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Spare Change: Family Saga (A Wyattsville Novel Book 1) (affiliate link)
Small-town gossip never much bothered Olivia Westerly. As a single career woman, she’s weathered her share. It’s easy to ignore the raised eyebrows over her late-in-life marriage to Charlie Doyle. But after he drops dead on their honeymoon, the whispers are salt on her raw grief. Especially when an orphaned, eleven-year-old-boy shows up on her doorstep, looking for the grandfather he never met.
Behind Ethan Allen Doyle’s wary blue eyes lie heavily guarded emotions that unexpectedly tug on Olivia’s heart, and she finds herself wanting to win his trust. But when his murderous secret comes looking for him, the entire town embraces the lonely widow and desperate child to show itstrue heart when danger threatens one of its own. A heartwarming tale of love, loss and unexpected gifts, featuring a woman you’d like to call friend, a boy you will ache to hug, and a town you wish you could call home.
Nadia’s Hope: (Hope and Grace Series – Book 1) (affiliate link)
The nightmares continue. Memories won’t heal. Nadia must make a choice.
Nadia Minsky fled Israel to escape her past, but she can’t outrun her nightmares. The throbbing scars along her hip and stomach are cruel reminders of shattered dreams. Even though surgeons mended her body, her spirit still bleeds. Friends claim only God can heal her. For Nadia, trusting a God who allowed her to suffer is inconceivable.
Can close friends, a wild roommate, and a handsome medical student help Nadia learn to trust? Or will she chose to allow her past to forever cripple her future?
Cookies For My Orc Neighbor (affiliate link)
The big green Orc living next door to me is so very mysterious.
He works from home and rarely goes outside. And when he does go out, he never wears a shirt buttoned over his massive chest, no matter the weather. Small children and senior citizens run screaming when he stomps to his truck, so I guess I understand his reticence?
But today is Valentine’s Day and I’m worried the big guy is sad and lonely. My neighbor is more angry-looking and growly than usual, despite that darling puppy he recently adopted.
And since I happen to be alone this Valentine’s Day too, I decide to bring him a plate of my famous sugar cookies.
Everyone warns me not to disturb him because Orcs always claim their Brides in the dark of winter.
But for some reason, this doesn’t worry me at all.
Batter Up (Bachelors of Buttermilk Falls Book 1) (affiliate link)
Bakeshop owner Emma Stevens has a secret. A delicious premonition she shares every Monday evening with the bachelors of Buttermilk Falls as they gather at the Sugar Spoon bakery for Batter Up night.
Investigative reporter Jason Levine just found himself as the man candy for a bachelorette party in Las Vegas. Roped into attending the Vegas nuptials, was he hearing things when the groom shares that the only reason he’s getting married is because a small town baker conjured up the name of his soulmate in her cake batter?
Sparks fly when Jason tries to expose Emma as a fraud, but reality and logic go out the window as he begins to fall under her spell.
She has one job—attend a masqued ball and dance with a handsome prince.
What could possibly go wrong?
Everything, that’s what.
After years of submitting to her stepmother’s unreasonable demands, Trystan finally has a chance to be free. The promise of a new life, in exchange for her help. Simple, right? After all, the old woman has only asked for one night. One night, one beautiful gown, one dance… and one message to be delivered to a mysterious recipient.
It should be easy. Maybe even fun. Especially when she can slip away into the night after the dance, leaving no clue as to her identity.
But before she can escape the ball, Trystan makes a shocking discovery that leaves all her hopes in ruins. She will be forced to confront two very different princes—and choose whether to betray her kingdom… or her heart.
The Napa Valley native is desperately seeking work after yet another job goes up in smoke. Her third employer in a row has gone out of business, and her only lead for gainful employment comes from the familiar voice of her late great grandma Jane, who tells Fio in a dream to seek a position at one of the country’s largest real estate agencies, Quest Realty.
After a disastrous interview with prospective boss Jack Adams, and a run-in with the apparition of a former Quest employee, Fio is ready to give up the ghost and accept long-term unemployment, but Jack has other ideas. He tells Fio if she can spend the night in a haunted apartment and get to the bottom of a supernatural mystery, she just might be right for the job.
Can Fio face her fear and calm a restless spirit? Is she destined for a desk in the Haunted and Hexed Property management division, or will it be back to the want ads in the morning, assuming she survives the night?
The Painted Bird (affiliate link)
Jerzy Kosinski’s mythic, master-work of a shattered post-War Europe.
Originally published in 1965, The Painted Bird established Jerzy Kosinski as a major literary figure. Kosinski’s story follows a dark-haired, olive-skinned boy, abandoned by his parents during World War II, as he wanders alone from one village to another, sometimes hounded and tortured, only rarely sheltered and cared for. Through the juxtaposition of adolescence and the most brutal of adult experiences, Kosinski sums up a Bosch-like world of harrowing excess where senseless violence and untempered hatred are the norm. Through sparse prose and vivid imagery, Kosinski’s novel is a story of mythic proportion, even more relevant to today’s society than it was upon its original publication.
Magic Uncorked (Midlife Magic Cocktail Club Book 1) (affiliate link)
Libbie Stark has seen better days in her forty-eight years. With a headache-inducing job, two teenagers, one ex-husband, and a deadbeat boyfriend, sometimes she wishes she could wave a magic wand and change her midlife lemons into lemonade.
When a friend dies unexpectedly and leaves Libbie an extraordinary gift, she may just get her wish…
The Mystery of the Blue Jar and The Witness for the Prosecution (affiliate link)
This collection of classic short mysteries by the author of The Mousetrap will have you asking, “Whodunit, howdunit, and whydunit?”
At the same time every day, Jack’s morning golf routine is interrupted by the sound of a woman calling for help. Though the cry is clearly coming from a nearby cottage, the lady who lives there has no distress to report—until she starts having nightmares about a mysterious woman and a blue Chinese vase. Could the cottage be haunted? Or is Jack losing his mind? His attempts to find out will lead him down a dangerous path.
A taut psychological thriller, “The Mystery of the Blue Jar” is quintessential Agatha Christie. This volume presents that story alongside other short works by the British master of mystery and suspense.
Survival (World of Anthrax Book 1) (affiliate link)
I almost died. Virtually everyone else around me has died.
Now, the dead aren’t staying dead anymore.
I’ve somehow ended up locked in the very epicenter of the zombie apocalypse.
F*ck me.
Like most college students, all Callie Norton has worried about for weeks was passing this semester’s finals. After a night out celebrating, she and her friends wake up, sick with way more than the hangover of the century. All too soon, Callie realizes that this is not just a common cold she’s suffering from—and when she wakes up from a coma in a quarantine tent as the sole survivor, lack of food and water aren’t her only problems.
Things aren’t looking good for her to survive the next hour, let alone escape a city where most of the inhabitants have turned into crazed cannibals… and this is just the beginning.
Fire Cider!: 101 Zesty Recipes for Health-Boosting Remedies Made with Apple Cider Vinegar (affiliate link)
Their Last Secret (affiliate link)
Some mistakes can never be forgotten—or forgiven.
Janie Klassyn was only fourteen years old when she made the blood pact with her friends. She could never imagine she was setting in motion the horrifying crime that would tear her peaceful prairie town apart.
Twenty years later in California, school counselor Emma Grant struggles to keep her past buried. But when she finds a note on her car threatening to reveal her secret, it becomes harder to keep up the deception. Even her teenage stepdaughter suspects that Emma is hiding something. Now, with her celebrated true-crime author husband digging into a decades-old murder case for his next book, and a suspicious accident involving someone who’s been following her, the perfect life Emma’s built is crumbling, forcing her to take desperate steps to save it . . .
… See the rest of today ‘s Book Picks here on page 2Page 2