(originally published on December 25, 2019) Despite being a family of non-believers, every year we pull out our holiday paraphernalia. We dress the tree, hanging with care the delicate glass ornaments gifted to us over the many years, sentimentally rub our fingers over the ones our children made, pull out the stepladder and put our…
Jo Goodman hasn’t published a historical romance in over five years and more’s the pity. Her work, often dark, always smart, and peopled with leads that feel vividly real, has garnered ten DIKs at AAR as well as a slew of Bs. One Forbidden Evening, first published in 2006 (Goodman has republished much her earlier…
As Fearne Hill is known primarily for writing m/m romance, I’m opening this review by making potential readers aware that Oyster, the second book in her Island Love series, is a queer m/f romance featuring a transwoman protagonist. As I’ve come to expect from this author, we’re treated to a beautifully written and emotionally satisfying…
Jennifer Ryan is back with the second installment of her Dark Horse Dive Bar series, Wilde for You, a subtle romantic suspense wrapped up in a small-town cowboy romance. It’s the first Ryan novel I’ve read, and I liked this standalone enough to delve into her backlist as soon as I was finished. Layla Brock…
Narrated by Gary Furlong The Art of Husbandry is the first book in Jay Hogan’s latest trilogy, Mackenzie Country, set on and around a remote New Zealand sheep station in the Southern Alps. This is a quiet book in many ways, being character rather than plot driven, and there is a lot of emotional baggage…
Canadian Boyfriend is shockingly weighty for the usually lighthearted Jenny Holiday, but heavy subject matter looks good on her. The book is just thoughtful enough to keep the winter chill away, but is also a completely trenchant character study. There’s a couple of quirks that keep this from reaching DIK status, but it’s a very…
I’ve been reading the Sydney Smoke Rugby series by Amy Andrews since the first book, Playing by Her Rules was released in 2016. Seven years later, Playing it Tough, book eight, has the same energy, strong characters and sexy romance as the previous entries, a feat indeed. Unlike previous entries though, the hero of this…
Using Power Search, it seems that there have been no reviews of Lizzie Lamb’s books at AAR. That’s a surprise. She is a buried treasure in my view who deserves some attention. Her newest book, Dark Highland Skies, was particularly poignant for me because one of the central themes is bereavement and how one deals…
I’ve been on a LaVyrle Spencer reading kick recently. I was in the mood for something quiet, emotional and deeply immersive, and Spencer’s books nearly always deliver in that regard. Her last published novel, Then Came Heaven, was an interesting read in many ways, but didn’t have the romantic depth of her previous work. In…
Do you ever find yourself putting off the really great books? The ones that you know will be deeply moving, that will chew you up and spit you out emotionally, leaving you in a daze as you circle through and process everything that happened in this other world, to this other group of people? I…
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