Story for the Week
Fifty books in twelve months. That’s my standard goal every year. Some years I read more. Occasionally, I read less. I came really close in 2023 with 48 but didn’t quite make it. And that’s ok. Life happens. For 2024, I set a goal of 50 again.
Four primary sources drive what I read throughout the year. As an Amazon Prime member, I download a free new release each month, sometimes two, from six or seven options offered by Amazon First Reads. I purchase books by my favorite authors or recommendations from friends, but I also have found a lot of great new reads through the My Book Friends Facebook group. I am a NetGalley reviewer, so I’ll request advance reader copies (ARCs) and review them before they release. And I belong to The Creepy Book Club, a group I discovered on TikTok.
Currently, my reading/reviewing queue contains 23 titles:
- One Creepy Book Club purchase (they announce them a month in advance, so most of them are on my list as placeholders like “Feb CBC”)
- Six direct Amazon purchases
- Three Amazon First Reads
- Ten NetGalley ARCs
- Three I’ll request on NetGalley when they’re available or buy on Amazon if I don’t get approved on NetGalley
A couple of them I’ve already read and scheduled the blog posts. All of them are previewed below in the order I plan to publish the reviews, and every week has something until the last week of June. Sometimes a new book makes its way in (I have four titles pending requests on NetGalley right now), and I have to shift things around to accommodate release dates, but it rarely changes much.
And occasionally I start a book and realize it’s not what I thought, and I’ll take it completely off the list. Those are pretty rare. I’ve requested 202 titles on NetGalley since I joined. Forty-two of my requests were declined, but there have only been ten that I started reading and decided they were absolutely not for me. It only takes a chapter or two for me to realize that it was a mistake to request it.
Enjoy! And here’s hoping that we all find our happiness in this New Year.
Upcoming Reads and Reviews in 2024
The Getaway List by Emma Lord
Release date January 23, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
The day of her high school graduation, Riley realizes two things: One, that she has spent the last four years trying so hard to be a Good Kid for her mom that she has no idea who she really is anymore, and two, she has no idea what she wants because of it. The solution? Pack her bags and move to New York for the summer, where her childhood best friend Tom and co-creator of The Getaway List—a list of all the adventures they’ve wanted to do together since he moved away—will hopefully help her get in touch with her old adventurous self, and pave the road to a new future.
Riley isn’t sure what to expect from Tom, who has been distant since his famous mom’s scriptwriting career pulled him away. But when Riley arrives in the city, their reconnection is as effortless as it was when they were young―except with one, unexpected complication that will pull Riley’s feelings in a direction she didn’t know they could take. As she, Tom, and their newfound friends work their way through the delightfully chaotic items on The Getaway List, Riley learns that sometimes the biggest adventure is not one you take, but one you feel in your heart.
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The Clinic by Cate Quinn
Release date January 23, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
Meg works for a casino in LA, catching cheaters and popping a few too many pain pills to cope, following a far different path than her sister Haley, a famous actress. But suddenly reports surface of Haley dying at the remote rehab facility where she had been forced to go to get her addictions under control.
There are whispers of suicide, but Meg can’t believe it. She decides that the best way to find out what happened to her sister is to check in herself―to investigate what really happened from the inside.
Battling her own addictions and figuring out the truth will be much more difficult than she imagined, far away from friends, family―and anyone who could help her.
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There Should Have Been Eight by Nalini Singh
Release date November 21, 2023 (Source: The Creepy Book Club)
Seven friends.
One last weekend.
A mansion half in ruins.
No room for lies.
Someone is going to confess.
Because there should have been eight….
They met when they were teenagers. Now they’re adults, and time has been kind to some and unkind to others—none more so than to Bea, the one they lost nine long years ago.
They’ve gathered to reminisce at Bea’s family’s estate, a once-glorious mansion straight out of a gothic novel. Best friends, old flames, secret enemies, and new lovers are all under one roof. But when the weather turns and they’re snowed in at the edge of eternity, there’s nowhere left to hide from their shared history.
As the walls close in, the pretense of normality gives way to long-buried grief, bitterness, and rage. Underneath it all, there’s the nagging feeling that Bea’s shocking death wasn’t what it was claimed to be. And before the weekend is through, the truth will be unleashed—no matter the cost….
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Very Very Lucky by Amanda Prowse
Release date January 9, 2024 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
With kids to look after, an ailing mother and a neglected husband, life is full for Emma Fountain—too full, she realizes, when she wakes up in IKEA after falling asleep in one of the show beds. Only her crazy, funny best friend Roz keeps her sane. But when Roz climbs in through her bathroom window one day to deliver terrible news, Emma’s belief that she can find a way around any obstacle crumbles in the face of a problem she just can’t fix.
For recently widowed Thurston, life without his beloved wife of 62 years has lost all its joy and sense of purpose. That is until he finds himself driving his niece to work one day and meets Emma, whose busy days are the opposite of his own. As Thurston is drawn into the whirlwind of Emma’s chaotic life, and as his calming influence starts to bring her troubles into perspective, an unlikely friendship grows.
In a world where grief is the price we pay for love, can two very different people realize that the little things in life are precious, that love is all around us, and that, even after all, they might still be very, very lucky?
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Admission by Julie Buxbaum
Release date December 1, 2020 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
It’s good to be Chloe Wynn Berringer—she has it all—money, privilege, and a ticket to the college of her dreams. Or at least she did until the FBI came knocking on her front door, guns at the ready, and her future went up in smoke. Now her B list celebrity mother is under arrest in a massive college admissions bribery scandal, and Chloe might be the next one facing charges. The public is furious, the headlines are brutal, and the US attorney is out for blood.
As everything she’s taken for granted starts to slip away, Chloe must reckon not only with the truth of what happened, but also with the examination of her own guilt. How much did she really know—or guess? Why did her parents think the only way for her to succeed was to cheat? And what does it really mean to be complicit?
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All the Little Raindrops by Mia Sheridan
Release date November 1, 2023 (Source: Amazon First Reads)
It’s senior-year spring break, and Noelle Meyer and Evan Sinclair have been kidnapped. Neither knows why they were chosen, only that they share a tragic past: Evan’s father got away with killing Noelle’s mother, effectively ruining her family when the death was ruled an accident.
Despite the connection that should have made them enemies, the teens instead unite to face their other common denominator—their abductors. Noelle and Evan survive one sadistic circumstance after another, eventually making a harrowing escape. But every happy ending comes at a price…
Years later, Evan, now a private investigator, revisits the crime when he learns it may be ongoing. He reaches out to Noelle for help, and they discover that the answers lie with a man known only as the Collector. To close their case and solve the ones that followed, Noelle and Evan must unmask this mysterious spectator—the only man who knows enough secrets to take their captors down.
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Bye, Baby by Carola Lovering
Release date March 5, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
On a brisk fall night in a New York apartment, 35-year-old Billie West hears terrified screams. It’s her lifelong best friend Cassie Barnwell, one floor above, and she’s just realized her infant daughter has gone missing. Billie is shaken as she looks down into her own arms to see the baby, remembering—with a jolt of fear—that she is responsible for the kidnapping that has instantly shattered Cassie’s world.
Once fiercely bonded by their secrets, Cassie and Billie have drifted apart in adulthood, no longer the inseparable pair they used to be in their small Hudson Valley hometown. Cassie is married to a wealthy man, has recently become a mother, and is building a following as a lifestyle influencer. She is desperate to leave her past behind—including Billie, who is single and childless, and no longer fits into her world. But Billie knows the worst thing Cassie has ever done, and she will do whatever it takes to restore their friendship…
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Cancelled by Farrah Penn
Release date March 19, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
Not to brag, but Brynn Whittaker is basically killing her senior year. She’s got the looks, the grades, and a thriving “flirt coach” business that will help pay for her ultimate dream school: Stanford University.
But when a highly incriminating video goes viral after the first rager of the year, Brynn finds herself at the center of a school-wide scandal of catastrophic proportions. She knows she’s not the girl in the video hooking up with her former best friend’s boyfriend (While wearing a banana costume, no less. Hey, points for style), but adding that to her reputation of being a serial dater, she quickly starts losing friends and customers. On top of that, the scorn she receives exposes the culture of misogyny that is rampant at her school…and Brynn and her three best friends are determined to take down all the haters.
But as she gets closer to identifying the person in the video that got her cancelled, Brynn must decide—is exposing the girl worth losing everything she’s worked so hard for?
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Wish Me Home by Kay Bratt
Release date March 21, 2017 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
A hungry, stray dog is the last thing Cara Butter needs. Stranded in Georgia with only her backpack and a few dwindling dollars, she already has too much baggage. Like her twin sister, Hana, who has broken Cara’s heart one too many times. After a lifetime of family troubles, and bouncing from one foster home to another, Cara decides to leave it all behind and strike out alone—on foot.
Cara sets off to Florida to see the home of her literary hero, Ernest Hemingway, accompanied only by Hemi, the stray dog who proves to be the perfect travel companion. But the harrowing trip takes unexpected turns as strangers become friends who make her question everything, and Cara finds that as the journey unfolds, so does her life—in ways she could never imagine.
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Expiration Dates by Rebecca Serle
Release date March 19, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
Daphne Bell believes the universe has a plan for her. Every time she meets a new man, she receives a slip of paper with his name and a number on it—the exact amount of time they will be together. The papers told her she’d spend three days with Martin in Paris; five weeks with Noah in San Francisco; and three months with Hugo, her ex-boyfriend turned best friend. Daphne has been receiving the numbered papers for over twenty years, always wondering when there might be one without an expiration. Finally, the night of a blind date at her favorite Los Angeles restaurant, there’s only a name: Jake.
But as Jake and Daphne’s story unfolds, Daphne finds herself doubting the paper’s prediction, and wrestling with what it means to be both committed and truthful. Because Daphne knows things Jake doesn’t, information that—if he found out—would break his heart.
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Please Tell Me by Mike Omer
Release date December 1, 2023 (Source: Amazon First Reads)
When eight-year-old Kathy Stone turns up on the side of the road a year after her abduction, the world awaits her harrowing story. But Kathy doesn’t say a word. Traumatized by her ordeal, she doesn’t speak at all, not even to her own parents.
Child therapist Robin Hart is the only one who’s had success connecting with the girl. Robin has been using play therapy to help Kathy process her memories. But as their work continues, Kathy’s playtime takes a grim turn: a doll stabs another doll, a tiny figurine is chained to a plastic toy couch. All of these horrifying moments, enacted within a Victorian doll house. Every session, another toy dies.
But the most disturbing detail? Kathy seems to be playacting real unsolved murders.
Soon Robin wonders if Kathy not only holds the key to the murders of the past but if she knows something about the murders of the future. Can Robin unlock the secrets in Kathy’s brain and stop a serial killer before he strikes again? Or is Robin’s work with Kathy putting her in the killer’s sights?
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You Belong With Me by Kathryn Biel
Release date September 5, 2023 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
Twelve years ago, would-be sportscaster Hannah LaRosa’s life was forever changed when she spent one night with her friend, Callaghan Entay. Now she’s finally ready to launch her career, covering all the sports news that’s fit to report. And as much as she’d like to forget about her past with Callaghan Entay, he’s making news that she has to cover.
Callaghan Entay has made soccer his whole life, sacrificing everything to be one of the country’s best goalkeepers. He has one milestone left…and then what?
Like a moth to a flame, Callaghan can’t stay away from his former friend. But he doesn’t want to, even though he’s pretty sure she’s using him for his career, like everyone else in his life.
Hannah’s not sure she can ever trust Callaghan to stay, no matter how attentive he seems. But what if, this time, he really is a keeper?
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The One That Got Away With Murder by Trish Lundy
Release date April 16, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
Robbie and Trevor Crestmont have a body count—the killer kind. Handsome and privileged, the Crestmont brothers have enough wealth to ensure they’ll never be found guilty of any wrongdoing, even if all of Happy Valley believes they’re behind the deaths of their ex-girlfriends. First there was soccer star Victoria Moreno, Robbie’s ex, who mysteriously drowned at the family lake house. Then, a year later, Trevor’s girlfriend died of a suspicious overdose.
But the Crestmonts aren’t the only ones with secrets. Lauren O’Brian might be the new girl at school, but she’s never been a good girl. With a dark past of her own, she’s desperate for a fresh start. Except when she starts a no-strings-attached relationship with Robbie, her chance is put in jeopardy. During what’s meant to be their last weekend together, Lauren stumbles across shocking evidence that just might implicate Robbie.
With danger closing in, Lauren doesn’t know who to trust. And after a third death rocks the town, she must decide whether to end things with Robbie or risk becoming another cautionary tale.
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Safe and Sound by Laura McHugh
Release date April 23, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
As kids, Amelia and Kylee were found unharmed in their upstairs bedroom the night their teenage cousin Grace, who was babysitting them, vanished from the farmhouse in Beaumont, Missouri, leaving blood all over the kitchen. Scrappy and driven, Grace, the first in their family to go to college instead of getting married and working at the meatpacking plant, had been on the verge of escaping their dead-end town. Her disappearance is a warning to any local girl who dared hope for better.
Now, as their own high school graduation looms, Amelia and Kylee dream about fleeing Beaumont, but the likelihood of that happening seems as low as that of Grace being found. When human remains are discovered in town, the sisters think they finally know who took Grace—but as they dig deeper into her past, they unearth long-buried secrets and a growing list of suspects.
Amelia and Kylee vow to find Grace, dead or alive. But as they draw closer to the truth and slip further into danger, they question how far someone would go to put a woman in her place, or to cover up a crime. The answer is worse than they could have imagined, and in the end, it won’t just be Grace they’re trying to save—they’ll have to fight for their lives.
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Every Time I Go on Vacation, Someone Dies by Catherine Mack
Release date April 30, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
All that bestselling author Eleanor Dash wants is to get through her book tour in Italy and kill off her main character, Connor Smith, in the next in her Vacation Mysteries series—is that too much to ask?
Clearly, because when an attempt is made on the real Connor’s life—the handsome but infuriating con man she got mixed up with ten years ago and now can’t get out of her life—Eleanor’s enlisted to help solve the case.
Contending with literary rivals, rabid fans, a stalker—and even her ex, Oliver, who turns up unexpectedly—theories are bandied about, and rivalries, rifts, and broken hearts are revealed. But who’s really trying to get away with murder?
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Summer After Summer by Lauren Bailey
Release date May 7, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
Olivia Taylor’s marriage is in a death spiral when she agrees to come home to the Hamptons to help her father and sisters pack up the family estate. If it looks like she’s running away from her soon-to-be-ex Wes and New York City, well, she is. But someone has to take care of things and that’s always been Olivia’s role in the family. After years of financial trouble, someone’s finally bailing them out with a huge offer to buy their beachfront property, which is a good thing, although it means losing the home she grew up in, where her mother died, and where she first met Fred, the love of her life.
It’s been five years since the last time things blew up between Olivia and Fred, but much longer since the first time. At this point, Olivia fears it was never meant to be, so there’s no reason to feel butterflies in her stomach at the idea of seeing him again. They’ve already tried, and tried again…and again…but she’s newly single, and she isn’t the same person she was the last time—and Fred has changed, too.
This time, things will be different. Maybe, just maybe, the fifth time’s the charm.
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Olivia Strauss is Running Out of Time by Angela Brown
Release date January 1, 2024 (Source: Amazon First Reads)
Olivia Strauss is turning 39. No major milestone. She still considers herself young. At least young enough to assume she has decades (emphasis on the plural) to check the unchecked boxes of her life’s to-do list.
Ballerina? Too late. But not too late for poet. Or for reigniting the romantic spark in her marriage, spending more quality time with her son, switching careers, learning to cook, or even dyeing her hair a bright bohemian pink. She’ll get to that one. There’s time—until Olivia’s best friend, Marian, gives her a birthday present she could have lived without.
It’s a visit to a trendy wellness clinic with a state-of-the-art genetic test that can predict the exact date of one’s death. It’s just what Olivia’s always wanted: an expiration date. As for her aspirations, who knew they were limited-time offers? One thing’s for sure. Olivia’s got a lot of living to do. At this point, what could go wrong?
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Saving Noah by Lucinda Berry
Release date September 12, 2017 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
Meet Noah—an A-honor roll student, award-winning swimmer, and small-town star destined for greatness. There weren’t any signs that something was wrong until the day he confesses to molesting little girls during swim team practice. He’s sentenced to 18 months in a juvenile sexual rehabilitation center.
His mother, Adrianne, refuses to turn her back on him despite his horrific crimes, but her husband won’t allow Noah back into their home. In a series of shocking and shattering revelations, Adrianne is forced to make the hardest decision of her life. Just how far will she go to protect her son?
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The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center
Release date June 11, 2024 (Source: NetGalley or Amazon Purchase)
Emma Wheeler desperately longs to be a screenwriter. She’s spent her life studying, obsessing over, and writing romantic comedies—good ones! That win contests! But she’s also been the sole caretaker for her kind-hearted dad, who needs full-time care. Now, when she gets a chance to re-write a script for famous screenwriter Charlie Yates—The Charlie Yates! Her personal writing god!—it’s a break too big to pass up.
Emma’s younger sister steps in for caretaking duties, and Emma moves to L.A. for six weeks for the writing gig of a lifetime. But what is it they say? Don’t meet your heroes? Charlie Yates doesn’t want to write with anyone—much less “a failed, nobody screenwriter.” Worse, the romantic comedy he’s written is so terrible it might actually bring on the apocalypse. Plus! He doesn’t even care about the script—it’s just a means to get a different one green-lit. Oh, and he thinks love is an emotional Ponzi scheme.
But Emma’s not going down without a fight. She will stand up for herself, and for rom-coms, and for love itself. She will convince him that love stories matter—even if she has to kiss him senseless to do it. But…what if that kiss is accidentally amazing? What if real life turns out to be so much…more real than fiction? What if the love story they’re writing breaks all Emma’s rules—and comes true?
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The Paris Widow by Kimberly Belle
Release date June 11, 2024 (Source: NetGalley)
When Stella met Adam, she thought she had finally found a nice, normal guy—a welcome change from her previous boyfriend and her precarious jetsetter lifestyle with him. But her secure world comes crashing down when Adam goes missing after an explosion in the city square. Unable to reach him, she panics.
As the French police investigate, it’s revealed that Adam was on their radar as a dealer of rare and stolen antiquities with a long roster of criminal clients. Reeling from this news, Stella is determined not to leave Paris until she has the full story. Was Adam a random victim or the target of the explosion? And why is someone following her through the streets of Paris?
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Holly by Stephen King
Release date September 5, 2023 (Source: Amazon Purchase)
When Penny Dahl calls the Finders Keepers detective agency hoping for help locating her missing daughter, Holly is reluctant to accept the case. Her partner, Pete, has Covid. Her (very complicated) mother has just died. And Holly is meant to be on leave. But something in Penny Dahl’s desperate voice makes it impossible for Holly to turn her down.
Mere blocks from where Bonnie Dahl disappeared live Professors Rodney and Emily Harris. They are the picture of bourgeois respectability: married octogenarians, devoted to each other, and semi-retired lifelong academics. But they are harboring an unholy secret in the basement of their well-kept, book-lined home, one that may be related to Bonnie’s disappearance. And it will prove nearly impossible to discover what they are up to: they are savvy, they are patient, and they are ruthless.
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Until Next Summer by Ali Brady
Release date July 9, 2024 (Source: NetGalley or Amazon Purchase)
Growing up, Jessie and Hillary lived for summer, when they’d be reunited at Camp Chickawah. The best friends vowed to become counselors together someday, but they drifted apart after Hillary broke her promise and only Jessie stuck to their plan, working her way up to become the camp director.
When Jessie learns that the camp will be sold, she decides to plan one last hurrah, inviting past campers—including Hillary—to a nostalgic “adult summer camp” before closing for good. Jessie and Hillary rebuild their friendship as they relive the best time of their lives—only now there are adult beverages, skinny dipping, and romantic entanglements. Straitlaced Hillary agrees to a “no strings attached” summer fling with the camp chef, while outgoing Jessie is drawn to a moody, reclusive writer who’s rented a cabin to work on his novel.
The friends soon realize this doesn’t have to be the last summer. They’ll team up and work together, just like the old days. But if they can’t save their beloved camp, will they be able to take the happiness of this summer away with them?
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The Break-Up Pact by Emma Lord
Release date August 13, 2024 (Source: NetGalley or Amazon Purchase)
June and Levi were best friends as teenagers—until the day they weren’t. Now June is struggling to make rent on her beachside tea shop, Levi is living a New York cliché as a disillusioned hedge fund manager and failed novelist, and they’ve barely spoken in years.
But after they both experience public, humiliating break-ups with their exes that spread like wildfire across TikTok rabbit holes and daytime talk shows alike, they accidentally make some juicy gossip of their own—a photo of them together has the internet convinced they’re a couple. With so many people rooting for them, they decide to put aside their rocky past and make a pact to fuel the fire. Pretending to date will help June’s shop get back on its feet and make Levi’s ex realize that she made a mistake. All they have to do is convince the world they’re in love, one swoon-worthy photo opp at a time.
Two viral break-ups. One fake relationship. Five sparkling, heart-pounding dates. June and Levi can definitely pull this off without their hearts getting involved. Because everyone knows fake dating doesn’t come with real feelings. Right?
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