Review: Kilt Trip

Ah, Scotland. As I write this, Google Photos are reminding me that I was in Scotland for the first time four years ago. And I’m also still working through posting some recent trip photos from my trip to England and Scotland in December. So, while I always love reading books set in Scotland, it was an especially lovely (and wanderlust inducing) time to read Alexandra Kiley’s debut novel Kilt Trip. I had really been looking forward to this book and it ended up being a nice romance to get lost in while wishing I was exploring Scotland in person again instead of through the pages of a book.

Here’s the book’s description:

Ready or Scot...
Globetrotter Addie Macrae always follows her wanderlust. As a travel consultant, she jet sets around the world—anywhere but Scotland. But when she’s sent on assignment to help a struggling family-run tour company in the Highlands—and save her own job—Addie packs away her emotional baggage and turns on the professional charm.
Rugged as the land he loves, Logan Sutherland’s greatest joy is sharing the beauty of Scotland’s hidden gems…even if it means a wee bit of red ink on the company’s bottom line. The last thing Logan wants is some American “expert” pushing tourist traps and perpetuating myths about the Loch Ness Monster—especially when Addie never leaves her desk to experience the country for herself.
As they wage an office war, Logan discovers Addie’s secret connection to Scotland: a handful of faded Polaroids of her late mother. Hoping for a truce, he creates a private tour to the places in the pictures to help Addie find closure and appreciate the enchantment in less-traveled destinations, never expecting the off-limits attraction sparking between them. But Addie’s contract is almost up, and magic won’t pay the bills. They can’t afford distractions, but how can Addie do her job if she hasn’t explored all Scotland—and Logan—have to offer?

OK, so, while this book was a lovely little romance, I was let down by it. Was it because my expectations were so freaking high? Perhaps. But it started off with tropes that I do not like at all and it was really hard to bring me back from that. I don’t love enemies to lovers and I don’t love when a character waltzes into another’s world and assumes they know best (it’s why some Hallmark movies are so terrible to me). I actually stopped reading a book before the holidays because it started a lot like this one but I persevered with Kiley's because 1. The book was set in Scotland and 2. A trusted friend told me it got better. It wasn’t as “better” as I wanted but I managed and was treated to a perfectly respectable romance but one that won’t stick with me.

I don’t want to focus on the negatives but I do want to illustrate what didn’t work for me at the start of this book. It just seems fair to explore it so you can decide if it’s something that will also be a problem for you or is something that you don’t mind at all. That’s the beauty of books - some people love them, some people don’t. I want you to make your own call here! So, first of all, Addie is late to joining a tour at the start of the story. Which, you know, happens. Part of why she was late though was because the airline lost her suitcase. The woman works for a travel consultancy agency and travels All. The. Time. There is no way she would have checked a suitcase! Anyway. Because she was late, she can’t find the start of the tour so she’s mentally docking points. First of all, if she was on time she’d have seen the group of folks waiting for the tour. Second of all, I’ve been to the exact spot she is supposed to be and I don’t think it's all that difficult to find. Then I realize the tour is literally just bringing people up Calton Hill and learning a little bit about it from a guide. A guide who runs tours that are supposed to be exploring “hidden gems” of Edinburgh. Calton Hill is not hidden. It’s very visible (and, fun fact, was created by the ash of the volcano that Edinburgh Castle now sits on) and has a number of monuments you can see from all over the city. And then when Addie finally meets the staff of the company she’s there to makeover, she assumes she knows best and everything they have to say is stupid and won’t make them any money. I would have LOVED to find a tour company like Logan’s who actually did find some of the hidden gems when I was in Edinburgh because I know there are tons of things to see that are off the beaten path (which I also explored and loved).

And speaking of her work. I have no idea what Addie was actually supposed to be doing. Making the tour company better and more profitable, sure. But if the client (Logan and his family) are set on something, shouldn’t she try to see if it can work instead of dismissing it immediately? Her boss was even worse. I used to work for a PR agency and we’d provide our expertise and opinions but, in the end, what the client wanted, the client got. The woman’s never been to Edinburgh and she thinks she’s an expert? It was just really hard for me to get over how frustrated that made me. Logan was just as bad, though, and wouldn’t listen to anything Addie had to say and was acting like a sulky teenage boy. So many people want a balance of big attractions and little known spots and he didn’t seem to grasp that.

The book looks like it should be a rom com, given the bright, happy, illustrated cover. It’s definitely firmly in the romance category, though there are a few humorous moments that are wacky as you’d expect from a rom com. The issues Addie had to work through (grief over the death of her mother and traveling to Scotland without her, and so on), made the story much heavier than you would expect. It’s not a bad thing, just a case of, don’t judge the romance by the cover.

The thing that saved this book for me was the setting. Surprise, surprise! I loved being able to “visit” places I had just been (Edinburgh and Stirling Castles and Edinburgh itself) while traveling to other spots in Scotland that I wasn’t able to visit. The atmosphere was wonderful and it’s a great armchair travel book if you’re feeling the wanderlust. Just know you’re going to want to book a trip to Scotland immediately if it’s anywhere on your travel bucket list!

While Kilt Trip wasn’t a winner for me, that’s not to say you won’t enjoy Alexandra Kiley’s debut novel. It was a fine romance with an amazing setting that I think other romance readers would enjoy.

*An egalley was provided by the publisher, HTP Books, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: Bury the Lead

I’ve been on a real mystery kick the last few years so was thrilled when two Canadian authors I love teamed up to write Bury the Lead, the start of a mystery series that features a small-town journalist. This novel, written by Kate Hilton and Elizabeth Renzetti, was one of my most anticipated of the year and I’m so thrilled to say it absolutely lived up to my expectations.

Here’s the book’s description:

A big-city journalist joins the staff of a small-town paper in cottage country and finds a community full of secrets … and murder. Cat Conway has recently returned to Port Ellis to work as a reporter at the Quill & Packet . She’s fled the tattered remains of her high-profile career and bad divorce for the holiday town of her childhood, famous for its butter tarts, theatre, and a century-old feud. One of Cat’s first assignments is to interview legendary actor Eliot Fraser, the lead in the theatre’s season opener of Inherit the Wind. When Eliot ends up dead onstage on opening night, the curtain rises on the sleepy town’s secrets. The suspects include the actor whose career Eliot ruined, the ex-wife he betrayed, the women he abused, and even the baker he wronged. With the attention of the world on Port Ellis, this story could be Cat’s chance to restore her reputation. But the police think she’s a suspect, and the murderer wants to kill the story―and her too. Can Cat solve the mystery before she loses her job or becomes the next victim of a killer with a theatrical bent for vengeance?

I did not see the end of this mystery coming at all! Hilton and Renzetti left cookie crumbs which I, personally, only realized were there after the story was tied up. Which I loved! There are times when I’m thrilled to have figured out whodunit and there are times I’m thrilled to be completely in the dark and have the author(s) deliver the resolution in a tidy little package. I probably would have been happy with either in this case, honestly, because I loved the book and the writing so much, but I did like that it wasn’t easy to spot who the murderer was. I had fun tracking down the clues for the story with Cat and really enjoyed the resolution (as much as one can enjoy reading about murder and finding out someone in town is guilty of killing someone else…).

I’m not always a fan of the amateur sleuth so I wondered how I would feel about Cat, who is not a law professional, working to solve a mystery. Turns out, it was perfection. She didn’t get in the way of the investigation the cops were running. She just stayed in her own lane and chipped away at the many layers covering up the story she wanted to expose. It was well-balanced, not something every mystery writer can do, so I applaud Hilton and Renzetti for giving me a non-police officer mystery protagonist I can root for!

Which brings me to the journalism side of things. I adored it. I admit that might be because I’m a tad biased as my partner is a journalist. It was a weird thing to read about now, I will admit, because there were massive layoffs at the paper he worked for and it’s a strange and kind of scary time for community news. I don’t think people realize how much we need those journalists and newspapers and they just keep disappearing. That terrifying and sad feeling aside, the authors nailed what it’s like to work in news, especially in a small town. Which didn’t surprise me at all as Renzetti is a former (fantastic) journalist herself who still provides pieces to news outlets today. There was one line where Cat’s talking about waiting for the police press conference regarding the murder and she says it will be held sometime “between now and the end of time” and, oof, isn’t that the truth! But even though the journalist angle had a special place in my heart, I think it’s a fresh take on the mystery genre with the bonus of showcasing how community journalism works. Take notes, friends, and pay attention to what’s happening to the news outlets in your area.

I loved that this story also had some commentary on the world today. Eliot was an absolute garbage human being (not that he deserved to die) and his past (and present) brought up the #MeToo movement and how women have been treated for decades. The reason Cat got fired from her TV job is infuriating (and I definitely guessed it before it was revealed which is a bit sad as I hate that female reporters are still being targeted by idiot males). And having multiple generations commenting on what was happening in town (and had happened in the past) was genius. Things aren’t as black and white as we’d like but it should still be easy to determine what is good and bad behaviour.

Finally, I loved the small town setting. I’ve said it before but it bears repeating here: I’m a small town girl and I really love when stories are set outside cities and I love it even more when the author(s) really “get” what it’s like to live in a small town. I figure Port Ellis is supposed to be somewhere in Muskoka and I grew up just south of the traditional Muskoka area but still in an area where cottagers flocked to in the summer. And reading this book felt right and made me miss summers at my grandparents’ house on the shores of Georgian Bay.

Bury the Lead was an amazing novel and it’s definitely in the running to be a favourite read of 2024. Kate Hilton and Elizabeth Renzetti have written a thoroughly enjoyable murder mystery with a heroine who is as intriguing as she is intelligent and I cannot wait to read more in the Quill & Packet series. If you’re a mystery fan, you absolutely must pick up this novel.

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, House of Anansi, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: How to Eat to Change How You Drink

I can’t be the only person in their mid-late thirties whose body all of a sudden decided to not function the way it’s supposed to. For me, my digestive system seems to be having a few issues and I started to wonder (after many medical appointments and consultations with actual trained folks, not Dr. Google) if alcohol was sometimes a culprit. So, when I saw Brooke Scheller’s book How to Eat to Change How You Drink: Heal Your Gut, Mend Your Mind, and Improve Nutrition to Change Your Relationship with Alcohol was available to review, I thought, hm let’s give this a try.

Here’s the book’s description:

Let nutrition guide you to sobriety (or to just drinking a little less) with this guide and meal plan to reduce alcohol cravings and repair your health through food.
Trapped in alcohol's addictive grip, Dr. Brooke Scheller wanted a way out. For her, total sobriety was the answer to her problem, which she achieved by applying her skills as a doctor of nutrition, pairing her knowledge of nutrition with other integrative therapies to eliminate alcohol for good. Seeing the success in herself, she shifted her practice to help inspire others to explore a lifestyle with little to no alcohol.
How to Eat to Change How You Drink is a revolutionary guide to leverage food and nutrition to reduce or eliminate alcohol consumption, develop mindfulness, and promote a healthier relationship with alcohol. Working through the book, readers will identify their drinking archetype and then learn the types of nutritional changes they can make to reduce alcohol cravings alongside behavior modification; they'll learn how alcohol affects their nutritional status and can contribute to health symptoms ranging from fatigue, to hormonal imbalances, digestive irregularities, weight gain, thyroid disorders, autoimmune diseases and more; and they'll restore their nutritional status and repair key body systems after moderate to heavy alcohol consumption.
This book will change the way we think about and address alcohol intake in our society-- through the lens of nutrition.

I requested this book right before leaving for an almost 3 week vacation and it was waiting for me when I got home. I say this because I may not have looked quite as closely at the book’s details or Scheller’s background as I may normally have done. And I say that because I wasn’t expecting the book to come from a place of sobriety more than dietary. I didn’t really want/need to be reading about the addictive qualities of alcohol nor did I need to find out what kind of drinker I am. I know that, duh, that’s all part of how alcohol affects your body but the tone of the book definitely came across as, “this is why you should become sober” not so much “this is why cutting back can be beneficial to all of us.” Is that fair of me? To be frustrated that true sobriety was a larger focus than I wanted? I recognize that no, it may not be fair.

I’ve been reading a few books on digestive health lately and some are far more accessible than others. Scheller’s fell somewhere in the middle. That said, I still didn’t quite get anything useful out of the gut health section. Again, this could very much be a personal thing. I’ve been trying for months to figure out my issues and I was really hoping for a nugget of information that could help and I just didn’t get one.

The book’s divided into four parts to help break down this somewhat unwieldy topic and make it understandable for us laypeople. Part 1 talked about relationships with alcohol, leaning (in my opinion) too heavily on Scheller’s personal history. Part 2 focused on a “functional approach to sobriety” and discussed how alcohol can affect different parts of the body, like the gut and brain. Learning how to eat to change drinking habits was the focus of Part 3 and Part 4 gave the reader some recipes to try to support an “alcohol reduction plan”. 

I think Brooke Scheller’s book, How to Eat to Change How You Drink, would be a good one to pick up if you’re committed to completely cutting out alcohol and living a sober life or if you’re sober-curious and don’t have any other medical issues to worry about. It was an interesting enough read for me, confirming what I knew about some of the sneaky downsides of alcohol, but it wasn’t as applicable to my life as I would have liked.

*A copy of this book was provided by the publisher, Grand Central Publishing, in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: How You Get the Girl

I absolutely adored Anita Kelly’s novel Love & Other Disasters when I read it last year. Since I was a little late to the game, I didn’t realize there was a second book in the series (Something Wild & Wonderful) but I did sit up and take notice when I heard about How You Get the Girl, which was published on February 13. A romance? In the world of basketball? And a f/f romance, no less? Yes, please! I. Loved. It. Seriously. This book shot immediately to the top of the list for 2024 reads!

Here’s the book’s description:

When smart-mouthed Vanessa Lerner joins the high school basketball team Julie Parker coaches, Julie’s ready for the challenge. What she’s not ready for is Vanessa’s new foster parent, Elle Cochrane—former University of Tennessee basketball star. While star-struck at first, soon Julie persuades Elle to step into the unfilled position of assistant coach for the year.
Even though Elle has stayed out of the basketball world since an injury ended her short-lived WNBA career, the gig might be a way to become closer to Vanessa—and to spend more time with Julie, who makes Elle laugh. As the coaches grow closer, Elle has a hard time understanding how Julie is single. When Julie reveals her lifelong insecurity about dating and how she wishes it was more like sports—being able to practice first—it sparks an intriguing idea. While Elle still doubts her abilities as a basketball coach, helping Julie figure out dating is definitely something she can do. But as the basketball season progresses, and lines grow increasingly blurred, Julie and Elle must decide to join the game—or retreat to the sidelines.

Basketball romances are major catnip stories for me. I played when I was in high school but wasn’t good enough (or dedicated enough) to move any higher so I stuck to playing intramural ball when I was at university. One thing I loved about this story from the basketball perspective, other than the major nostalgia factor, was the absence of male posturing BS since there were no males playing the game. Everyone hitting the court was female or non-binary. It was refreshing and kind of helped…hm…reposition?...some of my thoughts. My experience playing ball in high school was much different than the players currently on Julie’s team. I was a straight, white girl playing basketball in a small town in the early 2000s and it was assumed that everyone else I played with was also straight and a girl (also white…we were not a racially diverse town). If anyone felt like maybe a label other than “straight” or even “female” applied to them? They definitely weren’t saying anything. And so I wonder about those players - not necessarily the ones I played with but just players everywhere - who feel like they have to conform to the patriarchal world of sports.

In addition to talking about (sometimes explicitly, sometimes not) how to be female or non-binary in the world of sports, this novel also tackles some mental health topics. Elle’s torn ACL wasn’t the only reason she left the WNBA when she did - her mental health was just as damaged as her physical health. She’d worked hard to manage it and struggled mightily when her “management” failed and she found herself in a depressive episode (it’s not super dark or graphic but please be kind to yourself if you also have depression and are reading this book). I liked how Kelly had Julie approach this. She didn’t have a magical answer and couldn’t “fix” Elle, and Elle also couldn’t figure out how to let Julie in. In short, they both had shit to figure out and it was refreshing as hell. Who knows how best to be with a new partner in the best of circumstances let alone when you’re navigating a depressive episode? It felt realistic and I was here for it.

In the Reader’s Guide, Kelly talks about Happily Ever Afters (HEA) vs Happily For Now (HFN). I consider true romances to have a HEA (I even called my romance book club at work “Happily Ever After”) but HFNs totally fit the bill too. I think we focus on the forever aspect of “after” because we want to be optimistic and believe that the couple we’ve spent a few hundred pages with will have a wonderful life, even when we know that life isn’t easy for anyone. But that doesn’t mean that HFNs should be frowned upon. It’s simply more realistic to expect the couple to have to do more work to establish their relationship since they just got together (and may have even had that dreaded third act breakup!). But, for some reason, probably because we’re dumb humans, we want that fairy tale ending. I liked that Kelly made me think more about HEA vs HFN, even as someone who’s always been OK with a Happily For Now.

I freaking loved Julie and Elle. Loved. Them. I mean, come on. Julie had had a massive crush on Elle since she was 14 (and Elle 18, if my math/memory is correct) and now she had a shot at DATING her? Gah. I’m swooning. I was into the entire relationship. The tension as they flirted, and then fake/practice dated, and then for-real dated. So damn good. I loved everything about the whole thing. LOVED. 

How You Get the Girl was an absolute delight and I loved every second I spent reading Anita Kelly’s latest novel. Whether you’re here for the basketball or the romance (or both), you’ll love it too.

*An egalley was provided via NetGalley by Forever and a print copy was provided by HBG Canada, both in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: The Boy Who Cried Bear

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it lately, but I sure am glad I came across Kelley Armstrong’s Rockton series and I’m doubly glad she’s kept the characters around for Haven’s Rock, a spin-off series that’s not really a spin-off just kinda a continuation of a series but with a different location. Or something. However you want to look at it, I was thrilled to have the chance to hang out with Casey and Dalton in The Boy Who Cried Bear, the second book in Armstrong’s Haven’s Rock series.

Here’s the book’s description:

Haven’s Rock is a well-hidden town surrounded by forest. And it’s supposed to be, being that it’s a refuge for those who need to disappear. Detective Casey Duncan and her husband, Sheriff Eric Dalton already feel at home in their new town, which reminds them of where they first met in Rockton. And while they know how to navigate the woods and its various dangers, other residents don’t. Which is why people aren't allowed to wander off alone.
When Max, the town’s youngest resident—taught to track animals by Eric—fears a bear is stalking a hiking party, alarms are raised. Even stranger, the ten-year-old swears the bear had human eyes. Casey and Eric know the dangers a bear can present, so they’re taking it seriously. But odd occurrences are happening all around them, and when a dead body turns up, they’re not sure what they’re up against.

Since this is only the second book in the Haven’s Rock series, there’s still a lot to learn about the new hidden town. Casey and Dalton are figuring out how to run the town, who on their staff they can trust implicitly, and, you know, why dead bodies keep turning up. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be in charge of protecting folks who have escaped really crappy circumstances, only to have some people disappear and others wind up dead. Turns out living in the middle of nowhere doesn’t mean you’re safe from murder. Who knew?!

The book’s description is vague about the mystery in this one so I won't go into any specific details either. I want you to be as surprised as I was with the twists and turns. I will say that I’m really curious to see what book three will bring (even though I literally just finished book two before I started writing this…the dangers of anticipated books, eh? That you’re so excited about them and then rush through reading it because you just can’t help yourself and now you have to wait for the next one) because, well, there’s a bit of a cliffhanger at the end. Or…maybe not “cliffhanger” but…the bow isn’t as neat as you might want from a mystery. As a mystery reader, I’m a little annoyed but as a reader of this particular series? I totally get it. And I trust that Armstrong has a plan and all will, eventually, be revealed. (But seriously…why do we love book series so much? I think we’re all masochists.)

I love the characters in this series so much. There are a lot of them but they really do all have a purpose. It’s like Haven’s Rock itself. You wouldn’t be there - and definitely wouldn’t be staff - if you didn’t have a particular reason for being there. I loved being able to get more of a glimpse into Casey and Dalton’s married life (they have such a great, and unique, partnership) and see how some of the other former Rockton residents were faring. I will say there’s a side, more personal, storyline, in this one that is one I personally dislike but it’s very much a Me Thing, as much as I wish it hadn’t been brought into the series.

There are a number of times biases, especially around race, come up in this particular story. Armstrong is White (or at least very much White presenting) but Casey is Asian Canadian (I think Chinese but admit I cannot recall exactly) and there are a few other characters who are not White. In this story, Anders and Yolanda talk about being one of the only Black people in their towns. And another resident spews some ridiculous (and harmful) BS right to Casey’s face about “you people” being smart. Ugh, just reading it makes me rage because I know there are real people out there making those same assumptions based solely on racial stereotypes.

I really enjoyed The Boy Who Cried Bear and am so glad I saved it for a long weekend “treat” for myself. Kelley Armstrong has created a great series that’s so enjoyable (if you could call a series that features murders etc. “enjoyable”...) and I already cannot wait for the third installment.

*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, Minotaur, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Review: A Real Somebody

To know me is to know I love historical fiction. I’m pretty basic in my usual historical fiction tastes, tending to read all the WWI and WWII fiction, so I like to branch out every once and awhile. And when I find a Canadian historical fiction author writing a book set in Canada? I’m even more interested. I was intrigued by Deryn Collier’s novel A Real Somebody because it was inspired by her aunt and took place in post-war Montreal. Unfortunately, the book did not thrill me and I eventually gave up reading it.

Here’s the book’s description:

Montreal, 1947. To support her once-prosperous family, June Grant joins a steno pool in a prestigious advertising firm. For June, it’s hard to imagine having the kind of life her parents want—the kind of life her sister Daisy has, with a well-off husband and two precocious kids.
But Daisy might not be a picture-perfect housewife after all. As June makes her own waves in the advertising world, she probes a hidden side of her sister’s life.
June’s discoveries upend everything she thought she knew about her sister while challenging her own inner conflict about pursuing her dreams versus living up to expectations. Being a dutiful housewife might mean something else entirely.
Based on the true story of the author’s aunt, A Real Somebody charts the journey of a talented young writer who dares to break the conventions of her time during one pivotal season of her life.

I was really intrigued by the look at advertising in Montreal in the late 40s (I work in comms, of course I’m going to geek out over a look at advertising!) but it was such a small part of the story that even that couldn’t convince me to finish reading the book.

I’m not sure if the reader was expected to know who June Grant was because I certainly didn’t. So, because I had no idea who she was, I wasn’t sure why I was supposed to care about June, the fictional character. And, let me tell you, it sucks to not care about a character’s life when you know they’re supposed to have been based on a real person - the author’s aunt, no less. I’m sure part of my frustration at June came from unintentionally putting my modern views on her life in the 40s. Times were different, I get it, but I was still annoyed at the treatment of women, among other things.

I knew I wasn’t going to finish reading it when I had no desire to get back to the story. I tried to skim and read the last couple of chapters but the story seemed to have veered off in such a bizarre way and, even allowing for the fact that I didn’t read the whole thing, it ended strangely and abruptly.

All that said, Collier’s writing wasn’t one of the reasons I stopped reading. I would be willing to give another of her novels a go if it seemed like a topic that would interest me.

A Real Somebody was, unfortunately, a real miss for me. I wanted to enjoy Deryn Collier’s novel because it sounded like something I could really have a good time reading but the story completely missed the mark for me.

*A copy of this novel was provided by the Canadian distributors, Firefly, in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.* 

Review: With This Witch

When a friend told me With This Witch was a steamy, magical romance, I was all in and immediately signed myself up to receive an ARC of Isla Winter’s debut novel. It definitely hit the steamy mark but the rest of it didn’t quite thrill me as I wanted it to.

Here’s the book’s description:

A marriage of convenience proves to be magically inconvenient, and no spell will get them out of it or calm their burning desires.
Being a legacy witch comes with expectations, and, unfortunately, when Gammy shares that she’s sick, Petra becomes the front-runner for the role of Premier Witch, a part she’s never really wanted. The inconvenient catch? Traditionally, the Premier Witch must be married, and a combative supernatural council member is only too happy to point out. Petra must now find a husband to prove she is serious about accepting the role. Oh, and she must do it in the next thirty days! If she fails, she loses everything.
Enter bar owner and current delicious demon representative on the council, Lachlan Grace. A close friend of Petra’s, Lachlan, has been drawn to her from the moment she walked into his bar. Battling his own demons from his past and tired of being just friends, Lachlan offers himself as an option for a marriage candidate. Will he be able to move out of the friend zone while also keeping his history in the past?
Now, thrust into supernatural politics with a looming deadline, Petra finds herself questioning what she wants in life, struggling with how to make her Gammy proud and keep in check the pesky feelings bubbling under the surface for a smoking hot demon at the same time. What’s a witch to do?

OK - you have to know that I, like most sane people, don’t love writing less-than-positive book reviews. Especially when they’re novels by debut authors and/or that were self-published. But I don't think it's fair of me to only shout about the great books and ignore the ones that I didn’t love.

I love me some witchy books because I’m always curious about how authors put their own spin on magical worlds, even if said world is like our human one and magical folk are living in it. For the most part, I was totally into the world Winter created. I loved that there were different types of creatures all living in town with the humans, who, for the most part, knew there were magical creatures hanging out around them. I wasn’t totally sure if there were more towns like Leeside or if it was the only one. I also didn’t grasp all of the magical rules - how come Petra could clean up her apartment but had to call Lachlan, a male, to change her car’s tire? - but I liked that there was a focus on spells, potions, and herbs for the witches.

I think a big problem for me was I just didn’t understand anyone’s motivations. I never entirely understood why Petra never embraced her magic, knowing she was going to have to take over from her grandmother eventually. I didn’t quite get why Lachlan didn’t want to go back to the underworld or why he’d have to/felt like he should? That was part magical world confusion and part character confusion. The motivations of some important secondary characters were real head scratchers, which was tricky when they impacted the story SO much (yes, it’s vague but if I mention character names, it’ll be spoiled for you and that would be sad!).

I also just could not grasp the timeline in this book. There were times it seemed like, based on the characters’ feelings on how things were going, that time was ticking merrily along but, in fact, it had been, like 24 hours. And other times when we zoomed along to two weeks later? Somehow? It made my head spin.

I suppose I should also mention the romance in this romance novel, eh? I liked Petra and Lachlan together, even when they were refusing to admit they actually had real feelings for each other. I love fake dating tropes and find fake marriages a bit harder to swallow but the fact that they were friends for a few years prior to having to get hitched? That helped and there was clearly chemistry there. And did you catch me mentioning that this was a steamy book? Whew, baby. I found the sex scenes to be really well done.

Overall, With This Witch was a good read. I’m hopeful Isla Winter can grow stronger as a writer with her second Leeside Witches book as I think she has an interesting and fun idea for her series.

*An egalley was provided by the author in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*