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Lessons in Laughing Out Loud by Rowan Coleman
Publisher: Arrow
Release Date: 21st July 2011
Rating: 5/5
Source: Received from the publisher for review.
Amazon Summary:

Willow and Holly are identical twins. They are everything to each other. Holly calls Willow her rock, her soul mate, her other half. And Willow feels the same about Holly. They are alike in every respect except one – Willow is afraid on the inside. And all because of a secret – one that binds the sisters closely together and yet has meant their adult lives have taken two very different paths.

Willow often feels there are large parts of her missing, qualities she only knows she’s lacking because she sees them in her sister. For a very long time Willow has felt separated from Holly by one terrible moment in time – a moment that meant Willow’s life was never the same again. And when the past catches up with her, Willow realises it’s finally time for her to face her fears, and – with Holly’s help – learn to laugh out loud once more…

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An Autumn Crush by Milly Johnson
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Release Date: 29th September 2011
Rating: 2/5
Source: Received from the publisher for review.
Amazon Summary:

After a bruising divorce, headstrong Juliet Miller invests in a flat and advertises for a flatmate, little believing that in her mid-thirties she’ll find anyone suitable. But along comes self-employed copywriter Floz, raw from her own relationship split, and the two woman hit it off. When Juliet’s twin brother Guy meets Floz, he is overcome with a massive crush. But being a shy, gentle giant, he communicates so clumsily with her as to give her the opposite impression. Guy’s best friend Steve has always had a secret, unrequited crush on Juliet. After a night of too much wine, Steve and Juliet end up in bed, after moaning about the lack of sex in their lives. Convinced that Juliet doesn’t feel the same way, Steve agrees to a ‘just-sex’ relationship, until they can both hook their dream partners. Just when Guy has finally plucked up the courage to tell Floz how he feels, he finds she has rekindled an old romance. Floz has never had much love in her life and is obviously thirsty for affection. She loves the whole Miller family, from Juliet and Guy’s warm, loving parents, to their ancient one-eyed black cat. But can Guy turn Floz’s affection for his family into something more - into love for him? Then Juliet makes a series of discoveries which will turn the lives of all four friends upside-down and turns that Autumn into a season where love can be harvested.

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A Scandalous Secret by Jaishree Misra
Release Date: 26th May 2011
Publisher: Avon (a division of HarperCollins)
Rating: 2/5
Source: Received from the publishers.
Amazon Summary:

The truth will tear them apart…

They had the perfect marriage…

Glamour, money, and a beautiful home– the golden couple of Delhi, Neha and Sharat appear to have it all. But a dark secret from Neha’s past is about to resurface, a heartbreaking moment in her past that she has tried to block out.

While studying at Oxford, a naive eighteen year-old Neha fell pregnant and made the difficult decision to give the baby up for adoption, vowing never to contact her child again. But now, years later, her little girl – Sonya – is now a fully grown woman and determined to find her birth mother.

With the foundation of Neha’s and Sharat’s world rocked to its very core, will Sonya’s arrival in Delhi push it over the edge? And as Sonya begins to confront Neha, can mother and daughter allow themselves to forgive and forget?

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Don’t Let Me Go by Catherine Ryan Hyde
Publisher: Transworld
Release Date: 29th September 2011
Rating: 5/5
Source: Received from the publisher for review.
Amazon Summary:

Sometimes a child knows better…
GRACE

Ten-year-old Grace knows that her mum loves her, but her mum loves drugs too. And there’s only so long Grace can fend off the ‘woman from the county’ who is threatening to put her into care. Her only hope is…

BILLY

Grown-man Billy Shine hasn’t been out of his apartment for years. People scare him, and the outside world scares him even more. Day in, day out, he lives a perfectly orchestrated silent life within his four walls. Until now. . .

THE PLAN

Grace bursts into Billy’s life with a loud voice and a brave plan to get her mum clean. And it won’t be easy, because they will have to confiscate the one thing her mum holds most dear . . . they will have to kidnap Grace.

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The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Release Date: 23rd August 2011
Rating: 5/5
Source: Received from the publisher, thank you!
Publishers Summary:

The Victorian language of flowers was used to convey romantic expressions: honeysuckle for devotion, aster for patience, and red roses for love. But for Victoria Jones, it’s been more useful in communicating grief, mistrust, and solitude. After a childhood spent in the foster-care system, she is unable to get close to anybody, and her only connection to the world is through flowers and their meanings.

Now eighteen and emancipated from the system, Victoria has nowhere to go and sleeps in a public park, where she plants a small garden of her own. Soon a local florist discovers her talents, and Victoria realizes that she has a gift for helping others through the flowers she chooses for them. But a mysterious vendor at the flower market inspires her to question what’s been missing in her life. And when she’s forced to confront a painful secret from her past, she must decide whether it’s worth risking everything for a second chance at happiness.

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Only His by Susan Mallery (Book #6 in Fool’s Gold series)
Release Date: 27th September 2011
Publisher: HQN Books
Rating: 4/5
Source: Received from Netgalley for review.
Amazon Summary:

Wedding bells are ringing in Fool’s Gold, but not for Nevada Hendrix. Her triplet sisters are engaged, and even her mother has a more active love life than she does. Determined to make a fresh start, she applies for her dream job, only to discover that her new boss is her first love. Maybe she could overlook the fact that they’ve seen each other naked, but she’ll never forget the way he broke her heart. Tucker Janack agrees to Nevada’s “business only” ground rules. After all, love is a trap that the construction millionaire has avoided his whole life. But when great business partners turn out to be so much more, every rule gets broken. Will either of them be willing to try again…or will their past get in the way?

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Aftertaste: A Novel in Five Courses by Meredith Mileti
Publisher: Kensington
Release Date: 1st September 2011
Rating: 5/5
Source: Received from the author, thank you!
Publishers Summary:

Mira Rinaldi lives life at a rolling boil. Co-owner of Grappa, a chic New York City trattoria, she has an enviable apartment, a brand-new baby, and a frenzied schedule befitting her success.

Everything changes the night she catches her husband, Jake, “wielding his whisk” with Grappa’s new Mâitress d’. Mira’s fiery response earns her a court-ordered stint in anger management and the beginning of legal and personal predicaments as she battles to save her restaurant and pick up the pieces of her life.

Mira falls back on family and friends in Pittsburgh as she struggles to find a recipe for happiness. But the heat is really on when some surprising developments in New York present her with a high stakes opportunity to win back what she thought she had lost forever. For Mira, cooking isn’t just about delicious flavors and textures, but about the pleasure found in filling others’ needs. And the time has come to decide where her own fulfillment lies—even if the answers are unexpected.

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The Ugly Sister by Jane Fallon
Publisher: Penguin UK
Release Date: 29th September 2011
Rating: 3/5
Source: Received from the publisher for review.
Amazon Summary:

When it comes to genes life’s a lottery . . .

As Abi would the first to know. She has spent her life in the shadow of her stunningly beautiful, glamorous older sister Cleo.

Headhunted as model when she was sixteen, Cleo has been all but lost to Abi for the last twenty years, with only a fleeting visit or brief email to connect them. So when Abi is invited to spend the summer in Cleo’s large London home with her sister’s perfect family, she can’t bring herself to say no. Despite serious misgivings. Maybe Cleo is finally as keen as Abi to regain the closeness they shared in their youth?

But Abi is in for a shock. Soon she is left caring for her two young, bored and very spoilt nieces and handsome, unhappy brother-in-law - while Cleo plainly has other things on her mind. As Abi moves into her sister’s life, a cuckoo in the nest, she wrestles with uncomfortable feelings.

Could having beauty, wealth and fame lead to more unhappiness than not having them? Who in the family really is the ugly sister?

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