Mailbox Monday is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came in their mailbox during the last week.
Warning: Mailbox Monday can lead to envy, toppling TBR piles and humongous wish lists.
Don't forget to link up your list
~ My newest review book ~
mystery, December 30, 2014, hardcover, ebook, audio
Linda Wallheim is the mother of five grown boys and the wife of a Mormon bishop. As bishop, Kurt Wallheim is the ward’s designated spiritual father, and that makes Linda the ward’s unofficial mother, and her days are filled with comfort visits, community service, and informal counseling.
But Linda is increasingly troubled by the church’s patriarchal structure and secrecy, especially as a disturbing situation takes shape in the ward. One cold winter morning, a neighbor, Jared Helm, appears on the Wallheims’ doorstep with his 5-year-old daughter, claiming that his wife, Carrie, disappeared in the middle of the night, leaving behind everything she owns. The circumstances surrounding Carrie’s disappearance become more suspicious the more Linda learns about them, and she becomes convinced that Jared has murdered his wife and painted himself as an abandoned husband.
Kurt asks Linda not to get involved in the unfolding family saga, but she has become obsessed with Carrie’s fate, and with the well-being of her vulnerable young daughter. She cannot let the matter rest until she finds out the truth. Is she wrong to go against her husband, the bishop, when her inner convictions are so strong?"
~ here are the newest books in my house ~
The Christmas Wedding Ring by Susan MalleryHoliday, 2014, gift-size hardcover
In her youth, Molly Anderson couldn't help crushing on gorgeous bad boy Dylan Black-even though he had eyes only for her older sister. When things didn't work out between them, he said goodbye to Molly as well, vowing they'd have a great adventure when she grew up. Years later, dumped by her fiance just before Christmas, she's finally ready to take Dylan up on his promise.
A guarded Dylan always had a weakness for Molly, and when she waltzes back into his life—grown-up and gorgeous—he's stunned. So why not whisk her away for some no-strings-attached fun?
Laughter-filled days and late-night kisses are changing Molly's life, for good. The only gift she truly wants now is Dylan's love, but when he discovers the secret she's been keeping, she may lose him again…this time forever.
Casebook of Barnaby Adair, 2009, mass market paperback & kindle match
Penelope Ashford, Portia Cynster's younger sister, has grown up with every advantage—wealth, position, and beauty. Yet Penelope is anything but a pretty face in a satin gown—forceful, willful, and blunt to a fault, she has for years devoted her considerable energy and intelligence to caring for the forgotten orphans of London's sooty and seamier streets.
But now her charges are mysteriously disappearing. Desperate, Penelope turns to the one man she knows who might help her—Barnaby Adair.
Handsome scion of a noble house, Adair has made a name for himself in certain circles where his powers of observation and deduction have seen him solve several serious and unsavory crimes within the ton. His pedigree, relentless intelligence, and discretion make him a deadly avenger in an elegant guise. Despite his skills—or perhaps because of them—he makes Penelope distinctly uncomfortable, but the stakes are too grave. Throwing caution to the wind, defying every rule for unmarried ladies, she appears on his doorstep late one night determined to recruit his talents.
Barnaby is intrigued—both by her problem and her. Her bold beauty and undeniable brains make a striking contrast to the usual insipid ton misses. And as he's in dire need of an excuse to avoid said insipid misses, he accepts her challenge, never dreaming she and it will consume his every waking hour.
Enlisting the aid of Inspector Basil Stokes of the fledgling Scotland Yard, they infiltrate the streets of London's notorious East End. But as they unravel the mystery of the missing orphans, they uncover a trail leading to the upper echelons of society and a ruthless and clever criminal adept at pulling strings who, becoming aware of them and their efforts, is only too ready to destroy all they hold dear, including their new found understanding of the intrigues of the human heart.
A Primer for Adults Only, 2001, Paperback
Writing for an adult audience, the popular children's book author presents a humorous satire of alphabet books. This one is done as if he's written us notes.
Biographies & Memoirs, 2012, Trade paperback
With candor and wit, author Emily Colson shares a glimpse inside her personal battles and family bonds when, as a suddenly single mother, her only child is diagnosed with autism. Yet through the pain a remarkable story emerges, one of beauty, resilience, humor and hope. It's a journey that changes everyone, including Max's grandfather, Chuck Colson. In his most personal of writings, Chuck Colson shares his heart as a fther and grandfather, a tender side that was rarely seen from this spiritual giant, something precious brought out by his grandson with autism.
This is the story that will inspire you to "get up and live". And this is the young man who will capture, even change, your heart.
romance, 2013, mass market paperback
Carrie Slayton, a big-city society-page columnist, longs to write more serious news stories. So her editor hands her a challenge: She can cover any topic she wants, but only if she first scores the paper an interview with Finn Dalton, the notoriously reclusive author.
Living in the remote Alaskan wilderness, Finn has written a megabestselling memoir about surviving in the wild. But he stubbornly declines to speak to anyone in the press, and no one even knows exactly where he lives.
Digging deep into Finn’s past, Carrie develops a theory on his whereabouts. It is the holidays, but her career is at stake, so she forsakes her family celebrations and flies out to snowy Alaska. When she finally finds Finn, she discovers a man both more charismatic and more stubborn than she even expected. And soon she is torn between pursuing the story of a lifetime and following her heart.
romance, 2014, mass market paperback
“Candy Canes and Cupid” by Fern Michaels
All private investigator Hannah Ray wants for Christmas is a quiet day at her Florida beachfront condo. When her biggest client insists she join him on a Colorado ski trip, she has little choice—but what she finds on her arrival could melt the coldest heart…
“White Hot Christmas” by Nancy Bush
Aspiring PI Jane Kelly likes to pretend she’s a bah-humbug kind of girl, but she’s had mistletoe on the brain ever since she shared a kiss with her boss, Dwayne. Before she can hope for a repeat performance, Jane must solve a kidnapping that’s as twisted as a candy cane—and not nearly as sweet.
“Seven Days of Christmas” by Rosanna Chiofalo
Five years ago, Bianca Simone received a wonderful early Christmas gift from her boyfriend, Mark—a week amid the stunning Alpine scenery of Innsbruck, Austria. Now she’s back under very different circumstances, but Mark has one more special gift in mind…
“A Smoky Mountain Gift” by Lin Stepp
Veda Trent is back in Townsend to fill in as temporary manager of the Crafts Co-op, but she’s not planning to stay. Though the mountain town is small, it holds lots of unsettling memories. Yet the wind can change, bringing with it new opportunities—and the chance to create the kind of Christmas Veda has always longed for.
holiday m/m romance, 2009, ebook
Joel Martinez, a practical and organized computer programmer, is roommates with Ian Cooper, a certified IQ-in-the- stratosphere mathematical genius who literally can't find his own underwear in the mess of his day-to-day life. When Joel uneasily leaves Ian for the holidays, he ends up telling stories to his sister and discovers he feels much more for Ian than he thought. So when Ian calls, distraught because the only other thing in his life that loves him (a half-feral cat named Manky Bastard) is going to have to be put down, Joel hurries back home hoping that opposites really do attract.
romance, 2009, kindle match
Safe
After the pain of betrayal and divorce—after years spent decorating other people's houses—Shelley Wilde's cherished dream has finally come true: a home all her own, where she can live happily, secure. . .and alone.
Wild
But Cam Remington has come to shatter her solitude. A traveler who has journeyed to the world's wildest places, a renegade with no roots and no shame, he is everything Shelley has ever feared-and desired-in a man.
Free
An intruder has broken through Shelley's barricades to lure her wounded spirit out of hiding with his electric sensuality. And it will take a traveling man to show her that real love is risk and danger. . .and that home is the haven found in a lover's embrace.
mmp purchased 2001. Read, loved it, don't know where it is.
Leigh Koslow Mystery series (book 5), 2009, kindle match
Lilah Murchison never cared about anyone besides her prize-winning cats. Unfortunately, the feeling was mutual...
When wealthy socialite Lilah Murchison dies in an airplane crash, the locals in Pittsburgh’s North Boros shed no tears. The reclusive millionaire and rumored black widow was detested by almost everyone, including her own son, who expects to share his inheritance with the throng of Siamese that inhabit his mother’s dreary mansion. But when Lilah’s latest will delivers the bulk of her cash to another, unidentified heir, the cat litter flies.
The only local who seems genuinely sorry about Ms. Lilah’s passing is Leigh Koslow’s veterinarian father, who hasn’t a clue how the death of his long-term client could be connected to the bizarre series of break-ins and threats now plaguing his clinic. But daughter Leigh has a hunch that Lilah’s mystery heir may be hiding right under their noses, and wishes she could prove it before the entire staff runs screaming out the door. Because someone wants the past to stay buried—even if it means adding a little extra to the grave.
mmp purchased 2003. Read, don't know where it is, sure I'll be donating the print copy.
Zoe Donovan Mystery, 2014, kindle match
Amid a backdrop of zombies on the run and Halloween festivities, animal control officer Zoe Donovan is faced with losing something she loves in order to save someone she loves when she finds a dead body in the basement of a haunted house just two days before Halloween. With the help of her best friends, Levi and Ellie, and her dog Charlie, she delves into a mystery as complex and multi-layered as the feelings she develops for her ex-nemesis Zak Zimmerman. Halloween Hijinks is the perfect recipe, combining holiday fun with a touch of humor, a pinch of romance, and a dollop of murder.
print purchased 2014. Unread, don't know where it is.
Crossroads, 2013, ebook
Jason Sloan is known as Harper's Crossing's resident Romeo, and he's never had to work too hard to live up to that nickname. With his easygoing charm, whiskey-colored brown eyes, and sinfully sexy half smile, women just seem to fall all over themselves when he's around.
Well...most women, anyway. Katie Lawson's the one woman who isn't putty in his hands, and she's the only one he's ever wanted in his arms.
Katie Lawson left Harper's Crossing in the middle of the night ten years ago, immediately after her high school boyfriend Nick's funeral. She left behind all memories of Nick, and she left behind her life-long best friend, Jason Sloan.
Now she's on the fast track to junior partner at one of San Francisco's top law firms. She's made a life for herself that's all about maintaining order and sticking to the rules. Rule #1 is keeping herself way too busy to think about all that she ran away from. If she can do that, after all, she can keep everything under control.
But that rule is about to be broken. She's headed back home to be the maid of honor in Nick's little sister's wedding. It's time to face the truth she's been avoiding all these years, the same one that sent her running ten years ago - that maybe she didn't lose her first love the summer after high school. Maybe her first love has been waiting for her all this time, at home in Harper's Crossing.
A Twilight, Texas novel, 2014, mass market paperback
It's Christmas in Twilight, Texas. The Cookie Club is baking, the town is decorated, and Delta Force Operator "Hutch" Hutchinson has finally, reluctantly, returned home . . .
. . . only to get pepper sprayed by the delicious- looking stranger who's taken over his house. She says her name is Jane, and she immediately sets down ground rules. Top priority: no touching. For Hutch that isn't easy—he was wounded in action, but one part is still working very well.
Then Hutch learns the truth. Jane harbors a frightening secret—she's really Meredith Sommers, on the run from a dangerous ex-husband and desperately in need of the safety Hutch can provide. In that moment, he vows he'd do anything in his power to protect her. And as Christmas approaches, they discover that their love can conquer the past and overcome any obstacle—but what price will they pay?
The Dresden Files, 2014, audio CDs
Meet Harry Dresden, Chicago's first (and only) Wizard P.I. Turns out the "everyday" world is full of strange and magical things—and most of them don't play well with humans. That's where Harry comes in. Harry is the best at what he does—and not just because he's the only one who does it. So when the Chicago P.D. has a case that transcends mortal capabilities, they look to him for answers. There's just one problem. Business, to put it mildly, stinks. So when the police bring him in to consult on a grisly double murder committed with black magic, Harry's seeing dollar signs. But where there's black magic, there's a black mage behind it. And now that mage knows Harry's name. And that's when things start to get…interesting. Magic—it can get a guy killed.
(Nov 4? received early!) 2014, mass market paperback
Separated twin sisters are reunited at Christmas in these two connected novellas
One Silent Night
Framed for murder and on the run from her kidnappers, Vanessa Jackson secretly hides her infant son in a safe place and flees for a wooded cabin. There she finds her childhood friend Eric Tomlin—a man she must trust with her life…and her family's future.
The Danger in the Manger
Alyssa Jackson is shocked to find a baby in her Christmas manger. But the message on the infant's T-shirt tells Alyssa the child must be her nephew. Alyssa believes her twin sister, presumed dead for years, is still alive. With the help of handsome police officer Chris Jensen, Alyssa goes on a dangerous search for the truth to reunite her family for Christmas.
A Survivor's Club novel, 2014, mass market paperback
The Survivors' Club: Six men and one woman, all wounded in the Napoleonic Wars, their friendship forged during their recovery at Penderris Hall in Cornwall. Now, in the fourth novel of the Survivors' Club series, Flavian, Viscount Ponsonby, has left this refuge to find his own salvation—in the love of a most unsuspecting woman.…
Flavian, Viscount Ponsonby, was devastated by his fiancée’s desertion after his return home. Now the woman who broke his heart is back—and everyone is eager to revive their engagement. Except Flavian, who, in a panic, runs straight into the arms of a most sensible yet enchanting young woman.
Agnes Keeping has never been in love—and never wishes to be. But then she meets the charismatic Flavian, and suddenly Agnes falls so foolishly and so deeply that she agrees to his impetuous proposal of marriage.
When Agnes discovers that the proposal is only to avenge his former love, she’s determined to flee. But Flavian has no intention of letting his new bride go, especially now that he too has fallen so passionately and so unexpectedly in love.
2014, mass market paperback
Under the Christmas Tree (Virgin River)
(originally published October 2009 in the anthology That Holiday Feeling for MIRA Books) With snow falling over the redwood forests, secluded Virgin River is the ideal place to spend the holidays. Each year, the close-knit community gathers in the town square to decorate and light a massive tree. Carols are sung, hot chocolate is shared—and a surprise left under the Christmas tree is about to bring two special people together!
Midnight Confessions (Virgin River)
(originally published November 2010 in the anthology Midnight Kiss for Harlequin Books) Holiday kisses don’t end with Christmas—there’s still the New Year’s Eve party at Jack’s Bar to attend. Locals and newcomers alike find themselves eager for that special countdown...and that midnight kiss.
Backward Glance
(Previously published April 1991 in the anthology To Mother With Love for Silhouette) News of her "ailing" mother sent Leigh Brackon and her twin toddlers rushing home. But once there, she found her spry mom sipping medicinal wine and old flame John McElroy knee-deep in landscaping the backyard! Coincidence? Leigh suspected maternal meddling --- and feared the truth John might discover in her sons' eyes . . .
Cynster, 2014, hardcover
It's frosty December and six Cynster families come together at snowbound Casphairn Manor with members of their households to celebrate the season in true Cynster fashion—and where Cynsters gather, love is never far behind.
The festive occasion brings together Daniel Crosbie, tutor to Lucifer Cynster's sons, and Claire Meadows, widow and governess to Gabriel Cynster's daughter. Daniel and Claire have met before and the embers of an unexpected passion smolder between them.
However, Claire, once bitten, twice shy, believes a second marriage is not in her stars. Yet Daniel is determined. He's seen the kind of love the Cynsters share, and Claire is the lady with whom he dreams of sharing his life. Assisted by a bevy of Cynsters—innate matchmakers every one—Daniel strives to persuade Claire that trusting him with her hand and her heart is her right path to happiness.
Claire is increasingly drawn to Daniel and despite her misgivings, their relationship deepens. But then catastrophe strikes, and by winter's light, she learns that love—true love—is worth any risk, any price.
Blue Heron, 2014, mass market paperback
Everyone loves Jack Holland, but Emmaline Neal needs him. Her ex-fiancé is getting married in Malibu and, obviously, she can't go to the wedding alone. In Manningsport, New York, tall, blond and gorgeous Jack Holland is practically a cottage industry when it comes to rescuing desperate women. He knows the drill, Em figures, so he won't get the wrong idea.
What Jack needs is an excuse to leave town. Ever since rescuing four teenagers from a car wreck, he's been hailed as a hero and the attention is making him itchy, especially since his too-pretty ex-wife is back, angling for a reunion. He's always liked Emmaline. She needs a weekend date? No problem.
So when they wind up in bed together, Em chalks it up to red wine and chocolate cake, just one impulsive night not to be repeated. But Jack's pushing for more, and if she lets down her guard, either she'll get her heart crushed again, or discover that Jack's worth more than just dreaming about.
Spirit of the Highlands, 2013, ebook
Christmas in the Highlands. . .
Not any dashing English lord's idea of a good time. But now that Lord Alexander Mallory has won a Scottish estate in a hand of cards, he is the unlikely laird of the wild, snowy Bonniebroch. Worse yet, the ancient pile of stones comes with a betrothal. To a fiery red-headed virgin. And a curse.
Alex will have his hands full honoring the first, seducing the second and breaking the third. . .all by Twelfth Night.
How to Distract a Duchess: Trevelyn Deveridge never expected to pose naked to serve Queen and country, but when an artistic duchess asks a gentleman to disrobe, how can he refuse?
How to Please a Pirate: To protect the orphans in her charge, Jacquelyn has to see a prodigal pirate wed to a lady of quality. But she forgot one thing. What a pirate wants, a pirate takes…
How to Vex a Viscount: As children, Daisy and Lucian sparred with wooden swords, and Lucian has the scar to prove it. Now that they’re all grown up, the true battle is only beginning…
2014, mass market paperback
When Cody Hawk returns to Canyon Springs, Arizona, to make peace with his ailing father, his bad-boy reputation is still intact. So is his love for the woman he was forced to leave behind. But the privileged Paris Perslow is still off-limits. When Paris needs his help with the annual holiday gala, Cody braves the town's disapproving glances for a second chance with his first love. Years ago Cody promised he'd return for her. But with everyone and everything against them, what will it take to prove to Paris that his love is the perfect gift?
~*~*~*~*~
I haven't received
added to my ereader: (kindle app, html, etc.) ~ I find out about free/discounted ebooks at amazon mostly from Pixel of Ink. I do go through the Top 100 at amazon once in a while. I'm getting better at pinning my new ebooks, 2014's books
What are you Reading?
A weekly Monday meme hosted by Shelia at Book Journey. Post what you read last week and what you're planning to read this week then link to Shelia's post. Then visit others and be prepared to add to your TBR pile!
Finished:
The Christmas Wedding Ring by Susan Mallery
What's His Passion? anthology
The Winter Courtship Rituals of Fur-Bearing Critters by Amy Lane
How to Raise an Honest Rabbit by Amy Lane
If I Must by Amy Lane
A Knitter in His Natural Habitat by Amy Lane
Blackbird Knitting in a Bunny's Lair by Amy Lane
Triage by Louise Blaydon
Coal to Diamonds by August Li
Chasing Seth by R.R. Loveless
Luke by Jan Irving
Books stacked by my reading chair:
Our First Christmas anthology
By Winter's Light by Stephanie Laurens
Started in 2013 but not finished until 2014:
What the Duke Desires by Sabrina Jeffries (on page 34/384)
Pegasus by Kate O'Hearn (on page 44/384)
Dragonwriter edited by Todd McCaffrey (on page 42/271)
Mischief and Mistletoe, anthology (on page 312/402)
Jockeys and Jewels by Bev Pettersen (ebook - 21% read in 2013)
Home for the Homicide by Jennie Bentley (on page 18/284 + Home-Renovation and Design Tips)
Happy Reading!
copyright Book Dragon's Lair 2009-2014
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1 comment:
All of your romances look great. As does Dancing Wth Max.
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