On Bee's Bookshelf

The day Scarlett dies should have been one of the most important of her life. It doesn't feel fair that she'll never have the chance to fulfil her dreams. And now, she's still ... here - wherever here is - watching the ripple effect of her death on the lives of those she loved the most. Evie cannot contemplate her life without Scarlett, and she certainly cannot forgive Nate, the man she blames for her best friend's death. But Nate keeps popping up when she least expects him to, catapulting Evie's life in directions she'd never let herself imagine possible. Ways, perhaps, even those closest to her had long since given up on. If you could go back, knowing everything that happens after, everything that happens because of that one moment in time, would you change the course of history or would you do it all again?   "My life would have been lesser, without her in it. I wish, desperately, that I had taken more time to make her realise this while I still alive. W...

Kelly McCann is a fighter. She's fought to build a successful legal career, fought for the special needs of her family, and tirelessly fought for her clients. Her specialty is defending men accused of sex crimes--falsely accused, she always maintains. Her detractors call her a traitor to her gender, but she doesn't care. Badass and brilliant, Kelly simply loves to win, and as the story opens, she's done it again, securing an acquittal for a renowned scientist accused of sexually assaulting his female employees. But the thrill of her victory is short-lived. That very night she, too, falls victim of a brutal sexual assault. And almost as horrific as the attack is the fact that she can't tell anyone it happened--not without destroying her career in the process. Kelly has never backed down from a fight and she's not about to start pulling her punches now. Joining forces with her rapist's other victims, the shrewd lawyer plans to turn the tables on him. It's not ...

  Multan, Pakistan. A conservative city where an unmarried woman over the age of twenty-five is considered a curse by her family. Ayesha is twenty-seven. Independent and happily single, she has evaded an arranged marriage because of her family’s reduced circumstances. When she catches the eye of powerful, wealthy Raza, it seems like the answer to her parents’ prayers. But Ayesha is in love with someone else, and when she refuses to give up on him, Raza resorts to unthinkable revenge… Ayesha travels to London to rebuild her life and there she meets Kamil, an emotionally damaged man who has demons of his own. They embark on a friendship that could mean salvation for both of them, but danger stalks Ayesha in London, too. With her life thrown into turmoil, she is forced to make a decision that could change her and everyone she loves forever. Someone Like Her is a sweeping, epic tale that holds a lens to the complexity of society and tradition; the beauty but also the very real risks of...

On the outside, luxury realtor Sarah Nelson looks like every other mom in the neighborhood—running errands, navigating the school pickup line, and begrudgingly volunteering at the high school concession stand. Yet she has an edge that others don’t: She’s a witch! She uses light magic in secret, small ways, almost like an enchanted personal assistant. And absolutely no one knows about it. Except her estranged ex-coven. In college, when she and two friends, Katrina and Alicia, first uncovered the magic, it didn’t take long before they used it to improve their lives. Yet, they made a mistake one night, and their dorm went up in flames and burned to the ground. After that terrible night, the coven scattered. And no one ever found out that the fire was their fault. Their secret was safe, until the three reunite at a ceremony commemorating the anniversary of the fire. Suddenly, the magic doesn’t seem to want to stay small any longer. Her familiar—an overweight orange tabby cat named Katy Fur...

  This striking collection of interwoven short stories is an amazingly honest and heartfelt exploration into the relationships, people and moments that we have throughout our lives that shape us and change our paths, whether they endure, fade away or explode. It captures that transformative “in between” that young women experience between being a girl and an adult, when everything in intense and confusing and changing so quickly, and we aren’t sure whether to be looking back or onwards. These stories follow a whole cast of somewhat familiar and relatable women; three siblings navigating family dynamics, rivalries and rifts, someone learning to live without their best friend for the first time, a couple try to work out what they owe to each other and themselves, a young woman longing for the people who have moved away or drifted away, friends sit in a hospital face the possibility of losing someone they love forever, a college student recalling a humiliating love story — each story ...

  As Bergen PI Varg Veum investigates two different cases, it becomes clear that they are uncannily similar to harrowing events that took place thirty-six years earlier...  Bergen Private Investigator Varg Veum is perplexed when two wildly different cases cross his desk at the same time. A lawyer, anxious to protect her privacy, asks Varg to find her sister, who has disappeared with her husband, seemingly without trace, while a ship carrying unknown cargo is heading towards the Norwegian coast, and the authorities need answers. Varg immerses himself in the investigations, and it becomes clear that the two cases are linked, and have unsettling – and increasingly uncanny – similarities to events that took place thirty-six years earlier, when a woman and her saxophonist lover drove their car off a cliff, in an apparent double suicide. As Varg is drawn into a complex case involving star-crossed lovers, toxic waste and illegal immigrants, history seems determined to repeat itself i...

Genre: Adult Fiction | Comedy Publisher: Faber & Faber Release Date: Expected 14th September 2023 Deep in Essex and her own thoughts, Sophie had a feeling something was going to happen and then it did. Chris has entered the pub and re-entered her life after Sophie had finally stopped thinking about him and regretting what she'd done. Sophie has a chance at creating a new ending and paying off her emotional debts (if not her financial ones). All she has to do is act exactly like a normal, well-adjusted person and not say any of her inner monologue out loud. If she can suppress her light paranoia, pornographic visualisations and pathological lying maybe she'll even end up getting the guy she wants? Then she could dump her boyfriend Ian and try to enjoy Christmas. "I hated being told I was grown-up. I also hated being told I was young and had all my life ahead of me. I've hated all of my ages and every unnecessary and unasked-for comment upon them." Weirdo is tra...

  The night after her father's funeral, Claire meets Lucas in a bar. Lucas doesn't know it, but it's not a chance meeting. One thoughtless mistyped email has put him in the crosshairs of an extremely put-out serial killer. But before they make eye contact, before Claire lets him buy her a drink, even before she takes him home and carves him up into little pieces, something about that night is very wrong. Because someone is watching Claire. Someone who is about to discover her murderous little hobby. The thing is, it's not sensible to tangle with a part-time serial killer, even one who is distracted by attending a weekly bereavement support group and trying to get her art career off the ground. Let the games begin... "I smile, enjoying my favourite part of the process. The part when I know they're going to die soon. The part when I can anticipate every moment of their deaths. The part where I already see them as ghosts." This refreshingly original thriller ...

Genre: Literary Fiction | LGBTQ+ Release Date: Expected 19th September 2023 Publisher: VERVE Books It's the early 1990s, and in the Irish village of Crossmore, Lucy feels out of place. Despite her fierce friendships, she's always felt this way, and the conventional path of marriage and motherhood doesn't appeal to her at all. Not even with handsome and doting Martin, her closest childhood friend. Lucy begins to make sense of herself during a long hot summer, when a spark with her school friend Susannah escalates to an all-consuming infatuation, and, very quickly, to a desperate and devastating love. Fearful of rejection from her small and conservative community, Lucy begins living a double life, hiding the most honest parts of herself in stolen moments with Susannah. But with the end of school and the opportunity to leave Crossmore looming, Lucy must choose between two places, two people and two futures, each as terrifying as the other. Neither will be easy, but only one wi...

Genre: Young Adult | LGBTQ+ | Romance Release Date: 14th September 2023 Publisher: Hachette Childrens Group | Hodder Childrens Books When sixteen-year-old Noah starts at a new school, he has a plan to ensure the students see him as his true gender: join the school's secretive Borrow a Boyfriend Club, where members rent themselves out to their classmates for dates. The endless "accidental slip-ups" that plagued him at his last school will be a thing of the past once he joins the club; after all, it has "boy" right in the title. But he fails the audition. Desperate, he strikes a deal with the club's prickly president, Asher: he'll help lead the nearly-bankrupt club to victory at the school's fundraising dance competition, and in exchange Asher will allow Noah to prove his skills as a boyfriend in a series of tests that include romancing Asher himself. As Noah passes test after test, his fake romance with Asher starts to feel surprisingly real, and Noah...

Genre: Romcom | Romance | Fantasy Release Date: 19th September 2023 Publisher: Alcove Press Raised by a mother whose ironclad motto is “men are trash,” Iza longs to prove her wrong, ideally with a kind, steady boyfriend who will free her from the exhausting treadmill that is dating.  Although she’s willing to try (almost) anything to find love, accidentally summoning a wish-granting stranger out of thin air was never part of the plan. Unfortunately, Beckett, her personal wish-granter, isn’t exactly the sage and generous being she would expect. Instead, he loves to party, has attitude to spare, and boasts an uncanny ability to point out Iza’s worst flaws. Iza decides to use one of her three wishes to create her dream man—a modern Mr. Darcy. If that esteemed gentleman can’t impress her overbearing mother, no one can. Using  Pride and Prejudice  as the handbook to Darcy’s heart, Iza plays the part of Elizabeth Bennet and sets out to create her epic love story.   Making ...

Genre: YA | Dystopian | Feminist Fiction | LGBTQ+  Release Date: Expected 28th September 2023 Publisher: Usbourne Publishing In Belle and Joni's world there are two options for girls: One, follow the rules of the Doctrine like Belle: apply your Mask, work hard to be crowned at the Ceremony,  be a Pretty. Or two, fight the rules like Joni: leave your face bare, work hard to escape to the Education,  be an Objectionable. But maybe there is a third option... If Belle and Joni work together, can they destroy the rules and set themselves free? "They don't have t make things illegal, If society punishes you enough, then laws aren't needed, and they can continue this delusion of choice." It’s no secret that I consider Holly Bourne to be one of the most important feminist writers of today, so there is a nervous apprehension every time I get my hands on a new book of hers because I’m scared this will finally be the time she releases something I don’t like. And with the spe...

Genre: Contemporary Fiction  Release Date: Expected 14th September 2023 Publisher: Lake Union Publishing  Three siblings. Three promises. Three lifetimes of saying all the wrong things… Since their mother’s death, siblings Imran, Sumaya and Majid have drifted in three very different directions, trying to live up to the last promises they each made to her. But when a viral news piece throws an unwanted spotlight on the family, they’re drawn back into each other’s lives for the first time in years. With the media attention exposing the cracks in Imran’s already fragile marriage, he begs Sumaya to return from New York to help—but living under the same roof again after all this time brings up all the secrets they’d both thought long-buried. And now nothing can stop the truth from coming out… With the promises they once made in tatters, is this a chance for the siblings to finally live the lives they’ve always wanted and rebuild the bond they once had? Or has too much already been ...

Genre: Romance | Magic | Fantasy | LGBTQ+ Release Date: 3rd September 2023 Publisher: Harper Collins | One More Chapter Things you should know about Poppy: 1. She’s a witch 2. She has magical hair like Rapunzel from  Tangled 3. She lives with Iris, the head of her coven, in a beautiful, ramshackle house next to Highgate cemetery 4. She works at Hubble Bubble, a magic shop in Covent Garden. Though none of it is real magic as that would be highly irresponsible. Until… …Poppy accidentally sells gorgeous celebrity magician Axl Storm, all six-foot-four of him, a cursed pendant. When all hell breaks loose can the guy with fake magic and the girl with real magic fix the chaos they’ve caused? Or will sparks fly both in and out of the cauldron? "'I nurture things', says Iris, as a plump kitten wandered in. 'Kittens, plants, grudges.'" Sexy, spooky, spellbinding and just a bit silly — this was a magical romcom full of laughter and love. Our leading lady Poppy was an abs...