Book Life Rambles

Pretty Dead Things by Kelsey Cox Alt Cover NetGalley About Summary Secrets emerge as a Texas beauty pageant turns deadly in this rich and addictive novel with a jaw-dropping twist from psychological suspense author Kelsey Cox. This program features multicast narration. 2000: Isabelle Whitmore vanishes at Sherman Ranch in Anhalt, Texas, without a trace. 2025: The Lone Star Princess Pageant is about to begin, but this year it’s offering more than an annual dose of rhinestone heels and plunging necklines. Competition is stiffer than ever —and long standing grudges are about to resurface. Ingrid fled Anhalt in the wake of her sister Isabelle’s disappearance and has now returned, just in time for a construction crew to start digging up Sherman Ranch; the pageant brings up past traumas that Melanie can't forget; Cat, newly sober, starts to feel threatened in ways that bring back old demons; and Sarah Lynn, who comes from a long line of pageant winners, knows that losing is not an optio...

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman Cover Wars Canadian Hungarian Serbian German Swedish Bulgarian Portuguese Hebrew There are many more. I'm partial to the pink flamingo covers. Least fav is the German. I didn't get it. Google said it's Inkblot (Rorschach Test) to symbolize her mental health status, bleeding watercolor to represent her 'messy mind'. Update: I didn't think she had a messy mind. Her thoughts and routine were very organized.   G👀dreads About Summary Eleanor Oliphant is a bit of an odd ball. She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. That, combined with her unusual appearance (scarred cheek, sometime wearer of an eczema glove), means that Eleanor has become a bit of a loner – or ‘self-contained entity’ as she calls it. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life and phone chats with ‘Mummy’ (in prison for crimes unknown). But everything changes when Eleanor falls for the l...

Pretty as a Peach by Grace Helena Walz NetGalley About Summary When a new beauty company threatens everything she holds dear, Delilah must find the courage to speak up and reveal the truth. Delilah Thomas has a stellar track record of avoiding conflict. Her life mantra? Keep the peace. Born to a family she has never fit in, Delilah learned early that no matter what it costs her, it's best to keep quiet, nod, and agree. Now in her late thirties, she has mastered the art and employs it daily with the preschoolers she teaches. Then Peach Pit sets up shop in her small hometown and infiltrates every female relationship, including Delilah's lifelong best-friend group. A direct sales business, Peach Pit claims its beauty products are organic and all-natural and recruits women to become "Darlings" who host parties to sell products to friends and family. Delilah's friend Betsy is ecstatic to join, drawn by promises of sisterhood and easy income. But something seems off to ...

Villa Coco by Andrew Sean Greer  Just one alt cover G 👀 dreads About Summary A coming-of-age novel, a love story and a tale of life-enhancing Pulitzer Prize winner Andrew Sean Greer showcases his wit, sophistication and deep knowledge of focaccia in this magical tale set amidst the Tuscan hills. Broke and directionless, our young man takes a job in the Italian countryside as the all-purpose assistant to Lisabetta, known to her friends as Coco - a strong-willed, wealthy widow of great local renown. Trained as an archivist, he thinks he's been hired to catalogue the contents of the beautiful, crumbling mansion nestled in the green Tuscan hills... but what are his actual duties? Days are spent ridding the house of a marten - whatever that is - locating the antediluvian septic system, entertaining an endless carousel of guests (from bohemian painters to elderly princesses to unnervingly handsome nephews), attending a funeral in order to make off with the urn, and not inadvertently sab...

The Ending Writes Itself by Evelyn Clarke G 👀 dreads About Summary Six authors. One private island. Seventy-two hours to write the ending that will change their lives. Arthur Fletch, one of the world’s bestselling novelists, is a reclusive genius known for his iconic protagonists and fiendish twists. When six struggling authors are invited to spend a weekend on his private Scottish island, they arrive to discover a shocking secret: Arthur Fletch is dead . . . and his last book is unfinished. Desperate to publish the novel, Fletch’s agent and editor have summoned these writers in the hope that one of them will imagine a worthy ending for this final book. To sweeten the deal, they are offering an irresistible prize: in addition to ghost-writing the last chapter––for a mind-boggling sum––they will also help the lucky writer successfully re-launch their own career, guaranteeing future bestsellers. The catch: the writers have just seventy-two hours to finish Fletch’s magnum opus. Starting ...

Into the Blue by Emma Brodie *DNF* G 👀 dreads About Summary An epic, decades-spanning love story that blazes through the worlds of acting and comedy and charts a connection unlike any other. “The truth is there’s no such thing as a normal life. There’s just the time you get and how you spend it.” In the summer of 2000, AJ Graves dreams of writing for SNL; instead, she’s stuck working in a video rental store, with slim odds of escaping her Massachusetts small town and large family. Then in walks Noah Drew, the enigmatic and intense scion of the Drew acting dynasty, and her life changes forever. Despite wildly different upbringings, the two forge a deep, cosmic bond first as friends, then as acting partners—until one day, Noah disappears without a word. Seven years later in New York City, AJ is shocked to find herself cast in the same intergalactic TV production as Noah, by then a well-known Hollywood heartthrob. As their on-screen characters grow closer every day, the lines between r...

The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty Mini Cover Wars Sadly, out of 45 editions, not one has a lady pirate on the cover! Arg!  Imagined my own Amina with the help of Gemini AI Beautiful Bad @$$ Pirate G👀dreads About Summary ...spins a new trilogy of magic and mayhem on the high seas in this tale of pirates and sorcerers, forbidden artifacts and ancient mysteries, in one woman’s determined quest to seize a final chance at glory—and write her own legend. Amina al-Sirafi should be content. After a storied and scandalous career as one of the Indian Ocean’s most notorious pirates, she’s survived backstabbing rogues, vengeful merchant princes, several husbands, and one actual demon to retire peacefully with her family to a life of piety, motherhood, and absolutely nothing that hints of the supernatural. But when she’s tracked down by the obscenely wealthy mother of a former crewman, she’s offered a job no bandit could refuse: retrieve her comrade’s kidnapped daughte...

Heart of Glass by Jennifer Hillier NetGalley About Summary Twenty-five years ago in Seaside, Washington, a charming drifter named Sam met three inseparable teenage girls at the local amusement park. Days later, one of them was found dead, her body surfacing in a flooded cranberry bog not far from where she was murdered. Barb and Nicolette were shocked to learn that the man they all met at Wonderland was the Carnival Killer. After he's arrested for the murders of five young women – one of whom was their best friend, Lorelei – Nicolette moved to the city to pursue her dreams of being famous. Barb stayed behind in Seaside, eventually becoming a reporter for the local paper. Their past safely behind them, they’ve both moved on with their lives. But when the Carnival Killer recants his confession and a new body washes ashore on the eve of Wonderland’s grand reopening, the secrets that Barb and Nicolette have worked so hard to bury begin to resurface, threatening to destroy everything in...

A Pair of Aces by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray G 👀 dreads About Summary A gripping novel about two trailblazing women on opposite sides of the law—a prosecutor and a madam—who team up to bring down notorious gangster Lucky Luciano, from the New York Times bestselling authors of the million-copy bestseller The Personal Librarian. Eunice Carter, assistant district attorney for the City of New York and Manhattan’s first Black female prosecutor, has her sights set on the one and only Lucky Luciano, head of New York City’s five largest organized crime families. Other prosecutors have tried to bring down Lucky, but they’ve all focused on the crime syndicate’s traditional businesses—bootlegging, gambling, loan sharking, and drug dealing—or tax evasion. No one has thought to approach the mob through its hand in prostitution. Until Eunice. But she can’t get Luciano alone. Polly Adler has worked long and hard to build up her high-class brothel business. Her client list is fi...