Nashville Eats by Jennifer Justus

Growing up in Nashville I was very interested in what was in Nashville Eats. I was pleasantly surprised to see some old family favorites. My mother rarely used a recipe so I didn't learn to cook some of these old southern favorites but this books clearly gives recipes for many of the favorites I grew up eating. It did not particularly read like a cookbook which I liked. I enjoyed the stories that went behind many of the recipes. I have several bookmarked that I'm wanting to try. Loved reading some of the history behind the recipes.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing me a digital copy of this book to review.

Playing with Fire by Tess Gerritsen

Playing with Fire is a stand alone novel by Tess Gerritsen.  This one does not have her Rizzio and Isles characters. I was not sure if I would enjoy this book with out Maura and Jane in it but this book did not disappoint. It kept me in suspense from the first chapter. Tess Gerritsen is a physician and has always had science behind her novel.  Until the very end I had thought she had gone the way of Stephen King with unexplained things happening to Julie Ansell. Julie was a gifted violinist and had purchased some unpublished sheet music while in Italy. Strange things started happening with her daughter every time she played the piece.

This novel has a dual storyline, the present with Julie and the past which is before World War II started with a Jewish family living in Italy. The father was a Luthier in Italy but the tragic story centered around Lorenzo and Laura. I can't comment too much on the past storyline as it will give too much of the storyline away. All I say is that the past and the future come together in the end.

I thought all the characters were well-developed. The characters were written in such a way that you started to care about them right away. The story was clean.  No sexual situations. Only some chaste kisses. The language was pretty clean also. Only three times where the character in the modern story used curse words.

Thanks to Netgalley and Ballatine books for furnishing me an digital copy of this book to read and review. This book is due for release on Ocotber 27.