Short Story Sunday: Audiobook Review: The Heart of a Mother by Julie Clark
The Heart of a Mother
Series: Obsession Collection #4
Author: Julie Clark
Narrator: Susan Dalian
Published: July 25, 2023
Audiobook: 1 hour 16 minutes
Reviewed By: Jessica
Date Listened To: April 27, 2024
Jessica’s Rating: 4 stars
Short Story Description:
A fateful decision from the past haunts a wealthy Californian. Desperate to make things right, she risks everything in this tense short story from New York Times bestselling author Julie Clark. Hillary Jean leads an enviable life. She has a loving husband, a beautiful home, caring friends, and meaningful work planning fundraisers. Yet she’s always felt incomplete. After a DNA website emails her a match, Hillary sets out to find the daughter she gave up twenty-five years ago. But her hunger to reconnect threatens to destroy the very thing she hopes to gain.
The Heart of a Mother is part of Obsession , a collection of compulsively readable short stories about people pushed to their extremes. So addictive you won’t be able to put them down—read or listen to each story in a single sitting.
Jessica’s Review:
Whoa! I’m not a mother but this short story gives you an idea of what a mother goes through when she puts a baby up for adoption. And how much it can affect her many years later.
You definitely experience a mother’s turmoil where she questions herself on what she should do. It shows a mother’s love above all else.
I knew the direction the story was going, but that did not stop me from ‘enjoying’ it. I would be interested in seeing what else Julie Clark writes. The narrator Susan Dalian did a great job with her portrayal. And do listen or read this in one sitting, I did!
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
An Advanced Listening Copy Review of Switched by Sarah Ready
Switched
Series: Ghosted #2
Author: Sarah Ready
Narrators:
Kelsey Navarro Foster
James Anderson Foster
To Be Published: February 20, 2024
Audiobook: 10 hours 12 minutes
Reviewed By: Jessica
Dates Listened To: February 2-12, 2024
Jessica’s Rating: 4.5 stars
Book Description:
For Serena Otaki, free-spirited Californian, life is simple. She loves smashing atoms at The Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland. She loves Star Trek, spicy tofu, and her cat, Captain Purrk. She loves her messy (slob-fest) apartment, her chaotic brand of organizing, and staying permanently, happily unattached.
Life is perfect. She has one true love—physics.
Loving a man isn’t in her future.
For Henry Joules, uptight Brit, life is simple. He loves making analog black holes, drinking piping hot tea, and organizing his pencil tray. He loves his family, red meat, and obsessively cleaning his spotless apartment.
Life is perfect. He has many loves—physics, family, friends. He can’t wait to find the woman of his dreams.
Love and marriage are in his future.
One perfect night Serena and Henry meet. Sparks fly, particles collide, the universe comes to a halt, and…
It was a mistake.
They’re too different.
It won’t work.
Love isn’t in their future.
Until an electric storm causes an unexpected event at the particle collider and suddenly—they’ve switched.
Serena is in Henry’s body.
Henry is in Serena’s body.
And both life and love are suddenly very, very complicated.
Jessica’s Review:
Wow, Jessica listened to another romance novel and really enjoyed it! This is the second in the Ghosted series. It isn’t necessary to have read Ghosted before this one because Jillian and Daniel’s story is mentioned in Switched, but I really do recommend it! Their story also continues since Switched happens after Ghosted. So far in this series we have extremely smart FMCs (female main characters) with STEM careers, that are also nerdy but adorable. It’s great to have strong female characters with this type of career!
To be honest, I wasn’t really interested in the book until Serena and Henry switched bodies. I think it was a ‘me’ thing with some things going on in my life. But once that switch happened the book took off for me.
Switched is very entertaining and hilarious at times. We see what happens when you are not just in another person’s body, but someone of the opposite gender! Both Serena and Henry have experiences as the opposite sex. And really, we do see that women really are the stronger gender! Full on hilarity ensues, I just don’t want to say what as a minor spoiler. We do have a small amount of spice that I could have done without. Remember…. I’ve figured out that I seem to be a ‘fade to black’/ ‘behind closed door’ romance reader.
Here are some of the tropes we have in Switched:
Fake Dating
One Night Stand
Forced Proximity
We have two narrators: Kelsey Navarro Foster and James Anderson Foster, who are married in ‘real life’! Kelsey did a fabulous job! She really captured everything with the characters down to the ‘bad English accent’ with Serena attempting to be Henry. James only narrated for one chapter, and for that I was thankful as his voice for this chapter did not work for me.
Sarah Ready is an author I discovered last year and Switched is the third book I have listened to from her, and I have enjoyed them all! She’s an author I plan to read/listen to more. And with a third book in the Ghosted series coming out in July, I am ready for another book from her! And for one who doesn’t really read much romance, that is saying something! And let me just say that the covers of the books in this series… It’s very tempting for me to want physical copies of them because they are just… Gorgeous!
Many thanks to the publisher for having these audiobooks available to listen to and reviewing!
Pre-Order Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
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Book Review: Prey by Sarah Davis
Prey
Author: Sarah Davis
Published: October 31, 2023
Paperback: 268 Pages
Reviewed By: Jessica
Dates Read: December 11-27, 2023
Jessica’s Rating: 4 stars
Book Description:
The fall waterfowl migration has brought something deadly to a small North Dakota town.
Dr. Emily Hayes, a veterinarian and single mom, is the first to submit a sample of mutated Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza—coined H5N1 2.0 or Mad Crow—a highly infectious disease that awakens violent aggression in birds and causes human infection.
Just as the community is about to be overcome by this Hitchcockian nightmare, handsome face from Emily’s past arrives—Dr. Jack Connor. He hopes he can help trace the source of the infection.
As the zoonotic infection spreads, unleashing unimaginable violence and turning birds into lethal creatures, Emily and Jack must overcome their differences and face the secrets that have kept them apart if they are to find a way out of this deadly biological nightmare.
Please be advised with these trigger warnings: Violence, animal death, human death, outbreak/ COVID 19.
Jessica’s Review:
Sarah Davis is a veterinarian, and she writes what she knows! (With some creative licensing). With Prey, Davis takes a crossover of bird flu and swine flu to create mad crow. We do have references to the COVID-19 pandemic happening in the past, and let’s face it: A medical thriller written in present times of course COVID-19 was going to be mentioned. It’s a part of our past, present, and will always be around.
I am a big fan of the 1995 movie Outbreak with Dustin Hoffman, Cuba Gooding Jr and Rene Russo, so I was excited to get a chance to read this novel! And Prey takes off full steam ahead from the beginning! We get very aggressive bird attacks against humans. The description is very vivid, so reader discretion would be advised.
The reader also gets multiple povs with short chapters, so this novel makes for some good and quick reading! For the romance readers, there is a little bit of a second chance romance added in to the mix, so there isn’t just deaths and killer birds!
In case you didn’t know a group of crows is called a murder, and Prey brings on a new meaning to this term! There were a few times as I was reading this book that I would be on the road and would pass a grouping of crows that might or might not fly off, which kind of freaked me out: But how could I not be while reading this book! Especially with one particular attack that happens early on!
I did like the ending, we have an ending but not! With a virus that may always be the case. Prey has a little bit of just about everything to it: Action, terror, horror, killer bird, romance, secrets, hope, and a little bit of supernatural. It should have something for most readers!
I really do like the cover to Prey: It is simple but also not! It achieves what it needs to do and catches my attention! This is one I would definitely pick up in the bookstore to see what it is about.
It was surprising to know that Davis has never seen the Alfred Hitchcock movie The Birds! She mentions that in her author notes. I wonder if that is still the case now?
Many thanks to Sarah Davis for sending me a paperback copy to read and review! I enjoyed it and I hope more people read it!
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK