Book Review: The Lives Between Us by Theresa Rizzo

This is how Amazon.com describes the book:

The Lives Between Us is about family and love. It's about desperate people doing what they need to, to save the ones they love. This book, Jodi Picoult style, is part love story and part social commentary. In the vein of JoJo Moyes, Me Before You.

How far would you go to save the one you love?

Grief-stricken reporter, Skylar Kendall, plots revenge on Michigan Sen. Hastings who opposed life-saving stem cell research and therapy. She gains access to Hastings, learning secrets that would launch her career and satisfy her need for retribution... 

Only, she hadn't counted on falling in love.

Winner of the 2016 National Indie Excellence Award for Women's Fiction, and finalist for the 2016 Next Generation Indie Book Awards for Chick Lit and the 2015 USA Best Book Awards for Chick Lit/ Women's Fiction.

My review:

This would make a great Book Club book it is loaded with a controversial  subject that will have everyone adding to the conversation. The author Theresa Rizzo sheds light on the need for stem cell research and therapy but also shows the other side of  the debate.  It will opens your eyes to a subject that is not put in the news enough.

Thank you to Netgalley and Theresa Rizzo for the opportunity to read and review this book.  Definitely a 5 out of 5 stars!!!

Book review: Bloodlines by Lynn Lipinski

Here is how Amazon.com describs the book

.Fired from his job at the Tulsa Zoo, 26-year-old Zane Clearwater wakes from an alcohol-and cough syrup-induced blackout to learn his mother was killed the night before in a fire in their trailer-park home. Zane has no memory of that night-could he have set the blaze? The police have a lot of questions, but so do Zane and his 14-year-old sister Lettie. When he gets a mysterious text that indicates everything his mother told him about her past was a lie, Zane embarks on a journey of discovery that results in meeting his supposedly long-dead father. Jeremiah Doom has a dangerous streak as long as the Arkansas River and a shady, secretive life. Zane may share his father's Cherokee blood, but can he battle against the anger and violence that also lurks beneath the surface of his own skin? Is Zane destined to repeat the sins of his father?

My review:

This is a very good story of a young man that has his life turned upside down when his mother dies.  I did not want to put this book down.  A very good read. I would give this book a 5 out of 5 stars.

Thank you to Netgalley for a copy of this book for my honest review.

Book Review: Golden Earrings by Belinda Alexandra

Here is the description from Amazon.com:

For fans of Colleen McCullough, Kate Morton, and Lucinda Riley, a powerful saga of family, love, honor, and betrayal set in historical Barcelona and romantic Paris, from the author of Tuscan Rose.

“You who judge me: come! Let me tell you a story…” Paloma Batton is the granddaughter of Spanish refugees who fled Barcelona after the Civil War. A disciplined student attending the school of the Paris Opera Ballet, Paloma lets little get in the way of her career until she receives a mysterious pair of golden earrings. She begins exploring her Spanish heritage and becomes fascinated by la Rusa, a woman who rose from poverty to become one of the great flamenco dancers of modern times before committing suicide. As Paloma begins to unravel the secrets of the past, she discovers more than one person who had good reason for wanting la Rusa dead—including Paloma’s own grandmother.

Written with the same depth and emotion as Belinda Alexandra’s “rich, unforgettable saga” (Kimberly Freeman, author of Wildflower Hill) Tuscan Rose, Golden Earrings moves between two of the great cities of Europe: Barcelona in the lead-up to the Civil War and Paris in the 1970s. It is the story of two women and the extremes to which they are willing to go for love. And above all, it is a story of great passions—and great betrayals—where nothing is quite as it seems.

My review:

I really enjoyed reading this book.  Historical fiction is my favorite genre, although this is the first time I have read historical fiction about Spain during the Civil War and the lives of Gypsies, the writer brought the period to life.  The beginning of the book starting off with a supernatural twist had me hooked.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing this book for my honest review.

Book review: Arrowood by Laura McHugh

Here is the description from Amazon.com:

“This robust, old-fashioned gothic mystery has everything you’re looking for: a creepy old house, a tenant with a secret history, and even a few ghosts. Laura McHugh’s novel sits at the intersection of memory and history, astutely asking whether we carry the past, or whether it carries us.”—Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of The Storyteller and Leaving Time

A haunting novel from the author of The Weight of Blood about a young woman’s return to her childhood home—and her encounter with the memories and secrets it holds
 
Arrowood is the most ornate and grand of the historical houses that line the Mississippi River in southern Iowa. But the house has a mystery it has never revealed: It’s where Arden Arrowood’s younger twin sisters vanished on her watch twenty years ago—never to be seen again. After the twins’ disappearance, Arden’s parents divorced and the Arrowoods left the big house that had been in their family for generations. And Arden’s own life fell apart: She can’t finish her master’s thesis; a misguided love affair has ended badly. She has held on to the hope that her sisters are still alive, and it seems she can’t move forward until she finds them. When her father dies and she inherits Arrowood, Arden returns to her childhood home determined to discover what really happened to her sisters that traumatic summer.
 
Arden’s return to the town of Keokuk—and the now infamous house that bears her name—is greeted with curiosity. But she is welcomed back by her old neighbor and first love, Ben Ferris, whose family, she slowly learns, knows more about the Arrowoods’ secrets and their small, closed community than she ever realized. With the help of a young amateur investigator whose website, Midwest Mysteries, is devoted to solving local cold cases, Arden tracks down the man who was the prime suspect in the kidnapping, though he was never convicted of the crime. But the house and the surrounding town hold their secrets close—and the truth, when Arden finds it, is more devastating than she ever could have imagined.
 
Arrowood is a powerful and resonant novel that examines the ways in which our lives are shaped by memory. As with her award-winning debut novel, The Weight of Blood, Laura McHugh has written a thrilling novel in which nothing is as it seems, and in which our longing for the past can take hold of the present in insidious and haunting ways.
 
My review:  I loved this book!!  I love good mystery where I can not figure out the ending.  This book kept me enticed as to whether she would ever find her sisters and also if she would ever be able to get on with her life.  I will definitely read more of Laura McHugh's books and highly recommend this book to others.

Thank you to Netgalley and the author of this book for an advanced copy for my honest review.  5 out of 5 stars for this one!!

Book Review: Prevail by Cindy Trimm

Here is how Amazon.com describes Prevail.

Your problems don’t define you; they refine you.

Sometimes life feels like a roller coaster ride filled with ups, downs, twists, turns, and unexpected sudden drops. Instead of moving forward with peace and purpose, our lives spin out of control. When chaos and uncertainty threaten to make you feel helpless . . . what do you do?

Don’t let life’s detours take you for a ride. Get back in the driver’s seat!

In Prevail, life strategist, Dr. Cindy Trimm, reveals how you can turn problems into opportunities so no pitfall will throw you off course. Discover how you can:

• See your current challenges as doorways to new levels of success
• Break through barriers that keep you from enjoying life and loving the real you
• Develop a winning perspective that positions you to prosper
• Wake up every morning with a sense of meaning, purpose, dignity, and hope

Your success, fulfillment, satisfaction, and destiny await you on the other side of your struggles, fears, setbacks, and disappointments. In the same way that a diamond is brought to beauty through immense stress, your true strength of character, worth, and value are found by embracing the prospering power inherent in your problems.

You are tougher than your tough times.

Here is my review:

This was a very inspiring book.  I loved all of the quotes and inspiring advice.  This is a book to read over and over, and to pull out when you need a little encouragement .

Thank you to the publisher, the Author and Blogging for Books for my free copy of this book for my honest review.

Book Review: Driven to be loved by Pat Simmons

Here is how Amazon has the book described--

On the surface, Brecee Carmen has nothing in common with Adrian Cole. She is a pediatrician certified in trauma care; he is a transportation problem-solver for a luxury car dealership (a.k.a., a car salesman). Despite their slow but steady attraction to each other, neither one of them is sure that they're compatible. To complicate matters, Brecee is the sole unattached Carmen daughter when it seems as though everyone else around her, family and friends, is finding love. Through a series of discoveries, Adrian and Brecee learn that things don't always happen by coincidence. Generational forces are at work, keeping promises, protecting family members, and perhaps even drawing Adrian back to the church he had strayed from. Is it possible that God has been playing matchmaker all along?

My review:

I am a new fan of Pat Simmons. This is the first book I have read of her trilogy about the Carmen sisters but I will definitely  read the rest of the series.  I rate this book 5 stars.  I really enjoyed following along as Brecee Carmen and Adrian Cole meet and overcome obstacles for a true romance.

Thank you to the publisher and The Book Club Network for a copy of the book for my honest review.