Today’s Steals and Deals at AAR…..
Gotta love the MacRieves! All three of these books are a good time. A Hunger Like No Other is my favorite of the series! We gave it a DIK.
You can get all three books for 3.99 here.
We enjoyed Earls Trip. You can read our review here. Our reviewer wrote:
Warning to anyone thinking about picking this one up – don’t expect much in the way of historical accuracy. That doesn’t mean Earl’s Trip is not a fun ride. It’s funny, it’s breezy, it’s quick-witted: in short, it’s what you expect from a Jenny Holiday romance, just packed into a Regency. The ahistory is not an insurmountable problem; the greater one is the uneven tonal balance between light and dark subject matter. Yet the love story and central relationships here carry everything through, and the result is a pleasant romance.
It’s on sale for 1.99 here.
We gave this one a B+. Our reviewer wrote:
The book opens as Roderick Waites pulls up outside his parents’ home in the small town of Colebury in Vermont. It’s been years since he’s been back there or seen his parents, who are ultra conservative and don’t approve of his ‘lifestyle’. But after breaking up with his boyfriend of three years – a country singer who was firmly in the closet and had no intention of coming out – Roddy has nowhere else to go. Hoping that perhaps his father will have relaxed his stance a little, and realising that he misses Vermont, Roderick goes home in the hopes he’ll be able to stay there until he can find a job and get himself back on his feet. But it’s a no-go. His father is as unbending and bigoted as ever, saying Roderick can stay – but only if he will go to church and ask God’s forgiveness for being gay. Which is not happening.
Roderick, who‘s been through culinary school and previously worked as a baker, starts looking for work, spending the nights uncomfortably – and perhaps dangerously – in his car. His search isn’t going well when he decides to indulge in a decent cup of coffee at the Busy Bean Café… and suddenly things start looking up. They’re looking to hire more staff (one of the co-owners is pregnant) and after chatting briefly, Roderick is asked to do a couple of days’ trial for them.
Kieran Shipley works two jobs – three, if you could the work he does around his family’s farm – one of which is at his cousin Audrey’s café. He’s run ragged; his brother Kyle doesn’t really pull his weight around the farm, even though it’s his full-time employment and he actually gets paid to work there, and Kieran is dissatisfied in his other job at a local design firm, sticking with it because it’s the only way he can utilise the artistic skills his father derides, and because he’s saving up until he’s got enough money to be able to afford to rent a place of his own. He loves his family, but they put a lot on his shoulders and take him for granted, and he wants and needs the space to be able to branch out on his own… and maybe he can finally start to explore his sexuality and start living life on his own terms.
Roderick is probably the only person who knows the secret Kieran has been keeping for years. When he enters the coffee shop, Kieran is immediately on edge, worried that Roderick is going to let something slip – but he doesn’t. He’s just chatty and charming and funny… and a fantastic baker. Dammit. Roderick is soon a permanent fixture in the kitchen, preparing a mouth-watering selection of baked goods for the café, and Kieran tries his best to have as little to do with him as possible.
It’s on sale for 2.49 here.
We gave this contemp a B+. Maria Rose wrote:
Liam Nussbaum is an independent journalist who runs a politics blog. He’s had his eye on socialite fundraiser Alyse Philips for some time and they do have some mutual friends but she’s never really noticed him, at least not in the way he’d like.
Alyse enjoys her job at the non-profit Young Women Read Inc., and she’s good at what she does. In the course of preparing for the annual audit she uncovers some shady donor businesses and money going into the pocket of a man who happens to be dating her boss. Suddenly she finds herself in the middle of a potential money laundering scandal. Going to her best friends with her concerns, they call in none other than Liam, hoping he and the investigative journalists on his staff will be able to help figure out what is going on….
As Alyse and Liam grow closer, the suspense angle also ratchets up, such that every time Alyse goes into work knowing what she knows, the reader is waiting for what will happen next. I wouldn’t define this as a romantic suspense story, but there are definitely some pretty tense scenes. What to do with the things they find out is where complications ensue for Alyse and Liam as a couple, but all the mysteries get resolved and their happy ending is all the more meaningful for what they’ve been through together. Whether writing about politics or space, or whatever else is on her plate, Ms. Barry can be counted on to write an engaging and thought-provoking romance.
It’s on sale for 0.99 here.