Welcome to Mailbox Monday, the weekly meme where book lovers share the titles they received for review, purchased, or otherwise obtained over the past week. It is now being hosted at the Mailbox Monday blog.
No review books, but lots of other goodies! Here’s what I added to the shelves over the last week:
Purchased with a gift card from my mom:
Three Amazing Things About You by Jill Mansell
Hallie has a secret: she’s in love. He’s perfect for her in every way, but he’s seriously out of bounds. And Hallie doesn’t have long to live. Time is running out.
Flo has a dilemma — she likes Zander, but his scary sister really doesn’t approve.
Tasha has a problem. Her boyfriend is the adventurous type. And she’s afraid one of his adventures will go badly wrong.
As Three Amazing Things begins, Hallie’s about to be given new lungs. But whose?
The Unexpected Consequences of Love by Jill Mansell
When it comes to falling in love, the consequences are impossible to predict. That’s why Sophie Wells is working in St. Carys as a photographer, with a focus on putting her painful past firmly behind her.
When handsome Josh Strachan moves back to St. Carys to run the family hotel, he can’t understand why Sophie has zero interest in letting him — or any man — into her life. Meanwhile, he’s duped into employing Sophie’s impulsive friend Tula, whose crush on him is decidedly unrequited. Josh’s friend, the charming but utterly feckless surfer Riley Bryant, nurses a massive crush on Tula, and Riley’s aunt — superstar author Marguerite Marshall — has designs on Josh’s grandfather.
Love comes with complications, and the town of St. Carys has more than its fair share! Only one thing’s for sure — that love will change you forever, in ways you never expected.
Making Your Mind Up by Jill Mansell
Lottie Carlyle is happy enough. She is living in a beautiful cottage with her two adorable — sometimes — kids in an idyllic village, on good terms with her ex-husband, and with friends all around. Everything is going just fine.
But when she meets her new boss, her peaceful world is thrown into delightful, exciting, and frustrating chaos. Tyler is perfect for Lottie, but her kids do not agree. To make matters worse, the handsome and mysterious Seb appears on the scene, intriguing — and distracting — Lottie and charming her children, making it more and more difficult to make up her mind…
Falling for You by Jill Mansell
As a teen, Maddy Harvey was a bit of an ugly duckling. Luckily she’s blossomed since then, and Maddy thanks God for this small miracle when a tall, handsome stranger comes to her rescue one starry summer’s night.
Instant attraction becomes a disaster in the making when Maddy learns the identity of her superman: Kerr McKinnon. Of all the colorful residents of the small Cotswold town of Ashcombe, why did it have to be him? Because as family feuds go, the Montagues and the Capulets have nothing on the Harveys and the McKinnons.
Won:
The Darcys of Pemberley by Shannon Winslow — from Austenprose
Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy have been married for almost a year, and their heated arguments are a thing of the past. All that passion is now directed into more satisfying pursuits. But how long can the honeymoon last? The couple’s idyllic life together at Pemberley is jeopardized by secrets they begin keeping, and the threat of a villain in their midst. The Darcys of Pemberley is the tale of two romances: the continuation of Darcy and Elizabeth’s story, and the courtship of Miss Georgiana.
Miss Georgiana Darcy of Pemberley by Shannon Winslow — from Austenprose
What’s Georgiana Darcy’s story? Jane Austen tells us so little in Pride and Prejudice that we’re left to wonder. How did the early loss of her parents shape Miss Darcy’s character? And what about her near-disastrous affair with Mr. Wickham? Is that the true source of her shyness? She adores her brother and his new wife Elizabeth, but will their guiding influence be enough to steer Georgiana clear of new trouble as she comes of age and falls in love again?
This work is intended as a companion of sorts to The Darcys of Pemberley (sequel to Pride and Prejudice), with the timelines of the two running parallel. Both novels are unique and complete in themselves, but together they supply a richer reading experience than either one alone. The earlier book focused primarily on Darcy and Elizabeth’s relationship during their early married life. There was a third Darcy represented in the title, however. Now she and her courtship story take center stage in Miss Georgiana Darcy of Pemberley.
Wedding Night by Lily Lord — from a Facebook release party
Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy become man and wife and begin exploring the privileges of matrimony. To unschooled Lizzy, the passionate nights are shocking but exciting. She wants to please her husband, but how far must she go before she fears her own desires are so lustful and wanton that they are unseemly in the wife of a gentleman?
Twice Tempted by Lily Lord — from a Facebook release party
Everything is new to the former Miss Elizabeth Bennet, as is to be expected of a young lady of her time. Eager as she is to please her husband, some things don’t go according to her wishes, or his.
Mr. Darcy has planned an elaborate journey in celebration of their marriage. The trip from Netherfield to the Lake region, in the company of Elizabeth’s sister Jane and her new husband Charles Bingley, is lovely but difficult to enjoy. What Lizzy is experiencing in the evenings is so personal that she cannot bear to share it, even with her sister. Caught between dread and delight when she considers the next night with her husband, the new Mrs. Darcy’s days are a roller coaster of anticipation.
Third Tryst by Lily Lord — from a Facebook release party
Three days after her wedding, Lizzy is ever more delighted by the amorous attentions of her new husband.
But when the couple stays overnight at Viscount B___’s house on their way north from Hertfordshire to the Lake region, Darcy imbibes a bit too much of their host’s vintage brandy.
The elaborate post-wedding journey with the Bingleys includes glorious days full of beautiful sights, but Elizabeth’s nights in the bedchamber with Mr. Darcy are even more exciting. They open up a world of sensations that the former Miss Bennet had never imagined…and which she is every evening more eager to explore.
Teatime Tales: Short and Sweet Austen-Inspired Stories by Leenie Brown — from DarcyandLizzy.Com
This book is a collection of short and sweet Austen-inspired stories intended to be a light pick-me-up…a bit of fluff to brighten your day.
From Oxford Cottage by Leenie Brown
A Music Room Meeting
A look at the beginning of Richard and Harriet’s relationshipFrom Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
With All My Love
A letter from Edmund to FannyFrom Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Mr. Bingley Plans a Ball
Mr. Bingley returns to NetherfieldFrom Tolerable to Lovely
A ballroom blunder stops Mr. Darcy’s famous disparagementA Battle of Wills and Words
Elizabeth engages in a verbal joust with Colonel FitzwilliamTwo Days in November
Darcy and Elizabeth embark on a plan to bring happiness to Jane
Unexpected arrivals:
Cleopatra’s Shadow by Emily Holleman — from Little, Brown
Arsinoe, the bright and incisive eight-year-old daughter of King Ptolemy, awakens one morning from an ominous dream of statues weeping blood to find that her reality is even worse. There’s been a violent coup, and she is stranded alone in the palace, abandoned by both her beloved older sister Cleopatra and her indifferent father. The new monarch? Arsinoe’s half sister Berenice, who has seized the throne and now rules over a bloodthirsty royal court.
Arsinoe’s struggle to establish herself in this strange new world takes her from the palace to the streets of war-torn Alexandria, where she must cast off her childhood comforts, including her idolization of Cleopatra. Meanwhile, Berenice confronts her own demons — her cruel, dying mother, a pair of fickle husbands, and the ever-present threat of her father’s return from exile — as she fights to maintain power as the first queen to rule Egypt alone in a thousand years. When their deposed father, Ptolemy, marches on the city with a Roman army, both daughters must decide where their allegiances truly lie, and Arsinoe grapples with the difficult truth — that the only way to survive her dynasty is to rule it.
The Witches: Salem, 1692 by Stacy Schiff — from Little, Brown
It began in early 1692, over an exceptionally raw Massachusetts winter, when a minister’s daughter began to writhe and roar. It ended less than a year later, but not before nineteen men and women had been hanged and an elderly man crushed to death.
The panic spread quickly, involving the most educated men and prominent politicians in the colony. Neighbors accused neighbors, husbands accused wives, parents and children one another. Speaking loudly and emphatically, adolescent girls stood at the center of the crisis. Aside from suffrage, the Salem witch trials represent the only moment when women played the central role in American history.
The Witches is Stacy Schiff’s thriller of an account of this sentinel story — a great American mystery unveiled in crackling detail by one of our most acclaimed historians.
Free e-book (not sure if it is still free):
Courting Destiny: Homecoming (Pride and Prejudice Legacies Book 1) by Lily Granson
Introducing Mr William Bryce the 2nd. The dashing son of the famous lord of Cumberland has arrived home after completing several years of service in the Royal Navy. Formerly a reluctant heir, after traveling the world he is now ready to take on the role he was born to. He understands it will mean finding a suitable wife, someone fit to be Lady of Cumberland, and he is also ready for that…or is he?
There are plenty of eligible young ladies to vie for his attention, after all who wouldn’t want to be the future Lady of Cumberland? Three young ladies in particular stand out. All three have their attractions, but one in particular, the beautiful Destiny Blaine, catches his attention. Destiny is different, while her family is by far the least wealthy of the three, she cares not for titles and the trappings of wealth. Despite this, she finds her fondness for Mr. Bryce growing into something much deeper.
That’s where her troubles begin, William’s growing affection for her has not gone unnoticed, and what neither of them realize is that some young women will do whatever they can to get what…and who they want.
What books did you add to your shelves recently?
© 2015 Anna Horner of Diary of an Eccentric. All Rights Reserved. Please do not reproduce or republish content without permission.
Enjoy!
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Thanks!
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That’s quite a Jill Mansell haul you’ve got there. I hope you enjoy your new books. I particularly like the sound of Cleopatra’s Shadow. I love anything to do with Ancient Egypt 🙂
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Mansell is an auto-buy for me, and I had to get my hands on all her 2015 releases!
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Falling for you is one I don’t have yet!
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I waited until it was out to order them all at once.
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Those should keep you busy for a little while. You will love the Mansell books.
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I hope so!
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Oh, I want The Witches!
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It does look fantastic!
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Gorgeous Jill Mansell books! So many goodies in your mailbox. Happy reading 🙂
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Thanks, Lucy!
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These all look so lovely! I haven’t yet read Jill Mansell, but I think I must! Here are MY WEEKLY UPDATES
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Yes, you must! 🙂
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I keep wanting to read Jill Mansell, but I have yet to! Your mailbox looks lovely. Cleopatra’s shadow looks very interesting. Enjoy your new books!
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Thanks, Kay! I hope you give Mansell a try. She’s my go-to author for comfort reads.
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I keep meaning to read a Mansell book. Congratulations on your win!
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Thanks, Vicki! I hope you get a chance to try Mansell. She’s one of the few authors on my auto-buy list.
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Wow…what a mailbox.
I like THE WITCHES.
Have a great reading week.
Elizabeth
Silver’s Reviews
My Mailbox Monday
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Thanks, Elizabeth!
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The Jill Manson books look fabulous!
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I’m so excited to finally have them!
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Wow, Anna, you have a ton of new books! I hope you will have plenty of time to dive into them this month. Happy reading!
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Thanks, Suko! It always seems that I collect them faster than I can read them.
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Cleopatra’s Shadows and The Witches both sound fantastic. I hope you enjoy them!
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Thanks!
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The last one is still free with Kindle Unlimited.
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Good to know, thanks!
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Nice week! I received Cleopatra’s Shadows and The Witches last week and both sound great.
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Thanks! I’ll keep an eye out for your reviews.
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