Amazon First Reads this month included one book chosen from a small selection of different genres and a bonus short story.
My Book Pick
If Tomorrow Never Comes by Allison Ashley – Fate connects two people in life-changing ways in a deeply romantic and emotional novel about hope and second chances by the author of Would You Rather and The Roommate Pact.
Bonus Short Story
The Sublet: A Short Story by Greer Hendricks – A chilling story about the hidden cost of perfection.
I am currently reading The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper by Phaedra Patrick. This was published in 2016 and is part of my 25 in 2025 challenge to read some of the backlist books on my TBR. It was also her debut novel. I just started it but I like it so far.
What I Recently Finished
Fiction
Lawyers and Lattes: Happily Ever After in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi – I found this author during a stuff your Kindle day a year or so ago and liked the free book enough to want to get this one. This book was entertaining enough that I have added book three to my TBR.
The London Flat: Second Chances by Juliet Gauvin – I had enjoyed the first book in this series, which I got during a stuff your Kindle day a while back, but this one fell flat for me. I didn’t find the plot believable.
Hope in a Jar by Beth Harbison – Fun read! The action flips between the present day and the characters’ time in junior high and high school. I actually liked the chapters from the past better than the present; the author does a good job writing the younger characters. The present-day plot felt a bit childish to me, like the characters hadn’t really grown up since high school, which perhaps was the point.
What We Keep by Elizabeth Berg – I didn’t love it, even though Elizabeth Berg is one of my favorite writers. It started out good, but I just lost interest partway through.
Bonded in Death by J.D. Robb – I have been a longtime fan of the In Death series, and this book delivered on all fronts. I loved it!
Crime Scene by Jonathan Kellerman and Jesse Kellerman – I am a big fan of Jonathan Kellerman’s Alex Delaware series, so I had high hopes for this collaboration with his son Jesse. I thought it was alright, but it didn’t pull me in like the Delaware books do. I couldn’t really relate to the main character, or any of the characters, very much, and I didn’t find the storyline very compelling.
The Banned Books Club by Brenda Novak – I am still mulling over this one and plan to write a review soon. I gave it three stars for now.
Open Season by Jonathan Kellerman – I usually love the books in the Alex Delaware series, but this one didn’t hold my interest very well. The main draw of the series is that Delaware is a psychologist, and the crimes usually involve some psychological twists and turns. This one felt like more straightforward police work to me.
Nonfiction
The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby – This book was so intense. I am still processing it and plan to write a full review soon.
What I Added to my TBR
Not Quite by the Book by Julie Hatcher – my Amazon First Reads pick for February
The Fall Risk by Abby Jimenez – bonus short story from Amazon First Reads
A Good Indian Girl by Mansi Shah – a recent release from this author I discovered last year
More Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa – a sequel that I want to read
Feeling the Fireworks: Starting Over in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi – #3 in the South West series
Twisted by Jonathan Kellerman – #2 in the Petra Connor series, I have #1 on my 25 in 2025 list
TBR Stats
I currently have 152 books on my TBR
Of those, 20 are nonfiction and 132 are fiction
I have finished 6 of my 25 in 2025 challenge
If you’re on Goodreads, feel free to add me as a friend. I’m always looking for new recommendations!
This month, Amazon Prime members are able to pick one free book from a selection of eight from a variety of genres.
My pick:
Not Quite by the Book by Julie Hatcher – a novel about Emma Rini, a bookstore owner who needs a break and rents a crumbling manor house. I am intrigued by this one because it was inspired by the work and life of Emily Dickinson.
Bonus:
We also were able to download a bonus short story, The Fall Risk by Abby Jiminez, about two people who get stuck together on Valentine’s Day. It looks cute!
A brand new year – so exciting! It’s fun to look back on the year that we have just finished as well as to look forward to the next twelve months.
What I’m Reading Now
I currently have three books out from the library, so I am listing them all under this section. Hopefully I will finish them all before the due dates!
The Taste of Ginger by Mansi Shah
Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo
The Avalon Ladies Scrapbooking Society by Darien Gee
What I Recently Finished
Fiction:
The Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg
The Little Italian Hotel by Phaedra Patrick
Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors by Sonali Dev
The Book Swap by Tessa Bickers
The Handmaid and the Carpenter by Elizabeth Berg
The Healer’s Apprentice by Melanie Dickerson
Return to Bella Beach by Kate Wentworth
Miss Amelia’s List by Mercedes Lackey
Nonfiction:
Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church by Rachel Held Evans
UnClobber: Rethinking Our Misuse of the Bible on Homosexuality by Colby Martin
Short Stories:
When We Were Friends by Jane Green
The Answer Is No by Fredrick Backman
Cruel Winter with You by Ali Hazelwood
Merry After Ever by Tessa Bailey
All by My Elf by Olivia Dade
Merriment and Mayhem by Alexandria Bellefleur
Only Santas in the Building by Alexis Daria
What I Added to my TBR
Happy After All by Maisey Yates
The Autumn of Ruth Winters by Marshall Fine
One Big Happy Family by Susan Mallery
Wedding at Bella Beach by Kate Wentworth
My Friends by Fredrik Backman
Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry
We All Live Here by Jojo Moyes
Becoming the Pastor’s Wife: How Marriage Replaced Ordination as a Woman’s Path to Ministry by Beth Allison Barr
Queer & Christian: Reclaiming the Bible, Our Faith, and Our Place at the Table by Brandan Robertson
The Year of What If by Phaedra Patrick
The Spirit of Justice: True Stories of Faith, Race, and Resistance by Jemar Tisby
What Happened to the McCrays? by Tracey Lange
Diary of a Tuscan Bookshop: A Memoir by Alba Donati
Never Meant to Stay by Trisha Das
Christmas at the Little Paris Hotel by Rebecca Raisin
A Bookshop Christmas by Rachel Burton
The Second Chance Year by Melissa Wiesner
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Flirting Lessons by Jasmine Guillory
The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
How to Read a Book by Monica Wood
Plymouth Undercover by Pamela M. Kelley
TBR Stats
I currently have 120 books on my TBR
Of those, 20 are nonfiction and 100 are fiction
All of the books were added in 2024
One of my goals for 2025 is to read 2 nonfiction books each month. I usually set an overall goal on the Goodreads Reading Challenge as well. Last year, I put down 52 and I ended up finishing 99 books. This year, I may be a bit more ambitious and put down 75.
If you’re on Goodreads, feel free to add me as a friend. I’m always looking for new recommendations!
One of the perks of having Amazon Prime is getting a free book each month from a short list of editor’s picks. Sometimes we get a bonus short story or even a second book for free. It’s a great deal, and even better because I have Amazon Prime at a discounted price since my son is on Medicaid.
Here’s what I have added to my Kindle for free over the last six months:
July 2024 – We could choose two free books that month, although I ended up only picking one of them. I chose The Bookstore Wedding by Alice Hoffman. It is the second in a series of short stories called The Once Upon a Time Bookshop Stories, so I also purchased the first story, The Bookstore Sisters, and pre-ordered the third one, The Bookstore Keepers.
August 2024 – We got one book free plus a short story. I chose Fatal Intrusion by Jeffery Deaver and Isabella Maldonado for the book. The short story was Natural Selection by Erin Hilderbrand. I have read the short story and it was good but I would have liked it to be longer.
September 2024 – We got one book free plus a short story. I chose The Anti-Heroes by Jen Lancaster for the book. The short story was When We Were Friends by Jane Green.
October 2024 – We were able to pick two books from the list that month. I chose When We Were Widows by Annette Chavez Macias and Grave Talk by Nick Spalding.
November 2024 – We were again able to pick two titles from the list. I chose Nobody’s Perfect by Sally Kilpatrick and The Answer is No: A Short Story by Fredrik Bakman.
December 2024 – We were able to pick one free book from the list and, after that, we got to pick a free book out of another list. I chose Happy After All by Maisey Yates and The Autumn of Ruth Winters by Marshall Fine. The Amazon original short story collection Under the Mistletoe is also free this month for Amazon Prime members. There are five stories, so I downloaded all of them. From the descriptions, it sounds like they might be a little bit spicier.
All together, I got seven free books and nine free short stories. Not bad!
Passions in Death by J.D. Robb – This is book #59 of her In Death series about Eve Dallas, a homicide detective in futuristic New York City. I always love these!
Freckles by Cecelia Ahern – I have enjoyed several books by this author. This one is middling for me so far.
Her Gates Will Never Be Shut: Hope, Hell, and the New Jerusalem by Bradley Jersak – I had put this book down a few months ago and recently picked it up again. I have read some other nonfiction in the meantime that I liked, so I’m hoping this will be easier for me to read this time.
What I Recently Finished
Tapestry of Fortunes by Elizabeth Berg – Berg never disappoints. I raced through this enjoyable novel about a woman who makes major changes in her life after the death of her best friend.
The Fifth Avenue Apartment by Pamela M. Kelley – This was a fun, lighthearted read about a woman who has been searching for what she wants to do with her life and how she finds a career that seems right for her. It was enjoyable. The author also released a bonus short story that set the stage for a possible second book.
Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum – This book was recommended by someone on Instagram, and I am so glad I took a chance on it. It was very thoughtful and warm. I appreciated both the story and the lessons shared as the characters grow.
The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living, and Leaving the White Evangelical Church by Sarah McCammon – Very well-written book that is part memoir and part informational discourse on the issues that arise for people who don’t fit or start to question the church. I really liked this book.
Natural Selection by Erin Hilderbrand – Nice short story about a woman in love who has things turned upside down on what is supposed to be a romantic trip to an exotic location.
Look on the Bright Side by Kristan Higgins – A fake relationship romance with a twist. Cute book.
The Husbands by Holly Gramazio – Loved this magical realism novel about a woman whose life changes in an instant and how she copes with her new reality. I wrote a longer review of this a couple of weeks ago. Highly recommend!
What I’ve Added to my TBR List
I added a lot of books again this month. A lot of them are my standard fare, but I’m also trying to expand my horizons a bit:
The Anti-Heroes by Jen Lancaster
When We Were Friends by Jane Green (short story)
Smells Like Tween Spirit by Laurie Gelman
Nantucket Summer House by Pamela M. Kelley
Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood
The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang
The Bride Test by Helen Hoang
More of Less Maddy by Lisa Genova
The Little Italian Hotel by Phaedra Patrick
The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper by Phaedra Patrick
Rise & Shine, Benedict Stone by Phaedra Patrick
The Secrets of Love Story Bridge by Phaedra Patrick
Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett
Summer Island by Natalie Normann
The Hygge Holiday by Rosie Blake
The Healer’s Apprentice by Melanie Dickerson
Crime Scene by Jonathan Kellerman
Lethal Prey by John Sandford
Gryphon’s Valor by Mercedes Lackey
Bonded in Death by J.D. Robb
Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld
Open Season by Jonathan Kellerman
Billy Straight by Jonathan Kellerman
UnClobber by Colby Martin
If you’re on Goodreads, feel free to add me as a friend. I’m always looking for new recommendations!
The Husbands by Holly Gramazio – This is Holly’s debut novel, and I am thoroughly enjoying it. The main character, Lauren, returns home one night to find that reality has somehow shifted and she is married. As she tries to figure out what is going on, her husband goes to the attic to change a light bulb and disappears and a different husband comes down the ladder. So fun!
What I Recently Finished
Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes DuMez – This was a fascinating account of the development and evolution of white evangelicalism in America written by a historian. I found it very easy to read and extremely educational.
Pack Up the Moon by Kristan Higgins – This novel is about a man whose wife wrote him letters before she died and had them delivered to him every month for the first year after she passed. It was reminiscent of P.S. I Love You by Cecelia Ahern – in a good way!
The Library of Borrowed Hearts by Lucy Gilmore – I love books about books, and this novel features a librarian who discovers a 60-year old love story written in the margins of books. It was a charming book!
Earth’s the Right Place for Love by Elizabeth Berg – This is a another great installment from a writer I have admired for many years. It is a coming of age story which provides the backstory for the Arthur Moses, the main character in The Story of Arthur Truluv.
Once Upon a Time, There Was You by Elizabeth Berg – This is the story of John and Irene, who are divorced but are still connected by their 18-year old daughter Sadie. It is beautifully written, as are all of her books.
Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare – This is Book 1 of the Infernal Devices series, which is the prequel to the Mortal Instruments series. Both of these series are part of the Shadowhunter Chronicles. It was a recommendation from my friend Kim, who is a big fan of young adult romance and fantasy books. I don’t always love her selections, but I really enjoyed this one and am going to continue reading the series.
What I’ve Added to my TBR List
I added quite a few books to my list this month:
The Bookstore Sisters by Alice Hoffman (short story)
The Bookstore Wedding by Alice Hoffman (short story)
The Bookstore Keepers by Alice Hoffman (short story)
Fatal Intrusion by Jeffery Deaver
Natural Selection by Erin Hilderbrand (short story)
Heartstopper: Volume One by Alice Oseman
The Lonely Hearts Book Club by Lucy Gilmore
Slow Dance by Rainbow Rowell
Close Knit by Jenny Colgan
The Summer Pact by Emily Giffin
The Book Swap by Tessa Bickers
The Life Impossible by Matt Haig
Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout
The Banned Books Club by Brenda Novak
The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams
Found in a Bookshop by Stephanie Butland
The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods
The Door-to-Door Bookstore by Carsten Henn
Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa
Welcome to the Hyunam-dong Bookshop by Hwang Bo-reum
What You Are Looking For Is In The Library by Michiko Aoyama
Blue Sisters by Coco Mellors
Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare
Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare
The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living, and Leaving the White Evangelical Church by Sarah McCammon
If you’re on Goodreads, feel free to add me as a friend. I’m always looking for new recommendations!
In So Many Words 