My Best Friend's Honeymoon by Meryl Wilsner REVIEW

Summary:

Elsie Hoffman has been engaged to her college boyfriend for a year and a half. Ginny Holtz has been in love with Elsie for almost a decade and a half.

When Elsie discovers her fiance already planned their wedding and honeymoon as a surprise and she's expected to be in a white dress in seven days, she swiftly realizes that she's let herself become too comfortable with a future she never wanted. She breaks things off and a week later is on a plane to the Caribbean for her nonrefundable honeymoon with her best friend Ginny instead.

Ginny thinks it's high time Elsie learned how to speak up for herself. So, they make a deal with her. For the next week, Elsie can have whatever she wants, wherever, however, and whenever she wants it, as long as she asks. They never expected Elsie to want them.

What starts as choosing activities and taking selfies soon turns to toe-curling kisses and much, much more. But what happens when the honeymoon is over?

My Thoughts:

This was a lot of fun and a nice breather to read. Ginny has been in love with Elsie since middle school, but when Elsie rejected her invite to the dance, Ginny hasn't brought it up since. When Elsie learns Derrick planned their wedding without asking her, she realizes she doesn't know what she wants. Derrick encourages her to go on the honeymoon trip with Ginny, since it is nonrefundable. But there, Elsie and Ginny acknowledge their feelings for each other, and after a fight, things are left uncertain.

The third act breakup was not needed and the reasoning was so stupid and made no sense. Why did Elsie care so much that Ginny quit their job? I do like that Ginny ended up starting their own business and that Elsie went forward with rebranding her father's store before they make up though. They definitely needed the break from each other to follow what they wanted to do. I also enjoyed the spicy scenes.

My Rating: 3 stars

Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite REVIEW

Summary:

Near the topmost deck of an interstellar generation ship, Dorothy Gentleman wakes up in a body that isn't hers - just as someone is found murdered. Dorothy suspects her misfortune is partly the fault of her feckless nephew, Ruthie. Or perhaps the sultry yarn store proprietor - and current suspect - knows more than she's letting on.

As one of the ship's detective's, Dorothy usually delights in unraveling the passengers' schemes. But with someone not only killing bodies but purposefully deleting minds from the Library, she realizes something more sinister is afoot. Someone has found a way to make murder on the Fairweather a very permanent state indeed . . .

My Thoughts:

This was so interesting to read that I wish the novella was longer! I love the idea that memories are stored in a library so that when your current body dies, you can come back as a clone with all the memories from your past. It's also really cool that out of necessity, you can be brought back in someone else's body. I like the slow burn of the mystery of the killer's identity, but I do think that things were rushed towards the ending, and that the characters should have had more time on the page to get to know them better. That being said, I would love to check out the author's other works since I enjoyed this one a lot.

My Rating: 4 stars 

This Is My Body by Lindsay King-Miller REVIEW

Summary:

Gay single mom Brigid always thought that cutting ties with her extremist Catholic family was the best thing she could have done for her daughter, Dylan - and for herself. But when Dylan starts having terrifying fits of unnatural violence, Brigid can't shake her memories of a girl from her childhood who behaved the same way . . . until Brigid's uncle, Father Angus, performed an exorcism.

Convinced that Dylan is suffering from demonic possession, Brigid does the thing she told herself she'd never do: she goes home. Father Angus is the worst person she knows, but he's also the only person who can help her daughter.

But as Brigid starts to uncover secrets about Father Angus, that long-ago exorcism, and her family's past, she realizes that she and Dylan have never been in more danger.

My Thoughts:

This is by far the best exorcism book that I have read so far. When Brigid grew up, she cut all ties to her family and moved to the mountains to escape her trauma. Now a single mother, she runs a witchy store that she doesn't believe in either. When her daughter gets suspended from school for violence, Brigid is not sure what to do or believe. But when the demon reveals itself to be the same one she encountered as a child, she rushes Dylan to her uncle's house to get the demon exorcized. But secrets and truths from long ago start to surface, and Brigid doesn't know who or what to trust.

I do really like the author's writing style. It's part comedic, but also very real. Brigid is a character that a lot of people with religious trauma can relate to, especially those who are gay. I enjoyed the twists toward the end, but I do feel like everything could have been explained more and the book could have been longer. That being said, out of the two exorcism books I have read, this is the best by far and I would recommend it.

My Rating: 3 stars 

Tourist Season by Brynne Weaver REIVEW

Summary:

Cape Carnage is a seaside town of colorful houses, quirky shops, and an unusually high body count. But with tourists comes trouble, and Harper Starling won’t let anyone ruin her picture-perfect home. A skilled gardener with killer instincts, Harper protects her sanctuary at any cost—especially for her aging mentor with a fading memory.

Troublesome tourists don’t check out of Carnage. They compost beneath Harper’s award-winning flowerbeds. But Nolan Rhodes isn’t your average tourist. Devilishly handsome, disarmingly charming, and skilled with a blade, Nolan is relentless in the pursuit of revenge. On every anniversary of the hit-and-run accident that fractured his life, Nolan slays another target. And he’s saved the best for last: the undeniably beautiful Harper Starling.

The problem? Harper isn’t the monster he expected. And she won’t go down without a fight. When an amateur true crime investigator comes to Cape Carnage on the trail of a long-lost serial killer, Harper and Nolan strike an uneasy truce. If Nolan helps Harper protect her town, she’ll keep quiet about his hunting habits . . . for now. But their alliance soon spirals into obsession, one that threatens to shatter every secret in Carnage—including their fragile love.

My Thoughts:

As a huge fan of Butcher and Blackbird, I had to pick this up. Harper Starling is a serial killer who goes after terrible people and puts them through her woodchipper while taking care of an elderly man with Alzheimer's. Nolan Rhodes is on a revenge spree going after those who got his brother killed - and Harper Starling is next on the list. What they don't expect is to work together and find love in each other along the way.

As usual, the writing is very well done and the tone is darkly comedic. I love that even we as the readers don't know the full context of any of the characters' pasts, and the twist at the end was earth-shattering to me. My only complaint is that they seemed to have fallen in love a little too quickly, considering that they are enemies and Nolan's entire reason to being there is to kill Harper.

My Rating: 4 stars  

Quinto's Challenge by Peter McChesney REVIEW

Summary:

On the 100th anniversary of JFK's challenge to land a man on the Moon and return him safely to the Earth, visionary US President Vince Quinto challenges America with an even more audacious goal: finding a way to conquer death before the century is out - by developing the scientific means to achieve resurrection.

As the 21st century draws to a close, advances in genetics, quantum physics, and artificial intelligence converge to make Quinto's Challenge possible. The final breakthrough - hailed as the Theory of Everything - is made by Deeley Carr, a young, shy, quantum physicist recruited to work on a top-secret US government project.

However, those privy to this highly classified science quickly realize that the power to restore what once was is a double-edged sword - if it falls into the wrong hands, it could be wielded as a superweapon of surveillance and control, inevitably used for the subjugation of all.

My Thoughts:

This book is such a treat, I love it when books talk a lot about science, especially when it is central to the plot. Deeley is hired by CAPR, a top-secret government agency to assist with making Quinto's challenge of resurrecting the dead to come true. Working with two androids, Xina and Xara, Deeley is able to have a breakthrough that will change everything. But despite this, the real challenges lie ahead. President Gates' term is coming to an end, and if Benson succeeds him, all research will be put to an end. And in order to start attempting resurrection, they must upgrade Xara - which is currently illegal.

Deeley is such a lovable character. She is very shy and introverted yet extremely smart. I also love the characterization of the androids, who feel like they could be human, which helps this book in making it truly feel like the future. All of the characters in the book are very well developed and seem like real people that could exist. While I am not a science buff, this novel was truly enjoyable to read and I would definitely recommend reading it.

My Rating: 5 stars