A Potpourri of Opinions

  The Lost Witch  Paige Crutcher Publication Date: December 27, 2022 by St. Martin's Griffin Genre: Fantasy Rating: 3 🍷🍷🍷 Summary:  1922. Brigid Heron is a powerful witch and healer in the seemingly lost, but charming small town of Evermore on a forgotten isle in Ireland. However, there is one thing that she longs for above all else: a child of her own. She is even willing to be seduced by the mysterious Luc Knightly, head of the Knightly coven, whose pull is potent and impossible to resist. When their child is born and falls ill, Brigid will risk anything to save her daughter–even tap into the forbidden magic of the Lough of Brionglóid. But when the wild magic takes her daughter from her, Brigid is swept away as well. 2022. Evermore is under siege. The witches of Knight have been using their chaos magic to widen the rift between the island and the Otherworld. Creatures from folklore prey on the villagers, consuming their very humanity. Brigid awakens in this world with no memor

  The Lipstick Bureau Michelle Gable Publication Date: Dec. 27, 2022 by Graydon House Genre: Historical Fiction Rating: 3 🍷🍷🍷 Summary:  1944, Rome. Newlywed Niki Novotná is recruited by a new American spy agency to establish a secret branch in Italy's capital. One of the OSS's few female operatives abroad and multilingual, she's tasked with crafting fake stories and distributing propaganda to lower the morale of enemy soldiers. Despite limited resources, Niki and a scrappy team of artists, forgers and others—now nicknamed The Lipstick Bureau—find success, forming a bond amid the cobblestoned streets and storied villas of the newly liberated city. But her work is also a way to escape devastating truths about the family she left behind in Czechoslovakia and a future with her controlling American husband. As the war drags on and the pressure intensifies, Niki begins to question the rules she's been instructed to follow, and a colleague unexpectedly captures her heart. B

  How Y'all Doing? Leslie Jordan Publication date: April 27, 2021 by Harper Audio Genre: Memoir, Humor Rating: 5 🍷🍷🍷🍷🍷 Summary: Viral sensation and Emmy Award-winner Leslie Jordan regales fans with entertaining stories about the odd, funny, and unforgettable events in his life in this unmissable essay collection that echoes his droll, irreverent voice. When actor Leslie Jordan learned he had “gone viral,” he had no idea what that meant or how much his life was about to change. On Instagram, his uproarious videos have entertained millions and have made him a global celebrity. Now, he brings his bon vivance to the page with this collection of intimate and sassy essays. Bursting with color and life, dripping with his puckish Southern charm, How Y’all Doing? is Leslie doing what Leslie does best: telling stories that make us laugh and lift our spirits even in the darkest days. Whether he’s writing about his brush with a group of ruffians in a West Hollywood Starbucks, or an unexpe

Big Red Jerome Charyn Publication date: August 23, 2022 by Liveright Genre: Historical Fiction Rating: 3 📽📽📽 Summary:  Set amidst the noir glamour of Hollywood’s Golden Age,  Big Red  reenvisions the life of one of America’s most enduring icons: Gilda herself, Rita Hayworth, whose fiery red hair and hypnotic dancing helped make her the quintessential movie star of the 1940s. With narrator Rusty Redburn—a feisty second-string gossip columnist from Kalamazoo tasked with spying on Hayworth by Columbia movie mogul Harry “The Janitor” Cohn—as our guide, we follow the meteoric rise and heartrending demise of the actress, encountering her exploitative father, Eduardo; her controlling husband, “boy genius” Orson Welles; and notorious journalist Louella Parsons, among many others. Mixing his trademark screwball comedy and unerring tragedy, Jerome Charyn, with his “polymorphous imagination” (Jonathan Lethem) reanimates film classics such as Cover Girl, Gilda, and The Lady from Shanghai. An in

  Switchboard Soldiers Jennifer Chiaverini Publication Date: July 19, 2022 by William Morrow Genre: Historical Fiction Rating: 4 👢👢👢👢 Summary:    In June 1917, General John Pershing arrived in France to establish American forces in Europe. He immediately found himself unable to communicate with troops in the field. Pershing needed telephone operators who could swiftly and accurately connect multiple calls, speak fluent French and English, remain steady under fire, and be utterly discreet, since the calls often conveyed classified information. At the time, nearly all well-trained American telephone operators were women—but women were not permitted to enlist, or even to vote in most states. Nevertheless, the U.S. Army Signal Corps promptly began recruiting them. More than 7,600 women responded, including Grace Banker of New Jersey, a switchboard instructor with AT&T and an alumna of Barnard College; Marie Miossec, a Frenchwoman and aspiring opera singer; and Valerie DeSmedt, a tw

Metropolis B. A. Shapiro Publication date: May 17, 2022 by Algonquin Books Genre: Mystery/Thriller Rating: 4 🍷🍷🍷🍷 Summary: In Metropolis we meet six unforgettable characters who never would have met if not for their rental units at Metropolis Storage Warehouse. When a harrowing accident—or is it an accident?—occurs in the building, each character is forced to consider their life circumstances: Serge, a mentally unstable but brilliant street photographer who lives in his unit; Zach, the storage facility owner and an ex-drug dealer, who purchases Serge’s undeveloped photographs and discovers they contain clues to the mysterious accident. Marta, an undocumented immigrant hiding from ICE in her unit. Liddy, an abused wife and mother, who is responsible for the accident, unless she intended it; Jason, a lawyer who has left his big firm and now practices out of his unit; and Rose, the office manager who takes kickbacks to let people live in the facility and has her own disintegrating fam

  The Italian Ballerina Kristy Cambron Publication date: July 12, 2022 by Thomas Nelson Genre: Historical Fiction Rating: 4 👢👢👢👢 Summary: Rome, 1943 . With the fall of Italy's Fascist government and the Nazi regime occupying the streets of Rome, British ballerina Julia Bradbury is stranded and forced to take refuge at a hospital on Tiber Island. But when she learns of a deadly sickness that is sweeping through the quarantine wards—a fake disease known only as Syndrome K—she is drawn into one of the greatest cons in history. Alongside hospital staff, friars of the adjoining church, and two Allied medics, Julia risks everything to rescue Italian Jews from the deadly clutches of the Holocaust. But when one little girl who dreams of becoming a ballerina arrives at their door, Julia and the others are determined to reunite the young dancer with her family—if only she would reveal one crucial secret: her name. Present Day . With the recent loss of her grandfather—a beloved small-town