A Season of Seduction by Jennifer Haymore review/giveaway

Although the widowed Lady Rebecca has sworn off marriage, men are another matter. London's cold winter nights have her dreaming of warmer pursuits-like finding a lover to satisfy her hungry heart. Someone handsome, discreet, and most importantly as uninterested in marriage as she is. Someone like Jack Fulton.

A known adventurer and playboy, Jack seems like the perfect choice. There's just one problem: Jack isn't interested in an affair. He needs the beautiful, mysterious Lady Rebecca to be his wife. And he doesn't have much time to persuade her. A secret from Jack's past is about to surface, and by Christmas Day he'll be either married to Rebecca or dead.



My Thoughts:

Jennifer Haymore has done it again with her new novel A Season of Seduction. This has to be by far my favorite as of yet. There is something very alluring about Jack Fulton that makes the reader want t know more about him. Plus I found that Lady Rebecca, is one of my favorite heroines. A Season of Seduction is the perfect book for a cold winters night. A must read for all historical romance fans.

This would make the perfect gift this time of year.

Fun Idea:

Instead of giving cards for birthdays or other occasions why not inscribe your well wishes on a book rather than a card. People are more likely to keep a book (something that they will read) than a card that normally they tend to throw away.

Another fun idea- if you have get-togethers or if you are like me and have teas why not use books as name holders? I simply print up the names of my guests on corresponding cardstock, secure a ribbon around the cardstock, and wrap the ribbon around the book. It’s also the perfect gift for your book club.
I know that I am going to be using A Season of Seduction for my holiday tea favor.


Five fun facts
1. After writing two books with Lady Rebecca as a young girl trying to find her place in the world, I loved writing about how she becomes a strong and independent woman in A Season of Seduction.
2. Cornwall, England, where Lady Rebecca’s property is, is one of those stark, windy places I always imagine as a setting for gothic novels. I have always wanted to write about it and visit it. Now that I have written about it and researched it, visiting is the next on the list!
3. I spent hours and hours researching the traveling time from London to Launceston, Cornwall while writing A Season of Seduction. I am always stymied by the amount of time it took to go from point A to point B using the various means of travel during this era. I’m trying to talk my husband into buying a horse for me just so I can be as accurate as possible! Unfortunately, so far, my husband is not convinced, but I’m still working on him…
4. In my last book, A Touch of Scandal, Lady Rebecca broke her arm in a carriage accident. Unfortunately, I know some things about broken arms, because my son has had two of them in two years! Lady Rebecca had the same break as my son’s first injury (a broken humerus just above the elbow), but she didn’t have access to modern medical care, so even after four years she’s still suffering from the repercussions in A Season of Seduction.
5. Christmas is my favorite day of the year, and I’d never imagined I’d be lucky enough to have the opportunity to write a historical romance set during the holiday season. Combine that with the special romance between Becky and Jack, and A Season of Seduction is definitely one of my favorites!


About the author
I’ve been writing since I could pick up a pencil….
Wait, no…that’s what every other writer says! I started writing just before my eighth birthday, and it wasn’t on my own volition. I was sailing with my family in a 42-foot sailboat across the Pacific, and since there were no local schools (except those pertaining to fish) nearby, my mother homeschooled me. She was a strict taskmaster! A veritable slave driver! She demanded a new story every day.
So I’d sit in the boat’s galley and write. And stare out the porthole, and write some more. And doodle, and write some more. By the time we arrived in Hawaii the following year, I had a portfolio of stories, and I was hooked. Since then I haven’t stopped. (Well, much. I did take breaks now and then, for things like college, young kids, and a master’s degree.)
I love to read just as much as I love to write, and actually the reading bug hit me at about the same time my mom was cracking the whip over my head and commanding me to write. What else to occupy your time with when there are no other kids to play with and nothing to do but stare at the endless sea? Some of my most recent favorites: The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, Outlander by Diana Gabaldon, River God by Wilbur Smith, and anything by Laura Kinsale and Loretta Chase.


I have 5 copies to giveaway thanks to Anna @ Hachette Books

To enter leave your name and a comment along with a valid email address.
Contest ends Nov. 30

Spilling the Beans on the Cat's Pajamas by Judy Parkinson

Title- Spilling the Beans on the Cats Pajamas:
Popular Expressions-What They Mean & How We Got Them
Author- Judy Parkinson
Publisher- Reader’s Digest
ISBN- 978-1-60652-171-7
Format- Hardcover
$14.95



Strike while the iron's hot and bone up on the origins of your favorite expressions

Cat got your tongue? Well, for Pete's sake, use this collection of colorful expressions to enrich your everyday speech. This book spills the beans on our best-loved euphemisms and most curious sayings, explaining their fascinating origins and the remarkable stories that surround them. It rounds up the usual suspects -- the catch phrases, quotations, and expressions that keep our language flourishing -- and makes them easy to find in a convenient A-to-Z format.
Did you know that . . .
The expressions all that glitters is not gold and apple of the eye have each been in use for more than a thousand years?
To bark up the wrong tree comes from the sport of raccoon hunting?
Embarrassed parents can thank the songwriter Cole Porter for the euphemism the birds and the bees?
(from the back cover)

My Thoughts:

WOW!! WHAT A BOOK!!!!!! I picked this up last night just to have a look through and I was so hooked I ended up reading it straight through. Not only does Spilling the Beans on the Cats Pajamas contain the where any why, it contains little adages to go all along with each phrase. This book chocked-full of the normal ever day phrases as well as some that may be new to some readers. I was pleasantly surprised with the information that filled each page. I was surprised at the origins of a few of the phrases.

Overall would I read this book/use this book again? Most Defiantly. I believe that I will find myself referring to this book quite often.

Who would I recommend it to? Any/ Every one. This is the perfect book for those who are home schooling as well as writers, and lovers of literature.

My thanks to FSB Media for sending me this copy.

Two Lethal Lies by Annie Solomon Review/giveaway

Title- Two Lethal Lies
Author- Annie Solomon
Publisher- Forever Romance an imprint of Hachette Book Group
ISBN- 978-0-446-17845-7
Release Date- 10/1/2010
Format- Mass Market Paperback
$6.99/$7.99 CAN.
Pages- 381
How I read it- Mass Market Paperback

Book description:

A LOVE TO DIE FOR………….

On the run since his daughter was born, Mitch Turner has concealed a truth so dangerous, its discovery could jeopardize both their lives. But when a series of shocking murders hits their newfound home, the trail leads straight to Mitch. With the police out for blood and his daughter ripped from his arms, he has nowhere to turn- until a beautiful stranger offers her help.

Neesy Brown has made mistakes in her life, yet she refuses to believe this mysterious man is a killer. There’s a strength in his broad shoulders that draws her to him and a weariness in his eyes that she longs to ease. As the murders tear her small town apart, she vows to help Mitch find his missing child. But a cunning predator is pulling them deeper and deeper into his fatal game. And the price of losing is the child-and the future-they could both share……………………….


My Thoughts:

This was my first introduction to Annie Solomon, and I have to say that it will not be my last.

I truly enjoyed this book. In fact I loved it, and I am not one for Romantic Suspense. The writing was very intriguing, and I found that I could not put the book down. It seemed like each time I turned the page a new challenge was waiting for Mitch. I also enjoyed the characters immensely. Mitch was an enigma, one that I could not quite figure out in the beginning. He kept me guessing, which I rather enjoyed (normally I can have a character figured out by chapter two), I enjoyed unraveling the mystery that was Mitch. Neesy was also well mapped, and I found that she completed the story and gave it a nice rounded feel, while complimenting Mitch.

Overall this was my favorite book that I have read in a while. I think that this would make an incredible movie. It has all the right elements that one looks for in a Romantic Suspense novel. Intrigue, mystery, murder, secrets, and to top it off romance. In the end would I read this book again? Defiantly, it’s a keeper that I will reread.


I also wanted to say that while reading this book, in my mind Mitch Turner was Thorsten Kaye. If any of you have watched the soap opera All My Children, the character of Zach Slater (played by Thorsten Kaye) will remind you of Mitch, or at least it reminded me.


Favorite quote:
“But Mitch was more Rochester than Darcy. And like Rochester, there was something about him. Some dark undercurrent no one but her seemed to see.”


Five Fun Facts
1. Hot Chocolate Freaks: My hero, Mitch Turner, and his 11-year-old daughter, Julia, drink a lot of hot chocolate in Two Lethal Lies. And they are VERY particular about the type. No open-packet-and-add-water for them. This comes from my stint in Seville, Spain, where hot chocolate and churros is an afternoon treat. You've never enjoyed the drink until you've had it there—thickest, richest, most chocolaty I've ever tasted. Dip in a freshly made churro—paradise! I've got a bunch of hot chocolate recipes on my website, so come on over and check them out. Or email me yours and I'll include it with the others!

2. Radio Research: In an early draft I had a car problem I couldn't solve. So, where do you go for unsolvable car problems? Click and Clack of Car Talk, of course! You can hear my question and their on air response on my website. Sadly, though, the scene using their answer was deleted from the final book. But you can still read it. Where? My website, of course.

3. Southern Yankee: My heroine, Neesy Brown, is from a small town in Tennessee. Two Lethal Lies takes her, among other places, to New York City, where she has to learn what a knish and a nosh are. I had fun with this, since I'm a New Yorker living in Tennessee and had to learn what country ham and red-eye gravy were.

4. The Iowa Way: I stationed my FBI agent in Iowa's Quad Cities so I could send him to Muscatine. My brother and his wife moved there and I had a fun time visiting them. Everyone I met was so warm and welcoming. Among other things, I got to ride a combine and harvest corn. I used the layout of Muscatine, which is on the Mississippi River, as a partial model for Crossroads, the small town in Tennessee in which Two Lethal Lies takes place.

5. Lies, the Movie: No, I haven't sold the book to Hollywood, but you can see who I'd cast if I did sell it. Go to StoryCasting.com and click on Two Lethal Lies. You'll not only be able to see who I'd cast, but you can create your own cast, too.








A native New Yorker, RITA-winning author Annie Solomon has been dreaming up stories since she was ten. After a twelve-year career in advertising, where she rose to Vice President and Head Writer at a mid-size agency, she abandoned the air conditioners, furnaces and heat pumps of her professional life for her first love—romance. An avid knitter, she now lives in Nashville with her husband and daughter.

I have 5 copies to giveaway.
Contest ends October 29
To enter please leave your name & a valid email address.
Contest open to residents of the US & Canada only
Sorry no P.O. Boxes.

Simply Irresistible by Jill Shalvis review/giveaway

Title- Simply Irresistible
Author- Jill Shalvis
Publisher- Forever Romance an imprint of Hachette Book Group
ISBN: 978-0-446-57161-6
$6.99/$7.99 CAN.
Release Date- 10/1/2010
Format- Mass Market Paperback
Pages-336
How I read it-Mass Market Paperback


Book Description-

Maddie Moore's whole life needs a makeover

In one fell swoop, Maddie loses her boyfriend (her decision) and her job (so not her decision). But rather than drowning her sorrows in bags of potato chips, Maddie leaves L.A. to claim the inheritance left by her free-spirited mother-a ramshackle inn nestled in the little coastal town of Lucky Harbor, Washington.

Starting over won't be easy. Yet Maddie sees the potential for a new home and a new career-if only she can convince her two half-sisters to join her in the adventure. But convincing Tara and Chloe will be difficult because the inn needs a big makeover too.

The contractor Maddie hires is a tall, dark-haired hottie whose eyes-and mouth-are making it hard for her to remember that she's sworn off men. Even harder will be Maddie's struggles to overcome the past, though she's about to discover that there's no better place to call home than Lucky Harbor.
(from the publishers)

My Thoughts-

This was actually a good book. I found myself drawn in by the characters as well as their stories. The plot read smoothly, and while it didn’t offer that many ‘surprises’, I found it to be intriguing, and hard to put down. The only thing that I would change about this book is the cover. To me the cover seems a bit bland, I know the whole “don’t judge a book by it cover” adage, but I am afraid that if I spotted this cover in the bookstore I would walk right past it. The cover provides no allure which is sad because the book is full of it!!

Overall, don’t judge this book by its cover-give it a try and I believe that you will be pleasantly surprised. Although I will warn you once you finish this book you will be willing April to arrive so that you can read the second.


Favorite Character- While I really enjoyed Maddie and the way her character developed I found that my favorite character in the book had to be Jax. He held that extra something that will make him a memorable character.

Favorite line- At the beginning of each chapter, their deceased mother is quoted. Each quote is better than the last, although I have to say that my favorite quote would be
“If you are saving for a rainy day, you’re never going to get out of the house”

Five Fun Facts
1. Jill is more afraid of spiders than the bears that she runs into on her daily mountain hikes.
2. If Jill couldn't be a writer, she'd want to be a rock star. Only problem—she can't hold a tune to save her life.
3. Jill would take a box of cookies over just about any other food. Mother's Double Fudge, if she had a choice, but she's not picky.
4. While writing Simply Irresistible (Oct '10), the first Lucky Harbor book, she knitted her own crooked boyfriend scarf just like the heroine in the book. However, the dog ate it. You don't want to know what happened to it after that.
5. For more information on Jill, check out her website at jillshalvis.com, including her daily blog chronicling her I-Love-Lucy life.


USA Today bestselling author JILL SHALVIS lives in a small town in the Sierras also run by quirky characters. Any resemblance to the quirky characters in her books are, um, mostly coincidental. Look for Jill's bestselling, award-winning books wherever romances are sold and visit her website at www.jillshalvis.com for a complete book list and daily blog detailing her city-girl-living-in-the-mountain adventures.




I have 5 copies to giveaway thanks to Anna @ Hachette Books
To enter leave your name, and email address.
Open to Residents of the US & Canada only
Sorry no P.O. Boxes
Giveaway ends on October 29