My Most Anticipated Book Releases June 2024

June 4

One summer can change everything.

Brooklyn-based Hannah is a bestselling author struggling to write her second book after personal losses. Her older sister, Sara, still lives in Chatham, Cape Cod, where they grew up, and is married with four children. Once a dedicated librarian, Sara dreams of reviving her love affair with literature, but instead, she is stuck with too many family responsibilities and a fizzling marriage.

When Hannah gets the chance to retreat to her aunt’s oceanfront house in Chatham for the summer, it seems like just the thing to get her creative juices flowing. And she’ll be able to spend more time with Sara, who is eager to find her way back into the workforce, to do something rewarding and book-related. The pair will spend the summer making friends, rekindling romance― especially Spencer, an old acquaintance from high school-turned very hot grump― and opening themselves up to the magic of books and the beach.

June 11

Sounds like a perfect summer read!

Rue Siebert might not have it all, but she has enough: a few friends she can always count on, the financial stability she yearned for as a kid, and a successful career as a biotech engineer at Kline, one of the most promising start-ups in the field of food science. Her world is stable, pleasant, and hard-fought. Until a hostile takeover and its offensively attractive front man threatens to bring it all crumbling down.

Eli Killgore and his business partners want Kline, period. Eli has his own reasons for pushing this deal through—and he’s a man who gets what he wants. With one burning exception: Rue. The woman he can’t stop thinking about. The woman who’s off-limits to him.

Torn between loyalty and an undeniable attraction, Rue and Eli throw caution out the lab and the boardroom windows. Their affair is secret, no-strings-attached, and has a built-in deadline: the day one of their companies will prevail. But the heart is risky business—one that plays for keeps.

I still haven’t read an Ali Hazelwood book, but I keep accumulating them because the descriptions all sound so good!

June 25

Two women—separated by decades and continents, and united by a mysterious family heirloom—discover second chances at love in this sweeping novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Summer Wives.

I loved The Glass Ocean which Williams co-wrote with Lauren Willig and Karen White.

She has a dream. He has a plan. Together they’ll take a leap of faith.

Ren has never held an iPhone, googled the answer to a question, or followed a crush on social media. What she has done: Read a book or two, or three (okay, hundreds). Taught herself to paint. Built a working wind power system from scratch. But for all the books she’s read, Ren has never found one that’s taught a woman raised on a homestead and off the grid for most of her twenty-two years how to live in the real world. So when she finally achieves her lifelong dream of attending Corona College, it feels like her life is finally beginning.

Fitz has the rest of his life mapped out: Graduate from Corona at the top of his class, get his criminal record wiped clean, and pass himself off as the rich, handsome player everyone thinks he is. He’s a few short months from checking off step one of his plans when Ren Gylden, with her cascading blonde hair and encyclopedic brain, crashes into his life, and for the first time Fitz’s plan is in jeopardy.

But a simple assignment in their immunology seminar changes the course of both their lives, and suddenly they’re thrown out of the frying pan and into the fire on a road trip that will lead them in the most unexpected directions. Out on the open road, the world somehow shifts, and the unlikely pair realize that, maybe, the key to the dreams they’ve both been chasing have been sitting next to them the whole time.

I love this series and am so excited to see an installment by Christina Lauren.

Picture Book Review: Munchpie Morgan by Merry Lorenz

Title: Munchpie Morgan

Author: Merry Lorenz

Illustrator: Kenneth Anderson

Publisher: Fair Shair Publishing

Publication Date: June 1, 2024

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with a free ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Description:

Have you ever wondered what happens if your snacks become… you? Munchpie Morgan does! From angel hair pasta to ears of corn, her munching sparks a hilarious, wonderful adventure woven with playful rhyme. Get ready to giggle and maybe even try on a new food with this tasty tale – perfect for even the pickiest of eaters! 

My Thoughts:

“You are what you eat”, we’ve all heard the expression. This is the literal vision of this. Morgan describes all the food she likes to eat, then visualizes herself looking like the food. I love the fun word play such as having a head made of lettuce or chicken fingers. I imagine giggling kids wanting to read this again and again.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Bookish Talk: Hardcover vs. Paperback

I know some of you saw this title and are shouting “ebook” or “audiobook”. I do love my ereader for traveling, and other times when it’s convenient to have esomething light to throw in the purse. I don’t do a lot of audiobooks because my mind drifts too much and I miss important information. But, I have been using them more lately since I have fee audible credits. That’s not what this post is about though. The majority of my reading is still physical books. So, that will be the focus. audiobooks Printbooks vs ebooks

Paperbacks

My first choice is typically paperback. They’re lighter and take up less shelf space. I trade a lot of my books at paperbackswap.com, so it’s also cheaper to mail. They “feel” like a book should feel. They’re more transportable than hardcover and don’t add as much weight to luggage (because yes, I bring real books and my ereader when traveling- batteries die).

Hardcovers

While paperbacks are number one, there are some instances when a hardcover is preferable. If you’ve already waited two years for the next book in your favorite series, it’s not worth waiting for the paperback release. Hardcovers also last longer, so if it’s book I’m planning to keep, I’ll go with hardcover. I’m also more likely to pick hardcover for my classroom library because the books will be handled by grubby student hands with different standards of book care from mine.

Which book format do you prefer?

Middle Grade Carousel Challenge Update

I shared at the beginning of the month that I was planning on joining in on the monthly challenge at Middle Grade Carousel this month. The topic for April was rivals. I read Much Ado about Baseball by Rajani LaRocca.

My Review:

Trish and Ben are math competition rivals who end up on the same baseball team. Told from alternating viewpoints, it’s clear that these two rivals have so much in common they should be friends. This book covers so many different interests that it would appeal to a lot of different kids. The main characters love math puzzles and baseball. Plus, there’s Shakespeare references and a touch of magic. I am always looking for books that have diverse characters where the plot is not about racism or prejudices. Trish and Ben are from Indian American families, and the cultural aspect is just naturally woven into the plot. The main conflict is about winning their baseball championship. I would recommend this more for middle grade readers who are high readers because of all the problem solving elements to the plot.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

May’s theme for Middle Grade Caroousel is reptiles. My main reason for joining the challenges is to read the middle grade books I already own, and I don’t have anything with a “traditional” reptile, so I am going to go with dragons and read Dealing with Dragons by Patricia Wrede.

If you want more recommendations or to learn about the challenge you can get more information at Middle Grade Carousel

My Favorite read of April 2024: The Women of Chateau Lafayette

“To ask why was only to demand justification.
To ask why not assumed endless possibility…”
― Stephanie Dray, The Women of Chateau Lafayette

Title: The Women of Chateau Lafayette

Author: Stephanie Dray

Publisher: Berkley

Publication Date: March 31, 2021

Goodreads Synopsis:

Most castles are protected by men. This one by women.

A founding mother…
1774 . Gently-bred noblewoman Adrienne Lafayette becomes her husband, the Marquis de Lafayette’s political partner in the fight for American independence. But when their idealism sparks revolution in France and the guillotine threatens everything she holds dear, Adrienne must renounce the complicated man she loves, or risk her life for a legacy that will inspire generations to come.

A daring visionary…
1914 . Glittering New York socialite Beatrice Chanler is a force of nature, daunted by nothing—not her humble beginnings, her crumbling marriage, or the outbreak of war. But after witnessing the devastation in France firsthand, Beatrice takes on the challenge of a convincing America to fight for what’s right.

A reluctant resistor…
1940 . French school-teacher and aspiring artist Marthe Simone has an orphan’s self-reliance and wants nothing to do with war. But as the realities of Nazi occupation transform her life in the isolated castle where she came of age, she makes a discovery that calls into question who she is, and more importantly, who she is willing to become.

Intricately woven and powerfully told, The Women of Chateau Lafayette is a sweeping novel about duty and hope, love and courage, and the strength we take from those who came before us.

My thoughts:

I love books with interwoven stories, but usually one is not as interesting. In the beginning, I was primarily interested in the story of Adrienne, wife of the the Marquis de Lafayette. But, as the story progressed, I found Beatrice and Marthe’s stories more fascinating. It’s a beautiful story of the strength of women and the power of their contributions throughout history.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Baskerville 2 by Anders Noren.

Up ↑