Undercover Bromance

Undercover Bromance by Lyssa Kay Adams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Liv Papandreas is a brilliant pastry chef with a horrible boss. Braden Mack is a wealthy nightclub owner who wants to settle down with his current girlfriend so he can experience the kind of relationship he has helped his friends achieve. When Mack decides to splurge on a fancy dinner and $1000 cupcake at the restaurant where Liv works, the evening ends in disaster, with Mack's girlfriend dumping him, and Liv witnessing a young server being forced into performing sexual acts by their boss. Liv's defense of the girl costs Liv her job.

Realizing her former boss clearly has a history of harassing and coercing women, Liv goes on the offensive, trying to discover his previous victims, regardless of their fear, shame, and reluctance to come forward and accuse this powerful celebrity chef of his crimes. She demands Mack make up for costing her her job by offering a job to the server in an attempt to protect her. The girl initially refuses the help, but Liv is determined to put a stop to the abuse. Eventually the entire Bromance Book Club (plus a few others) cooks up a plan to break in to Royce's office and steal his computer files containing information on the women he's harassed and paid off so they have hard evidence with which to confront him.

All this plotting and planning means Liv and Mack are spending large amounts of time together, and despite Liv's initial disdain for Mack, she discovers there is more to him than she imagined. Mack, in turn, comes to realize he's going to have to face the trauma of his childhood if he wants to create something real with Liv, who has her own emotional baggage to deal with.

Book #2 in the series reveals more about how the Bromance Book Group got started and why Braden Mack, a bachelor, is a member. Spoiler alert: he started it! Getting to know more of Braden's backstory was one of my favorite aspects of the book. Also, the best thing about a hating-to-dating romance is the lack of insta-love. I generally prefer a slow burn story.

For readers' advisors: character and story doorways via for prominence. Profanity is pervasive, there are some steamy sex scenes, and a rooster gets pretty violent when men come to the farm where Liv resides. Trigger warning for anyone sensitive to issues of domestic violence and sexual harassment.

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Bring on the Blessings

Bring on the Blessings by Beverly Jenkins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Bernadine Brown earned her $275 million the hard way: she divorced her cheating husband. After a year of traveling the world, she's feeling the need to find a purpose for her life, and when she hears of Henry Adams, an historically all-Black town in Kansas that is struggling financially and has put itself up for sale, Bernadine has her Aha! moment. In her younger years, Bernadine was a social worker, and those instincts never die. She buys the town with the goal of making it a haven for foster kids and their foster parents.

Trent July, mayor of Henry Adams, along with the other 51 voting residents of the town, assumes anyone rich enough to buy a whole town must be white, so the arrival of a well-dressed, middle-aged Black woman comes as a shock. They are stunned by her plan to rebuild the town and quickly find themselves caught up in a whirlwind of construction. Everyone except the former mayor is on board with the changes, and soon Bernadine and her new assistant, returned local Lily, are flying in her private jet to various cities around the country to pick up the five foster kids Bernie has chosen. The children range in age from six to fourteen and come with all kinds of emotional baggage but little in the way of material possessions. Bit by bit, day by day, the residents and the children bond and begin to heal.

This is a warm hug of a book, set in a Kansas summer. It's a story of second chances, starting over, and Found Family, of foster children and a community to raise them. I absolutely loved it. It's hopeful, it made me cry, and I adored the characters. I don't know why so many people have categorized it as either Christian or romance--it's only barely either one. Only the seven year old Devon Watkins is particularly religious, and although Trent and Lily work through their decades-old estrangement to rekindle their relationship, it's just a sub-plot, not at all the focus of the story. I think Riley and his enormous hog Cletus get nearly as much screen time.

What kept this book from getting a 5-star rating from me was the dire need for a copy editor. There were typos and missing or extra words, a wrong name in one spot, and they all jolted me momentarily out of the story until I could make the corrections in my head to determine what the sentences should have said.

For readers' advisors: character doorway is primary, setting & story secondary. A bit of swearing, a lot of flirting, some references to sex but nothing explicit. The only violence is perpetrated by the hog.

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Why?

Why? by Adam Rex
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When a would-be supervillain crashes through the roof of a shopping mall, everyone flees except a little girl who keeps asking, “Why?” in response to every proclamation he makes. Soon it’s just the two of them wandering the stores, her repeated question inducing him to ponder how he came to this place and time, wondering if maybe his dreams lie elsewhere. A delightful depiction of curiosity cutting through the bluster of a bully to see the wounded child inside.

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Bringing Back the Wolves: How a Predator Restored an Ecosystem

Bringing Back the Wolves: How a Predator Restored an Ecosystem by Jude Isabella
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A lovely picture book for older kids (or adults) about the effects of reintroducing wolves into Yellowstone National Park, an ecosystem devastated by the systematic killing of apex predators in the late 1800s. There were a few spots where I felt like a little additional content would have been helpful, or at least don’t leave me hanging and searching for where the story thread picks back up. But overall an excellent book for anyone who wants to know more about the critical and sometimes surprising effects keystone species like wolves have on their environments.

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The Bromance Book Club

The Bromance Book Club by Lyssa Kay Adams
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Gavin Scott messed up. Badly. The love of his life, his wife of three years and the mother of his twin 3-year-old daughters, wants a divorce. He hadn't even realized they had grown so far apart until the night he found out she'd been faking it in bed for their entire marriage. The pain of her revelation sent him into a tailspin, shutting both his mouth and his ears until she got fed up and kicked him out of the house.

The thing is, Thea is furious because somehow over the past three years she lost herself, subsumed her identity and morphed from an artist into a stereotypical baseball wife, one whom Southern Lifestyle magazine called "wholesomely pastel." What Gavin doesn't grasp is that it's not just sex she's been faking, but everything, and she is D.O.N.E. being a stranger to herself.

Gavin, though, is desperate to save his marriage. So desperate, his best friend drags him to a very unique book group. A dozen or so alpha men of Nashville society--business owners, athletes, city officials--meet to read romance novels ("We call them manuals") and save each other's relationships. What?! Gavin thinks he's being punked, but the men are completely serious. What better way to learn the language of women than to read books "written by women for women...entirely about how they want to be treated and what they want out of life and in a relationship"? The men formulate a plan for Gavin to win Thea's heart all over again. In short? Backstory. It's ALL about backstory, and Gavin needs to understand not only Thea's, but his own if he is to have any hope of success.

I am so glad this is just the first in the series, because it's hilarious, heartwarming, and I wish men would try this strategy in the real world! Seriously, so many relationships could be saved and strengthened.

There is so much to love about this book. One of my favorite quotes is from a funny-but-serious moment in chapter 5 when one of the men says, "Don't be ashamed for liking them. The backlash against the PSL [pumpkin spice latte] is a perfect example of how toxic masculinity permeates even the most mundane things in life. If masses of women like something, our society automatically begins to mock them. Just like romance novels. If women like them, they must be a joke, right?" OMG, yes! Well, I don't know about the PSL--I hate coffee-flavored anything--but Ms. Adams is Spot On about the pervasiveness of toxic masculinity and the constant condescension toward the romance genre in particular.

My biggest beef with this book is that I really wanted Gavin to have more of an Aha! moment after he and Thea are cleaning up the puking toddlers and he has zero idea where the extra towels are. I mean, DUDE. It's your own house, how can you not know where the linen closet and clean towels are? A telling moment, no? But Ms. Adams moves on and passes up the chance for Gavin to have a meaningful awakening there, and I SO wanted him to.

I also kept forgetting the main characters were supposed to be in their mid-20s. Most of the time it seemed more like they were in their early or mid-30s. But given the belly laugh I had in the scene where Thea and her sister Liv come home earlier than expected and interrupt book group in progress, I forgive Ms. Adams entirely!

For readers' advisors: story doorway is primary, character and language secondary. There is no violence, but there is a lot of swearing amongst the witty banter and some very steamy sex scenes. Gavin struggles with a stutter and all the self-esteem issues that can crop up around that. The main characters are presumed white, but there are a few POC secondary characters.

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The Bookshop on the Shore

The Bookshop on the Shore by Jenny Colgan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Single mother Zoe can barely make ends meet. She works hard at a daycare taking care of wealthy people's children but can't afford to send her own 4-year-old there. Her ex, Jaz, rarely helps out and is gone most of the time, trying to make it as a DJ. Her son, Hari, is mute, and no one can figure out why. The last straw comes when her landlord hikes the rent on her lousy, run-down apartment higher than she can afford. Relief comes in the form of a job offer from Scotland. Well, two, actually. Jaz has finally told his sister he has a son, and when Surinder discovers that Zoe loves to read, she connects Zoe with Nina, from The Bookshop on the Corner. Nina needs someone to run her book van while she's on maternity leave. That's job #1.

Job #2 is as a nanny on evenings and weekends for the 3 children of the local Laird, Ramsay. This job comes with room and board in the form of a tiny attic bedroom in a Scottish castle and toast. A lot of toast. The three children have gone through six nannies in the past few years, and they are not excited about a seventh. If Zoe weren't so broke and desperate, she'd be happy to leave, too, but Hari loves Scotland and latches immediately onto the youngest of the three kids, Patrick. Eventually, with no good options remaining, Zoe straightens her metaphorical spine and begins to make changes, discovering that the siblings and their neglectful father aren't so much feral as traumatized, and though the locals don't want to buy books until Nina returns and tells them what to choose, the tourists are delighted with all the Scottish and Loch Ness-related volumes Zoe can lay her hands on.

The second book in this series conveys a tone of palpable grief, struggle, and emotional heaviness that slowly begins to lift as the characters grow and learn from each other. There is a slow-burn romance between Zoe and Ramsay, but it's not the focus of the story. Much of the book deals with mental illnesses and the effects those illnesses have on the family members who love them. Though the story begins with a weighted-down feeling, it ends with hope and strong family bonds.

For readers' advisors: character and setting doorways. No violence or sexual content, though sex is implied or mentioned as having occurred in a couple of places. Some swearing is sprinkled throughout, plus a great deal in one scene with Ramsay's drunk and angry girlfriend. "Found family" is a strong theme.

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Party of Two

Party of Two by Jasmine Guillory
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

3.5 stars

A fun rom-com about an African American attorney moving to L.A. to start her own firm with her best friend who meets a charismatic, idealistic white senator in a hotel bar without recognizing who he is. When they meet again by chance, they decide to start dating discreetly, despite Olivia's misgivings relating to Max's high-profile job.

I enjoyed the book very much. It's the fifth in the series, but only the second one I've read so far. It probably helps to have read the others, but it isn't necessary, particularly for this installment. I personally would have liked a bit more time to develop the characters and the relationship, and a bit less angst from Olivia, but it was a fun read nonetheless.

For readers' advisors: story doorway was primary. Several steamy sex scenes, but not terribly graphic. No violence, but plenty of swearing.

I read an ARC from NetGalley and the publisher in return for my honest option.

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