54 books like Bet Your Bottom Dollar

This is a wonderful story about romance, a touch of suspense, and second-chance love. The heroine, Gianna, comes home after three failed engagements, suffers the gossip of the town, and runs into her childhood boyfriend, Zach. She’s gun-shy about getting involved with him again but can’t deny her feelings.

He’s thrilled to see her, and intense feelings ignite between them while he is recovering from a tragedy of his own. The story is beautiful and touching as they help each other heal. I loved this book and recommend it.

The title made me curious about this book but I wasn't sure what to expect.

What I found was an interesting cast of characters. The strong-willed heroine tried to use lists and logic to control her emotions (something I might have done a time or two). The hero was swoon-worthy in both physical and personality terms. There was a mystery that reached deep into the past.

The story played out with humor, emotion, and a strong sense of the Southern. All things I love in a novel.

I first heard about this author when she was interviewed on the Self Publishing Author podcast.

During the interview, she said her books were set in small towns in the South, which caught my attention. Then she shared that she'd gotten comments from readers pointing out grammatical errors in the dialogue of characters in her books. As soon as I heard this, I knew I had to read one of her books.

You see, my characters don't always speak proper English either. So I read this book, loved it, and quickly read more. Set in my home state of Tennessee, When You Got a Good Thing was exactly what I hoped it would be, and more. The characters were well written and realistic and their story touched my heart. 

This book took me on a journey that was both heart-wrenching and heart-warming.

Once I started reading, I was hooked. This romance is not what I expected. Both the heroine and hero had faced tragedy, and the book took me back in time as they remembered the things that completely changed the course of their lives.

By each asking the other just one thing at a time, the story took shape. Slowly, painfully, together they took the road forward and found comfort in each other. As comfort turned into love it was a gift neither ever expected. This small-town novel is absolutely unforgettable.

I love this book mainly because the main character is an ordinary young woman with grit who defies all hostility in Missouri during the Civil War, including neighbors who turn against her.

I went through lots of emotions with this character during her journey to finding love, from anger and trepidation to wonder and exhilaration. The setting, historical context, and unsentimental yet tender and poetic writing make this book a triumph. 

This book grew out of a 2014 exhibition to mark the 75th anniversary of Gone With the Wind. The exhibition included rarely-seen material from the archives of producer David O. Selznick and his business partner John Hay “Jock” Whitney. So even if you've read one of the handful of previous books about the making of this movie classic there is much here that is new. The behind-the-scenes deals, battles with the censors, and the controversies surrounding the film are all covered in this fascinating book.

This book provides an excellent overview of Atlanta’s rise from humble beginnings as a rail hub before the Civil War to a thriving commercial center by the end of the century. Russell argues that the war accelerated Atlanta’s commercial and industrial development, but its path was already set before General William T. Sherman’s army arrived during the Civil War. White business elites dominated city politics until the election of Atlanta’s first Black mayor, Maynard Jackson, in 1973.

Founded as a rail center in the 1830s, Atlanta was dependent on commercial ties with the North which explains the city’s Unionism before the Civil War. In the pivotal election of 1860 where Lincoln carried the northern states and a “southern rights” candidate carried the deep South, Atlantans voted overwhelmingly for Unionist candidates John Bell and Stephen A. Douglas. Although their numbers diminished after secession, a small cadre of Unionists remained in the city during the war, including Cyrena Stone, whose secret (and fascinating) diary is both a major source for and an appendix in this book.

I can not recommend this series more. I absolutely love Kate Daniels's post-post-apocalyptic world of Sifters and Vampires. The magic system is so creative and not so blatant like some urban fantasies.

I personally loved the idea that this era of urban fantasies took off with the “The world ended, and now this is what became of society” trope; it became a huge influence on me and my own world-building. 

This book looks at Atlanta’s role in the emergence of a “New South” and the way that journalist and civic leader Henry Grady used the story of Atlanta’s wartime burning and destruction and its postwar rebuilding to rebrand the city. While supporting segregation in the South, Grady urged northern Whites to invest in the New South economy and denied that the region had a race problem. Black Atlantans presented an alternate narrative, one that emphasized the war as a first step in the fight for freedom and equality. The Atlanta Race Riot of 1906 left Grady’s New South concept “tattered and frayed”; the term was seldom used after that.