Today’s Steals and Deals at AAR…..
We gave this lovely contemp a DIK. In her review, Lisa wrote:
Gym teacher Mitch Malone is a sunshiny, confident himbo who has been April’s best friend for ages. April and Mitch have been flirting with one another for decades, but nothing has come of it. But now that April needs help with her house, Mitch happily agrees to do the renovation work – if she’ll agree to pose as his fiancée during his grandparent’s anniversary weekend. His family keeps pressuring him to settle down and get a white collar job, and having April along will at least stop them nagging him about the first thing. April feels a new connection with Mitch as they pretend to date, so when the Malones show up during the Renaissance Faire, where she’s volunteering and Mitch is once again working, she poses as his fiancée again. Will they find real love?
It is my solemn duty to inform you I’d die for Mitch Malone. Well Matched is made delightful by his existence, and poor sweet April, with her bubbling social anxiety, is a delightful counterpart to his confidence. They make a really delightful couple and it’s so much fun to watch them get blindsided by true love.
It’s on sale for 1.99 here.
This is a solid read from the very good Burrowes. In her review, Caz wrote:
Megan Windham is the third of the four sisters, all of whom are independent, intelligent young ladies with varying shades of red hair. Megan is fairly quiet and bookish; and when we first meet her, she is being importuned by Sir Fletcher Pilkington, a handsome young gentleman with aspirations to her hand. It’s quickly apparent that Megan wants nothing to do with him and that all he really wants is her dowry so he can pay off his debts and continue to life the high life. She is rescued from his unwanted attentions by a large, imposing man with dark auburn hair and piercing blue eyes – whom Sir Fletcher introduces as a former fellow officer, Colonel Hamish MacHugh.
MacHugh has recently become Duke of Murdoch and has come to London to see to all the legalities pertaining to his inheritance. He has also escorted his sisters to town so that they can take part in the Season, but he has no patience with the intricacies of society and feels completely adrift in the ballrooms and drawing rooms of the ton, so his plan is to decamp back to Scotland at the earliest opportunity. Yet if anything could tempt him to stay, it would be the lovely and intriguing Miss Windham, whom he senses is burdened by troubles that relate to Sir Fletcher, a man Hamish knows to be vicious, vain and unscrupulous.
Hamish’s suspicions about the true nature of Megan’s feelings for her suitor are correct. She loathes him and lives in dread of his gaining consent to their engagement. The problem is that telling her parents – or her strapping, protective Windham cousins – of the reason behind her dislike will risk her reputation and that of her sisters, and she is not prepared to ruin their standing in society because a youthful infatuation led her to believe herself in love with the scoundrel, and to write him a number of passionately improper letters – letters he is now using in order to blackmail her into marriage.
I have a soft spot for Norse myth retellings and this one is a good one! In her B+ review, Lisa wrote:
Angrboda, a witch with seer’s powers, had once been an assistant to the Old Gods, but now she has been ordered to be burned at the stake by Odin after refusing to share her gift of second sight with him. She is burned, but Angrboda lives; multiple immolations fail to kill her, though the fires strip her of her powers and result in her fleeing to a deep, secluded forest to heal. Loki follows, after taking possession of her heart (which was impaled upon a stake and left behind when she fled), and returns it to her.
Loki and Angrboda quickly marry and have three children in their woodland idyll, but during her first pregnancy Angrboda’s power of second sight begins to return in the form of prophetic dreams. As she gives birth to Hei – the bitter future ruler of the dead, Fenrir – a wolf-child with a heavy destiny, and Jormundgand – a half-snake, it becomes clearer and clearer that the Gods will not let her and her family rest peacefully. Angrboda must rely on Skadi, a gruff huntress who slowly becomes her best friend, to help her protect her family from the fates and ensure all three children fulfill their destinies. But when you have Odin trying to kill your kids to ensure his survival – well, all bets are off.
It’s on sale for 1.99 here.
1943. As war in the Pacific rages on, Isabel Cooper and her codebreaker colleagues huddle in “the dungeon” at Station HYPO in Pearl Harbor, deciphering secrets plucked from the airwaves in a race to bring down the enemy. Isabel has only one wish: to avenge her brother’s death. But she soon finds life has other plans when she meets his best friend, a hotshot pilot with secrets of his own.
1965. Fledgling journalist Lu Freitas comes home to Hawai’i to cover the grand opening of the glamorous Mauna Kea Beach Hotel, Rockefeller’s newest and grandest project. When a high-profile guest goes missing, Lu forms an unlikely alliance with an intimidating veteran photographer to unravel the mystery. The two make a shocking discovery that stirs up memories and uncovers an explosive secret from the war days. A secret that only a codebreaker can crack.