Review: The Housekeeper's Secret by Iona Grey

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Pages: 368

Format: ARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Duty, desire, and deception reside under one roof.

Standing in the remote windswept moors of Northern England, Coldwell Hall is the perfect place to hide. For the past five years, Kate Furniss has maintained her professional mask so carefully that she almost believes she is the character she has created: Coldwell’s respectable housekeeper.

It is the summer of 1911 that brings new faces above and below the stairs of Coldwell Hall―including the handsome and mysterious new footman, Jem Arden. Just as the house’s shuttered rooms open, so does Kate’s guarded heart to a love affair that is as intense as it is forbidden. But Kate can feel her control slipping as Jem harbors secrets of his own.

Kritters Thoughts:  Kate Furniss is the head of the household staff at Coldwell Hall and this home has become basically her entire existence.  She spends days and days making sure this home runs smoothly while there is a large changing happening in the home.  In another timeline in the book, July 1916, a solider is writing letters to a Kate in the middle of a war.  

From the beginning of this book, I was invested and wanted to know all the things about all the characters.  There is a large cast of characters and I grew to love them all, there wasn't a one where I felt as though they fell short of adding to the overall story.  For me, the cook Mrs. Gatley was a fun highlight, she was so fun and I enjoyed the levity she brought.  

If you are a fan of Downtown Abbey then this book is just the right fix to fill the whole that a complete Downtown Abbey could have left behind.  I love reading the story of the people who are serving the family of the home and hear about what goes in their lives too.  There are two more Iona Grey books in her backlist and I would love to read those soon as I really enjoyed the writing in this one.

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With a week in Mexico to end the month, I was able to read some in airplanes and by a pool!  I am hoping that I am back on the reading train and can find some more quiet moments this year to get lost in a book. 

1. The Housekeeper's Secret by Iona Grey

2. The Correspondent by Virginia Evans

3. Happily Ever After by Elizabeth Maxwell

Total pages read, clicked and flipped:  1,008

Where Have I Been Reading?:

Northern England

Annapolis, MD

Review: Shopgirls by Jessica Anya Blau

Publisher: Mariner Books

Pages: 266

Format: eARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Nineteen-year-old Zippy can hardly believe it: she's the newest and youngest salesgirl at I. Magnin, "San Francisco's Finest Department Store." Every week, she rotates her three spruced-up Salvation Army outfits and Vaseline-shined pumps; still, she's thrilled to walk those pumps through the employee entrance five days a week as she saves to buy something new. For a girl who grew up in a one-bedroom apartment above a liquor store with her mother and her mother's madcap boyfriend, Howard; a girl who wanted to go to college but had no help in figuring out how; I. Magnin represents a real chance for a better and more elegant life. Or, at the very least, a more interesting one.

Zippy may not be in school, but she's about to get an education that will stick with her for decades. Her fellow salesgirls (lifetime professionals) run the gamut from mean and indifferent to caring and helpful. The cosmetics ladies on the first floor share both samples and advice ("only date a man with a Rolex"); and her new roommate, Raquel, an ambitious lawyer, tells Zippy she can lose ten pounds easy if she joins Raquel in eating only every other day. Just when Zippy thinks she's getting a handle on how to be an adult woman in 1985, two surprises threaten both her sense of self and her coveted position at I. Magnin.

Kritters Thoughts:  What a fun book!  Zippy is a young woman in the 80s who has been working at a dress shop and is surrounded by the most fun cast of characters.  Zippy doesn't have a lot, but she does have the drive to make this job into a career.  

While Zippy was for sure the main character, the cast of characters surrounding here were so entertaining.  I loved Zippy, but I loved even more how she reacted with the ladies around her.  AND the inner workings of a dress shop were so fun.  The ladies coming and going and getting their outfits picked out - I wanted to watch a tv show based on this store and these women.    

I found this book to be the right amount of young girl big city and I loved following Zippy through the ups and downs of this book.  I would recommend this book to those who love this kind of story, who love to follow a young girl through a great story arc.  I love when I finish a story and I just wish a sequel was on its way because I could have used more of Zippy when this one was done.      

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With a newborn in the house, there was more vegging in front of the tv than curling up with a book, SO one book complete is good from my point of view!  I am hoping for more over the next few months and to end with a great 2026 of reading.  

1. When I Kill You by BA Paris

Total pages read, clicked and flipped: 304

Where Have I Been Reading?:

London

Review: You Can't Hide by Emily Shiner

Publisher: Inkubator Books

Pages: 225

Format: ARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:   Beth thought she’d escaped her past. But all this time, it’s been waiting for her…

Beth and Ian are desperate to have a child. So much so that they decide to sell his family cabin in upstate New York to pay for IVF.

When they arrive at the cabin, they meet Ryan, the caretaker. But Ryan is not who he says he is… He’s here because he knows Beth has a dark secret. And now he intends to use it against her.

He threatens to tell Ian everything about Beth's past unless she does exactly what he says.

Beth finds herself caught in a nightmarish trap. If Ian discovers what she’s been hiding from him, she’s sure he’ll leave her. She’ll lose everything she cares about, including the chance to have a child of her own.

On the other hand, what Ryan wants her to do is so dark and twisted it’s beyond horrifying.

Either way, Beth is sure her life is over, she can see no way out. Unless… Unless she digs deep and finds a part of herself that is willing to do something so awful it doesn’t even bear thinking about…

Kritters Thoughts:  A dark and twisty mystery that took me on an adventure and because of that it had me flipping pages one after the other, on my kindle of course!  Told from two different perspectives and I couldn't wait to see when and where these two women would collide.  

Beth and Ian head to their family's remote cabin to get it ready to sell and from the beginning there are eery feelings.  I loved that from the very beginning I was in the book and the mood was set; especially with the book being a little on the shorter side, I was glad the author dove in and got the story going.  And then Lizzie's story is hard to read from the start, it was difficult to read but I kept going wanting to know where these two worlds would come together.  

I would suggest you hold and read this book for the spooky season as it was quite the perfect read for that season.  It was also a quick read if your spooky season is busy! 

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Review: American Mother by Gregg Olsen

Publisher: Thread

Pages: 497

Format: audiobook

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  At 5.02 pm on June 5th, 1986, a call came into the local sheriff office in the small town of Auburn, Washington State from Stella Nickell. Her husband Bruce was having a seizure. As the officers arrived on the scene, Bruce was already dead.

Forensics identified that Bruce had consumed headache pills laced with cyanide and in an attempt to cover her tracks, Stella saw to it that a stranger would also become her next victim of the cyanide-tainted painkillers.

What would drive a seemingly normal outgoing and popular mum and wife to kill?
As the investigation began to unfold, Stella’s daughter Cynthia notified federal agents of her mother’s crimes. But she didn’t reveal everything…

Kritters Thoughts:  In 1982, there were murders that were tied to Tylenol pills in Chicago, IL and just four short years later across the country in the state of Washington a copycat of sorts happened.  A woman who was very unhappily married figured that murder was easier than divorce and laced pills with cyanide, but not only did they kill her target another woman was also killed.  

While this book for sure described the events of 1986, but it also went back in time to give the reader an extensive amount of background knowledge that gave context as to why everyone ended up where they did - by no means an excuse for Stella's actions.  For me, this book moved a little slower and maybe spent a little too much time in the past and could have spent more time in the present day of 1986.    

My second Gregg Olsen book and I have read both via audiobook and I really enjoy taking in nonfiction via audiobook.  

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Review: The Bookshop by the Bay by Pamela Kelley

Publisher: Griffin

Pages: 320

Format: eARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:   Two lifelong friends. One bookshop by the beach. And the summer that could change everything.

Jess loves her work as a high-profile lawyer in the respectable and austere city of Charleston. But when she finds her husband, Parker, has been cheating on her with his assistant, she retreats, with her thirty year-old daughter Caitlin for support, to her childhood home on Cape Cod, in Chatham. Caitlin has always been bright but directionless, looking for her passion but keeps coming up blank. And Jess needs to regroup with the help of good food and wine, the company of her best friend, Allison, and come up with a plan for the future.

Allison’s career has hit a low. After twenty years as an editor for the Chatham magazine, circulation is dwindling and though her boss and long-time friend, Jim, does everything to keep her, she has no choice but to take a step back. With a career on hiatus and her main relationship being with Chris, her ex-husband who is still a good friend, Allison is at a pivotal point in life. Her daughter Julia opened her own artisanal jewelry shop a year prior, and she has the kind of day-to-day fulfillment Allison yearns for.

When Allison stops into her beloved local bookstore one day and learns that the owner wants to sell, a long-held dream turns into a reality, thanks to Jess. Allison and Jess set a plan in motion and what was once a place that held warm childhood memories is now theirs to run. As the two friends, along with the help of their daughters, reopen the doors of the cherished bookstore and adjacent coffee shop to the community, they also open themselves up to the possibility of romance, the bonds of mothers and daughters, and the magic of second chances.

Kritters Thoughts:  Two sets of lifelong friends and their daughters take center stage in this book.  Jess and her daughter Caitlin and Allison and her daughter Julia all end up in Cape Cod for a summer and each have something going on that hopefully can be solved by the end of summer.  Jess has recently discovered her husband's infidelity and needs a physical break from Charleston, SC, while her daughter Caitlin recently lost her job and isn't sure what is next for herself.  Allison is also dealing with a dwindling career and may need to take a hard pivot to something new instead of the magazine that she has worked at for a long time.  And Julia has been building her own jewelry business on Cape Cod and just needs something to make a splash in order to ensure that her basic bills can get paid and her long-term boyfriend Kyle is ready for marriage and she may not be so ready.  

With all these things going on, it took a moment to make sure I had everyone and their sub characters straight.  I loved the dynamic of both personal and professional drama and while I tend to avoid books with cheating spouses, thankfully I was warned that this was a minor moment in the book and that there was way more plot to enjoy.  The one thing that kept me from making this a five star read was the pacing towards the middle of the book, it seemed to slow down for me and at that moment I kind of knew where we would end up and was ready for the author to get there.  

My first Pamela Kelley book and will for sure not be my last read.  I will share that the summer vibe of this book was perfect to throw in my beach bag on our family summer vacation.  

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