Jencey's Writer's Corner

  What was your experience with chemistry like in high school?  Have you ever considered how life skills like cooking utilize chemistry?  These are qualities that I had never considered.  In the book Lessons in Chemistry, Bonnie Garmus explores this through the character of Elizabeth Zott.  This is her story:  About the Book:  "Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing as an average woman. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute takes a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans; the lonely, brilliant, Nobel–prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with—of all things—her mind. True chemistry results. But like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show Supper at...

  Katherine Center released The Love Haters last May.  This is the book that you want to go on vacation with.  This story takes us to the Florida Keys.  What could be a better vacation spot even now?  Or a setting for a story?   About the Book:  “Katie Vaughn has been burned by love in the past—now she may be lighting her career on fire. She has two choices: wait to get laid off from her job as a video producer or, at her coworker Cole’s request, take a career-making gig profiling Tom “Hutch” Hutcheson, a Coast Guard rescue swimmer in Key West. The catch? Katie’s not exactly qualified. She can’t swim—but pretends that she can. Plus, Cole and Hutch are brothers. And they don’t get along. Next stop: paradise! But paradise is messier than it seems. As Katie gets entangled with Hutch (the most scientifically good-looking man she has ever seen . . . but maybe a bit of a love hater), along with his colorful aunt Rue and his rescue Great Dane, she gets t...

  Kimberly Belle released her latest tale in June of this year.  The Expat Affair is set in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.  The two main characters are Americans.  They both seem to be involved in a murder and a diamond heist.  Are you ready for an adventure? About the Book:  “Rayna Dumont came to Amsterdam for a fresh start. She’s never been the type for a one-night stand, but this move is all about adventure, and Xander is handsome and successful and more than willing to go along for the ride. Until the morning after, when Rayna finds him dead, millions of dollars’ worth of diamonds missing from his safe. Willow Prins is captivated by the news. Her husband is Xander’s former boss and heir to a diamond house, and the scandal strains their already-rocky marriage. As the house comes under scrutiny, Willow wonders how much of the blame she can place on Rayna. Soon, the two women are dragged into the dark underbelly of the diamond market, where they’ll have to un...

  I recently had the pleasure of meeting with author Kristy Cambron virtually.  She shared in this meeting we both attended about her desire to write about strong women.  Her readers will not be disappointed with this story.  Who wouldn’t want to read about bookstores?  This story takes place during the London Blitz during World War II. About the Book:   “Inspired by real accounts of the Forgotten Blitz bombings, The British Booksellers highlights the courage of those whose lives were forever changed by war—and the stories that bind us in the fight for what matters most. A tenant farmer’s son had no business daring to dream of a future with an earl’s daughter, but that couldn’t keep Amos Darby from his secret friendship with Charlotte Terrington…until the reality of the Great War sobered youthful dreams. Now decades later, he bears the brutal scars of battles fought in the trenches and their futures that were stolen away. His return home doesn’t come with...

  Kate Quinn is one of my favorite authors!  I recently had the opportunity to read The Briar Club.  This book is her pandemic book, meaning that there wasn’t much traveling.  This story takes us back to the early 1950s and the McCarthy era.  The story begins when Grace takes a room at the Briarwood house.  About the Book: “Washington, DC, 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic room, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss, whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; policeman’s daughter Nora, who finds herself entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Beatrice, whose career has come to an end along with the women’s baseball league of WWII; and ...

  I have become a fan of Nora Roberts in recent years, starting with her Bridal quartet books.  Her books are great to listen to as audiobooks as well.  Today, I am reviewing her book One Inheritance of the Lost Rings Series.  I loved the cover for this book!   About the Book:  “1806: Astrid Poole sits in her bridal clothes, overwhelmed with happiness. But before her marriage can be consummated, she is murdered, and the circle of gold torn from her finger. Her last words are a promise to Collin never to leave him… Graphic designer Sonya MacTavish is stunned to learn that her late father had a twin he never knew about―and that her newly discovered uncle, Collin Poole, has left her almost everything he owned, including a majestic Victorian house on the Maine coast, which the will stipulates she must live in for at least three years. Her engagement recently broken, she sets off to find out why the boys were separated at birth―and why it was all kept secre...