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Last week I did my top 5 non-fiction favorite books. This week, the fiction ones. And you’ll be surprised that they’re not all romance books (!).

1. THE SEVEN HUSBANDS OF EVELYN HUGO Aging and reclusive Hollywood movie icon Evelyn Hugo is finally ready to tell the truth about her glamorous and scandalous life. But when she chooses unknown magazine reporter Monique Grant for the job, no one is more astounded than Monique herself. Why her? Why now. Monique is not exactly on top of the world. Her husband has left her, and her professional life is going nowhere. Regardless of why Evelyn has selected her to write her biography, Monique is determined to use this opportunity to jumpstart her career. Summoned to Evelyn’s luxurious apartment, Monique listens in fascination as the actress tells her story. From making her way to Los Angeles in the 1950s to her decision to leave show business in the ‘80s, and, of course, the seven husbands along the way, Evelyn unspools a tale of ruthless ambition, unexpected friendship, and a great forbidden love. Monique begins to feel a very real connection to the legendary star, but as Evelyn’s story near its conclusion, it becomes clear that her life intersects with Monique’s own in tragic and irreversible ways.
2. PRIDE AND PREJUDICE  Do I really need to synopsis this one? LOL
3. NAKED IN DEATH The first EVE DALLAS book.
   In the year 2058, technology completely rules the world. But for New York City Detective Eve Dallas, one irresistible impulse still rules the heart: passion…
   
   Eve Dallas is a New York police lieutenant hunting for a ruthless killer. In over ten years on the force, she’s seen it all—and knows her survival depends on her instincts. And she’s going against every warning telling her not to get involved with Roarke, an Irish billionaire—and a suspect in Eve’s murder investigation. But passion and seduction have rules of their own, and it’s up to Eve to take a chance in the arms of a man she knows nothing about—except the addictive hunger of needing his touch.
4. New York TO DALLAS My favorite of the series. When a monster named Isaac McQueen—taken down by Eve back in her uniform days—escapes from Rikers, he has two things in mind. One is to take up where he left off, abducting young victims and leaving them scarred in both mind and body. The other is to get revenge on the woman who stopped him all those years ago.
    
5. ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS ( Novella) my favorite Christmas romance. Identical twin boys Zeke and Zach only want one gift from Santa this year: a new wife for their lonely single dad, Mac Taylor, a builder who fixes things up in their small town. But convincing their love-wary dad that their music teacher, Nell Davis, is not only part of Santa’s plan, but Mac’s soul mate, isn’t quite as easy as they’d hoped…
6. FRENCH SILK , My favorite Sandra Brown book. When she becomes a murder suspect, a New Orleans beauty and lingerie tycoon must share her most deeply buried secrets with a disturbingly handsome district attorney in order to clear her name.
   
   Like the city of New Orleans itself, Claire Laurent is a vibrant beauty laced with mystery. As the founder of French Silk, a fabulous lingerie company, she has fought hard to achieve worldwide success. Then a TV evangelist attacks French Silk’s erotic sleepwear as sinful. And when he is killed, Claire becomes the prime suspect.
   
   District Attorney Robert Cassidy knows Claire is damning herself with lie after lie about the murder, even as he feels her drawing him into her world and her very soul. But neither Cassidy nor her protests of innocence can save Claire unless she reveals a shocking truth — one she has sworn to take to the grave . . .

Okay, so it’s 6 but one of them is a novella so that only counts for half, lol!

Today, I’m sharing my five favorite books so far in 2023…

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid

Happy Place, Emily Henry

Same time Next Summer, Annabel Monaghan

Nora Goes off Script, Annabel Monaghan

Did You hear about Kitty Karr, Crystal Smith Paul

Now…you.

It’s 11 weeks today since my mom’s passing.

I don’t cry every day anymore, but still find myself, at times, getting weepy for what seems like no reason. Watching t.v., making dinner. Nothing tangible to put the sadness on to. Just…grief.

Life has moved on.

Case in point, I closed on my parent’s house recently.

Miraculously, it sold. I say miraculously, because, in all honesty, I never thought it would.

Shows you how wrong I can be about stuff.

My parents lived in 2 trailers/mobile homes during the past 20+ years. The first one was destroyed during Hurricane Irene. They were left homeless.

I didn’t know this. It occurred during the time frame my mother and I weren’t in communication. When we reconnected she told me about how they watched the water from the nearby creek rush under their front door. In no time at all they were standing in a foot of it. No time to pack anything. They were evacuated by the local fire department and could only bring the clothes on their backs. Luckily, my mother had the foresight to grab all their personal papers.

For three days they were put up in a local motel, wearing the same clothes, depending on the kindness of the Red Cross for food, and then allowed to go back to their home once the water receded.

Not much survived the flood. Some clothing, their mattress. The rest was destroyed by water damage.

As luck would have it, FEMA gave them money and they found another trailer, where they lived for the last 16 years of their lives, until circumstances made it impossible for them to do so anymore.

I’m ashamed to say this but the thought of them living in what was a glorified ( and not really all that nice) trailer made me a little…well…embarrassed. And I hear in my head how horrible, elitist, and prejudicial that sounds. There’s absolutely nothing wrong or shameful about living in a mobile home.

Nothing.

But…it was just another facet of their lifestyle that made me realize how poor they really were. I think that’s the thing that shames me most of all. Their relative poverty. For all my life and all their adult lives and marriage, they could never get ahead financially. They lived paycheck to paycheck and sometimes not even that long. They didn’t live an extravagant life, either. No cars, no vacations. The cheapest food. It was simply the cost of living out-cost their take-home pay.

“New” clothes were purchased at the Salvation Army. My mother took to wearing shoes that were a size too small for her simply because they “looked nice” and were only a quarter. All she could afford.

When I was clearing and cleaning out their house so they could move into the nursing home I saw their bed, unmade, for the first time. There was a huge depression in the center so that no matter what side you were on, you rolled to it. My mother said they’d brought the bed with them from Brooklyn, bought when they were newly married.

They hadn’t lived in Brooklyn since 1968. That meant their mattress was over 55 years old.

Think about that for a moment and then think about your own, comfortable, probably NOT 55-year-old mattress.

And then think about the fact that mattress survived a flood.

She suffered through, and survived, so much in her life. I wish I had been more understanding, more compassionate about all her mental and emotional issues.

I wish I had been a better person; a more empathetic, understanding daughter.

A better human.

11 weeks. Still so raw.