I voluntarily reviewed this after receiving a free copy. Lauren and Jenny are sisters who lead very different lives. Their mom is an artist who appeared very "cold" to the girls while they were growing up. I loved this book and all the ups and downs the girls encounter through their life. I loved this book. Another great book by Sarah Morgan.

I was very excited to read this book because I’ve enjoyed Sarah Morgan’s romances in the past and I really was in the mood for a good women’s fiction novel this summer. I’m happy to report this was exactly what I was looking for! I often feel like romance authors let the romance writing side overpower their womens’ fiction novels. This was not the case here.

HOW TO KEEP A SECRET is told in multiple POV and unravels many secrets that have been kept hidden by three generations of women in the Stewart family. They each carry them as their own personal burden and they don’t realize how they can affect others. Or maybe they do, and that’s exactly what makes them keep things hidden. But one event slowly starts a chain that unravels everything.

This is the perfect beach family drama for this summer. I couldn’t get enough of it. I’ll admit it starts out quite slow for my taste so it took me a little while to get into it. But once things get going, I was glued to it. I came to care for all the characters and really wanted them to have a happy ending. And rest assured, there is one. This is not a tear jerker.

I can honestly say this is my favorite Sarah Morgan book to date. The voice is different here and I was able to connect more. I really hope we get to see more stories like this from her in the future. And if you are looking for the perfect beach read this year, be sure to add this to your list.

Couldn't put this book down. Was an enthralling story and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Will definitely recommend to customers at my work!

Secrets are at the core of HOW TO KEEP A SECRET and the Stewart family is awash in secrets, from long-standing ones to more recent secrets. Nancy, her two adult daughters Jenna and Lauren, and Lauren’s daughter Mackenzie (aka “Mack”) have all bottled up secrets that are now about to explode. Can they pull together when life hits them with the unexpected?

Mack, despite being a cranky and rebellious teenager, quickly stole my heart. Her penchant for opening her mouth and saying exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time is almost endearing, particularly since I could see her own pain at the core of each one of her embarrassing moments. Lauren handles her with grace even though she’s a wreck inside and I love watching their mother/daughter relationship rekindle as the secrets separating them begin to surface.

In fact, mother/daughter relationships are a key part of HOW TO KEEP A SECRET. Nancy has been distant from her daughters ever since they were children, never opening the door for confidences because of her own secrets. Little did she know that Jenna and Lauren harbored their own secrets from her. Jenna and Lauren already have a strong sisterly bond but I love watching them develop a relationship with their once aloof mother. There is a heart-breaking scene where Jenna asks for her mother that still makes me cry when I think about it.

HOW TO KEEP A SECRET alternates viewpoints, as we see the story unfold through the eyes of each woman. Nancy, Lauren, Jenna, and Mack all have a story to tell and Sarah Morgan does a beautiful job at letting their individual voices shine through. Sarah Morgan is a master at capturing the emotional heart of a moment and encapsulating it for the reader to not only read but experience that moment and this talent shines in HOW TO KEEP A SECRET. If you love stories that make you laugh, cry, and yes even a little angry, then HOW TO KEEP A SECRET is perfect for you.

*review is in the editing queue at Fresh Fiction*

Copied from my blog
So yesterday I gave you a review of a wonderful and magical novel of women’s fiction, The Lost Queen of Crocker County. Today, however, we have a typical melodramatic representation of women’s fiction. You might wonder why I chose to read it. Well, the only Sarah Morgan novel I’ve read so far was delightful and humorous. The blurb says: witty. A review said: funny. I thought: yes!

While How to Keep a Secret is well-written, I never felt that I was reading something fresh or new. Lauren’s husband dies. She finds out that he’s kept secrets. Not only is she a widow, she has no money and must return to her childhood home, where her sister and mother are also going through life-crises.

Perhaps part of the problem is that I detested Lauren, who, despite there being three generations of women and multiple povs, is supposed to be the heroine. She came across as controlling, whiny, and self-absorbed. As the novel moved on, it frequently seemed as if the loss of her husband of 16 years was an after-thought. Sixteen years is an awful lot of time to spend with someone and then just sweep them away. The fact that she didn’t know their situation wasn’t his fault alone. Or shouldn’t have been, certainly not in 21st century marriages.

The use of four povs also wasn’t an asset because I never felt like we really came to know Jenna, Nancy, and Mack as well as we should (or as I would have liked), not to mention the fact that Jenna’s story was not wrapped up and we never saw what happened at Mack’s school again. Thus a very ambitious story became a package with ribbon left untied.

I did like the sister’s friendship and closeness and wondered if this should have been focused on a bit more. I also liked the fact that Mack and Nancy became close, showing that, despite generations, there doesn’t have to be a gap or misunderstandings.

There were two romances in the novel. One felt right, the other way, way off–unfortunately to explain why would spoil the novel.

In the end, while I came to like the story and most of the characters (never came around to liking Lauren), I think that if the blurb hadn’t led me to believe that I was going to be reading something witty, I might have appreciated it slightly more, or not. In general and on a good day, I feel “meh” about melodrama.

Should you read this novel? Let’s just say that the average review on Goodreads is just a bit over 4.5 stars out of 5, so it’s pretty generally loved. Just because I wasn’t feeling it doesn’t mean that you may not.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

WOW. I'm in awe with deep admiration towards Sarah Morgan's ability to tell a heartfelt story, even more so than before, if that is even possible.
How To Keep A Secret was an emotional journey of four women of three generations through lives battles on stormy seas.
From grief, anger, betrayal, and devastation, to joy, love, passion, and the sense of accomplishment I took each step with the ladies, feeling the range of emotions, living through the heartbreak to finding peace and accepting the new normal while cheering them on and loving each moment of it. I was completely lost in the world the author had created, wanting to linger there as long as possible while needing to inhale the tale as fast as I could, to find that satisfying, gratifying, exhilarating point where the life for that one moment is as perfect as it can be, where the end departed me from the tale that had brought so much more to me than I dared to expect.
While the story as a whole is a very entertaining and beautiful tale of women, family, sisters, mothers, and daughters, love, and the fragility of life, it also had me reflecting those relationships in my own life, seeing things from the different point of view, and suddenly growing and maturing right along the characters. What a beautiful, unexpected gift that turned out to be.
Each of the four women in the tale gets their chance to tell part of the story from their own point of view. There is the turbulence of a teenager, the confusion, the anger, the need to be accepted while worried about being too much and abandoned. There is the love, and frustration, of that teenager's parents, how to survive the gusty waters. There are the sisters who have always been there for each other, yet seems to have kept some substantial secrets. There are the three marriages, their strengths, their weaknesses, and their fails, and jubilees. There are the mother-daughter relationships that never seemed to work yet suddenly gets a new point of view, new strength, when looked from the different angle, with honest eyes. And there is the romance, the tangible, palpable feelings between couples who truly are soulmates, who get each other, understand each other, and accept the shortcomings and cherish the endearing qualities. There are many characters, with different kinds of relationships, yet never for a minute was there any confusion or overwhelm to keep everything in order.
How To Keep A Secret, while vastly entertaining, thought life-lessons and sorted out all possible kinds of relationships one can face through life. It brought me smiles and sighs of contentment, had me tear up, even broke my heart a bit, but it also brought lots of loving healing, new possibilities, and refreshingly realistic solutions to lives many problems. A book that makes you feel like you have learned valuable lessons and a new way to look at some things in life, that kind stories are rare gifts, priceless, precious stories, that you want to spread the word about, cherish them for days to come.
A must-read, unputdownable story that will touch your heart and mind
~ Five Spoons

Wow! When I started this book it was very quickly obvious that it was different from the other Sarah Morgan books I have enjoyed. I wasn’t sure that I would enjoy this new direction she was taking.
This is the story of the Stewart women- and how one summer sees everything in their lives change.
I have to say that this book gives you all the feels- you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll gasp and you’ll sigh:)
I loved how the people and the situations were realistic and interesting. It wasn’t one drama to another, but just life during big changes.
There isn’t just one secret, but several and I didn’t see them coming! It was great to be surprised!
The pacing of the book was great! There were no instantaneous situations, but it didn’t drag either.
I also liked how the author evenly split the book between the four Stewart women.
If you love family, sisterhood or just want an excellent read, this book should be on your TBR.
Thank you to NetGalley and the author and publisher for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Lauren has her home and her life in England in perfect order, until one afternoon-everything becomes a disaster. Her sister, Jenna, across the pond comes to the rescue but has struggles of her own. Little do they know, their own mother also has secrets of her own that may tear the family apart. Can these three find a way to work together and work though these issues?

​This book was heavy! I cried with the characters, I laughed with the characters, I felt second-hand embarrassment. Basically, this book has all of the feels and I absolutely loved it. Just when you think it can't get worse, it often does. The images we portray are a mask for the secrets we keep. Thankfully, there is some scandal, humor, and hope thrown in to lighten the mood at times when it gets almost too dark.

​​How To Keep A Secret​ is different from the previous books that I have read from ​Sarah Morgan​, the From Manhattan With Love series in ​the sense that the perspectives alternate from more than just the two main characters. On the other hand, this book was compares in the way that it dealt with more than one crisis at a time. But this one had four surprising crises! However, Sarah Morgan wrote this novel so fluidly that it all blended together well in a realistic "when it rains, it pours" sense. For me, it also helped with the pace. The emotions were so raw at times that I had to put the book down as the pain that each of these characters are going through is very evident. Most prominent were: grief, frustration, regret, and panic.

​My favorite character was Lauren's teenage daughter, Mack, because she is brutally honest yet terribly insecure. I think out of all of the characters, she developed the most. She also was the source of a very pivotal surprise in the plot of which I laughed out loud in surprise then immediately felt guilty. I really appreciated that some of the perspective was told in her point-of-view as it added depth to the overall mood of the novel.

For those who may be triggered or offended: there are themes of ​grief, infertility, infidelity, mild foul language, and one graphically sexual scenario.

Please note: an electronic advanced reader copy of this book was generously provided for free by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

How to Keep a Secret takes us through the story of three generations of women, their relationships, troubles, grief and their secrets.

Lauren has recently lost her husband Ed unexpectedly, but in the aftermath of his death, it reveals that she wasn’t the only one keeping secrets. They have no money and have to give up the life they’ve grown accustom to. Having to pack up your life while grieving, doesn’t help matters for Lauren or her daughter Mackenzie.

Jenna, Laurens sister, of course take them in. But she too has her own share of issues going on in her life. All of this is going on with these two women, with no help or consideration from the mother, Nancy. From I could tell at the beginning of this story, she was never really in the running for mother of the year anyway.

Character wise, these three women seemed very self obsorbed. I will say that Jenna is not really that selfish, all she wants is a family which is not proving to be all that simple. I felt bad for her, because that would awful to go through. Nancy their mother, however is some well known artist and has never had the time to be a mother to the girls. It made sense why these two sisters were so close all this time, they kinda had to be there for each other.

This family has SO many secrets between them and things they need to work through, which is what kept me turning the pages. It was a little slow going in the beginning, but I think it a good pace to be able to get their stories, because this is an emotionally charged read. Second chances aren’t always easy, sometimes you have to wait and even work for them, which made this even better for me to follow these three generations of women to see if they get their happiness back.

How to Keep a Secret was a beautifully written story of second chances, growth, family and one of love. It is one read I would certainly recommend.

This was the first Sarah Morgan book I’ve had a chance to read and it was delightful. I love how it took you on an emotional adventure.
Lauren finds herself lost after her husband suddenly passes away. Knowing she has to take care of her daughter and herself she heads back to her childhood home to help her mother and be close to sister. Jenna is happy to have her sister home but is struggling with her emotions as she strives to get pregnant. Their mother tries to be there for the sisters and her granddaughter while dealing with her own past. The three generations find a way to come together and triumph through it all. This book will make you both laugh and cry.
Thank you Netgalley and Harlequin for the ARC of this. I really enjoyed it and look forward to reading more of Ms. Morgan’s work.

This was a fun, perfect beach read. A bit deeper than other Sarah Morgan titles I've read - it reminded me more of Nancy Thayer or Elin Hilderbrand.

How to Keep a Secret by Sarah Morgan is another feather in her cap and it shows the quality and depth of her writing in this contemporary women’s fictional story. The story follows the Stewart women from matriarch Nancy, her two daughters Jenna and Lauren and Mackenzie the granddaughter, as they spend a summer together working to bring back some normalcy after a sudden tragedy. Jenna and Lauren are as close as two sisters can be, especially after they share a devastating secret as children and how it formed them as adults. Now they are both faced with personal challenges and how they need to depend on family now more than ever as their secret is revealed to their mother. Mackenzie herself found out her own secret and is also dealing with the aftermath and where she goes from there. Nancy has the biggest challenge of finally being a mother for her daughters since she wasn’t there for them as they were growing up. Each of these women found inner strength to move past their hurts and reach a better understanding within their family unit. Seeing these 4 women come together for one another was masterfully crafted with warmth, poignancy and humor. Morgan brings out the best in relationships and shows how family is there through thick and thin. I simply loved this book!

I always look forward to any book written by Ms Morgan, so I was anxious to read this story.
In this book, the author takes a different road from her usual format. While we usually have a story about a couple and the trials and tribulations they go through to find their HEA, in this one , we have three generations of women who are struggling to find themselves and deal with life in general.
It’s a story about family dynamics, or lack thereof, about secrets kept and the repercussion of those secrets and about relationships. Each generation depicting different perspective and also that what you see isn’t always what really is happening in people’s lives.
But above all, it’s also a story filled with hope, and strong women . I love that the author not only gives us an engaging plot, but also that Nancy, Lauren, Jenna and even Mack, are complex and strong.
Yes, not your usual Sarah Morgan story, but one definitely worth your time.
I received this copy from Netgalley. The opinions expressed are solely my own.

How to Keep a Secret by Sarah MorganSisters know how to keep a secret. Lauren and Jenna learned that when they were young. Even if htat secret still haunts them, they know not to let it out. It's 24 (ish) years later and they're now adults. Adults who are in the middle of crises. Jenna has the perfect husband, the perfect job but can't seem to get pregnant. Neither can turn to the mother, except when Lauren's husband dies and her whole world implodes. Lauren and her daughter, Mack, move back to the States to stay with her mother. But Nancy has problems, and secrets, of her own.

At the end of the book, Morgan mentions that this book is a departure for her. This is true and it is one I most heartily enjoyed. Her last two fast, fun, and fluffies were a little too shallow for me. This book was a welcome change. Did I love all the characters? No. And we didn't get to see enough of Lauren and Scott's new romance to feel like this was anew love not just echoes of their puppy love. But I really enjoyed this book.



Four stars
This book comes out July 10
ARC kindly provided by NetGalley

In this story we have two sisters, Lauren and Jenna, who are incredibly close. Lauren is married and has a 16-year-old daughter by the name of Mack. They are wealthy and live in London. Jenna is a school teacher, is married, and lives in Martha’s Vineyard where she and her sister grew up. She longs to be a mother but even as much as her and her husband have tried, they’ve not gotten pregnant. Neither girl was ever close with their mother, Nancy, but always had a great time with their now deceased father.

Tragedy strikes Lauren and her husband Ed dies. Due to unforeseen and shocking circumstances Lauren and Mack end up moving back to Martha’s Vineyard to live with Nancy. Lauren is devastated by everything going on in her life – especially the fact that Mack has discovered that the man she thought was her dad…wasn’t. The man who actually is her father is still living in Martha’s Vineyard and wants to be part of Mack’s life. Lauren’s not sure how to handle this as Scott, the dad, was never one for sticking to one place very long. Lauren doesn’t want Mack to get attached to Scott and then have him leave.

Lauren, despite her grief, finds that she’s still incredibly attracted to Scott. She was so in love with him back when she was 18 years old. When she got pregnant she understood the reasons he couldn’t step up and that’s why she married Ed. Ed had his own emotional roller coaster to deal with and that’s what brought them together. They weren’t actually in love but they definitely loved each other.

With Lauren back on the island and living with her mother there are a lot of information that get brought out in the open. Secrets every character kept get outed and the characters in the book have to learn how to live with the new normal.

While this book was definitely stronger in the Women’s Fiction arena, it did have a small romance in it as well. Even if it hadn’t would have liked this book. Morgan brought to life some interesting characters that I couldn’t get enough of. I felt their pain, loneliness, grief, happiness – you name it, I felt it. I got so into the lives of these women and what they were individually going through. I loved that they were there for each other and worked through their many issues.

I can’t tell you too much about what goes on the book because that’s part of the beauty of it, watching it all unfold page by page. What I can tell you is that I definitely recommend this book as I thought it was pretty darned great.

Rating: 4 out of 5

This will post as a guest review on Book Binge.
bookbinge.com

I did not enjoy this book. The author tries to switch from romances to more serious novel a la Susan Mallery but it is not working. Everything seems very convoluted and not consistent, situations don't really make sense and the writing of teenage characters is not good.

HOW TO KEEP A SECRET
Sarah Morgan
Morgan’s first foray into mainstream women’s fiction is a huge homerun, a fresh, fast-paced emotional novel with a lot of heart. Its a fantastic tale about keeping secrets, grief, starting over and second chances and proves you can go home again. It’s poignant, about family dynamics and dysfunction but it’s also full of well-timed humor and wit. The author has absolute mastery over all her mesmerizing, memorable characters but one angst-filled, not sure where she fits in the world troubled teen who suffers a terrible loss then moves across the ocean is a stand-out and how Morgan develops Mack’s character so that readers will experience every one of those emotions with her is simply amazing. Be prepared for a one-sitting, hard-to-put-down page-turner that fans of Karen White, Kristin Hannah and Susan Wiggs will simply adore.
Thirty-five year old Lauren Hudson’s world just imploded, her husband Ed died leaving she and their sixteen-year-old daughter Mack in financial ruin because of secrets he kept If that’s not enough Mack just discovered that Ed wasn’t her biological dad thanks to secrets they were both keeping from her. She can think of only one place to go, back home where both good and bad memories exist. Only when she gets there her biggest secret is there to meet her.
Mack Hudson just lost her dad, or wait he wasn’t her dad so what exactly did she lose besides her sense of belonging and her mind. Oh and yeah her mom just moves her from London to Martha’s Vineyard so that sucks too!
Thirty-two year old Jenna Sullivan has the perfect life, the perfect job and married to the perfect husband. Too bad she can’t seem to get the perfect baby to go with it. Maybe she’ll fall apart later, right now her big sister Lauren needs her, a big sister who apparently was keeping secrets from her.
Nancy Stewart has a secret and unfortunately when both her daughters, Lauren and Jenna could use some easy sailing she’s going to rough up their waters.

I loved the characters. Both sisters were very relatable and were characters you truly cared about. Great plot, a truly fun read.

What a fantastic book ! Loved, loved, loved the characters. I found myself not being able to put this down. It was great start to finish

I have really been enjoying all of the Sarah Morgan books. I love it when I find a new author that I enjoy reading and that I can recommend to my customers.