amazing, show stopping and I can't stop thinking on how amazing and telling this book is. I really like this book. this book made think a lot about sisterhood and, friendship is so important to me and the way this women care so much about each other and I just want to be able to find more friendship like that the way the support each other is one in a kind,

This book turned out to not be what I expected from the title. No cozy bookstore mystery (or romance), but a slightly over the top soap opera. The characters are all flawed, immature, and overly dramatic and treat each other poorly. But, the book is well written and I ended enjoying the ride.

From the very first chapter of this book, was clear that things were going to go sideways fast. However, for as predictable place as it started, The elemental groundwork continued to keep coming back around and be a main theme throughout.
Four friends who love books, and have gotten together for book club for years, Decide to open their own bookstore, have money down and are ready to start the process of opening. They are mostly all in a great place and are willing to support the friend who is not in the best place. They have all their ducks in a row, So clearly something has to happen to the ducks and the row and the idea perfection, friendship, sisterhood.

This book covered so much about what it means to be a family, forgiveness, personal faults, friendship, supporting each other, the way you show that support, mental health, overcoming past failures... All with a backdrop of books and literature.

#arc
#netgalley
#thebookshopsisterhood

This book kind of felt like the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants for grown ups. I liked seeing how their stories flowed separately and together. The references to other books were fun too.

My main issue with the book was that it was pretty boring for me. It just never fully grabbed my attention. I did like the characters though and the premise seemed like a dream - owning a bookstore with your friends. Ultimately, this was a pleasant skim read for me.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

thank you netgalley for the e-arc. this one did not hit with me, maybe it will for others. i chose this title for the fact it's called "bookshop sisterhood". where is the bookshop in the story?? i also thought the supporting characters were just dumb, no common sense or critical thinking whatsoever. these people would never associate irl.

Ummm... me and this book aren't friends.

As a former bookseller and a member of a tight friend group, nothing in The Bookshop Sisterhood made sense to me. Four best friends meet at the beginning of the year to celebrate and plan to implement their dream of opening a bookstore together. Sounds like a perfect scenario. Then, every single one of their lives starts to fall apart and creates tension within the group. Tons of juicy drama. Still could be good, but:

- Way too much namedropping of other popular books. To the point that it took me out of the story because it made the dialogue unbelievable.

-Not a single member of the friend group made wise decisions. Not one. There's usually at least one level-headed, voice of reason to talk some sense into her girlfriends. Nope. When faced with a dilemma, or stressful situation, they all picked the choice that would bring even more stress. And, trust me, some of this stuff was just plain stupid

Loved the premise and direction of this book but unfortunately found myself skimming through some parts. While it was an enjoyable read, it just wasn’t what I was expecting. I love reading books about books which is why I was initially excited for this ARC. That’s where I wish the book was a little different: more about the bookshop/bookish content and less drama because there was literally always something happening.

I really wanted to love this book! Seriously, a book about four friends, each with their own strengths and challenges bound together by their love of books. It sounded perfect. However, while I liked the book, I found the drama surrounding each of the characters a little too much. I typically enjoy stories that reference great books and authors but again, just a little too much. Thanks #NetGalley

Many thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing MIRA Books for gifting me a digital ARC of the new book by Michelle Lindo-Rice. All opinions expressed in this review are my own - 4 stars!

Celeste, Yasmeen, Toni and Leslie are the best of friends. They are finally close to achieving their dream of opening a bookstore together when each of the friends finds their personal lives blowing up. Will their friendship be strong enough to sustain them?

I love books about books and bookstores! This one delves mostly into the lives of these four friends and the personal issues each face. There's a lot of issues too - infertility, adultery, money issues, and more - and sometimes things get a bit confusing, but basically we can all relate to life interfering with our plans. A good read about the importance of friendship!

This book was not what I expected. I thought the focus would be on the four friends getting the bookshop opened. Instead it's about the drama in their lives. The bookshop was an afterthought. There's so much going on in these women's lives there's no room for the writer to focus on the bookshop. I hoped for an easy read but this was too heavy for me to finish. Sadly is a dnf for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Harlequin for this ARC.

Wow, what an exhilarating journey! Initially, I anticipated a cozy and book-centric experience when I requested this read, envisioning a gathering of bookworms bonding over literary conversations and sharing their insightful wisdom (which did have a presence). However, it quickly veered into full-fledged soap opera territory! Drama with a capital D.

The dynamics within the so-called "sisterhood" were undeniably toxic. Constant clashes, secretive behaviors, and a series of questionable choices characterized their interactions.

Here comes the interesting part – I was captivated! Despite not typically gravitating towards soap operas, this book had me utterly engrossed. The exaggerated drama was irresistibly compelling, akin to witnessing a train wreck – you know it's not right to revel in it, yet you can't tear your eyes away.

There is just SO much going on in this book. I felt very confused, the timeline seemed all over the place and just didn’t make a whole lot of sense. I wasn’t a fan of this book or the writing.
All of the characters had so much going on, I feel like a lot of little details got overshadowed by all the bigger details.

Like many other reviewers, I thought this book was mainly going to focus on four friends opening a book store together. The book shop plot is definitely secondary to everything else that these women face in this book!

From a child’s illness & an adoption reveal, to a separation, past secrets coming out of the woodwork, money troubles, relationship woes, fertility challenges and a lottery win - it’s no wonder there didn’t seem to be enough time for getting their business off the ground.

I wanted to enjoy this book more than I did. I appreciate stories of people who are facing different challenges, but I found these characters tough to love and didn’t enjoy their friendship dynamic.

Thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for an opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Took 5 years off of my life but in the best way. These four friends couldn’t be more different from each other, but they’re the perfect blend together. I appreciate that they fight like sisters and keep it 100% real.

Their struggles vary from divorce, a haunting past and fertility issues, money troubles, and family illness. All big content warnings. As someone who is triggered by money issues, that’s what kept my heart pumping, especially at the end! This story moves at a great pace. The author does a great job of giving us the details in a way where we get to know the characters and can still be entertained!

Some of these women are better than I am, because any Pookie in my life would be a pat tense!

Truly a sisterhood. The cover makes it seem like it’ll be cozy conflicts — nope!! Loved it nonetheless and anyone with a long time friend group would love this. Would absolutely recommend :)

Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for this book in exchange for an honest review.

I want to start this review by thanking Netgalley, Harlequin Trade Publishing, and Michelle Lindo-Rice for gifting me with a digital copy of The Bookshop Sisterhood in return for an honest review. I was completely drawn in by not only the cover of the book but the blurb for the book. Everything points to this book being something that I would gobble up. So, needless to say, when I got approval to read it, I was ecstatic. I mean, seriously, who doesn’t love a book about friendship and books? This story was not what I was expecting, but to be fair, I am not sure what I was expecting. Let me jump into my review, and I will do my best not to include spoilers, but as always, if there are any, I will give you fair warning.

This book had so much going on, and the drama was YIKES a lot. In this story, we are following four friends: Yasmeen, Leslie, Toni, and Celeste. These characters irritated me to no end, which I will get into in a bit. These four women are in their thirties and have been friends for fifteen years. It is their dream to open a bookshop together since they are such big readers. Their book club is what has kept them together throughout the years and during life’s ups and downs. No matter what went on in their lives, they would always meet to discuss the book club pick and catch up on life. I thought that this book would be all for female friendship, with them wanting to open a bookshop and all, but I found their friendship to be somewhat toxic. They often picked one another apart and got in backhanded jabs, all while still being friendly with one another for the most part. Let me break down these characters for you before I go on much further. This section may contain spoilers, so skip the characters section if you do not want to see anything that might contain spoilers. The spoilers will be small and only used to help me make my point about these characters.

Yasmeen lives with her folks and is a college dropout. She dropped out of school because she had such a hard time with the coursework due to a learning disability, which she refuses to be tested for or even acknowledge. She is dating a man who wants to attend culinary school but is trapped in the cycle of hanging with the wrong crowd. He is constantly trying to bum money from Yasmeen, but the problem lies in the fact that she does not have any. Yasmeen and her family are struggling to even keep the lights on in their home, especially since her father has become disabled. Money is always tight for her, and she often relies on her wealthy friends (girls, as she calls them) to help her out. All of these things really made me feel for Yasmeen until she won the lottery, and then her stupidity and choices drove me up the wall. The mistakes she made to me are so in your face, and I could not understand how it was that she couldn’t see them.

Celeste is happily married to her college sweetheart (or maybe high school) and living the dream. They have a lovely home, drive fancy vehicles, have a nice savings account/assets, and both enjoy their jobs. Their lives seem to be going perfectly until one night, fifteen or so months prior, they are victims in a car hijacking. Celeste is held at gunpoint while the two men beat her husband and use racial slurs before leaving to escape the cops. One would think that an experience like this would bring the couple closer together; however, that is not the case because Celeste refuses to go to therapy. Her husband begs her to go and eventually gives her an ultimatum. The thing that got me about Celeste is that she is willing to lose the man that she loves because she does not want to help herself. Even with the urging of her friends, she still refuses to get the help she needs. She suffers from severe Anxiety and PTSD from that night, which is completely understandable, and it makes me feel for her. It really does, but her refusal to get help drove me crazy.

Leslie is a stay-at-home mom to her twelve (or maybe it was ten) year-old daughter while her husband works in pharmaceuticals. Her life appears to be perfect from the outside, with a beautiful home, a talented daughter, and a hard-working husband, but trust me when I say all is not what it seems. Leslie enjoys an orderly life, but when someone she loves falls deathly ill, a secret is revealed that threatens to upend her whole world. The stress Leslie is put under is enough to break a person even before the secret is revealed. I am not going to reveal this secret, but I will say that I think she did a terrible job of handling the situation, and it infuriated me. When a second secret comes to light, it again turns Leslie’s life upside down, but this time, I can say I think she handled part of it really well. This secret is kind of a two-part deal, and for me, the main part of it she handled well, but the delivery part of it not so much.

Toni is a social influencer who has recently become engaged to the man of her dreams. There is only one little problem: he does not know the real Toni, and frankly, neither do her friends. Toni made some very bad choices as a teen, which led to her leaving her home in New York and ending up in Delaware. She made some choices that are not staying in her past but threatening to bring down the life that she now lives. Instead of asking for help from her boyfriend and her long-time friends, she decides it is best to lie to them and try and figure it out on her own. This is not the only secret that Toni has been keeping from her boyfriend; she also recently got some devastating news that will change the future that they want together. I found Toni annoying because she had so many opportunities to share her secrets with her loved ones but refused to do so, allowing them to build up in her mind all the more. Toni always wants to be there for her friends, but when it comes to her and her problems, she does not trust them enough to see and love her despite her past. She simply did not trust them or her boyfriend; she never wanted to give them a chance to get to know her beyond what she presented to them until her past crept in to destroy her and everything she had worked so hard for.

I thought this story was going to be about four friends opening a bookstore together and their day-to-day lives. I did not expect that this story would be about all their drama, lies, and picking at one another. I think that each one of these characters could have a story written just about themselves with the amount of drama each one was carrying. If you love a story filled with drama and secrets, then I think that this story would be right for you. If you are looking for a story about women opening a bookshop, and that is the main focus of the story, then I am afraid that you might be disappointed. Did I enjoy reading this book? I think I did, but for me, it was more of a how stupid can they get kind of a read rather than a rooting for them kind of a read. This is my first book by this author, and I hope to pick more up from her in the future.

Again, I want to thank Netgalley, Harlequin Trade Publishing, and Michelle Lindo-Rice for gifting me a digital copy of The Bookshop Sisterhood in exchange for an honest review. Everything I have written above is completely my own thoughts and opinions.

Trigger Warnings:

Gang Member Talk
Racisms
Car Hijacking
Violence/ Being Held At Gun Point
Divorce
Gambling Addiction
Sick Child With Hospital Scenes
Arrest
Strained Parent/Child Relationship Due To Life Choices
Adoption

I think you will like this book if you enjoyed the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Jane the Virgin, and First Wives Clubs. It has high drama and comradery/sisterhood throughout this read. I am a mood reader and recommend reading the book with friends in the spring or at the end of summer. There are some great moments that you would want to discuss with others. Book Club Anyone?!

Overall, the book is good and I hope you all enjoy it.

Thank you, #Netgalley and #HTP, for eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This book gives adult Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants friendship vibes.

Celeste, Toni, Leslie, and Yasmeen are a close knit group of friends in Delaware whose friendship is centered around their monthly book club. Now, as they make moves to open their own Bookshop together, each of them has major drama unfold that may threaten their collective dream.

I grew quite attached to the diverse group of characters but I gotta admit, I also had a fair bit of secondhand anxiety as I spent a lot of time mentally screaming at each of them to stop making stupid choices at various points in the book 😅

I love books about bookstores. Four friends come together to open their dream bookstore. On the week it’s supposed to open, each one other friends is going through something big. Now more than ever they have to lean on each other to get through.

This book is full of twists, turns, and the unexpected. The story follows four best friends ready to make their dreams come true by opening a bookstore. Instead, they encounter some of the biggest surprises of their lives. They have to figure out how to work together to overcome their challenges and work on new opportunities. Thank you Harlequin Trade Publishing for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

The Bookshop Sisterhood by Michelle Londo-Rice is about four long time friends who love books and decide to open their own bookshop. However, as things with the business get rolling, each friend has drama come up in her life.

I enjoyed this book, but it wasn’t what I expected. The bookshop storyline was almost secondary to the things that go on with each woman and with their relationships with each other. Still a fun read that I think readers will enjoy.