Let's Not Do That Again by Grant Ginder

 

Nancy Harrison is running for the Senate from New York and this race is close.  She has two grown children.  Her son Nick was her assistant but now is teaching at Columbia.  Her daughter, Greta, seems to be at loose ends.  About a year ago, she suddenly distanced herself from her family, broke up with her fiance and moved out of a great apartment.  Now she is living in a room with strange roommates and working at an Apple store.

Then Greta falls in love with a man she meets online.  Unfortunately, he is a French right wing radical who is filled with prejudice and looking to become famous by spouting horrendous diatribes on YouTube.  Greta heads to Paris and the next the family sees of her, she is throwing a champagne bottle through a glass window of one of the finest restaurants in Paris.  The video goes viral and Nancy's prospects of winning are looking slimmer.  She sends Nick to Paris to bring Greta home.  Will he succeed?

Grant Ginder is an American novelist whose life is very similar to Nick's.  He has woven a tale of family relationships and secrets that will have the reader enthralled.  Although Greta seems to have gone off the tracks, the reader will discover what made her change so dramatically and what happens to her as the book progresses.  Nick starts a relationship with an FBI agent and thinks about moving away to get some distance from his family and their constant crises.   The tone of the book is actually light and the reader will find it easy to read.  This book is recommended for readers interested in family relationships.  

Beasts Of A Little Land by Juhea Kim

 

This novel follows the lives of three Korean women, courtesans for decades.  Luna, Lotus and Jade came to Seoul as young girls, accepted by the best courtesan school in the country which was run by Dani.  Dani was acknowledged throughout the land as the most beautiful and accomplished courtesan.  Luna and Lotus were sisters while Jade was Lotus's best friend.  They received lessons in dance and song, art and music and etiquette.

When the girls were young women, each went a different way.  Luna was the victim of a horrific attack and became a recluse.  Lotus became a noted singer while Luna was a dancer and movie star.  Both Lotus and Luna had men that they loved above all else but no man was willing to marry a courtesan no matter how much he loved her.  The men were involved in business and politics as Korea was desperate to break away from Japanese rule.  

This is a debut novel for Juhea Kim.  She received her BA from Princeton in Art and Archeology and is very tied up in animal conservation.  The substory of a tiger which runs through the novel is an indication of her love for these animals.  Readers will be exposed to the history of Korea as it broke out from Japanese rule after World War II and became broken into the two Koreas existent today.  The women, no matter how accomplished and how lauded were doomed to solitary lives.  This book is recommended for readers of historical and women's fiction.  

When They Come For You by James W. Hall

 

Grace McDaniel is a photographer living in Florida with her husband and infant son.  Her mother had been a famous photographer, jetting all over the world to photograph rulers, rock stars, actors and other famous people but Grace doesn't want that life.  Her quiet life with her journalist husband suits her fine.  When Grace arrives home one day to find her house in flames and her husband and son murdered, she must decide what to do.

Ross never talked about his work but Grace manages to find out what he was working on.  A man had come to him exposing the horrors being committed in Africa in the name of bringing chocolate to market.  Grace is determined to find out exactly what was going on and who took away her family.  Although she is living a quiet life now, in her past she had worked for one of the secret services and is a martial arts expert.  Her grandfather had been one of the big names in the Florida mafia and he still has connections as does her brother who works worldwide in the banking industry.  With their connections and her determination, Grace is going to get to the bottom of what has been going on regardless of what it takes or who she offends.

James W. Hall is known for his work in the thriller genre.  His most well known series is that of Thorne who is a loner who teams up with a partner to solve crimes native to Florida.  This novel is the first in a new series.  Grace draws on everything she can in order to put the world back to order and get revenge on those who took her family.  This book is recommended for thriller readers.  

While Idaho Slept by J. Reuben Appelman

 

Kaylee Goncalves.  Madison Mogen.  Xana Kernodle.  Ethan Chapin.  These were the four University of Idaho students whose murders stunned the nation.  Who could do such a horrific act?  Kaylee had finished with school and was about to start her first adult job.  She had come back for the weekend.  Ethan was Xana's boyfriend and didn't live at the house where the murders occurred but was there that night.  

The act sent the university and town into panic.  Streets were deserted at night and restaurants were empty, with home delivery of food skyrocketing.  Everyone demanded answers but the police were taking their time and working the case methodically, determined that any case they built would stand up in court.  Rumors were rampant and one was that the police weren't really working on the case or weren't up to the job.  The local police had immediately called in the state police and the FBI were also involved so there was plenty of expertise and resources.  

The police actually had fairly good clues early on.  The murderer had left a knife sheath at the scene which had his DNA.  There were camera shots of his car and going back, showing that he had staked out the house far before the actual murders.  As the suspect was investigated, he turned out to be a man who was heavy as a child and bullied.  He had managed to turn himself around physically but women could tell that there was something off about him and he had few if any relationships.  

J. Reuben Appelman is known for his work in the true crime genre.  He wrote and produced a series for television about the Detroit Area child killings that won great acclaim and he is a private investigator in Idaho who specializes in human trafficking.  In this book, he devoted chapters to each victim, giving the reader a look into their lives.  He then described the police investigation and how they narrowed in on the suspect although many of the facts of the case won't be available until the trial.  He has written a sensitive account of this tragedy making his focus the personalization of the victims. This book is recommended for true crime readers.  

The Island by Adrian McKinty

 

When Tom, an orthopedic surgeon, goes to a conference in Australia, he decides to make it a family vacation.  His wife had died a year or so ago and he had recently remarried to Heather.  There are two children, Olivia and Owen.  The children aren't thrilled about Heather and this should be a trip to bring the family together.

While there, the family hears about an island only a mile and a half offshore which is private and has an amazing variety of animals.  Since the children want to see native animals, Tom decides the cost to go is worth it, especially when they meet a German couple who agree to split the cost.  The six of them head off to the island on a ferry and then they split up, each heading out in their own cars.  But something goes terribly wrong.  Tom commits an act that puts the family at odds with the strange cultlike family that owns the island.  This group are the only inhabitants of the island and they live a life dictated by Ma, the matriarch.  The group has its own rules and Tom and Heather are now on the other side of the law.

It's clear that the family wants revenge and soon Heather and the children are being hunted along with the German couple.  As they fight capture, burning temperatures, lack of water and dangerous animals, Heather and the children come together to survive until they can be rescued.  The family has decided that only death will do for Heather, Tom, the children and the other couple and they hunt them relentlessly.  But Heather had grown up in the remote wilderness herself with parents both from the military and she knows a thing or two about survival.  Who will win?

This was one of the most heartstopping books I've read.  I'm pretty tough but I had to put it down a time or two when the suspense got to be more than I could take.  Heather has survival skills few would know about and she manages to keep herself and the children going while bonding with them more than any of them ever expected.  Adrian McKinty is an Irish author who also lived for a while in Australia so the environment rings true.  He is known for his Sean Duffy series about a Protestant detective working in Northern Ireland and his standalone hit, The Chain.  He has won numerous awards in the mystery genre and this book is recommended for mystery and thriller readers.  

End Of Story by A. J. Finn

 

Nicky Hunter is a professor who teaches writing and criticism, specifically of mysteries.  One of her favorites has always been Sebastian Trapp one of the masters of the genre.  The two have been corresponding for years and she feels as if she knows him both as an author and a man.  So she is quite upset when she gets the letter that he writes, saying that he has been given three months to live and asking her to come to San Francisco to write his memoirs.  Since she is between semesters she agrees and is soon knocking on the door.

Twenty years ago, Sebastian had been involved in a scandal when on New Year's Eve, his wife and young son had disappeared after a New Year Eve's party.  Neither has ever been found and many thought that Sebastian killed them both.  Now he lives in his mansion with his second wife, Diana, his daughter Madeline and his nephew Freddy.  Do they know Sebastian's secrets?

As Sebastian tells his story to Nicky, other things start to happen.  Soon Nicky is caught up in the mysteries and feels that she is getting closer to the answers of that original scandal.  But does she really know what is going on around her?

This is A.J. Finn's second novel and there's no doubt that the man can write a compelling mystery.  The action moves quickly and the twists and turns are unexpected. Readers will be caught up in the mystery of what happened to Trapp's family all those years ago and what is happening now.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.   

The Covenant Of Water by Abraham Verghese

 

This novel follows one Indian family in the province of Kerala for over seven decades.  It begins when a twelve year old girl is married to a forty year old landowner.  She doesn't know how to be a wife but slowly learns and although she starts out fearing her husband she learns to love him over the years.  They have three children, JoJo, who is the husband's child from his first wife, Baby Mol and Philipose.  Over the years, the young girl becomes the family matriarch known as Big Ammachi.

There is also an alternate storyline following an English doctor named Digby who is a surgeon but who ends up spending his life working in a leprosy sanitarium.  The two stories end up coming together at the end of the novel.

Along the way, the reader will learn about many things; the caste system of India, the scourge of leprosy, medical practice in the 1900's in India, Indian culture and art.  The family hides a secret; that the men especially have what they call The Condition.  That condition is an inordinate fear of water in a watery environment and many with the condition end up drowning.  As the book progresses we learn that this is a medical condition and the grandchild of Big Ammachi becomes a surgeon and dedicates her life to studying the condition.

Abraham Verghese is a medical doctor and some readers have thought there was too much medical detail in this novel.  Overall, it was released to great anticipation and was an Oprah's Book Club pick.  I enjoyed the novel but thought it ended too abruptly as one of the main stories was left in limbo.  Overall I enjoyed learning more about the Indian culture and especially reading the twists and turns of this family over many decades.  This book is recommended for readers of literary and multicultural fiction. 

Such A Fun Age by Kiley Reid

 

Emira is drifting.  She has graduated college but what's next?  She has patched together a couple of parttime jobs to make the rent in the small apartment she shares with a roommate.  She works a couple of days as a transcriptionist for a nonprofit and the rest of the time she babysits for two children.  Briar is almost three and she has a baby sister.  Their parents are upwardly mobile professionals.  Alix is an influencer with her own company while her husband, Peter, is a local newscaster.  They are both white while Emira is black.  Emira knows she needs to find a job with benefits and potential but doesn't really know what she wants to do and she and Briar have a special relationship.

She meets Kelly one night in a grocery store.  Emira had been called away from a party by Alix.  They had had an emergency and wanted Emira to take Briar to a grocery store while the police came to their house so she wouldn't be scared.  But a store security guard, seeing a black woman with a white toddler at eleven-thirty, accuses Emira of kidnapping the child and won't let her leave.  Kelly sees what is going on and videos it on his phone.  The store incident is over when Peter arrives to vouch for Emira but she is left shaken and angry.

Soon after she runs into Kelly again and they begin a relationship.  As it advances, she can tell Kelly wants her to figure out a better job while Alix wants to be Emira's friend.  She starts to feel pressured by both of them and when it turns out that the two have a former relationship, everything comes to a crisis point.

Kiley Reid is an African American author.  This novel, which explores the aimlessness of youth, racial relationships and the pushiness of those who think they know better what one's life should be is her debut.  She attended the Iowa Writer's Workshop where she received the Truman Capote Fellowship and is now an associate professor as well as an author.  I could relate best to Emira as I have a daughter the same age.  She went through a year or so of this after she graduated from college.  Her graduation occurred during the lockdown for covid and she ended up moving home for a while as employers weren't hiring.  She felt pressured to start the rest of her life while not knowing what that rest would look like.  Just as she figured it out and is now happy and employed in a job she loves, I feel Emira will do the same.  This book was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2020 and is recommended for readers of literary fiction and those interested in other lives.

White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link

 

In this anthology of seven stories, Kelly Link takes fairy tales and modernizes them with characters searching for what will make their lives complete.  My favorite story was The Lady And The Fox about a man who had been entranced by a fairy lady and the human woman who broke the spell.  The longest story is the last one, Skinder's Veil about a cottage in the remote Maine woods where visitors must be admitted all except the one who owns the cottage.  

Kelly Link is known as an editor and author.  She also owns a bookstore with her husband.  She specializes in fantasy and says that the reader knows going in that they will be asked to imagine a world different from what they know.  She has won various awards.  Best known for her short stories, she wrote her first novel in 2024.  The characters in these stories will make the reader imagine how things could be different and how we can make the world around us over to our choosing.  This book is recommended for fantasy readers.  

The Breaker by Minette Walters

 

Two crimes face the police in a normally quiet sailing town.  A woman's body has been discovered, nude, washed up on shore.  In the nearby town, a toddler is found wandering, mute and unwilling to say anything.  The woman is Kate Summer, the child hers.  Kate was raped, strangled then thrown into the water.  The killer assumed she was dead but even with broken fingers, she had been alive and tried to swim to shore.  Her daughter, Hannah, is almost three and will speak only to women; she screams whenever her father tries to interact with her.

The police have two main suspects.  Steven Harding is the man who called in the discovery of the body.  He says he was hiking and found two boys who had discovered the body and just called it in and waited with the boys.  But the police soon discover that Steven, an actor, had a boat nearby and more suspiciously, had had an affair with Kate.  The other suspect is Kate's husband.  Kate had been a secretary at the pharmaceutical plant where he worked and she set her cap for him and quickly married him to gain the money and house she had always dreamed of.  He has an alibi, attendance at a conference but was he really there?

Minette Walters is a British author whose career is unusual.  She started off writing psychological thrillers and mysteries and I thought was one of the best around.  Apparently she tired of the mystery genre, took a ten year break and since then has written a series of successful historical novels.  The plotting in this mystery is taut, the police procedures spot on.  There are side stories of a policeman in love with a local stable owner and smuggling in the coastal town the murder occurred in.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

Savage Vengence by Gary C. King

 

Renae Ahlers Wicklund thought that sunny day in December of 1974 would be the worst day of her life.  She was at home with her 16-month old daughter when a man burst into the house.  He attacked Renae and told her to strip, saying that he would kill her daughter otherwise.  He left only after oral sex.  Renae ran to the neighbor's house and reported it immediately to the police.

The man was Charles Campbell.  Although he was young, only twenty, he had a long record of victimizing women.  He had no problems beating them and threatening their children.  He was also into drugs and committed burglaries.  When he was captured, he was sentenced to many years in prison and Renae finally felt safe.

But Campbell was the kind of man who managed to work the system.  Instead of the years he was given, he managed to get out in only seven years although he hadn't been a model prisoner.  His first act upon moving to a halfway house?  He tracked down Renae, broke in once again and this time killed her, her daughter who was eight by then and a neighbor who came to check on Renae.  

Gary King is recognized as one of the genre's best true crime writers.  His career has spanned thirty decades and he's written nineteen books as well as writing shorter fiction for true crime magazines and content for the various television shows on true crime channels.  It is apparent that he does extensive research and follows the criminal from the crime, through the trial and then gives the reader the disposition of the case.  This book is recommended for true crime readers.  

Sleeping Giants by Rene Denfeld

 

Larry Palmer is retired and at loose ends.  When he left the police force, he moved to the coast to please his wife who had always wanted to live there.  They ended up in a small town in Oregon and then unexpectedly, she died.  Now Palmer is left in a place where he has no real friends and nothing much to do. 

One day on the beach he meets a young woman.  Her name is Amanda and she has come there to try to find out about her brother.  The children had been separated and she didn't know about him until recently.  Amanda had been adopted but her brother had been turned over to the state and ended up in a home for troubled youths in the town where Palmer now lives.  The home had been closed for many years and Amanda's brother had died in the waves twenty years ago.  The ocean there is dangerous with rocks and rip tides and when he went in for the first time, he was swept away. 

Amanda is crushed to learn this and she and Palmer do what they can to learn about his life.  They learn that the boys there were mistreated and that the director retired and is still living in another state. The only friend Dennis the brother had was a maintenance worker and no one knows what happened to him.  It seems like a dead end.  

Rene Denfeld is a foster mother herself and has adopted three children she fostered.  Her work was as an investigator for the Public Defender's office and since she started writing she has used her knowledge to form the background of her work.  She has won numerous awards for her writing and her hope is that it makes the way of children left without parents easier.  There is suspense in the book and readers will be on Amanda and Palmer's side as they investigate.  This book is recommended for mystery fans.

Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart

 

Mungo is fourteen and lives on a housing estate in Glasgow, Scotland.  His mother had the children young, only twenty when Mungo the youngest was born.  She is an alcoholic who is rarely home, off with men who will keep her supplied with drink.  Mungo's oldest brother, Hamish, is eighteen.  He is the leader of a group of Protestant boys who fight with Catholics and immigrants.  Hamish already is a father and spends most of his time with his young girlfriend and baby.  That leaves Mungo alone most often with his big sister Jodie.  Jodie is smart and yearns to go to college one day if she can break free.

Lonely most of the time, Mungo meets James.  James lives with his father but his father works on the oil rigs, away for weeks at a time, leaving James to live alone.  His family is Catholic so he and Mungo should never be friends according to those around him.  James raises pigeons and the boys bond over their care.  Eventually the friendship turns romantic although both boys are ashamed of their love for each other.

There are two main stories that intertwine in the book.  One is the friendship between Mungo and James and how that progresses over time and the other is a weekend that Mungo spends camping with two old men.  His mother has sent him away with them, saying they will show Mungo how to fish and survive in the woods but really because they provided her with money to buy the drink she cannot live without.  What happens on that trip will affect Mungo's life forever.  

Douglas Stuart got off to a huge start in the literary world.  His first book, Shuggie Bain, won the Booker Prize which is unheard of.  This book echoes many of the same themes, the Scottish lower class families, the enmity between the two religions and homosexual love.  The book is lyrical and the reader will just want to reach into the pages and save Mungo from the disasters one can see coming for him.  I listened to this novel and the narrator's Scottish accent made the characters and place come alive.  I'm looking forward to Stuart's third book to see if he can break away from this environment and write about different things.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.    

All The Colors Of The Dark by Chris Whitaker

 

Saint lives with her grandmother, friendless because she's so smart and loves things like beekeeping instead of regular kid stuff.  Patch lives with a junkie mother, his nickname the result of only having one eye from birth.  The two find each other and start a friendship that deepens quickly.  

When they are thirteen, a man tries to kidnap the school beauty.  Patch intervenes and he is instead taken away.  He comes to in a dark underground room where he is imprisoned for almost a year.  The only thing that keeps him going is the company of another captive, Grace.  He is found when Saint, who never gives up on him, discovers where he is hidden and manages to free him.  Grace, however, doesn't make it out.

That sets in motion the paths of each life.  Saint starts a law enforcement career, first locally then with the FBI.  Patch spends his life looking for Grace and the rest of the girls the man who took him took and killed.  Along the way, he becomes an artist and paints pictures of the girls he gives to the parents who will never see their daughters again.  Over the years, the two friends continue to be thrown together at times and their friendship never fades.  Each is the most important person in the other's world.

This book was released to great fanfare.  It lives up to the expectations set by all the buzz.  Whitaker explores the nature of love and friendship and whether obsession is ever valid or if it ruins lives.  The two main characters are such that the reader will fall in love with both of them and cheer them on as they live their lives.  This book is recommended for readers of thrillers.  

Seventh Decimate by Stephen R. Donaldson

 

The countries of Belleger and Amika have been at war as long as most men have been alive.  Amika has the advantage in number of men but Belleger has rifles which evens the field.  Both sides have sorcery which allows use of fire, earthquakes and other deadly occurrences.   The war is basically in a stalemate then one day Belleger forces wake up and their sorcery no longer works.

An ancient sorcerer tells them that there is a Seventh Decimate that rules the six that they know about.  Surely Amika has somehow managed to gain that Seventh Decimate and without their sorcery, Belleger is doomed to be conquered and extinguished.

Prince Bifalt who has fought the Amikaians as long as he was old enough is chosen to lead a mission.  There is talk of an ancient library where the Seventh Decimate can be found.  He and a group of men are to find where this library is, go to it and return with the Seventh Decimate.  It is a fool's errand as no one knows where they should go or how they will manage to get it.  

The men set out and have many adventures and battles.  By the time Prince Bifalt gets to the library, his troop is down to him and one other man.  Now that he is there, Bifalt must figure out how to convince the monks that run the library to give him the tome he desires.  Will he be successful?

Stephen R. Donaldson is known for his fantasy works.  His books about Thomas Covenant are a fantasy classic.  This book is the start of a new trilogy, The Great God's War.  Readers will be interested in the world building and the quandary those living in Belleger and Amika are caught up in.  Prince Bifalt starts out as a crude soldier but grows as he travels and encounters people and cultures he never imagined.  This book is recommended for fantasy readers.  

The Wedding People by Alison Espach

 

Phoebe Stone's life has fallen apart.  Before the Covid pandemic, she had a happy marriage with Matt, a job she loved and the hope of having a family.  Afterwards, not so much.  Matt leaves Phoebe for her best friend after Phoebe and Matt realize that one of them is infertile and they won't be having a family.  Worse, they both work as professors where Phoebe does so she will be running into them daily.  Then to top everything off, her cat who loved her regardless of what she did dies.

Phoebe goes to work for the first day of classes and snaps.  She leaves the university and ends up at the luxurious Cornwall Hotel where she plans to take all of her cat's pain pills, have a great meal and die in her sleep.  But Lila isn't having that.  Lila thought she had reserved the entire hotel for a week as it's her wedding week.  She isn't happy to see Phoebe there and when she hears what Phoebe is planning, she is outraged.  How could Phoebe ruin her wedding?  Who does she think she is?

But Phoebe's plans don't work out.  She can't have a great meal because the kitchen isn't doing room service because of the wedding festivities.  The cat pain killers don't seem to do much and Phoebe wakes up the next morning.  When Lila storms into her room, they start to talk and soon Lila has decided that Phoebe should stay for the week as she is the only person who is indifferent to everyone and who will tell Lila the truth about things.

As the week goes on, Phoebe becomes attached to the people in the wedding.  There's Jim who thought he was taking the groom along as a wingman the day Lila and the groom, Gary, met and fell in love.  There's Lila's mother who has a huge nude portrait of herself commissioned and which Lila gives to Gary.  There's Gary's sister who dislikes Lila and is having an affair.  There's Gary's preteen daughter, Juice, who really dislikes Lila and is suspicious she is trying to replace Juice's mother who dies.  Then there is Gary who Phoebe feels an instant attraction to and it's clear as the week goes on that the attraction is returned.  What will happen?

This is my first Alison Espach book but it definitely won't be my last.  I expected a frothy romance but instead there is a gradual realization by Phoebe what was wrong with her life before and how to fix it going forward.  The characters are well drawn and the reader will be pulled into the plot as the week of the wedding goes forward.  This book is recommended for readers of women's and romance fiction. 

The Crucifix Killer by Chris Carter

 

Robert Hunter is the star detective on a specialized unit of homicide detectives.  This unit only deals with serial killers or other high profile cases.  Hunter's nemesis had been what the newspapers named The Crucifix Killer who killed seven people before stopping two years ago.  His signature was a double cross carved on the victims' necks and his cruel methods of killing.  After the capture of the killer, Hunter had more stress when his partner and his partner's wife were killed in a boating accident.

Hunter arrives at work one morning to discover two things.  He has been assigned a new partner, Garcia.  Garcia is new to the unit and Hunter is the only man without a partner.  The other thing is that a new body has been discovered and has the distinctive double cross carved on the neck.  Does the Crucifix Killer have a copy cat or did the unit make a terrible mistake two years ago?

This is the first of thirteen Robert Hunter novels.  I've heard a lot about the author and was curious to read one of the series.  The deaths are imaginative and those who enjoy a police procedural will be interested.  I did have issues with Hunter as he is remote from everyone and his approach and treatment of women was pretty dismissive.  However, I enjoyed the book enough that I'll continue the series and see if Hunter grows on me.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

This Strange Eventful History by Claire Messud

 

This novel follows the lives of one family over seventy years.  Gaston and Lucienne Cassars are separated during World War II and Lucienne take the couple's two children, Francoise and Denise, back to the couple's homeland of Algeria.  Gaston joins them after the war but when Algeria receives its freedom from France, the family is forced to leave and resettle in France.  Gaston and Lucienne portray the epitome of true love although Gaston is much younger than his wife.  Their marriage sets the goal for their descendants.

Francoise marries Barbara, who is much different than the family and who regards the closeness as obsessive and needy.  They have two daughters, Chloe and Lou-Lou.  Denise never marries and is prone to unspoken crushes that can last years and periodic nervous breakdowns.  Over the years to please Barbara, Francoise moves his family from France to Canada to Australia to the United States.  He becomes a business success although his boyhood dream had been to become an author.

This book was released to much anticipation and has been selected as one of this year's Booker Prize longlist.  The Cassar family's story is based on the author's own family history although probably not the final climatic twist.  The theme is that history will change, lives will change but family is all.  The reader will determine if Messud manages to demonstrate that theme or if family causes issues that could be avoided with less emphasis on family relationships.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.   

Mecca by Susan Straight

 

In this novel, the reader meets a variety of individuals who live in Southern California.  Some are recent immigrants from Mexico and other countries in Central or South America.  Some are families with Latino backgrounds who have been in the area longer than the English pioneers who came to settle the land.  Some are police, some are criminals.  Some live in poverty, some are rich through work or luck.  

The individual stories wrap around and the reader may become confused where the book is going.  Yet as it progresses, the stories often merge and events that happened twenty years ago play out in the present.  Other stories are just beginning and no one knows if they will have connections to the other ones.

Susan Straight is a native California from the area she writes about.  Her work has gained awards with past works being named an NPR Book Of The Year and a National Book Award finalist.  I listened to this book with its multiple narrators.  Each did a good job although I think an added layer of richness would have applied if those presenting the story of recent immigrants had that accent.  Readers will learn about the land and its people, often in ways never considered.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers. 

Don't Believe It by Charlie Donlea

 

Grace Sebold has been imprisoned in a Caribbean prison for ten years.  At a destination wedding for her friends, Grace's boyfriend, Julian, had ended up in the ocean at the bottom of a cliff, dead.  When it was determined that the death had been murder, it didn't take long for the local authorities to arrest Grace.  The country depended on tourists and it was better if one tourist killed another over a relationship issue than if one of the locals had killed a tourist.  Grace found herself in prison, her dream of being a neurosurgeon now unattainable.

Sidney Ryan has made a name for herself as a documentary maker.  She has proven two prisoners innocent and now her desk overflows with pleading letters from prisoners all over the country asking for her help.  Grace's case catches Sidney's attention as she is looking for a case that she can film and release in a series of episodes where the audience finds out the evidence as she does, much like the popular podcast, Serial.  Grace's case is the one she chooses and soon the country is entranced with Grace's case as week by week Sidney uncovers evidence that Grace might well be falsely imprisoned.  Will Sidney win Grace's freedom?

This is my first Donlea book.  He has made a name for himself in the thriller genre with several bestselling novels.  His forte is shocking twists and turns and this book is full of those along with a breathtaking climax that will take the reader by surprise.  The characters have believable backstories and he never crosses the line into events that the reader wouldn't believe.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

Dept. Of Speculation by Jenny Offill

 

In this short novel, Offill uses short paragraphs to illustrate a marriage, the arrival of a baby, an affair and then the decision to try to work things out in the marriage.  The title comes from the love letters they would write each other, speculating on their future and what it would hold.  They each had a stack of these.  With the arrival of a daughter, they learn that there is another kind of love they could not imagine before she came to them.  But the strain of caring for a dependant child while working can often lead to marriage partners not spending enough time with and for each other.

This book was named one of the ten best books of 2014 by the New York Times Review.  Her work has received other awards such as being selected as a New York Times Notable Book and listed for the Women's Fiction Award.  She was raised by two academic parents and attended UNC for her undergraduate degree.  She works as a professor or visiting professor in various universities.  It is amazing to see how she can build entire lives with short statements that accumulate and build a picture.  This book is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

When The Music's Over by Peter Robinson

 

Detective Superintendent Alan Bank's team is facing two cases.  His case involves the suspicion that a beloved comic and TV variety show host had molested and raped a series of young girls over the years, going back forty years.  Now a woman has come forward who is willing to testify and other women are starting to do the same.  The case is touchy with a rich, beloved man and hard to come by evidence so many years ago.  

DI Annie Cabbot's job is a recent murder.  A young girl was taken for a ride by a group of men.  She was drugged and raped then thrown out of the van to make her way home.  But she never got there.  The man she flagged down for help instead killed her.  Cabbot discovers that a group of men in the same town have targeted young women from the poorer classes and turned them into prostitutes.  This girl was one who was willing to do whatever it took to get out of that life.  

This is the twenty-third book in the Peter Robinson series.  Banks has been promoted and will only get the hardest cases from now on.  His team is also moving upward, gaining the promotions that experience and hard work bring.  The two cases are similar since they both focus on exploited young women brought against their will into worlds where murder is not rare.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

 

Luzia Cotado is a maid in a small household in Spain.  She had been raised by educated parents and expected to marry and have a household.  When they died early and her rich aunt, the mistress of a powerful man, refused to help her, she had to go into service.  Now her days are long and exhausting and she is subject to the whims and cruelty of the woman of the household.  

To make her life a little easier, Luzia uses some small magic tricks she learned.  Things like opening a locked drawer or adding some extra carrots or potatoes to the basket when the household money wasn't sufficient.  But her mistress learns that she can do these things and forces Luzia to start entertaining dinner guests so that her mistress can get a leg up in society.  

Luiza starts to get a reputation and even the man who keeps her aunt in jewels and luxury hears about her.  He is attempting to gain a reputation at court and a title.  When he hears about a magic competition that the king's former secretary is arranging, he sends his familiar, Guillen Santangel, to coach Luzia so she can be their entry.  Santangel is a familiar, a man who has lived for centuries enslaved to the family of the wealthy man.  He cares little about life after all these years but something about Luiza catches his attention and starts to bring him back to full life as he works with her.  If Luiza wins the competition, she will become the king's champion and Santangel will go free at last.  Can she win?

I read a ton of fantasy and I can't believe I've waited this long to read Bardugo.  The writing is lush and sensual as Luiza and Santangel find love.  There is intrigue, betrayal and always the threat of the Inquisition as magic can be inspired from God or from the devil.  Luiza discovers her strength and power as she discovers love.  This book is recommended for fantasy readers.