We're pleased to meet Kasie West...plus a book giveaway

Today we are celebrating the publication of Kasie West's debut adult rom-com, We Met Like This. It sounds like a fun and sweet story and it's receiving rave reviews already. We enjoyed chatting with Kasie and hope you will enjoy getting to know her too. Thanks to St. Martin's Press, we have FIVE copies of We Met Like This to give away!

Kasie West is the author of 16 young adult books and counting. Her debut, Pivot Point, received a starred review in Publishers Weekly and was a 2014 YALSA BFYA (Best Fiction for Young Adults) pick and the 2013 Whitney Award for Best Novel by a New Author. Kasie is also the author of PS I Like You, Sunkissed, and many others. Kasie’s books have been translated into over 20 languages, including German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Chinese, Turkish, Danish, Polish, Indonesian, Czech, and Slovakian. Kasie lives with her family in Central California. We Met Like This is her adult debut.

Visit Kasie online:
Website * Facebook * Instagram

Synopsis:

Can the wrong kind of meet-cute still lead to Mr. Right?

Margot Hart is a hopeless romantic who dreams of repping love stories as a literary agent—and living one herself. Which is why she despises dating apps. The only guy she keeps matching with is Oliver, whose one disastrous date with her ended in nothing but a memorable kiss.

When Margot loses her job and runs into Oliver again, he’s convinced she just wants a repeat make-out. And maybe she does. They’re total opposites, after all. But as she fights to launch her own agency, Oliver proves steady, supportive, and impossible to ignore.

Now Margot has to decide if true love can come from the one place she swore it never would.

Kasie West’s adult debut sparkles with witty banter, messy meet-cutes, and romance worth swiping right on.

"West’s adult debut is everything―vulnerable, spicy, funny, and squeal-out-loud romantic." 

- Kirkus (starred review)

"YA author West’s (Better Than Revenge) adult debut gives second-chance romance and opposites-attract tropes a new twist. This engaging, witty, unputdownable romance is a must for all collections." 

- Library Journal (starred review)

"A fun and delightful romance from a beloved author." 

- Culturess

What is a favorite compliment you have received on your writing?
My very favorite compliment is when people tell me that they related so much to the character that it was like they were reading about their own life. I love that. I love when people feel understood when reading something I wrote. I think it is such a human need—to feel seen. To know we are not alone in this world and that other people have felt the things we’ve felt or experienced some of the same joys and heartaches that we have. I love it when books make us feel that way. 

How is Margot similar to or different from you?
People have told me that Margot is a lovable mess and I would agree with that. I don’t think I’m super similar to Margot except in the fact that she and I share the same organization style. I have a chair where I keep my not too dirty but not completely clean clothes as well. I also have a very unorganized bookcase. And I often find myself distracted by my phone while trying to work. Oh, also, I’m a total romantic. On the other hand, I do not have a love/hate relationship with my sister and I’m pretty driven. 

If We Met Like This was made into a movie, who would you cast in the leading roles?
This is a tricky question because people tend to hold you to this down the road if any casting ever does take place. And honestly, I don’t picture any particular actors/actresses when I’m writing. BUT, since you asked, and since I think it’s fun, I will list off a few who I think would do a fabulous job and who I could picture in the role. But I think there are so many options for all these characters.

Margot: Cailee Spaeny
Oliver: Diego Boneta
Sloane (best friend): Yara Shahidi
Audrey (sister): Skyler Samuels
Rob (boss): Matt Bomer

What is your favorite autumn activity?
Drinking iced pumpkin spiced chai because I am that girl and yummy drinks are my happy place in any season. But I also love driving around and looking at all the pretty fall colors. Autumn really is my favorite season.

If your life was a TV series, which celebrity would you want to narrate it? (Like how John McEnroe narrated Devi's life on Never Have I Ever.)
Okay, so I love Never Have I Ever and he does a fabulous job. The writing on that show is chef’s kiss (as is the acting). Anyway, my life…who would I want to narrate it? I’m a Swiftie so Taylor would be awesome, of course. I think she’d be funny too and a bit chaotic, which is me. But I also love a deep voice with a sexy accent, so maybe Tom Hiddleston. He could make my life seem more intriguing and exciting than it actually is. 

If we were to visit you right now, what are some places you would take us to see?
I’m lucky enough to live right in between two national parks: Yosemite and Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. They are both amazing and if anyone ever comes and visits me, I think they must go to see either of them. They are truly stunning. 

Thanks to Kasie for chatting with us and to St. Martin's Press for sharing her book with our readers.

How to win: Use Gleam to enter the giveaway. (Rafflecopter is shutting down at the end of September, so we are switching over to Gleam.) If you have any questions, feel free to contact us. If you have trouble using Gleam on our blog, enter the giveaway here.

We Met Like This (5 print copies)

Giveaway ends September 21st at midnight EST.

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Book Review: The Swimming Group

By Sara Steven

My name is Emma Brennan, and I never thought I’d find myself in this position — standing on a Cape Cod beach at sunrise, wondering which of my friends is a killer.

I came to the idyllic seaside town of Provincetown, to raise my young niece and figure out what to do next with my life. Eleven months ago my sister vanished off the coast of Ocracoke Island. No body, no answers. Just a teenage daughter left behind — and me. At the same time, the man I thought I was going to marry cheated on me with a cute young florist.

I joined the Tragic Wives’ Group — a tight-knit, cold-water swimming group with enough personal drama to fill a bestseller. And one of us has put it in a manuscript, spilling all our secrets.

Then she disappears . . . leaving just a pile of clothes on the sand. She’s the second person I’ve lost in twelve months. (Synopsis courtesy of Goodreads.)

The Swimming Group is an excellent whodunnit, primarily because it starts out so innocuously. Emma is part of a ragtag group of unique individuals who meet up regularly to cold-water swim, but beneath the surface of the group bears the need to heal from various tragedies within their lives. For Emma, her primary tragedy involves her missing sister, who had vanished after swimming off the coast of Ocracoke Island. A plotline that runs concurrently with that event is her recently failed marriage. Relocating herself to Cape Cod was done as a means of self-preservation, and to help her niece recover from losing her mother.

But then one of the swimming group members goes missing. All they have to go by is a pile of clothes and some other personal belongings, but no one knows what happened or why the person is missing. Or how it happened to her. Suddenly, everyone is a suspect, and no one is safe. The slow unraveling of trust was depicted well, without anything feeling too rushed or pushed on to the reader, allowing the opportunity to come to their own conclusions. Even still, there was a particular bombshell that hit hard and sent me reeling! I couldn’t believe the deeper issues that Emma has to face, with me feeling just as shocked as she does when the truth is finally revealed. 

The various relationships between the Tragic Wives’ Group was intricate and provided a lot of background to each and every eventual suspect. Woven into the mix is the opportunity for romance, as well as forming deeper friendships and connections, but with everything going on it’s hard to know who is really in Emma’s corner. In the end, I didn’t necessarily agree with the decisions made in order to rectify what really happened to the missing Tragic Wives’ Group member, but it made sense. 

The best part of the story was the gradual ramp up of raising the stakes and revealing what’s really going on behind the surface of things. Emma thinks things are the way they are and nothing can be changed, but if I learned anything from The Swimming Group, it’s that nothing is the way it seems and much like the cold waters she swims in, the landscape of the world is unpredictable and can at times become uncontrollable, too. It was a definite five-star read!

Thanks to Bella Ellwood Clayton for the book in exchange for an honest review.

Also by Bella Ellwood-Clayton: Weekend Friends

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What's in the (e)mail

All (or most) of these books can be found on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, Apple, Kobo, etc.

NG = NetGalley

Melissa:

Peter Pulaski Must Pay by Jen Lancaster from Little A (NG)
Always and Forever by Lorraine Zago Rosenthal from Tribeca Press (NG)
Blade by Wendy Walker from MB Communications (NG)
Cherry Baby by Rainbow Rowell from William Morrow (NG)
I'm Looking for a Man in Finance by Sabrina Waldorf from Alcove Press (NG)

Strangers in the Villa by Robyn Harding from Grand Central (NG)

Bloom by Robbie Couch from Gallery (NG)

Nerdplay by Annabel Chase from Red Palm Press (NG)

Young Fools by Liza Palmer from Kathleen Carter Communications (print)

The Voice I Just Heard by/from Susan Dormady Eisenberg (print)

Once and Again by Rebecca Serle from Atria (NG)

Love By the Book by Jessica George from St. Martin's Press (NG)

Clutch by Emily Nemens from Zando (NG)

The Midnight Show by Lee Kelly and Jennifer Thorne from Crown (NG)

Match Me If You Can by Heidi Shertok from Embla (NG)

Sara:
My Husband's Wife by Tracey Noonan from Wicked Good Entertainment (print)

Laws of Love and Logic by Debra Curtis from Ballantine (NG)

Jami:

Such a Perfect Family by Nalini Singh from Berkley (NG)

Melissa S:
Maybe This Once by Sophie Sullivan from St. Martin's Press (print)
Anne of a Different Island by Virginia Kantra from Berkley (print)

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Book Review: Last Seen

By Melissa Smoot

Come here. Come closer.

Halley James knows her marriage is over. But she’s not prepared for the rest of her life to fall apart too.

No one can hear you. No one can help you.

She just lost her job at the forensics lab. Her dad needs emergency surgery. But the biggest blow comes back home in Marchburg, Virginia, where she discovers her mother didn’t actually die in a car crash. Her mom was murdered—and her father lied about it all these years.

I have nothing to hide from you. Are you hiding something from me?

Since she was six years old, it’s been Halley and her dad. Now, she doesn’t know what to believe. Desperate for the truth, Halley chases down a lead in Brockville, Tennessee. But all there is not as it seems. Brockville’s utopian charm hides a chilling darkness. And Halley’s search for answers threatens to expose an unspeakable reality. (Synopsis courtesy of Amazon.)

From the very first pages of Last Seen, I was drawn into a thick cloud of suspense, a feeling that only intensified as the story unfolded. J.T. Ellison masterfully crafts a narrative that keeps you on the edge of your seat, a true nail biter. The setting in the dark, isolated woods enhances the creepy atmosphere perfectly.

The fear that the main character, Halley, felt was palpable and I was eager to accompany her on her journey to uncover the truth. The small town of Brockville, TN looked like a perfect place where everyone was happy and only ever felt joy. Little did they know what was lurking below the idyllic façade. 

What truly resonated with me was the main character. Her strong will and determination made her a beacon of resilience amid the chaos. I found myself rooting for her and admiring her courage, even if sometimes I wanted her to stop searching for her own safety. 

Overall, Last Seen is more than just a thriller. It is a mind bending, nonstop roller-coaster of emotions. If you are looking for a gripping read that combines suspense with a deeply relatable protagonist, I highly recommend diving into this chilling tale.

Thanks to Over the River PR for the book in exchange for an honest review.

More by J.T. Ellison:
Good Girls Lie
It's One of Us
A Very Bad Thing

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Book Review: Play Nice

By Jami Denison

The horror genre has always been a barometer for global fears. Motherhood is one of the subjects it often explores, in work like Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist, Hereditary, and The Babadook.  Now USA Today bestselling horror writer Rachel Harrison has added to the genre from the (adult) child’s point-of-view in her latest release, Play Nice. 

The youngest of three sisters, Clio Barnes is a stereotypical Gen Zer—working as a stylist and influencer, obsessed with Instagram, uninterested in a real romantic relationship, and dependent on her father for help with any kind of adulting. She’s got real trauma from her childhood, though—when she was seven, her parents divorced and her mother Alex lost her mind, thinking their house was haunted. Clio’s father got full custody of his daughters, and Alex moved in with her demonologist boyfriend, eventually writing a book about the haunting and allowing her daughters to sever ties with her.

When Alex dies, Clio is the only one to attend her funeral, and she’s shocked to learn her mother never sold the haunted house—in fact, she died there. Now it belongs to Clio and her sisters, and Clio—anxious for new content for her social media followers—wants to fix it and flip it. Her father and sisters have misgivings, but no one succeeds in talking her out of it. 

In the house, Clio finds a copy of her mother’s book (the sisters all pledged to never read it) with notes from Alex to her. As Clio starts to doubt the narrative her father and sisters fed to her about Alex’s alcoholism and mental illness, strange things begin to happen in the house. Is Clio suffering from the same delusions that felled her mother, or is there really a demon in the house?

Play Nice is told in Clio’s first-person point of view, and the story starts before Alex’s death. We meet Clio in the middle of a night of partying, and her voice is so bratty and grating that I almost gave up on the book. I’m glad I didn’t. Not only is Play Nice a strong modern addition to the haunted house genre, it draws a line connecting personal demons with actual demons. Although I still found Clio’s subplots about her friends in fashion and her maybe boyfriend to be distractions, the book is incredibly fast-paced and the scares build effectively. Clio’s sisters, her father, and stepmother are all realistically portrayed and well-rounded. As the story unfolds, Clio grows beyond her bratty influencer persona into a young woman forced to confront her parents as fallible humans and accept responsibility for herself. It’s horror as personal growth. 

The horror genre becomes more popular during turbulent times, so fans should find themselves with a plethora of choices. While Play Nice is my first Rachel Harrison, it won’t be my last. I look forward to reading her back list.

Thanks to Berkley for the book in exchange for an honest review.

More by Rachel Harrison:
Black Sheep
The Return
Bad Dolls

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Spotlight and Giveaway: Holly and Nick Hate Christmas

It's September, so that means holiday rom-coms are releasing soon. Holly and Nick Hate Christmas by Betsy St. Amant is arriving mid-month and it sounds like a lot of fun! It has forced proximity and enemies-to-lovers vibes, for those of you who are into tropes. Thanks to Penguin Random House, we have one copy to give away!

When a Christmas-hating woman’s brother sets her up with a fellow Grinch and it backfires, she decides to out-Christmas her date by kicking off a festive battle of wills in this inspirational enemies-to-lovers holiday romcom.

Holly Sinclair has hated Christmas for as long as she can remember. Who names their Christmas baby Holly in the first place? She was teased mercilessly growing up. Holly Berry, Holli-days, Holly Jolly . . . not to mention the fact that her birthday is often totally overlooked amidst the season.

To make matters worse, instead of getting the promotion she was expecting, Holly’s been downsized—which is just fancy holiday talk for fired. Now Holly has to go home single, unemployed, turning thirty, and only a tinsel strand of faith. Bah, humbug.

Holly’s big brother, Ryan, has dragged his best friend, known holiday-hater Nick Kinsley, home with him. But when Holly discovers that Nick’s here to be her pity date, she decides the best revenge is to play along . . . and Christmas like she’s never Christmas’d before. Commence Operation: Naughty List. The fact that she’s attracted to Nick is totally not the point. She’ll teach him a lesson, one ho ho ho at a time. 

The holiday grows more complicated when Holly and Ryan find out their parents asked all the siblings to come home for Christmas this year, but refuse to say why. The rest of the Sinclair siblings descend, each with their own sleigh full of secrets. Rumors spread as everyone tries to guess the reason for their parents’ demand—and Nick turns out to have a secret of his own. Will this be a Christmas to forget? Or will Holly and Nick discover there is so much more?

“Holly and Nick Hate Christmas is a charming, romantic, feel-good delight!”

—Bethany Turner, award-winning author of Brynn and Sebastian Hate Each Other

“Holly and Nick Hate Christmas includes everything a reader could want for Christmas. Humor, family fun, the spirit of Christmas, and Christmas shenanigans. Fans of Melissa Ferguson and Bethany Turner will love this heartwarming, joyous read for the holiday season and years to come!”

—Toni Shiloh, Christy Award–winning author

“Holly and Nick Hate Christmas overflows with festive chaos. If you enjoy holiday stories featuring huge families, secrets, and witty banter, then you’ll fall in love with this rom-com.”

—Angela Ruth Strong, author of Husband Auditions

Credit: Michala Vaughn

Betsy St. Amant Haddox is the author of more than twenty-five romance novels and novellas. She resides in north Louisiana with her hubby, two teenagers, and one furry schnauzer-toddler. Betsy has a bachelor of arts in communication and loves teaching and speaking on the craft of writing. She writes frequently for iBelieve, a devotional site for women, and offers author coaching and editing services through Storyside LLC.

Visit Betsy online:

Website * Facebook * Instagram

How to win: Use Gleam to enter the giveaway. (Rafflecopter is shutting down at the end of September, so we are switching over to Gleam.) If you have any questions, feel free to contact us. If you have trouble using Gleam on our blog, enter the giveaway here.

Holly and Nick Hate Christmas (1 print copy)

Giveaway ends September 14th at midnight EST.

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Book Review: Ghost Business

By Melissa Amster

Boneyard Key, Florida, is the only home Sophie has ever known. Her love for its supernatural history has flourished into a career, as she guides the one and only ghost tour through the town’s can’t-miss haunted spots. And while her bank account isn’t full by any means, her heart is. Or at least, it was.

But there's a newcomer in town. The son of a Fortune 500 businessman, former theater kid Tristan has grown his tours from a fraternity fundraiser to a multicity ghost tour conglomerate. It’s doing well, but not well enough—if he can’t prove that he’s solidly in the black by the fall, Dad’s going to pull his funding, spelling the end of his career. Boneyard Key, with its haunted reputation, seems like the perfect place to boost his bottom line.

When the two ghost tours clash, Sophie’s expletive-filled rant goes viral, and the rivals strike up a deal. Whoever has the most successful business by summer’s end stays, while the loser must ghost. But the more Tristan comes to appreciate Boneyard Key, the more Sophie comes to appreciate Tristan, and what starts as begrudging respect becomes something spicier. Can they put their feuding businesses aside to make room for a chance at love, or is Boneyard Key too small for two ghost tours? (Synopsis courtesy of Amazon.)

Last year, I read Haunted Ever After (reviewed here) because I was a big fan of Jen DeLuca's previous novels and wanted to see what she could do with a different type of story. I wasn't really into ghost stories at the time, but this one not only sold me on this new series, but also convinced me to watch Ghosts, which I am in love with now. So I was really excited for the chance to read an advanced copy of the second Boneyard Key novel, Ghost Business!

This novel is just as delightful as the previous one. While it can be read on its own, there are spoilers for Haunted Ever After and you really should read that one first anyway. Also the dedication, which made me laugh out loud, only makes sense if you read the first book. 

I adored Sophie and Tristan and had fun reconnecting with the Boneyard Key locals. It's an enemies-to-lovers rom-com that could have gone the You've Got Mail route, but it didn't. I liked where the story went and found myself laughing and smiling a lot. There's even a nice amount of steam! The business and marketing aspect of the novel was really interesting to me, as well. I hope there will be a third book in this series, as Libby needs her own story. 

Be sure to add this one to your fall TBR for a spooky, swoony, and sexy time!

(Trigger warnings at the bottom of this post.)

Movie casting suggestions (most are from HEA):

Sophie: Laura Marano

Tristan: Finn Cole

Cassie: Kayla Wallace

Nick: Sam Corlett

Libby: Hayley Erin

Nan: Lin Shaye

Theo: Chris Mason

Aura: Jillian Rose Reed

Thanks to Berkley for the book in exchange for an honest review.

Also by Jen DeLuca: Well Met series

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TW: Hurricane. Death of close relative (off page). Potential loss of business/finances.