Cocktails & Conversation

We are going back to Sunken Meadow for our 4th Annual Summer Beach Reads! Please bring something to sit on and meet us at the boardwalk by Concession Stand, where there's food/beverages/wine available. And we haven't lost a member yet!

1st STOP - HOPE FALLS, ENGLAND 🇬🇧

Eden Fox and her husband recently moved into Spyglass, an enchanting old house in Hope Falls. A pretty village on the coast. She's an artist and before her first exhibition, sets off for a run. When she returns home, nothing is as it should be. Her key doesn’t fit. A woman, eerily similar to her, answers the door. And this stranger insists that she is the wife.

One house. One husband. Two women. Someone is lying.

Six months earlier . . . There is this shady London clinic that claims to be able to predict a person’s date of death. And after visiting, she feels compelled to right some old wrongs . . .
[mashed-up publisher blurbs]

310 pgs
Thriller/Mystery

Join us as we dive into this twisty, character-driven thriller about family-secrets, small-town judgment, and how you define justice.

2nd STOP - MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA 🇦🇺

Meet Mad Mabel. She knows where the bodies are buried . . .

Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick has lived on her picture-perfect street longer than anyone. Few would suspect that this eighty-one year old has a dark past, or was known by a very different name. Because when it comes to murder, no one ever suspects little girls or old ladies. And Elsie has kept her secret buried for decades.

Enter a new neighbor with a daughter. A relentless little chatterbox who has just moved in across the street (armed with stickers, questions, and no sense of personal boundaries) and desperate to be friends.

Elsie has a strange history of people in her life coming to a foul end. So when a neighbor turns up dead, whispers swirl around her. Who was Mad Mabel fifty years ago? Who is Elsie Fitzpatrick today? And if history repeats itself…

Well, Mabel does what she’s always done best, and takes matters into her own hands.

Is she a cantankerous old lady with a shady past? A cold-blooded killer with arthritis? Or just someone who's ready to tell her side of the story?
[mashed-up publisher blurbs]

352 pgs
Thriller/Mystery

While this heart-pounding thriller won the vote, I urge everyone to read all of the books listed (“Dear Debbie” by Frieda McFadden lost by 1 vote! And “Yesteryear” by Caro Claire Burke).
Join us to discuss this edge-of-your-seat story that’ll have you questioning your friendships. And shadows . . .

FINAL STOP - THE DEVIL'S STAIRCASE, WASHINGTON STATE

If you can’t trust your best friend, who can you trust?

Lifelong friends Allie (a bold travel influencer) and Tess (a claustrophobic legal assistant) finally take that caving vacation. But their adventure begins with tension when they're harassed by a guy and Allie tosses back an insult. As they descend deeper into the Earth, the women realize they’re not alone.

Soon, they’re trapped inside a narrow cave, hundreds of feet underground, fighting to stay alive.

24 hrs later, a hospitalized Tess tells her story to police and discovers her best friend had a much darker side than known. Allie’s true motives unravel in shocking ways. Maybe, the brutal attack wasn’t so random after all.

Who was Allie, really? Why did this man target them? And did Tess leave the danger behind when she escaped the cave?

323 pgs
suspense/thriller