100 books like Meant to Be

I have read all the Winston Brother novels this author wrote, but Beard Science is my favorite. Cletus is an oddball hillbilly who meets his match in Jennifer Sylvester. Thanks to Reid's compelling storytelling, this bearded self-professed weirdo is my favorite romantic character. As a fan of hilarious romance novels with atypical heroes, this book was up my alley. And because Cletus is part of a new series, I didn't have to say goodbye to the character for some time.

This is a heartwarming, emotional small-town romance with a wounded hero (Leo) and a gamer girl heroine (Hannah). Leo and Hannah meet through their online alter egos and I love the fact they were able to develop a beautiful friendship that’s free of the complications of real life (where Leo is afraid to leave his family’s winery and Hannah is in an abusive relationship). 

When their online and actual lives meet, Leo busts free of his comfort zone to help Hannah. Their love story is real, raw, and uplifting. They help each other grow, which left me feeling warm on the inside. The ensemble cast (primarily Leo’s family) is enchanting and funny. Hidden Miles is a perfect blend of emotion and humor.

I relate to the characters in Tease so much. Hutton is a billionaire with social anxiety. People think he’s aloof, but in reality, he’s never sure what to say. As someone with mild social anxiety myself, I loved seeing my own experiences reflected in his struggles. Not to mention, he’s a sweet, good-hearted man. 

Felicity is the kind of heroine you can’t help but like. She’s a bit of a hot mess, but she’s endearing and tries really hard. She also has a habit of stress-cutting her hair. As someone who currently has bangs because I got stressed out earlier in the year and took a pair of scissors to my hair (never a good idea!), I felt both seen and called out by this character trait.

In Wrecked Palace, Catherine Cowles has created the type of characters you can’t help but adore. Caelyn dropped everything to raise her three younger siblings after her mother was arrested and her father disappeared. She’s loving, optimistic, and I’d love to have her as a friend. 

Griffin also experienced a traumatic event that changed his life, during which he lost his family. He’s determined to lock himself away from everyone and everything. His pain is so well written that my heart hurt for him.

Caelyn can’t stay away from any wounded creature, and it’s absolutely beautiful to see Griffin open up to her and her siblings. On a side note, Caelyn’s siblings are wonderful all on their own.

If you’ve ever heard that the “marshmallow research” shows that the ability to delay gratification aged 3 determines your life success and skills later, this book will put you right! It is far more positive, interesting and practical than that and you need to read the whole book, not just the headlines. There are techniques you can put into practice to improve your (and your family’s) habits in relation to pretty much anything. I use it to help develop healthy screen-time behaviours – for myself, too! And I refer to it regularly when giving talks and training to teachers and parents.  

I was drawn to the setting and the plot of this book. The main character Zoey has inherited her mother’s condominium on Mallow Island off the South Carolina coast.

Zoey’s mother died when Zoey was a child, so she is anxious to make some connection with her mother by seeing what she left behind in a condominium the mother stayed in alone throughout her married life from time to time.

Since I was never close to my own mother, I wanted to go on this journey with Zoey who has a delightful, invisible pet, a bird named Pigeon. At The Dellawisp condos, Zoey discovers magical turquoise birds that watch everything. They enter condos at will and steal random objects, hanging them in courtyard trees. Those little devils!

She meets the other residents, including three ghosts, all with their own mysteries to solve. A cast of characters that bond in friendship… show more.

There is no better book on Thanksgiving for young children than Phyllis Alsdurf’s Thanksgiving in the Woods, which recounts the true story of the annual holiday dinner that a group of family and friends celebrate in the woods of upstate New York. Gorgeous illustrations by Jenny Lovlie evoke the famous First Thanksgiving of 1621, when Pilgrims and Indians enjoyed a three-day harvest feast in the woods of New England. Four hundred years later, the meaning of the holiday remains the same. As Thanksgiving in the Woods explains, Thanksgiving is about faith, family, and friends. 

Lorna Landvik captures your attention with entertaining and provocative characters who have endearing qualities that also can challenge us to look at our own lives. She writes with humor, race, and has a style that will draw you in. Many of her books have stories that take you off guard and make you laugh hysterically.

This is a bittersweet comedy of manners in which John le Carré ventures way beyond the spy novels for which he is more famous. For lovers of spy novels—and I am one such—there is much here to savour. Le Carré draws upon the French concept of the naïve – as paired with the sentimental by the German essayist Friedrich Schiller—to inform and enliven the telling of a tale about a love triangle in middle England. Underlying the comic idiom of the novel is an acid dissection of the causes of British failure to be a part of Europe and to help lead Europe out of her darkness. A tale, perhaps, for our times. 

This novel exemplifies parenting fiction in my mind. It takes a concept I could’ve read about in a nonfiction parenting book (how to handle teenage drinking) and slides it into a compelling narrative that realistically depicts all the potential complexities and nuances in the parenting decisions and how they might play out, including several factors and consequences related to teen alcohol use and parent-sponsored parties that I would’ve never thought of myself.