ALL IS BRIGHT (Hope’s Crossing Book #8) by RaeAnne Thayne is an emotional holiday contemporary romance featuring a young female architect who returns home to Hope’s Crossing for the holidays to oversee the completion of her most ambitious project to date. This story is a complete romance plot and can be read as a standalone, but so many people from town are pulled in for the community holiday theme from previous books in this series, I feel I would have enjoyed it more if I had read the previous books first.
Sage McKnight is making a name for herself in the world of architecture with her unique designs for inclusiveness and accessibility for everyone. Her largest and most challenging project to date was completely redesigning Wolf Ridge in Hope’s Crossing to meet the needs and wishes of her current client, Mason Tucker and his daughter.
Mason Tucker was a famous professional baseball player until the helicopter crash which killed his wife and unborn son as well as leaving him partially paralyzed. He has become bitter and reclusive since the accident and feels the smaller community of Hope’s Crossing can give him and his daughter a new start, but his property needs extensive work to make it appropriate for his needs.
Sage is excited about the project, but Mason makes the project difficult with his attitude and constant interference. Slowly Mason becomes more involved with the community through his daughter and Sage, but Sage is only in town through the holidays and Mason believes no woman would want him with his disabilities. It will take some holiday magic and friendly interference to make Mason realize what he has before he loses it.
This is a wonderfully heartwarming holiday romance with memorable main characters. Sage is such a loving and caring person, and she makes Mason face his anger and bitterness head on. The discussions of inclusive design are very interesting. There are several minor plot threads with Sage’s previous pregnancy, Mason’s mother, and the secondary romance between Taryn and Charlie which kept me turning the pages and were all tied up satisfactorily in the end. I did get slightly irritated when there were occasionally to many names and relationships discussed which I felt were not necessary and at those times I wished I had read the previous books in the series. This is a cozy romance with no sex scenes, but lots of love, family, and romance.
This is an enjoyable contemporary romance that will fill you with holiday warmth, love and cheer.
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About the Author
#1 Publishers Weekly, New York Times and USA Today bestselling author RaeAnne Thayne finds inspiration in the beautiful northern Utah mountains where she lives with her family. Her books have won numerous honors, including seven RITA Award nominations from Romance Writers of America and a Career Achievement Award from RT Book Reviews magazine. RaeAnne loves to hear from readers.
FLIRTING WITH THE BEAST (Modern Love Book #2) by Jane Porter is an emotional romance/women’s fiction addition to the Modern Love series. This is a story featuring a mature woman in her sixties moving forward after major life changes. This book is a part of a series, but each book stands on its own.
Andi McDermott has mourned for her husband and long-term marriage for five years and has decided it is time to move on and date again with the encouragement of her girlfriends. When her stepson disappoints her by not coming for her planned Christmas dinner to meet his fiancée, she refuses to mope and takes off for the family cabin at Lake Arrowhead and invites her best friend, Margo to join her. Everything is going well, until Andi once again must deal with her closest neighbor, who had been feuding with husband for years.
With the threat of a major snowstorm, Margo returns home, but Andi does not leave in time to safely get home and finds herself snowed in. When her power goes out, she turns to the neighbor who is not quite what she imagined.
Wolf Enders enjoys the solitude of living full time at Lake Arrowhead. The Marine vet, divorced father lives as he pleases and while Andi has always found him intimidating, when she comes to his cabin, she finds him kind and uncomfortably sexy. Wolf finds he is attracted to Andi and wants to take this good girl to bed, but he is not interested in a relationship. But life keeps throwing these two together and Andi just might be the one to tame the beast.
This is a wonderful read, not just a romance, but an all-around emotional journey not only for the H/h but their family members also. Andi has grown personally since her marriage ended and while she now stands up for herself and what she wants, she is still kind and loving. Wolf needs his space, is gruff on the outside and is one of those men that takes care of his family in the things he does for them and not necessarily verbally. The on again off again relationship is very believable as they both deal with family drama, grief, and fear. The sexual relationship was well written and steamy. This story is based around the romance between Andi and Wolf, but the realistic situations with grown children, friends, and life in general makes this story multilayered and memorable.
I highly recommend this mature romance/women’s fiction!
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About the Author
USA Today, and New York Times bestselling author of 65 romances and women’s fiction titles, Jane Porter has been a finalist for the prestigious RITA award six times, with her Tule Publishing novella, Take Me, Cowboy, winning the Novella Category July 2014. Today, Jane has over 15 million copies in print, including her wildly popular Flirting with Forty, a novel picked by Redbook Magazine as it’s Red Hot Summer Read in 2006 before being turned into a Lifetime movie in 2008 starring Heather Locklear.
Jane holds an MA in Writing from the University of San Francisco and makes her home in sunny San Clemente, CA with her surfer husband three sons, and two dogs. You can learn more about Jane at janeporter.com.
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for THE LIPSTICK BUREAU by Michelle Gable on this Graydon House Books blog tour.
Below you will find an author Q&A, an about the book section, my mini book review, an excerpt from the book, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Author Q&A
Q: How did you learn about Barbara Lauwers? How did you come to discover this piece of history?
I don’t remember when or how I first heard about Barbara, she was just in my file of “interesting people to eventually write about” when it came time for book #6. Most likely, she was in a listicle along the lines of “fascinating women from history you don’t know about.” Whatever the case, she made my file because of her intriguing role in the OSS (precursor to the CIA) and the misinformation campaigns she participated in. The website https://www.psywarrior.com/ has photographs of many of their campaigns, and that sucked me right in.
Q: Why do you believe there continues to be a fascination for writers exploring and writing WWII novels for readers? Why are readers so interested?
I think people are drawn to WWII stories because there are so many different countries and continents involved, and therefore thousands of angles. For Americans in particular, though we were involved in the war, it was not fought on our shores, so I think there’s a yearning to know what it was like to live with war on a more day-to-day basis. 100 million were deployed and there are millions of stories of ordinary people showing heroism when facing the worst.
Q: Many women were part of the OSS. Did they experience sexism?
The sexism was outrageous! Many of the quotes I included in the book were actually said. Like Niki (the Barbara character) being told to sew her travel documents into her girdle, and the trainers telling the women not to mess this up.
When I started out in corporate America in the late 90s, sexism was rampant enough that we more or less accepted it as part of our jobs. I can only imagine (and tried to do this in the book!) how much worse it was in the 40s, amidst the stress of war, when men were away from their families.
Q: Did many women join these groups to escape difficult marriages?
It’s possible! Many husbands were sent to fight, so I think a lot of women wanted to contribute. Stateside, women were being asked to chip in and many unmarried women viewed it as a more interesting way to help versus working in a missile factory or something along those lines.
Q: What specifically stood out in the time and place of Rome during WWII?
Rome is my favorite city so I was excited to set another book there! I also found it a fascinating time…after the city was liberated from the Nazis, and before the war was over. Also the fact Italy changed alliances partway through the war, and half the country was still under Axis control, heightened the tensions in the city, and people were extremely suspicious, all around.
Q: What challenged you about writing THE LIPSTICK BUREAU?
I try very hard to keep as close to real facts as possible, building fiction around the truth. This can be very limiting, and so it’s always a challenge for me to remember I’m telling a story, not writing a biography. It’s a big reason I changed Barbara’s name–so I could go a little more “rogue.”
A smaller challenge was finding out what was happening in Niki’s hometown in Czechoslovakia during the war. As in the novel, no news was getting out. Also, I use a lot of first-hand accounts and government records in my research, and many of these were destroyed in the war. Not that I can read Czech, but I’ve definitely had records translated in the past.
Q: Which character do you most relate to and why?
There was no character I related to outright, but I appreciated Niki’s gumption and how she wanted to prove herself on her own terms.
Q: What are you hoping readers will come away with after they’ve read THE LIPSTICK BUREAU?
As always, I want people to get swept up in the story but also learn something new along the way.
Q: What research did you do to bring the history to life in this fiction?
Anything I could get my hands on. Several OSS women wrote memoirs, and I read these, along with interviews, biographies of the major OSS players, and thousands of internal memos and documents (some of which are included in the novel), including all of Allen Dulles’s wartime intelligence reports (this was pretty boring!) I read the Stars & Stripes newspapers published during this time (fun fact: my dad wrote for Stars & Stripes in Vietnam), among other things. My favorite was a biography of Saul Steinberg (the inspiration for Ezra) by Deirdre Bair.
Q: How do you think this conversation into the use of misinformation plays in today’s politics?
In real life as in the novel, the OSS used Hitler’s own rules for propaganda/misinformation when creating theirs. There were three key strategies: 1) the disinformation must be easy to comprehend (not too highbrow), 2) it must be addressed to the masses (NOT the intellectuals), and 3) it should hit on emotions, not logic or fact. These are very effective strategies, as we’ve seen, and it’s been reported that Trump has also specifically followed Hitler’s rulebook for spreading disinformation. The OSS folks were the “good guys” and would say they were doing this for a greater purpose (e.g. ending the war), and the ends justify the means. And maybe it does, but perhaps Trump believes the same thing?
Q: What are you working on next?
A book set in the 1960s Jet Set, about a failed San Francisco debutante who becomes assistant to beloved society photographer Slim Aarons as a way to social climb her way to a rich husband, but is instead drawn into the complicated inner circle of young Palm Beach socialites, and to the star at its center, heiress and rising fashion designer Lilly Pulitzer.
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About the Book
Inspired by a real-life female spy, a WWII-set novel about a woman challenging convention and boundaries to help win a war, no matter the cost.
1944, Rome. Newlywed Niki Novotná is recruited by a new American spy agency to establish a secret branch in Italy’s capital. One of the OSS’s few female operatives abroad and multilingual, she’s tasked with crafting fake stories and distributing propaganda to lower the morale of enemy soldiers.
Despite limited resources, Niki and a scrappy team of artists, forgers and others—now nicknamed The Lipstick Bureau—find success, forming a bond amid the cobblestoned streets and storied villas of the newly liberated city. But her work is also a way to escape devastating truths about the family she left behind in Czechoslovakia and a future with her controlling American husband.
As the war drags on and the pressure intensifies, Niki begins to question the rules she’s been instructed to follow, and a colleague unexpectedly captures her heart. But one step out of line, one mistake, could mean life or death…
The Lipstick Bureau : A Novel Inspired by a Real-Life Female Spy
Michelle Gable
On Sale Date: December 27, 2022
9781525811470
Trade Paperback
$16.99 USD
464 pages
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My Mini Book Review
RATING: 3 out of 5 Stars
THE LIPSTICK BUREAU by Michelle Gable is a historical fiction story loosely based on a real female spy during WWII working for the fledgling OSS (Office of Strategic Services) later to become the CIA.
I loved the premise and the extensive historical research, but the characters never hooked me emotionally, the writing at times seemed disjointed and the pace was slow. I really wish the characters had been more developed and intrigued me as much as the plot regarding U.S. political propaganda developed and distributed during the war to undermine the Nazi Party and Hitler.
I feel I would have enjoyed this story much more if it had been an actual biography of the fictionalized main characters. The history and information surrounding the OSS and Department of Morale Operations was the reason I continued reading this book to the end.
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Excerpt
NIKI
May 1989
Washington, DC
Niki’s stomach flip-flops, and there’s a wild fluttering in her chest. You’re fine, she tells herself. In this buzzing, glittering room of some three hundred, she’s unlikely to encounter anyone she knows. Not that she’d recognize them if she did. It’s been almost forty-five years.
“Jeez, what a turnout,” her daughter, Andrea, says as Niki takes several short inhales, trying to wrangle her breath. “Did you know this many people would show up?”
“I had no idea what to expect,” Niki answers, and this much is true. When the invitation arrived three months ago, she’d almost pitched it straight into the trash.
You are invited
to a Black-Tie Dinner
Honoring
The Ladies of the O.S.S.
The ladies of the OSS. A deceptively quaint title, like a neighborhood bridge club, or a collection of wives whose given names are not important.
“You should go,” Niki’s husband had said when she showed him the thick, ecru cardstock with its ornate engraving. “Relive your war days.”
“Manfred,” Niki had replied sternly. “Nobody wants to relive those.”
Though he’d convinced Niki to accept the invitation, it hadn’t been the hardest sell. Manfred was ill—dying, in fact, of latestage lung cancer—and Niki figured the tick mark beside “yes” was merely a way to delay a no.
The week before the event, Manfred was weaker than ever, and Niki saw her chance to back out. “I’ll just skip it,” she’d said. “This is for the best. You’d be bored out of your skull, and no one I worked with will even be there!”
“Zuska,” Manfred said, using her old pet name. As always, he’d known what his wife was up to. “I want you to go. Take Andrea. She could use a night out. It’d be like a holiday for her.”
“I don’t know…” Niki demurred. Their daughter did hate to cook, and no doubt longed for a break from her two extremely pert teenagers.
“You can’t refuse,” Manfred said. “What if this ends up qualifying as my dying wish?” It was a joke, but what could Niki possibly say to that?
Now she regrets having shown Manfred the invitation and is discomfited by the scene. Niki feels naked, exposed, as though she’s wearing a transparent blouse instead of a black sparkly top with double shoulder pads.
“Do you think you’ll spot anyone you know?” Andrea asks as they wend their way through the tables, scanning for number eighteen. Every Czech native considers eighteen an auspicious number, so maybe this is a positive sign.
“It’s unlikely,” Niki says. “The dinner is honoring women, and I mostly worked with men.” Most of whom are now dead, she does not add.
Soon enough, mother and daughter find their table, and exchange greetings with the two women already seated. Niki squints at their badges and notes they worked in different theaters of operation. Onstage is a podium, behind it a screen emblazoned with O.S.S. Beneath the letters is a gold spade encircled in black.
“What a beautiful outfit!” says one of their tablemates in a tight Texas twang.
“Thank you.” Niki blushes lightly, smoothing her billowy, bright green chiffon skirt.
“You’re the prettiest one in the place,” Andrea whispers as they sit.
“What a load of shit,” Niki spits back. In this room, it’s sequins and diamonds and fur for miles. She pats Andrea’s hand. “But thank you for the compliment.” And thank God for Manfred, who’d raised their girl to treat her mother so well.
Manfred. Niki feels a quake somewhere deep. She is losing him. She’s been losing him for a long time, and maybe this is the reason she came tonight. Those three letters on-screen call up—rather, exhume—a swarm of emotions, not all of them good. But they also offer a strange kind of hope, a reminder that Niki’s survived loss before, and this old body of hers has lived more than one life.
MICHELLE GABLE is the New York Times bestselling author of A Paris Apartment, I’ll See You in Paris, The Book of Summer, and The Summer I Met Jack. She attended the College of William & Mary and spent twenty years working in finance before becoming a full-time writer. She grew up in San Diego and lives in Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California.
On the dark streets of Mumbai, the paths of a missing dancer, a serial killer, and an inspector with a haunted past converge in an evocative thriller about lost love and murderous obsession.
After years of dancing in Mumbai’s bars, Tara Mondal was desperate for a new start. So when a client offered her a life-changing payout to indulge a harmless, if odd, fantasy, she accepted. The setup was simple: wear a blue-sequined saree, enter a crowded railway station, and escape from view in less than three minutes. It was the last time anyone saw Tara.
Thirteen years later, Tara’s lover, Inspector Arnav Singh Rajput, is still grappling with her disappearance as he faces a horrifying new crisis: on the city’s outskirts, women’s dismembered bodies are being unearthed from shallow graves. Very little links the murders, except a scattering of blue sequins and a decade’s worth of missing persons reports that correspond with major festivals.
Past and present blur as Arnav realizes he’s on the trail of a serial killer and that someone wants his investigation buried at any cost. Could the key to finding Tara and solving these murders be hidden in one of his cold cases? Or will the next body they recover be hers?
THE BLUE BAR (Blue Mumbai Thriller Book #1) by Damyanti Biswas is a gritty crime thriller/police procedural which is hopefully the first in a new series set in Mumbai, India, and features Inspector Arnav Rajput.
This thriller pulled me in with a perfectly paced police procedural on the hunt for a serial killer who has been able to kill for two decades without capture. Money, power, fame, government corruption, and police graft have misdirected or eliminated attempts to solve the killings of dance girls in the Mafia controlled Mumbai bar scene. The girls are all found without the same body parts, but the killings are not described in real time.
The story is told in alternating chapters by Inspector Arnav Rajput of the Mumbai Police department and Tara Mondal who was a young bar girl who got away but is back for the offer of a life-changing payment for one week’s work at the re-opening of The Blue Bar. They slept together when they were young and then Tara disappeared without a word. Arnav has never forgotten her and fears every time he discovers a young female’s body that it will be Tara. He shows up for The Blue Bar’s re-opening and is shocked to find Tara there once again. While Arnav has changed and wants Tara back, she is hiding a secret from him. Tara was the one who got away, not just from Arnav, and now that she is back, she once again becomes a target of the serial killer.
I was completely engrossed in this thriller. The characters are fully drawn and believable and even more interesting with the cultural differences. The crime thriller plot was paced perfectly as it continued to gain momentum as it got closer to the climax. I had to change my guess of who I believed was the serial killer several times. The descriptions of the scenery in and around Mumbai were vivid and made me feel like I was there. This was the first book I have read by this author, and it definitely will not be the last.
I highly recommend this crime thriller/police procedural with memorable characters and unique setting.
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About the Author
Damyanti Biswas lives in Singapore, and works with Delhi’s underprivileged children as part of Project Why, a charity that promotes education and social enhancement in underprivileged communities. Her short stories have been published in magazines in the US, UK, and Asia, and she helps edit the Forge Literary Magazine. Her debut crime novel You Beneath Your Skin has been optioned for screen by Endemol Shine, and her next, The Blue Bar, will be published on Jan 1, 2023 by Thomas & Mercer.
Today I am sharing My Feature Post and Book Review for THE SECRET SOCIETY OF SALZBURG by Renee Ryan from Harlequin Love Inspired Trade.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an about the author section and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Description
Inspired by true events, comes a gripping and heart-wrenching story of two very different women united to bring light to the darkest days of World War II.
London, 1933
At first glance, Austrian opera singer Elsa Mayer-Braun has little in common with the young English typist she encounters on tour. Yet she and Hattie Featherstone forge an instant connection—and strike a dangerous alliance. Using their friendship as a cover, they form a secret society with a daring goal: to rescue as many Jews as possible from Nazi persecution.
Though the war’s outbreak threatens Elsa and Hattie’s network, their efforts attract the covert attention of the British government, offering more opportunities to thwart the Germans. But Elsa’s growing fame as Hitler’s favorite opera singer, coupled with her secret Jewish ancestry, make her both a weapon and a target—until her future, too, hangs in the balance.
From the glamorous stages of Covent Garden and Salzburg to the horrors of Bergen-Belsen, two ordinary women swept up by the tide of war discover an extraordinary friendship—and the courage to save countless lives.
THE SECRET SOCIETY OF SALZBURG by Renee Ryan is an emotionally riveting historical fiction story primarily set in WWII Salzburg and London featuring two talented artists who risk everything to save as many Jewish lives as possible from persecution. Loosely based on a true story, I was unable to put this book down. Make sure you have some tissues handy.
Hattie and Vera Featherstone are sisters who have been working clerical jobs to survive, but they both have bigger dreams. Vera, being the oldest has also been a mother figure to the younger Hattie since their mother’s death. Even as she does everything in her power to encourage Hattie’s dream of being an accomplished artist, she works on her own dream behind closed doors. Hattie’s art is good, but there is still an emotional depth missing until she and Vera are introduced to a young opera singer’s work.
Elsa Mayer-Braun has worked her entire young life in Salzburg to reach operatic recognition and fame. As her fame rises, so does the threat from the new Nazi party. When Elsa meets the two sisters Featherstone on tour, she forms an instant bond with Hattie. Elsa and Hattie refuse to ignore the threat to the Jewish population and set up network to help as many as possible escape to England.
This dangerous alliance will test both women’s courage and bond of friendship forged in a time of danger with spies, traitors, and informers around every corner.
This is an inspirational historical fiction story beautifully written with memorable characters, acts of bravery and of human depravity and treachery which kept me on an emotional roller coaster. Hattie and Elsa displayed courage, bravery, and an unbreakable bond of friendship. All the secondary characters are as realistic and fully fleshed as the main characters. The plot is divided between two timelines that merge into an uplifting and triumphant ending.
I highly recommend this inspirational historical fiction!
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About the Author
Multi-published, award-winning author Renee Ryan grew up in Florida. She’s written nearly thirty books in several genres, including historical fiction, historical romance and contemporary romance. She currently lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with her husband and a large cat many have mistaken for a small bear.
HIGH IMPACT (High Mountain Trackers Book #4) by Freya Barker is another exciting romantic suspense in the High Mountain Tracker series. This is Lucy and Bo’s story that faithful readers of the series have been waiting for. This book can be read as a standalone, but the characters are all evolving in their relationships throughout the series.
Bo Rivera has been a member of the High Mountain Trackers since his discharge from the service. Unlike the other members of the team, Bo lives in town so that he can keep an eye on his elderly and feisty mother. Bo is a flirt with all the ladies, but he is really interested in Lucy, the prickly assistant to his boss’s wife at the animal rescue down the road. But he feels she is too young, so he keeps his distance. When he discovers her age and realizes she just looks young, he is ready to change their status.
Lucy Lenoir finds more comfort and trust with animals than humans. She has never let anyone know about her true background even her best friend and boss. She is independent and sometimes wishes for the type of relationships she sees happening around her, but she is also afraid to jeopardize anyone else’s safety. After Lucy rescued some abused goats, strange incidents have been happening at the rescue and she begins to feel she is being watched and set up for the murder of the goats’ abusive owner. Bo believes in her innocence and is determined to protect her even as she fights his attention.
Lucy slowly begins to allow Bo into her life and when she tells him about her past, he feels even more protective. But Lucy’s past is closer than anyone knows, and it may destroy her future.
I have been looking forward to this pair coming together after the brief glimpses of their attraction in previous books. Even though I knew Lucy’s past was bad, it was much worse than I expected and broke my heart. Bo had secrets of his own which could have broken up this pair even before they started, but Lucy understood about not being believed. Lucy and Bo’s romance proceeded at a believable pace with honest discussion of triggers during sex scenes. It is great to catch up with the crossover characters from the previous books, also. The suspense plot continues to ramp up the tension at an ever-increasing rate until the climactic confrontation and rescue. This story has everything I was hoping for and more.
I highly recommend this romantic suspense and the entire High Mountain Trackers series!
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Author Bio
USA Today bestselling author Freya Barker loves writing about ordinary people with extraordinary stories.
Driven to make her books about ‘real’ people; she creates characters who are perhaps less than perfect, each struggling to find their own slice of happy, but just as deserving of romance, thrills and chills in their lives.
Recipient of the ReadFREE.ly 2019 Best Book We’ve Read All Year Award for “Covering Ollie, the 2015 RomCon “Reader’s Choice” Award for Best First Book, “Slim To None”, Finalist for the 2017 Kindle Book Award with “From Dust”, and Finalist for the 2020 Kindle Book Award with “When Hope Ends”, Freya continues to add to her rapidly growing collection of published novels as she spins story after story with an endless supply of bruised and dented characters, vying for attention!
