Not Built in a Day

 Not Built in a Day: How Slavery Made the Roman Empire-Emma Southon

Simon & Schuster

Release Date: June 30, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: When Julius Caesar conquered Gaul he boasted that he killed a million Gauls and enslaved a million more. This is the truth about the Roman Rome could not function without slavery as it underpinned every single part of their economy. Without the millions of people snatched from their homes in the aftermath of war, kidnapped from the streets, sold into slavery as punishment, or born into it as “home bred slaves”, the Roman empire’s great aqueducts and temples could never have been built. There would be no coins or tiles to find in fields, no limitless manpower for the army and navy that conquered the Mediterranean, no marble palaces or underfloor heating, and certainly no life of unimaginable luxury for the one percent who didn’t even tie their own shoes. For the first time, Not Built in a Day tells their stories.

Not Built in a Day takes readers into the invisible spaces of the Roman empire, where the millions of enslaved lives perpetuated the excesses of the empire that owned them. From the fields of wheat required to give every Roman his daily bread, to the actors and gladiators who provided their circuses; from the guards who kept the streets of Rome safe and the mines which kept Rome a city of gold and marble, to the builders who placed every brick in the Colosseum. It traces how people entered, experienced, and left slavery, covering the little known story of slave revolts and the complex realities of enslaved people who themselves owned enslaved people. Not Built in a Dayalso explores the lives of those freed from slavery, finally able to choose their own destinies.

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I'm a huge fan of historian Emma Southon. She's on my short list of must-buy historians when she has a new book coming out. She questions sources, she gets into the cracks of what archaeology and literature and laws have left us and works out what life would have been like for those who have been left out of so many re-tellings of history with a big H: women (A Rome of One's Own), and in Not Build in a Day, the enslaved population of the Roman Empire. And she does it all with a delightful snarky, irreverent sense of humor. 

As horrifying as Roman slavery was, the layers of complexity thanks to frankly weird laws that meant the empire literally could not survive without a massive enslaved population were fascinting. I had no idea about some of the financial and legal hoops Romans built for themselves. While I knew this was a civilization that was focused on status, I'm not sure I had absorbed just what that meant about daily life: your status had status and could change depending on so many things. This included people in slavery. Enslaved people, freed people and citizens, all had so many levels of status depending on who was involved with what that it must have been exhausting. 

The book breaks down into where people are enslaved (the imperial house, the city, the country, etc.) and the kind of work they are required to do, because that has massive impacts on the experience of the individual.

I can't tell you how much I think this book is a must-read for anyone interested in Roman history. Read it along side all the other histories that look at the big pictures and the big names and forget to tell you about what a Roman's daily life was like. Because this, this was daily life in Rome. You were on one side of the whip or the other, but every single person experienced this in some form every day. 

Wonderfully researched, well written, another triumph for Emma Southon. I can't wait to see where she takes us next. 

Enter the Nightmare

 

Enter the Nightmare (Harmony #18)- Jayne Castle

Berkley

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Release Date: June 30, 20206

Synopsis: Alice Radstone should have known not to return. Her life before the Hotel of Dreams had been one of a perfectly cloistered teacher at the Ballantine Academy. When the death of her mentor forced her out, she was left to reinvent herself in the big city. Since then, things have not gone well. Ten months ago, after her first trip to the hotel, she woke up in the locked ward of a hospital for the criminally insane and was informed that she had murdered her husband on their wedding night. She has no memory of the husband or the wedding, but after she escapes from the asylum, one thing is certain: She is never going back.

Unfortunately, Alice’s second reinvented life is also deteriorating rapidly, which is why she finds herself once more at the Hotel of Dreams—this time hiding in the shadows of her room with a dead body in the shower and two men wearing masks creeping toward the bed to kidnap her. Again.

When the enigmatic and decidedly dangerous Owen March shows up and claims he’s there to rescue her, she has no choice but to accept his offer—and hope that he doesn’t also intend to kidnap her. 

With Alice and now Owen in the killer’s sights, time is running out. They must trust each other and the electric passion between them if they are to make it out of this hotel alive.

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Alice Radstone and Owen March are the human main characters of Jayne Castle's latest Harmony book, with Sebastian the dust bunny along for the ride. Alice has had a rough year: a quick marriage to someone she barely remembers, a wedding night that ended with her suposedly killing the groom, three months locked in an institution, and seven months on the run with Sebastian. Only the lure of proof of her innocence could get her back to the Hotel of Dreams (even knowing it was probably a trap). One dead guy in the bathroom and a kidnapping attempt later and she's on the run again, this time with Owen March who claims he wants to help her. She and Sebastian are out of options so she takes his help. The plot thickens to include powerful families out for money and revenge, more kidnapping attempts, murder and attempted murders. Plus a dust bunny who loves shiny things in a casino. What could possibly go wrong?

I enjoyed Alice and Owen and their developing relationship. Alice isn't as naive as everyone assumes she is and Owen has a knack for putting his foot in his mouth, which lead to some fun conversations in Quick's usual witty banter. Sebastian steals the show in this one with his antics in the casino. The Hotel of Dreams came a close second though, as the kind of nightmare place you never want to visit. The hotel gives the ending a bit more suspense than a traditional Jayne Castle ending, and a definite yikes! factor, but it's a nightmare worth reading about- though I wouldn't want to spend the night there. And most visitors probably don't live long enough to write a review of the place. Probably for the best. 

Fast-paced and good chemistry between Owen and Alice, Enter the Nightmare is a fun addition to the Harmony world. Fans will enjoy and those new to the series shouldn't have trouble jumping into this delightful paranormal world.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

The Butler

 The Butler- Claire Mackintosh

Podium Publishing

Release Date: June 16, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚

Synopsis: The South of France is stunning, though not without its imperfections, from pickpockets to burglars to the occasional cold-blooded killer. But in his twenty-five years of service, Baxter—with a spotless reputation as a polished, well-mannered butler—has never run into any issues catering to the ultrawealthy. Until now.

Baxter's latest assignment is at Villa Sérénité, where Alec Prescott is hosting a colorful cast of characters, including his ex-wife, his much younger lady friend, and some Hollywood hotshots, after the Cannes Film Festival. But it doesn't take long for a week of sun, wine, and a family birthday celebration to devolve into bickering and backstabbing. And soon, secrets aren't the only thing floating to the surface . . .

When one of the guests is found dead in the villa's glittering pool, the unflappable Baxter must assist the gendarmes in determining who's responsible. With some standing to gain and others motivated to take it away, fingers are pointed in all directions. A good butler is expected to see everything and say nothing—but what if he too becomes a target?

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Baxter is the perfect butler: professional demeanor, thinks of everything ahead of time, lets nothing phase him. He's been hired to buttle for a home in Cannes over the film fest, where wealthy Alec Prescott is hosting film friends and family to celebrate his son's birthday. But more than a few hours into the weeklong party and backstabbing and old feuds emerge. When someone winds up dead in the pool, it isn't a huge surprise but it is inconvenient. All three of the staff are sheduled for other jobs soon and can't afford to hang around while the cops think about solving things. With the help of a local pickpocket called Red they decide to take matters into their own hands and solve the crime. Which puts Baxter on top of the killer's target list.

The Butler  is the first book by Claire Macintosh I've read, but as someone writing a nonfiction book about butlers in mystery novels, how could I pass this up? It was a fun, quick read, almost a cozy mystery with wonderful descriptions of food, locations, views, etc. The end of the book definitely left open the possibilty for more to come, which would be great. Macintosh revealed tiny glimpses of Baxter's past and personality behind his professional facade in a slow-drip way that would suit a series, getting a little more in each book.

Each of the guests is suitably unlikable without the feeling that they all needed to go to jail and by the time we have a dead body we also have plenty of motives. I enjoyed how the staff all decided they were not sitting around for the police to slowly handle things: they all had places to be and other jobs to be getting on with, and would just deal with this themselves, thank you very much. And they do. The end "living room reveal" scene didn't feel very Baxter-like, but I think it hit about every cliche it could manage in a slightly tongue-in-cheek way.

This is a good examply of a book that didn't need a prologue. The writing for the prologue was so over the top just to get to the expected body in the pool I almost put the book down, because there was no way I could have read the book if the writing was like that the whole way through. Fortunately, it wasn't. I recommend skipping those few pages, or just know they don't reflect the book as a whole.

A fun summer mystery. I hope for more Baxter in the future.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review 

An Artful Dodge

 An Artful Dodge-Karen Odden

Soho Crime

Release Date: June 2, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: London, 1879: Twenty-year-old Kit Jimeson has fingers so nimble she can nick a necklace off a lady in a crowded theater without raising alarm. Kit and her dodge partner, Mary, are the highest earners in the notorious all-women thieving ring in South London's Elephant and Castle district.

Kit, whose mother had been a thief before her, dreams of a different life, one where she’s not constantly on the lookout for constables and plainclothes detectives, and where a mistake or pure bad luck won't land her in the hangman’s noose. She has been saving up her earnings so her younger sister, a maid for a wealthy Mayfair family, might have a shot at respectability.

Kit is very close to leaving the life entirely when the legendary former thief Maggie O’Connell brings her plans to a halt. Beautiful, charismatic Maggie has returned to reclaim leadership of the ring after twenty years in a brutal Australian penal colony. But Maggie desires more than mere wealth. She longs for revenge against those who sent her away. Kit, with her quick mind and dangerously clever hands, is Maggie’s best weapon. If Kit wants to walk away with her life, she must carry out a heist that will demand every skill she possesses.

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London, 1879—not a great time to be poor. Kit works three jobs to make ends meet and two of them are legal. She constantly worries over money: what will happen to her sister if there isn't enough money? If she gets sick and they can't afford a doctor? If Kit can't earn enough to take care of them? She saves as much as possible, but can't bring herself to leave the all-women theiving ring she's a part of because, despite the risk, it brings in good money. The other women are more than friends, many are a second family to her. As clever as the tricks these women use are, we are never shown their crimes as glamourous or fun—they steal because they have to, from people and places that can afford to lose it.

Kit and the rest of the cast in An Artful Dodge are well-drawn and relatable. In similar situations, what would anyone do to survive, and protect a beloved family member? The gang members are loyal to each other in the face of danger and hardship, and that support is echoed by other members of the community. Even minor characters are written in a fully three-dimensional style—the reader can easily see them sitting around a pub's fireplace, telling stories and drinking after a hard day, and feel like you could almost join them for a round.

The pacing was fast and exciting throughout the book: as the danger to Kit increased, tension built and I couldn't wait to see what would happen and how she would get out of the danger Maggie was weaving around her. But one of the things that struck me was that even Maggie is never painted as a total villain. She does terrible things, but the reader (and even Kit to an extent) is able to understand her point of view. As much as loyalty and family are the backbone of this book, so is the question: what makes a monster? Can one ever turn back from a course of vengeance? Does one crime cause another, or do we have choices in life? Maggie believes in vengeance, that actions have consequences and she returns to England to make that happen. But Kit finds herself asking questions that easily can be asked in situations today: where should that circle of vengeance end?

As always, some of Karen Odden's most brilliant writing is in her depictions of Victorian London. From the Thames River to the streets of South London's Elephant and Castle district, to the fanciest jewelry shops of Holbourn, every inch of the city feels alive, as if you could walk it next to Kit. 

An Artful Dodge is a masterful Victorian mystery adventure that historical mystery readers will love!

I received an ARC of this book from Soho Crime and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review   

Murder on the Rocks

 

Murder on the Rocks (Lady Hardcastle Mystery 13)- T.E. Kinsey

Thomas & Mercer

Release Date: May 26, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚

Synopsis: February 1913. Lady Hardcastle and her diminutive but mettlesome lady’s maid, Flo, have been invited by their friend JB McIntyre to spend the weekend at his recently renovated Tudor fort on a remote island off the Devonshire coast. But the holiday quickly turns sinister when first a number of valuable jewels go missing—and then a fellow guest is murdered with a most unusual weapon.

Asked by JB to investigate, the stakes are raised for the sleuthing duo when a violent storm traps the group on the island and cuts them off from help. Is the murderer in their midst? With everyone claiming to have an alibi—but each also having a skeleton in their closet—can Lady Hardcastle and Flo unravel this complex web of secrets and deception before the killer strikes again?

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Lady Hardcastle (Emily) and her lady's maid/assistant Florence are hoping for a long weekend to enjoy themselves when they are invited to friend JB McIntyre's island. He's getting it ready to become a resort getaway and wants some friends to test things out. All is well until some valuable jewelry is stolen—and then the rather unpleasant guest is murdered. No one is actually sorry he's dead, but no one wants a murderer on the guest list. Especially when he isn't the only one who gets killed. With everyone trapped on the island until Tuesday, can Emily and Flo solve the crimes and keep everyone else safe?

It's been ages since I read a Lady Hardcastle mystery (I think I read the first one) so I was pretty much coming into the series new. There are throwaway references to other cases, presumably from other books, but none that made me feel lost coming into the series at Book 13. I did enjoy this book, but I can't say it made me feel like I needed to go back and reread the rest of the series. The characters were all pretty basic and mostly 2-dimensional. Friends who aren't entirely friends because they have secrets, or don't like the bullying of a wife. One tells long-winded stories that everyone knows but are entertaining if you've had enough to drink. The servants who smuggle goods. The American millionaire who is obsessed with the latest inventions. The story itself plods along, dragging especially in the middle, before speeding up to the end with the quick solution. I figured out some of it, but there was a good twist in there that helped keep things going.

The best part of the book for me was the description and history of the island fort, which is really well done. The author builds the fort/island into an excellent site to explore and you can see the details inside and out as they are described. The historical accuracy for the time period is subtle but well drawn, and benefits from JB loving to have all the latest gadgets (and showing them off to guests!). 

A quiet cozy mystery that might appeal to people already in love with the series more than newcomers, but wasn't bad if you can accept a slightly slower than usual pace.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

The Cupid Dilemma

The Cupid Dilemma- April Asher

St. Martin's Griffin

Release Date: May 12, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: A lover of love and a champion for happily ever after. Those were two of many things people expected from Aphrodite’s daughter. To Adalyn Whitlock, ‘love’ paid the bills, and currently, not well. Business was dropping at Happily Ever Forever, with her latest wedding planning catastrophe ending in a negative social media storm and her sister Maxi’s matchmaking ability on the fritz. To top it off, there’s an ex-boyfriend calling her ‘the Anti-Aphrodite’ and paparazzi pics linking Addie to her new client’s older brother.

Phoenix ‘Nix’ Cross—song writer and drummer of the hot new band, The Stone Talons—was no saint, but he was far from the womanizer the band’s image rep bestowed on him. If anything, he was a romantic, hopeful to find a love like the one in which his parents shared. With the band’s star quickly rising and the record label pressuring him to deliver the band’s next hit, Nix’s writer’s block couldn’t have come at a worse time. But when he opens his door to his irate new next-door neighbor, Nix feels the brief flash of inspiration for the first time in ages. And it just so happens that his new Muse is none other than his little sister’s new wedding planner.

With Addie needing an end to the public relations nightmare and the record label breathing down Nix’s neck, the pair agree to a fauxmance. But what happens when the emotions turned on for the cameras don't turn off?

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Certain things are expected of you when you're one of Aphrodite's daughters. Not believing in love, happily ever afters, and planning a streak of disasterous weddings (the fire department gets called out more than once) aren't anywhere on that list. But that's Adalyn "Addie" Whitlock's life at the moment. She runs a matchmaking and wedding planning agency with her sister and cousin and is watching it go down in flames (literally). They need a big success to pull things back- and a big name would be even better. When they agree to plan the wedding of a rock star in a month, things might get back on track. 

Except fellow band member and brother of the bride is Phoenix "Nix" Cross -aka Addie's new neighbor. He's suffering song writer's block and think's Addie's the Muse to get his songs flowing again. She could use some positive press to help her business. The answer? A fauxmance as they plan his little sister and best friend's wedding. What could go wrong?

I'm always up for a fauxmance (why have we not been using this term forever?). How long will it take them to work out that it's real? Who falls first? Why did they think the fake out was a good plan in the first place? It's always fun. While the why here was pretty typical, how they went about it wasn't: they got to just hang out and be themselves. It led to some very fun dates and watching the chemistry build between Nix and Addie was great.

While Nix was a well-developed character, I did sometimes want more from Addie. Why does she not believe in love? She hasn't had any traumatic relationships- though yes, plenty of decently bad dates. Her parents aren't together but don't fight and Addie seems to get along with them as well as most adult children with their parents might. It was kind of a big miss that it never got explained or developed. But otherwise I enjoyed the flirting, the heat, the getting-to-know-you dates, the quirky humor of the the characters and the book. 

The Cupid Dilemma's world-building and humor grabbed me from the first chapter. Mixing "normal" contemporary with Greek myth descendants and it not being something you hide (her dogs are from Cerebus' latest litter and play in the park with them like any other dogs would) was a great twist. I'm hoping for much more in this world to explore. Demigoddesses, shifters, gargoyles, humans all living together- more please!

Definitely recommend for romance lovers, even if you don't normally go for any kind of paranormal vibes. I'd call this "paranormal lite" but still enough to satifsy everyone. Fake dating trope lovers will enjoy!

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

Archangel's Eternity

 

Archangel's Eternity (Guild Hunter #18)- Nalini Singh

Berkley

Release Date: May 18, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: It’s been a millennium since Elena’s fateful first meeting with Archangel Raphael. She has survived war and loss, experienced beauty and cruelty. But no matter what, she has always held on to her mortal heart, as she and Raphael have held on to each other. Passionate and vibrant, they’ve built a life that has stood the test of time, growing ever stronger with each turn of the sun.

But change is coming—of a magnitude they could have never imagined—and it will forever alter the trajectory of their existence.

Even as they grapple with the cataclysmic shift in their personal lives, the Cadre of Ten, which has maintained a hard-won peace for centuries, begins to simmer with dangerous fault lines. The specter of madness looms in one archangel, the promise of war burns between two others, and in darkness far from mortal and immortal eyes stirs an ancient, slumbering power.

Suddenly, the future is terrifyingly uncertain . . . at the very moment that Elena and her archangel need to protect a treasure infinitely more precious than eternity.

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The last book in the Guild Hunter's series is a low stakes, high character love letter to the fans and all of the characters we've come to know across the past 17 books of the series. Think of it as an extended epilogue taking place 1,000 years after the main series—life goes on when you're immortal, but what does that mean?

Not going to lie, I spent a good part of this book (especially the beginning half) in tears. This is a book that will emotionally destroy you, so probably don't read it in public. Elena is still coming to grips with all of the goodbyes she has had to say as an immortal, which means memories of many of the humans we knew through the series. 

But of course, that's not the whole book. There are new friends, deepening friendships, and (as you may have guessed from the synopsis hints) our favorite Guild Hunter and archangel spend much of the book preparing for the most terrifying new feat of all: parenthood. I loved how very human Raphael was in his emotions around the whole experience—and seeing everyone we knew from other books as honorary aunts and uncles was a lot of fun!

As the last book in the series, don't start with this if you haven't read any of the others. If you've been reading this series, don't miss this one—but read with tissues close by.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

The Ending Writes Itself

 

The Ending Writes Itself- Evelyn Clarke

Harper

Release Date: April 7, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: Arthur Fletch, one of the world’s bestselling novelists, is a reclusive genius known for his iconic protagonists and fiendish twists. When six struggling authors are invited to spend a weekend on his private Scottish island, they arrive to discover a shocking secret: Arthur Fletch is dead . . . and his last book is unfinished.

Desperate to publish the novel, Fletch’s agent and editor have summoned these writers in the hope that one of them will imagine a worthy ending for this final book. To sweeten the deal, they are offering an irresistible prize: in addition to ghost-writing the last chapter––for a mind-boggling sum––they will also help the lucky writer successfully re-launch their own career, guaranteeing future bestsellers. The catch: the writers have just seventy-two hours to finish Fletch’s magnum opus.

It’s the perfect plot. All it needs is a killer ending.

_________________________________________

When Arthur Fletch and his publishers began advertising his upcoming Julia Petrarch book as his last book, they had no idea how true that would be. The problem? The most famous author in the world died without finishing the most anticipated book ever. Or leaving any notes on how it was supposed to end. So his desperate editors bring a small group of midlist authors to his private island home and offer a competition: whoever writes the best ending gets to not only ghostwrite the ending to Fletch's book, they get a 3-book deal and 2 million dollars. It would re-launch any of their careers. The catch? They have 72 hours to write the ending. What could possibly go wrong?

Put a small group on an island, remove all acess to the outside world, add monetary and career desperation, a surprise storm, and seriously questionable home decorating choices and I think we all know it isn't going to end well for at least one guest. So the reader gets to play the game from the beginning: who will get bumped off? And who will do the deed? The annoying sci-fi writer? The husband half of a thriller married couple? No jury would convict his killer after spending the weekend with him. There's a horror writer who seems to know more about crime and weapons than expected; a YA author, romance author, and debut author, as well as the wife half of the married couple—who plans on breaking up both the writing partnership and the marriage.

The first half of the book is more a critique of the publishing industry, with a slow build up to mayhem and murder. I did like that the chapters were told through alternating POVs (a trick I'm not always a fan of, but it worked here). Surprisingly, I didn't feel like it helped me get to know all the characters—particularly the women. Among the women, I felt like Sienna was the only one who stood out for her motives and personality. 

The book is entertaining, and I liked the bit of a spin the Epilogue gave to it. I enjoyed the sharp humor and critiques of the industry (and people) it is involved in (again, see Epilogue).  A fun locked-room read with And Then There Were None vibes mystery lovers should enjoy.

Stay for a Spell

 

Stay for a Spell- Amy Coombe

Ace

Release Date: April 14, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: Princess Tanadelle of the Widdenmar is disillusioned with life as a princess. She longs for real conversation, the chance to build a life of her own making, and uninterrupted reading time.

During a routine royal visit to the town of Little Pepperidge, Tandy’s dream comes true when she finds herself cursed to remain in a run-down bookshop until she unlocks her heart’s desire. Certain that someone will figure out how to break the curse eventually, and delighted by the prospect of an entire bookstore of her own, Tandy settles into life among the stacks. She finds it easy to exchange balls and endless state dinners for teetering piles of books and an irritatingly handsome pirate who seems bent on stealing her stock.

She even starts to believe she's stumbled into her very own happily ever after.

There's just one, minor problem: as Tandy's royal duties go unfulfilled, her frantic parents start sending princes to woo her, each one of them certain their kiss will break the curse. After all, what more could a princess want but a prince?

____________________________________________________

We've all had the dream: if you were locked in a bookshop overnight, what would you do?

Tandy (Princess Tanandelle of Widdenmar) gets to find out the answer. She pops off for what should be a quick visit to a local bookshop in between royal duties on the road and finds herself cursed to stay in the shop until she finds her heart's desire. What's a book-loving woman to do when literally unable to leave a bookshop?

She dives right in and finds herself loving the quiet life. Before long it's just Tandy; a goth teenage assistant; a magical bookshop cat (every bookshop should have one); and a hot (also-cursed), pirate who seems to enjoy hanging out with them. Chaos and hilarity ensues when Tandy's parents start sending princes out to kiss her and break the curse. Because what else could a princess want? 

Stay for a Spell is a cozy fantasy that I can best describe as utterly delightful and adorable. Tandy is completely down-to-earth in a slightly naive way. Used to trying to make everyone but herself happy, she's suddenly confronted by the one question she's never asked: what does she want in life? Is the solution to all her problems a prince, the way her parent think? (Never mind that she's known them all for most of her life and would already know if she loved one). What else is she allowed to have? 

The secondary characters are well-done. Goth draconae Sasha is a classic teen, but once she drops the initial act she and Tandy get along really well and she's more of a delight than she'd want to know. Bash the cursed pirate gives off Once Upon a Time Captain Hook-lite vibes—so I completely fell for him. The slow build relationship between Bash and Tandy was completely charming. And though the competent Honey doesn't get much page time, she rocks what time she has.

If you're a cozy fantasy fan, and especially a fellow book-lover, make sure you read Stay for a Spell. 

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

Murder on the Airship

 Murder on the Airship- Victoria Bergman

Stonehenge Circle  Press

Release Date: March 12, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: An emergency landing, quarreling elven and naga nobility, meddlesome dwarven officials, renegade pixies, dubious mercenaries, and a dragon who cheats at cards.

Bad enough without a murder.

Thyria had signed on to protect passengers, not investigate them. But she takes over morning watch aboard the Silver Kestrel, the finest airship aloft, to find a first-class passenger stabbed to death in his own stateroom.

Now she must investigate – tactfully, whatever that means – a burgeoning diplomatic incident, navigating the towering egos of influential passengers who each have something to hide.

Because if she doesn’t find her quarry within the day, this will be the Kestrel’s final flight.

________________________________________________

What would you get if Terry Pratchett's Discworld visited Agatha Christie's Murder on the Nile? Probably something along the lines of Victoria Bergman's Murder on the Airship. 

When guard Thyria finds one of the annoying first-class passengers stabbed to death on the airship Silver Kestrel, it isn't a great start to her day. The good news is that there are a limited number of suspects, since most of the passengers were in town partying for the solstice. The rest of the news is all bad. All the guests have reasons to want him dead; the airship has been sabotaged; the elves and naga are about five minutes from war and everyone is taking sides on the ship; there's at least two assassination attempts on top of the murder; a smuggled dragon; and let's not even mention the pixies. The guard who should be in charge is in sickbay with a bad case of being poisoned and it's up to Thyria to figure out what happened—preferably before the local dwarves get involved. But when everyone has a reason to want soomeone dead, how do you find the actual killer?

Thyria is a fun character. She's not a detective. She's the guard who gets to threaten smugglers and toss drunks off her ship while her boss handles things like "diplomacy" and "politeness". So she's completely out of her element being asked to deal with important ambasadors and first-class passengers. Give her a good bar fight any day! She's quite sure at first she can't handle the assignment. But the captain is busy and she's the only one left to handle it, so she has to grit her teeth and figure it out.

There's a delightful sense of humor to  Bergman's writing. Thyria approaches the murder (and the world) with a no-nonsense, we're-all-in-this-together-so-why-waste-my-time feeling. The various high-handed sensibilities of the senators, ambasadors, and self-described important people she has to deal with don't get anywhere with her. But they try. While she may not be able to threaten them the way she can incompentent mercenaries and moronic magic students, she learns the power of a fake smile and a little blackmail.

While things got a little overly complicated in ways they might not have needed to, and tangled with a few extra subplots, Murder on the Airship was a delightful cozy fantasy mystery that should make readers of both genres happy and looking for more by Victoria Bergman. I will certainly be hoping for more flights by the Silver Kestrel.

I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

The Blood Countess

  

The Blood Countess:Murder, Betrayal, and the Making of a Monster- Shelley Puhak

Bloomsbury Publishing

Release Day: February 17, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: There have long been whispers, coming from the castle; from the village square; from the dark woods. The great lady-a countess, from one of Europe's oldest families-is a vicious killer. Some even say she bathes in the blood of her victims. When the king's men force their way into her manor house, she has blood on her hands, caught in the act of murdering yet another of her maids. She is walled up in a tower and never seen again, except in the uppermost barred window, where she broods over the countryside, cursing all those who dared speak up against her.

Told and retold in many languages, the legend of the Blood Countess has consumed cultural imaginations around the world. But despite claims that Elizabeth Bathory tortured and killed as many as 650 girls, some have wondered if the Countess was herself a victim- of one of the most successful disinformation campaigns known to history. So, was Elizabeth Bathory a monster, a victim, or a bit of both? With the breathlessness of a whodunit, drawing upon new archival evidence and questioning old assumptions, Shelley Puhak traces the Countess's downfall, bringing to life an assertive woman leader in a world sliding into anti-scientific, reactionary darkness-a world where nothing is ever as it seems. In this exhilarating narrative, Puhak renders a vivid portrait of history's most dangerous woman and her tumultuous time, revealing just how far we will go to destroy a woman in power.

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If you go into Shelley Puhak's The Blood Countess expecting to read confirmation of the same horror stories you've heard before, imaging Elizabeth Bathory as a serial killer of innocent young women and bathing in their blood, you'll be disappointed. If, however, you want to read it for a fascinating exploration of a woman in power and how she was brought down by politics, religion, and the patriarchy—this is the book for you.

I knew nothing about Hungarian politics or how the Lutheran/Calvinist religious division manifested itself there or affected everyday people before reading this book. Puhak does a good job of breaking things down into understandable accounts, sticking to what we need to know because it's going to be important to Elizabeth's story. Puhak talks about working with translators and what previous translations of documents got wrong, which first led to accounts of cannibalism (for example) when that's not what was happening. 

The Bathorys were a powerful family in Hungary and Transylvania at a time when this was dangerous. Elizabeth was a strong woman who held a lot of land (both on her own and for her young son), she supported women healers during a time they were being pushed out by men. She made enemies by standing up for herself and other women, for insisting on justice during a time of corruption. She believed in the courts and the law, even when she saw it being made a mockery of by the Holy Roman Emperor, her supposed ruler and protector. When her neighbors came for her, she thought the laws would protect her. 

Instead, she became perhaps the greatest reminder of how much men fear women's minds, their leadership, their knowledge, and their strength, and how far men will go to erase women's power.

The Blood Countess is well researched, well written, full of fascinating information, and a great read for anyone interested in learning how politics, jealousy, and greed can create such an enduring and false legacy. 

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review 

On Thin Ice

 

On Thin Ice- Kelly Jamieson

Boldwood Books

Release Day: February 13, 2026

Rating: 📚📚📚📚

Synopsis: 

Marek

Playing for the New Jersey Storm I know how to handle the heat – on and off the ice. But nothing compares to Nicki Sullivan. We collided in One wild night, no strings and a spark I couldn’t shake. We went our separate ways, but I never stopped thinking about her. When I see she’s involved in an accident that nearly takes her life, I drop everything and drive to New York. She’s broken, shaken… but still the woman who set my world alight. So I bring her home with me — to recover, to breathe… and maybe, to see if that spark between us still burns.

Nicki

After the accident, I can’t face the music — or the world. The last person I expect to show up is Marek — sinfully hot, too good to be real, and suddenly my rescuer. I should push him away. Instead, I let him take me to his apartment, where everything feels dangerously safe. But it’s not just comfort — it’s him. The heat between us is impossible to ignore and being with him feels right. But I can’t hide away forever. Falling for him is a risk because this time the ice beneath us may just crack.

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On Thin Ice is a hockey romance that hits hard and plays for all the feels. Marek and Nikki meet in Vegas and have instant connection—but despite their best intentions their schedules keep them from meeting up afterwards and they drift apart. A year later he's determined to get over her—until he hears about an accident at one of her concerts. She's in shock and the people around her don't seem to want to her to do anything but get back to work. So Marek has Nikki move in with him until she recovers. Nikki feels safe with Marek, but the chemistry from Vegas is still there. Should they act on it? And what happens when Nikki has to return to the real world?

Marek is definitely one of those MMCs you love to read about. Gentle, confident, willing to just be there and support Nikki however he can. Of course he gets some things wrong (nobody is perfect) but he does his best with what he knows how to do. Writing in alternating first-person POVs let us get into both of their heads, let us really feel them being messed up over each other when they think they can't make it work because of long-distances and busy schedules. For me, one of the things that woked best was seeing in Nikki's head after the concert, as she goes through the trauma and mental health issues that have really been there all her life but she's pushed the away until now. Lack of confidence, trying to live up to other's expectations, meshing with survivor's guilt and doses of toxic social media created a perfect storm that she didn't know how to recognize, let alone get out of. But Marek stood by her for all of it, supporting her and helping her, showing her he loved her for herself, not for her stardom.

Kelly Jamieson puts her characters (and readers) through it all here. Expect humor, romance, trauma, serious heart-to-hearts, deep friendships, self-discovery, sizzling chemistry, and love at first sight that neither recognizes. Nikki and Marek have to work for their HEA, making On Thin Ice relatable in all the best of ways.

Great for hocket romance fans,  & romance fans. Kelly Jamieson fans will love this new book and new readers will be hooked!

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review