Mailbox Monday - May 18

Mailbox Monday is a gathering place for readers to share what came in their mailbox. This meme has a permanent home at Mailbox Monday and was created by Marcia at To Be Continued I am linking up to Mailbox Monday. 

Bought

Give it Up by Mary Carlomagno

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo

The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball

A Lady's Honor by Laurie Alice Eakes

Review

Hearts Made Whole by Jody Hedlund

Love's Rescue by Christine Johnson

The Case of the Sin City Sister by Lynne Hinton

Bye Bye Love by K.J. Larsen

Give It Up! by Mary Carlomagno

Like most people, Mary Carlomagno was stressed out, overscheduled, and tripping over th clutter of her days - until she decided to take control and simplify her life. Give IT Up! is Mary's chronicle of he year she renounced one thing a month every month - from alcohol to chocolate to  newspapers to elevators to cell phones - and, by doing so, was able to take stock of her life, discover what was really important, and gain a deeper appreciation of the world around her. 

Warm, humorous, and eminently sensible, Give I Up! provides a commonsense blueprint for anyone looking for a fresh start or a new outlook. It's about simplifying your life and cherishing every moment of it. 

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo

Despite constant efforts to declutter your home, do papers still accumulate like snowdrifts and clothes pile up like a tangled mes of noodles?

Japanese cleaning consultant Mari Kondo takes a tidying to a whole new level, promising that if you properly simplify and organize your home once, you'll  never have to do it again. Most methods advocate a room-by-room or little-by-little approach, which doom you to pick away at your piles of stuff forever. The KonMari Method, with its revolutionary category-by-category system, leads to lasting results. In fact, non of Kondo's clients have lapsed (and she still has a three-month waiting list).

With detailed guidance for determining which items in our house "spark joy" (and which don't), this international best seller featuring Tokyo's newest lifestyle phenomenon will help you clear your clutter and enjoy the unique magic of a tidy home - and the calm, motivated mindset it can inspire. 

The Dirty Life by Kristin Kimball

When Kristin Kimball left New York City to interview a dynamic young farmer named Mark, her world changed. On an impulse, she shed her city self and started a new farm with him on five hundred acres near Lake Champlain. The Dirty Life is the captivating chronicle of the couple's first year on Essex Farm, from teh cold North Country winter through their harvest-season wedding in the loft of the barn. 

Kristin and Mark's plan to grow everything needed to feed a community was an ambitious idea, and a bit romantic. It worked. Every Friday evening, all year round, over a hundred people travel to Essex Farm to pick up their weekly share of the"whole diet" - beef, port, chicken, milk, eggs, maple syrup, grains, flours, dried beans, herbs, fruits, and forty different vegetables - produced by the farm. In the Dirty Life, Kristin discovers the wrenching pleasures of physical work, learns that good food is a the center of a good life, falls deeply in love, and finally finds the engagement and commitment she craved in the form of a man, a small town, ad a beautiful piece of land. 

 A Lady's Honor by Laurie Alice Eakes

England, 1811

A tarnished reputation. A distant home. A forced engagement to a dangerous man. When Elizabeth Trelawny flees London, she has more than one reason to run. And when her carriage, pursued by her would-be finance, is caught in a storm, she quickly accepts the help of a dark stranger. Anything to get back to Cornwall.

But Rowan Curnow is not exactly a stranger. He's not quite a gentleman either. Class disparity once kept him from courting Elizabeth ... even if it didn't keep him from kissing her. 

The couple elude their pursuers and reach Bastion Point, Elizabeth's future inheritance and the one place she calls home. But in the very act of spiriting her to safety, Rowan has jeopardized Elizabeth's inheritance -- if her grandfather ever earns she spent the night, however innocently, in the company of a man. 

When smugglers unite the pair in a reckless, flirtatious alliance -- an alliance that both challenges the social norms Elizabeth has been raised to revere and rattles Rowan's fledgling faith in God. Elizabeth must choose between the obedience of a child and the desires of a woman: cling to the safety of her home or follow the man she loves. 

Cliffs of Cornwall Series

#1 A Lady's Honor 

#2 A Stranger's Secret

Hearts Made Whole by Jody Hedlund

After her father's death, Caroline Taylor has grown confident running the Windmill Point Lighthouse. But in 1865 Michigan, women aren't supposed to have such roles, so it's only a matter of time before the lighthouse inspector appoints a new keeper -- even though Caroline has nowhere else to go and no other job available to her. 

Ryan Chambers is a Civil War veteran still haunted by the horrors of battle. He's secured the position of lighthouse keeper mostly for the isolation -- the chance to hide from his past is appealing. He's not expecting the current keeper to be a feisty and beautiful woman who's angry with him for taking her job and for his inability to properly run the light. When his failing endanger others, he and Caroline realize he's in no shape to run the lighthouse, but he's unwilling to let anyone close enough to help. Caroling feels drawn to this wounded soud, but with both of them relying on that single position, can they look past their loss to the future filled with hope ... and possibly love?

Beacons of Hope Series

#1 Love Unexpected

#2 Hearts Made Whole

 

Love's Rescue by Christine Johnson

When her mother dies, Elizabeth Benjamin heads home to Key West, determined to transform herself into the perfect Southern belle her parents always wished her to be. But nothing goes according to plan. Her brother resents her, the servants do not obey her, and Rourke O'Malley, the dashing man she vowed to forget, refuses to relinquish his hold on her heart. Worst of all, it becomes painfully obvious that her father is not hte man he appears to be. 

As family secrets come to light, Elizabeth is faced with a difficult choice: to perform her duty and abandon her dreams, or to leave her life of privilege behind to chase the man her faterh sees as little better than a pirate. 

From the first emotional page, author Christine Johnson throws you into a world of impossible choices, hidden desires, and heart-melting romance in the steamy South. 

Keys of Promise

#1 Love's Rescue

The Case of the Sin City Sister by Lynne Hinton

Sister Eve Divine recently discovered she's got a gift: turns out she's a natural at private detective work. But it is a temptation or a calling? As Eve wrestles with this question, she's taking a leave of absence from the convent, investigating a case with her PI father. 

But something else troubles Eve. It's been weeks since Eve heard from her sister, Dorisanne. And Eve's gut tells her that something sinister has happened to her difficult sibling. There's only one place Eve can find the answers she's looking for: in Dorisanne's world, under the bright lights of Sin City - Las Vegas, Nevada.

Late night visits to the casino and some clever clues hidden in an address book set Eve on a trail that soon reveals that Dorisanne's life is darker and more complicated that Eve ever expected. In the end, Eve's ability to understand her sister - and herself - may be a matter of life and death. 

Divine Private Detective Agency Mystery

#1 Sister Eve, Private Eye

#2 The Case of the Sin City Sister

Bye, Bye Love by K.J. Larsen

Chicago's Pants On Fire Detective Agency targets liars and cheats. But PI Ca DeLuca is once again up to her smokin' skinny jeans in murder. 

Cat is out running in a neighborhood park when she crashes over the faceless body of Bernie Love. Bernie was the finance guy to the scary Provenza family, with whom he grew up. And friend to Cat's shady, Ferrari-wheeling-cop Uncle Joey. As she hauls out her phone, Cat is assaulted by someone with a Rolex, stun gun, and wheelbarrow. When the cops show up, the killer is gone. And so is the body. 

Captain Bob, a stickler for habeas corpus, blows off Cat's story. Stung by a chorus of snickers from the Ninth Precinct, home base for DeLuca men, Cat vows to make her case and goes after Rolex man. The murderer, desperate to silence the only person who can place him at the part, comes after Cat. She's quickly on a collision course with the deadliest adversary she's ever encountered - but she has the help of her beagle partner, her gun-happy assistant, an ex-spy (or two), and her outrageous, interfering Italian family. Meanwhile her hot, FBI-boyfriend seems sidelined in Vegas. 

In Bye, Bye Love, K.J. Larson delivers another nail-biting tale rife with unexpected plot twists, zany characters, fabulous food, and laugh - out - loud humor. 

Cat DeLuca Mystery Series

#1 Liar, Liar 

#2 Sticks and Stones

#3 Some Like it Hot

#4 Bye, Bye Love