eyes.2c Reviews

If I Stopped Haunting You  by Colby Wilkens      ⭐️⭐️ An intriguing concept but it just didn’t engage my interest. Two writers who dislike each other at a supposedly haunted castle as part of a writing week. They’ve both lost their writing mojo and hope for the opportunity to find it. Pen’s major problem with Neil Storm is that he’s sold out his writings for success. His novels don’t do their First Nation’s heritage justice. Fascinating! So that premise alone holds so much promise. This was a great springboard. That, along with the enemies to lovers trope should have sparkled, but I just wasn’t on board. I finished the title, skimming mostly. Not what I wanted or intended to do.  A St. Martin’s Press ARC via NetGalley.                                               Many thanks to the author and publisher.

Alliance Unbound  (Hinder Stars #2) by C. J. Cherryh; Jane S. Fancher       ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Tense unforgiving times for Finity’s End starship’s crew as they endeavour to bring the last two merchant family ships into an Alliance as a third power to counter the Earth Company’s enforcer’s actions in space. The two ships leave as Infinity comes into Pell, and before Senior Captain Neihart can speak with them. An innocent look by Jen Neihart, the Senior Captain’s niece, her partner Ross Monahan and some of his cousins  at Pell Station’s Gardens and trees have the Finity Starship Captains realising that illegal Sol items are showing up at Pell. How? Such items are sanctioned.  Jen is a security officer for Finity.  Ross, a Navigator from the Galaxy family ship, along with his cousins are currently attached to Finity. From there it’s a small thought for Finity’s End to go to two mothballed space stations to investigate. Ross is a talented navigator who feels the stars as living entities. It’s his

A Lady's Lesson in Scandal  (Queen’s Deadly Damsels #2) by Darcy McGuire          ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Millicent Whittenburg is a member of a secret group of Queen Victoria’s sleuths led by the formidable Duchess of Dorsett. Millie’s been training with the Duchess, Phillipa Winterbourne, to be a Queen’s investigator. The Queen needs to keep an eye on her House of Lords and certain villainous members. Unfortunately Millie is being forced into marriage with a repulsive, elderly man, Viscount Tread, a friend of her father’s and “wicked” (truly!) stepmother. (I’m frequently disgusted by Millie’s avarice stepmother Patricia. A nasty piece of work. How did Millie’s beloved father, Marquess Whittenburg, allow Patricia to make so much angst and trouble for Millie? Dreadful woman! Pitiful father!) Millie’s  attending a ball where her betrothal is to be announced.  Her way to escape? Entrap someone into marriage, and then refuse to marry them. Only Millie didn’t have the measure of her target, Major

The Restaurant of Lost Recipes  (Kamogawa of Food Detectives #2)   by Hisashi Kashiwai        ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Another arc of delightful vignettes centered around people tying to recapture a moment in time that a special dish evoked. Seekers find the modest restaurant in Tokyo with little or no fanfare and signage. It’s a little “seek and ye shall find, ask and it will be opened up to you.” Invariably the restaurant’s clients are looking for something beyond the dish; a special memory, resolution, forgiveness, or maybe something else. Chef Nagare loves the challenge of recreating the meal. His daughter Koishi Kamogawa takes particulars of a meal their client wants reproduced. It’s the deep seated search and then explanation of what is special about that dish that grabs me. I want a local restaurant down around the corner just like the Kamogawa Diner. The way the discovered dish might be plated, the texture of the meal offset by the serving dishes, all bespeaks love and care. A magical group

Of Gold and Shadows  (Times Lost Treasures #1) by Michelle Griep   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Ami Dalton moonlights as a Shadow Broker, dealing in Egyptian antiquities on the edges of places like convenient cemeteries. Out from that shadowy existence, Ami is the daughter of famed Oxford Professor, Archer Dalton, an archaeologist whose expertise is Egyptology. Under her father’s tutelage Ami too has become an expert in Egyptian artefacts. Not that that helps as Ami battles the prejudices against women of her very Victorian times. Ami’s passion is restoring plundered relics back to Egypt. If that’s not possible she brokers for smaller items to have them put in museums rather than private collections. Hence her work as the Shadow Broker. Edmund Price is a successful business man returned from India to take charge of a shipment of Egyptian items that he wants catalogued and priced to sell to any interested collector at the highest price. He needs the money for an Indian friend to fight taxes the English pa

The Dead Sang Off Key (Viscount Lord Ware #4)  by J.L. Buck      ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Lady Anne Ashburn discovers a young girl’s body in a cave whilst out walking with her maid Jenny along the beach at the village of Seaford, near to Brighton.  Anne’s beloved mother had passed away some six moths ago. Anne and her father, Lord Chadley, had decided to spend the summer by the sea, away from sad memories. However her father has now decamped to London for the the resumption of Parliament and the House of Lords Lady Anne reports her find to the local constabulary. After searching the cave and the surrounding area they find nothing. (It also seems much  of the village participates in smuggling!) The magistrate and his wife disparage Anne’s insistence that a body had been there.  So of course Anne writes to Lucien, Lord Ware! Serendipitously, he’s searching for the daughter of the Secretary to the Spanish envoy, Rosa Maria Hidalgo, who’s been kidnapped. (What are the odds!? 🤣) Oh and the French have pla

The Dead Came Calling (Viscount Ware Mystery #3) by J.L. Buck       ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Lord Lucian Grey and Lord Andrew Sherbourne are in deep water. Sherry’s been accused of murdering a young woman, Maria Pembroke.  Maria had betrayed them in France. He had Lucian had barely made it out the window ahead of the French soldiers. Maria’s left behind a small child who could be his daughter. A charming three year old, Fanny. About to investigate further, Sherry is arrested for murder by a vigilant but narrow minded Bow Street Runner who can’t see past the too obvious. Ware has to go in debt to the Gentleman Thief, Charles Cade, owner of an exclusive club and runner of criminal activities and clubs, to help Sherbourne. I’m still waiting for the other shoe to drop! A twisted and complex plot that unfortunately only has Lady Anne appearing in her correspondence with Ware. A Camel ARC via Booksirens                                         Many thanks to the author and publisher. Previous titles in the