Monday, March 18, 2024

A Very Nice Girl by Imogen Crimp

 

Anna is twenty-four and wants to be an opera singer.  She was shocked when she was accepted to the London conservatory she applied for on a scholarship as she never expected it would happen.  She moves to London much to her parents' dismay but they aren't able to help her with money.  She must scrimp and save and take side jobs when they appear.  Then she meets Max.

Max is in his mid-thirties, rich and successful and everything Anna had dreamed of.  He is an investment banker and has a huge apartment on the seventeenth floor of a glass skyscraper.  Max is in the process of getting a divorce and the two agree to keep it casual, keep it light.

But soon Anna finds that is impossible to do.  She finds herself skipping classes and rehearsals if Max has a free evening.  She listens as he questions if this is the life she really wants, one of constant competition and auditions, one that pays little unless you are at the very top of the profession.  She even lets Max give her money when he sees how she is struggling to even eat some weeks.  Anna finds that her dreams seem to be shifting from the career she has always held first to being whatever Max wants her to be.  Which dream will win

This is Crimp's debut novel and she takes much from her own life.  After getting a degree from Cambridge in English, she spent several years trying to be an opera singer, although it was clear to her from the start that she was ill-suited for it.  She describes the atmosphere of a conservatory clearly, the comradery, the competition, the constant anxiety and fear of failure and the joy when something goes well and it seems that one might yet reach their dreams.  She also captures the experience of a young girl dating a man who is soon overpowering.  She explores how slowly one starts to accommodate the man's schedule, his desires, his need to remain free even if one is head over heels in love with him.  Accepting someone else's thoughts about one's dreams is a formula for failure but the balancing act between one's dreams and one's desire for love is a tricky one, one that many women wake up in middle age to regret which end of the balance they have ended up with. I listened to this novel and the narrator with her English accent transports the reader to the London Anna is trying to conquer.   The reader will emphasize with Anna but may not like Max.  This book is recommended for readers of literary and women's fiction.

Sunday, March 17, 2024

The Waters by Bonnie Jo Campbell

 


The Zook women live on an island on the waters, or swamp as most would call it, in Michigan.  The head of the family is Herself, a woman who those around her fear but come to for healing.  She lives in harmony with the plants and animals of the waters, even the rattlesnakes that are a protected species.  Herself had three daughters.  One is living in California, one is a nurse nearby and the youngest, Rose Thorn, is the town's fascination.  All the men are in love with her.  She has always loved the farmer next to the island but refuses to marry him.  Rose periodically disappears, staying with her sister in California and leaving behind her eleven year old daughter, Dorothy known as Donkey, with Herself.

Men are forbidden on the island.  Herself was married but that was long ago and she doesn't trust men with their guns and their casual destruction of everything around them.  When a bullet hits Herself her thoughts are justified.  Her injury brings all the sisters home and the Zook family secrets start to emerge. 

Bonnie Jo Campbell is known as a master of documenting the lives of those who live close to nature, those who are poor and ignored.  Campbell has the knack of transporting the reader into the world she has created and the characters are drawn so well one feels they just ran into them at the post office yesterday.  There are echoes from Campbell's own life in the novel as she also grew up in Michigan and she also loves mathematics as Donkey does.  The relationships between the sisters and their mother are strong and sustaining.  This book should be a strong contender for literary awards such as the Women's Prize for Literature and the Booker and is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

Saturday, March 16, 2024

Close To Home by Peter Robinson

 

When Alan Banks was fourteen, like most teenage boys he had a gang of friends.  They played football, listened to music, checked out girls and just hung out at each others' homes.  Of them all, Banks was closest to Graham Marshall.  Then, a few weeks after Banks had an encounter near the river with an aggressive man, Graham went missing.  Did he run away?  Had he been murdered?  Now, all these years later, bones have been found and identified as Graham.  Although the body isn't in Bank's district, he volunteers to help with the case.

There is also a case going on at home.  Another teenage boy, this one the stepson of a famous footballer, has gone missing.  Luke was a quiet boy, interested in literature and music with not much use for sports. When Luke's body is found floating in the water,  Annie Cabbot is assigned the case and Banks works it also.  There are hints that Luke had a girlfriend that no one can identify and that there  was tension at home.  Can these two cases of murdered teenage boys be solved?

This is number thirteen in the Alan Banks series.  The reader gets to see more about Bank's background and his relationship with his parents and brother.  Banks meets a new woman, the officer in charge of the Graham Marshall case and since he and Annie are no longer dating, he starts a relationship with this new woman.  At the end, both cases are solved along with a larger issue of police corruption and gangster involvement.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.

Friday, March 15, 2024

House Of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland

 

Iris is the youngest of the infamous Hollow sisters.  When they were small, they disappeared off a busy Edinburgh street on New Year's Eve in the space of time it took for their parents to exchange a kiss.  They reappeared, Grey, Vivi and Iris, a month later on the same street, naked and shivering and with no memory of where they had been or what happened there.  Their parents who had been about to be arrested for murder were ecstatic.  

But things weren't good.  The parents had spent a month grieving and blaming each other and the marriage was basically over.  The girls' father had a mental breakdown and killed himself.  Both Grey and Vivi left and made their own way in the world, leaving Iris alone at home with her mother.  Grey had become the world's most famous model and designer while Vivi was a rebel and played in a rock band.  

Now Grey has disappeared again and Iris and Vivi band together along with Grey's boyfriend, another model, to find her.  Can they find Grey and all the secrets their lives have been composed of?

Krystal Sutherland, originally from Australia, is a young adult author.  Her books incorporate the supernatural and are dark with vividly drawn characters.  The reader will be drawn into the Hollow sisters' mystery and appalled as all the secrets emerge.  This book is recommended for young adult readers and those interested in the supernatural.


Thursday, March 14, 2024

Exordia by Seth Dickinson

 


When Anna goes on a walk in Central Park, the last thing she expects is to meet an alien.  An alien with nine snakelike heads and who expects to come home with her.  Ssrin tells Anna that they share a connection that will never end.  Anna, who is a Kurdish immigrant, is not sure she believes Ssrin but the fact that no one else seems to see her lends merit to the idea.

Ssrin is on Earth for a reason.  She is a renegade from her home planet and is here to retrieve a spaceship called Blackbird.  It is in Anna's home country and she wants Anna to go with her.  Anna is contacted by the United States government which is trying to make sense of Blackbird.  She and Ssrin go there along with the military and an associate Defense Secretary.  There are already scientists from several countries there trying to figure out what Blackbird is.

The word isn't good.  The aliens want not only to retrieve Ssrin and Blackbird but plan to extinguish human life on Earth.  Anna reunites with her mother who she hasn't seen since she was a child and who leads the Kurdish immigrants in the area.  An Iranian pilot also joins the core group that is frantically working to find a way to save human life on earth.  Is it possible?

Seth Dickinson hit the science fiction genre with his book The Traitor Baru Cormorant, which is more of a fantasy.  This novel is more science fiction and has lots of military action and battles.  It brings together seven humans, each with their own strengths and weaknesses along with their own secrets, and bands them together to attempt the impossible.  There is lots of math and science and this is not a novel that one picks up for a light afternoon's reading; it requires concentration and intelligence to fully grasp the horror of what is happening and the science that may defeat it.  This book is recommended for science fiction readers.  

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

Cultish by Amanda Montell

 

In this book, author Amanda Montell, who holds a degree in linguistics, discusses cults and how one of their major tools in attracting and retaining members is language.  At the beginning, individuals are 'love-bombed' and told that they can reach their highest potential.  Promises and information is kept vague.  Later, those who have joined are given a language specific to those surrounding them, drawing them in deeper and giving them a feeling of community.  That feeling of community is used to guilt trip anyone who wants to leave and many finally wake up to find years have passed.

Montell starts by using examples of what everyone calls cults, people like Jim Jones and the leader of Heaven's Gate, both of whom led their followers into suicide.  She talks about how deception is a key component of these cults and gives examples of various dangerous and life threatening cults.

But then Montell goes on to describe other areas which are 'cultish' and that use many of the same techniques and language that their more dangerous cousins do.  Multilevel marketing like Amway, cosmetic and clothing lines are discussed.  This is interesting because most of the individuals caught up in these areas rarely think of themselves as belonging to cults.  Another area, the newest one created by our Covid isolation and our focus on health, are exercise groups like Crossfit and Peleton.  These groups have cultish language, create groups that soon are the individuals social outlet and which disappear immediately when the individual leaves the group.

Montell has written several books about linguistic subjects and has a popular podcast about cults.  She wrote Wordslut: A Feminist Guide To Taking Back The Language in which she encourages women not to allow others to define them by the words they might be called.  Her degree is in linguistics from NYU.  This book and its concepts are in development for a television series and is recommended for nonfiction readers interested in how language can be used for negative purposes.  

Tuesday, March 12, 2024

Captain Sinbad by Graham Diamond

 

Sinbad is renowned in Bagdad as an adventurer, soldier and hero.  He is about to marry his long time love, Scheherazade, when the Caliph decides to take her as his own wife and makes Sinbad a criminal.  Sinbad flees Bagdad but is determined to return and marry his love.

His plan is to find a ship and sail until he can find the elusive Red Dahlia which is said to allow the finder to have his most desperate wish.  As Sinbad starts the journey, he finds a talking frog and promises to help him return to being ordinary.  Off they go and soon Sinbad has a ship and crew.

There are many adventures.  Sinbad is captured by female pirates and then imprisoned by the Greeks.  He encounters storms like he has never seen and washes up in Spain in a small village which is about to be overrun by an army of thieves and murderers.  In all his travels, he falls in love with women who help him.  But can he ever get back to Scheherazade?

Graham Diamond writes predominantly in the fantasy and science fiction genres.  This book is a rollicking retelling of the legend of Captain Sinbad and all his adventures.  The reader will be immersed in intrigues, storms, battles and given peaks into Sinbad's way with women and his loyalty to those he surrounds himself with.  This book is recommended for fantasy readers.  

Monday, March 11, 2024

Murder Road by Simone St James

 


April and Eddie are driving to their honeymoon resort when they take a wrong turn.  Soon they are on a deserted road, deep in the woods with no one or nothing around.  Then they see the girl stumbling down the road.  They stop and determine that she is definitely in trouble; there is blood everywhere.  They get her in the car and to a hospital at the nearest town but she dies there.  

Now the police are suspicious of the couple and tell them not to leave town.  The couple go to a local bed and breakfast and are interrogated repeatedly by the police.  They learn that there have been other hitchhikers who have been killed on that stretch of road going back twenty years.  There are also rumors of The Lost Girl who was the first murder victim found and who has never been identified.

Eddie and April know they are guiltless but that doesn't mean they don't have secrets.  Both have things they have never told anyone, including each other.  The police start to bring their secrets to the surface and the couple decides that they will have to find the killer if they are ever going to be able to leave.  With the help of a pair of crime fascinated teenage sisters and the irascible owner of the bed and breakfast, they start to delve into the mystery.  Can they find who killed The Lost Girl?

Simone St. James has made a name for herself in the mystery genre.  Her books typically have a supernatural element and this one follows that.  But the supernatural in this novel is much more believable than usual and the reader will be drawn into April and Eddie's story.  They are both believable characters, haunted by their pasts but totally in love with each other.  As they work to find the answers, they draw on the strength of their relationship.  This book is recommended for mystery readers. 

Sunday, March 10, 2024

Help For The Haunted by John Searles

 

Sylvie Mason doesn't live a teenage normal life.  Her parents are ghosthunters, and spend their time giving lectures and going to haunted places to rid them of spirits.  They have fitted up the basement to bring the most disturbed individuals back to the house to stay until they are healed.  Sylvie has a big sister, Rose, and that's her touchstone to normality.

Then one winter night, things explode.  Her parents are called to a deserted church in the middle of a snowstorm.  They take Sylvie with them but that only means that she is the one who discovers their murdered bodies.  Now she and Rose are living by themselves in the house with all their parents' haunted artifacts in the basement.  

Sylvie is determined to find out what happened.  She is the main witness for the crime and she isn't sure she remembers exactly what happened in that dark place.  She also wants to know all the family secrets that were kept from her.  Can she find out the truth?

John Searles writes suspense novels, often with a supernatural overtone.  He was the books editor at Cosmopolitan magazine and his novels are bestsellers.  In Sylvie, he has created a character readers can relate to as she delves into her family's history, determined to find the truths that have been hidden from her.  This book is recommended for suspense readers.

Saturday, March 9, 2024

Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King

 

Bill Hodges is a recently retired policeman.  He hasn't had a very successful retirement so far as he never developed any hobbies.  He basically sits in his recliner and watches daytime television while brooding over the case he couldn't solve before he retired.  His only friend is the teenage boy who mows his lawn and helps him with errands.

The case that he broods over is the Mercedes murder.  While a line of people waited for a job fair to open, out of the early morning fog came a Mercedes, plowing into the crowd.  Eight people were killed, including a mother and baby, and many more injured.  The driver calmly drove away afterwards.

Then something unimaginable happens.  The man who drove the Mercedes that day contacts Hodges.  He starts a cat and mouse game with him, daring him to catch him before he kills again.  Bill doesn't want to turn this over to his ex-partner but is determined to catch the killer himself.  His only allies are Jerome, the teenage boy, Jenny, the sister of the woman who owned the Mercedes and Holly, her niece who is on the spectrum but a computer whiz.  Can this ragtag mix of people stop the killer before he strikes again?

This book is the first in the Bill Hodges trilogy.  It also introduces Holly, who got her own book this past summer.  Mr. Mercedes won the Edgar Award for Best Novel.  Hodges is a sympathetic character as are the people who help him.  The killer is clearly beyond saving as his entire life has been full of psychopathy.  The reader will cheer for Hodges and his team in a race against time and the book is recommended for thriller readers.

Friday, March 8, 2024

The Postmistress by Sarah Blake

 


The town of Franklin, Massachusetts, is not sure what to think when their new postmistress arrives.  Iris James is a redheaded, middle-aged woman who is sure about what needs to be done with the mail.  She keeps the place spotless and the lines move along efficiently.  Another newcomer to the small town is Emma Trask who is Iris' total opposite.  She is a young woman, small and pretty, come to town to marry the town's doctor, Will.  

It is 1940 and the townspeople listen each night to broadcasts about the war the United States hasn't yet entered. Bombs are falling nightly on London and newscasters like Edward R. Murrow bear witness.  Frankie Bard is a woman reporter who is also there.  She reports on the bombings but after her roommate is killed, takes up her mission to report on the exodus of the Jewish population from the German held countries.  She meets Will there as he has volunteered to go to London to help with the overwhelming need for more doctors.  

Sarah Blake specializes in historical fiction set in New England.  This book explores the attitudes of the American population before World War II when many believed the war would never touch Americans and no one was thinking about the Jewish population and what was happening to them.  It also explores small town relationships, how everyone know everyone's business but how that leads to people taking care of their neighbors.  This book is recommended for historical fiction readers, especially those interested in World War II fiction.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Lady In The Lake by Laura Lippman

 

It's 1966 and Maddie Schwartz is determined to live the life she chooses.  She has left her husband and son and the comfortable country club life she had.  Now she lives in a tiny apartment downtown and after finding the body of a missing girl, has managed to parlay that into a job at one of Baltimore's newspapers.  She wants to be a reporter but is instead the assistant to the man who writes the advice column.

Maddie is determined to find a story that will make her bosses give her a shot as a reporter.  The discovery of a woman's body in a nearby fountain at a lake gives her an opportunity.  Cleo Sherwood was a black woman at a local nightclub.  Maddie is sure that Cleo was having an affair with a local politician and is sure she can find if that led to her death.  Maddie has fallen into an affair with one of the policemen she reported the missing girl's body to, and she uses that to get inside information.  Ferdie, the policeman, tells her she can't use anything he tells her as the department will know the information came from him, but Maddie is headstrong and sure she can write the story without leaving any clues behind.  Can she make her dreams come true?

Laura Lippman is one of the best authors in the mystery genre.  She is known as a feminist and her books feature strong women and her beloved city of Baltimore.  Maddie is not really sympathetic as she uses everyone around her to get her way, but it is a story of how women fought to be allowed to work in occupations that had been closed to them before.  It is also a historical look at race relations in the 1960's.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

The Family Chao by Lan Samantha Chang

 

When James heads home from university for his Christmas break, he is eager to see his family.  But he finds chaos when he gets there.  His mother Winnie has moved out and is living at a Buddhist temple, tired of her husband's temper and infidelities.  His oldest brother, Dagou, returned home six years ago becoming the head chef and expecting to take over the restaurant.  Now his father is refusing to make him a partner and wants to continue underpaying and overworking him.  Ming, the middle brother, lives in New York where he works in finance and can barely stand to be home for a few days.  The source of the family chaos is in the father, Leo, who is a bully, a miser and a control freak.

When Leo is found frozen to death in the basement meat freezer, it is unclear if it is an accident or murder.  The police come down on the side of murder and all of the Chao family secrets start to surface.  There are the two women that love Dagou and the rivalry between them.  There is the matter of inheritance.  A long-time employee harbors resentment and anger.  Who killed Leo?

Lan Samantha Chang is a Chinese American author who writes about the Chinese experience.  This novel won numerous awards and is a compelling read about the immigrant experience and about toxic family relationships.  It is told mainly through the eyes of the youngest son James who loves everyone in the family and has a hard time believing the things about his family that he discovers.  He must in the end, make a moral decision that will affect everyone.  This book is recommended for readers of multicultural literature and family relationships.

Tuesday, March 5, 2024

Dust Off The Bones by Paul Howarth

 


When fourteen year old Billy McBride and his twelve year old brother, Tommy, return to their Australian homestead after fishing that day, they know immediately that something is wrong.  It's too quiet.  They go into the house and find their parents shot dead and their sister dying.  When the Native Police arrive led by the Chief Edmund Noone, they vow to track down the killers and get justice for the boys who they take along.  But something more happens, something so evil that it must be hidden forever.

Now years later, everyone has scattered.  Tommy is somewhere out in the Outback, herding cattle the last he was heard of.  Billy came back home and ended up marrying Katherine, the girl on the largest cattle ranch in the area.  Noone with the help of local law enforcement has hidden what happened that day and has risen in the law establishment.  But he hasn't changed his ways and is determined to keep what happened hidden no matter what it takes.

When a barrister listens to an alcoholic minister who witnessed the incident, he tries to take Noone to account in a courtroom.  That leads to everyone involved having to relive what happens and another successful quashing of the truth.  But Noone isn't satisfied and decides that the only good witness is a dead one.

Paul Howarth is an Australian author and lawyer.  This novel is as raw and elemental as the Australian country as it went through colonization.   It demonstrates the cruelty used to subjugate the native population and how that evil was perpetrated throughout the justice system and society.  Edmund Noone is a cruel man, willing to kill humans as easily as others might swat a fly.  He is a terrifying villain the reader won't forget soon.  This novel is recommended for literary fiction readers and those interested in other country's histories. 

Sunday, March 3, 2024

From Caucasia, With Love by Danzy Senna

 

Birdie just wants a normal family.  She, her sister Cole and their parents live in Boston.  Her mother is a white activist while her father is a black academic.  Birdie looks like her mother while Cole looks like her father's side of the family.  But things aren't good in the marriage and her parents split up.  Birdie and Cole visit her father on the weekends but she feels like he is more interested in Cole.  Soon he gets a girlfriend and she makes no secret about her preference for Cole.  Birdie starts to let Cole go to her father's house by herself at times since she feels left out.

Then her mother gets spooked.  The group she is in has caught the attention of the FBI and she feels she has to get out of Boston.  The father and she agree to split up, the mother taking Birdie and the father taking Cole and going to Brazil.  Birdie and her mother start years of living on the road, getting up in the middle of the night to move to a new place if her mother thinks someone was watching them.  They lived for a while at a woman's commune.  Birdie is now Jesse with a new Jewish background she often forgets about.  Eventually the two settle in a small New England village.

But Birdie still longs for Cole and her father.  She runs away, back to Boston, looking for any clues that will help her track them down.  Can she find them?

Senna's background is similar to that of Birdie.  She was raised in Boston and was biracial with activist parents.  The novel was well received and received a longlist nomination for the Woman's Prize For Fiction along with other awards.  It is a reminder of the civil rights fights of the 1960's and those on the government's lists as activists were tracked for years as Birdie's mother suspects.  Birdie spends her life looking for love and acceptance and never quite finding what she is looking for.  This book is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

Saturday, March 2, 2024

The Cask Of Cranglimmering by Dawn Vogel

 

Captain Svetlana Tereshchenko had been one of the country's best pilots before she left the military.  Now she flies a rogue ship, The Silent Monsoon, with a crew of renegades from all over the world and makes her living by her wits.  She still has allies from her days at the academy and in the service but she also has enemies who would like nothing better than to see her behind bars.

When Svetlana hears that one of the legendary whisky casks of Cranglimmering has been stolen, she sees an opportunity.  If she can only find it before all those looking for it, she can use it as a bargaining chip and to make a fortune.  In the process of looking for it, she finds an island which had left the Alliance decades before and a hint of what else the cask would mean.  Can she find it before everyone else?

This is the first of a fantasy trilogy.  It would best be considered young adult as it is simpler than many of the other books in this genre.  Svetlana is an interesting character and her crew each have distinct personalities and backstories.  The book would be considered in the steampunk subgenre of fantasy.  Svetlana is the main character and the story of how she lost an eye and that of her loves is yet to be revealed.  This book is recommended for fantasy readers.

Friday, March 1, 2024

Aftermath by Peter Robinson

 


When a domestic occurrence is called in to the local police force, they arrive to find a woman, unconscious, with a head wound.  A male police officer and his rookie female partner go into the basement to clear the house and find horror.  A man comes out swinging a machete, cutting the male officer's throat and killing him.  The female manages to subdue him before her partner dies in her arms.  There is also a teenage girl staked out on a mattress, the missing teenager the police have been looking for.  

By the time Alan Banks arrives, both the husband and wife have been taken to the hospital.  The basement gives up more bodies and the police realize they have found the serial killer known as The Chameleon.  Five teenage girls have gone missing in the past months and Banks suspects they are the other bodies found.  Terence Payne is their villain but how did his wife, Lucy?  How could she not have known what was happening in her house?

As Banks and the team investigate, it turns out that Lucy has a dark past of her own.  Banks suspects she was involved but there is no evidence.  Can he discover all the secrets of that horror house?

This is the twelfth novel in the DCI Alan Banks series.  Banks is still involved, off and on, with Annie Cabbott, who is in the internal affairs department and investigating the actions of the policewoman who subdued Payne.  The psychologist Jenny Fuller is also in the picture and helping with the investigation.  Bank's dogged determination makes sure that the crime is fully investigated and that all the secrets are uncovered.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

Thursday, February 29, 2024

The Great Offshore Grounds by Vanessa Veselka

 

Thirty some years ago, two women got pregnant by the same man who then disappeared.  They made a pact that both would carry their babies to term but one would leave afterwards, giving her baby to the other to raise along with her sister.  Those babies, both girls, are Cheyenne and Livy.  They don't know which woman is the mother of each.  The father went on to become successful and rich but never contributed to the upbringing of his children.  Along the way, the family also took in a boy from the streets and adopted him as well.

Now everyone is struggling.  Cheyenne is back home after a failed marriage.  Livy is working a series of low-paying jobs, saving every cent she can to go fish in Alaska which is her dream.  Essex, their brother, joins the military so that he can get some steady money and benefits to help his family.  When the sisters find out the other woman's name, Cheyenne goes on a road trip to try to find her.  

The book follows each individual as they try to gain their dreams.  Livy makes it to Alaska and falls in love.  Cheyenne discovers that the other woman is not motherly and she has nothing to offer the sisters.  Essex finds that he likes the military but falls afoul of its rules.  

Vanessa Veselka is an American author who seems to share the restless lives of her characters.  She has been a train hopper, a student of paleontology, a mother, a teenage runaway, a musician and a labor organizer.  Her interest is in those living on the edge of poverty, those who can't quite reach the American Dream.  This novel was her second and was a National Book Award nominee.  The characters live out their lives on the edge of poverty, always trying to become more stable.  This book is recommended for readers of literary fiction. 

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Winter In Madrid by C.J. Sansom

 

Harry Brett never expected to find himself back in Madrid.  He had gone there during the Spanish Civil War to try to find a childhood friend, Bernie.  Bernie was always a Communist and had gone to Spain to fight.  He was reported missing and suspected dead after a horrendous battle.  Harry met Bernie's lover, Barbara, and together they searched but had to admit defeat and the loss of Bernie.

Now it's 1940 and Harry has been taken out of the military due to injuries he sustained at Dunkirk.  But there are still ways to serve his country.  He is approached about returning to Madrid as a spy.  Another childhood friend, Sandy Forsyth, is there and the English government suspects that he has information about Spanish gold reserves that could make the English blockade of goods and food less effective.  Harry reluctantly agrees to go.

Sandy seems thrilled to see Harry again.  Harry is shocked to discover that Sandy is living as a married couple with Barbara.  There does seem to be a big gold project that Sandy is working on and he invites Harry to invest in it as well.  In the meantime, Barbara discovers that Bernie is still alive, secretly imprisoned in a Spanish prison camp and starts to make plans to help him escape.  How will this all work out?

C.J. Sansom is an English author who focuses on historical works and is best known for his historical mystery series set during Henry VIII's reign.  In this work, he focuses on the Spanish Civil War which is an area that will be new to many readers although most will be familiar with Franco who emerged victorious from that conflict to rule Spain for many years.  Harry is a decent English man who is at a loss as to what his life will be next.  He, Bernie and Sandy all attended one of the many English private boarding schools that make up many English males lifetime friends and network.  The privations and hardships of the Spanish population after the war are not well known by most readers and Sansom makes it real.  This book is recommended for historical fiction readers.

Monday, February 26, 2024

Spring by Ali Smith

 


This is the third novel in Ali Smith's seasonal quartet.  She uses a medley of characters to discuss Britain's immigration policies.  There is Brittany King who has given up her dreams of writing to become a guard at an immigration detention facility.  There immigrants may linger for months or years even though the policy is no more than 72 hours.  They are treated as warehoused objects rather than individuals.  There is Richard Lease who has lost his old friend and mentor and isn't sure he wants to continue living in a world without her.  Then there is Florence.  She is a twelve year old girl who seems magical.  She can walk into a detention facility, into the office of the man who supervises the entire facility and get him to have the filthy communal toilets steam cleaned.  She doesn't need tickets to ride trains or other public conveyances and she can be invisible when she wants.  

These characters unite at a railroad station.  Richard is on the tracks, having decided that life is not worth living.  Florence saves him and he agrees to go with her and Brittany north to a place where he can honor his mentor.  It is unclear exactly what Florence's agenda is and Brittany is apparently taken to open her eyes to her life as it is now and what she wanted it to be.  

Ali Smith is a Scottish author who grew up in poverty.  She managed to shine academically and ended up at Cambridge.  She has been given various literature awards and is a CBE of the British Empire.  Her work has been short-listed four times for the Booker Prize and has won the Bailey Prize For Women.  She writes in an unique fashion, with short chapters and what seems random sentences that comes together to make a united point.  This work is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

Sunday, February 25, 2024

Passerby by Britney King

 

Ruth barely has time to think.  She runs a bed and breakfast in a tourist town with the help of her brothers Johnny and Davis.  But Johnny has a full time job and Davis isn't much help so almost all the work falls on Ruth.  She doesn't even have time for romance although Cole, Johnny's best friend, would love to have a relationship.

Then disaster strikes.  Davis goes on a road trip and brings back a woman, Ashley.  Ruth dislikes her on sight but everyone else is fascinated by her.  She is beautiful but Ruth doesn't trust her and suspects there is a story behind her smiles.  Ashley invites herself along on Ruth's errands and the two of them are attacked on the road by a man in a truck with a gun.  They manage to escape and Ruth is sure it is someone from the family her own family had a running feud with.

Then the deaths start.  The first is the brother of a bride who is having her wedding at Ruth's venue and who got into a fight with Davis at the reception.  The second is the son of the family the feud is with.  Ruth is afraid that Davis will be suspected or even worse arrested.  She spends her time trying to figure out the killer along with all her other work.  Then the climax; two bodies in the house right before Davis and Ashley's engagement party.  Who is trying to set up her family?

This is my first Britney King novel.  She specializes in psychological thrillers.  I listened to this novel and the narrator was the perfect Ruth, from whose eyes the story is told.  Ruth isn't a goodie two shoes; she is often sarcastic and rude to others and she clearly sees the defects in her brothers although she loves them dearly.  The ending was not as strong as the beginning but all ends satisfactorily.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.

Saturday, February 24, 2024

Beartown by Fredrik Backman

 

Beartown is a hockey town.  It's the first thing anyone would tell someone.  The entire town is consumed with the play of the junior league and the adult A-team.  The stars of the junior league, who have made it to the semi-finals so far this year, are Kevin, the main scorer and Benji, his best friend and defender on the ice.  Their coach is David and most of the team has played for him for years.  They regard him as a father and would do anything for him.

Peter Andersson is the general manager of the teams.  He played here growing up, made it out to the NHL and when his career was over, returned to his hometown.  He and his wife have two children, Maya, fifteen, and Leo, twelve.  

On the night of the semifinal victory, the team meets at Kevin's place for a party.  Things get out of hand and a crime occurs there, a crime that would put Kevin, the star, in jeopardy of not being able to play anymore.  The town immediately takes sides, most on Kevin's side as he carries their hopes and dreams on his back.  Will goodness triumph over self interest?

This book is immensely popular and it is well deserved.  Backman gets the intensity of team sports exactly right, the way the athletes devote their lives to it, the loyalty of the team to its members, the love for teammates and coaches.  Backman is a Swedish author and his novel outlines the controversy between evil and team sport loyalty as well as talking about the secrets various members of the team keep to themselves to fit in.  This book is recommended to readers of literary fiction.

Friday, February 23, 2024

Z by Therese Ann Fowler

 


This is the story of Zelda and F. Scott Fitzgerald.  Zelda was a Southern girl and meets Scott as he is sent to her town for training before going overseas for World War I.  But time intervenes and he is never sent there.  He returns to New York and proposes to Zelda.  She refuses to marry him until he finishes his first book and starts to get established.

But once they are married, they become New York's Golden Couple.  They go out every night, partying and dancing and drinking.  They meet everyone and Scott continues to write and climb the ranks of successful authors.  They travel to Paris, to Italy, places where Scott believes he will be able to concentrate and write.  But the parties are everywhere.  The couple has a daughter, Scottie, and Zelda starts to tire of her life.  

The book mainly follows the Fitzgeralds in their successful years but as the book winds to an end, the sad things emerge.  Scott becomes an alcoholic who can't write without drinking and who leaves the house for days for more partying and other women.  Zelda attempts to carve out a life for herself with painting and dancing but eventually is diagnosed with mental illnesses and suffers a series of breakdowns that leave her hospitalized.  

This is the definitive book about the Fitzgeralds in fiction form.  Fowler has meticulously researched the couple and their lives, using their letters as a primary source.  There is much discussion about Ernest Hemingway as Scott regards him as his best friend while Hemingway and Zelda despise each other.  Fowler discusses the early stirrings of feminism as women start breaking away from seeing being a wife and mother as their main definition and she captures the wild, frantic partying of the era.  This book is recommended to readers of historical fiction.

Thursday, February 22, 2024

The Pull Of The Stars by Emma Donoghue

 

It's 1918 and Dublin is feeling the effects of the Great Flu and the last days of World War I like the rest of the world.  Julia Powers is a nurse on the small ward made for those women about to give birth who also have the flu.  Julia lives quietly with her brother who came back from the war physically intact but wounded mentally and who is now mute.  The ward is tiny, a former space repurposed for the women who need it.  The hospital is understaffed and in the throes of the pandemic.

The novel looks at three days in Julia's life.  In that time, babies are born, some healthy, some not.  Some mothers recover from the flu and go home while others leave their newborns orphaned.  Two women enter Julia's life.  One is a volunteer named Bridie who comes to help.  She had been orphaned as a child and grew up in the care of nuns, a care that was akin to slavery.  She and Julia feel an instant connection and Bridie quickly picks up the ways to help the suffering women.  The other woman is Doctor Lynn.  The hospital needs her expertise but the police are looking for her as she had sided with the rebels in the recent troubles.  

Emma Donoghue is best known for her novel Room which was a major success but she has written quite a few novels.  Her interests include women's relationships and historical fiction but some of her novels also have a bit of supernatural influence.  In this novel, she explores how women made the best of things during the War, serving in ways different from the men who went to fight but ways that were just as important.  I thought the ending was a bit abrupt but overall enjoyed the novel, which Donoghue turned in to her publisher a month before the start of our own Covid pandemic.  This book is recommended for historical fiction and women's fiction readers. 

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

Cold Is The Grave by Peter Robinson

 

Chief Constable Jimmy Riddle has made it his life's work to crush DCI Alan Banks.  He thinks Banks takes too many liberties with the rules and can't be trusted to follow orders if he thinks a case isn't right.  He also suspects that Banks is a womanizer although that is far from the truth.

So it is surprising when Riddle comes to Banks and asks for a favor.  His daughter has run off to London several months ago and now there are nude photographs of her on the Web.  Could Banks go to London, find her and bring her home?  Banks is uneasy but being a father himself, agrees to go.

Banks finds Emily but things are worse than Riddle had imagined.  Emily is living with a criminal, a crime boss who has his fingers in every criminal pie, most recently smuggling.  Banks manages to bring her home and return her to her parents.

But crime doesn't stop.  At home, there are several murders of low level criminals.  Banks suspects that these murders are tied to smuggling and he wonders if this is the work of the same crime boss.  Then Emily asks to meet Banks for lunch and he agrees, seeing that she is doing better and talking about going to university.  She seems to be done with her teenage rebellion but that night she is killed, in a horrific manner, in a nightclub.  Can Banks solve the murder?

This is the eleventh novel in the series.  This one has even more twists and turns than some prior ones.  Banks is still reeling from the breakup of his marriage but is recovering.  His essentially honorable nature shows through as he does a favor for a man who has spent time trying to ruin Bank's career.  I didn't see the ending coming or how old crimes could have long consequences.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.

Tuesday, February 20, 2024

The Nanny by Gilly Macmillan

 


Jo is back where she never expected to be again.  Growing up, she found her parents inattentive and cold.  The only warmth and love she got was from her nanny, Hannah.  But Hannah disappeared in the middle of the night when Jo was eight and after that she counted the days until she could leave also.  Jo married, moved to the United States and had a daughter, Ruby.  But her husband was killed in an accident and now she is back in England, back home with the mother she could never love.

Jo's mother is even more demanding and cold now that her health is waning.  She does love Ruby, though, and shows her the love and attention Jo had wanted so desperately growing up.  Then one day, Jo opens the door and there stands Hannah on the doorstep.  She has returned to the village and wants to renew her relationship with Jo.

Jo is ecstatic but her mother warns that Hannah is conniving.  Soon Jo is caught between the two women who despise each other.  Each of the older women tries to get Ruby's attention and love but Ruby doesn't like Hannah much to Jo's dismay.  When a skull is found on the estate, the police come to uncover all the secrets.  Who died and how?

This was my first novel by Gilly Macmillan and it won't be my last.  Every time I thought I knew where the story was going, there was another twist.  Macmillan is known for her thrillers and this delivered.  The relationships stretching back to childhood and the renewed fight for Jo's child's love adds another layer of suspense.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

Monday, February 19, 2024

Simon The Fiddler by Paulette Jiles

 

Simon Boudlin has one talent to make his way in the world.  It's 1865 and he was only conscripted in the last few weeks of the war where his ability with the fiddle put him in the regimental band.  Now the war is done although only after one last bloody unnecessary battle fought only so a Yankee officer could claim credit.  Simon slips away rather than stay with the tatters of the Confederate army.  

He soon meets up with three other men in his same situation; musicians who have left the military rather than stay.  They start to play together in bars and at parties.  At one party, Simon sees an indentured Irish girl, Doris Dillion.  Simon is entranced with her but knows she has years to serve and he has nothing to offer.  As her household leaves the city, he stands on the side of the road and plays a love song to her.

Life is hard and the men barely scrape by.  The youngest boy is also Irish and Simon writes to Doris as the boy, giving news from home and starting a conversation he hopes will lead to marriage.  Simon plans to buy land and farm and he wants Doris by his side.  But the two are separated by miles of Texas land and poverty and legal obligations.  Simon and his crew travel from city to city with Simon saving all his money to purchase land.  He knows somehow he will find his Irish girl and make her his.

This is a lovely historical fiction that shows the difficulty of life after the Civil War and how hard it was to make a living.  There is lots of opportunity for a man who will work in the territories and its a perfect time to reinvent oneself.  Tensions still remain from the war and laws are uncertain and legal business such as buying land is shaky without the infrastructure to support it.  Simon decides to marry Doris after only seeing her once or twice and quick relationships were the norm at such an unsettled time.  Readers will be interested to read about life in this time period and cheer on Simon's pursuit of Doris.  This book is recommended for readers of historical fiction.

Sunday, February 18, 2024

The Amendment by Kiersten Modglin

 

When Peter and Ainsley fell in love, they thought it would be like that forever.  Now years later, Ainsley thinks Peter is secretive and he thinks she is controlling.  But there are three children to consider and each still loves the other.  They need to figure out how to save this marriage.

It turns out that Peter is hiding much more than Ainsley ever considered.  He has been having affairs but when he is done, he kills his mistress and buries her in the woods behind their house.  Can Ainsley accept this dark secret?  She knows if she doesn't their marriage is over so she finds a way to accommodate. 

I listened to this book and the narrators were great.  The book is told in alternating chapters between Peter and Ainsley with both a male and female narrator.  They slowly reveal all the secrets and the twists and turns of the couple's relationship.  Modglin is known for her psychological thrillers and this one does not disappoint.  This book is recommended for mystery readers. 

Saturday, February 17, 2024

Swingtime by Zadie Smith

 


Two young girls grow up in London in housing.  They meet in dance but Tracey is the one with talent, the one who grows up quickly.  The other girl loves music and singing but dance is not her talent.  One girl has a very indulgent mother, one a mother who insists that her daughter must be better, be smarter, be more.

When the girls grow up, Tracey makes it onto the theatre scene, although only on the periphery.  The other after a dead end job, becomes an assistant to one of the world's most popular singers.  She does whatever is needed, even when Aimee, the singer, decides her next project is starting a school for girls in Africa.  Like most of her projects, Aimee loses interest after a while so the assistant is charged with trips to Africa and overseeing the project.  

This is the story of female friendships.  There is the rivalry and the disagreements, the telling of secrets and being each other's champion.  The girls' lives turn out very different and the mothers are also main characters.  One is driven to succeed, the other is driven by living through her daughter.  

Zadie Smith has written several novels that have gained acclaim, being nominated for Booker Prizes and the Women's Prize for Fiction, which her novel, On Beauty, won.  Her writing explores the lives of women of color and female friendships.  In this novel, she made the choice to never tell the reader the name of her main character from whose perspective the book is narrated.  It also delves into the mother daughter relationship and how various styles of parenting affects children.  This novel is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

Friday, February 16, 2024

Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead by Elle Cosimano

 

It's never placid being the single mother of two small children.  Finlay is juggling everything she has to do.  Her next book is about to hit deadline and she's behind.  Her family is in and out as they always are.  Then there's the little matter of someone trying to kill Finlay's ex-husband, Steven.  While she hasn't forgiven him for walking out on her for another woman, Steven is a great dad and she doesn't want him dead.  

Along with Vero, her nanny and sidekick, Finlay attempts to figure out who is after Steven.  She discovers a website set up for those who want to hire hit men and sure enough, Steven is on there as a potential victim.  Tracking that down takes Finlay into prison to talk with the head of the Russian mob and then dealing with a superrich woman assassin.  There's also the matter of the dead body she discovers in a storage unit in a freezer but is that also related?

This is the second novel in the Finlay Donovan series and it is a light, madcap adventure.  Elle Cosimano was a YA author until her first Donovan novel which was a big hit.  I listened to this book and the narrator was perfect.  She had a light voice that had the perfect timing, moving the plot along and showing Finlay as a woman determined to make it whatever life throws at her.  Readers will enjoy this novel and look forward to the next in the series.  This book is recommended for light mystery readers.