2026

Posted in The Monday Check-In by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

My Monday tradition, including a look back and a look ahead — what I read last week, what new books came my way, and what books are keeping me busy right now. Plus a smattering of other stuff too.

Life.

After a very busy workweek, I took time over the weekend to relax, exercise, and do not much at all! Well, that’s not entirely accurate — I did spend some time organizing and getting ready to travel. My extended family is meeting on the east coast this coming week to celebrate Passover together, and I can’t wait to see everyone!

I’ll be away for the remainder of the week starting tomorrow, and expect to mainly be off-line until the weekend. I’m busy planning what to read on the plane (let’s focus on the important things!) and what to pack for a few days of cold, rainy weather.

Wishing all who celebrate a Happy Passover and Happy Easter!

What did I read during the last week?

Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman: I finished this sweet audiobook last week, and just posted a review, here.

Nobody’s Baby by Olivia Waite: This novella is the 2nd in a really fun space/detective novella series. My review is here.

And Then There Was You by Sophie Cousens: An uneven story, although the audiobook narration kept me entertained. My review is here.

Everybody’s Favorite Guy by Katherine Center: Cute short story by a favorite author. (Looks like it’s currently free as a Prime reading choice.)

Butterfly Effects (Incryptids, #15 by Seanan McGuire: That’s right, it’s book #15 in this series! I finished this book late on Sunday — look for my review later this week.

Pop culture & TV:

I’m trying to decide if I feel like downloading something to watch on the plane — or to devote my six hours of flight time to reading. What a choice! For downloads, I’m considering watching the first episodes of either Bad Monkey or For All Mankind… unless something else catches my eye between now and then.

I managed to finish the newest season of Virgin River early last week. It was… okay. I enjoy the characters, even when the drama is over the top and the romance is beyond corny. The cliffhanger ending is more annoying than suspenseful. I have full faith that everyone will be okay!

Fresh Catch:

No new books this week… but I found out via email that I won not one, but two Goodreads giveaways! I’m looking forward to my copies of both books.

What will I be reading during the coming week?

Currently in my hands:

The Last Devil to Die (Thursday Murder Club, #4) by Richard Osman: I’m just starting today — right in time for my flight tomorrow! A nice long plane ride feels like the perfect opportunity to enjoy the next book in this entertaining series.

Now playing via audiobook:

I don’t really have time to start something before my trip, and I probably won’t do any audiobook listening before I get back next weekend. I haven’t really settled on what I’ll listen to next, but I’m leaning toward one of these:

Ongoing reads:

As of this moment, I’m down to just one long-term reading commitment:

The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien: My book group’s journey through the LOTR books continues, and the end is in sight. Three chapters left!

What will you be reading this week?

So many books, so little time…

29Mar2026

Audiobook Review: And Then There Was You by Sophie Cousens

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: And Then There Was You
Author: Sophie Cousens
Narrator: Kerry Gilbert
Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons
Publication date: November 18, 2025
Print length: 352 pages
Audio length: 9 hours 10 minutes
Genre: Contemporary romance
Source: Library
Rating:

She’s found the perfect man . . . There’s just one big twist.

Stuck in a Production Assistant job and living at home with her parents after a painful breakup, thirty-one-year-old Chloe Fairway isn’t where she wants to be in life. The last thing she needs is to face the people who once voted her “most likely to succeed” at her upcoming ten-year college reunion. And she definitely doesn’t want to see her former best friend, Sean Adler, who is now a hotshot film director living the life Chloe dreamed of. Desperate to make a splash—and to save face in front of the man who might be the one that got away—she turns to a mysterious dating service.

Enter Rob, her handsome, well-read, and charming match, the perfect plus-one to take to her reunion. The more she gets to know him, the more perfect he appears to be. Could it be that this dating service knows her better than she knows herself? And can she overlook the one big catch? As Chloe reconnects with old friends, she begins to question everything she thought she wanted. Maybe, just maybe, revisiting the past is exactly what she needs to move forward.

After really enjoying my last audiobook by Sophie Cousens (Is She Really Going Out With Him?), I grabbed her newest when I saw it was available through the library. And while I enjoy her upbeat storytelling and the terrific narration by Kerry Gilbert, this romance had certain elements that just didn’t work for me.

Ten years after graduating from Oxford, Chloe feels like a failure. Once considered most likely to succeed, sure of a brilliant career ahead of her as an actress and playwright, Chloe now lives with her parents and works as the personal assistant to a highly unpleasant man at a mediocre production company. All of her old schoolmates have gone on to do amazing things, especially Sean, once her best friend and writing partner, now practically a stranger, who’s a big-time Hollywood director. With the reunion looming, Chloe’s instinct is to hide and avoid it all. A chance encounter with a friend who seems to be radiantly happy leads Chloe to an exclusive matchmaking company that promises to find her the man of her dreams, someone who’ll be perfect for her. And when Chloe meets Rob, they just click. He’s gorgeous, smart, and sweet… so maybe attending the reunion with this impressive guy on her arm will be just the confidence boost that Chloe needs?

There’s a catch, of course… and here’s where I’m going to insert a big, fat…

SPOILER ALERT!

I’m guessing Goodreads reviews will already have spilled the beans, but in case you don’t want to know, here’s where to look away.

Seriously!

I’m going to get into the details of what I really did not like about this book.

SPOILERS COMING RIGHT NOW!

Okay, you’ve been warned.

The reason that Rob seems perfect for Chloe is that… he is. Rob is an AI robot created to Chloe’s exact specifications, based on an exhaustive questionnaire that she’s required to complete as part of her intake at the matchmaking company. She (and we) have no idea what she’s signing up for until after she’s signed an NDA and is introduced to Rob, who instantly impresses her with his good lucks, excellent manners, and sensitivity. He’s everything she thinks she wants in a man… because he’s been built and programmed that way.

Taking Rob to her reunion seems like a crazy idea. And it is. Convincing herself that she could have a future with Rob also seems ridiculous. And it is. Chloe spends a lot of mental energy trying to figure out whether a robot boyfriend might be her best bet for a happy life. Meanwhile, the entire reunion weekend is rife with moments when Rob’s perfection or stilted manners or weird affect threatens to reveal Chloe’s secret and undermine everything she’s trying to achieve.

From the moment of the reveal about what Rob really is (somewhere around the 15% mark), I was kind of over this book. I stuck with it because I liked certain elements of the story — but this was very nearly a DNF. The sad thing is that I don’t think this story needed the robot storyline at all. Rob could have simply been a date-for-hire, and the plot could have played out practically the same way. The AI/robot piece is a distracting novelty that just doesn’t work at all.

It’s a shame, because there are other elements that are very good. Who can’t relate to the feeling that everyone else is doing better at life than you are? Or the anxiety of reuniting with people who were once the center of your world? It’s not exactly surprising that at the reunion, Chloe discovers romantic feelings for an old friend and learns secrets that change what she thought she knew about their past. This part was very good! I liked Chloe’s process of understanding her past, admitting where she’d made mistakes, and getting past the roadblocks that had her feeling stuck professionally and emotionally.

END SPOILERS

All in all, And Then There Was You has some very engaging bits and pieces that unfortunately get swamped by a ridiculous overarching storyline. Sticking with this book all the way to the end tried my patience, despite the great audiobook narration and the generally interesting, quirky characters. The clever and entertaining bits just can’t save an unconvincing storyline. My eyes hurt from too much rolling.

Purchase links: Amazon – Audible – Bookshop.org – Libro.fm
Disclaimer: When you make a purchase through one of these affiliate links, I may earn a small commission, at no additional cost to you.

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29Mar2026

Goodreads Giveaways gives me good news!

Posted in Bookish Thoughts by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

It’s nice to wake up to something positive in my inbox once in a while… and this week, I received not one, but two emails informing me that I’d won Goodreads Giveaways! I’m happy about both books — I’ll be hovering around my mailbox waiting for them to arrive sometime in the next few weeks.

Meanwhile, here’s a peek at what I’m waiting for. First, I found out I’d won:

The Foursome by Christina Baker Kline
Release date: May 12, 2026

Synopsis:

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Christina Baker Kline comes a boldly original reimagining of an astonishing true two sisters in nineteenth-century North Carolina—Kline’s own distant relatives—who married world-famous conjoined twins from Siam.

When Chang and Eng Bunker arrive in Wilkes County in 1839, they’re not just a curiosity—they’re a sensation. Everyone is eager to learn whether the salacious rumors about them are true. Within months, the twins have opened a general store, bought land, and begun building a plantation. Now, word has it, they’re looking for wives—and in a place that thrives on gossip and legacy, their ambitions set the community on edge.

Sarah and Adelaide Yates, daughters of a once-prominent local family brought low by scandal, are drawn into their orbit. Bold, beautiful Addie sees in the twins’ fame a chance to reclaim her future. Sallie, quiet and observant, isn’t so sure. When the twins’ lives become entangled with theirs, they must navigate loyalty, longing, and identity in a world where everything—including race, class, and gender—is rigidly defined.

Spanning five decades and unfolding against the backdrop of a fractured nation hurtling toward war, The Foursome is both intimate and a story of love and constraint, identity and reinvention. With piercing insight and emotional precision, Kline brings to life a forgotten chapter of American history and the complex, boundary-defying marriages at its center.

I’m so looking forward to reading this book! I loved this author’s 2020 novel The Exiles. I’ve actually read a different novel about the same historical figures (Chang and Eng by Darin Strauss, published 2020). It’ll be interesting to compare the two!

My second giveaway book is:

Destination Funeral by Paige Harbison
Release date: July 21, 2026

Synopsis:

Four friends. One funeral. An endless Saturday.

When Babe—the complicated, magnetic matriarch of their teenage summers—dies, four estranged friends return to sleepy Mercy Island, a storm-swept stretch of coastal Georgia, summoned by the reading of her will.

Didion expects nothing more than an awkward visit with her sister and, maybe, a sundrenched funeral attended by beer-soaked locals. Instead, she arrives at the timeworn pink house to find the friends she never thought she’d see again—along with the tensions, attractions, and unfinished business that once bound them together and blew them apart.

What should be a brief weekend of small talk quickly unravels. Because the next morning, it’s Saturday again.
And again.
And again.

Trapped in a time loop with no end and no instructions, they’re forced to confront the betrayals, breakups, and buried truths that shattered them ten years ago. Something on the island isn’t ready to let them go—and if they can’t find a way to fix things, it may never let them leave.

I love this author’s 2025 novel, The Other Side of Now, and I’m so eager to read this new one!

Two very different books… and I’m excited for both!

What do you think? Would you read either of these?

And speaking of giveaways… do you tend to enter Goodreads Giveaways? Have you ever won a giveaway for a book you were dying to read?

28Mar2026

Novella review: Nobody’s Baby (Dorothy Gentleman, #2) by Olivia Waite

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Nobody’s Baby
Series: Dorothy Gentleman, #2
Author: Olivia Waite
Publisher: Tor Books
Publication date: March 10, 2026
Length: 144 pages
Genre: Science fiction
Source: Library
Rating:

Becky Chambers meets Miss Marple in the second entry of this cozy sci-fi mystery series, helmed by a formidable no-nonsense auntie of a detective

Welcome to the HMS Fairweather, Her Majesty’s most luxurious interstellar passenger liner! Room and board are included, new bodies are graciously provided upon request, and should you desire a rest between lifetimes, your mind shall be most carefully preserved in glass in the Library, shielded from every danger.

A wild baby appears! Dorothy Gentleman, ship detective, is put to the test once again when an infant is mysteriously left on her nephew’s doorstep. Fertility is supposed to be on pause during the Fairweather’s journey across the stars—but humans have a way of breaking any rule you set them. Who produced this child, and why did they then abandon him? And as her nephew and his partner get more and more attached, how can Dorothy prevent her colleague and rival detective, Leloup, a stickler for law and order, from classifying the baby as a stowaway or a piece of luggage?

Told through Dorothy’s delightfully shrewd POV, this novella series is an ode to the cozy mystery taken to the stars with a fresh new sci-fi take. Perfect for fans of the plot-twisty narratives of Dorothy Sayers and Ann Leckie, this well-paced story will leave readers captivated and hungry for the next installment.

Dorothy Gentleman is back! In the second installment in this delightful sci-fi/mystery novella series, our favorite spacefaring detective has another doozy of a case to solve.

The HMS Fairweather is a generation ship, currently 300 years into a millennium-long journey to a new planet. Passengers essentially live forever by preserving their minds in the ship library’s memory books, then downloading themselves back into new bodies when their current bodies wear out. Carrying 10,000 people, the ship is comfortable and well-provisioned, but can’t accommodate population growth, so reproductive abilities are put on hold for the duration of the journey.

Imagine everyone’s surprise when a baby — a real, human baby! — is left on Dorothy’s nephew’s doorstep. He and his husband are instantly smitten, but Dorothy knows there’s something serious afoot. How is a baby even possible? Who abandoned it and why? And who’s been taking care of it so far?

Her sleuthing leads her to the biological parents, who are just as confused as everyone else and have no memories of where this baby came from. Meanwhile, after a thwarted kidnapping attempt, Dorothy’s nephew wants custody — but there’s the legal conundrum of whether the baby is to be considered a legitimate passenger on the ship, entitled to memory preservation and bodily renewal, or if (because he’s not on the official passenger manifest) he’s a stowaway, with no rights beyond the length of a normal mortal life.

The mystery is a fun, not terribly serious tangle of people, technology, and motives which Dorothy unravels with style. Meanwhile, life on the Fairweather is a strange mix of advanced tech — memory books and journeying through the stars — and low tech even by our standards: There don’t appear to be computers, much less smart phones — everyone is always shuffling paperwork… as in, literally piles of paper!

I love the noir vibes that the writing gives off — basically, a noir detective story in space! The writing captures the tone perfectly:

I […] opened the door — only to find Violet St. Owen there on the threshold, looking like all my weaknesses made flesh.

I mean, doesn’t that just practically scream “and then this dame walked into my office…”?

I really enjoy the world of these novellas and the details of life aboard ship. As the 2nd in a series, Nobody’s Baby doesn’t offer quite the same level of delightful discovery as the first novella, Murder by Memory, but it’s still fun to revisit the characters and setting. I did feel a bit let down by the solution to the baby’s origin, which seemed not all that consequential in the end after quite a big build-up, but otherwise found the clues and legal wrangling to be highly amusing.

Overall, Nobody’s Baby is a nice, short treat. At novella length, it’s a quick, all-in-one-sitting sort of read, and offers great entertainment throughout. I enjoyed this newest adventure with Dorothy, and hope there are plenty more to come!

27Mar2026

First Lines Friday 3/27/2026

Posted in Fun and Whimsy by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

I’ve had fun seeing other people’s First Lines Friday posts, and finally decided to give it a try myself! Here’s an overview:

First Lines Friday is a weekly feature for book lovers created by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page.
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first.
Finally… reveal the book!

Note: The original host blog does not appear to be active any longer — but if anyone knows of a new host, please share the information!

This week, I’m featuring lines from an upcoming new release that I’m really eager to read:

It’s interesting to note that there are two groups of people who are rarely, if ever, suspected of murder. These groups are elderly women and little girls.

So what’s the book?

Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth
St. Martin’s Press
Release date: April 21, 2026
352 pages

Synopsis:

From New York Times bestselling author Sally Hepworth comes a twisty tale of justice, redemption, and one irrepressible woman who’s not done breaking the rules just yet.

Meet Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick: eighty-one years old, gloriously grumpy, fiercely independent, and never without a hot cup of tea—or a cutting remark. She minds her own business in her quiet Melbourne suburb, until a neighbor turns up dead and the whispers start flying.

Because Elsie hasn’t always been Elsie. Once upon a headline, she was Mad Mabel Waller—Australia’s youngest convicted murderer. But was she really mad, or just misunderstood? Either way, she’s kept her secret buried for decades.

Enter seven-year-old Persephone, a relentless little chatterbox who has just moved in across the road (armed with stickers, questions, and no sense of personal boundaries); Joan, who appears to have it in for Elsie; and a healthy dose of public interest—the cops are sniffing around, and the media is circling like seagulls at a picnic.

So Mabel does what she’s always done best—she takes matters into her own hands.

Is she a cantankerous old lady with a shady past? A cold-blooded killer with arthritis? Or just someone who’s finally ready to tell her side of the story?

Sharp, surprising, and wickedly funny, this is the unforgettable story of a woman who’s spent a lifetime being underestimated—and is about to prove everyone wrong. Again.

Sound like something you’d enjoy?

Happy Friday! Wishing everyone a great weekend!

25Mar2026

Audiobook Review: Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon
Author: Matthew Norman
Narrators: Alex Finke, Jay Myers
Publisher: Random House
Publication date: October 14, 2025
Print length: 337 pages
Audio length: 8 hours 43 minutes
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Library
Rating:

A sentimental advertising creative and a blunt, no-nonsense bar owner find a second chance at love while binge-watching iconic holiday movies in this poignant and heartwarming romance, from the author of Charm City Rocks and All Together Now.

“Norman weaves nostalgic references to modern holiday classics . . . throughout this comforting romance.”—The Washington Post (Noteworthy Books of the Month)

The new year had barely begun when Grace White and Henry Adler both lost their spouses. Now, nearly a year later, the first holiday season since their “Great and Terrible Sadnesses” approaches. Although their mothers scheme to matchmake the two surviving spouses, it’s clear that neither is ready to date again. Yet no one understands what they are going through better than each other, and a delicate friendship is born.

When Henry sees an ad for a Christmas movie marathon—once an annual tradition for him and his wife—Grace offers to watch some films with him, despite her aversion to a few of his picks. Her two young kids, Ian and Bella, also join in whenever possible—bedtimes permitting, of course.

With each movie, Grace and Henry’s shared grief eases as they start to see a life beyond the sadness. But as they draw closer, other romantic possibilities leave them uncertain about their future together. Is their bond merely the result of loneliness and shared circumstances, or have they found something that’s worth taking a shot at . . . again?

Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon was an unusual pick for me — I don’t tend to read a lot of holiday-themed fiction, especially when it’s not even the holiday season! And yet… the charming title caught my eye, and then the story drew me in.

Grace and Henry both suffered terrible losses at the beginning of the year: Grace’s husband Tim died after a fast-moving cancer diagnosis, and Henry’s wife Bryn died in a shocking plane crash. Now, as the holidays approach, neither is doing particularly well. Grace is busy with her two children Ian and Bella (and their hilariously-named dog Harry Styles), but she spends most of her down time in her Costco sweats talking with the version of her dead husband who lives in her head. Henry can’t bring himself to return to the home he shared with his wife, so he’s rented a mostly empty apartment but mainly hangs out in his parents’ basement playing Mario Kart.

When Henry’s mom asks him to pop over to Grace’s mom’s house to “fix the internet” (which isn’t working due to a sneakily unplugged modem), Henry and Grace are helpless in the face of motherly matchmaking. Neither are interested in being fixed up or even considering dating again, but they do recognize that they might actually fit together as friends. As they talk about holiday movies, they find common ground, and soon, Henry is popping by for family movie nights, and then hanging out with Grace and the kids to help with Ian’s art projects, free captive mice (don’t ask), and discovering a mutual friendship that helps them all start finding a little joy in their lives.

I suppose most people would shelve this as a romance — and yes, of course there’s an underlying romance brewing slowly between Henry and Grace. But that, to me, isn’t the main point. The story overall is much more about loss and grieving, about the process of remembering and letting go, about finding ways to move on when everything you expected for your life is taken away.

The narrative is organized by the movies Henry and Grace watch, together and separately, as the holiday season advances. There are plenty of fun little references to a wide range of holiday (and holiday-adjacent) movies, from Die Hard and Edward Scissorhands to Love Actually, The Holiday, The Family Stone, and more. Point-of-view chapters shift between Henry and Grace; the audiobook has a narrator for each, and both are terrific at voicing the lead and supporting characters and adding humor (and sadness) as the story progresses.

I found both characters’ stories to be quite moving, each loss awful in its own way. Grace is forced to carry on for the sake of her children and does a wonderful job, but there’s a sadness in their home that they can’t quite overcome. Henry’s loneliness is different yet also deep and real. It’s easy to see why these two need one another, first as “grief buddies”, then as friends, to get through the worst of times — or even just normal days when a sudden memory or association can knock them out of orbit. Their ability to understand one another’s pain forms the backbone of what becomes a beautiful support system.

I also appreciated how well both Grace and Henry are supported by their families and friends. While their well-meaning mothers may be pushing a bit too hard for them to get back into the dating world, it’s clear that the people who love them want to help — somehow — and are often stuck on how to do it.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that Baltimore, the book’s setting, feels like a living, breathing character in this charming story. Grace and Henry have rich, deep connections to the city and the community, and it comes to sparkling life on every page.

All in all, I truly enjoyed Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon. The holiday spirit, the sense of fun, and the straightforward treatment of loss and grieving all contribute to making this sweet book feel like something special. The audiobook delivery is terrific — but in whatever format, I think this is a book well worth picking up and experiencing.

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24Mar2026

Top Ten Tuesday: Top ten books on my TBR list for spring 2026

Posted in Top Ten Tuesday by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is about our spring 2026 reading plans.

I did a quick scan of my winter TBR post… and was surprised to see that I didn’t do quite as badly as I’d thought! Of my 10 winter TBR books, I actually read five and DNFd one. I do still want to read these remaining four books…

… but I’m not sure when. Let’s just say that I’m going to try to get to these sometime this year — because at the moment, between ARCs and book group books, I feel like I’m “booked” solid.

Earlier in the year, I shared a post on my most anticipated new releases for the first half of 2026 — all of which remain books I’m eager to read (or have read already!). I’m including a few below, as well as a bunch of others… because I’ll never run out of books that I want to read.

Here are the top 10 books I’m planning to read this spring — mostly new releases, but also two books from series that are high priorities for me:

The Name Game by Beth O’Leary
Our Perfect Storm by Carley Fortune
Just One Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor (I can’t wait to finally start this series!)
The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman
We Burned So Bright by TJ Klune
The Book Witch by Meg Shaffer
Dolly All the Time by Annabel Monghan
Cherry Baby by Rainbow Rowell
Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth
Love by the Book by Jessica George

What books will you be reading this spring? Do we have any in common?

Share your links, and I’ll come check out your top 10!

23Mar2026

The Monday Check-In ~ 3/23/2026

Posted in The Monday Check-In by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Life.

It was my husband’s birthday over the weekend, and we had two birthday dinners to celebrate! First, I took him out to one of our favorite little French restaurants for a fancy-ish romantic dinner, and then two nights later, we did a group outing with our local adult kids and a few friends at a yummy Burmese restaurant, where we basically ate everything in sight. We finished off with an amazing cake that I somehow managed to sneak in without my husband noticing. All in all, lots of fun (and great food) celebrating a fantastic human!

In pop culture / entertainment news, it was a sad week for Buffy fans. First, Hulu pulled the plug on the eagerly anticipated Buffy reboot. Second, and more heartbreaking, actor Nicholas Brendon, who played Xander throughout the seven seasons of Buffy, passed away over the weekend at age 54. I never knew this before, but a quick Google search reveals that Nicholas Brendon appeared in 143 of the 144 Buffy episodes (only absent from one episode in season 7, ” Conversations with Dead People”).

On a happier note, Nathan Fillion announced the return of Firefly as an animated series featuring the original cast, which is exciting… although it’s not a done deal yet. Fingers crossed that it really happens!

What did I read during the last week?

One & Only by Maureen Goo: An entertaining audiobook with some terrific family elements, even if I didn’t love the love triangle. My review is here.

Mania by Lionel Shriver: One of the oddest books I’ve ever read! Great material for a book group discussion, even though I can’t say I actually loved this book. My review is here.

Once and Again by Rebecca Serle: This author’s books can be hit-or-miss for me; this one falls in the hit category! My review is here.

Grace & Henry’s Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman: This sweet audiobook was a lovely listen. Review to follow.

Pop culture & TV:

Project Hail Mary! I went to an early screening at the beginning of the week, and really enjoyed it. It was interesting seeing it with my son, who hasn’t read the book and only knew what to expect from the movie trailers. He really liked it too, and we both thought it was very well done.

Outlander‘s final season continues to be solid and strong. And I love this season’s version of theme song as sung by Annie Lennox!

I’m slowly making my way through the newest season of Virgin River — I just haven’t had time for an outright binge. I have two episodes left in what’s been an okay season so far.

Fresh Catch:

No new books this week… but I did get a nice little surprise in the mail. A while back, I entered a giveaway through Lisa See’s website, and while I didn’t win the grand prize, apparently I was one of 100 runner-up winners! Here’s what I got:

Can’t wait for her new book, Daughters of the Sun and Moon, to be released in June!

What will I be reading during the coming week?

Currently in my hands:

Nobody’s Baby (Dorothy Gentleman, #2) by Olivia Waite: My library hold for this novella came in really quickly! Just started last night. I liked the first novella in this series a lot, and this follow-up is off to a good start.

Now playing via audiobook:

And Then There Was You by Sophie Cousens: I just finished a different audiobook by this author a few weeks ago, and when I saw this one available at the library, I couldn’t resist. Just getting started.

Ongoing reads:

As of this moment, I’m down to just one long-term reading commitment:

The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien: My book group’s journey through the LOTR books continues, and the end is in sight. Four chapters left!

What will you be reading this week?

So many books, so little time…

22Mar2026

Book Review: Once and Again by Rebecca Serle

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Once and Again
Author: Rebecca Serle
Publisher: Atria Books
Publication date: March 10, 2026
Length: 256 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

New York Times bestselling author Rebecca Serle, the author behind “heartbreaking, redemptive, and authentic” (Jamie Ford, New York Times bestselling author) modern classic In Five Years, returns with an unforgettable tale of a family of women with an astonishing gift: the ability to redo one moment in their lives.

The women of the Novak family were each born with a gift: they can, just once, turn back time.

Lauren has known since she was fifteen that her mother Marcella saved Lauren’s father from a deadly car accident. Dave is alive and happy, and out on the Malibu waves. But ever since, Marcella, her power spent, has lived in fear of what she won’t be able to reverse. Her own mother, Sylvia, is her polar opposite: a free-spirited iconoclast with a glamorous past she only hints at. Lauren has spent her life between these two role models—and waiting for her own catastrophe to strike.

Then one summer, Lauren’s husband takes a job in New York and she moves back to Broad Beach Road, back into her childhood home on the shores of Malibu. Lauren looks forward to surfing with her dad again and perhaps repairing an unspoken fracture in her relationship with her mother. What she doesn’t expect is for the boy next to door to return home as well: Stone, Lauren’s first love, who broke her heart nearly a decade before.

As Lauren falls into familiar patterns, with her family and, more dangerously, Stone, she finds herself thinking about all the choices, large and small, that have brought her to this moment. And wondering, finally, if one of them should be undone.

In Once and Again, main character Lauren’s family has a secret — a superpower, of sorts. Each woman in the family is gifted with the ability to undo one event that’s already happened, but it’s a gift that’s a one-time deal. Use it, and it’s gone forever. While we might think of this as an amazing opportunity, in these women’s lives, it’s also a burden. How do you know when is the right time to use it? What if you use it, and then end up needing it even more later on?

Lauren is 37 years old, married for three years at this point to her wonderful husband Leo — but things have become fraught between them as they struggle with infertility. After multiple attempts at IVF and IUI, Leo is ready to stop trying, but Lauren is not, and the stress of the financial, physical, and psychological burdens is straining their marriage almost to the breaking point.

When Leo heads to New York for a short-term work opportunity, Lauren decides to rent out their West Hollywood home and spend the summer at the shambling Malibu bungalow where her parents and grandmother live. Back home in Malibu, Lauren reintroduces herself to the surfing and slower beach rhythms that she grew up with, while also spending time with her cool surfer dad, uptight mother, and loving, super-hip grandmother. But being there also brings up memories for Lauren of the intensity of her teen years, especially her mother’s obsessive worry over her father’s health.

Meanwhile, Lauren encounters Stone while out surfing — the man she loved and was involved with for a solid ten years, only ending the relationship when he moved away from Malibu and left her behind. Seeing Stone again brings up old feelings, even as Lauren juggles her love for Leo and how much she misses him with the pain of their current marital problems.

Lauren has an opportunity to fix something using her gift — but is this the right moment? If she uses it, will she regret it later? And what will her choice mean for the rest of the family?

Once and Again presents a unique take on the subjects of regret and second chances. There’s no explanation offered for the family’s gift, and there doesn’t need to be. It’s a magical element that just is — and if you have a hard time with this sort of magical plotline, this may not be the book for you. To be clear, there’s nothing else that’s fantasy or magic-based in the story. This is a family that’s ordinary in every way… but one.

I appreciated the insights we get from the intermittent chapters that provide Lauren’s mother’s and grandmother’s backstories, as well as the story of the first woman to have the gift. The family’s Jewish heritage features in both the gift and their ongoing lives as a lovely background element. It’s fascinating to learn more about how each woman chose to use the gift and what the ramifications were — and there’s a major twist later in the book that made me look at it in an entirely new way.

The ability to turn back time isn’t trivial and has consequences. The characters experience joy with their second chances, but also carry a unique pain: The woman who uses the gift still remembers what they’ve changed, even if no one else does, which means they may be grieving for something that no one else understands. Another fascinating element is the choice to undo everything that’s come since the event that they’re changing. How far back can or should they go? And if they change something terrible that happened, can they live with losing all the good things that happened too?

I’ve had hit or miss experiences with Rebecca Serle’s books in the past — I’ve loved two of her books, and felt less connected with two others. Once and Again belongs firmly in the “hit” category. I found it emotional, thought-provoking, and engaging, with characters to care about and a plot strongly rooted in reality even with a magical gift in the mix. Highly recommended.

For more by this author:
The Dinner List
In Five Years
One Italian Summer
Expiration Dates

Purchase links: Amazon – Audible audiobook – Bookshop.org – Libro.fm
Disclaimer: When you make a purchase through one of these affiliate links, I may earn a small commission, at no additional cost to you.

20Mar2026

First Lines Friday: Trying something new here!

Posted in Fun and Whimsy by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

I’ve had fun seeing other people’s First Lines Friday posts, and finally decided to give it a try myself! Here’s an overview:

First Lines Friday is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page.
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first.
Finally… reveal the book!

Note: I’m not sure if the original host blog is still active — I haven’t been able to find it! If anyone knows of a current host, please share the info!

Onward with my FIRST first lines post! This week, I’m featuring lines from a book that I just borrowed from the library. Hint: It’s a novella, it’s a sequel, and it’s sci-fi. Here goes!

The note from Ruthie arrived at breakfast with no preamble, flashing on the glowing face of my pocket watch. At what age do human children grow teeth?

So what’s the book?

Nobody’s Baby (Dorothy Gentleman, #2) by Olivia Waite
Tor Books
Published March 10, 2026
144 pages

Synopsis:

Becky Chambers meets Miss Marple in the second entry of this cozy sci-fi mystery series, helmed by a formidable no-nonsense auntie of a detective

Welcome to the HMS Fairweather, Her Majesty’s most luxurious interstellar passenger liner! Room and board are included, new bodies are graciously provided upon request, and should you desire a rest between lifetimes, your mind shall be most carefully preserved in glass in the Library, shielded from every danger.

A wild baby appears! Dorothy Gentleman, ship detective, is put to the test once again when an infant is mysteriously left on her nephew’s doorstep. Fertility is supposed to be on pause during the Fairweather’s journey across the stars—but humans have a way of breaking any rule you set them. Who produced this child, and why did they then abandon him? And as her nephew and his partner get more and more attached, how can Dorothy prevent her colleague and rival detective, Leloup, a stickler for law and order, from classifying the baby as a stowaway or a piece of luggage?

Told through Dorothy’s delightfully shrewd POV, this novella series is an ode to the cozy mystery taken to the stars with a fresh new sci-fi take. Perfect for fans of the plot-twisty narratives of Dorothy Sayers and Ann Leckie, this well-paced story will leave readers captivated and hungry for the next installment.

Sound like something you’d enjoy?

Happy Friday! Wishing everyone a great weekend!