Save Us by Mona KastenMaxton Hall #3

Title: Save Us

Series: Maxton Hall #3

Author: Mona Kasten

Publisher: Berkley

The third and final book in the international bestselling Maxton Hall series—now a Prime Video streaming series—in English for the first time.

Can they save themselves? Or will they destroy each other?

Ruby is in shock: Her worst nightmare has come true, and now Oxford and all her dreams that finally seemed within reach are at risk. Worst of all, everything points to James as the one responsible, even after everything they’ve been through together. Ruby thought that she had met the real James—the one who has his own dreams, the one who makes her laugh and makes her heart beat faster with a single glance.

However, after an explosive fight between the two, they discover a terrible truth. Together, Ruby fights to graduate, as James tries to clear her name at school. But that means once again James must challenge his father and his expectations for him. And despite everything, James still threatens to break under the obligations to his family. Ruby and James must ask themselves if the worlds they live in are perhaps too different after all, or if they can finally find a way back to each other.

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I'm happy with the ending!

At the beginning of Save Us, Ruby's future is uncertain, and James might be the one to blame.

Ruby and James are still fighting the outside forces that want to tear them apart. They’re fighting for their love. At the same time, James feels a heavy responsibility toward his family legacy. Although he would rather forge his own path, he can’t bear the thought of letting his mother down. Ruby, meanwhile, is still fighting to keep her dream of attending Oxford without losing James.

How can they both be happy in the end with their choices without losing each other?

I really enjoyed this final book. Ruby and James evolved so much and finally started trusting each other. They realized they were stronger together than apart.

I was also deeply invested in all the subplots. I was rooting hard for good outcomes for the three other couples.

The ending, even though everything was tied up a bit too perfectly, still worked for me!

Cliffhanger: No

4/5 Fangs

This Story Might Save Your Life by Tiffany Crum

Title: This Story Might Save Your Life

Author: Tiffany Crum

Narrators: Julia Whelan, Sean Patrick Hopkins

Publisher: Macmillan Audio

Release Date: March 10, 2026

Best friends Benny and Joy like to say they’ve been saving each other’s lives since the moment they met. Until the day Joy disappears and Benny is suspected of murder . . .

Benny Abbott and Joy Moore host one of the most beloved podcasts in the world. Each week, they delight listeners with a different “against all odds” survival story, gleefully finding the weird, life-affirming humor in near-death experiences. Since their first episode on Joy’s experience with severe narcolepsy, they’ve been the best friends everyone wants to befriend—and thanks to the meticulous management of Joy’s husband, Xander, they’ve built a lucrative empire.

The problem is, their next survival story may be their own. When Benny arrives at Joy and Xander’s one morning to record, he finds shattered glass and an empty house. The one clue shedding light on the couple’s disappearance is the incomplete, previously unseen first draft of Joy’s memoir. Benny is desperate to find them, even when the police soon zero in on him as their prime suspect.

Millions of devoted listeners think they know the “real” Benny and Joy. But as the hours tick by, and the odds seem increasingly stacked against Joy and Xander being found alive, not even the most devoted fans could guess the terrible secrets their favorite famous BFFs have hidden from the world—and from each other.

A Macmillan Audio production from Pine & Cedar Books

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I want all my friends to read this one, and I hope they love it as much as I did.

Joy Moore and Benny Abbott have been friends for several years. When they met, they decided to be friends—and they’ve been best friends ever since. For the last few years, they’ve run one of the most famous podcasts in the world together. Joy’s husband handles all the behind-the-scenes work and keeps everything running smoothly.

One morning, Benny shows up to tape the next episode, but no one is home. To Benny, this is very strange—Joy would never disappear right before taping. He becomes even more worried when Joy’s dog is found outside the house. Benny knows something bad has happened.

Benny is desperate; he wants his best friend back.

So what happened to Joy and Xander?

And this is where I stopped. I don’t recommend reading any further spoilers. Better to go in blind.

This Story Might Save Your Life was refreshing in its delivery. It’s definitely a debut worth reading—and recommending wholeheartedly.

Just so you know, I devoured the audiobook. It helped that both narrators—Julia Whelan and Sean Patrick Hopkins—are outstanding.

In case you missed it at the beginning of this review: Read this book!

Cliffhanger: No

5/5 Fangs

A complimentary copy was provided by Macmillan Audio via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Save You by Mona KastenMaxton Hall #2

Title: Save you

Series: Maxton Hall #2

Author: Mona Kasten

Publisher: Berkley

The second book in the international bestselling Maxton Hall series—now a Prime Video streaming series—in English for the first time.

After all the hurt between them, will they be able to find their way back to each other?

Ruby Bell thought that she and James Beaufort had something special. She’s never had such strong feelings for someone. And after his betrayal, she’s also never felt this much hurt. Ruby just wants her old life back before she knew anyone at Maxton Hall, before she knew James. She used to be able to rely on her studies to keep her focused, but school is no longer a refuge—not when she sees James everywhere. But she has to stay on track, especially with university looming over them and the uncertainty of what the future holds.

Despite everything, Ruby wants to support James as he struggles with his father’s expectations of him taking over the family business. But she makes one thing very clear: she is not willing to forgive him or give him a second chance. As love and hate compete for Ruby's heart, James will try everything he can to win her back.

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Second in the Maxton Hall series.

The book picks up exactly where the previous one left off. Both Ruby and James are heartbroken, but for completely different reasons.

James deals with his pain in all the unhealthy ways possible. He pushes Ruby away and even pushes his twin sister, Lydia, away—though she deserves so much better, in my opinion. At first, James’s friends encourage his bad behavior, but later, they’re just there to support him.

Ruby copes by throwing herself into her schoolwork and her job on the events committee. She refuses to let James ruin her time at Maxton Hall. She tries to ignore him, but when he finally wakes up from his horrible behavior, he realizes he needs Ruby. He’s ready to fight to win her back. Just when things start looking better for them, the other shoe drops.

I’m deeply invested in the trio of girls—Ruby, Lydia, and Ember—and their happily-ever-afters.

Save You ends with another cliffhanger. Diving straight into Save Us right away.

Cliffhanger: Yes

4/5 Fangs

Welcome to Murder Week by Karen Dukess

 

Title: Welcome to Murder Week

Author:  Karen Dukess

Publisher: Gallery/Scout Press

Release Date: June 10, 2025

In this delightfully funny and heartfelt new novel from the author of the “bittersweet page-turner” ( The New York Times ) The Last Book Party , an American woman travels to the English countryside when she discovers tickets her late mother had purchased for a murder mystery simulation in a small British town.

When thirty-four-year-old Cath loses her mostly absentee mother, she is ambivalent. With days of quiet, unassuming routine in Buffalo, New York, Cath consciously avoids the impulsive, thrill-seeking lifestyle that her mother once led. But when she’s forced to go through her mother’s things one afternoon, Cath is perplexed to find tickets for an upcoming “murder week” in England’s Peak a whole town has come together to stage a fake murder mystery to attract tourism to their quaint hamlet. Baffled but helplessly intrigued by her mother’s secret purchase, Cath decides to go on the trip herself—and begins a journey she never could have anticipated.

Teaming up with her two cottage-mates, both ardent mystery lovers—Wyatt Green, forty, who works unhappily in his husband’s birding store, and Amity Clark, fifty, a divorced romance writer struggling with her novels—Cath sets about solving the “crime” and begins to unravel shocking truths about her mother along the way. Amidst a fling—or something more—with the handsome local maker of artisanal gin, Cath and her irresistibly charming fellow sleuths will find this week of fake murder may help them face up to a very real crossroads in their own lives.

Witty, wise, and deliciously escapist, Welcome to Murder Week is a fresh, inventive twist on the murder mystery and a touching portrayal of one daughter’s reckoning with her grief, her past—and her own budding sense of adventure.

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A cozy mystery with a side of romance!

Cath is in her thirties. She is an optician who took over the practice when her boss retired. Her former boss now lives with her, and she leads a tranquil, predictable life. When Cath was young, her mother left her with her grandmother. Over the years, her mother has drifted in and out of her life—showing up briefly before disappearing again. Now her mother has died of a stroke, and Cath doesn’t know how to feel about it; she’s been mostly absent for Cath’s entire life.

Then Cath finds tickets for a paid murder-mystery simulation in a small town in England. She decides to go, and several things happen at once: she meets the charming local bar owner, Dev Sharma; she’s assigned two friendly housemates and teammates, Wyatt Green and Amity Clark; and for some reason, she feels an inexplicable connection to the town even though she has never been there before.

Welcome to Murder Week was super entertaining. It made me want to participate in one of these events—I would love to do it. It sounds like so much fun. Wyatt and Amity made excellent secondary characters, and the romance played out beautifully. Quite enjoyable.

Cliffhanger: No

4/5 Fangs

Her Every Fear by Peter Swanson

 

Title: Her Every Fear 

Author: Peter Swanson

Publisher: William Morrow

Release Date: January 10, 2017 

Growing up, Kate Priddy was always a bit neurotic, experiencing momentary bouts of anxiety that exploded into full-blown panic attacks after an ex-boyfriend kidnapped her and nearly ended her life. When Corbin Dell, a distant cousin in Boston, suggests the two temporarily swap apartments, Kate, an art student in London, agrees, hoping that time away in a new place will help her overcome the recent wreckage of her life.

Soon after her arrival at Corbin’s grand apartment on Beacon Hill, Kate makes a shocking discovery: his next-door neighbor, a young woman named Audrey Marshall, has been murdered. When the police question her about Corbin, a shaken Kate has few answers, and many questions of her own—curiosity that intensifies when she meets Alan Cherney, a handsome, quiet tenant who lives across the courtyard, in the apartment facing Audrey’s. Alan saw Corbin surreptitiously come and go from Audrey’s place, yet he’s denied knowing her. Then, Kate runs into a tearful man claiming to be the dead woman’s old boyfriend, who insists Corbin did the deed the night that he left for London.

When she reaches out to her cousin, he proclaims his innocence and calms her nerves--until she comes across disturbing objects hidden in the apartment and accidentally learns that Corbin is not where he says he is. Could Corbin be a killer? What about Alan? Kate finds herself drawn to this appealing man who seems so sincere, yet she isn’t sure. Jet-lagged and emotionally unstable, her imagination full of dark images caused by the terror of her past, Kate can barely trust herself, so how could she take the chance on a stranger she’s just met?

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Not The Holiday!

Kate Priddy has decided to swap homes with her distant cousin, Corbin Dell. Corbin is moving to London for six months for work, and during that time Kate will stay in his upscale Boston apartment on Beacon Hill while he stays in her flat.

For Kate, this is a huge step. She was almost killed by her ex-boyfriend, and since that terrible night she has become increasingly paranoid, with worsening anxiety and a vivid worst-case-scenario imagination.

When she arrives in Boston and reaches Corbin’s apartment, she sees a woman banging on the door next door. Kate immediately senses something is wrong with the young woman who lives there. The next morning, the police are on the scene—and yes, Kate was right. Corbin’s neighbor, Audrey Marshall, is dead.

Soon after, Kate meets two men. The first is Alan Cherney, a tenant in the same building who lives directly across from Audrey’s apartment. The second she encounters while leaving the building to get something to eat; the young man tells her he used to be Audrey’s friend and is convinced Corbin killed her.

Alan tells Kate that Corbin used to see Audrey—he saw them together from his apartment—yet Corbin denied even knowing her.

Could Corbin be a killer? Is Kate’s life in danger?

Her Every Fear was addictive, with good twists and a little bit of everything. The constant need to know what was really going on kept me turning pages or accelerating the speed of my audiobook! 

Cliffhanger: No

4/5 Fangs

Save Me by Mona KastenMaxton Hall #1

Title: Save Me

Series: Maxton Hall #1

Author: Mona Kasten

Publisher:  Berkley

Release Date: July 1, 2025

The first book in the international bestselling Maxton Hall series—now a Prime Video streaming series—in English for the first time.

They come from different worlds, and yet they are meant for each other.

Money, glamour, luxury, power—Ruby Bell couldn’t be less interested in these things if she tried. After being awarded a scholarship to one of England’s most prestigious and expensive private schools, Maxton Hall, all she wants is to keep her head down, work hard, and get accepted to Oxford. She keeps her distance from everyone, especially the arrogant, rich, and extremely handsome James Beaufort, ringleader of the school’s party boys.

When Ruby discovers a scandalous secret about the Beauforts, she is suddenly on James’s radar. It only gets worse when James is forced to work with her to plan the school's annual gala. Yet the more time they spend together, the more they realize they share much more than they thought.

Falling for James Beaufort was never part of her plan, yet Ruby can’t help but let her feelings sweep her away. But James must make a decision for himself: will he choose what’s expected of him, or what he feels for her?

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I had to read it!

I keep seeing Maxton Hall on my feed, and it’s already a Prime Video series!

Ruby Bell attends Maxton Hall on a scholarship. She comes from a non-affluent family and keeps her home life completely separate from her school life. She has one close friend, Lynn, and she’s part of the events committee. Ruby’s only goal is to gain admission to Oxford—if she gets in, she’ll be the first in her family to attend college.

Then she uncovers a secret that makes the bad-boy lacrosse captain, James Beaufort, discover who she really is. He starts making her life difficult—but also more exciting. She can’t seem to escape him, especially when he’s assigned to the events committee too.

There are quite a few interesting characters. Of course, I was rooting for Ruby—she deserved to succeed in her dream. I liked James too, once I could see how his relationship with Ruby evolved from enemies to friends and then to something more. James’s sister, Lydia, was also likable, and so was Ruby's sister.

The cliffhanger only made me want to continue with the next book in the series. Now I can also start the TV show…

Cliffhanger: Yes

4/5 Fangs

Academy of Outcasts by Larry CorreiaAcademy of Outcasts #1

 

Title: Academy of Outcasts

Series: Academy of Outcasts #1

Author: Larry Correia

Publisher: Aethon Books

Release Date: October 7, 2025

All Oz Carnavon ever wanted was to become a master mage.Except, to do so requires the natural gifts or wealth necessary to secure an appointment to one of the prestigious magical academies in the Core City at the center of the seven realms. Oz had neither.

He was born without magical talent, serving in the elemental plane of fire, a nightmarish hellscape of treacherous lava and vicious monsters, where life is cheap, and escape is rare. But Carnavons never give up.

When Oz fakes his death to get out of his family’s contract and crosses the Nexus gate to sneak into the Core, everything seems to be going according to plan… Until he gets blamed for an assassination attempt on the fire realm’s ambassador.

Now, Oz must become a fugitive in a vast magical city, while trying to earn a place among the magical academies which have nothing but disdain for his kind.

And the clock is ticking, because in one week, the most dangerous wizard in the realm of fire is coming to track him down and drag him back to hell.

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I liked this new world.

The Academy of Outcasts stars Oz Carnavon. Oz was born into the plane of fire in Fogo, where he and his family live in servitude. He dreams of becoming a mage, but unfortunately, he was not born with the gift. What he does have is tremendous determination. Oz decides to teach himself the craft, fakes his own death, and flees the plane of fire to seek acceptance into one of the prestigious academies in Core City, the heart of the seven realms.

His quest is interrupted almost immediately: as soon as he crosses over, an attack is launched, and Carnavon is blamed for it. Time is running out. The authorities are hunting him, and it seems unlikely he’ll reach any academy in time.

The Academy of Outcasts is packed with action. Carnavon is extremely easy to root for—he’s worked incredibly hard for the little power he’s gained, and he’s already lost so much. Along the way, he picks up both friends and foes, and the supporting cast is full of memorable characters.

I'm excited for the next book, Magic and Bullets.

Cliffhanger: No

4/5 Fangs