I love it when the Top Ten Tuesday topic du jour is a seasonal TBR list!  It's always fun to think about what I want to read in the coming months (even if I never get around to actually reading my picks).  For the next couple of weeks, I'll still be reading frantically for the Cybils.  After that, I've got a variety of books I'm hoping to get to this winter/early spring.  We'll see how it goes.

If you're not playing along with TTT this week, what's wrong with you?  Seriously, it's a good time!  All you have to do is click on over to That Artsy Reader Girl, scan a few quick instructions, make your own list, and then spend some happy hours wandering around the book blogosphere.  Sure, there's Christmas shopping to do, gifts to wrap, goodies to bake, and bills to pay, but those things will wait while you visit favorite blogs, discover new ones, add books to your TBR mountain chain, and spread the love around this wonderful book blogging community.  It's an entertaining diversion, trust me!

Top Ten(ish) Books on My Winter TBR List:   

1.  Dog Driven by Terry Lynn Johnson—I just bought myself a copy of this middle-grade novel about a girl who's trying to hide the devastating fact that she's rapidly losing her eyesight.  When her sister begs her to enter a dog sled race in the Canadian wilderness, she can't refuse—even if she's not sure she can see well enough to race, let alone win.  Sounds like an exciting adventure novel!

2.  A Conspiracy of Bones by Kathy Reichs (coming March 17, 2020)—I've been waiting for this newest installment in Reichs' Temperance Brennan series to come out for several years.  The author had to take a break from writing due to health problems and I'm so glad she (and her fictional counterpart) are back in business.

3.  The Sea of Lost Girls by Carol Goodman (coming March 3, 2020)—I'm a fan of Goodman's Gothic thrillers, so I'm excited about her newest.  It concerns a teacher at a posh boarding school whose teen son is accused of murdering his girlfriend.  The crime brings attacks on the family and threats of revealing secrets from the woman's hidden past.  

4.  From the Desk of Zoe Washington by Janae Marks (coming January 14, 2020)—I love me a good middle-grade mystery and this debut sounds intriguing.  When the titular character receives a letter from her father—a man she's never met who is in prison for a heinous crime—proclaiming his innocence, she launches a secret investigation to figure out if he's telling the truth.  

5.  How to Walk Away by Katherine Center—Things You Save in a Fire was one of my favorite reads this year.  This one, Center's 2018 offering, sounds just as good.  It's about a woman whose life changes in an instant.  As she figures out how to deal with her new normal, she must reexamine her entire life and everyone in it.  

I just realized Center has a new novel coming out in July 2020, so I'll be keeping an eye out for that one as well.  

6.  A Murderous Relation by Deanna Raybourn (coming March 10, 2020)—An ARC of this one, the newest installment in Raybourn's always-entertaining Veronica Speedwell mystery series, is winging its way to my doorstep as we speak.  I can't wait to see what the delightful, intrepid Veronica gets herself up to next! 

7.  The Lost Castle and Castle on the Rise by Kristy Cambron—I really enjoyed reading The Painted Castle this year.  Since I didn't realize it's actually the third book in a trilogy of connected novels, I need to go back and read the first two.  

8.  What Stars Are Made of by Sarah Allen (coming March 31, 2020)—This debut middle-grade novel concerns a girl with Turner Syndrome who makes a deal with the universe—if she wins the grand prize in a contest she wants to enter and she gives all the money to her sister, her sister's baby will be born perfectly healthy.  Sounds like a sweet story!

9.  The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley (coming February 4, 2020)—When a lonely old man writes the stark truth about his life in a green journal he purposely leaves in a cafe, it inspires others to write—and own—their own truths.  

10.  We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry (coming March 3, 2020)—This YA novel is about a group of high school field hockey players living in the town that 300 years ago was known as Salem Village who find a spellbook that just might reverse their losing streak and change their lives forever.  Fun!

There you have it, ten(ish) books I'm looking forward to reading this winter/early spring.  Have you read any of them?  What's on your Winter TBR?  I'd truly love to know.  Leave a comment on this post and I will gladly return the favor on yours.  

Happy TTT!

(Image from Barnes & Noble)

With an "English" father and a French mother, Maggie Hughes never knows quite who she's supposed to be.  She's well aware that her father does not want her to marry a French boy, but she can't help but be attracted to her neighbor, Gabriel Phénix.  Poor though he may be, he's kind and decent.  When Maggie finds herself pregnant at 15, she's given a choice—marry Gabriel and doom herself to a life of poverty or give up the baby.  She chooses the latter.  As she ages, Maggie's plagued by guilt and a longing to know how her child fared.  When she learns that her infant was placed in a Móntreal orphanage that is being turned into a mental institution, she knows it's time to find her daughter.  She must know what happened to baby Elodie, no matter how awful the truth is ...

I've always been drawn to stories about orphans, adoption, and foster care, even before I became an adoptive mother myself.  So, naturally, I found the premise of The Home for Unwanted Girls by Joanna Goodman intriguing.  I did find the subject of the early orphanage/foster care system in Canada interesting.  Heartbreaking, but interesting.  Unfortunately, most of the characters in this novel are some combination of cold, selfish, fickle, and just generally unlikeable, which makes it really tough to connect with them.  I did care what happened in the story, enough that I finished the book, but overall, I feel very ambivalent about the novel.  It ended up being another didn't-love-it-didn't-hate-it read.  

(Readalikes:  Reminds me of No Ocean Too Wide by Carrie Turansky and a little of The Quintland Sisters by Shelley Wood)

Grade:

If this were a movie, it would be rated:

for language (a handful of F-bombs, plus milder expletives), violence, sexual content, and disturbing subject matter

To the FTC, with love:  I bought a copy of The Home for Unwanted Girls with a portion of the millions I make from my lucrative career as a book blogger.  Ha ha.

(Image from Barnes & Noble)

Anne Calloway longs for something more exciting than marrying her wealthy, but dull fiancé and settling down to a boring, predictable life.  So, when Gerard ships off to fight in Europe, the 21-year-old decides to do her part for the war effort.  She and her best friend, Kitty Morgan, join the Army Nurse Corps.  Serving together in Bora-Bora, the two soon realize that nursing on a far-off island in the middle of a bloody war is nowhere near as glamorous as it sounded when they signed up.  Picnics and outings with the soldiers are bright spots in the women's lives, but even those have a way of leading to trouble ...

Although Anne vows not to let the Army boys turn her head, she's immediately drawn to Westry Green.  In spite of herself, she falls for the enigmatic soldier.  As they work together to fix up a small, abandoned bungalow the Tahitians claim is cursed, they build a secret relationship that Anne knows will endure beyond the war.  Then they witness a brutal crime.  Before Anne knows it, she's become more than an innocent bystander and Westry's been shipped out suddenly.  With no communication from the soldier she's come to adore, Anne has no idea what's happened to him.  Where is Westry now?  Why isn't he writing her?  And what will become of the love that blossomed between them in their secret little bungalow?

I've heard good things about Sarah Jio's books, so I decided to give The Bungalow a try.  What did I think?  Meh.  The plot's melodramatic, the prose is stilted, and the characters are nothing special.  I'm especially confused by Anne and Wesley's big romance.  Both are bland characters, with no real personality, so I spent the whole book wondering what they saw in each other.  Although they are supposed to have this great, timeless love, there's no real spark between them.  Their relationship feels like a silly little wartime fling.  The mystery element did pique my interest.  Otherwise, The Bungalow just didn't do much for me.  It's an okay read, but nothing that will entice me to read more from Jio.  Oh well.

(Readalikes:  Reminds me of The Woman in the White Kimono by Ana Johns and Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford)

Grade:

If this were a movie, it would be rated:

for brief, mild language (no F-bombs), violence, mild sexual content, and disturbing subject matter

To the FTC, with love:  Another library fine find

(Image from Barnes & Noble)

Is your marriage in trouble?  Give it two weeks at a luxurious resort on an isolated island in the Mayan Riviera under the influence of two celebrity therapists and, voilá!  You're back in business.  At least that's what couples are sold when they sign up to attend retreats at The Harmony Resort.  Some come reluctantly, some nervously, some with great faith in the abilities of the famous power couple who run the retreat.  It doesn't take long, though, for the newest Harmony recruits to realize that not everything at the resort is what it seems ... especially not their glamorous hosts.

In the wake of a fierce tropical storm that's rapidly swirling toward the island, everyone's secrets will be revealed—to the devastation of them all.

There's something about an isolated, closed-room situation that really amps up a mystery/thriller for me.  That's the main reason I was drawn to The Last Resort by Marissa Stapley.  It did turn out to be a compelling page-turner.  That being said, it also didn't feature the most likable of characters.  Plus, the story's sad and depressing, which seems to be the norm for these kinds of books.  There was enough happening with the plot that I kept turning pages, but in the end, The Last Resort was just an okay read for me.  

(Readalikes:  Reminds me of Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty and two books by Emily Carpenter—Every Single Secret and Until the Day I Die)

Grade:

If this were a movie, it would be rated:

for language, violence, disturbing subject matter, and illegal drug use

To the FTC, with love:  I bought a copy of The Last Resort with a portion of the millions I make from my lucrative career as a book blogger.  Ha ha.