The narrator, Mary Jane Wells, was the best part of the listening experience! Wells' performance was engaging, nuanced, and easy to listen to. Overall, I enjoyed this work and think that readers looking for a humorous romance will enjoy it. "All Stirred Up" can definitely be categorized as a slow-burn romance, which I will definitely mention during any reader's advisory conversations. For fans of Sophie Kinsella, Meg Cabot, and Heather Cocks.

Very cute story! I was honored to received the audio book through Net Galley. I am hoping how it ended that there will be a sequel. The story just made me want to get up and cook all the time! Ha. The characters are lovely and I love that this book is not written in first person. The narrator did a great job with the accents. I would read from this author again. :)#AllStirredUpDreamscapeMedia #NetGalley

When Susan’s family’s chain of restaurants must close due to subpar management she is put in charge of the business and keeping the first and now final restaurant open. At the same time, her ex Chris is also returning to Edinburgh to open his restaurant. Reading the book description for All Stirred Up I went into this audiobook expecting a second chance romance filled with family drama, secrets, reconnecting, healing, and good food. Although the elements were there I felt it was high in family drama and food and low in everything else.

Thoughts on Susan and her family:
Something I did appreciate about this story was Susan’s passion for the business her grandfather created and the love for food instilled by her grandfather and mother. I was thankful for her confidence in her role in managing the business and taking no nonsense from others.

Susan spends most of her time throughout the story with her kitchen staff or her family. I wasn’t a fan of the fam. They had many quirks that I would say I wasn’t a fan of and were a bit snobby/unhelpful. Here Susan was trying to keep them afloat by making sure the family business survived and they either didn’t want to make sacrifices or could not be bothered to care what went on.

On Chris:
This book was highly centered on Susan with a handful of shifts into Chris’s perspective. The glimpses into Chris’ backstory and current life were intriguing. I actually would have preferred to get to have more of his life than all the time spent with Susan’s family. He’s doing some pretty cool stuff with his business and that was nice to begin to explore.

On Susan and Chris:
Oh my, where do I start. For me, their potential chemistry was just not believable. The two hadn’t seen each other in 10 years and don’t have a face to face interaction until about 40% into the book and even then they didn’t fill me with any new information. I could have lived with this if we at least got to know them as a couple through some flashbacks. Any of Susan’s free time outside of the kitchen or with family are with Phillip which didn’t seem to add to the story.

Besides a brief recount of Susan leaving Chris early in the story, I felt like everything regarding their relationship and breakup is just sprung on you at the end without really any build-up.

There was much potential for a juicy and exciting story but In the end, this book was much too slow and I wasn’t invested in the outcome of Susan and Chris. All the focus was really on reopening and updating the restaurant which in itself is not a bad thing. As mentioned it helped me appreciate Susan and I loved the talk about food but I found myself asking “where’s the balance”?

On the romance/steam:
I found this in the romance section but don’t know that I’d classify it as such. I just really didn’t find any romantic moments within. I tend to read a lot of books with a range of steam levels and know I lot of the other readers I interact with do also. I don’t need all my books to be extra explicit or anything but just wanted to give a heads up that there are no sexy times in this book and just one, maybe two kisses.

On the food:
The gem of this book. Susan and Chris’s love for food is so clear! So many drool-worthy meals & treats mentioned throughout. It definitely made me hungry.

On the narrator:
It took me a long time to get into audiobooks because the first few I tried the narrator's voice was just unpleasant to me. It is still a hit and miss but I enjoyed listening to this narrator and her shift from being Susan to Chris.

Thank you @netgalley for the audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

#AllStirredUpDreamscapeMedia #NetGalley #bookstagram #audiobook #foodiebookcharacters #readersofig #booksthatmakeyouhungry

This was pretty cute, but I found myself pretty uninvested in the book halfway in. I enjoy rivals and history of romance, but something about this plot just didn't pull me in.

All Stirred Up is a fun read, though not quite the light romcom I was expecting. There was more focus on familial relationships, delicious food descriptions, but that only made it an interesting and more complex novel. The audio version was great- loved the accents- and was an enjoyable way to hear this story.
Many thanks to Alcove Press and NetGalley for the advance copy.

I was so excited to listen to this book mainly because I loved the cover. I also read the blurb and it sounded super cute. I was hoping this would be a fun second chance romance, but sadly it didn’t work for me. My biggest issue was that I was so bored while listening. My mind constantly wandered and it couldn’t keep my attention at all. Plus, the romance was on the weak side. This could have very well just been my mood, but this one didn’t work for me.

This was good but I wanted more moments together with Chris and Susan. I felt like it was more about their own family drama. I just thought this was going to be more of a romance story.

I received an ARC of this book through NetGalley in exchange for my unbiased opinion.

Susan Napier's grandfather started a successful chain of high-end restaurants called Elliot's. Now, however, years after his death, the flagship restaurant in Edinburgh is the only location left, and it is in trouble. Susan heads to Scotland to save the restaurant, but she ends up with more struggles than she expected there. Chris Baker, Susan's ex-boyfriend and her grandfather's protege, is also returning to Edinburgh to open his own high-end restaurant after a successful career as a TV chef. Susan and Chris have a lot of unresolved feelings, both good and bad, surrounding their former relationship and breakup, and in the small community of the restaurant industry in Edinburgh, they can't help but interact with each other. Can they each make their restaurants a success <i>and/</i> find their happily ever after?

I listened to the audiobook version of this story, and Mary Jane Wells did a nice job with the narration. I think the cover was honestly my favorite part of this story, though. The story seemed primarily about the Napier family, as opposed to Susan and Chris's story. I wouldn't have minded except that the rest of Susan's family were irritating and rather flat. It was not a bad book but won't end up at the top of my list of books read this year, either.

When Susan Napier’s grandfather passed, she was handed the job of running the restaurants he had built. Financial problems forced them to close all but the flagship Elliot’s, named for her grandfather, located in Edinburgh. But as soon as she returns to the city, she is faced not only with a head chef who clearly doesn’t intend to take any direction from her but also with the man she once thought she’d spend the rest of her life with.

Chef Chris Baker has returned to Edinburgh, the city of his childhood, to open the restaurant he’d always dreamed of. He got his start as a cocky young cook in the kitchen of Elliot’s, falling in love with the kitchen and his granddaughter. But when things went south for him, and he and Susan broke up, he traveled the world, finding refuge in kitchens and learning cuisine from other countries. He ended up in New York, where he stumbled into the opportunity to host a cooking competition show. The show was a hit, and he became a household name in America and Europe. But he wanted nothing more than to move back to Scotland and create his own place.

The weeks go by, and Susan is able to find a replacement executive chef pretty quickly but not a new pastry chef. A baker herself, she understands how important the right desserts can be for a restaurant. Finally, her new chef convinces her to give it a try herself, so Susan jumps in and starts to create new recipes with her pastry skills. But a radio interview of Chris Baker raises her hackles when he says unflattering things about Elliot’s. So when the opportunity appears for Elliot’s new chefs to go up against Chef Baker in a competition at the food festival, they jump at the chance.

Chris feels a little manipulated to be in the competition at the festival, but he agrees to it because he knows that Elliot’s has been struggling, and he does want to help Susan. But when he does see her again, and her food turns out to be delicious, he is plagued with conflicting emotions. Elliot’s is where he started, and he wants them to succeed, but after what happened to him there, he also just wants to protect himself. Which would be easier if Susan weren’t still so beautiful. But so much happened. Would they ever be able to get past it all?

As the weeks go by, and the restaurants consume all their time, Susan and Chris find that despite their attempts to stay apart from each other, fate keeps bringing them into each other’s lives. And the more time they spend together, the more their feelings bubble up. But with the missteps and mistakes, the interruptions and the interlopers, will Susan and Chris ever get a second chance to get it right?

All Stirred up is Brianne Moore’s look at love in the kitchen. This delightful romantic comedy is a fun view inside a professional kitchen as well as a bit of family drama from things left unsaid for too long. The characters that dance across these pages feel like they could be the people sitting next to you in the cafe or on the bus. And as a lover of all things Scottish, I adored the descriptions of life in Edinburgh and felt like I got to take a mini-trip there for awhile.

I got to listen to the audio book of All Stirred Up, and narrator Mary Jane Wells is a revelation. She could pull off the Scottish brogue when it was called for, not an easy task, and made the rest of the story charming as well.

I loved every minute I got to spend in this story’s universe. I loved how the characters were mature and took responsibility for their mistakes. I thought the story was honest and interesting, and as I mentioned, I adored the setting. I recommend All Stirred Up for foodies, for fans of a good rom com, and for anyone who wants to have a really good story read to them by a fantastic narrator.

A copy of the audiobook for All Stirred Up was provided by Dreamscape Media through NetGalley, with many thanks.

While I didn't hate this book, I didn't particularly love it either. It was good enough with a predictable happy ending, but I felt there were some unanswered questions.
We are introduced to a litany of characters involved in the food service industry. There is Susan and Chris, rivals and former lovers, both racing to open/reopen a restaurant in the same neighborhood. As it hints at different parts of their past relationship, the writer attempts to keep bits and pieces a mystery which leads to lingering questions for the reader.
Then there are Susan's 2 sisters, her father, her aunt, a blogger, the new chef, the old chef. At times it felt a little confusing to keep track of what was going on and why Susan's family didn't seem to know much about this past romance.
Overall this was a light-hearted romance, but parts of it fell flat for me.

First - I am VERY glad I listened to the audiobook version of this story - the narrater was fantastic and did such a great job with a wide range of characters and accents. Her storytelling skills really brought the Edinburgh scene to life.

As a retelling of a Jane Austen Novel, I was impressed. I've read some really bad retellings lately and only now caome across one that really understands that the heart of the Persuasion novel is more about the characters then the 'lost love' trope. As a contemporary Austen, it is lovely; entertaining and with a wide spectrum of emotional situations. As a romance - perhaps less so. That's not where the focus is (not here and not in the Jane Austen novel). In that, the cover suggesting a cute little lite romance is very misleading: this is more of a slice of life of a modern Edinburgh woman with some romance on the side (which I appreciated but others may not).

Story: Susan's grandfather's legacy is a chain of prestigious restaurants that has kept the family in good fortune. But that was the past and her vain father's mismanagement has led to the closure of the satellites and with the original Elliot's coasting on its laurels. Susan returns to the Edinburgh flagship restaurant to give it a rehaul - revitalize and modernize it and reinvigorate the brand again. At the same time, her grandfather's protégé has returned to Edinburgh to create his own restaurant. At one time, Susan and Chris were an item but family situations drove them apart. Will being competitors prevent any chance of making up for the past?

For the Persuasion part, I really feel that the author captured it quite well. The side characters and plot are modernized in a good way that make sense yet are still respectful of the depth and subtlety of the original. From the vain father, the mismanagement of wealth, frivolous suitors, etc. But even more, both Chris and Susan are very reminiscent of their Austen counterparts Anne and Wentworth: grounded, realistic, and still hanging on to the past. I am very glad that author Moore kept the characters intact. The plot follows the novel fairly closely but not slavishly, which is also a relief.

Because the homage is Austen, this isn't a quirky romance with twinkly overdramatic characters and scenes. There are a lot of discussions about food, the restaurant business, show business, and especially Edinburgh. Those looking for a focus on romance may be frustrated since the romance does takea back seat to the milieu and family dynamics of both main characters. Susan is constantly dealing with her family while Chris also has his own family issues. There are many discussions and descriptions of Edinburgh locales.

If I had a nitpick, I wish Susan was plainer (as was Anne) and Chris a lot less 'hunkier' sounding in his description. The author says several times that Chris looks like Christopher Lambert from The Highlander movie - and perhaps it is no coincidence that he is named Chris. I just had a hard time picturing the Highlander spending 'most of his time in the kitchen' as was said throughout the novel. Other than walks with a dog, we never hear about him doing anything physical to keep up that physique.

So, although there were some issues, I did greatly enjoy the narration and the plot. I appreciated that the author respected Austen's characters and resisted the impulse to make them over the top in order to appeal to modern audiences. And I like a book that is gentle and heartwarming. I just wish the cover better reflected the nature of the book. And if you do decide to read All Stirred Up, I highly recommend the audio version. The narrator is excellent and elevators the story even further. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

This was a slow burn. I had to listen for a bit before I felt invested. It was sweet and had just the right style of romance; a bit of an old flame, new interest, rediscovering an old love. I appreciated the setting and the incorporation of food. There was a “twist” that I wasn’t quite expecting which was nice. My one major complaint is that a lot of the different layers present in the book felt very surface level. It would have been nice to many e have less layers but more depth. That being said, the ending was sweet and I enjoyed the audiobook.

A fun enemies to lovers contemporary romance set in Edinborough with competing chef-restaurant owners with a past. Appealing leads, and a charming story that hits all the tropes, told in dual POVs. The supporting characters--a gossip blogger, sisters of both main characters, plus additional inlaws and relatives of Susan's, kitchen staff--really came alive and felt distinct as performed by the very gifted narrator. Billed as a retelling of Jane Austen's Persuasion, which I kind of forgot about, but it did seem to stand well on its own. My only criticism is that I wish it moved a little faster toward the HEA.

The idea of the story sounded amazing. A former lovers-to kind of enemies- to lovers again book about food and family. But sadly it didn't deliver as I thought. The book seems to be marketed as a romance but in this book, I would say that romance is more the secondary story. Which would be fine, but not when you think you are diving into a (capital R) Romance book. I think marketing this book as literary fiction rather than chick-lit or romance would give readers a better understanding of what they are getting themselves into. It's a good story, just not what I signed up for. The audio was also a little weird. It sounded as if there were two tracks playing at once. Not that there was an echo but that there was a reverberation in the sound that made it sound like there was an overlap. If that makes sense? Whatever it was, it was very distracting.

Unfortunately, I ended up DNFing this one about 2 hours into the audiobook. I was enjoying the audiobook narration, but the story itself was just not what I was expecting and I found it really hard to get into/pay attention to. I did not post a public review as I do not want to negatively effect the book when I chose not to finish it, but feel free to reach out if you would still like me to post a full Goodreads review and I will happily do so.

Loved it! Loved all the descriptions and details. The characters and the realism of dealing with grief. So much passion and spirit. Even down to the dog Ginger. I just really enjoyed this, would love to read more from this author, and listen to more from this narrator.

Thanks to Net Galley and DreamScape Media for the Advanced Listener’s Copy in exchange for my honest review. This is a re-telling of Persuasion that takes place in Edinburgh in the high-end restaurant world. I liked the re-making of the characters, especially the father and family friend, in this case an aunt, that gave the poor counsel in the book. The tension built a little slowly for my taste, but it had a nice ending and a feel-good air about it I appreciated.

#allstirredup #briannemoore #persuasionretelling #netgalley #dreamscapemedia #edinburgh

I LOVED this book! 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

It’s rare that a book fully holds my attention from beginning to end, but this one did! Susan and Chris were wonderful and such real characters. I felt like I could feel all of Susan’s frustrations and confusion and excitement. All of the supporting characters were well done and served useful purposes, which isn’t always the case. The narration was great and fit into the story well.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley. Thank you to the author, the publisher and to Netgalley. I give this book 3 stars...this was a quick, simple read...the story and the characters were good, but they were not very developed. If you want a quick read where you don't really need to think about it (at the beach or by the pool) this is great...

Very enjoyable read/listen. The will they won’t they throughout this book is so good. I found myself rooting for the characters and the businesses. I especially loved the actual recipe talk and looked up a couple to try sometime. I do wish she had figured out one recipe. Overall the whole story was lovely.