Hot Off The Shelf: August 1st New Releases
Happy August everyone! This means summer is almost over and those reading lists are about to wrap up.
There are books from new authors, second books from acclaimed authors, and stories you may seem interested in just by the synopsis. At Maude’s Book Club, we want our community to broaden their horizons and try new genres!
Here are the new books being released in the first week of August!
August 1st
When Tara Connelly is released from prison after serving eighteen months on a drug charge, she knows rebuilding her life at thirty years old won’t be easy. With no money or prospects, she returns home to live with her siblings, who are both busy with their problems. Her brother, a single dad, struggles with the ongoing effects of a brain injury he sustained years ago, and her sister’s fragile facade of calm and order is cracking under the burden of big secrets. While she works to build a new career and hold her family together, Tara finds a chance at love in a most unlikely place. But when the Connellys’ secrets start to unravel and threaten her future, they all must face their worst fears and come clean, or risk losing each other forever.
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family’s orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theatre company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
Flor has a gift: she can predict, to the day, when someone will die. So when she decides she wants a living wake — a party to bring her family and community together to celebrate the long life she’s led — her sisters are surprised. Has Flor foreseen her own death, or someone else’s? Spanning the three days prior to the wake, this novel traces the lives of each of the Marte women, weaving together past and present, Santo Domingo and New York City.
A Japanese American nurse’s aide navigates the dangers of post-WWII and post-Manzanar life as she attempts to find justice for a broken family. It’s been two years since Aki Ito and her family were released from the Manzanar detention center and resettled in Chicago with other Japanese Americans. Now the Itos have finally been allowed to return home to California — but nothing is as they left it. The entire Japanese community is starting from scratch, with thousands of people living in dismal refugee camps while they struggle to find new houses and jobs in over-crowded Los Angeles.
On a routine trip to the Piggly Wiggly in Albany, Georgia, widower Fletcher Dukes smells a familiar perfume, then sees a tall woman the colour of paper shell pecans with a strawberry birthmark on the nape of her neck. He knows immediately that she is his lost love, Altovise Benson. Their bond, built on county fairs, sit-ins, and marches, once seemed a sure and forever thing. But their marriage plans were disrupted when the police turned a peaceful protest violent.
Lauren Fox is the bookkeeper for Cold World, a tourist destination that’s always a winter wonderland despite being located in humid Orlando, Florida. Sure, it’s ranked way below any of the trademarked amusement parks and maybe foot traffic could be better. But it’s a fun place to work, even if “fun” isn’t exactly Lauren’s middle name.
Her coworker Asa Williamson, on the other hand, is all about finding ways to enliven his days at Cold World — whether that means organizing the Secret Santa or teasing Lauren. When the owner asks Lauren and Asa to propose something to raise more revenue, their rivalry heats up as they compete to come up with the best idea.
On the night of her husband Matt’s fortieth birthday, Rachel Abbott receives a sexy, explicit text from her husband that she quickly realizes was meant for another woman. Divorce is inevitable, and Rachel is determined not to leave her thirteen-year marriage empty-handed. Meanwhile, Matt, a rising star mayor with his eye on the White House can’t afford a messy split in the middle of his reelection campaign. They strike a deal: Rachel gets one million dollars and their lavish house in the wealthy DC suburb of Oasis Springs, as long as she keeps playing the ideal Black trophy wife until the election.
Tana Fairchild’s fate has never been in question. Her life has been planned out since the moment she was born: she is to marry the governor’s son, Landon, and secure an unprecedented alliance between the witches of her island home and the mainlanders who see her very existence as a threat. Tana’s coven has appeased those who fear their power for years by releasing most of their magic into the ocean during the full moon. But when Tana misses the midnight ritual — a fatal mistake — there is no one she can turn to for help…until she meets Wolfe.
The proposition is simple: if ER nurse Claire Harper and her roommate, firefighter Graham Scott, are still single by the time they’re forty, they’ll take the proverbial plunge together…as friends with benefits. Maybe it’s the wine, but at the moment, Claire figures the pact is a safe enough deal, considering she hasn’t had much luck in love and he’s in no rush to settle down.
Just as things begin to heat up way before the proposed deadline, Graham’s injured in a serious rock-climbing accident — and needs Claire’s help to heal. She’ll do whatever it takes to nurse him back to health…even if it means moving into Graham’s bed and putting up with his little dog who hates her.
Britain, 1961: A bouncing blond baby is born to Viscount Althorp, heit to the Spencer earldom, and his wife Frances. Diana grows up amid the fallout of her parent’s messy divorce. She struggles at school. Moving to London, she takes menial jobs as a cleaner and nanny. Her refuge throughout is romantic novels. She dreams of falling in love and being rescued by a handsome prince. Bestselling author Wendy Holden explores the astonishing backstory and young adulthood of the ultimate royal celebrity.
Have you picked any of the books listed above? If you have, let us know which ones! If you have any recommendations similar to the books listed above drop them in the comments below.
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