that we hadn’t exactly updated her to let her know he shouldn’t still be on the call list of people to inform if something went wrong.
“And so you came all the way from New York?”
“Actually, no. I was in town already for work. It’s why I called you the other night as well. Was hoping we could talk after all these years. But then when Chrissy’s mom called, I just figured it was fate I was here, and so I should come.”
“You definitely came around that corner just as I needed you to,” I admitted with a sigh. “I’m sorry about that, by the way. I just… I couldn’t cry in there and then I saw you and—”
“Hey, you don’t have to apologize for that. I’m—I don’t want to say glad but—grateful I was there when you needed someone.”
“Thank you. I don’t want to make this about me, though. She’s the one in there fighting for her life. I was simply trying to encourage her to keep doing so because… I’m… I’m just not ready to lose my friend.” I held back more tears that were aching to flow down my cheeks.
“And it’s okay to feel that,” he said, lifting my head so we were eye to eye. “It’s okay to not be everyone’s strength all the time. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Yeah, I hear you.”
“I don’t think you do, but that’s okay, too. Just know you don’t have to be strong with me. I can take your tears and your questions.”
About the Author
Darby Baham is a debut author with Harlequin Books Special Edition, where she signed a three-book deal in August 2020. She is also a senior managing editor with The Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center.
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