5 stars

Kissing the Cotton Clouds – Michela O’Brien

Apr 30, 2012
Rose

Kissing the Cotton Clouds - Michela O'BrienKissing the Cotton Clouds
Michela O’Brien

When arty Livy falls for her sister’s boyfriend, she knows her dreams are unlikely to come true…

Sensitive Seth thinks he has hit the jackpot when the girl of his dreams finally looks his way…

While laidback Aidan is every girl’s hero.

Fast forward twenty-five years as carefree youth turns into adulthood responsibilities, relationships begin and end, music and fashion change, and life moves on with its successes, failures and heartaches. As the friends grow up, they discover life rarely turns out the way you imagined it at fifteen.

The rites of passage through years are eerily familiar to every 1980s teenager in this moving, heartfelt novel.

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The Love Letter – Fiona Walker

Apr 30, 2012
Char

The Love Letter - Fiona WalkerThe Love Letter
Fiona Walker

Can fate be signed, sealed and delivered?

When Allegra North parted from first love Francis after a decade together, she poured all her regret into a letter. He didn’t reply. A year later, her job brings her back to the beautiful Devon coast where romance first blossomed and she hopes that they can start a new chapter.

As summer storms circle, the exes juggle rebellious parents, vengeful family members and a very reluctant celebrity author who holds the key to everybody’s future…

The Love Letter is a wonderfully warm comedy of mistaken identities, new loves and old flames.

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99 Reasons Why – Caroline Smailes

Apr 2, 2012
Beth

99 Reasons Why - Caroline Smailes99 Reasons Why
Caroline Smailes

99 Reasons, 11 endings, your pick.

Kate isn’t like other 22 year olds. She’s got a job to do for her Uncle Phil. Each day, she spies on The Kevin Keegan Day Nursery across the road from her bedroom window, writing down all of the comings and goings in her notebooks. That’s how she spots her little girl in the pink coat. She likes her, and it isn’t long before Kate asks her mam to get her for her. Plans are made.

But then, quite unexpectedly, Kate flashes her breasts out her bedroom window at the little girl’s father. And that’s the reason that nothing will ever be the same again…

There is no one ending to Kate’s story, instead there are eleven possible outcomes, 9 of which you can navigate through your e-reading device. Each is different, and each exposes a little more of Kate’s utterly wonky world.

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The Brief History of the Dead – Kevin Brockmeier

Mar 6, 2012
Sarah

The Brief History of the Dead - Kevin BrockmeierThe Brief History of the Dead
Kevin Brockmeier

‘Remember me when I’m gone’ just took on a whole new meaning . . .

Laura Byrd is in trouble. Three weeks ago she and her friends found themselves alone in one of the coldest, most remote places on earth. Her friends set out in search of help, and now Laura realises that they are not coming back. So she gathers her remaining supplies and sets out on an extraordinary journey.

Meanwhile in another city, more and more people arrive every day. Each has a different story to tell, but their accounts have one thing in common – it was their final journey. For this is the city of the dead. And the link between this city and Laura’s journey lies at the heart of this remarkable novel.

The Brief History of the Dead tells a magical story about our lives – about our place in the world, our connections with each other, and what happens to us all after our deaths. It is a story of spellbinding power and imagination, which resonates long after the final page.

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Bad Moon Rising – Frances di Plino

Mar 3, 2012
Beth

Bad Moon Rising - Frances di PlinoBad Moon Rising
Frances di Plino

Bad Moon Rising is a dark psychological thriller.

Brought up believing sex with the living is the devil’s work, a killer only finds release once he has saved his victims’ souls. Abiding by his vision, he marks them as his. A gift to guide his chosen ones on the rightful path to redemption.

Detective Inspector Paolo Storey is out to stop him, but Paolo has problems of his own. Hunting down the killer as the death toll rises, the lines soon blur between Paolo’s personal and professional lives.

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The House on Willow Street – Cathy Kelly

Mar 3, 2012
Char

The House on Willow Street - Cathy KellyThe House on Willow Street
Cathy Kelly

The warm, engrossing new paperback from the natural heir to Maeve Binchy.

Tess used to be happy with her lot: she lives in the idyllic Irish coastal village, Avalon, with her teenage son, Zach and nine-year-old Kitty, and works in the local antiques shop. Her only regret in life is that everything went so horribly wrong with her first love. Then her marriage falls apart and her first love returns to Avalon.

Suki, Tess’s sister, fled Ireland years ago to marry politician Kyle Richardon, but when Suki discovers that a biographer is planning to tell all, there is only one place she can go to ensure that her secrets stay hidden.

Danae is the village post mistress in Avalon and she’s worked very hard to make sure nobody knows where she came from or who she is… Her past is her business and that’s the way she would like to keep it.

In Galway, Mara sits with a smile glued to her face at a wedding; she only wants to ask the groom one thing: why did he tell her he loved her? Needing to put her past behind her, Mara packs up her life and gets ready for a fresh start.

Can these four women lay their pasts to rest? Or do they need to look back before they can begin to live for the future?

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Johnny Be Good – Paige Toon

Mar 1, 2012
Rose

Johnny Be Good - Paige ToonJohnny be Good
Paige Toon

If your boss was the hottest rock star on the planet, would you mix business with pleasure?

I’m Meg Stiles. This is my leaving party. And that song we’re making a mockery of? That’s written by one of the biggest rock stars in the world. And I’m moving in with him tomorrow. Seriously! I am not even joking.

Well, maybe I’m misleading you a little bit. You see, I haven’t actually met him yet…

No, I’m not a stalker. I’m his new PA. His Personal Assistant. And I am off to La-La Land. Los Angeles. The City of Angels – whatever you want to call it – and I can’t bloody believe it!

Celebrity PA to wild boy of rock Johnny Jefferson, Meg’s glam new life in sun-drenched LA is a whirlwind of showbiz parties and backstage passes. Cool, calm Christian, in town to write his famous friend’s biography, helps keep Meg’s feet firmly on the ground. But with Johnny’s piercing green eyes and a body Brad Pitt would kill for, how long will it be before she’s swept right off them again?

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Baby Be Mine – Paige Toon

Feb 20, 2012
Rose

Baby Be Mine - Paige ToonBaby Be Mine
Paige Toon

‘He’s not mine, is he?’ That’s the question I fear the most. You see, I have a secret. My son is not fathered by my boyfriend, but by one of the most famous rock stars that ever lived. And he doesn’t even know it.

One-time celebrity personal assistant to wild boy of rock Johnny Jefferson, Meg Stiles is now settled and living in the south of France with her doting boyfriend Christian and their son Barney. But they’re living a lie – a lie that will turn their lives upside down and inside out – because as Barney reaches his first birthday, Meg can no longer deny that her son is growing to look more and more like his rock star father every day, and less and less like Christian, and sooner or later, the world is going to realise…

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The Stag and Hen Weekend – Mike Gayle

Feb 7, 2012
Rose

The Stag and Hen Weekend - Mike GayleThe Stag and Hen Weekend
Mike Gayle

The Stag and Hen Weekend is the story of Phil and Helen, a couple in their thirties about to commit their lives to one another… that is of course if they can just manage to get through their respective stag and hen weekends (his: Amsterdam; hers: a country house and day spa in the Peak District) without falling apart.

Told in the unique form of two separate stories that have common characters as well as themes and conclusion, The Stag and Hen Weekend can be read from front to back or from back to front putting the reader in the driver’s seat as to which story they wish to read first. Feisty, fun and thought provoking.

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In Search of Adam – Caroline Smailes

Feb 2, 2012
Beth

In Search of Adam - Caroline SmailesIn Search of Adam
Caroline Smailes

A taut and beautifully written debut novel by an exciting and accomplished new author.

Motherless, rootless and unprotected, Jude Williams’ childhood is fractured by the horror and experience of sexual abuse, forcing her to exist somewhere and nowhere in-between childhood and adulthood. Caught within the limitations of her own language and trapped within a family secret, Jude becomes the consequence of her mother’s tragedy. As she moves through the 1980s, Jude’s life is buffeted by choice and destiny and she collects experiences that layer her personal tragedy and plunge her into the darkest of worlds.

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Interview With The Vampire – Anne Rice

Feb 1, 2012
Lauren C.

Interview With The Vampire - Anne RiceInterview With The Vampire
Anne Rice

In a darkened room a young man sits telling the macabre and eerie story of his life – the story of a vampire, gifted with eternal life, cursed with an exquisite craving for human blood.

Anne Rice’s compulsively readable novel is arguably the most celebrated work of vampire fiction since Bram Stoker’s Dracula was published in 1897.

As the Washington Post said on its first publication, it is a ‘thrilling, strikingly original work of the imagination … sometimes horrible, sometimes beautiful, always unforgettable’.

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Mile High Guy – Marisa Mackle

Jan 30, 2012
Rose

The Mile High Guy - Marisa MackleThe Mile High Guy
Marisa Mackle

Welcome on board, Ladies and Gentlemen!

Mingling with rich and famous first class passengers is all in a day’s work for Katie. But when she meets a gorgeous, eligible TV star on board a transatlantic flight from New York to Dublin, her whole word is turned upside down.

Adam is everything a woman could want and more. But why is he insisting on keeping their relationship a secret? And is really a member of THAT club?

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Bad Sisters – Rebecca Chance

Jan 26, 2012
Rose

Bad Sisters - Rebecca ChanceBad Sisters
Rebecca Chance

Three sisters, one deadly secret.

Deeley is the fake wife of a gay Hollywood hunk. But now her contract is up, and Deeley is left penniless and alone. Devon is married to rugby-hunk Matt, and hosts her own TV cookery show. But behind her buxom facade, Devon is desperately lonely. Maxie is politician’s wife, and fiercely ambitious. So when Deeley threatens to expose their past, just how far will Maxie go to keep it hidden?

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The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight – Jennifer E. Smith

Jan 17, 2012
Nikki

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight - Jennifer E. SmithThe Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight
Jennifer E. Smith

Who would have guessed that four minutes could change everything?

Imagine if she hadn’t forgotten the book. Or if there hadn’t been traffic on the expressway. Or if she hadn’t fumbled the coins for the toll. What if she’d run just that little bit faster and caught the flight she was supposed to be on? Would it have been something else – the weather over the Atlantic or a fault with the plane?

Hadley isn’t sure if she believes in destiny or fate but, on what is potentially the worst day of each of their lives, it’s the quirks of timing and chance events that mean Hadley meets Oliver…

Set over a 24-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver’s story will make you believe that true love finds you when you’re least expecting it.

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