Summertime and the Reading is Easy by Jenny Gardiner

Hey all!

I'm just back from sitting in a dark hospital room for a couple of days with our son, who got a nasty infection in his elbow joint a week after cutting his arm. Thank goodness he's fine, but had to spend a couple of days on IV antibiotics to try to knock out the infection so it didn't go septic, which is why we dropped everything to go up to DC to be with our boy! Hospitals are not the place you want to be, that's for sure.

Happy my baby is on the mend and we're back home. I'm now quite behind prepping for the release of my upcoming novel, Blue-Blooded Romeo, the latest in the Royal Romeo contemporary rom-com series, and trying to write Big O Romeo, which is due with my editor in two weeks.

So since I'm in the weeds and it's summertime and everyone loves book suggestions for those lazy, hot summer days, I'm going to just list a bunch of books I've enjoyed in the past several months. I always love to get book recs from friends, so hope this helps if you're in the market for some new reads! (and while you're at it feel free to check out the 25+ books I've read here!)

I'm currently reading American Fire: Love, Arson and Life in a Vanishing Land by Monica Hesse. I'd read a piece in the Washington Post about this crazy arsonist couple on the Eastern Shore of Virginia a few years back--one of those "you can't make it up" stories. The reporter has since written this book and it's a really compelling account of what happened, complete with all of the nutty local color you'll get with books like this. If you listened to the Serial podcast and liked it, you'll enjoy this.

My friend Karen Dionne has a fabulous suspense thriller out to rave reviews this summer: The Marsh King's Daughter. Highly recommend it. It'll keep you on the edge of your seat.

I LOVED Standard Deviation by Katherine Heiny. I have such metaphor envy after reading this novel. The author is extraordinarily insightful into the tiny nuances of the mundanities of life, and conveys them so wonderfully.

The Season by Jonah Lisa Dyer was great fun. The authors are a husband/wife screenwriting team, and the book reads like a well-crafted TV show or movie. About a tomboy young woman who plays college soccer and her mother forces her and her twin sister to be girly-girl debutantes. Good beach read.

The Assistants by Camille Perri was a fun beach read.

I LOVED The Hating Game by Sally Thorne. Great beach read.

Oh, The Nix is amazing. Fabulously talented writer, crazy ride of a novel--it goes down so many rabbit holes, you cannot imagine how they all connect, but they do!

A few books I've started but have to get back to (but was enjoying!): Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman. Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney. The Heirs by Susan Rieger. This is Your Life, Harriet Chance by Jonathan Evison. The People We Hate at the Wedding by Grant Ginder.

I just heard about Those Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero and can't wait to read it. It's a dark take on the Scooby Doo-type kid detectives who survive a harrowing episode that involves ghosts and dead bodies but when they grow up they're psychologically scarred from the experience. When one of them commits suicide, the rest team together to face the demons of their past. Brilliant premise for a novel, right?

I hope you'll have a chance to check out my Royal Romeos series, which is a spin-off of my wildly popular It's Reigning Men series--please do check them out!

Happy reading!

    

  

 

How Horribly Lovely by Jenny Gardiner

Hey all!

Happy three days after Valentine’s Day ;-). This winter I’ve tried to make time for a little bit of TV series binge-watching—the latest being The Crown. I thought it started out slow but I quickly became quite engrossed in it—a bit of insight into what is really a strangely rarified world that the rest of us peons could never properly relate to. I did find it quite fascinating to learn about I guess you’d call it the moral underpinnings of Queen Elizabeth—what has motivated her over the years, perhaps why she’s often seemed cold and detached, even why she’s not yet yielded the throne to her son (who sure comes across as neglected in that series!). But it turns out, it’s complicated! Evidently it’s not easy being the Queen…

One of the fun things about writing about royals is the research involved. For Red Carpet Romeo, which comes out today and is centered around a royal wedding in Monaforte with the It’s Reigning Men gang, I started digging around to learn what happens in a palace in preparation for things like State Dinners and other premier royal events, and wow, it’s nuts! The manpower and the elbow grease are staggering. It takes days to prepare, and there is no detail unattended to, right down to measuring the distance between the dinner plate and the edge of the table.  You can learn more here http://bit.ly/2l0Lus0

I suspect I’d make a horrible guest at a royal dinner: guaranteed I’d say the wrong thing, use the wrong utensil, request my dressing on the side, make an inappropriate joke that would render those within earshot dead silent. I feel fairly certain I’d not be invited back.

Once I saw a documentary about Queen Elizabeth in which two girls presented her with a sweater they’d knit for her. The Queen, in her own inimitable way, thanked them. “How horribly lovely,” she said with what looked like a grimace but was probably actually a smile. Not many people can properly use the word “horribly” in a compliment. I thought it was endearing.

We’ve also caught up on movies in advance of the Oscars—so many good ones out right now but a lot of pretty depressing ones. Loved Manchester by the Sea but ugh, it was, to borrow the Queen’s phrasing, horribly sad. La La Land—they had me till the ending, which I hated. Jackie—again, so grim but so well-acted. Lion—amazing. But so sad. Hmmm…there’s a theme here. Hidden Figures was uplifting! Oh but I adored 20^th Century Women—it was quirky yet so much fun and terrifically acted. The other night because of a movie ticket snafu, we ended up watching The Nice Guys at home—loved that film! Lots of laughs and slapstick, which I love. Oh and go watch A Royal Night Out if you’re looking for a fun escapist movie.

I also wait anxiously each week for a new episode of This is Us (the best!) and I can’t resist that evil Corinne on the Bachelor, which has me tuning in for all their mindless nonsense ;-). Oh and now I can’t help but watch Riverdale—it’s totally not my thing, but the girl who plays Veronica used to live across the street from us and was my daughter’s best friend when they were little girls, so it’s fun to watch her all grown up and all girl-powery while being slightly villainous.

On a sad note, we lost our beloved Labrador Sassy a couple of weeks ago after nearly 14-1/2 wonderful years. It’s been really hard; I miss her like mad. I set her picture as my phone wallpaper, but it made me cry every time I looked at her so had to switch it out. I’ve now taken to stalking the most gorgeous Labrador retriever on Instagram here—his name is Camden and he belongs to a friend of a friend of a friend. He’s so a handsome boy! Oh, and if you love him, check out these insanely adorable white Lab puppies here—makes my heart jump for joy to watch them! I really need a puppy…

Here’s to royal weddings and puppies and good guys and villains, and while we’re at it, springtime being just around the corner.

 Check out my Royal Romeos series, which is a spin-off of my wildly successful It's Reigning Men series--I hope you'll be able to check them out!