Bargain Read: The Beach Cafe - Lucy Diamond

Evie Flynn has always been the black sheep of her family - a dreamer and a drifter, unlike her over-achieving elder sisters. She's tried making a name for herself as an actress, a photographer and a singer, but nothing has ever worked out. Now she's stuck in temp hell, with a sensible, pension-planning boyfriend. Somehow life seems to be passing her by. Then her beloved aunt Jo dies suddenly in a car crash, leaving Evie an unusual legacy - her precious beach cafe in Cornwall. Determined to make a success of something for the first time in her life, Evie heads off to Cornwall to get the cafe and her life back on track - and gets more than she bargained for, both in work and in love...

At this very moment I have a cold and Scotland has well and truly entered autumn, in a desperate attempt to ignore anything festive beginning with the letter 'C' I decided I'd delve into my first Lucy Diamond and reach for a little bit of sun.

Mini-view: Insatiable (Insatiable #1) - Meg Cabot

Sick of hearing about vampires? So is Meena Harper. 

But her bosses are making her write about them anyway, even though Meena doesn’t believe in them.  

Not that Meena isn’t familiar with the supernatural. See, Meena Harper knows how you’re going to die. (Not that you’re going to believe her; no one ever does.)

But not even Meena’s precognition can prepare her for what happens when she meets—then makes the mistake of falling in love with—Lucien Antonescu, a modern-day prince with a bit of a dark side. It's a dark side a lot of people, like an ancient society of vampire-hunters, would prefer to see him dead for. 

The problem is, Lucien's already dead. Maybe that’s why he’s the first guy Meena’s ever met that she could see herself having a future with. See, while Meena’s always been able to see everyone else’s future, she’s never been able look into her own.  

And while Lucien seems like everything Meena has ever dreamed of in a boyfriend, he might turn out to be more like a nightmare.  

Now might be a good time for Meena to start learning to predict her own future . . . 

If she even has one.

I've gone from being a complete paranormal romance newbie to someone who just can't get enough. You may remember me not so much reviewing but gushing about Meg Cabot in one of my previous posts so I thought, what better book to add to my growing obsession than the first in her Insatiable series?

Review: Looking for Trouble (Girls' Night Out #1) - Victoria Dahl

A good reason to be bad... 

Librarian Sophie Heyer has walked the straight and narrow her entire life to avoid paying for her mother's mistakes. But in tiny Jackson Hole, Wyoming, juicy gossip just doesn't go away, so the last thing she needs is for history to repeat itself. Falling hard for the sexiest biker who's ever rode into town would undo everything she's worked for. And to add insult to injury, the sexy stranger is none other than Alex Bishop--the son of the man her mother abandoned Sophie's family for. He may be temptation on wheels, but Sophie's not looking for trouble!

Maybe Sophie's buttoned-up facade fools some, but Alex knows a naughty smile when he sees one. Despite their parents' checkered pasts, he's willing to take some risks to find out the truth about the town librarian. He figures a little fling might be just the ticket to get his mind off of family drama. But what he finds underneath Sophie's prim demeanour might change his world in ways he never expected.

Let's not beat around the bush, Victoria Dahl is one of my favourite authors and for good reason. Dahl's books are funny, sassy and sexy and the first in her new series is wonderfully more of the same.

Mini-view: The Ocean at the end of the Lane- Neil Gaiman

Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.

Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what.

Neil Gaiman is one of those authors who truly baffles me, how in the world he comes up with his tales I'll never know. Genre defying and utterly brilliant, Ocean at the End of the Lane is yet another wonderful book from a unique author. 

Review: The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight - Jennifer E Smith*

Who would have guessed that four minutes could change everything?

Today should be one of the worst days of seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan's life. Having missed her flight, she's stuck at JFK airport and late to her father's second wedding, which is taking place in London and involves a soon-to-be stepmother Hadley's never even met. Then she meets the perfect boy in the airport's cramped waiting area. His name is Oliver, he's British, and he's sitting in her row.

A long night on the plane passes in the blink of an eye, and Hadley and Oliver lose track of each other in the airport chaos upon arrival. Can fate intervene to bring them together once more?

Quirks of timing play out in this romantic and cinematic novel about family connections, second chances, and first loves. Set over a twenty-four-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver's story will make you believe that true love finds you when you're least expecting it. 

This book has been on my TBR for a while and with a long-haul flight coming up I decided to save it to read on the plane. I know, I'm too cool for school, right?

Mini-view: Natural Causes (Inspector McLean #1) - James Oswald

A young girl's mutilated body is discovered in a sealed room. Her remains are carefully arranged, in what seems to have been a cruel and macabre ritual, which appears to have taken place over 60 years ago. 

For newly appointed Edinburgh Detective Inspector Tony McLean this baffling cold case ought to be a low priority - but he is haunted by the young victim and her grisly death. 

Meanwhile, the city is horrified by a series of bloody killings. Deaths for which there appears to be neither rhyme nor reason, and which leave Edinburgh's police at a loss. 

McLean is convinced that these deaths are somehow connected to the terrible ceremonial killing of the girl, all those years ago. It is an irrational, almost supernatural theory. 

And one which will lead McLean closer to the heart of a terrifying and ancient evil . . .

What you might not know is that as well as loving romance novels I also love a good crime novel. Being a Scot I also have a really big soft spot for the wonderfully dubbed 'Tartan Noir'. James Oswald is a name that I'd heard a lot in relation to this sub-genre so when I saw the first of his Inspector McLean novels in the library I couldn't help but grab it.

Review: Love Me or Leave Me - Claudia Carroll*

‘Welcome to the Hope Street Hotel – where you check in married, and check out single.’ 

Two years ago Chloe Townsend was dumped at the altar and had to leave behind everything that mattered to her. Even now she’s finding it hard to move forward. That is until she lands an incredible job, running a brand new boutique hotel. Suddenly she’s starting to put her life back together, and, apart from the fact that her hard-to-please new boss is breathing down her neck, things are looking good. 

But what goes on in the Hope Street Hotel is a far cry from anything she’s ever dealt with before. This is a pioneering ‘divorce hotel’ designed to make every aspect of breaking up efficient and pain-free. In one single weekend, Chloe’s team promises to take care of everything – legal, technical, emotional – and guests check out carefree and single. 

No one is better qualified than Chloe to understand what couples need when their relationship is at breaking point, but she soon finds herself having to tackle the heartbreak she’s tried to bury. In particular three couples need her help – Jo and Dave, Lucy and Andrew, and Kirk and Dawn – and the opening weekend is full of revelation, trouble, memories happy and sad, facts that need facing, and some very big surprises. 

It’s time to move on. And it soon becomes clear that some endings are, in fact, very exciting new beginnings …

How do these brilliant authors keep escaping me? I don't know either, but you can be assured that I'm very excited about reading the rest of Carroll's books.