Time Travel Thursday – wings and fables

It’s Time Travel Thursday! Hosted by Budget Tales Book Blog, this is where you get to relive all those bookish memories! Take a look back at what you were reading this time last year (or the year before or the year before that…) and compare it to what you are reading now!

2025 was a pretty sparse reading year for me as I was pursuing my Master’s Degree, so I’m going to jump back to 2024 for this series.

This time in 2024 I was reading:

Summary: If he had been with me, everything would have been different…

Autumn and Finn used to be inseparable. But then something changed. Or they changed. Now, they do their best to ignore each other.

Autumn has her boyfriend Jamie, and her close-knit group of friends. And Finn has become that boy at school, the one everyone wants to be around.

That still doesn’t stop the way Autumn feels every time she and Finn cross paths, and the growing, nagging thought that maybe things could have been different. Maybe they should be together.

But come August, things will change forever. And as time passes, Autumn will be forced to confront how else life might have been different if they had never parted ways…

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary Romance

Rating: 2 stars

Currently I am reading:

Summary: Daphne dreams of Mr. Darcy. Finn serves up pints and rock music. Can opposites attract when a tea shop princess meets her pub-owning rival?

In the charming mountain town of Wisteria, North Carolina, Daphne Austen clings to tradition like cream to a scone. She’s built her life–and her late grandmother’s tearoom, Tea Thyme–around all things delicate china, Jane Austen novels, and the comforting predictability of routine. The only thing threatening her perfectly ordered world? The loud, aggravatingly handsome Brit opening a pub next door.

After his ex-wife broke his heart and his business partner nearly destroyed his career, Finn Dashwood packed up his six-year-old daughter and left England behind. He’s looking for a fresh start, and the last thing he needs is a fussy, tea-obsessed neighbor criticizing his every pint and playlist. It doesn’t matter that she’s ridiculously kind (to everyone else) and that his daughter is utterly fascinated by her. Finn’s heart is not open to being broken again.

But disagreements turn into prank wars and then a competition when a high-profile wedding needs a last-minute caterer. The townsfolk are thrilled–Wisteria hasn’t seen this much excitement since the county fair lost a goat.

When the wedding demands both sweet and savory fare, Daphne and Finn are forced to put down their swords and pick up their serving trays. Between burnt pastries, brewing tempers, trending hashtags (#SipsAndSpats, anyone?), and one very adorable little girl, rivalry soon gives way to reluctant friendship–and maybe something that feels suspiciously like chemistry.

Can a tea shop princess and a pub owner with a past mix their lives as seamlessly as clotted cream and jam . . . or will their differences keep them steeped in rivalry forever?

Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance

Comparison:

I picked up If He Had Been With Me by Laura Nowlin from my library around this time because the collector’s edition of the book was coming out, and I wanted to see if it was something I wanted to snag because it was gorgeous. For me, this reeked of John Green vibes with an attempt at a quirky teen protagonist that really just didn’t work for me. I still sometimes think about how the FMC would wear a tiara to school every single day. Needless to say, this is not something I purchased a physical copy of, and I did not continue the series when the second book dropped.

This year I’m reading A Brewed Awakening by Pepper Basham. A Brewed Awakening is an adult contemporary romance with nods to Jane Austen and an enemies-to-lovers romance. I’m really enjoying this so far, especially the humor and banter between the MCs. I’ve really turned away from the Young Adult genre in the past year or so simply because my reading tastes have changed. I can still see myself reading upper-YA, but I can’t see myself ever picking up something like If He Had Been With Me in the near future.

Have you read any of these titles? What were you reading this time last year?

Goodreads | Storygraph

2025 was a pretty sparse reading year for me as I was pursuing my Master’s Degree, so I’m going to jump back to 2024 for this series.

This time in 2024 I was reading:

Summary: Friends becoming something much more in this hilarious romantic comedy from author Ann Marie Walker. A whirlwind trip to Ireland is supposed to end with a suitcase full of wool sweaters and souvenir pint glasses—not a husband you only just met!

After one-too-many whiskeys, fledgling screenwriter Cara Kennedy takes a page out of someone else’s script when she gets caught up in the Irish tradition of women proposing on Leap Day. She thought she might have dreamt everything until she woke the next morning with a hot guy in her bed and a tin foil ring on her finger. Her flight is in four hours, her clothes are all over the room, and she has the most important meeting of her career in exactly two days—and on top of everything else, her husband has a dog who thinks Cara is a perfect surrogate mother, despite the fact that she has never been much of an animal lover…

Deciding to work things out stateside, Finn and her new fur baby accompany her to LA, where Finn spends his days going on auditions and his nights charming his new bride, leaving Cara to wonder whether this is real love, or if Finn is another aspiring actor just after her Hollywood connections? With limited time on his tourist visa, will Finn be able to convince Cara that she’s the right girl for him, or will time run out on their Hollywood ending?

Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance

Rating: 1 star

Currently I am reading:

Summary: She’s running from London’s marriage mart. He’s running out of time to save his estate. Neither planned on falling in love—but their hearts have other plans.

American heiress Calliope Hart is thrust into London’s high society against her will, all because her mother is determined to marry her off to an aristocrat. Despite being named “the debutante of the season” back in New York, Calliope wants nothing more than to avoid becoming another pawn in the social game.

Edward Chase, the Earl of Hayward, is on the brink of financial ruin. To save his estate, he must marry, and Calliope Hart is his last hope. When he boldly declares his intentions, she swiftly rejects him, making it clear she has no interest in marrying for convenience. Undeterred, Edward offers a deal: He will escort Calliope to all the best sights of London that she’s been dying to see if she agrees to visit his estate and consider what they could accomplish together.

What begins as a business arrangement soon sparks something much more complicated—an undeniable chemistry neither can ignore. But as their hearts begin to soften, both must confront their fears: Can Calliope trust Edward with her heart, and can Edward truly win her love when she’s convinced he only wants her fortune?

Genre: Adult Historical Romance (Edwardian Era)

Summary: When a mystery writer mysteriously dies on a cruise filled with rabid fans, his protégé (and personal assistant) teams up with a rugged cowboy and fellow writer to crack the case. One part Only Murders in the Building, one part Book Lovers, and a whole lot of laughs, Without a Clue will keep readers guessing and swooning until the very end.

If there’s one thing Penelope Mae Dupont prizes most, it’s her composure–her ability to stay calm in the face of stress. It’s a vital trait in her job as a personal assistant to renowned mystery author Hugh Griffin. But when Pip organizes a book cruise featuring The Fabulous Seven–seven celebrated authors from different genres who have supported each other through thick and thin–her famed composure is in danger of sailing away. One boat, hundreds of devoted readers, and seven Big Personalities. What could possibly go wrong?

Disaster strikes when, on the second day of the cruise, Hugh is found murdered. And, in the face of gross incompetence by the on-board security force, Pip realizes she’ll need to be the one to discover who did it. With the ship stranded in the middle of the Atlantic and no help on the horizon, it’s up to her to unravel the mystery. Along with her friend Nash–a dreamy Western author who’s just as rugged as the cowboys he writes about. As Pip’s composure starts to sink faster than a leaky dinghy, Nash becomes her anchor in a storm of clues and red herrings.

With Nash at her side, Penelope dives into the murky depths of the mystery, navigating treacherous waters filled with unexpected twists and turns. No one, not even a desperately hopeful mystery sleuth named Pip, could anticipate the wild ride ahead. Whether she likes it or not, she is on the adventure of a lifetime . . . and maybe, just maybe, she’ll find love along the way.

In this laugh-out-loud funny Clue-meets-Emily-Henry rom-com, Penelope Mae Dupont is about to find out that in the world of mystery and romance, you have to risk going overboard to find the truth.

Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance + Cozy Mystery

Comparison:

My love of romance continues through the years. I meant to pick up Lucky Leap Day by Ann Marie Walker around St. Patrick’s Day in 2024 since the book takes place in Ireland, but ended up reading it later than I planned. This is an adult contemporary romance that I expected to take a spin on the 2010 film Leap Year, starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode, but it did not deliver. Unfortunately, I wasn’t fond of the characters or the pacing, and felt the writing was a bit too cringey at times.

This year I’m reading two books at once, A Deal with a Debutante by Chelsea Bobulski and Without a Clue by Melissa Ferguson. A Deal with a Debutante is an adult historical romance set in the Edwardian era (1908). Without a Clue is a cozy mystery with a romance angle added in. Pretty different genres compared to 2024, and I’m enjoying these two books far more than their predecessor. If Without a Clue sounds interesting to you, I highly recommend picking up the audiobook version of it. The narrator has done an amazing job bringing the characters to life and has captured the humor laced throughout the storyline.