The undertaking of Hart and Mercy by Megan Bannen

Series: Hart and Mercy (#1)

Format: 416 pages, Paperback

Published: August 23, 2022 by Orbit

Western fantasy/own

I just do not know. I kept waiting for something to happen, but it never did.

Mercy works at her family´s funeral home. In a western style fantasy world. Hart is a marshall because there is a portal to a place where old gods went and there are like...sort of zombies there that needs to die.

Anyway they hate each other for some reason and I kept waiting for something to happen. Instead it was these two getting to know each other through letters and I am done with a romance, just...the world was cool! I wanted more about the gods, the ghosts who wanted to live again and just this world you know. Instead we got a you have mail and then a bit of drama at the end. But that is a long time to wait, 350 pages for some action, and I do not mean the smutty kind.

So...ok? I am not reading more

Hart is a marshal, tasked with patrolling the strange and magical wilds of Tanria. It’s an unforgiving job, and Hart’s got nothing but time to ponder his loneliness.  

Mercy never has a moment to herself. She’s been single-handedly keeping Birdsall & Son Undertakers afloat in defiance of sullen jerks like Hart, who seems to have a gift for showing up right when her patience is thinnest. 

After yet another exasperating run-in with Mercy, Hart finds himself penning a letter addressed simply to “A Friend”. Much to his surprise, an anonymous letter comes back in return, and a tentative friendship is born.  

If only Hart knew he’s been baring his soul to the person who infuriates him most—Mercy. As the dangers from Tanria grow closer, so do the unlikely correspondents. But can their blossoming romance survive the fated discovery that their pen pals are their worst nightmares—each other?

First time caller by BK Borison

Format: 448 pages, Paperback

Published: February 11, 2025 by Berkley

Contemporary romance/own

I am so behind on reviews!

Right, Aiden has a radio show, he comes in contact with Lucie who has a bad dating life and has given up. She is brough on air and there is banter there, and chemistry. But the whole point is to get her dates and Baltimore falls in love with her.

I liked Aiden, he had worked too long and did not believe in love anymore. While Lucie wants it, but does not have the patience or time for bad dates.

There was banter, some slow romance building. Then the obvious drama before it all worked out.

I enjoyed it. I will read more

Aiden Valentine has a secret: he's fallen out of love with love. And as the host of Baltimore's romance hotline, that's a bit of a problem. But when a young girl calls in to the station asking for dating advice for her mom, the interview goes viral, thrusting Aiden and Heartstrings into the limelight.

Lucie Stone thought she was doing just fine. She has a good job; an incredible family; and a smart, slightly devious kid. But when all of Baltimore is suddenly scrutinizing her love life—or lack thereof—she begins to question if she's as happy as she thought. Maybe a little more romance wouldn't be such a bad thing.

Everyone wants Lucie to find her happy ending... even the handsome, temperamental man calling the shots. But when sparks start to fly behind the scenes, Lucie must make the final call between the radio-sponsored happily ever after or the man in the headphones next to her.

What kind of paradise by Janelle Brown

Format: 384 pages, Paperback

Published: May 26, 2026 by Random House Trade Paperbacks

Fiction/own

 I do not actually remember hearing about this book before, it was just a book at the grocery store among livehockey books and I thought I deserved a treat.

Also, nominee for best historical? Whaaaat? no I refuse too, historical should at LEAST be 50 years ago, not the 90s.

Jane grows up with her dad in a cabin in Montana. Nearest town 1 hour away. They only go there as a treat. She is homeschooled. Learns to hunt. And writes her dad´s manifesto as he hates new technology. But she is 17 now and she starts to question things. Where did they come from? Why does her dad disappears for days at a time?

We all know what is coming, certainly not something good. Her dad has escape routes, talks about the feds, and just gets angrier...

I liked this one. I wanted to know what had happened before and if Jane would be ok. She is just trying to hang in there, and she is so curious about the outside world.

The first thing you have to understand is that my father was my entire world.

Growing up in an isolated cabin in Montana in the mid-1990s, Jane knows only the world that she and her father live the woodstove that heats their home, the vegetable garden where they try to eke out a subsistence existence, the books of nineteenth-century philosophy that her father gives her to read in lieu of going to school. Her father is elusive about their pasts, giving Jane little beyond the facts that they once lived in the Bay Area and that her mother died in a car accident, the crash propelling him to move Jane off the grid to raise her in a Thoreau-like utopia.

As Jane becomes a teenager she starts pushing against the boundaries of her restricted world. She begs to accompany her father on his occasional trips away from the cabin. But when Jane realizes that her devotion to her father has made her an accomplice to a horrific crime, she flees Montana to the only place she knows to look for answers about her mysterious past, and her mother's San Francisco. It is a city in the midst of a seismic change, where her quest to understand herself will force her to reckon with both the possibilities and the perils of the fledgling Internet, and where she will come to question everything she values.

Play of Shadows by Sebastien de Castell

Series: Court of Shadows (#1)

Format: 478 pages, Paperback

Published: February 18, 2025 by Arcadia Books

Fantasy/own

Most of this takes place in a Theatre, certainly a change from my usual fantasy.

It starts with Damelas running from a duel he knows he cant win, and then he takes refuge in a theatre. Luckily for him they say sure he is apart of their troop and then he is stuck there. Because he really does not want to fight that duel.

In the mean time there are these Iron Orchids trying to take over the town little by little. A foreign Duke who suddenly got power is loosing control, and the theatre crew is trying to put together a play.

Oh and there is a magic that makes the actor like become one with someone who has passed? And see what they see, to really play that part well. I wonder if that will happen wink wink.

I liked this concept. Theatre , dueling and a town in turmoil. Who to trust? And what happened 100 years ago?

But book 2 is not even about Damelas! It seems to be some other city, sadness

Damelas Shademantaigne picked a poor night to flee a judicial duel.

He has precious little hope of escaping the wrath of the Vixen, the most feared duellist in the entire city, until he stumbles through the stage doors of the magnificent Operato Belleza and tricks his way into the company of actors. An archaic law provides a temporary respite from his troubles - until one night a ghostly voice in his head causes Damelas to fumble his lines, inadvertently blurting out a dreadful truth: the city's most legendary hero may actually be a traitor and a brutal murderer.

With only the help of his boisterous and lusty friend Bereto, a beautiful assassin whose target may well be Damelas himself, and a company of misfit actors who'd just as soon see him dead, this failed son of two Greatcoats must somehow find within himself the courage to dig up long-buried truths before a ruthless band of bravos known as the Iron Orchids come for his head.

Oh, and there's still that matter of the Vixen waiting to duel him . . .