Month: March 2023

Book Review: The House is On Fire by Rachel Beanland

Posted in Book RecommendationsTagged , , , , , 1 Comment
Book Review

THE HOUSE IS ON FIRE by RACHEL BEANLAND

Release Date: April 4, 2023

Rating: 5 out of 5.

Thank you NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for providing me with an advanced reader copy of this book. I am giving this honest review freely.

The House is on Fire by Rachel Beanland is a historical fiction set around the 1811 Richmond theater fire. What? You haven’t heard of the fire? Neither had I until I read this book. I probably would have plowed my way through this book without putting it down, except I had to go research more about this fire. This book definitely sent me down a rabbit hole. Which I loved.

The book follows four distinct characters: Sally, a young widow who is attending the theater with her brother-in-law and sister-in-law, Cicely, a slave girl attending the theater with the daughter of her master, Jack, a young stage hand backstage during the play, and Gilbert, a slave who dreams of buying his and his wife’s freedom. The fire changed these four characters’ lives forever.

Fire is a beautifully written and well-researched book. Sally and Gilbert were real people actually involved in the fire. Cicely and Jack were based on real people. The story is definitely a fictionalized version of events, but there is so much historical accuracy, it reads almost like a series of first-hand accounts of the night.

Beanland really delves deep into the issues that women and slaves dealt with in 1811, not very many years after the United States gained their freedom from Britain. You can’t help but feel for Sally, Gilbert and Cicely as they navigate the obstacles they face as they navigate the days following the fire.

I absolutely loved this book. My degree is in US History, however, I had never heard of this event. Beanland not only drew me into the narrative of the story, which was enthralling, she inspired me to do my own research into the event. The characters felt so real, which they were, they were real people, but Beanland still made these names that can often feel two dimensional in a historical document become three-dimensional characters.

If you enjoy historical fiction, I recommend you pick up this book when it comes out. Rumor is this will be an April Book of the Month selection, so this could also be a wonderful opportunity to try that service out, if you’ve been interested.

Review: #TagMe for Murder by Sarah E. Burr

Posted in Book RecommendationsTagged , , , , , 1 Comment
Book Review

#TAGME FOR MURDER by SARAH E. BURR

Release date: April 25, 2023

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I received this advanced copy from NetGalley, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I love cozy mysteries. They’re always fun, and I fall in love with the cast of characters. Sarah E. Burr’s #TagMe For Murder hit all the right notes for me. It was funny; it was light; the stakes were medium, and the characters were like having some friends over to hang out.

#TagMe is the second book in Burr’s Trending Topic Mysteries series, which follows Coco Cline, a social media specialist and influencer as she plays amateur detective when she inadvertently finds herself in the middle of murder cases.

I have not read the first book in the series, #FollowMe For Murder, but I didn’t feel lost. In fact, reading this one has made me want to go back and read the first book in the series!

#TagMe took me a little while to get into, but once we were sleuthing along with Coco, it became hard to put down. I needed to know “whodunit.” Coco and Hudson are a delightful couple and I really enjoyed their interactions, as well as the interactions Coco had with Jasper. I felt there were just enough characters to make it interesting, but not too many to not remember who each character was.

The mystery was typical of a cozy, and I honestly did not know “whodunit” until Coco began putting the puzzle together near the end, which I loved. Usually, in some cozies, you can figure out who the perpetrator is early on. I loved that it kept me guessing.

If you’re looking for a fun beach read, I highly recommend you check out this book. Maybe even start with the first book, I’m sure you won’t regret spending more time with Coco and her crew.

Review: Hollyland by Patricia Leavy

Posted in Book RecommendationsTagged , , , , 1 Comment
Book Review

HOLLYLAND by PATRICIA LEAVY

Release Date: April 4, 2023

Rating: 2 out of 5.

I received an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Hollyland by Patricia Leavy is an insta-love romance between Dee Schwartz, a writer and art researcher, and Ryder Field, Hollywood’s leading man. When the two of them meet, sparks instantly fly. From the first paragraph through the rest of the book, the two are inseparable. They just know they’ve met the love of their lives. What follows is a romance full of sweet moments between the two, however, the story often feels as if something is missing.

Because the characters meet in the first couple paragraphs, we never get to see Dee and Rye on their own. They’re almost never apart. Because we don’t see the characters separate, it feels as if the characters are not complete. It’s never really clear who they are as individuals. I think there are only a handful of scenes where the two aren’t together. There is no character growth throughout the whole novel. The characters feel very stagnant.

Because there is little character growth, there is also almost no conflict. The couple gets together, and then have a series of very happy interaction through the whole book. There’s no will they or won’t they, or question about whether or not things are happening too quickly. While this might be a very realistic story, it doesn’t make for a very interesting one.

In the end, the book wasn’t the best thing I’ve read this year, but it certainly wasn’t the worst. If you enjoy sweet insta-love romances, and just want something fluffy to read, this book is for you. If you want something with more meat, then you should probably skip.