Christmas at Rosie Hopkins’ Sweetshop by Jenny Colgan

source: free review copy via Library Thing/ Harper Collins
title: Christmas at Rosie Hopkins’ Sweetshop
author: Jenny Colgan / Twitter
genre: Christmas fiction / Romance
published: November 7th 2013
pages: 341
first line: Lipton was quiet underneath the stars.
rated: 3 1/2 out of 5

blurb:
Rosie Hopkins is looking forward to Christmas in the little Derbyshire village of Lipton, buried under a thick blanket of snow. Her sweetshop is festooned with striped candy canes, large tempting piles of Turkish Delight, crinkling selection boxes and happy, sticky children. She’s going to be spending it with her boyfriend, Stephen, and her family, flying in from Australia. She can’t wait. But when a tragedy strikes at the heart of their little community, all of Rosie’s plans for the future seem to be blown apart. Can she build a life in Lipton? And is what’s best for the sweetshop also what’s best for Rosie?

my thoughts:
Christmas at Rosie Hopkins’ Sweetshop by Jenny Colgan is a nice read mainly centering on family life during the holidays in a small town. Rosie Hopkins left her life as a registered nurse in the big city to move to a little village in Lipton and open up a candy shop. She lives with her boyfriend Stephen, who is a Mr. Darcy type. His mother is Lady Lipton and she lives in the large estate of Lipton Hall. She is cold towards Rosie. Rosie wants Stephen to propose and she wants to start a family with him, this is a biggie for her. She wonders if staying in small town Derbyshire with no family is worth it if she doesn’t ever marry and have a family of her own.

Deadly Ride (Britton Bay #3) by Jody Holford

source: NetGalley
title:Deadly Ride (A Britton Bay Mystery Book 3)
author: Jody Holford
genre: cozy mystery
pages: 217
first line: Molly Owens had a pretty strong grasp on vocabulary, but clearly she misunderstood the word chilly.
rated: 3 1/2 out of 5

blurb:
Newspaper editor Molly Owens loves her new life—and her new man—in the beautiful seaside town of Britton Bay, Oregon. But when a car-show killer strikes, she needs to put the brakes on the culprit . . .

As editor-in-chief of the Britton Bay Bulletin, Molly steps in for a sick reporter to cover the Classic Car Crawl, an exhibit of vintage automobiles. Her main challenge is not being driven to distraction by the presence of her hunky boyfriend, Sam Alderich, a fellow car enthusiast whose auto shop is sponsoring the event. But when she and Sam discover the co-founder dead in his car, Molly quickly shifts gears to solve the murder.

With a showroom full of suspects—including the co-founder’s longtime partner, much-younger wife, enigmatic ex, and car owners with grudges and grievances—Molly soon starts to feel like she’s spinning her wheels. And after things take a turn for the worse, it’s all she can do to steer clear of trouble and stay out of a killer’s clutches . . .

my thoughts:
Deadly Ride is Book 3 in Jody Holford’s A Britton Bay Mystery series. How cute is the cover? The other book covers in this series can be found here and are also adorable.
The story centers around newspaper editor Molly Owens. There is a car show coming to the seaside town of Britton Bay and Molly is covering the story. While she’s at the show she meets a few people and contestants. However, she and her boyfriend Sam Alderich stumble upon a dead contestant at the end of the night. The cops are called in and there are a few suspects including the victim’s young widow, his ex-wife and fellow car owners who all have motive. Even though Sam wants Molly to stay safe and steer clear of the investigation she can’t help but get pulled in. This is not the first time she has stumbled upon a dead body.

Caught Up in a Cowboy by Jennie Marts

source: free review copy courtesy of NetGalley / SourceBooks
title: Caught Up in a Cowboy (Cowboys of Creedence)
author: Jennie Marts / Twitter
genre: contemporary romance
pages: 334
published: May 2018
first line: Bits of gravel flew behind the tires of the convertible, and Rockford James swore as he turned onto the dirt road leading to the Triple J Ranch.
rated: 4 out of 5

blurb:
This cowboy plays to win

Rockford James was raised as a tried and true cowboy in a town crazy about ice hockey. Rock is as hot on the ice as he is on a horse, and the NHL snapped him up. Now, injuries have permanently benched him. Body and pride wounded, he returns to his hometown ranch to find that a lot has changed. The one thing that hasn’t? His feelings for high school sweetheart and girl-next-door Quinn Rivers.

Quinn had no choice but to get over Rock after he left. Teenaged and heartbroken, she had a rebound one night stand that ended in single motherhood. Now that Rock’s back—and clamoring for a second chance—Quinn will do anything to avoid getting caught up in this oh-so-tempting cowboy…

my thoughts:
Caught Up in a Cowboy is the first in the Cowboys of Creedence series by Jennie Marts. This book has been sitting in my Nook since last year and I finally made the time to read it last week. I am glad I did.

First of all, can I just mention the cover. THAT is how you put a cowboy on a cover. Simple yet effective.

Sister of Mine by Laurie Petrou

source: review copy courtesy of Meryl Moss Media
title: Sister of Mine
author: Laurie Petrou/ Twitter
pages: 294
genre: psychological thriller
first line: She breaks into a run as soon as she clears the flames.
rated: 4 out of 5

blurb:
For fans of Sarah Pinborough and Liane Moriarty comes a taut domestic suspense about the lies we tell to hold our lives together.

Sisters, like secrets, are best kept close.

Penny and Hattie, orphaned sisters in a small town, are best friends, bound together to the point of knots. But Penny, at the mercy of her brutal husband, is desperate for a fresh start. Willing to do anything for her older sister, Hattie agrees to help. A match is struck and a fire burns Penny’s marriage to the ground. With her husband gone, Penny is free, and the sisters, it seems, get away with murder. But freedom comes at a cost.

More than a year after the fire, a charming young man comes to town. Hattie and Penny quickly bring him into the fold and into their hearts but their love for him threatens the delicate balance. Soon long-held resentments, sibling rivalry, and debts unpaid boil over, and the bonds of sisterhood begin to snap. As one little lie grows into the next, the sisters’ secrets will unravel, eroding their lives until only a single, horrible truth remains: You owe me.

A compelling novel of suspense from a talented new voice, Sister of Mine asks us to consider the bonds of family, what it takes to commit the unthinkable, and how far you’ll go to protect the ones you love.

my thoughts:

Sister of Mine is a multi layered novel about two sisters, Penny and Hattie, who are tied together by a dark secret. This secret rips them apart as the years go by because of resentments, lies, cover-ups and bad memories.

As the story opens, their mother who raised them died in an accident at home while Penny was away at college. Giving up her dreams of finishing school, Penelope comes back home after the death of her mother to take care of her younger sister Hattie. She gets a steady job and marries a local man who turns out to be an abuser. Terrified of her husband and what he is capable of Penny sees only one way to escape him. When her husband is found dead in a house fire, the two sisters just want to get on with their lives and leave his memory behind.

Christmas at Conwenna Cove by Darcie Boleyn

source: free review copy via Net Galley
title: Christmas at Conwenna Cove
author: Darcie Boleyn
published: Oct 2017
first line: “What on earth is that?”
genre: contemporary holiday small town romance
rated: 4 out of 5 stars for sweet holiday romance

 

blurb:
Pack your bags for a festive trip to Conwenna Cove, just in time for Christmas…
When Grace Phillips travels to Conwenna Cove to help her parents move there, 30 years after their honeymoon in the village, she sees why they fell in love with the place. The festive decorations, carols in the air and constant supply of delicious mince pies certainly make it hard to leave. Will the rude and abrupt local vet Oli Davenport soften up and give Grace more of a reason to stay?

It’s been two years since Oli lost his wife to cancer. He loves his eleven-year-old Amy and five-year-old Tom more than anything, and his world revolves around being both mum and dad to his children. He has no interest in romance until he crosses paths with beautiful and kind-hearted Grace. The sparks fly but both Oli and Grace are holding onto the fear of letting someone into their heart.

As the snow falls and Christmas wishes come true can Conwenna Cove work its magic and help Grace and Oli find the happiness they both deserve?

my thoughts:
This is the time of year when I’m already getting into the Christmas spirit and Christmas at Conwenna Cove was the perfect read to start off the holiday season. I read this one as part of Kim’s Ho Ho Ho Read a Thon last week and I really enjoyed it.