#BookReview: In My Life by Kay Bratt

When Art Imitates Life. This deep in this particular series, you really need to read the first two books in the series – which are both excellent, btw – in order to fully understand all that is going on here… and to avoid major spoilers from each of those two books. Once you’ve read those books, you’re going to want this one on hand anyway, as it picks up shortly after the events of Book 2. Once again, the crime being investigated is one Bratt had heard a similar tale of in her real life, and once again (as is so often in Bratt’s writing), those who have paid attention to her for in some cases not long at all will notice other details of her life making their way onto the page. In a glancing reference here, we get a reference to a child currently living on Maui, as Bratt’s own youngest daughter currently does. But much more interestingly, there is a minor plot point here – that helps build into something that could become much larger – that those familiar with Bratt’s postings on social media from just a few months ago will be all too familiar with. To be clear, while the character here pursues the more criminal method that Bratt was *tempted* to do in real life, in real life Bratt did in fact pursue numerous *legal* methods of achieving the same result. Her socials are worth perusing for that story alone, for those that also come to enjoy her fictional work. 🙂 Overall another solid tale that expands the world while also keeping the “freak of the week” episodic nature of the series intact. Very much recommended.

This review of In My Life by Kay Bratt was originally written on March 13, 2023.

#BlogTour: Forever Home by Elysia Whisler

For this blog tour, we’re looking at a strong tale of second chances and taking risks… in more ways than one. For this blog tour, we’re looking at Forever Home by Elysia Whisler.

Lots Of Moving Parts And Yet It All Works. This book has a *lot* of moving parts with a primary romance, a secondary romance setup, two different tragic female backstories to encounter and mostly resolve, and a primary mystery and a secondary one to boot. And yet Whisler somehow manages to make all of that work, though the fact that she has 400 or so pages to play with here probably plays into this working as well as it does. The story is well paced – if you don’t mind a very slow burn primary romance. As in, not so slow that there is zero “piano playing” at all, but slow burn enough that this doesn’t actually happen until the last 15% or so of the book. So for the clean/ sweet crowd… eh, *all* of these characters have enough rough edges you’re likely not going to like this one. For those that *like* a bit more edginess… yep, this one is for you, particularly if you’re closer to the clean/ sweet side but like to get brave occasionally. 🙂 Overall a great tale that never overly feels like a “Book 2”, even though it is explicitly noted that this tale is, in fact, a “Book 2”. Very much recommended.

After the jump, an excerpt from the book followed by the “publisher details” – book description, author bio, and social media and buy links.
Continue reading “#BlogTour: Forever Home by Elysia Whisler”