This is such a cute book and a great one for a fast summer read. Poppy, the main character, seems so young and naive. She is so in love with her husband that the decisions she makes had me wanting to call her to help her out. Fortunately, she has a friend.
When twenty-seven-year-old image consultant Poppy Ross accidentally hears that her handsome and seemingly devoted husband Parker is having an affair, she is dumbfounded. Before she has chance to confront him, however, he is struck by lightning. When he regains consciousness, he has lost his short-term memory—including that of the affair.
Given a chance to erase history and possible save her marriage, Poppy decides to remake herself in the mistress’s image, so that Parker might never be tempted to stray again. Her quest to become his perfect woman has disastrous and hilarious results—and might turn out to be the worst thing possible for her marriage.
We all have struggles and the ones I found in this small,fictitious rivertown of Avalon, Illinois can hit close to home. This book has many characters which are introduced slowly enough to know each one by the end of the book. Usually not my genre, but I continued on and it was worth reading.
Here is a message from the author Darien Gee on this debut novel.
Like many small communities, Avalon is a place where families gather to share a meal and where neighbors are quick to come to one another’s aid. Visitors are charmed by the quiet simplicity of Avalon, of the scent of fresh-baked goods wafting from Madeline’s Tea Salon, of the sweet bungalow homes that line the shady streets.
But behind every closed door is a story, and on a sunny afternoon in March, my protagonist’s story begins. For five years Julia Evarts has carried a grief that threatens to tear her family apart. She’s going through the motions of life when her young daughter discovers the equivalent of a culinary chain letter sitting on their front porch: a plate of Amish Friendship Bread along with a bag of starter and an anonymous note that says “I HOPE YOU ENJOY IT.”
They’re instructed to feed the starter over a ten-day period and then bake two loaves of bread and share the remaining starter with three other people. As the bread and its starter make their way through Julia’s small town, including into the home of her estranged sister, the residents of Avalon, Illinois, find their lives--and hearts--opening in ways both poignant and unexpected.
This book takes an interesting look at physic energy power levels and aura reading. There is romance mixed in with mystery. I liked the main characters almost instantly - the good ones, not the evil ones. It's a long book, but the story line keeps moving. I would recommend this book for a summer read.
Librarian Grace Renquist and ex-cop-turned-bartender Luther Malone, both members of the centuries-old Arcane Society, join forces when the psychic investigative agency Jones & Jones hires Grace, with Luther as her bodyguard, to find a killer in Hawaii. Luther quickly realizes Grace is not your normal paranormal, but their hot romance is put (briefly) on hold as they learn that Nightshade, drug-fueled supernatural baddies, are after the same murderer—as is the lethal psychic hunter La Sirène, an opera diva with a killer voice.
Hamish Macbeth, a hulking Highlander cop and the Scottish Highlands most stubborn (and romantically challenged) bachelor. He has has refused or resigned from every promotion offered so that he can stay in his beloved village, Lochdubh, with its harsh beauty and eccentric inhabitants. But the outside world keeps intruding, the vicious police hierarchy; the effect of Strathbane, an ugly city, spreading its tentacles into the Highlands.
As this story opens Hamish returns to his home village of Lochdubh from a disappointing vacation to discover a witch stirring up trouble. To Macbeth's annoyance, the sex-starved local men have fallen under the spell of Catriona Beldame, who turns out to be a runaway bride with a shady past. Macbeth longs to prove she's selling illegal (and bogus) remedies for sexual dysfunction, and warns her to stop if she is. Macbeth gets a shock when someone murders Beldame and sets her house on fire. More murders follow in As this story opens Hamish returns to his home village of Lochdubh from a disappointing vacation to discover a witch stirring up trouble. To Macbeth's annoyance, the sex-starved local men have fallen under the spell of Catriona Beldame, who turns out to be a runaway bride with a shady past. Macbeth longs to prove she's selling illegal (and bogus) remedies for sexual dysfunction, and warns her to stop if she is. Macbeth gets a shock when someone murders Beldame and sets her house on fire. More murders follow in the village, against the usual backdrop of Macbeth trying to sort out his love life.
