Review: Get Lost With You by Sophie Sullivan

 

Get Lost With You (Rock Bottom Love #2) by Sophie Sullivan

Publication Date: February11th 2025 by St. Martin's Griffin

Pages: 304

Source: Publisher

Rating: ★★★★

Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Goodreads | Librofm | Audible 

My Thoughts:

Jillian Keller has rebounded after divorce, raising her eight-year-old daughter on her own while working at the Get Lost Lodge with her family. She’s in a good place in her life, happy to be in her beloved hometown of Smile. However, her teenage crush, Levi Bright, has come back to town and the attraction she felt for him back then reignites and grows the more she sees him, which is often since he’s been filling in as chef at the lodge. It’s fast and a bit disconcerting considering her past failure with love.

 

Levi Bright left Smile to pursue his dream of becoming a chef and achieved his goal, but now he is craving a life closer to family and friends. He’s never forgotten his best friend’s younger sister, Jillian, and the kiss the “almost kiss” before he left for college. Now that Levi’s back, that simmering attraction they felt as teenagers is sparking up again. Levi’s ecstatic over his blossoming romance with Jillian, but knows she’s wary of jumping in too fast.

 

I adored Levi! He embraced life with gusto, from reaching out and achieving his dream of becoming a chef to realizing he wanted more from life than just a career and then doing something about it. I admired Jillian for picking up the pieces after a bad marriage and then thriving as a single mom. Both had to deal with messy issues: Jillian with her awful ex, and her personal fears of repeating the past; Levi had an angry and hurt father with his loving mother caught in between.

 

The picturesque setting of Smile, in the Lake Michigan area, sounded lovely with Get Lost Lodge as a perfect rustic lake getaway!

 

Get Lost With You was a sweet, small-town, second chance romance with a lively secondary cast of characters! It was a joy to experience Jillian and Levi’s journey to HEA!

4 Stars

Book Description: 

A second chance at love, small-town romance that’s all sweet with just a hint of heat from the “queen of sweet romance” (Falon Ballard) Sophie Sullivan.

Jillian Keller took the long route to her best life, but is now happily settled in her hometown of Smile, raising her little girl alone while helping her brother run Get Lost Lodge. A lover of structure and routine, she doesn’t need anything, or anyone, disrupting her carefully curated life.

After chasing and achieving his culinary dreams, Levi Bright realizes he’s still missing something. Something he can’t find in a big city. Returning home to Smile, he intends to build a different future for himself that includes mending fences with his dad, reconnecting with friends, and creating elevated comfort food for a town he loves.

When Levi and Jilly run into each other one day in Smile, once requited feelings that never had a chance to bloom as teens flare between them immediately. Jaded from her past, Jilly is cautious and convinced that she can handle being just friends, as the two have to work closely together to prepare for Get Lost’s official summer opening, spending time together, camping, laughing, kayaking, and reminiscing. But when her brother hires sweet, funny, ridiculously hot Levi as the new chef at the lodge, and she and Ollie are getting more attached, things are moving more quickly than she anticipated--and Jilly has been hurt before. If she wants to be head over heels in love, she'll have to learn that the past doesn’t always repeat itself. Sometimes, it just leads you where you’re meant to be.

About the Author:

SOPHIE SULLIVAN (she/her) is a Canadian author as well as a cookie-eating, Diet Pepsi-drinking, Disney enthusiast who loves reading and writing romance in almost equal measure. She writes around her day job as a teacher and spends her spare time with her sweet family watching reruns of Friends. She has written Ten Rules for Faking it and How to Love Your Neighbor, and has had plenty of practice writing happily ever after as her alter ego, Jody Holford.

Review: Hotel of Secrets by Diana Biller

 

Hotel of Secrets by Diana Biller

Publication Date: March 28th 2023 by St. Martin's Griffin  & Dreamscape Media

Pages: 416

Audiobook Length: 13hrs 31min

Narrator: Carlotta Brentan

Source: Publishers

Rating: ★★★★★

Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Audible | Goodreads

My Thoughts:

Maria Wallner is trying to keep her hotel running while turning it back into the dazzling gem it used to be. Not an easy task since her mother ran it into the ground, focused more on her love affair than the hotel or even her daughter. But sabotage and attempts on Maria’s life hinder her efforts.

Eli is sent from the US to Vienna to find out who leaked top secret codes. A suspicious letter was sent from the Hotel Wallner and so he goes there in an undercover mission to investigate. The codes aren’t the only mystery, though. When Eli saves Maria’s life he is compelled to find out who’s behind the attempts to kill her and rule Maria out as a suspect in the espionage plots, as well.

Hotel of Secrets was magical! The writing beautifully described an old world, glamorous Vienna. Maria and her tribe of friends and family were so much fun. Maria is independent and resourceful, forever working out a solution to the many problems that hinder her goals of restoring the hotel to its former glory. Loved that even though she had a mission, she didn’t forget her family and friends.

Eli was focused and methodical in his job and investigations. It was refreshing that Eli was the inexperienced one in the romance department, but that didn’t stop him from using his attention to details and focus into research and he was a quick, thorough study! Maria and Eli’s romance was fun, open, and honest, but also very passionate and sensual! It was spicy, but not overdone. Also enjoyed Eli’s relationship with Maria’s brother, Mac and the French spy, Claude. They were a hoot!

I alternately read an e-copy and listened to the audio version of Hotel of Secrets, and I highly recommend either version! Carlotta Brentan narrated the story, and her accents were lovely! Her performance definitely enhanced this captivating romance! I listened at my usual 1.5x normal speed.

5 Stars

Book Description:

During ball season, anything can happen, even love.

It’s ball season in Vienna, and Maria Wallner only wants one thing: to restore her family’s hotel, the Hotel Wallner, to its former glory. She’s not going to let anything get in her way - not her parents’ three-decade-long affair; not seemingly-random attacks by masked assassins; and especially not the broad-shouldered American foreign agent who’s saved her life two times already. No matter how luscious his mouth is.

Eli Whittaker also only wants one thing: to find out who is selling American secret codes across Europe, arrest them, and go home to his sensible life in Washington, DC. He has one lead - a letter the culprit sent from a Viennese hotel. But when he arrives in Vienna, he is immediately swept up into a chaotic whirlwind of balls, spies, waltzes, and beautiful hotelkeepers who seem to constantly find themselves in danger. He disapproves of all of it! But his disapproval is tested as he slowly falls deeper into the chaos - and as his attraction to said hotelkeeper grows.

Review: Off the Map by Trish Doller

 

Off the Map by Trish Doller

Publication Date: March 7th 2023 by St. Martin's Griffin & Macmillan Audio

Pages: 272

Audio Book Length: 6hrs 37min

Narrator: Sarah Naughton

Source: Publishers

Rating: ★★★★

Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Audible | Goodreads

My Thoughts:

Carla Black has traveled all over the world, so when her best friend, Anna decides to get married in Ireland and asks Carla to be the maid of honor, she doesn’t blink an eye. She’s to meet Eamon Sullivan, Keane’s handsome brother, to hitch a ride with him to the wedding. As soon as they meet there’s an immediate connection, talking, bonding, and physical attraction!

Eamon Sullivan has dreams of traveling around but has never got around to it, so when Carla suggests they take a detour and check out some of the sites he’s longed to visit they end up on a road/camping trip that changes both of them. Carla starts to reconsider her resolve to make no permanent attachments and Eamon takes a hard look at his stationary life. Each have some personal issues to sort out.

Off the Map was a delight from beginning to end! Carla and Eamon’s immediate chemistry was palpable, and I felt part of their personal journey and travels: the beauty, the bumps in the road and the growing attachment they feel. I rooted for their HEA all the way! 

Loved catching up with Anna and Keane from Float Plan, too! It was a lovely sort of epilogue to their story!

I alternately listened to an audio copy and read an e-copy of Off the Map. I highly recommend the audio narrated beautifully by Sarah Naughton! She has a pleasing voice and she performed both American and Irish accents well! I listened at my usual 1.5x normal speed.

4 Stars

Book Description:

On the road to love, you don't need a GPS...

Carla Black’s life motto is “here for a good time, not for a long time.” She’s been travelling the world on her own in her vintage Jeep Wrangler for nearly a decade, stopping only long enough to replenish her adventure fund. She doesn’t do love and she doesn’t ever go home.

Eamon Sullivan is a modern-day cartographer who creates digital maps. His work helps people find their way, but he’s the one who’s lost his sense of direction. He’s unhappy at work, recently dumped, and his one big dream is stalled out—literally.

Fate throws them together when Carla arrives in Dublin for her best friend’s wedding and Eamon is tasked with picking her up from the airport. But what should be a simple drive across Ireland quickly becomes complicated with chemistry-filled detours, unexpected feelings, and a chance at love - if only they choose it.

Review: The Suite Spot by Trish Doller

 

The Suite Spot (Beck Sisters #2) by Trish Doller

Publication Date: March 8th 2022 by Macmillan Audio & St. Martin's Griffin

Pages: 320

Audio Book Length: 7 hrs 42 min

Narrator: Sarah Naughton

Source: Publisher

Rating: ★★★★

Links: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Libro.fm | Audible | Goodreads 

My Thoughts:

Rachel loses the job she’s had for the last ten years as a hotel concierge in one night when a rich entitled jerk doesn’t get his way. All she’s worked hard for seems to have gone up in smoke and she’s faced with taking a job at a budget hotel chain. However, another option presents itself when a friend recommends Rachel to another friend starting up a boutique hotel/lodge on an island off Lake Erie, miles away from Miami Beach. Rachel would have to take a chance and leave the only home she’s ever known in Florida, the father of her child (a total deadbeat dad). I was totally on board with this gamble, especially when the owner/proprietor is revealed to be a hot reclusive guy.

Mason was a good guy, and it was apparent he had a sad past, but this was the perfect situation for Rachel and her three-year-old daughter. Of course, I knew there’d be a romance coming and I couldn’t wait! These two deserved each other and every happiness I hoped was coming. I loved that Rachel found a such a perfect life situation in an unexpected place by making a last minute, sort of impulsive choice by taking a job so far from home. I found the process of starting up the hotel/brewery fascinating! Choosing the layout, theme, and décor, sounded like a lot of fun. I could picture the cabins and brewery, with all its rustic charm and it sounded like a place I’d love to stay!

The Suite Spot was a sweet, easy-going romance. Rachel and Mason were firmly friends before there was romance and I appreciated that strong foundation. It was a low drama romance with the conflict coming from another source. The Suite Spot was book two in the Beck Sisters series, however, you don’t need to read the first book in order to enjoy this installment. It works well as a standalone since it’s focused on a different couple.

I alternately listened and read the book and I thought Sarah Naughton did a fantastic job with both the male and female voices. She also narrated Float Plan, which I thoroughly enjoyed as well. Total recommend! I listened at 1.5-1.7x normal speed.

4 Stars

About the book:

Trish Doller’s The Suite Spot is a charming romance novel about taking a chance on a new life and a new love.

Rachel Beck has hit a brick wall. She’s a single mom, still living at home and trying to keep a dying relationship alive. Aside from her daughter, the one bright light in Rachel’s life is her job as the night reservations manager at a luxury hotel in Miami Beach—until the night she is fired for something she didn’t do.

On impulse, Rachel inquires about a management position at a brewery hotel on an island in Lake Erie called Kelleys Island. When she’s offered the job, Rachel packs up her daughter and makes the cross country move.

What she finds on Kelleys Island is Mason, a handsome, moody man who knows everything about brewing beer and nothing about running a hotel. Especially one that’s barely more than foundation and studs. It’s not the job Rachel was looking for, but Mason offers her a chance to help build a hotel—and rebuild her own life—from the ground up.