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TWICE SHY BY SARAH HOGLE // spoiler-free book review: a cinnamon roll of a contemporary romance that you absolutely need to warm your cold hearts <3
Read this literally a year ago and I have only just managed to get my hands on a physical copy and I need to yell at you all about this delightful book. Ugh, it’s so good and underrated and let’s just get into it!!!! Title: Twice ShyAuthor: Sarah HoglePage count: 302Date published: 6 April 2021Genre: Adult contemporary romance 🌳 Synopsis: Can you find real love when you’ve always got your head in the clouds? Maybell Parish has always been a dreamer and a hopeless romantic. But living in her own world has long been preferable to dealing with the disappointments of real life. So when Maybell inherits a charming house in the Smokies from her Great-Aunt Violet, she seizes the opportunity to make a fresh start. Yet when she arrives, it seems her troubles have only just begun. Not only is the house falling apart around her, but she isn’t the only inheritor: she has to share everything with Wesley Koehler, the groundskeeper who’s as grouchy as he is gorgeous—and it turns out he has very different vision for the property’s future. Convincing the taciturn Wesley to stop avoiding her and compromise is a task more formidable than the other…
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MAY RECAP // a lot of essay writing, cute new books & some romance to relieve the stress
Who doesn’t love when Ruby only does recaps? Definitely not you, because you love me no matter what I do right? I’m full of myself I know. Please just ignore me. Let’s get into this already ; ) — Sabrina September Is A Liar by Nikki Lincoln {★★★★☆}: never going to get over how stunning this cover is and you all so need to read this absolutely fabulous debut romance! I was SHOCKED it was a debut because the writing is blow-you-socks-off good and I’m so excited to see Nikki flourish. Tysm for gifting me with an ARC and a finished copy!!! Click here for the GR review xoxo! Meet Me At The Lake by Carley Fortune {★★★★☆}: Another stunner of a cover, gosh these pinks are getting to me, man. This was an excellent follow-up to Every Summer After, which I really liked last year. She almost had the potential to get a higher rating but something was holding me back. But I loved the characters, and the writing was wonderful and I literally want to go to Canada rn. Love that for me. I’m truly going haha. Click here for more thoughts With Love, From Cold World by…
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INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR NIKKI LINCOLN // chatting to local author of Sabrina September is a Liar about this gorg debut romance
Moment of silence for this cover that could honestly whack me over the head and I’d be thankful for it. The cover gods BLESSED US and I shall absolutely never recover from the stunningness. Which is indeed a word, in case you were wondering. Find it in the Ruby dictionary. Anyways, ecstatic to have the wonderful Nikki Lincoln with us on the blog today to celebrate her debut Sabrina September Is A Liar which has been out for just over a month and you all NEED to read it!!!! Title: Sabrina September is a LiarSeries: The Summer Fall book #1Author: Nikki LincolnPage count: 370Date published: 28 April 2023Genre: Adult contemporary romance 🏝️ Synopsis: An emotional second-chance romance story about the strength of love, life-changing friendships, and forgiveness. Sometimes perfect love finds you at the most imperfect time. At least that was what she’d spent nine years, eight months, and six days telling herself. But when it comes to her true feelings, Sabrina September is a prolific liar. Their love had arrived at the perfect time, but fear was a destructive force in matters of the heart. Ten years ago, she arrived in Japan, broken, and desperately searching for a way back to…
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APRIL RECAP // i am in my british comedy era, finally read a jane austen & sinking down the academic research rabbit hole aka life is great
Currently, my brain capacity is at 0.1 but that is not necessarily a bad thing. It just means I have a lot to say and no way to articulate it so this recap should be fun. If there’s one thing Ruby Rae Reads will always deliver, it is chaos and you can at least count on that. Let’s try and remember what happened this month before May is over *insert happy dance* Don’t You Forget About Me by Mhairi McFarlane {★★★★½}: Don’t remember what finally gave me the push to read this author, maybe fate because I just KNEW I would love her and Ms McFarlane and I are now best friends. She doesn’t know that yet but it’s the truth. Maybe you’ll get a full review soon because I have a lot to say, but this was like watching a British comedy in book form and no-one does comedy like the British. The writing was whip-smart, the characters loveable and it’s just everything I want in an adult contemporary technically women’s fiction, but agh that term sucks. It was absolutely brilliant READ IT RIGHT NOW!!!!!! GR review here Mad About You by Mhairi McFarlane {★★★★★}: I couldn’t tell you…
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MARCH RECAP // graduation, moving, some reading & other chaos
Quite chuffed with my incredibly inventive title if I do say so myself *wink wink* We all know that I am a comedian by nature. God I need to shut up now. Anyways, back to your irregularly scheduled belated recap, as per usual, due to very obvious reasons in the title. I honestly don’t remember what happened last month, it was all very blurry but I shall try my best to recount it to you. Into the chaos we go! Last Violent Call by Chloe Gong {★★★★★}: I was never prepared for this book and I have read it and am still not prepared. Chloe never misses and this book was perfection, as is everything she writes. My heart stopped beating for approximately 200 pages and I need to tattoo this book onto my forehead. It was stunning and I will have a full review up hopefully soon, GR review here in the meantime *screams for eternity* The First Move by Jenny Ireland {★★★☆☆}: The lovely people at Penguin SA had an eARC available and I needed a smol pick me up so I read this on a whim. Devoured this in like a day and agh what a cute…
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POPULAR BOOKTOK BOOKS I RECOMMEND // 10 viral tiktok books i actually like that you could read if you want
I don’t know what I’m doing today but I am unhinged and we’re just rolling with it. Spur of the moment decisions over at Ruby Rae Reads today *hides* I could be here talking about the worst BookTok books because I know there are many but I don’t want to put myself through that amount of pain. Very rarely will you catch me pushing through god-awful books and oof I know which ones those are. Avoiding them like the plague in this household. Anyways, I shan’t waste time on the opinions I have concerning this platform because frankly, I don’t know what I would say. It has been both very amusing watching books grow on TikTok whilst also being really cool for the book industry. So there are my two cents, maybe I’ll come back for a discussion? This post is just going to discuss books I rated basically higher than 3 stars. Some are not amazing and a few by authors I wouldn’t support anymore, but I wanted to talk about. Let’s just get into the books. There are more than I anticipated so I’ll be as brief as possible! CONTEMPORARY — It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover:…
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EVERMORE BOOK TAG // the belated book tag but at least i finally listened to this album ft. books i love, fave romances and lots of tears
Indeed I am 123456789 years late and none of you care about this tag anymore, but I can live with that. I think. It was a Monday and I saw this still in my drafts and here we are *cue nervous laughter* The creator of this tag, my dear friend Rhi, is currently on hiatus and her original post is unavailable to view, but do feast your eyes on the stunning graphics. Big thanks to the wonderful Olivia for tagging me, love you so much! I,,, can’t remember if anyone else tagged me. I’ve tried my hardest to talk about books I don’t talk about all that much. Or at least often? Hopefully, you haven’t heard me talking about them all the time, I guess we’ll see. Enough rambling and let’s get started! A Million Junes by Emily Henry I mean what a fun song. I absolutely love it as the lead single, the instrumentals are just stunning and I even like the 90s trend line #sorrynotsorry — As for a book, I decided I needed to choose a book with a romance that felt fated, one I NEEDED them to be together so badly, and this immediately stood out.…
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THE DEAD ROMANTICS BY ASHLEY POSTON // spoiler-free book review: you need this crazy romance book with ghostwriters that can see ghosts but also deals with grief in your life!!!
Today’s post is an incredibly exciting one because I finally get to cry about one of my favourite books this year!!! I read this one back in July actually, but ugh it was so good and I’m back to shove it down all of your throats *sighs* Let’s just get into the screaming!!!! Title: The Dead RomanticsAuthor: Ashley PostonPage count: 368Date published: 28 June 2022Genre: Adult contemporary romance 👻 Synopsis: Florence Day is the ghostwriter for one of the most prolific romance authors in the industry, and she has a problem—after a terrible breakup, she no longer believes in love. It’s as good as dead. When her new editor, a too-handsome mountain of a man, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye. But then she gets a phone call she never wanted to receive, and she must return home for the first time in a decade to help her family bury her beloved father. For ten years, she’s run from the town that never understood her, and even though she misses the sound of a warm Southern night and her eccentric, loving family and their funeral parlor, she can’t bring herself…
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TWO WRONGS MAKE A RIGHT BY CHLOE LIESE // blog tour book review: the perfect romantic shakespeare retelling ft. opposites attract fake dating for revenge slow-burn gloriousness
Hi hello friends I apologise for this delay and for taking so long with this but I must admit I was scared to read this book. I didn’t want it to destroy me with its cuteness and be eternally damaged. But of course, it did and I have no regrets so let’s get into this! Big thanks to Berkley for having me on the blog tour <3<3<3 Title: Two Wrongs Make A RightSeries: The Wilmot Sisters book #1Author: Chloe LiesePage count: 352Date published: 22 November 2022Genre: Adult contemporary romance 💌 Synopsis: Opposites become allies to fool their matchmaking friends in this swoony reimagining of Shakespeare’s beloved comedy, Much Ado About Nothing. Jamie Westenberg and Bea Wilmot have nothing in common except a meet-disaster and the mutual understanding that they couldn’t be more wrong for each other. But when the people closest to them play Cupid and trick them into going on a date, Jamie and Bea realize they have something else in common after all—an undeniable need for revenge. Soon their plan is in place: Fake date obnoxiously and convince the meddlers they’re madly in love. Then, break up spectacularly and dash their hopes, putting an end to the…
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LOVE ON THE BRAIN BY ALI HAZELWOOD // spoiler-free book review: an adult romance sizzling with chemistry ft. neuroscience geekiness, enemies to lovers & cats
Hi hello wonderful friends I’ve been sitting on this review for a hot minute and I’m so ready to finally talk about it because I LOVED this book so so so much. Like a huge amount. Like a ‘Bee and Levi could step on me and I’d let them’ amount!!!! Imma stop wasting time and just get to it! Title: Love On The BrainAuthor: Ali HazelwoodPage count: 368Date published: 23 August 2022Genre: Adult contemporary romance ✉ Synopsis: Bee Königswasser lives by a simple code: What would Marie Curie do? If NASA offered her the lead on a neuro-engineering project – a literal dream come true – Marie would accept without hesitation. Duh. But the mother of modern physics never had to co-lead with Levi Ward. Sure, Levi is attractive in a tall, dark, and piercing-eyes kind of way. But Levi made his feelings toward Bee very clear in grad school – archenemies work best employed in their own galaxies far, far away. But when her equipment starts to go missing and the staff ignore her, Bee could swear she sees Levi softening into an ally, backing her plays, seconding her ideas… devouring her with those eyes. The possibilities have all…
