Drawing Lessons by Patricia Sands

A special thank you to the author, Patricia Sands, for generously providing me with a copy to review.

Sixty-two-year-old Arianna arrives in the South of France for a two-week artists’ workshop. She is full of anticipation, but weighted down with the guilt of leaving her husband, Ben, back in Toronto—he is literally slipping away before her very eyes. 

After her husband's devastating diagnosis with dementia and caring for him with little time for herself, Arianna's family have convinced her to take some time away. It is in Arles where Arianna rediscovers her passion for art, finding comfort in her her fellow artists and from the guest lecturer, Jacques de Villeneuve. 

Drawing Lessons is one woman's moving journey to seek the permission of her heart to create a new life for herself. 

I had the sincerest pleasure of meeting Patricia, totally by chance, at a launch party for another author. She is absolutely delightful and her warmth and wonderful personality comes through on the page—her books are like reading letters from a cherished friend. 

Sands' intimate portrait of Arles will have readers falling in love with the city. Rich in art history—most notably van Gogh—it is the perfect canvas for her story. Patricia carefully and compassionately writes about dementia, a disease that is sadly so prevalent today. It is through painting that Arianna begins the healing process and she is able to come to terms with her husband's condition. Art is the perfect vehicle for Arianna's story to unfold.  

What I love most about the book is reading about characters that are not widely published—a mature woman as well as someone who is on the autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This is refreshing. Thank you, Patricia, we all need more stories with diverse characters.  

Drawing Lessons is a reminder to enjoy the pleasures life has to offer, even the simple ones. 

BUY NOW

PATRICIA SANDS is a proud indie author who is also delighted to be under contract with Lake Union Publishing for her Love in Provence series. Her award-winning debut novel The Bridge Club was published in 2010 and the audiobook is read by Patricia herself.

With a focus on her love of the south of France, women’s issues and ageing, her stories celebrate the feminine spirit and the power of friendship. Patricia encourages women of all ages to stare down the fear factor and embrace change.

Sands lives in Collingwood with her husband and travels whenever she can.

The Wrong Family by Tarryn Fisher

A special thank you to Edelweiss and Graydon House for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Juno was wrong about Winnie Crouch.

Before moving in with the Crouch family, Juno thought Winnie and her husband, Nigel, had the perfect marriage, the perfect son—the perfect life. Only now that she’s living in their beautiful house, she sees the cracks in the crumbling facade are too deep to ignore.

As a retired therapist, she isn't one to judge. After being diagnosed with an illness, Juno just wants to enjoy the rest of the time she has left. But that is short lived when Juno overhears a chilling and disturbing conversation between Winnie and Nigel…

Juno shouldn’t get involved, but this could be her chance to make a few things right.

Because if you thought Juno didn’t have a secret of her own, then you were wrong about her, too.

Tarryn Fisher has a wicked and brilliant mind. The Wrong Family is her most well-written and polished book to date. Divided into three parts, the story takes place in a striking yet unsettling looking house in Greenlake, a neighbourhood in Seattle, WA. The narrative lives between Winnie's and Juno's third person perspectives. Both women are complex and well-developed, reader's will be shocked while living in their heads. 

The writing is slick and fluid, but there are a few missteps. There are instances where the narrative shifts in time causing overall confusion and for the reader to stumble. Fisher's audience will struggle with the book's overall bulk—there is an unnecessary scene (Friendsgiving) that introduces characters that do nothing to the plot, this is just filler. And at the climax/end/epilogue, there is a genre jump and the book reads more like a horror versus a psychological thriller.    

Tarryn's loyal and rabid PLNs will love this book. Her writing is completely captivating—Fisher wields words, they are definitely her weapon. Parts of the story are simply excellent! But the unreliable/unstable female narrator is so overdone right now and I wish that Tarryn would return to the more angsty relationships that are tinged with her signature darkness.  

BUY NOW

TARRYN FISHER is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Wives.

Born a sun hater, she currently makes her home in Seattle, Washington with her children, husband, and psychotic husky.

Tarryn writes about villains.

Magic Lessons by Alice Hoffman

A special thank you to Edelweiss and Simon & Schuster for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Owens family bloodline begins with Maria in the 1600s. Abandoned as a baby in a snowy field in rural England, Maria is discovered by Hannah Owens who was an orphan herself. Hannah is known not only for her kindness and herbal knowledge, but also for the fact that she could read and write—a rare skill for a working woman from the country. She recognizes that Maria has a gift and teaches the girl all about the "Unnamed Arts." The first lesson: Always love someone who will love you back.

When Maria is abandoned by the man who has declared his love for her, she follows him to Salem, Massachusetts. It is here where she invokes the curse that will haunt her family for centuries to come and where she learns the rules of magic. These are the lessons that Maria will carry with her for the rest of her life. Love is the only thing that matters.

Magic Lessons (the pre-prequel to Practical Magic and the prequel to The Rules of Magic) takes place in 17th-century and centres around the Owens matriarch, Maria. Readers follow her journey from England, to the Caribbean, and Salem, Massachusetts. Maria learns how to unlock the power of magic, including the infamous Owens family curse—any man who loves an Owens woman is doomed.

What I love most about these characters is that they are all strong and powerful women—women that are feared by a world that is not ready for them. Hoffman excels when she is writing about sisterhood and the bond between women. At the heart of this series is love and these are exactly the types of stories that we need more of. 

There is going to be a fourth and final novel in the Practical Magic series that will primarily be about Sally's daughters as grown ups, and breaking the curse that was called down. I literally can't wait!

Magical. Beautiful.  Mesmerizing. Steeped in the history of witchcraft, Magic Lessons is Hoffman at her finest. 

BUY NOW

ALICE HOFFMAN has a BA from Adelphi University and an MA in creative writing from Stanford University.

Hoffman's first novel, Property Of, was written at the age of twenty-one, while she was studying at Stanford, and published shortly thereafter by Farrar Straus and Giroux. Since that remarkable beginning, Alice Hoffman has become one of our most distinguished novelists. She has published over thirty novels, three books of short fiction, and eight books for children and young adults.

Her novel, Here on Earth, an Oprah Book Club choice, was a modern reworking of some of the themes of Emily Bronte’s masterpiece Wuthering Heights. Practical Magic was made into a Warner film starring Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman. Her novel, At Risk, which concerns a family dealing with AIDS, can be found on the reading lists of many universities, colleges and secondary schools. Hoffman’s advance from Local Girls, a collection of inter-related fictions about love and loss on Long Island, was donated to help create the Hoffman Breast Center at Mt. Auburn Hospital in Cambridge, MA.

Hoffman has written a number of novels for young adults, including Aquamarine, Green Angel, and the New York Times bestseller The Ice Queen. In 2007 Little Brown published the teen novel Incantation, a story about hidden Jews during the Spanish Inquisition, which Publishers Weekly has chosen as one of the best books of the year.

Her works have been published in more than twenty translations and more than one hundred foreign editions. Hoffman's novels have received mention as notable books of the year by The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times, Library Journal, and People Magazine. She has also worked as a screenwriter and is the author of the original screenplay “Independence Day,” a film starring Kathleen Quinlan and Diane Wiest. Her teen novel Aquamarine was made into a film starring Emma Roberts. Her short fiction and non-fiction have appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe Magazine, Kenyon Review, The Los Angeles Times, Architectural Digest, Harvard Review, Ploughshares and other magazines.

She currently lives in Boston and New York. 

The Forgotten Daughter by Joanna Goodman

A special thank you to Edelweiss and HarperCollins Canada for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

1992: French-Canadian factions renew Quebec’s fight to gain independence. Véronique Fortin, the beautiful but wild daughter of a radical separatist convicted of kidnapping and murdering a prominent politician in 1970, has embraced her father’s cause. When she falls for James Phénix, a journalist of French-Canadian heritage who opposes Quebec separatism, it comes as quite a surprise. Their love affair is as passionate as it is turbulent—they constantly struggle struggle between love and morals.

James’s older sister, Elodie Phénix, is one of the Duplessis Orphans. She becomes involved with a coalition demanding justice and reparations for their suffering in the 1950s when Quebec’s orphanages were converted to mental hospitals. This heinous political act of Premier Maurice Duplessis affected 5,000 children.

Véronique is the only person Elodie can rely on as she relives her trauma fighting for retribution while Elodie becomes a sisterly presence for Véronique, who continues to struggle with her family’s legacy.

The Forgotten Daughter is a moving portrait of true love, familial bonds, and persistence in the face of injustice. Each character is pushed to their moral brink, discovering which lines they’ll cross and how far they’ll go for what they believe in. 

Told through multiple third person point of view, The Forgotten Daughter is a story of love, loyalty, and friendship. Although it is a prequel to The Home for Unwanted Girls, it can function as a standalone novel, but I would recommend reading them in order. 

Goodman is a compelling storyteller who puts a spotlight on the dark, scandalous parts of Canadian history that quite frankly, nobody has heard of (including myself). But as the story progresses, I found that my attention waned. It is not as gripping as The Home for Unwanted Girls—there is too much going on and it didn't quite have the same flow as the prequel. The flashbacks, although important, are not plotted properly and muddle the timeline which is confusing. 

That being said, I highly recommend The Home for Unwanted Girls. Beautifully written with emotional depth, it is as close to perfect as a book can be.  

BUY NOW

JOANNA GOODMAN is the author of five novels, including #1 national bestseller, The Home for Unwanted Girls as well as The Finishing School, also a national bestseller. 

Originally from Montreal, Goodman now lives in Toronto with her husband and two children.

Goodnight Beautiful: A Novel by Aimee Molloy

A special thank you to Libro.fm and HarperAudio for an audiobook listening copy, and Edelweiss and HarperCollins for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Newlyweds Sam Statler and Annie Potter have left Manhattan to start their life together in Sam’s hometown in upstate New York to be closer to his ailing mother. Annie spends most of her days alone while Sam is working long hours seeing his (mostly female) patients—his practice is booming after an article about the handsome therapist runs in the local paper. Little does Sam know that there is a vent in the ceiling of his downstairs office and every word of his sessions can be heard from the room directly above. Who could resist listening? 

After a few weeks, Sam disappears. But since there is no indication of foul play, the police aren’t taking it seriously, especially after being tipped off about the debt he’s in and that he may be having an affair with one of his patients. Sam’s disappearance has turned Annie’s world on its head and she wonders if she truly knows her husband after all. 

Goodnight Beautiful is a gripping and insidious psychological thriller. Molloy is a master at misdirection. She plays on perceptions and assumptions and then completely flips the narrative on its head. There were two HUGE plot twists that completely blindsided me, as in left me totally gobsmacked—one of which I actually stopped listening, backed it up, and listened again. 

In a genre saturated with unreliable female narrators who are seen as crazy, this high-concept book is fresh and startling. 

BUY NOW

AIMEE MOLLOY is the New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Mother, which has been translated into more than twenty languages. 

Molloy lives in Western Massachusetts with her family.

The Return by Nicholas Sparks

A special thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. 

Trevor Benson, an orthopedic surgeon, was wounded by a mortar explosion while working in Afghanistan. Plagued with injuries, as well as post-traumatic stress disorder, he decides to take some time at his late grandfather's dilapidated cabin before going back to medical school, this time to study psychiatry. 

Keeping busy with home improvements and tending to his grandfather's beehives, the last thing Trevor expects is to meet someone. Natalie Masterson is a deputy in town and very detached, but it turns out Natalie has a heartbreaking reason to keep her feelings guarded. 

Trevor discovers that his grandfather was friends with a teenage girl from the trailer park down the road. Callie, who claims to be 19, works as a waitress at the local restaurant in town. She keeps to herself and when pressed, offers Trevor very little information about the mysterious circumstances of his grandfather's death. But he can't shake the feeling that there is more to the story.

In his quest to learn what happened to his grandfather, and unravel Natalie and Callie's secrets, Trevor will learn the true meaning of love and forgiveness, and the strength it takes to triumph over tragedy.

The Return was fine and by fine I mean that it's a nice book. But it just wasn't for me. In fact, I think I've simply outgrown Sparks' books—nothing will live up to The Notebook and The Wedding. 

Of late, Sparks' books have been very formulaic. They feature the same people. It's like he just recycles his characters and gives them new names—they are literally that unoriginal, right down to their mannerisms and what they eat and drink. Swap out the small town for another made up small town and you've got a new Sparks book. 

It would be remiss if I also didn't point out that Nicholas Sparks has been getting a lot of negative press lately and I was even torn to read/review this book. But I always honour my obligations and had committed to this review before I was made aware of the controversy. 

BUY NOW

NICHOLAS SPARKS has sold over 100 million copies of his books. His novels include fifteen #1 New York Times bestsellers, and all of his books, including Three Weeks with My Brother, the memoir he wrote with his brother, Micah, have been New York Times and international bestsellers, and were translated into more than fifty languages. Eleven of Nicholas Sparks’s novels—The Choice, The Longest Ride, The Best of Me, Safe Haven, The Lucky One, The Last Song, Dear John, Nights in Rodanthe, The Notebook, A Walk to Remember, and Message in a Bottle—have been adapted into major motion pictures.

Sparks lives in North Carolina.