Summer in a Bottle by Annie Rains

Summer in a Bottle by Annie Rains
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Kensington for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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In this tender, uplifting novel for fans of Josie Silver and Rebecca Serle, a young woman returns to her North Carolina hometown hoping to make new memories, but finds history repeating itself—literally . . .

Dumped by her fiancé, opinion columnist Lyla Dune returns to small-town Echo Cove to heal, and to help her parents prep their house for sale. When she decides to open a time capsule she buried in high school, past memories lead her to a diary filled with memorable moments from the last summer she spent at home, right before college. Some of the events feel like they happened yesterday. That’s normal. Not so normal is that they actually start happening all over again . . .

Lyla gets a flat tire in the same spot and is saved by the same person. The same movie is playing at the theater. Her house has the same leak it once had. As her current summer increasingly mirrors that last one, Lyla worries it will end just as disastrously: with a category 3 hurricane—and with losing Travis, the best friend she was always secretly in love with. If only she hadn’t been too scared to admit it.

She revisits other fears too, like the fear of rejection that led her to abandon her passion for fiction writing. And when she reconnects with Travis, Lyla becomes certain that unless she does what her younger self was unable to do, she’ll suffer the same regrets. But if this time around she can gather her courage, maybe the life that was falling apart when she arrived will fall back together—even better than before.
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Annie Rains is always good for an enjoyable story that offers plenty of romance but much more than that, and her newest offering is no different. Lyla finds herself back home, a little bit down on her luck and at loose ends, and she isn't sure how she will be received. She has burned some bridges, and she is feeling some trepidation about reconnecting with the people of her past. And then she finds herself experiencing some major déjà vu.

This is a fun book, with a little bit of magic thrown in. There are some more serious plot points (CW: child loss), but for the most part, I found it be very uplifting. The central romance plot is satisfying, and even more satisfying for me was the strong theme of second chances and women's friendships. As we head into summer, this book is the perfect read for anyone who has ever wondered what would happen if you had the chance to go back and right old wrongs or redo some things from your past, as well as anyone who is looking for a warm, feel-good story complete with more than one HEA.


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The Book Club for Troublesome Women by Marie Bostwick

The Book Club for Troublesome Women by Marie Bostwick
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Muse for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Margaret Ryan never really meant to start a book club . . . or a feminist revolution in her buttoned-up suburb.

By 1960s standards, Margaret Ryan is living the American woman's dream. She has a husband, three children, a station wagon, and a home in Concordia--one of Northern Virginia's most exclusive and picturesque suburbs. She has a standing invitation to the neighborhood coffee klatch, and now, thanks to her husband, a new subscription to A Woman's Place--a magazine that tells housewives like Margaret exactly who to be and what to buy. On paper, she has it all. So why doesn't that feel like enough?

Margaret is thrown for a loop when she first meets Charlotte Gustafson, Concordia's newest and most intriguing resident. As an excuse to be in the mysterious Charlotte's orbit, Margaret concocts a book club get-together and invites two other neighborhood women--Bitsy and Viv--to the inaugural meeting. As the women share secrets, cocktails, and their honest reactions to the controversial bestseller The Feminine Mystique, they begin to discover that the American dream they'd been sold isn't all roses and sunshine--and that their secret longing for more is something they share. Nicknaming themselves the Bettys, after Betty Friedan, these four friends have no idea their impromptu club and the books they read together will become the glue that helps them hold fast through tears, triumphs, angst, and arguments--and what will prove to be the most consequential and freeing year of their lives.
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I have read many of Marie Bostwick’s books in the past and always enjoyed them, so when I found this on NetGalley, I was quick to request it. I don’t read a lot of historical fiction, and I have never (although I am a feminist) read The Feminine Mystique. However, I think the impact Betty Friedan had on women’s realization that there was more to life than what they found in their roles in the family is pretty well known.

Bostwick tells the story of four very different suburban housewives brought together by geography and bonded by what first is a “little” book club but then becomes so much more with such beauty and care and humor. Each women’s story is very different from the other, but the lengths they are willing to go to for each other shows how strong female friendships can hold us up and carry us through all the stages of life. I found myself feeling a full range of emotions, celebrating victories for the women and shedding a tear on an occasion or two. This book is definitely one that I would recommend to anyone who enjoys strong female characters, historical fiction of a period that is perhaps not often written about, and an uplifting story that celebrates the strength of women coming together in community.

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Summer Light on Nantucket by Nancy Thayer

Summer Light on Nantucket by Nancy Thayer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine Books for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!
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A touching novel about parenthood, first love, family bonds, and rekindled relationships from the New York Times bestselling author and beloved Nantucket storyteller Nancy Thayer.

Blythe Benedict is content. Her life didn’t end when her marriage did. In fact, she’s more than happy living in her comfortable house in Boston, working as a middle school teacher, and raising four wonderful children. With three of her kids in the throes of teenagerhood and one not too far behind them, Blythe has plenty of drama to keep her busy every single day.

But no amount of that drama could change the family’s beloved annual summer trip to Nantucket. Blythe has always treasured the months spent at her island home-away-from-home, and has fond memories of her children growing up there. But this summer’s getaway proves to be much more than she bargained for.

Yes, there are sunny days enjoyed at the beach. But Blythe must contend with teenage angst, her ex-mother-in-law’s declining health, and a troubling secret involving her ex-husband. Meanwhile, Blythe reconnects with her first love, her former high school sweetheart Aaden. But their second-time-around romance becomes complicated when another intriguing man enters the picture.

It’s all a bit out of Blythe’s comfort zone. This particular island summer may not be as relaxing as Blythe had hoped, but she’s never felt that life has given her more than she can handle—especially when she has the love and support of her family around her.
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Every summer, I look forward to a new Nancy Thayer novel. After all, what summer would be complete without a trip to Nantucket, if only in my mind? Her ability to capture the beauty and magic of this island (which I have never actually visited) is a delight. I also look forward to the relationships she writes so well, whether they are romantic relationships or friendships or family relationships. She has a real ability to capture the day-to-day nuance in the interactions between people and make them come alive.

That being said, this one was a little less interesting of a story for me. While it still had all the elements that make Thayer’s books special for me, I found myself caring just a little bit less than usual about the love story than I usually do. It wasn’t enough to make it a bad read for me or for me not to recommend it…fans of this type of book will still really enjoy it. But it was not a one-sitting book like so many of Thayer’s books have been in the past. Still, I would give it a solid four stars and recommend it to fans of women’s fiction who enjoy Elin Hilderbrand, Mary Alice Monroe, Dorothea Benton Frank, and similar authors.

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The Griffin Sisters' Greatest Hits by Jennifer Weiner

The Griffin Sisters' Greatest Hits by Jennifer Weiner
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and William Morrow for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Cassie and Zoe Grossberg were thrust into the spotlight as The Griffin Sisters, a pop duo that defined the aughts. Together, they skyrocketed to the top, gracing MTV, SNL, and the cover of Rolling Stone. Cassie, a musical genius who never felt at ease in her own skin, preferred to stay in the shadows. Zoe, full of confidence and craving fame, lived for the stage. But fame has a price, and after one turbulent year, the band abruptly broke up.

Now, two decades later, the sisters couldn’t be further apart. Zoe is a suburban mom warning her daughter Cherry to avoid the spotlight, while Cassie has disappeared from public life entirely. But when Cherry begins unearthing the truth behind their breathtaking rise and infamous breakup, long-buried secrets surface, forcing all three women to confront their choices, their desires, and their complicated bonds.

With richly developed characters, a nostalgic nod to the pop culture of the 2000s, and a resonant tale of ambition, forgiveness, and family, The Griffin Sisters' Greatest Hits will captivate readers from the first note to the final encore. Whether you’ve followed Jennifer Weiner for years or are discovering her for the first time, this book is a must-read for music lovers, fans of sisterly dramas, and anyone who cherishes a great story of second chances.
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Jennifer Weiner's novel Good in Bed was life-changing for me, and I have continued to read and enjoy every book she has written. I was a little worried about this one because I am not a huge music buff, and it was clear that the music industry was going to be a major plot point...would this be too central to the story to hold my interest? I don't even watch shows like American Idol and The Voice. I listen to podcasts and audiobooks in my car.

Well, it turns out I did not need to worry. This was a story about so much more than music. It was about family and sisterhood and finding yourself and losing yourself and finding yourself again. It was about making mistakes and redeeming yourself. I just finished it, and I have to admit that the words were blurry because my eyes were filled with tears...the ending of this book was one of the most satisfying I have read in a while. I loved it.

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Swept Away by Beth O'Leary

Swept Away by Beth O'Leary
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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Two strangers find themselves stranded at sea together in this epic new love story by bestselling author Beth O’Leary.

What if you were lost at sea…with your one-night stand?

Zeke and Lexi thought it would just be a night of fun. They had no intentions of seeing each other again. Zeke is only in town for the weekend to buy back his late father’s houseboat. Lexi has no time for dating when she needs to help take care of her best friend's daughter.

Going back home with a stranger seems like a perfect escape from their problems. But a miscommunication in the dark, foggy night means no one tied the houseboat to the dock. The next morning, Zeke and Lexi realize all they can see is miles and miles of water.

With just a few provisions on the idle boat, Zeke and Lexi must figure out how to get back home. But aside from their survival, they’re facing another challenge. Because when you’re stuck together for days on end, it gives you a lot of time to get to know someone—and to fall in love with them.
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I have loved every book I have ever read by Beth O'Leary, so when this one showed up on NetGalley, I was quick to request it, and I am so glad I did! The adventurous plot line of this book made this one a little different from her other novels, but all the elements that make her stories so enjoyable were still there. There was excellent character development and growth, which I really enjoyed. I am more of an open door romance fan, so the fact that this wasn't a super spicy romance had me giving it bonus points. And the addition of Eugene the Seagull (my dad's name is Eugene) filled the spot that a dog usually holds in some of my favorite romance novels.

There was one big twist at the end that was kind of a gimme, but it was still a good one, and the fact that I guessed it ahead of time didn't ruin it for me. And there was another twist that happened that I didn't guess that was handled in an unexpected and lovely way that kind of lent a redemptive arc to a relationship that I didn't expect to want so much. There was a lot of miscommunication, which often annoys me, but it was written well and not drawn out beyond the point that it was reasonable, so it didn't feel overdone.

Overall, I would say this wasn't my favorite of O'Leary book (I really loved The Flatshare, and it will be hard to beat that!), but I did love spending most of the day with Zeke and Lexi (and Eugene) as I read this one almost in one sitting.

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Any Trope but You by Victoria Lavine

Any Trope but You by Victoria Lavine
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for providing me with an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
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A bestselling romance author flees to Alaska to reinvent herself and write her first murder mystery, but the rugged resort proprietor soon has her fearing she’s living in a rom-com plot instead in this earnestly spectacular debut by a stunning new voice.

Beloved romance author Margot Bradley has a dark secret: she doesn’t believe in Happily Ever Afters. Not for herself, not for her readers, and not even for her characters, for whom she secretly writes alternate endings that swap weddings and babies for divorce papers and the occasional slashed tire. When her Happily Never After document is hacked and released to the public, she finds herself canceled by her readers and dropped by her publisher.

Desperate to find a way to continue supporting her chronically ill sister, Savannah, Margot decides to trade meet-cutes for murder. The fictional kind. Probably. But when Savannah books Margot a six-week stay in a remote Alaskan resort to pen her first murder mystery, Margot finds herself running from a moose and leaping into the arms of the handsome proprietor, making her fear she’s just landed in a romance novel instead.

The last thing Dr. Forrest Wakefield ever expected was to leave his dream job as a cancer researcher to become a glorified bellhop. What he’s really doing at his family’s resort is caring for his stubborn, ailing father, and his puzzle-loving mind is slowly freezing over—until Margot shows up. But Forrest doesn’t have any room in his life for another person he could lose, especially one with a checkout date.

As long snowy nights and one unlikely trope after another draw Margot and Forrest together, they’ll each have to learn to overcome their fears and set their aside assumptions before Margot leaves—or risk becoming a Happily Never After story themselves.
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Oh, what to say about this book? I was very excited to get to read this ahead of print because the premise sounded so much fun. I am a huge romcom fan, and the idea of a book that was made up of all the tropes that contemporary romance fans loved sounded really promising. And there were a lot of things I really enjoyed about this book. The setting was great, and I really liked the sort of found family aspect that was touched on when Margot found herself in Alaska. And it was a good story. However, this wasn't the kind of book that I found myself rushing home from work to pick up and read before I did anything else, and I have to admit I set it aside a couple of times in order to read something else. That being said, I never considered DNFing it, and I was happy with the conclusion, so I would definitely recommend it to people who enjoy romance, and I do think that I will check out this author as she continues to write more in the future. It just maybe turns out that you can have too many tropes crammed into one book, and for me, it was not as much fun as I thought it was going to be.

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January Wrap-up

Well, it's March, and I am finally getting around to writing some kind of January wrap-up, which is par for the course around here. If anyone ever stumbles upon this dusty little corner of the Internet (Is "Next Blog" even a thing anymore?), you will find procrastination and lack of execution is a real stumbling block in my desire to be a "real" book blogger. Luckily, I have Goodreads to do much of the heavy lifting for me, and I belong to several book clubs on Facebook, so I am still able to enjoy the perks that NetGalley has to offer. As an aside, if you have ever considered joining NetGalley and trying to get your hands on advanced copies of books to review but have thought you don't have enough clout do so, let me be your muse. I started out by searching for a "read now" book that was available to anyone and read it (and it was a really good book...and I got a very sweet email from the author thanking me for my review, which was an unexpected bonus) and reviewed it on Goodreads and on the NetGalley site. I then started requesting books that looked good to me in my chosen genres (women's fiction, general fiction, romance, and thriller). I focused heavily on authors I already love, but I also branched out based on recommendations I found on social media. I have been a member since 2019, and I have been active off and on, so while I have been approved for a total of 96 books (and reviewed 41 so far), I have been approved for 26 titles that have been or will be published in 2025. My goal this year is to read and post reviews for each of these titles before their publication dates, which I admit I have not always done. A special thrill has been that, on occasion, I have gotten books sent directly to my email from publishers for me to review. ME! This has included books by Nora Roberts, Mary Kay Andrews, Christina Lauren, and Katherine Center, and each time, I have had to pinch myself because it has felt like such a gift for a reader like myself to have the opportunity to read these books before they are on sale to the general public. I do not take this gift lightly, and I encourage you to check it out if you think it might be something of interest to you. NetGalley suggests a goal review percentage of 80%, which is a lofty dream. If I get the rest of these 2025 books read and reviewed on time, I will sit right at 60%, which is the best my percentage will have ever been and will be a number I am happy with.

Anyway, on to January! In January, I read 13 books, which was the equivalent of 4568 pages. However, two of these were audiobooks, for a total of 20 hours of listening time. One book, Promise Me Sunshine by Cara Bastone, was an advanced reader's copy from NetGalley that was reviewed here. Five of the books I read I rated five stars. Two of these were the audiobooks I listened to, which were books that I had read in the past, Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez and Beach Read (reviewed here) by Emily Henry. One was Promise Me Sunshine, which I immediately requested after reading Bastone's debut novel Ready or Not, which I heard about last year on, of course, social media. It was another five-star read for me. If you are a contemporary romance fan, both of these books should be added to your TBR shelf immediately. Another was The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston, which I loved with every part of me. I had only read one other of her books, A Novel Love Story, which I also really enjoyed (a four-star read for me in 2024), but this one just had me from page one, and I can't wait to read The Seven Year Slip, as well as the book she has coming out this year Sounds Like Love. And then my final five-star review for January went to a real departure for me, which I read to fulfill a category in one of my reading challenges for 2025 (the sci-fi category in my Book BINGO in my reading journal), Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. I do not read sci-fi, but I also saw this listed as a thriller, and in 2024, I really entered by Thriller Era. I consumed those things like popcorn. When I had to dip my toe into the sci-fi waters, I heard that Blake Crouch was the way to go because his books would be sci-fi-ish without being "too much." Well, this book grabbed me by the throat and would not let go. I loooooooooooved it. I did find that I had to really tune in with my brain, and it was a thinking person's book, but the story was fast-paced and amazing, and I have already purchased his Wayward Pines trilogy on audio for my listening pleasure.

The rest of the month was mixed bag of four- and three-star reads that I won't bore you with details of. I really had a fun month with a mix split pretty evenly between thrillers and contemporary romance novels, which are usually my two top genres. As an aside, does anyone else recall really loving the word genre when they first learned it back in school? My first real memory of that word comes from a high school English class, taught by a cherished teacher who really shaped so much of my development as a reader, and every time I type it out, I get a little flash of how he encouraged me to really lean in to my love of reading. Such good memories.

I will be back (she says, with good intentions, but a history of lack of follow-through) with February sometime soon. I should warn you that I am a liberal Democrat whose reading life got derailed by the political climate in February, as well as the 20-hour audiobook version of Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver (Spoiler alert: I may have already found my top book of the year.), so February was not as prolific of a month as January, but I am trying to head back in the right direction in March. We have a lot of months left in 2025, and my 100-book goal is still well within reach. My challenges in my reading journal are looking less promising, but we do what we can do, right?

Happy reading!