Skip to main content

Featured

Review: Crown of Lies by Pepper Winters

“I couldn’t let him get away with such a remark. I couldn’t stand there and let him smirk as if I was a tantrumy adolescent who never worked and believed money came from fairy farts.” (3h12m) ★★★☆☆ 🌶🌶 Series: Truth and Lies Duet, Book 1 Review: First, I would like to thank Valentine PR and the author for providing me with a free audio review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. The cliffhanger is so gripping that you’ll be searching for the next book immediately! Elle’s childhood was spent learning her father’s business, and she became the CEO of Belle Elle as a teenager. Working as hard as she does has led to a very sheltered life. When she finally decides to go out on her own, she is assaulted by two men, but a young vagrant saves her. Unexpectedly, Elle becomes smitten with the young man but never even learns his name before he is arrested and she is whisked away. Years later, her father is trying to play matchmaker, and a cocky young man claims
Post a Comment
Read more
Labels

Review: The Fortuna Coin by Karen Ann Hopkins

  


★★★★★

Review:

It’s been a long time since I’ve read a book that was utterly unputdownable. This book is everything I had hoped it would be, and more. It is easily the best book I have read in over a year and is among my favorite books of all time. I frequently caught myself scanning ahead because my eyes just couldn’t wait to find out what happened next.

 Wendy has just remarried, and her abusive ex-husband, Josh, kills her and her entire family in retaliation. She wakes up disoriented, finding herself in a bar, and like a bad dream, her memory fades as she comes to. She is twenty-one again, and what she doesn’t know is that she’s been given a second chance at life by the Fortuna coin her father gave her. Plagued by flashes of her memories of the future, she experiences overwhelming déjà vu. She meets her soulmate that night in the bar, but for her to save her future children’s lives, she will need to relive her past with Josh rather than follow her heart.

 The first few chapters were difficult to read, but they were brief. This book definitely has a lot of triggers, but the worst of them is at the beginning. As Wendy and Josh’s relationship develops in her new life, she can sense that something isn’t right. As a domestic violence survivor, I could feel my anxiety building with each insidious thing Josh would do, even though the advancement of his controlling behavior was very gradual. Sometimes, it was just a subtle change in his demeanor, and he would have looked perfectly amiable to an outsider, which is so often the case in domestic violence situations. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the pages. However, despite the tension I felt, Karen Ann Hopkins delivered this story with such understanding and delicacy that at no time did I feel overwhelmed or triggered. I would guess that she or someone very close to her has experienced this sort of relationship, but if that’s not the case, her research has served her very well; Josh’s character is written flawlessly.

 I would highly recommend this book to all women. (Domestic violence is genderless, but I make this statement since the majority of victims are women and the main character is a woman.) So many of us second-guess ourselves when our instincts are screaming at us that something isn’t right, and this book could help many women identify toxic behavior in their current and future relationships. For domestic violence survivors, I would recommend that you embark upon this book with caution, but I do not feel it is so extreme that you couldn’t find the same pleasure in reading it that I did.

 I will be recommending this book to everyone I know. The author graciously provided me with a digital advanced reader copy at my request, but I love it so much that I am purchasing a print copy to add to my bookshelf.


#TheFortunaCoin

Audience: adult
Trigger warnings: domestic violence, abuse, murder, death of children, gun violence, sexual content
Recommended for fans of: domestic thrillers, psychological thrillers, time travel, romance

Publisher's Synopsis:

Wendy Catalano, a newly remarried mother of four, finds herself, her husband and her children, murder victims of her ex-husband. A family heirloom takes her back in time to the beginning of her relationship with her eventual killer where she’s given the magical opportunity to change the future and stop her family's tragic ending. But she isn't aware that she's reliving a tortured life. With only glimpses of the future, Wendy struggles to survive present day, unaware that a bloody and unforgiving destiny awaits her.

The Fortuna Coin is a haunting psychological thriller about domestic abuse and second chances…but will the truth really set Wendy free?


Source:

Author-provided ARC

©Karen Ann Hopkins: October 12, 2021
Edition: ebook


Disclaimer: By clicking the link below, you will be directed to Amazon.com through my affiliate link. Should you decide to make a purchase, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. This commission helps to cover costs associated with running this blog.
Follow me on Instagram and Goodreads!
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts