An inventive time-travel romance with an appealing mix of action and intrigue.
A surprise discovery leads a woman on a quest through time as she seeks a priceless brooch in Drennan’s romance novel.
As a child, Tessa Madigan loved spending time with her Uncle Theo in the home built by her grandfather on Balboa Island, California. When Theo died, Tessa inherited the home—and its secrets. While renovating the property with her boyfriend, Phillip Koenig, and best friend, Alexis “Lexi” Hill, she discovers a cache of valuables, including silverware and jewelry, hidden within the walls of the house. Tessa’s fascinated by the jewelry, particularly a serpent bangle that exerts an unusual power over her (“Tess snagged the bracelet, fascinated with its red rhinestone eyes”). As she researches the jewelry’s provenance, Tessa finds herself pulled back in time to 324 C.E., during the reign of Emperor Constantine, where she experiences life through the eyes of Kindra, a slave trained as a craftsperson by a man named Haldor. Tessa is not the only person interested in jewelry: A local shop owner and collector named Karl Johns and his sister-in-law, Valerie, also want the treasure and will stop at nothing to obtain it. When Tessa discovers that another piece—an exquisite cloisonné brooch—is missing, she again dons the bracelet to embark on a trip back through time to find the precious object before it’s lost forever. The narrative offers a satisfying blend of action and romance, with well-developed characters and an irresistible time-travel hook. Tessa Madigan is an amiable protagonist whose life becomes intertwined with that of Kindra, the craftsperson responsible for creating the cloisonné brooch at the heart of the story. The story moves seamlessly between Tessa’s life on Balboa Island in 2019 and Kindra’s life in 324 and her romance with Marcus, one of Emperor Constantine’s guards. Both the mystery of the jewelry’s provenance and the suspenseful search for the brooch are engaging and suspenseful.
An inventive time-travel romance with an appealing mix of action and intrigue.Pub Date: March 21, 2020
ISBN: 9781734258417
Page Count: 426
Publisher: KCPublications
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
A beautiful meditation on queer identity against a supernatural backdrop.
Three women deal very differently with vampirism in Schwab’s era-spanning follow-up to The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue (2020).
In 16th-century Spain, Maria seduces a wealthy viscount in an attempt to seize whatever control she can over her own life. It turns out that being a wife—even a wealthy one—is just another cage, but then a mysterious widow offers Maria a surprising escape route. In the 19th century, Charlotte is sent from her home in the English countryside to live with an aunt in London when she’s found trying to kiss her best friend. She’s despondent at the idea of marrying a man, but another mysterious widow—who has a secret connection to Maria’s widow from centuries earlier—appears and teaches Charlotte that she can be free to love whomever she chooses, if she’s brave enough. In 2019, Alice’s memories of growing up in Scotland with her mercurial older sister, Catty, pull her mind away from her first days at Harvard University. And though she doesn’t meet any mysterious widows, Alice wakes up alone after a one-night stand unable to tolerate sunlight, sporting two new fangs, and desperate to drink blood. Horrified at her transformation, she searches Boston for her hookup, who was the last person she remembers seeing before she woke up as a vampire. Schwab delicately intertwines the three storylines, which are compelling individually even before the reader knows how they will connect. Maria, Charlotte, and Alice are queer women searching for love, recognition, and wholeness, growing fangs and defying mortality in a world that would deny them their very existence. Alice’s flashbacks to Catty are particularly moving, and subtly play off themes of grief and loneliness laid out in the historical timelines.
A beautiful meditation on queer identity against a supernatural backdrop.Pub Date: June 10, 2025
ISBN: 9781250320520
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 22, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
A wallowing, emotionally wrenching family drama that leaves little time for romance.
Two people with bad luck in relationships find each other through a popular Reddit thread.
Emma Grant and her best friend, Maddy, are travel nurses, working at hospitals for three-month stints while they see the country. Just a few weeks before they’re set to move to Hawaii, Emma reads a popular “Am I the Asshole” Reddit thread from a Minnesota man who thinks he’s cursed—women he dates find their soulmates after breaking up with him, and the latest one found true love with his best friend! Emma has had a similar experience, which inspires her to DM the man and commiserate. She’s delighted by her witty, lively interactions with software engineer Justin Dahl, and is intrigued when he suggests that if they date each other, maybe they’ll each find their soulmate afterward. Emma upends the Hawaii plan and convinces Maddy to move to Minneapolis for the summer so she can meet Justin in person. The overly complex setup brings Emma and Justin together and the two hit it off, with Justin immediately falling head over heels for Emma. Jimenez then pivots to creating romantic roadblocks and melodramatic subplots centering on each character’s family of origin. Justin’s mother is about to serve six years in prison for embezzlement, which means Justin must move back home to care for his three much younger siblings. Emma was traumatized by her own mother for much of her childhood, left to fend for herself and eventually abandoned in the foster system. When her mother shows up in Minnesota, Emma must face her traumatic childhood and admit that she has prioritized her mother’s well-being over her own. There is little time devoted to Emma’s painful efforts to heal herself enough to accept Justin’s love, which leaves the novel feeling unsatisfying.
A wallowing, emotionally wrenching family drama that leaves little time for romance.Pub Date: April 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781538704431
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Forever
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
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