Book and Product Reviews by Roundtable Reviews

Release Date - September 4, 2018 What She Gave Away is the first of two novels in a series per Amazon's page. I can't see how the second book fits in as a part of a series as this first book was complete and didn't leave anything open for a sequel. I tried to read it last year and just couldn't get into it, but I really wanted to try again and stuck with it this time. The story is told from two viewpoints. You have Crystal Love, a plus-sized loan analyst who manages to get the job she desires despite not fitting into Santa Barbara's mold. It's clear that she has ulterior motives regarding her new job. Kathi Wright has spent a long time as one of Santa Barbara's elite. She's the wife of the bank president, the same bank where Crystal gets a job. When Kathi's husband dies, she learns he's not only left her penniless, but he was also embroiled in a fraudulent scheme and Kathi's suspected of knowing all about it. As Kathi struggles to

Release Date - September 24, 2019 I don't like seeing or hearing about people who feel it's necessary to hide mental illness. I get it, but I wish those people would have the courage to speak up. So many people from all walks of life deal with depression, anxiety, PTSD, OCD, Bipolar, and so many other forms of mental illness. For that reason, I appreciated the story in Six Goodbyes We Never Said . Naima Rodriquez struggles with OCD and generalized anxiety disorder. Her military father's death has only made that harder. While she used to become anxious when he deployed, now she's experiencing the worst in that she'll never see him again. That said, she doesn't want you to talk about it. Hence a lot of the agitation between her and her step-mom. Andrew, Dew for short, is also suffering. The sudden death of both parents has left him alone. Anxiety attacks have become the daily norm for him. Social anxiety has become his biggest challenge. Naima's appea

Release Date - September 17, 2019 Reporter Rain has a tragic past. She and two friends were attacked by a stranger in the woods as children. She ran away and managed to avoid capture, but her two friends were kidnapped. One didn't survive. Though years have passed, she cannot forget and it's a bond she will always have with Hank, the childhood friend who survived. She's a stay-at-home mom now, but there's a strong itch to return to journalism. There's the perfect story too. There's a vigilante out there committing executions of murderers. One of those executions was Rain and Hank's attacker. Is it justice finally being served? Rain and her friend, a fellow reporter, think it would make for an explosive podcast and reason for Rain to return to work. Doing so may lead Rain down a path she isn't ready to face. The Stranger Inside was gripping. I get a strong feeling this is the first in a series, and I can't wait. While I didn't always get

Release Date - September 10, 2019 Wow how 29 Seconds ticked me off, brought me to the edge of rage and back. It had me snickering and wanting to cry. It's a book that is maddening, addicting, and oh so satisfying at times. T. M. Logan took me on quite the ride. Since Sarah's husband, an actor, walked off to be with some other woman, she's done all she can to balance her time with her kids with her job as a professor. Her boss, a positively lecherous creep, doesn't make it easy. The more she refuses his advances, the harder he makes her life. It's a clear-cut case of sexual harassment, one he's used on other young professors, but his connections to so many higher-ups make it impossible to get anyone to take a complaint seriously. On the way to get her children, Sarah witnesses an attempted kidnapping. The father of that child reaches out to her and makes her an offer she struggling to refuse. To thank her for saving his daughter, all she has to do is cal

Release Date - September 10, 2019 The right cover art can lure me to read a book. That's what happened with As the Light Fades . The tranquility of the sand and surf caught my eye. The story ended up being a touching romance. Liz Carlisle is back in Nantucket after suffering tremendous abuse at the hands of her boyfriend. The lawyer isn't sure what she wants to do next. Her family's beachfront estate is under renovations, so she needs to find a job and a place to live while she starts the next chapter of her life. While she's out walking the family dogs, she sees an erratic driver take out a neighbor's fence, prized rose garden, and tree. The rebellious teen girl that gets out of the vehicle raises Liz's anger. Little does she know that that girl will end up changing her life. Matthew Stone is dealing as best he can with his niece. She's miserable on Nantucket and money's tight. When Liz calls him about a carriage house he has for rent, he thi

Release Date - September 3, 2019 Rosie's family was never the same after her sister vanished at Astroland, a theme park in the U.S. While 15 years have passed, the family hasn't given up all hope. The anniversary also brings a lot of media attention to the girl's disappearance during a vacation in the U.S. The problem is that after 15 years, the fund keeping the search going is about to be shut down for good. It's tearing Rosie's family apart. Anna has grown up under the care of a domineering, highly protective mom. The older she gets, the more she thinks there are things her mom keeps from her. On her 18th birthday, a mysterious letter arrives calling her by another name, and that has her questioning everything about her past. So begins a suspense novel that really isn't that shocking, but it does offer insight into both Anna's and Rosie's struggles to figure out what happened and how to move on in a world full of uncertainty. Chapte

Release Date - August 27, 2019 I've been a fan of Carla Neggers for so many years. I haven't been following the Sharpe & Donovan series. Picking up Rival's Break and trying to jump in now was a mistake. I didn't feel a strong connection to the characters and struggled with the "who's who" aspect. Emma Sharpe hasn't seen her husband Colin Donovan in a while as he's been off doing his thing. Both are FBI agents with busy lives and caseloads. Colin's brother is getting married, so they're at their home in Maine to reconnect and for the wedding. Things go awry when passengers aboard a private yacht are poisoned. Georgina, the chef, is devastated that she may be responsible for poisoning so many people including her father. Colin opts to help the marine patrol officer look into the poisonings. When it's found a painting by a friend of both Colin and Emma's disappeared from the yacht, the investigation takes a personal tur