Jane Litte's Blog, page 16

REVIEW: Bellwether by Connie Willis

Sandra Foster studies fads—from Barbie dolls to the grunge look—how they start and what they mean. Bennett O’Reilly is a chaos theorist studying monkey group behavior. They both work for the HiTek corporation, strangers until a misdelivered package brings them together. It’s a moment of synchronicity—if not serendipity—which leads them into a chaotic system of their own, complete with a million-dollar research grant, caffé latte, tattoos, and a series of unlucky coincidences that leaves Bennet...

REVIEW: All’s Fair in Love and War by Virginia Heath

A new Regency romp of a series, about governess who believes in cultivating joy in her charges, clashes with the children’s uncle who hired her, only to find herself falling in love.

When the flighty older sister of former naval captain, Henry Kincaid, decides on a whim to accompany her explorer husband on an expedition to Egypt, he finds himself unwittingly left in the lurch with her three unruly children and her giant, mad dog. With no clue how to manage the little rascals, a busy career at the...

Review: Love Bites (Tales from the Alpha Art Gallery Book 1) by Cynthia St. Aubin

 

A girl’s gotta eat—and so do her three cats. Recently divorced art history grad student Hanna Harvey has just fibbed her way into a job as the assistant to dangerously drool-worthy art gallery owner Mark Abernathy. For Hanna, working in the field she desperately loves provides the perfect opportunity to begin putting her life back together. Soon her cheese budget is in the black and her feline life partners are no longer eyeing her like a six-foot can of Fancy Feast.

But when her boss’s lady f...

REVIEW: The Vacation Rental by Katie Sise

I read Sise’s The Break about a year and a half ago and gave it a B; I don’t remember loving it but I liked it enough that when The Vacation Rental came to my attention I checked out the blurb:

A summer getaway triggers a psychological game of cat and mouse in a novel about the frightening damages of love, family, and obsession by the bestselling author of Open House and We Were Mothers.

When Georgia rents her country home for the month of August, it’s off to the relaxing Connecticut shore for h...

REVIEW: The Medicine Woman of Galveston by Amanda Skenandore

A downtrodden female doctor takes up with a traveling medicine show to support her disabled son, joining a German giantess, a bowlegged musician, an indentured Creek poet, and a handsome tinker under the thumb of a charismatic but menacing swindler on a collision course with the deadliest natural disaster in American history – the Galveston Hurricane of 1900.

Once a trailblazer in the field of medicine, Dr. Tucia Hatherley hasn’t touched a scalpel or stethoscope since she made a fatal mistake ...

Review: Wait till Midnight by Amanda Quick

The sins of Adam Hardesty’s past have been discovered. And if he does not hunt down his blackmailer quickly, his secrets will be revealed to all. But there is an obstacle in his way: sensation novelist Caroline Fordyce. She knows that Adam’s quest for justice could shatter her own reputation—and mire her family in lethal scandal. And she fears what he may find….

Together, they will navigate the shadow side of London, venturing into an underworld of cutthroats, connivers, and illusionists. And a...

REVIEW: I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue

As far as Jolene is concerned, her interactions with her colleagues should start and end with her official duties as an admin for Supershops, Inc. Unfortunately, her irritating, incompetent coworkers don’t seem to understand the importance of boundaries. Her secret to survival? She vents her grievances in petty email postscripts, then changes the text color to white so no one can see. That is until one of her secret messages is exposed. Her punishment: sensitivity training (led by the suspicio...

REVIEW: Baseball: The Movie by Noah Gittell

Featuring Field of Dreams, The Bad News Bears, A League of Their Own, and more: a probing and entertaining work at the intersection of pop culture and sports Baseball has always been a symbol as much as a sport. With a blend of individual confrontation and team play, a luxurious pace, and an immaculate urban parkland setting, it offers a sunny rendering of the American Dream, both the hard work that underpins it and the rewards it promises. Film, America’s other national pastime, which magnifi...

Review: You Should be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

An emotional, slow-burn, grumpy/sunshine, queer mid-century romance for fans of Evvie Drake Starts Over, about grief and found family, between the new star shortstop stuck in a batting slump and the reporter assigned to (reluctantly) cover his first season—set in the same universe as We Could Be So Good.

The 1960 baseball season is shaping up to be the worst year of Eddie O’Leary’s life. He can’t manage to hit the ball, his new teammates hate him, he’s living out of a suitcase, and he’s hom...

REVIEW: Trippy: The Peril and Promise of Medicinal Psychedelics by Ernesto Londoño

A riveting look at the tremendous promise and inherent risks of the use of psychedelics in mental health treatment through the lens of a New York Times reporter whose journalistic exploration of this emerging field began with a personal crisis.

When he signed up for a psychedelic retreat run by a mysterious Argentine woman deep in Brazil’s rainforest in early 2018, Ernesto Londoño, a veteran New York Times journalist, was so depressed he had come close to jumping off his terrace weeks earlier....