Hunted (The Giving Chronicles #2) Reluctant allies to lovers Only one bed “I’ll protect you” Only one horse Wound tending Fated mates Slow burn (but it pays off) Groveling Touch her and dîé (and he means it)
Nothing is as it seems.
The Giving Season has ended, but the onset of winter hasn’t brought Wren peace. The king is still after her, and he has more reason than ever to want her dead. In possession of magic she shouldn’t have, she’s desperate to flee the capital.
And there’s just one person who can help her: Gabriel Moreau, the Hunter who chased Wren across the country, duty-bound to bring her to justice. Forced to make the most difficult decision he’s ever faced, Gabriel chooses to break his oath and vows anew to protect Wren. Now, he too will be hunted.
Together, Wren and Gabriel race across the kingdom to escape the king’s wrath. But the cost of safety is steep, and life on the run is more dangerous than ever. Even with the Hunter by her side, their bond growing stronger with each obstacle, Wren is all too aware that everything, especially the notion of safety, is a lie.
Simon Maltman is the author of novels, novellas and short stories, released with various publishers. An Amazon Bestseller from Northern Ireland he writes a range of crime fiction thrillers.
A regular guest at festivals and events, he is the tour guide for Belfast Noir, and also a well known book reviewer for the likes of ITV and online journals.
An established ‘Ulster Noir’ author, he also writes American-set high concept thrillers.
My thoughts: A collection of short and clever crime stories, some very brief, others a few pages. One even features the current President of US (or does it?)
This was an enjoyable read, I liked how the stories were self-contained but some of them could also be snippets from larger narratives. Short stories are not easy things to write and make them interesting on their own, but this collection manages that with ease.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
Seven assassins. One election. The fate of the British Empire hangs in the balance. Felix Grey returns in a high-stakes historical mystery of power, politics and murder.
Prime Minister Felix Grey is still reeling from the fallout of his last ordeal, which left his home secretary dead and his own reputation in tatters. With a general election looming, a fragile Labour party emerging, and an odious Tory leader waiting to seize power, he would rather retreat than fight. Duty, however, and the quiet pressure of King Edward VII, leave him with no choice.
As tensions rise at home, danger gathers abroad. In India, demands for independence grow louder, and a shadowy group of seven assassins is dispatched to strike at the heart of the British establishment. Their targets include senior politicians and even the king himself. The message is clear: empire will not be preserved without bloodshed.
Relying on his wits and a loyal circle of allies, Felix must uncover the conspiracy before it tears the country apart. Felix Grey and the Seven Assassins is the second novel in this historical crime series, combining political intrigue, real historical figures, and a high-stakes assassination plot into a fast-paced, witty caper that will delight fans of classic historical mysteries and intelligent, plot-driven fiction.
My thoughts: Prime Minister Felix Grey is up for re-election, and then he’s warned that a team of assassins from India are in Britain with the hope of striking a blow for independence and he’s on their list.
With the help of his friends and loyal steward Humphrey, Felix plans to find the potential killers and stop their plan, protecting the king and staying alive himself too.
There’s a visiting Swami as well, and while he purports the importance of ahimsa (non-violence to all living things), Felix isn’t sure that he isn’t involved in some way.
I really enjoyed this book, Felix is a great protagonist and his friends are all fascinating too – especially Alfred, the young man Felix rescued in the previous book. He’s investigating the secret office through the Downing Street fireplace, as it seems someone else has been accessing it. He’s also taken up photography, accompanying Felix on his campaign as his official photographer, and learning to read thanks to Felix’s housekeeper.
This book covered a complicated period of time, as India attempted to wrest control of its destiny from the British, and the principles of non-violent protest clashed with those who were willing to do anything to achieve their goals.
Felix is much more moderate than the real politicians of the time, and more willing to listen to people and understand their point. He might not be able to do much as the rest of the Establishment was against home rule for India, but he’s not completely beyond redemption. I’m looking forward to the next book.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
We’re thrilled to share The Bounty of Blood and Nails by N.K. Brown this week and we have a deluxe special edition to give away too!
The Bounty of Blood and Nails (The Devil’s Huntress Book 1)
Release Date: March 2026
Genre: Dark Fantasy
Feminine Rage
Morally Grey Characters
Dark magic
Forbidden magic
Grumpy x Sunshine
Love Triangles
Spicy Romance
Hidden Villains
Tam is a heartless, ruthless bounty hunter—or so her handler would have you believe.
With her ability to use forbidden blood magic, Tam tracks and captures her prey. The same blood magic that curses her to a life of servitude under a cruel handler—one wrong move and not only her life, but her family’s will be at stake. But when she’s sent to a remote, superstitious northern town where even a glimmer of magic will send you to the gallows, she’s forced to confront the darker consequences of her work.
After the murder of her bounty, innocent townspeople are blamed—and Tam’s conscience begins to stir. But there’s no turning back. Her handler raises the stakes, and her next mission is even more dangerous: infiltrate the royal castle and capture the enigmatic Prince Bellinor. Disguised as a maid, Tam is drawn into a world of deadly secrets, where her words are whispered into the prince’s ears through an ancient magic she’s never faced before.
To get close to the prince, she befriends his loyal bodyguard, Clement, but the deeper she digs, the more she realizes that Clement’s destiny is tied to the prince. With time running out and the castle tightening, Tam is forced to watch the trial of the people blamed for her own prior actions. But will she complete the mission—or risk it all as she falls in love with the person whose life she must destroy?
In this fast-paced, thrilling tale of magic, betrayal, and forbidden love, Tam will have to decide if being the bad guy is worth losing everything.
Danielle MacKinnon’s nearly thirty and still hasn’t got her life sorted. She’s broke, hates her job as PA to the blithely privileged Jeannie, and now a break-up has left her with nowhere to live.
It comes as a surprise when Jeannie suggests that Danielle stay at Westerley, the sprawling Yorkshire estate where she grew up. They need someone to look after the place anyway.
At Westerley, Danielle luxuriates in her idyllic, borrowed life as lady of the manor – but the house is strange, uneasy. that started in London has followed her there.
Then Jeannie arrives unannounced. Working for Jeannie, serving her, living in her house, the razor-thin boundaries between Danielle and her boss begin to dissolve. Soon their relationship slides into one that is older, stranger and harder to name.
Something is happening at Westerley. Things where they shouldn’t be. The shadow of a maid sweeping in the dawn light. But is the house really haunted? Or is Danielle?
Lauren Mooney is a writer from the East Midlands. She works in theatre and audio drama, and has co-run Kandinsky Theatre Company since 2015, making award-winning shows across the UK and Europe. She is a graduate of UEA’s Creative Writing Prose MA, where she held the David Higham Scholarship. She lives in south London with her husband Stewart and their tortoise, Sacher Tort. Service is her first novel.
My thoughts: Danielle is coasting through life, she’s stuck in an assistant’s job at a charity that doesn’t seem to really do anything, working for Jeannie, who treats her like a dogsbody, sending her to do the weekly shop and her errands.
When Danielle’s best friend tells her she can’t sleep on the sofa in her house share anymore (her ex is in their flat), she’s suddenly homeless. When Jeannie suggests she stay at her family’s moldering house Westerley and look after it, she accepts.
But the night terrors and sleep paralysis that have been plaguing her seem to be worse in Yorkshire than they were in London and she’s even starting to see things in the daytime. Bowls of peaches seem to appear, a maid in the corridor when she’s the only person in the house.
Then Jeannie and her son pitch up, the roof of their London home having caved in, and suddenly Danielle is cooking and cleaning for them and sleeping in the old servants’ quarters in the attic, and her strange visions are getting even more real.
I liked Danielle, I’ve been a PA, although thankfully not for anyone as entitled as Jeannie, and I have an ancestor who was a housemaid (my great-grandmother) so I recognised that in her.
She’s clearly struggling with her life, her relationship has ended and she’s stuck in a rut with her job, her strange experience at the house, the visions and the increasingly real haunting seem like warning signals that she needs to change things, to start over and stop letting life happen to her.
A really interesting and enjoyable read.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
When the local fish and chip shop owner is found dead next to the fryer, is it a case of wrong plaice, wrong time or is a killer on the loose in the village?
Judy is reading late one night when a knock at the door disturbs her. Local teenager Megan has discovered her boss Colin, owner of local fish and chip shop The Codfather, lying dead next to the fryer. Found with the book club pick of the month at his side, surely Judy and her crime-loving book group can help?
The local police haven’t a clue, but as Judy gathers her bookish friends, they soon uncover more suspects than they bargained for. Was it John from rival fish and chip shop Salty Towers, the estranged brother who stands to inherit the family business? Or is there something fishy about Dazza, the new handyman who carries an empty toolbox? But when they both appear to have solid alibis, the book club are worried there are more red herrings in this case than they had counted on.
When another body is found, Judy realises that time is running out to crack the case before the killer strikes again. Can Judy and her book club follow in the footsteps of their fictional detective heroes to uncover the murderer before someone else is found sleeping with the fishes?
An absolutely hilarious and unputdownable new cozy mystery series, perfect for fans of Richard Osman, Robert Thorogood and Faith Martin.
Tracy started writing when her cruel, heartless husband ripped her away from her dream job – shopping for rollercoasters for the UK’s leading theme parks – to live in America with a brand new baby and no mates. In a cunning plan to avoid domestic duties and people who didn’t understand her Derbyshire accent, she wrote NO-ONE EVER HAS SEX ON A TUESDAY. It went on to become a No 1 bestseller and publishing phenomenon. So now Tracy has a new dream job, making people laugh and sometimes cry through her writing and has had many more novels published successfully around the world. She now lives back in Derbyshire with her now wonderful husband and two children!
My thoughts: This was a really fun crime romp with the rather obsessive crime fans of the Serial Killers Book Club (where they read crime fiction, not kill people!).
When chip shop employee Megan knocks on Judy’s door clutching a book soaked copy of The Hound of the Baskervilles, having found her boss dead in his shop, Judy first of all has to convince the police she isn’t the killer, then ropes the book club members into solving it, having decided the police are useless.
With some undercover work for a few of the team, and a lot of text messages in the group chat as they try to sort out their prime suspects, they uncover a drug dealing money laundering business right under the town’s noses, serve up some rather sad sandwiches at a wake, and hopefully catch a killer.
Lots of fun, funny and a bit silly, this is crime fiction’s lighter side, yes there’s murder but there’s also puns and cake.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
A body in a cello case. A victim who shouldn’t be dead. A killer playing a deadly game.
Detective Jack is enjoying a rare day off and attempting a spot of DIY when the call comes in.
A passenger has made a horrifying discovery on the Edinburgh to King’s Cross train.
Stuffed inside a cello case, abandoned on a luggage rack, is the body of a middle-aged woman. Strangled to death.
Wealthy businesswoman Rhona Miller has been dead for at least two weeks. But that’s impossible. She spoke to her father just four days ago.
As Jack and his team dig deeper, he finds himself plunged into the most frustrating case of his career – a crime carefully staged, a timeline that makes no sense, and a killer always one step ahead.
Jack comes to realize this isn’t just murder. It’s a performance.
And Detective Jack MacIntosh has been cast in the lead role.
Michelle Kidd is a crime fiction author best known for the DI Jack MacIntosh and DI Nicki Hardcastle series. Michelle qualified as a legal executive in the early 1990s, spending ten years practising civil and criminal litigation.
But the dream to write was never far from her mind and in 2008 she began writing the first book in what would later become the DI Jack MacIntosh series.
Michelle now works full time for the NHS and lives in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk. She enjoys reading, wine and cats — not necessarily in that order.
My thoughts: This is a nasty case for Jack and his team, and one that hits close too. Rhona Miller has been strangled, placed inside a cello case and left on the train from Edinburgh to London for an unwitting passenger to find.
But Rhona’s father is adamant he spoke to her the previous day, and as he reveals that his daughter was kidnapped and he paid a ransom, the case takes on a different form. Something else is going on here, and it might date back to Rhona’s time at medical school. A medical school also attended by Jack’s friend, pathologist Dr Philip Meadows.
As the case heats up and the killer strikes again, Jack needs Dr Meadows to think, he knows the Millers, he’s known them for years, can he help identity the killer?
A shocking, twisting story with a nasty sting in the tale for some of the team, as Jack hunts an obsessed, revenge seeking psychopath, who refuses to stop on his dark path. Will they all survive it?
Well, you’ll have to read the book to find out!
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
Amanda Fitzroy has everything she ever wanted: a successful husband, a beautiful home, and a precious young son. When the pressure of juggling work and motherhood becomes too much, hiring a nanny feels like the perfect solution. Katelyn is capable, attentive, and adored by Amanda’s little boy. Almost overnight, life becomes easier. But then things start to go wrong…
At first it’s small changes – appliances are turned off. The coffee is in the wrong place. Her son doesn’t come back from the playground on time. But when her husband starts to act strangely around the nanny, Amanda realises her carefully controlled world is beginning to spin out of control…
Can she regain the household she adores? Or is the danger already inside her home?
Heather Burnside is a Manchester based author whose books are based in her home city. She has published fifteen gritty urban crime novels to date, most of which have become Amazon Category Bestsellers. Before writing novels, Heather had various articles published in well-known UK magazines. She started her career by attending a creative writing course, and has also run a writing services business.
My thoughts: Amanda and her husband Alex are busy people, so hiring a nanny/housekeeper seems like a good idea, their son has allergies and chronic asthma, another adult looking after him would be a help. And at first Katelyn seems great. She’s helpful, Bradley seems to adore her, and Amanda can finally relax.
But all is not as it seems. Katelyn and Alex have history, and secrets. Amanda starts to feel anxious as things in the house turn up in different places, the kettle is switched off at the wall, Katelyn doesn’t seem to be listening to her and Alex is behaving strangely.
As secrets start to surface, Amanda realises she doesn’t know her husband at all. A chance reconnection with an old flame makes her wonder whether it’s time to make some big changes in her life. Especially as she doesn’t feel safe in her home anymore.
There’s a shocking twist or two in this book as Amanda learns the truth about who her husband really is and what he’s been hiding from her, and she does something drastic to protect herself. Katelyn’s not a nice person, but acts as a catalyst that will change Amanda forever.
*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.
We have a fantastic series rec for your summer reading list today!
We’re also gifting one lucky reader a paperback copy of both When Gods Fall AND When Sisters Collide!
The Gifts of the Gods Series by S.E. Bouvier
Series Tropes:
– New Adult
– Epic romantic fantasy
– Multi POV
– Found family + sisterhood
– Greek, Etruscan and Celtic mythology
– Strong FMCs
– Tattoo-based magic system
– Reluctant allies to lovers
– Morally grey men
– Slow burn to spice
– Emotional damage
Fans of Throne of Glass, An Ember in the Ashes, and The Ashen series will be swept into this epic romantic fantasy set in a brutal world inspired by Greek and Roman mythology. Perfect for readers craving high-stakes, strong female heroines, elemental magic, emotional angst, and slow burn romance.
Please note the series is New Adult and contains moderate steam/spice, some violence, language, and mature situations. Recommended for ages sixteen and up.
Triggers: explicit language, mature sexual situations, physical violence, death, drug addiction, slavery of adults and children, mentions of sexual assault, threats of sexual violence
We’re celebrating the release of Truths of the Allied Guild this week!
Truths of the Allied Guild (Descendants of the Stars Book 2)
Release Date: June 30, 2026
Genre: Epic Romantasy
Found Family
Vast and Secretive Worlds
Unique Magic
Political Intrigue
Love Triangles
Plot Twists
Slow Burn Romance
Feminine Rage
August Monroe has endured more than a human woman should have to by the time they are thirty one years old.
But her story is just beginning. After escaping capture by one of the most powerful magical leaders of her world, August realizes that in order to continue to survive she’ll have to uncover the truth.
Caught in a world much larger than she could have ever imagined, August must adapt quickly, or be lost in the dark once more. Choosing to fight, she finds herself training with a woman who blames her for the imminent war, banned from her solace of the kitchen by a Sovereign she thought was her ally, searching endlessly for her missing friends, and in an internal battle over where her heart belongs.
But the voices in her head are only getting stronger, and something inside her tells her to listen.
History has been hidden from the citizens of Celestera for too long. Enemies, long since thought locked away, are set to return. Powerful beings, once thought to be fictional, come to life. The Dragons have had enough and the stars are aligning above Celestera. August may have incited the inevitable war, but it’s time for the world to know the truth.
She survived the river,
She survived the flames,
Can she survive the Truth?
Truths of the Allied Guild, Book Two in Mara van Nacht’s Descendants of the Stars Series, is for lovers of Epic and Romantic Fantasy, Found Family, Vast and Secretive Worlds, Unique Magic, Political Intrigue, Love Triangles, Plot Twists, Slow Burn Romance and Feminine Rage.
Fans of Strong Character Development as seen in The Plated Prisoner Series by Raven Kennedy, Women Scorned as seen in The War of Lost Hearts Series by Carissa Broadbent, and Vast Worlds with Ensemble Casts as seen in The Throne of Glass Series by Sarah J Maas will fall in love with The Descendants of the Stars Series.
ramblingmads 