#BookReview by Lou Hope In Liverpool @tracy_traynor @LoveBooksGroup #FamilySaga #HopeInLiverpool #Northerners #RiverMersey #BlogTour

Hope In Liverpool
By T.N. Traynor

Emotionally charged with courage and hope is what Hope in Liverpool brings to readers eyes and imaginations. FInd out more in the blurb and review below.

Blurb

Can an alliance of convenience heal two broken hearts?

Liverpool, 1958. Hope Bennett longs to feel safe and wanted. Loyal to an alcoholic mother who gambles away all her hard-earned wages, she’s devastated by the announcement her family is moving and she’s not to follow. But her despondent plan to fling herself off the ferry and succumb to the freezing River Mersey is interrupted by a handsome older man.

John Walker expects to live out the rest of his days drowning in grief, isolated and lonely after the loss of his childhood sweetheart. When he spots a young woman in distress he is immediately drawn to help her.

Can the fragile dream of a better life out of the slums provide the security and companionship they both crave?

Hope in Liverpool is an emotional foray into historical women’s fiction. If you like compellingly complex characters, light humour woven through heart-wrenching drama, and gripping romantic overtones, then you’ll adore T N Traynor’s poignant story.

Review

Set in Liverpool 1958, Traynor has cut an emotional atmosphere for an involving family drama that unfolds. This could be an utterly depressing story, but Traynor has steered away from this just enough to make it hopeful instead.

Hope’s life is challenging to the max, from practically being abandoned and her mother being an alcoholic who fritters away her wages. Hope however shows courage and a certain amount of resilience through the bleakness and hardships. She also has a certain amount of courage as she allows some romance to enter her life, even though life still seems to have some fragilities within it, which, before romance, had an intention of suicide. This is written in sensitively and isn’t dwelled too much upon, but something some people may be able to relate to. By the end there is hope to be had and nicely shows that even through harrowing and bleak times there can be lightness. Readers can discover through the twists and turns of Hope’s life how that happens.

By Lou – Happy Publication Day fo The Meeting Place @olilara_writes @Aria_Fiction #BlogBlitz #Fiction #WomensFiction #RomanticFiction #ContemporaryFiction @Lovebookstours @LoveBooksGroup

The Meeting Place
By Olivia Lara
Blog Blitz

Firstly let’s wish author Olivia Lara a warm Congratulations for her book The Meeting Place. Today, in celebration, you’re treated to the blurb and a little bit about her.
Thanks to Love Books Group for inviting me to the Blog Blitz Tour and for Aria for gifting the blog and other info.

Blurb

What if the Lift driver who finds your cheating boyfriend’s phone holds the directions to true love?

‘Who are you and why do you have my boyfriend’s phone?’

‘He left it in my car. You must be the blonde in the red dress? I’m the Lift driver who dropped you two off earlier.’

And with these words, the life of the brunette and t-shirt wearing Maya Maas is turned upside down. Having planned to surprise her boyfriend, she finds herself single and stranded in an unknown city on her birthday.

So when the mystery driver rescues Maya with the suggestion that she cheers herself up at a nearby beach town, she jumps at the chance to get things back on track. She wasn’t expecting a personalised itinerary or the easy companionship that comes from opening up to a stranger via text, let alone the possibility it might grow into something more…

Come on this 5* journey to love, laughter and back again, perfect for fans of Mhairi Mcfarlane, Josie Silver and Sally Thorne.

About the Author

Olivia Lara’s love for words started as a child when she spent her summer vacations watching her grandfather, who worked for the biggest publishing house in Romania, edit hundreds of books. She is a former journalist for a newspaper and a television network in Bucharest, now a Marketing VP in San Francisco – in between she lived in France where her love for Paris and the Alsace region was born. Her first book, Someday in Paris, became a B&N, Apple, Kobo and Amazon Top 100 Bestseller and was shortlisted for the Romantic Novel Awards. She lives in the Bay Area, California.

Buy Links

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Meeting-Point-romcom-wont-summer-ebook/dp/B08YP3H4MZ/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=olivia+lara&qid=1625822706&s=digital-text&sr=1-3

#Review By Lou – Alice, Shaken and Definitely Stirred by Paula Smith @PaulaSmith2424 @lovebooksgroup @lovebookstours

Alice, Shaken and Definitely Stirred
By Paula Smith

Food, Films, Famous People, Romance and a lot of fun… What more can a girl ask for? This book is jam-packed full of all of that. Thanks to Love Books Group for inviting me to review and for The Conrad Press for gifting me the book. The book was published in 2020 and I am delighted to be part of this blog tour.

Blurb

This uplifting romantic comedy takes you on Alice’s journey, interweaving her relationships with real-life characters and dreams involving her favourite romantic screen idols.

Lamenting the loss of her long-term partner and having been made redundant, Alice makes a New Year’s Resolution to get on with life, and definitely without a man. But things don’t quite go to plan. As her Aunty Betty says, ‘Men, dear, are like buses, there are none on the horizon then three come along all at once.’ Alice certainly is shaken and definitely stirred.

Review

The tone of friends who are also related together (Alice and Sue), just chatting, reminiscing, gossiping is just pure fun and something to relax into from the start.

There’s humour to be had and a dream that starts off exquisitely and romantically… until it starts to come tumbling down, down, down, until reality totally hits and there’s work to go to. Alice works for Mr Frobersham as a director and is in the business of buttons for all the top named stores and brands… until things changed when she was off work.
She also has a social life of sorts, involving all sorts of food and drink. This is a book you may want to prepare a snack and a drink before you sit back and relax in the summer sun with.

The interweaving of real life and dreams is quite different and is easy to differentiate from the two, one because of the famous people’s names, two, because it says when she’s having a dream, three, the style of text changes slightly. They are also pretty outlandish and definitely odd, but adds to the fun of Alice. If you enjoy films you’ll enjoy this book, with its references, . In a way the book almost plays out like a film within a book, or a tv show in a book as there are some references and names from tv too and the fact it’s a romcom makes it more so.

When practically swearing off men, 3 enter her life – Ollie, Malcolm and Alistair and it’s rather a conundrum for her to choose which guy would be more suitable for her and to work out who may have a bigger chance of breaking her heart. Mixed in with this, is the hard truth that she needs to find a new job, which brings more than a dose of reality to the book.

The book is set at Christmas time, but not too many references to it. It’s one of those that doesn’t feel like it matters too much when you read it. It’s just a feelgood, cosy rom-com, that I think will make people feel warm inside and can have a very nice time with.

Swop The Satsuma-Sized Secret by Lucy Noguera @monsterscantalk @lovebooksgroup @lovebookstours #AD #Gifted

Swop The Satsuma-Sized Secret
by Lucy Noguera
Cover Reveal

Today I have a Cover Reveal. Meet Swop, he’s a dog who is the size of a satsuma, and his owner Eric. Find out what they get up to in a feelgood book with humour and positivity. Check out the themes, cover and blurb for this middlegrade book for ages 7-9 as well as the bookshops this is available from.

Themes

Friendship Adventure Family Deaf sibling Sign Language Acceptance

Blurb

What would you do if you found the world’s smallest dog?

When Ernie and his family leave the countryside to move to the city. Ernie feels like he’ll never settle into their new home.

Yet on his very first night, a surprising new friend introduces himself – Swop is a very tiny dog. A dog that just happens to be the size of a satsuma.

Ernie vows to keep Swop a secret, but Swop has other ideas and he’s determined to make Ernie’s first day at his new school a memorable one!

About The Author

An ex-primary school teacher and Teacher of the Deaf. I now run a small educational company, specialising in arranging book projects and theatre events for schools and families. I live with my husband, our three children and our three dogs in Ealing, London. Yet the one in charge is our little ex-street dog, even though he has no eyes and three legs. He also happens to be called Swop!

Bookshops where you can find this book…. Check them out!

@telltalesbooks

@booksbantergames

@bookcornershop

@bearhuntbooks

@ANewChapterBks
Amazon

#BlogBlitz by Lou – Info about #Thriller – Too Near the Dead by Helen Grant – Happy Publication Day to @helengrantsays @FledglingPress @lovebooksgroup @lovebookstours

Too Near The Dead
By Helen Grant

Blog Blitz – Blurb and About The Author

Today I am delighted to present to you a bit of info about this new thriller – Too Near the Dead, set in the Perthshire countryside, Scotland. Today is exciting as it is publication day, so you can get your hands on it if you so wish, from now! Find out more in the blurb and then about the author as well as how to buy this new addition to the ever popular “Tartan Noir” genre.
Thanks to Love Books Group Tours for inviting me to share this info with you and to Fledgling Press for gifting the info you will see in this blog post.

Blurb

Sometimes it’s terrifying, loving someone this much…

For Fen Munro and her fiancé James, it is a dream come true: an escape from London to a beautiful house in the stunning Perthshire countryside.

Barr Dubh house is modern, a building with no past at all. But someone walks the grounds, always dressed in lavender. Under a lichenous stone in an abandoned graveyard, a hideous secret lies buried. And at night, Fen is tormented by horrifying dreams.

Someone wants Fen’s happiness, and nothing is going to stop them – not even death…

Buy Links

Amazon – https://www.amazon.co.uk/Too-Near-Dead-Grant/dp/191228040X/
The book is available in paperback and on Kindle.

About the Author

Helen was born in London in 1964. She showed an early leaning towards the arts, having been told off for writing stories under the desk in maths lessons at school.

Helen went on to read Classics at St. Hugh’s College, Oxford, and then worked in marketing for ten years to fund her love of travelling. Her two most memorable travelling days were the one spent exploring Damascus in Syria and the day she went to the Raj Mandir cinema in Jaipur to see the romantic blockbuster Beta.

In 2001, she and her family moved to Bad Münstereifel in Germany. It was exploring the legends of this beautiful old town that inspired her to write her first novel, The Vanishing of Katharina Linden, which is set there.

Helen now lives in Scotland with her husband, her two children and her two cats.

In The Blood by Margaret Kirk @HighlandWriter @orionbooks @lovebooksgroup @lovebookstours

In The Blood
By Margaret Kirk

Today I am so pleased to show you a bit about In The Blood and its dark, brooding cover and intriguing blurb. Go ahead and take a look and discover more about the book and about this ‘Highland Noir’ author.

Blurb

‘Ritual murder and ghosts from a chilling past haunt DCI Lukas Mahler in his latest case, set on the ancient Orkney Islands.’Tied to a derelict pier on Orkney, the bloated remains of a man bob in the waves, under the shadow of forbidding Sandisquoy House. The locals know him as William Spencer.

But DCI Luke as Mahler identifies him as Alex Fleming – his former boss.

Unable to step away from the case, Mahler tries to piece together why Fleming would retire to such a remote location. But the deeper he digs, the more disturbing the investigation becomes.

Seal bones, witches’ salve, and runic symbols appear everywhere he looks, ushering Mahler towards Fleming’s most notorious unsolved case: the ‘Witchfinder’ murders. And towards a dark and uncomfortable truth someone has gone to great lengths to bury…

About The Author

Margaret Kirk writes ‘Highland Noir’ Scottish crime fiction, set in and around her home town of Inverness.

Her debut novel, Shadow Man, won the Good Housekeeping First Novel Competition in 2016. Described as ‘a harrowing and horrific game of consequences’ by Val McDermid, it was published in 2017 by Orion. Book 2 in the DI Lukas Mahler series, What Lies Buried, was published on 13th June 2019. Book 3, In The Blood, will be released by Orion on 29th April 2021.

Margaret is also the writer of several award-winning short stories, including The Seal Singers, which has been published in translation in Germany. She has contributed a short story, Still Life, to the Noir From The Bar anthology, which has been compiled to raise funds for NHS charities.