Book Life Rambles

  Carnegie's Maid by Marie Benedict   G👀dreads Clara Kelley is not who they think she is. She's not the experienced Irish maid who was hired to work in one of Pittsburgh's grandest households. She's a poor farmer's daughter with nowhere to go and nothing in her pockets. But the other woman with the same name has vanished, and pretending to be her just might get Clara some money to send back home. If she can keep up the ruse, that is. Serving as a lady's maid in the household of Andrew Carnegie requires skills he doesn't have, answering to an icy mistress who rules her sons and her domain with an iron fist. What Clara does have is a resolve as strong as the steel Pittsburgh is becoming famous for, coupled with an uncanny understanding of business, and Andrew begins to rely on her. But Clara can't let her guard down, not even when Andrew becomes something more than an employer. Revealing her past might ruin her future -- and her family's. With captiva...

  The Chili Queen by Sandra Dallas  G👀dreads Life may have been hard on Addie French, but when she meets friendless Emma Roby on a train, all her protective instincts emerge. Emma's brother is seeing her off to Nalgitas to marry a man she has never met. And Emma seems like a lost soul to Addie-someone who needs Addie's savvy and wary eye. It isn't often that Addie is drawn to anyone as a friend, but Emma seems different somehow. When Emma's prospective fails to show up at the train depot, Addie breaks all her principles to shelter the girl at her brothel, The Chili Queen. But once Emma enters Addie's life, the secrets that unfold and schemes that are hatched cause both women to question everything they thought they knew. With Sandra Dallas's trademark humor, charm, and pathos, The Chili Queen will satisfy anyone who has ever longed for happiness. Hoopla A bank robber, a mail-order bride, and a cathouse madam joining forces on a quest for happiness in 1880s New ...

  When Women Ran Fifth Avenue by Julie Satow *DNF* The cover is the best part G👀dreads A glittering, glamorous portrait of the golden age of American department stores and of three visionary women who led them, from the award-winning author of The Plaza . The American department a palace of consumption that epitomized modern consumerism. Every wish could be met under one roof – afternoon tea, a stroll through the latest fashions, a wedding (or funeral) planned. It was a place where women, shopper and shopgirl alike, could stake out a newfound independence. Whether in New York or Chicago or on Main Street, USA, men owned the buildings, but inside, women ruled. Genre: NonFiction, History, Fashion, Biography. Circa early 1900's. I listened a little while I was puttering around in the casita in the morning. There is a part where she says the sales ladies would say "Oh Harriett" to warn another employee that a customer could not be pleased. Like a take off of modern day ...

T he Stone Witch of Florence by Anna Rasche . G👀dreads 1348. As the Black Plague ravages Italy, Ginevra di Gasparo is summoned to Florence after nearly a decade of lonely exile. Ginevra has a gift—harnessing the hidden powers of gemstones, she can heal the sick. But when word spread of her unusual abilities, she was condemned as a witch and banished. Now the same men who expelled Ginevra are begging for her return. Ginevra obliges, assuming the city’s leaders are finally ready to accept her unorthodox cures amid a pandemic. But upon arrival, she is tasked with a much different task. She must use her collection of jewels to track down a ruthless thief who is ransacking Florence’s churches for priceless relics—the city’s only hope for protection. If she succeeds, she’ll be a recognized physician and never accused of witchcraft again. But as her investigation progresses, Ginevra discovers she’s merely a pawn in a much larger scheme than the one she’s been hired to solve. And the dangerou...

  The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult *DNF*   G👀dreads: Sage Singer is a baker. She works through the night, preparing the day’s breads and pastries, trying to escape a reality of loneliness, bad memories, and the shadow of her mother’s death. When Josef Weber, an elderly man in Sage’s grief support group, begins stopping by the bakery, they strike up an unlikely friendship. Despite their differences, they see in each other the hidden scars that others can’t, and they become companions. Everything changes on the day that Josef confesses a long-buried and shameful secret—one that nobody else in town would ever suspect—and asks Sage for an extraordinary favor. If she says yes, she faces not only moral repercussions, but potentially legal ones as well. Genre: Historical Fiction, Holocaust RSCBC = RSCBC BookClubRead This was a book club pick. At the prior meeting someone said she started it and it's depressing. Another lady asked "it's depressing?" "Well, it *IS* during...

The Next Ship Home, A Novel of Ellis Island by Heather Webb  Thought provoking cover  G👀dreads Ellis Island, 1902. Francesca arrives on the shores of America, her sights set on a better life than the one she left in Italy. That same day, aspiring linguist Alma reports to her first day of work at the immigrant processing center. Ellis, though, is not the refuge it first appears thanks to President Roosevelt's attempts to deter crime. Francesca and Alma will have to rely on each other to escape its corruption and claim the American dreams they were promised. Genre: Historical Fiction  Day 1 - I started The Next Ship Home. It captured my attention right off the bat. I'm at the 23% mark and find it very interesting. It takes place in 1902 which I'm thinking was about the time my Grandfather (on my Father's side) processed through Ellis Island so it makes me wonder if what the author is describing is what he went through with his Mom. In the book, their biggest fear was not...

Dial A For Aunties by Jesse Q Sutanto *DNF* G👀dreads What happens when you mix 1 (accidental) murder with 2 thousand wedding guests, and then toss in a possible curse on 3 generations of an immigrant Chinese-Indonesian family? You get 4 meddling Asian aunties coming to the rescue! Okay, the number structure is making me itch. I want to correct it to: one, 2,000, three, four... I won't deduct any points for that though!  It's kind of giving me Rich Crazy Asian vibes and I thought that was cute movie.  Genre: Fiction, Mystery (but not cozy), Humor, Romance, Adult. DNF No, No, No >>Return. Not Rich Crazy Asians, but Bat Shit Crazy Family. When the aunties decided to cut the body up and put it in trash bags...Not funny. No.Can.Do. There was one funny part though. The Mom set up a dating profile under the daughter's name and had been chatting with a guy, as if she was the daughter. Cuz you know, medaling mother wanting to marry off her daughter. When they set up date, tha...

Sidney Sheldon's Mistress of the Game by Tilly Bagshawe *NOT READ* This is "why I didn't pick this one" rather of a review of the book after reading. I had written this in my personal blog and thought it was worthy transferring here.  I was perusing my list and was thinking maybe Sidney Sheldon's Mistress of the Game by Tilly Bagshawe. Apparently she was a fan of Sidney Sheldon's and decided to write sequels of his books. Supposedly she was chosen by his estate to continue writing novels in his style after his death. Well, according to some reviews, she has missed the mark BIG TIME. Reviews from G👀dreads. Copy and paste for their entertainment value: I did not expect the pile of utter and complete rubbish that this book was. And calling it rubbish is the most polite thing I can truly say about this. First of all, what the hell is WRONG with you, Ms Bagshawe, that you've got incest every ten pages? Sidney Sheldon is ROLLING IN HIS GRAVE and wanting to spit...

The Enigma Girls: How Ten Teenagers Broke Ciphers, Kept Secrets, and Helped Win World War II by Candance Fleming   I think the long ass title pretty much summed it up. From the Author 10 young women (most were 18 years old) who left their homes to work secretly on projects related to the German military's Enigma cipher machine. Genre: NonFiction, History, WWII, YA G👀dreads One reviewer said: " Although targeted to preteen/teen readers, I thought this was a brilliant account of Bletchley Park. I've read several accounts of the goings on at Bletchley and the secret service of Britain during WWII, but in many ways this surpasses them. Fleming dug deep, explains in detail what these young women were doing, including examples and diagrams, add to that the plethora of pictures of the complex, this is a comprehensive and entertaining look at history." Genre: Non Fiction, History, WWII Circa: 1940 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Obviously no plethora of pictures for me with the audio version.  I was ...

Climbing in Heels by Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas *DNF* G👀dreads ...debut novel, is a fictional tale of the rise of three secretaries at the hottest agency in 1980's Hollywood, giving you a glimpse into the boys-will-be-boys club and the women who wanted a seat at a table where they were expected to serve. It's the story of friendship, betrayal, survival, standing up when they pass you by, and saying I won't go when they want you gone. And it's also a story about how some of those women became very much like the monsters who trained them. Libby adds ...the author was a top agent at the William Morris Agency in the late 1980's and ICM in the 1990's. She represented A-List actors including Jennifer Lopez, Julia Roberts, Tim Robbins, and Madonna. Genre: Historical Fiction. The agency environment is historical, the three secretaries are fictional. You know, like the names have been changed to protect the innocent...and the guilty... The area is my old stomping grounds. ...

Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry G👀dreads Two writers compete for the chance to tell the larger-than-life story of a woman with more than a couple of plot twists up her sleeve. Two writers to write a biography of a woman no one has seen in years, or at least to meet with the octogenarian who claims to be the Margaret Ives. Tragic heiress, former tabloid princess, and daughter of one of the most storied and scandalous families of the 20th Century. Margaret is only giving each of them pieces of her story. Pieces they can’t swap to put together because of an ironclad NDA and an inconvenient yearning pulsing between them every time they’re in the same room. And it’s becoming abundantly clear that their story—just like the tale Margaret’s spinning—could be a mystery, tragedy, or love ballad…depending on who’s telling it. Genre: Fiction, Contemporary Romance...but... one reviewer said: "I don’t care how beautiful the prose is (and yes, the writing was gorgeous)—this book is bein...

Husbands & Lovers by Beatriz Williams Cover has nothing to do with the story G👀gle Two women—separated by decades and continents, and united by an exotic family heirloom—reclaim secrets and lost loves. “My favorite kind of page-turner—unputdownable!” G👀dreads New England, 2022. Three years ago, single mother Mallory Dunne received the telephone call every parent dreads—her ten-year-old son, Sam, had been airlifted from summer camp with acute poisoning from a toxic death cap mushroom, leaving him fighting for his life. Now, searching for the donor kidney that will give her son a chance for a normal life, Mallory’s forced to confront two harrowing secrets from her past: her mother’s adoption from an infamous Irish orphanage in 1952, and her own all-consuming summer romance fourteen years earlier with her childhood best friend, Monk Adams— one of the world’s most beloved singer-songwriters—a fairy tale cut short by a devastating betrayal. Cairo, 1951. After suffering tragedy beyond ...

Murder in Tuscany by T.A. Williams G👀dreads Nestled high in the Tuscan hills lies Villa Volpone, home to renowned crime writer Jonah Moore and his creative writing course. It’s also the last place retired DCI Dan Armstrong expected to spend his retirement! Dan’s no writer, but maybe this break will help him to think about the next chapter in his own life story? Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Cozy Mystery, Crime, Italy It sounded interesting enough. Separated from his wife (her decision) and facing divorce; recently retired police department murder investigator receives a retirement gift from his co-workers. A two week writing course in Tuscany. He wants to write a Renaissance book, however the fine print for the course says erratica! He's going to back out but his daughter convinces him to go, at least he gets a free vacay. Of course there is a murder, thus the title, and of course he gets pulled into the investigation. Ya, it's a little cozy, but I'm half way through and it...

Kills Well With Others by Danna Raybourn   It's the sequel to Killers of a Certain Age which I read about a month ago and liked enough to put the sequel on hold.  Review is here . G👀dreads 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 connecte...

  One Sharp Stitch by Allie Pleiter G👀dreads When thirty-something Shelby Phillips returns to her quiet hometown just outside of Asheville, North Carolina, she reluctantly takes over her mother’s Nimble Needle needlepoint shop—and gets entangled in a murder investigation . . . It’s only temporary. That’s what Shelby Phillips tells herself when she returns to excruciatingly harmless Gwen Lake after her graphic arts career—and the office romance blooming with it—get tossed like rejected design mockups. Her plan is as simple and fool-proof as a tent manage the family needlepoint shop during her parents’ RV vacation. It’s just a month. It’s not as if they’re retiring . . . right? Genre: Cozy Mystery, Contemporary Fiction Could be fun.  Could be a bomb. I'll let you know!  ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Cute little cozy mystery, even though cozy isn't usually my thing. Nothing earth shattering but enough to keep me listening and nothing specifically to deduct for. Definitely not something to spend mu...

The Writer by James Patterson and JD Barker I'm not normally a Patterson fan but my sister recommended this one. She said The Writer was really good and thought I would like it. G👀dreads: …thriller about a true-crime author swept up in a murder plot. NYPD Detective Declan Shaw gets a call: How fast can you get to the Beresford building on Central Park West? In the tower apartment, Shaw finds a woman waiting for him. She’s covered in blood. A body is lying dead on the floor of the luxurious living room. Every book in the apartment’s floor-to-ceiling shelves is by the same author: bestselling true-crime writer Denise Morrow. "This is you?" Shaw asks the woman. "You're a writer?" Only one person knows the ending to this story. Is it the victim or the killer? Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Crime, Psychological Thriller ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💫 I gave it 4.5 stars. I listened most of the time I was working in the kitchen yesterday so that's why I finished it i...