ShellieLovesBooks

Publication Date:  October 28, 2013 Length:  423 pages My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5 out of 5 stars WHY I CHOSE THIS BOOK: All my life I've been obsessed with Queen Victoria. It amazes me how many lives she influenced as queen and as the grandmother of an empire. She and her descendants linked countless nations through marriages and children and their personal sagas provide endless material for writers.  They endured highlights and hardships most of us cannot fathom. And at the end of an era it all came crashing to a halt with the fading of the Imperialist age. Christina Croft is excellent and so knowledgeable about this time period.  SUMMARY: This book spans the years before and during World War I, culminating with the painful and tragic end of Alix and Ella, the two unfortunates who ended up in Russia during the Revolution. Queen Victoria  produced  twenty-two granddaughters, five of which became monarchs through their marriages:  Maud of Norway, Empress Alix of Russia, Sophie of Greece, Ma

  I am a very social person. I'm not one of those people who hides behind the internet and has this book blog because I'm an introvert. I like discussing what I read and finding fellow book nerds. When I meet someone in person who shares my love of books I get very excited. Almost too excited wanting to discuss all.the.books!  But having said that the one thing I've oddly never had a desire to do is join a book club. My very introverted mother has been in one for years. Even during the height of the Covid pandemic she was disappointed that she couldn't meet in person with them. Weird that I don't feel the same. I've been pondering why on earth I don't join one? Here are my reasons. Are you in a book club? Why or why not? Am I missing out?  1. Time This is huge. I fully realize I make time to get to the gym 2 or 3 days a week. I make time to read many books and write this blog. But for some reason, I can't make the leap to give an entire afternoon a month

  Publication Date:  September 11, 2020 Length:  264 pages My Rating:  ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆ WHY I CHOSE THIS BOOK: I am working my way through these books as I have a moment between longer reads. They are just so much fun and although I don't really need to do a review for each one I want to because they all have a different theme. It's fun to check in with the characters and see what new mischief they've gotten themselves into.  SUMMARY:  We find our heroine, Lady Eleanor, adjusting to her new life at Henley Hall. In the six months since arriving, she has already been instrumental in solving two murders and with the help of her much loved butler, Clifford, and her darling bulldog, Gladstone, she has created a world for herself among the people of the village of Chipstone. Ellie's parents have been missing for a number of years and she has led a life of adventure prior to returning to her late Uncle's estate to take over the running of the place. Ellie always seems to find herself

  Publication Date: October 4, 2011 Length: 116 pages My Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ WHY I CHOSE THIS BOOK: If you've read any of my reviews before then you know I'm a huge Outlander fan. What I probably haven't said before though is that I'm a huge Lord John Grey fan. At the risk of the wrath of fellow Outlanders out there I am going to be honest....I enjoy the character of Lord John Grey more than Jamie Fraser sometimes. He is fascinating with his aristocratic background, military prowess, and the interesting situations he always finds himself in. Many loyal Gabaldon readers don't even like or read the LJG books but I can't understand why. They fill in a lot of gaps from the big books and as the series has progressed he has become an important figure. In honor of Halloween this month I wanted to review my favorite LJG story, A Plague of Zombies.  It is a novella added to her collection in the book Seven Stones to Stand or Fall,  but you can buy it as a stand alone as well.

Thank you to Net Galley for loaning me this book. Publication Date:  November 8, 2022 Length:  224 Pages My Rating:  ⭐⭐⭐☆☆ 3 out of 5 stars WHY I CHOSE THIS BOOK: I am still new to this book blogging world and so one of the fun discoveries for me has been Net Galley. You just go online to their website and enter your information and you can request early copies of books that haven't been released yet. So amazing! I still can't believe I've been able to read this book before it even hits the shelves in November. I have loved Anne Perry books for over 20 years. So this one was a no brainer. I still have to read about four more of her Christmas books and I knew there would be some spoilers here by reading them out of order but I just couldn't resist. They always get you into the holiday spirit.  SUMMARY: Crowe is a doctor running a clinic for the poorest, downtrodden members of London society. He spends his time healing those who cannot or will not go to a more prestigious

  While Halloween is by no means my favorite holiday, it is nevertheless an important part of October and can be a lot of fun to celebrate. I'm not exactly a gal who reads horror books or watches a lot of scary movies, but I am a mystery buff and especially enjoy stories with creepy characters and spooky settings. In honor of Halloween I'd like to share some of my favorite classic books that will maybe make you look over your shoulder a bit. Some I read years ago but they stuck with me as a little more disturbing than your average mystery book. What are your favorite spooky stories this time of year?  My Cousin Rachel by Daphne Du Maurier Amazon Book Summary: I threw the piece of paper on the fire. She saw it burn ...Orphaned at an early age, Philip Ashley is raised by his benevolent older cousin, Ambrose. Resolutely single, Ambrose delights in Philip as his heir, a man who will love his grand home as much as he does himself. But the cosy world the two construct is shattered w

Publication Date:  January 1, 1962 Length: 216 pages My Rating:  ⭐⭐⭐☆☆ 3 out of 5 stars WHY I CHOSE THIS BOOK: I absolutely love historical fiction set in the West Indies, especially Jamaica. They are hard to find, let alone find one that is also a mystery. So this book was right up my alley. Throw in that it is considered a classic, having been written in the 1960's, and I just had to read it. I also had never heard of this author and when I went to do a little research was surprised to find how many stories she penned in her lifetime. You'd think she'd be a more familiar name. Maybe the whole mystery vibe had been done so much she was just one of many by the time her books were being published. I planned for it to be an Agatha Christie type book and to some degree it is but it is also different in its own way. The book synopsis leads you to believe it will take place in South Carolina as well but I found most of the book was set in Jamaica. Which was just fine with me.  S

  Mrs. Graves was my ninth grade language arts teacher and she was tough as nails. I can still clearly remember sitting in her class and being handed the synopsis of the school year. We were to write a term theme and pick a book from the list she presented. It was going to take six weeks to write and then type (pre computers people, typewriters!) We had to learn how to research using the card catalog in the school library (I can hear kids today asking, what is a card catalog?) and document our information on index cards. It sounded terrible.  I chose To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Thirty years later, I still have that term paper. It is in the attic in a box somewhere because it was special enough to keep. Students simultaneously hated and loved Mrs. Graves. She made us read and work and read and work and write and write and write. It was terrible. And fun. And rewarding. It prepared me for the rest of high school and beyond. And introduced me to a classic book I love to this day.