Flash book reviews for the last three months

 I am soooo behind on book reviews ugh. Comment or DM me for trigger warnings and more info.

 

The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen - K.J. Charles is an insta-buy author for me, so I snapped up this ebook when it went on sale. This is a Regency historical romance with plenty of action and suspense, and I couldn't put it down. A baron who recently inherited his title and estate in Kent learns that the local smuggler chief was his anonymous hookup back in London. There's a lot of friction between them as they parted on bad terms, and the baron almost testifies that he saw the smuggler chief's sister smuggling, but they can't stay away from each other. They go on cute bug-finding dates in the marsh and have to team up to save each other's families from bad men. While not related to KJC's other regency romance series, the theme of healing from childhood trauma is also present. I thought it was interesting that the smuggler chief's grandpa was a formerly enslaved man from the US.  ★★★★  🌶🌶🌶

Get a Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibberts - I've had this author's books on my mental to-read list for a while since a lot of bookstagrammers said they were really good. Despite my initial surprise that the book is set in England and consequently all of the characters are English, I was sucked in and devoured this book.  Chloe goes through a near-death experience (a car almost hits her on her hot girl walk) and she consequently decides to change up her whole life, since when it flashed before her eyes, it was really boring. She makes a list of things to do, like camping and 'meaningless but thoroughly enjoyable sex'. After her apartment building's hot super, Red, helps her get out of a tree while rescuing a cat, she enlists him to help her go through her list 👀 He's down bad for her so he agrees. Chloe is chronically ill, hence not having done many things in her life, and Red has trauma from his last rich upper-class girlfriend (which Chloe is, uh-oh) being horrible and classist to him. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a romance novel this much! This is definitely a kicking-your-feet-and-giggling book, but with a good amount of depth. I need to read the rest of the books in this series, which are about Chloe's sisters. ★★★★.5  🌶🌶🌶

 

I reread How to Keep House While Drowning since, well, guess. It's just as good and helpful as ever. I last flash-reviewed it here. 

I also reread The Secret Diary of Lizzie Bennet by Bernie Su and Kate Rorick since I rewatched the webseries for the first time in a decade. If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it! The webseries (really a transmedia series, as the characters also tweeted and used various social media to add to the story) is a really fun modern retelling of Pride & Prejudice. This book is the book version of that webseries, as Lizzie's actual diary, and it goes through the same stories as the webseries, with more behind-the-scenes stuff that didn't make it into the YouTube videos. For instance, Lizzie's tour of San Francisco with William and Gigi Darcy is described. It's such a great retelling that left me with a warm and fuzzy feeling, but I suspect someone who's never seen the TSDoLB webseries wouldn't be getting the same story out of it. I still recommend it, though. ★★★★

Queerly Beloved by Susie Dumond - I got this book from the thrift store. It's set in Oklahoma in 2013 (aka before gay marriage equality). Amy is a lesbian and a baker who is in the closet at her Christian baker job. Somebody outs her and she gets fired, so she starts working as a bridesmaid-for-hire since she loves wedding romcoms and is great at problem-solving. She also meets this cute lesbian engineer, Charley, but their dates are really sporadic due to Charley's demanding job, and Amy isn't sure where they stand. There's also friend drama and ex drama, and Amy struggles with her people-pleasing tendencies, being closeted at one job while bartending at the queer bar as her second job, and being true to herself. This book was not as fluffy as it looked, and there is tension with Amy having to go through lots of straight wedding drama while being unable to marry herself (hang in there Amy! 2015 is so close!). I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it. ★★★★  🌶🌶

Women's Hotel by Daniel M. Lavery

I bought this during Barnes & Noble's half-off sale since I had a giftcard. Here's the summary; this book is about the residents of a women's hotel, the Biedermeier, in New York in the 1960s. There's not much plot, and the chapters are loosely connected. Lavery has that retro chatty informative tone down perfectly, and he's an excellent writer. While I enjoyed this, a lot of the women's stories were anywhere from a little to very sad, and the last story is rather horrible (the epilogue softens it). I'd recommend this to anyone who likes reading slice of life stories, mid-twentieth-century books, and how New York was in the past. I'll give this away due to lack of shelf space. ★★★★