Book Review: Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

August 26, 2021September 9, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads8 Comments

Goodreads: Before the Coffee Gets Cold
Publisher: Picador
Published: 19 September 2019
Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Magical Realism

Panda Rating:

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What would you change if you could go back in time?

In a small back alley in Tokyo, there is a café which has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. But this coffee shop offers its customers a unique experience: the chance to travel back in time.

In Before the Coffee Gets Cold, we meet four visitors, each of whom is hoping to make use of the café’s time-travelling offer, in order to: confront the man who left them, receive a letter from their husband whose memory has been taken by early onset Alzheimer’s, to see their sister one last time, and to meet the daughter they never got the chance to know.

But the journey into the past does not come without risks: customers must sit in a particular seat, they cannot leave the café, and finally, they must return to the present before the coffee gets cold…

Book Review: The Sugared Game by K.J. Charles

August 26, 2021September 9, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads7 Comments

Goodreads: The Sugared Game (The Will Darling Adventures #2)
Publisher: KJC Books
Published: 26 August 2020
Genre: Historical Romance, Mystery

Panda Rating:

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It’s been two months since Will Darling saw Kim Secretan, and he doesn’t expect to see him again. What do a rough and ready soldier-turned-bookseller and a disgraced shady aristocrat have to do with each other anyway?

But when Will encounters a face from the past in a disreputable nightclub, Kim turns up, as shifty, unreliable, and irresistible as ever. And before Will knows it, he’s been dragged back into Kim’s shadowy world of secrets, criminal conspiracies, and underhand dealings.

This time, though, things are underhanded even by Kim standards. This time, the danger is too close to home. And if Will and Kim can’t find common ground against unseen enemies, they risk losing everything.

A 1920s m/m romance trilogy in the spirit of Golden Age pulp fiction.

Book Review: Slippery Creatures by K.J. Charles

August 23, 2021September 9, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads10 Comments

Goodreads: Slippery Creatures (The Will Darling Adventures #1)
Publisher: KJC Books
Published: 13 May 2020
Genre: Historical Romance, Mystery

Panda Rating:

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Will Darling came back from the Great War with a few scars, a lot of medals, and no idea what to do next. Inheriting his uncle’s chaotic second-hand bookshop is a blessing…until strange visitors start making threats. First a criminal gang, then the War Office, both telling Will to give them the information they want, or else.

Will has no idea what that information is, and nobody to turn to, until Kim Secretan—charming, cultured, oddly attractive—steps in to offer help. As Kim and Will try to find answers and outrun trouble, mutual desire grows along with the danger.

And then Will discovers the truth about Kim. His identity, his past, his real intentions. Enraged and betrayed, Will never wants to see him again.

But Will possesses knowledge that could cost thousands of lives. Enemies are closing in on him from all sides—and Kim is the only man who can help.

A 1920s m/m romance trilogy in the spirit of Golden Age pulp fiction.

Cover Reveal: Fire & Ash by Heather Frost

August 6, 2021August 6, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads1 Comment

Hello, friends! I’m so excited to be sharing the cover reveal for Fire & Ash by Heather Frost! Fire & Ash is a novella set in the world of the Royal Decoy series. While it is a prequel story, it is best enjoyed after reading Royal Spy.

I’m so excited to check this one out because it’s about Desfan, one of the newest characters we meet in book two of her series and one of my favourites! I can’t wait to learn more about his back story 😍

Check out my reviews for Royal Spy and Royal Decoy!

Goodreads: Fire & Ash (Fate of Eyrinthia 0.5)
Publication Date: 28 October 2021
Genre: Fantasy Romance (Romantasy)

First the flames . . .

When Desfan Cassian, the future ruler of Mortise, skips his fifteenth birthday celebration so he can gamble in the slums, he knows his father won’t be pleased. Then again, the serjan hasn’t been happy with him in years. And while Desfan anticipates a reprimand for his latest transgression, he doesn’t expect to be thrown out of the palace and exiled onto a patrol ship for the next year.

Then from the ashes . . .

Furious to be trapped on the same sea that stole his family four years ago, Desfan is fully prepared to hate his new life. After all, the Phoenix is run by a strict captain, and Desfan’s annoying new bodyguard, Karim, is his constant shadow. But when Desfan learns that a group of dangerous pirates may have been behind the deaths of his mother and sisters, he’s suddenly committed to hunting down the truth—no matter the risk.

He will rise.

ADD tO GOODREADS!

PRE-ORDER NOW!

Blog Tour Review: Bloodlines by Peter Hartog

April 22, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads3 Comments

I’m back with another blog tour with The Storytellers on Tour for Bloodlines by Peter Hartog. Thanks to the author for providing a copy in exchange for an honest review!

Be sure to click on the banner below to check out the rest of the bloggers on tour!

Goodreads: Bloodlines (The Guardian of Empire City #1)
Publication Date: 28 August 2018
Genre: Dystopian Urban Fantasy, Sci-Fi Techno Thriller
Panda Rating:

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When former hotshot homicide detective Tom “”Doc”” Holliday is recruited to join Special Crimes, he trades in his boring desk job for a second chance to do what he does best, hunt down killers. And his first case doesn’t disappoint: a murdered woman with a bogus past, her body drained of blood, and two eyewitnesses wasted on the designer drug goldjoy claiming a vampire did it.

For Holliday is no stranger to the unusual. He wields the Insight, a fickle clairvoyance that allows him to see the dark and terrible things that hide upon his world. After all, when you live in Empire City, where magic and technology co-exist, and humanity endures behind walls of stone and spell-forged steel, anything is possible.

Saddled with a team whose past is as checkered as his own, Holliday embarks upon an investigation that pits them against bio-engineered vampires, interdimensional parasites and the magical masterminds behind it all.

From nightclubs and skyscrapers, to underground drug labs and coffee shops, Holliday’s search for the truth will uncover a shadowy conspiracy that spans the ages, and forces him to confront a destiny he never wanted.

BUY NOW

First Lines Friday – 02 April

April 2, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads7 Comments

Happy Friday book lovers! We’re back with another First Lines Friday, a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines? Here are the rules:

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

First lines:

“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a brilliant idea, conceived and executed by a clever young woman, must be claimed by a man.”

Do you recognize the book these first lines come from?

First Lines Friday – 26 March

March 26, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads8 Comments

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

First lines:

“There’s blood on my hands, blood between my toes, blood speckled in my hair. It’s splashed across my chest, and to my horror, I can taste a few droplets on my lips.
There’s far too much of it staining the kitchen’s polished floors. No one can survive that much blood loss, not even the monster at my feet.”

Do you recognize the book these first lines come from?

Cover Reveal: Royal Spy by Heather Frost

March 19, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads4 Comments

I was delighted when Heather Frost reached out to ask me to take part in the cover reveal for book two in her Fate of Eyrinthia series: Royal Spy!

If you pre-order a copy there’s also an exciting gift (an EXCLUSIVE scene from one of the characters POVs: The Decoy and The Bodyguard) that you can receive once you show proof of purchase. The form to enter for the pre-order gift is linked down below so don’t forget to check it out!

Goodreads: Royal Spy (Fate of Eyrinthia #2)
Publish Date: 20 May 2021
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy/Romance

A DECOY recruited to be a spy.
A PRINCE compelled to become an assassin.
A SERJAH pressured by an unwanted crown.
A WORLD covered in shadows.

Mere months ago, Clare was just a kitchen maid. Now, she is a decoy for Princess Serene and a novice spy, caught in the royal family’s web of secrets. While journeying to Mortise to finalize the princess’s betrothal to Serjah Desfan, Clare lives for the stolen moments she has with Bennick, the bodyguard who is quickly claiming her heart. But when a notorious assassin is hired to kill her, Clare’s life and the alliance hang in the balance.

In Ryden, Grayson prepares to leave for Mortise with his brother, Liam. Their orders are to ignite a war between their enemies, and Grayson has been tasked with assassinating Princess Serene. It may cost his soul, but he is ready to comply, as long as he gets something in return: freedom for Mia, the girl he loves. But the more time he spends with his brother, the more he begins to wonder if Liam is what Grayson wishes he had the courage to be . . . a traitor.

Desfan feels trapped. By his disapproving council, his impending marriage to a stranger, and the imminent arrival of enemy princes who may not want the peace they profess. When a dangerous drug threatens his people, Desfan jumps at the chance to rely on his swords instead of politics. But his investigation uncovers more than he bargained for—a plot that may destroy Mortise from within.

Eyrinthia hovers on the edge of war. Spies. Rebels. Traitors. All must choose a side.

PRE-ORDER LINKS: Amazon

ENTER TO RECEIVE THE PRE-ORDER GIFT ➡️ here!

Read the first book Royal Decoy (Fate of Eyrinthia #1) today! Available on Kindle Unlimited. You can also check out my review for book one.

First Lines Friday – 12 March

March 13, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads2 Comments

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

First lines:

“I saw my mother raise a man from the dead. “It still didn’t help him much, my love,” she told me. But I saw her do it all the same. That’s how I knew she was magic.”

Do you recognize the book these first lines come from?

First Lines Friday – 05 March

March 5, 2021June 23, 2021 Dini @ dinipandareads13 Comments

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

First lines:

“My first dive was followed by my first drink of rye. The sea was filled with the sound of gemstones as I swam, following my mother’s silhouette toward the puddle of light rippling on the surface of the water.”