As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
The Christmas Cookie House (Christmas House Romances Book 1) (affiliate link)
Christmas, love, and a batch of cookies.
Former bookshop keeper Leela Miller is back in Massey Falls. Her mom passed away last spring, and she’s home taking care of her ailing father. Now, Leela is desperate to fill Mom’s shoes in the Ladies’ Auxiliary by chairing the Cookie House fundraiser. The hitch: mean-eyed Mrs. Coldicott refuses to host the event at her Society Row home as planned.
Leela must find a new venue big enough and fancy enough to draw in customers, or Mom’s event might get canceled. There’s only one perfect place: the Layton Mansion.
New vet school graduate Jay Wilson has been remodeling the Layton Mansion since he inherited it this summer. It’s almost Christmas, and the house is nearly ready to flip!
If he can get a good price for it, he can buy a partnership at a veterinary clinic out of town.
A Certain Threat (The Merriman Chronicles Book 1) (affiliate link)
The Year 1792. With French Revolutionary agents travelling freely but secretly between Ireland and England and war with France inevitable, the English government of Mr. Pitt is desperately anxious to uncover any plots between Irish rebels and the French.
Lieutenant James Merriman with his ship, the sloop Aphrodite, is ordered to the Irish Sea to assist the principal Treasury agent Mr. Grahame in this work. Merriman is plunged headlong into the world of espionage and when Grahame is seriously wounded it falls to Merriman to carry on the investigation.
Young James Merriman must keep all his wits about him to foil these plans especially when his adversary is revealed to be an exceptional French agent Henri Moreau who hopes that by helping the Irish to throw off the English yoke, France will be able to use Irish ports from which to attack England.
False Identity (affiliate link)
Believe in miracles … believe in hope … believe in love.
It’s Christmastime! Chancy Hamilton can’t bear the thought of spending the holidays without her late husband Max who died in a plane crash. When Chancy and her teenage son, Travis, have an argument, Travis storms out of the house and ends up in the wrong part of town where he is attacked by a group of thugs. When a homeless man comes to his rescue, he invites the man home to have a meal with his mom and little sister.
Gabe Jones is not like any other homeless man Chancy has ever seen—he’s confident, intelligent, and devastatingly handsome. Jake, Chancy’s boyfriend, takes an instant dislike to Gabe and warns Chancy to stay away from him. Nevertheless, their lives become intertwined, and Chancy is soon thrown into nightmarish events caused by a betrayal of trust and a chilling deception where nothing is as it seems, bringing a terrifying aftermath that threatens not only her but the lives of her children.
Deuce Mora’s one tough cookie–-a female sleuth with a conscience and an attitude–fiery, tough, athletic, a dirty fighter when she has to be. The scrappy lead columnist for the Chicago Journal normally writes about politics, and, rather than shying away from fights, she tends to pick them, but every once in a while, Deuce’s search for a good story brings her face to face with more trouble than she was really looking for. In Award-winning journalist Jean Heller’s first action-packed mystery featuring the intrepid sleuth, Deuce learns in short order that if you mess with organized crime, you have to be tough—and you’d better be as much detective as reporter. The second volume finds Deuce on the wrong side of the NSA, the FBI and the CIA. At a minimum. Exhausted by these two white-knuckle investigations in one year, Deuce is content to focus on her column until she gains information that could help catch the relentless arsonist whose Burning Rage is consuming Chicago.
The Jeri Howard Anthology: Books 1-9 (affiliate link)
THE PORN STAR, THE MURDERER, AND THE DISAPPEARING WIFE…
Those are just a few of the family members Oakland P.I. Jeri Howard finds herself investigating in a puzzling missing persons case that sprawls throughout the grittier sections of Northern California. For a woman who told her husband she had no relatives, Renee Foster’s actually well-stocked with them….and doozies at that. The whole family—criminals, abusers, and kindly aunts alike– comes alive in Janet Dawson’s first novel, prompting the New York Times to hail it as “a welcome addition to this tough genre.”
There’s clearly a lot more here than the simple matter of a wife disappearing with the grocery money. Smelling a rat or two right from the beginning of this complex and intriguing mystery, the red-haired private detective follows many a twisty trail as Dawson weaves an equally twisty tale, which, to the reader’s delight, just keeps winding back on itself, revealing brand new secrets as fast as ancient skeletons can fall out of closets.
When did Santa get so hot?! This inked, bearded, motorbike riding Santa falls hard and falls first for the curvy photographer who’s sworn off men.
I just met my future wife.
She’s dressed as an elf and I’m standing in my underpants wearing Santa eyebrows.
No wonder she friend zone’s me.
But I’m not giving up easily.
Jo is mine and I’ll do whatever it takes to win over my Curvy Christmas Treat.
His Curvy Christmas Treat is a short and steamy instalove Christmas romance featuring an OTT obsessed man and the curvy woman he claims as his own.
Levi Bailey has Butterflies (Another Bailey Brother: Book 1) (affiliate link)
Butterflies? Levi Bailey does not get butterflies. Well, at least he didn’t until Meredith Porter spilled coffee all over him.
Meredith has plans. Big plans. She is done being safely wrapped in bubble wrap. She is ready to live. That’s what her list is all about—living and experiencing. Is it fate that her list of learning, trying, and experiencing continues to bring her into the path of grumpy Levi Bailey? She isn’t sure—but she doesn’t mind. Levi is just a misunderstood cinnamon roll and Meredith plans to enjoy every second of helping him realize that.
Levi’s life has a routine. He’s been running it for years. Go to work, care for Mom, watch over the siblings. If he’s lucky, he’ll get to play with his niece Alice, before his head hits the pillow at night. It may sound boring, but it’s worked for years. Why mess with a good thing?
She has zero time for a relationship. A fake one will have to do—in New York Times bestselling author Marina Adair’s new romance that brings the humor and the heart…
Evie Granger’s life is one crisis away from a complete meltdown.
Between single-parenting a sixteen-going-on-forty daughter, managing a mom living her best life way out loud, caring for an ailing father, and keeping the family’s struggling coffee shop afloat, Evie hasn’t looked after herself in far too long.
So naturally her best friend chooses this moment to post a video of Evie describing the ideal man…and sends it stratospherically viral.
Now Evie’s an overnight social media sensation and every eligible (and otherwise) guy in a five-state radius is turning up with his “I’m the one” credentials. But Evie can’t bring herself to let any Prince Charming into a life that’s barely holding together. A life she doesn’t even recognize as hers.
Killers of the King: The Men Who Dared to Execute Charles I (affiliate link)
On August 18, 1648, with no relief from the siege in sight, the royalist garrison holding Colchester Castle surrendered and Oliver Cromwell’s army firmly ended the rule of Charles I of England. To send a clear message to the fallen monarch, the rebels executed four of the senior officers captured at the castle. Yet still the king refused to accept he had lost the war. As France and other allies mobilized in support of Charles, a tribunal was hastily gathered and a death sentence was passed. On January 30, 1649, the King of England was executed. This is the account of the fifty-nine regicides, the men who signed Charles I’s death warrant.
Recounting a little-known corner of British history, Charles Spencer explores what happened when the Restoration arrived. From George Downing, the chief plotter, to Richard Ingoldsby, who claimed he was forced to sign his name by his cousin Oliver Cromwell, and from those who returned to the monarchist cause and betrayed their fellow regicides to those that fled the country in an attempt to escape their punishment, Spencer examines the long-lasting, far-reaching consequences not only for those who signed the warrant, but also for those who were present at the trial, and for England itself.
Modern Asian Baking at Home: Essential Sweet and Savory Recipes for Milk Bread, Mochi, Mooncakes, and More (affiliate link)
This is the perfect cookbook for anyone nostalgic for Asian desserts as well as hobbyist and avid home bakers interested in using vibrant ingredients like miso, matcha, pandan, and soy sauce to expand their repertoires. No passport is needed when you can easily create and experience popular Asian sweets and one-of-a-kind Asian-influenced drinks, custards, cakes, and frozen treats at home.
Recipes include:
Quick Microwave Mochi
Fluffy Japanese Pancakes
Lemony Matcha Macarons
Tangzhong Milk Bread
Vietnamese Egg Dalgona Coffee
Steam, fry, boil, and bake your way through this straight-from-the-heart collection of recipes!
The Trouble with Hating You (affiliate link)
Jay Shah looks good on paper…and off. Especially if you like that whole gorgeous, charming lawyer-in-a-good-suit thing. He’s also infuriating. As their witty office banter turns into late-night chats, Liya starts to think he might be the one man who truly accepts her. But falling for each other means exposing their painful pasts. Will Liya keep running, or will she finally give love a real chance?
Thus Spoke the Plant: A Remarkable Journey of Groundbreaking Scientific Discoveries and Personal Encounters with Plants (affiliate link)
In this “phytobiography”—a collection of stories written in partnership with a plant—research scientist Monica Gagliano shares genuine first-hand accounts from her research into plant communication and cognition.
By transcending the view of plants as the objects of scientific materialism, Gagliano encourages us to rethink plants as people—beings with subjectivity, consciousness, and volition, and hence having the capacity for their own perspectives and voices. The book draws on up-close-and-personal encounters with the plants themselves, as well as plant shamans, indigenous elders, and mystics from around the world and integrates these experiences with an incredible research journey and the groundbreaking scientific discoveries that emerged from it.
… See the rest of today ‘s Book Picks here on page 2Page 2