In May I had both a trip to London (long trains journeys!) and a holiday with a mix of flights and downtime. So, as predicted, I got a fair bit of reading done - and here's everything I read in May, with my usual quickfire reviews and ratings out of five...
Last Call by Lainey Davis
I grabbed this for free on Stuff Your Kindle Day, which is always a bit of a mixed bag, but I liked this one a fair bit. We follow Esther, who marries Koa - he needs a green card, she needs money to open her bar. Now he's back in the picture to sort some paperwork, and she's wondering if it's really just a business arrangement after all... It's a sweet story, super easy to read, but sadly the spice was sooooo cringe and badly done. 3.5 stars from me.
Wild Love by Elsie Silver
Ahead of my recent cruise I downloaded this whole series on KU, so I really hoped I'd fall in love - and I did. Wild Love follows billionaire music producer Ford, who has always had a soft spot for his best friend's sister Rosie; now she's back in town in need of a job, and he can't keep his hands to himself. Good job the feeling is mutual. Oh and there's a teenager claiming to be Ford's child. What could go wrong? This was seriously very lovely, a lot of fun, good spice and a brilliant start to the series. 4 stars!
Wild Eyes by Elsie Silver
Next up, book two - we meet West (brother of Rosie & best friend of Ford from book one) and Skylar. He's a doting dad and she's a pop star on the verge of a breakdown who finds herself in their small town with nowhere to stay. Again, the spice is phenomenal but the relationship that grows alongside it is genuinely so beautiful too. I liked this one even more, as we really start to develop more of a feel for Rose Hill and its inhabitants. 5 stars.
Wild Side by Elsie Silver
Book three of the Rose Hill series follows Tabitha and Rhys, who we've seen hints of in the previous two books - starting off as enemies contesting custody of Tabitha's nephew, they hatch a plan to get married (despite "really not liking each other") to keep things settled for this little boy. Also Rhys is a wrestler on TV which was so random but really cool to read about. Lots of yearning and tension. Very good spice. Honestly what I can say, Elsie Silver does it again! 5 stars.
Wild Card by Elsie Silver
The final book in the series made it hard to say goodbye to Rose Hill and the characters I had now grown so attached to - we're following fire pilot Sebastien and his estranged son's ex girlfriend Gwen, who is a yoga teacher. SO many good tropes; chance meeting, wrong number, son's (ex) girlfriend, age gap, small town... god it was fantastic. Another 5 stars - I thoroughly enjoyed this series and preferred it to the Chestnut Springs series!
I'm Gonna Get You Back by Eva Des Lauriers
This was a Netgalley ARC, and it's a YA story which teeters on the edge of romance and mystery - it follows an elite group of students who were all hoping for a 'Legacy' spot in their small town ahead of college, but one of them gets sabotaged. Now that all the Legacy students are back in town, she enlists her sort-of-ex-boyfriend to try and get to the bottom of who did it... I really liked this and gave it 4 stars.
Someone is Lying by Jenny Blackhurst
My wife found this for me in the bathroom on our cruise (random) and it made a nice change from reading on my Kindle while we were away. This is a great thriller set in a gated community, where one of the neighbours dies at a Halloween party - everyone is keeping something secret, and it seems like everyone had a reason to want her dead. The backstabbing and drama of a very small British community was *chef's kiss* and the storyline was really good too. 4 stars!
Powerless by Lauren Roberts
This was recommended to me by one of my book club friends, and we usually have VERY similar taste in books so I had high expectations. I'm generally not a fantasy/romantasy reader, and this confirmed that for me - it took me AGES to get into, I was so confused by the seemingly endless different powers people had, it felt like someone took The Hunger Games (which I love) and just tore it up and badly stitched it back together. The last 20% of the book has a lot of action and did sort of leave me wanting to know where the story goes, so I may come back to the rest of the trilogy, but for now it's on the back burner. 2.5 stars from me...
The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
I love magical realism, and this didn't disappoint - this was our book club read for May, and I really enjoyed it. We follow Clementine, who works in publishing and is currently grieving for her nana, who lived a life FULL of travel and lived in an old NYC apartment which has some sort of strange magical power to it where sometimes you step inside and it's 7 years ago. In the apartment, Clementine meets Iwan who is absolutely perfect. The problem? He's stuck in the past, and she's very much in the present. Will they ever make it work?! Swooooooon this was honestly lush, a few questionable moments for me but overall loved it a lot. 4 stars!
It's Not What You Think by Claire Mcintosh
I listened to this an audiobook and when I tell you it was absolutely NOT what I thought - this was so so good, one of my favourite thrillers of 2026 so far. We're following Nadeeka, who's boyfriend has been murdered; but a few days later, the police have zero record of a crime taking place, and it becomes a huge case as the detectives, and Nadeeka, try to work out what's really happened and how it relates to a far right political movement... Drama after drama, twist after twist. Loved it, 5 stars.
Pitcher Perfect by Tessa Bailey
Tessa Bailey can do no wrong in my eyes; I had this on my shelf for a while, waiting for the perfect moment, which happened to be a sunny Sunday on my egg chair in the garden. I devoured the story of Skylar, softball pitcher and people pleaser, and Robbie - NHL rookie who's a bit of a womaniser, until he meets her. As they head off to her family home for a week of fake dating and wild competition, sparks FLY and boy do they fly. This was sensational; 5 stars from me.
The Calling of the Grave by Simon Beckett
I read the first three instalments in the David Hunter series years ago, and picking this up felt so comforting. The series follows a forensic anthropologist and dives deep into some crazy cases, with this one being no exception - after trying and failing to discover where a serial killer has buried his victims the case goes quiet for 8 years until said serial killer escapes from prison, and David finds himself once again embroiled in the case and the drama that goes alongside a nationwide manhunt. Fantastic and can't wait to continue the series. 4.5 stars!
I can't wait to see if June is just as good of a reading month for me...
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