Saturday 9 December 2023

Emma's Festive Giveaway: Win a £10 Amazon Gift Voucher

It's time for the final giveaway of the year which has been very generously donated by Emma who has once again been my saviour on the blog this year with her fabulous reviews. Emma is offering one follower the chance to win a £10 Amazon voucher to treat yourself to a book or 2 for Christmas.

*Terms and Conditions* – As with all giveaways on the blog the giveaway is open to existing followers, enter via Rafflecopter form below.  The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by email and/or Twitter. Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with Emma only to order the gift voucher and will be deleted once receipt of the prize has been confirmed.  NB. Please do not add details of this giveaway to other sites without my permission.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Wednesday 6 December 2023

Emma's Review: The Lost Gift to the Italian Island by Barbara Josselsohn

Reviewed by Emma Crowley 

New York, present day. When Tori Coleman discovers that her mother was adopted, her whole world shatters. Jeremy, her boyfriend, wants to get married, but how can Tori commit when she doesn’t know who she truly is? The only clue to the identity of her biological family is a mysterious postcard with a photograph of an ornate wedding dress her grandmother Giulia made, which she’s told was gifted to a museum on an Italian island…

Tori arrives on Parissi Island, surrounded by turquoise Mediterranean waters, with the sweet smell of orange blossom filling the air. She soon finds the museum and learns that Giulia was Jewish, and secretly lived there during World War Two. She thought her grandmother abandoned her mother, but was she forced to leave and give up her child?

Just as she’s getting closer to answers, an unexpected call from Jeremy stops Tori in her tracks. As he passionately urges her to find out the truth, suddenly Tori wishes he were in Italy by her side, ready to propose again.

But then Tori is shocked to find bullets sewn into the lining of one of Giulia’s dresses and a notebook claiming she did something terrible during World War Two. Will the secrets in her family help her follow her own heart, or send her home from Italy with it finally broken forever?

Book Links: Kindle or Paperback 

Friday 1 December 2023

Festive Giveaway: Win a bundle of bookish goodies

How is it even December already? I feel like I haven't achieved much at all this year and time has just run away from me so let's see how many of my 2023 goals I actually manage to cross off my list this month! 

It wouldn't be the festive season without a giveaway or two on the blog, the first of which is for a bundle of bookish goodies that I've wrapped (apart from the sweets) for the element of surprise. 

The only clues I'll give you is that the bundle includes: 

  • 1 x tote bag
  • 1 x Festive Read
  • 1 x Christmas Crime 

Wednesday 15 November 2023

Emma's Review: The Irish Lake House by Colleen Coleman

Reviewed by Emma Crowley

Clutching the faded postcard tightly in her hand, Daisy looks around the sun-soaked Irish village. So this is the place her mother ran away from all those years ago… What secrets did she leave hidden here for Daisy to find?

Daisy Clarke is searching for a new beginning. So when she inherits a lake house on the stunning west coast of Ireland that was mysteriously left to her late mother Rose, she wonders if this could be the fresh start she’s been looking for.

Daisy has never visited the tiny village of Innisfree, with its rolling green hills and cobbled streets, but she remembers how her mother’s eyes would fill with tears whenever it was mentioned.Because when she was pregnant, Rose ran away from this magical place in the middle of the night with a heart-breaking secret she never shared…

Arriving in Ireland, Daisy meets James, the handsome lawyer handling her inheritance. With his warm Irish charm, gorgeous sense of humour, and sparkling sapphire blue eyes, he soon makes her heart flip whenever she sees him. And when he offers to renovate the lake house and help her uncover her family history, Daisy begins to wonder if she can open her heart once more.

But when Daisy discovers the shocking truth behind her inheritance and her true family, it changes everything… When the dust settles, will she be able to build a future with James? Or will the secrets of her mother’s past destroy her hopes of a future in the beautiful Irish village she has grown to love? 

Book Links: Kindle or Paperback

Friday 10 November 2023

Emma's Review: Child of the Ruins by Kate Furnivall

Reviewed by Emma Crowley

Two families divided by war.
An entire city on the edge of disaster.

1948, Berlin. World War II has ended and there is supposed to be peace; but Russian troops have closed all access to the city. Roads, railway lines and waterways are blocked and two million people are trapped, relying on airlifts of food, water and medicine to survive. The sharp eyes of the Russian state police watch everything; no one can be trusted.

Anna and Ingrid are both searching for answers - and revenge - in the messy aftermath of war. They understand that survival comes only by knowing what to trade: food; medicine; heirlooms; secrets. Both are living in the shadows of a city where the line between right and wrong has become dangerously blurred.

But they cannot give up in the search for a lost child ... 

Book Links: Kindle or Hardcover