On Bee's Bookshelf

The Lightman System - Roger Hyams  Genre: Fiction | Released: 27/06/2022   The Italian Job - Kathryn Freeman ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Genre: Romance | Released: 07/07/2022 Life Ceremony - Sayaka Murata  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Genre: Short Stories | Released: 14/07/2022 Cat Brushing - Jane Campbell  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Genre: Short Stories | Released: 21/07/2022 Grace - Victoria Scott  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Genre: Fiction | Released: 07/07/2022 The Reading List - Sara Nisha Adams  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Genre: Fiction | Released:21/07/2022 How to Raise an AntiRacist - Dr Ibram X Kendi  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ ⭐ Genre: Non-Fiction | Released: 07/07/2022 The Movement - Ayisha Malik  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ ⭐ Genre: Speculative Fiction | Released: 21/07/2022 Great Sexpectations - Kristen Bailey  ⭐⭐⭐⭐ ⭐ Genre: Romance | Released: 28/07/2022  Total Read: 9 Total 2022 Reading Challenge so far: 

Genre: Romance | Romantic Comedy | Contemporary Fiction Release Date: 28th July 2022 Publisher: Bookouture  Josie Jewell is the heir of the family sex toy business, but the closest she's come to getting any recently is accidentally crashing a hook-up at a Halloween party.  Everyone assumes she's some kind of sex guru, especially considering her parents literally met on a porn set. And yes, she knows all the moves, all the toys, all the tricks - in theory, anyway. So when she meets Cameron at a party, accidentally in matching outfits, everyone tells her it's fate - it's a love story just waiting to happen. But her life is complicated, and so is his - so can she ever live up to her expectations of her reputation if he ever finds out who she really is?  "'True love hath a sense of timing that is both a farce and a shitter.', Sonny adds. 'Is that Shakespeare?'" Right from the first mention of strawberry-scented dildos a mere 35 words in, this book ...

Genre: Short Stories Release Date: 21st July 2022 Publisher: Quercus Books In this electrifying debut, we follow the stories of thirteen older women as they reflect on the erotic, the emotional and the evocative parts of life they leave unspoken.  The narrator of our lead story as she looks back on the sensuality of her past. An elderly woman who finds herself starting a relationship with her stunning young carer. A married lady trying to find her former lover. Someone explores robotic pleasure for the first time. A woman arrives at the funeral of her ex-husband and relives the pain of the relationship.  Each story creates a tender, elegant connection with the subject, each character undeniable real and visceral. Jane Campbell boldly and unashamedly writes about the unspoken, unaccepted truths of female lust and life as we go through life and age - about the forced invisibility and desexualisation of women that is put upon us we age.  Exploring sexuality, sensuality and f...

Genre: Speculative Fiction | Psychological Thriller | Fiction Release Date: Expected 21st July 2022 Publisher: Orenda  In July 2022, a terror attack send shockwaves through London. Now, the ICS are trying to examine the evidence, find out what actually happened that day and everything that led to that moment. Could it have been prevented? Was it inevitable? And what really is the start of a story? We explore the intertwined lives and deaths of perfect strangers as they orbit each other, waiting for collision. The nurse who has lost her humanity, the young man waking up in hospital to a world of black and white, the widower seeing angels, the con artists who might be murderers, the commuter reading on the train, two men named Dave who may have a brain tumour - and the potential terrorist, riding the same train every day, watching and waiting. But waiting for what, exactly? "If a butterfly can cause a tornado, if something so small can have such a giant effect, what, then, is the ef...

Genre: Romance | Contemporary Release Date: 6th May 2022 Publisher: Harper Collins UK | One More Chapter  Three days ago, Anna had it all. A career as a chef in a her loving boyfriends restaurant and a cosy home with him too. But now, she's sitting in her Dads kitchen after her boyfriend cheats and she somehow ends up losing everything.  She doesn't know where to go next, but when she stumbles across an actual dream job managing a castle in Italy, the only thing stopping her is they want a couple. So instead of giving up, she drags along the boy-next-door, Jake, who could also use a fresh start after just getting out of jail for punching the same man who just cheated on her.  Aside from some pretentious guests and a lot of cleaning, it's a real life fairy-tale - but can this unlikely duo really find their dream come true and live happily ever after? Kathryn Freeman is always an auto-read for me. I don't care what it's about, what it's called, I don't even bo...

Genre: Contemporary | Literary Fiction | Adult Fiction Release Date: 23rd June 2022 Publisher: Welbeck Publishing UK Gosia Golab is stuck. Her parents have dramatically split up and might be leaving her sister homeless, her cheating ex is getting married and writing a self-help book that definitely seems to be referencing her a bit too much, her flatmates are unbearable, and she can barely afford to help her broke dad with the meagre wages from the 24-hour supermarket she works at.  But at least at work she gets to see her true love, even though he doesn't quite seem to want to take it further than occasionally using her checkout. Gosia needs help to get out of the hole she's in … even if it's from a stupid book written by her stupid ex.  First things first - this book is not happy or particularly enjoyable. Gosia is not a likeable character, she's a mean, vindictive, unlikeable and sometimes cringe-worthy person. This book is grey and dreary and bitter - and that's...

Genre: Non-Fiction | Memoir  Release Date: 23rd June 2022 Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing Baek is successful, young and healthy - she has an amazing job and a good life. But she begins to see a psychiatrist about something she can't quite describe. She doesn't exactly want to die, but most of the time she doesn't have the energy to live either. She isn't happy, but she finds little moments of joy, like in her favourite snack tteokboki.  She spends all her days hiding her feelings of depression, desperation, doubt and finds it leaves her with little energy for love, friends or happiness. Over the next twelve weeks, she sits in that room with her psychiatrist trying to unravel the cycle of self-abuse and crippling hopelessness that is taking over her life. " I wasn't deathly depressed, but I wasn't happy either, floating instead in some feeling between the two. I suffered more because I had no idea that these contradictory feelings could and did coexist....

Genre: Romance | Contemporary Release Date: 30th June 2022 Publisher: Head of Zeus | Aria  Saffie and her friends aren't very lucky in love. Her boss, Tamara has been alone since her painful divorce and just haven't have the time, effort or trust to waste on dating. Tamara's brother Milo is on his fifth boyfriend in as many months. And Saffie, she just isn't sure she'll ever find Mr Right after leaving her ex at the altar. So when Milo finds an advert for the 24-Hour Dating Agency, they decide to give it a shot. Instead of endless swiping and small talk, you get matched and spend 24 hours on an intense, specially designed date made just for the couple. But despite the agencies soulmate guarantee, they can't help but think they might all need to rethink their idea of what a happily ever after really looks like.  "No matter how old you get, today is always the first day of the rest of your life." Wacky, whimsical and wonderful - this somewhat eccentric b...

  Genre: Psychological Thriller | Crime |  Release Date: 23rd June 2022 Publisher: Random House UK The apartment upstairs was referred to as the ‘bedroom bloodbath’ by the tabloids. It’s where her aunt Rebecca lived. Lived being the key word here, because it’s also where she was brutally murdered by her fiancé who then cowardly killed himself. Scarlett is trying to heal and move on, to claw back the comfort in her own home just a few feet below a crime scene. So when it’s time to try and say goodbye, she goes to Dee to organise the funeral - but Dee has enough going on, managing  her job as a funeral director, trying to plan a memorial for her own missing best friend and the recent anonymous abuse she’s been receiving. But in their grief they find something else - hope. Hope that they might just uncover secrets that have laid buried for a long time. But secrets are buried for a reason, and if they’re not careful they could end up in the dirt with Rebecca. '" Maybe having...

Genre: Contemporary Fiction Release Date: 23rd June 2022 Publisher: HQ Edie isn't exactly where she wanted to be, but life is good enough. She's the co-director of her successful family business, owners her own home and has a boyfriend who's sweet and not too pushy about making plans for the future. But then on her 35th birthday, she gets an email. Not the usual birthday-10%-off-cake email, but one from her 18 year old self that she'd completely forgotten she'd sent during the summer of her life. Her past self had such hope for the future, hopes of comfort and confidence and clarity - and also love. Maybe with her teenage boyfriend, Scott, but then there was Joel - the one that was never quite was but left a question mark hanging ever since. So she takes her own advice - and goes back through the years looking for any happiness she might have left behind and reconnecting with old friends. Is this her chance at rediscovering herself? Or is the past better forgotten? ...

The small community of Akranes is devastated when a young man dies in a mysterious house fire, and when Detective Elma and her colleagues from West Iceland CID discover the fire was arson, they become embroiled in an increasingly perplexing case involving multiple suspects. What’s more, the dead man’s final online search raises fears that they could be investigating not one murder, but two. A few months before the fire, a young Dutch woman takes a job as an au pair in Iceland, desperate to make a new life for herself after the death of her father. But the seemingly perfect family who employs her turns out to have problems of its own and she soon discovers she is running out of people to turn to. As the police begin to home in on the truth, Elma, already struggling to come to terms with a life-changing event, finds herself in mortal danger as it becomes clear that someone has secrets they’ll do anything to hide... If I've learned one thing from this book it's that you can't ...