Wellness by Nathan Hill

 

They both came to Chicago to start their lives over.  They fell in love across a space as their windows looked across at each other.  Elizabeth came from money, a long line of robber barons and she just doesn't want to be associated with that anymore.  Jack came from the Midwest, growing up on a farm in a community where almost no one left.  But he wants to be an artist and comes to Chicago to learn how to do that.

Twenty years on, little is left of that idealistic pair.  They have a young child, a son that Elizabeth is sure is on the spectrum but Jack thinks is just sensitive and who looks at the world a little differently.  Elizabeth is corporate in a job where she convinces people that placebos work as well as medicine.  Jack is teaching art at a university but his artwork hasn't appreciably changed in more than a decade.  They are about to move into a high end condo that their friend is building and that will take all their savings.  Jack still loves Elizabeth madly but she's not so sure she loves Jack the same way anymore.  As we discover their backstories, it becomes more clear why each is the way they are as adults.

Nathan Hill is an American author whose debut novel was published seven years ago.  This is his second novel.  The first, The Nix, was a major hit and won many awards.  This novel captures the feel of the 1990's and of the present, how we change as we get older and how difficult it is to keep love alive.  It talks about how hard it is to avoid the common misperceptions of the time and how the world changes for everyone.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers. 

Black Wolf by Juan Gomez-Jurado

 

In this second Antonia Scott novel, the wife of a Mob figure in Spain is at risk.  The head of the Spanish mob is not forgiving and when he suspects her husband is betraying him, he sends his assassins to kill him and the family.  They get her husband, but Lola is shopping and sees her killer in a shop window seconds before he fires.  She manages to escape but now Lola is on the run.

Antonia and Jon are brought in to find Lola.  Now that her husband is dead, she is the police and the consortium's best chance to get a witness against the Spanish mob.  But the mob chief isn't playing around.  Since the first killer failed, he calls in a specialist; a killer that never misses.  Known as The Black Wolf, this is a female assassin who is deadlier than a black widow spider.

This is Antonia's and Jon's second case together.  Antonia is still not through with the first since the killer escaped but the Red Queen project can't indulge her anymore.  They need her skills and Jon's to have a chance to break the back of the Spanish mob.  I enjoyed this one and it, like the first, is fast-paced and keeps the reader's interest.  This book is recommended for mystery readers

The Colony by Audrey Magee

 It is summer on a small island off the Irish coast.  Two outsiders come to spend the summer.  Mr. Lloyd is a landscape painter who has come to paint the cliffs and sea.  Jean-Pierre Masson is a Frenchman who is studying the native Irish language and has come to a place where it is still spoken with little English influence.  

Both rent a place to stay and get meals from a family who has lived there for decades.  The father and grandfather have been lost at sea, a tragic yet common end for those who fish for a living.  The household now consists of the grandmother, the recently widowed mother and a teenage boy, James.  James doesn't know what he wants except that he doesn't want his life to be one of becoming a fisherman.

As the summer progresses, the two men find they are at odds.  Violence is common on the mainland and news of various killings and bombings are interspersed with the narrative.  Mr. Lloyd changes his focus from landscapes to portraits of the widowed mother who is in her thirties and believes that he has done the best work in his life.   He encourages James to paint and tells him that he has talent and that the two of them can have an exhibit and that James can come with him at the end of summer and go to art school.  

Audrey Magee is an Irish author whose two novels have won much acclaim.  I listened to this book and the Irish accent of the narrator added so much to the book along with the English and French accents of the other characters.  Her choice to include frequent reports of the violence between Catholics and Protestants on the Irish mainland sets a surreal background to the betrayals happening on the island.  The ending of this novel is one that I'll long remember and her ability to transport the reader to a distant land and environment is to be envied.  This book is recommended for readers of literary fiction. 

Nights At The Circus by Angela Carter

 

Sophie Fevvers is the undoubted star of Colonel Kearney's Circus.   She isn't a delicate trapeze artist, no, this is a Viking of a woman who loves to eat and who is almost a giantess.  But she has something no one else can claim.  Fevvers has two wings growing from her back so she has a built-in safety device.  She started life as an orphan and was raised and spoiled in a brothel.  But now she is the toast of the Continent and courted by noblemen.

Jack Walser is an American journalist who comes to do a story on Fevvers and see if she is a fraud.  But he leaves that night as another male conquered by Fevvers beauty and unattainability.  He convinces his editor to let him join the circus undercover to follow Fevvers on her tour.  When he hurts himself, he is repurposed by the Colonel as a clown.  

The circus moves from France to Russia and is headed to Japan.  Fevvers is cheered everywhere but there is also the master of the Clowns, the woman who tames the tigers and finds a mate among the circus regulars and the Strongman along with the usual bears and elephants and chimps.  Together they go forth to perform but fate has more in store for them than they knew.

Angela Carter was born in England but also lived for times in Japan and Australia.  She was known for her short stories and novels which won much acclaim.  Her work focused on feminism and used magic realism as a plot device.  Her most famous work was The Bloody Chamber which was a feminist retelling of traditional fairy tales but readers may prefer this novel as an introduction as it is the closest to expected literature of her work.  Carter creates characters in this novel that are intriguing and weaves together subplots to make a story that can't be put down.  This work is recommended for literary fiction readers  

The Correspondent by Virginia Evans

 

Sybil Van Antwerp was a lawyer.  Now retired, she lives a quiet life and carries on with her biggest hobby; writing letters.  She writes to her family and friends as one might suspect.  She writes notes to her neighbors when they do something kind for her.  She writes to the president of a nearby university where she audits classes and argues when the audit policy is changed.  She writes letters she doesn't send.  She writes to authors whose books she has enjoyed and has established relationships with some through these letters.  She writes to a young teenage boy who is having a hard time adjusting to life with a brilliant mind who is rejected by his peers.

But she doesn't always tell her secrets.  She has one in particular that will change her life drastically that she doesn't share with anyone.  Her letters are not always kind; sometimes she argues and lectures those who have upset her.  Through her letters we see her family relationships.  We see her oldest friendships and how she threatens it.  We see her kindness in her letters to a wounded teenager and her willingness to do whatever she can to help him.  We see her blooming romances with two different men.

I'm so glad I read this novel.  It has been picked as a PBS Top Summer Book and a LibraryReads Pick Of The Month and I imagine it will get more awards.  This is her debut novel and I can't wait to read others.  I expected a saccharine novel but was excited to discover a novel that showed all sides of a woman who has led a full and interesting life.  I'm even excited to discover that she also lives in North Carolina about thirty miles from me which means I have a good chance of seeing her in person at a book event.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.   

The Space Between Worlds by Miciah Johnson

 

Cara is an outsider wherever she goes.  She grew up in the wastelands, desperate to get out and do something with her life.  She was the mistress of the emperor but that was a perilous position as he beat her constantly, bringing her repeatedly to the brink of death.  When Cara finds a woman dying on the wastelands one day and hears a voice coming from a transmitter, she takes the woman's place, not knowing what she is doing.

What she is doing is being someone who travels between worlds.  A scientist has discovered the travel process and now heads up a massive corporation, selling data to those who want to know about other worlds.  There are over four hundred worlds that can be traveled to, but there is one caveat; you must be dead in the world you are traveling to.

Cara is dead in over three hundred of those worlds and soon is one of the top travelers.  In some worlds, the emperor she knew is in power, in others he is on the outside.  Cara's family is always there but she can not visit them as they know she is dead.  She slides between power plays in governments and soon in the company she is working for.  Can she ever find peace?

This is Micaiah Johnson's debut novel and it made quite a splash.  It was a finalist for the Locust Award and won the Compton Crook Award while being named one of the year's best books by NPR and Library Journal.  It is an intricate work with Cara moving seamlessly between worlds while trying to discover what she wants her life to be and who she wants to have in it.  She struggles with whether she will have a relationship with her family and knows she wants a relationship with her handler, Dell, who she fantasizes about.  The world building is amazing and this author seems slated for fame in the science fiction genre.  This book is recommended for science fiction readers.  

Story Of A Murder by Hallie Rubenhold

 

This book tells the case of Dr. Crippen who was convicted of murdering his wife, Belle.  Hallie Rubenhold is known for exhaustively researched true crime and I'm always glad to hear she has a new book out.  I thought I knew about the Dr. Crippen case but I learned so much.  I always assumed that he was English; instead he was American.  He had a history here of cons and possibly another murdered wife.  That one went under the radar so no one knows but she died out of the blue far from home and family.

Soon after the death of his first wife, Crippen met Belle.  Belle had thoughts of being a singer, preferably opera but refocused to be a musical hall singer.  Crippen never wanted children and convinced her to have a total hysterectomy, leaving her in pain and prone to gaining weight.  They moved to England where Belle had a successful career and made friends with the other stars of the musical revue world.  Crippen did have medical training and at various times he was a surgeon, an eye doctor and a dentist.  

But Crippen had finally fallen in love with his secretary, Ethel Le Neve.  He was determined to live with Ethel and after seven years of a relationship, he decided that Belle had to go.  He told everyone she had gone to America and then after a few weeks that she had died there.  Her music hall friends didn't believe him and were instrumental in bringing him to justice.

Rubenhold covers the lives of all three characters, Belle, Ethel and Crippen.  She covers the months between the murder and the revelation of it, the escape that Crippen and Ethel made and the trial after their capture.  Hallie Ruberhold's work focuses on the seventeenth and eighteenth British history, especially of women and social causes.  Her work focuses less on the crimes and more on the factors surrounding the crimes; the lives involved, the investigation, and the effects of the crime.  This book is recommended for readers of true crime.  

Gods Of Howl Mountain by Taylor Brown

 

Life is hard on Howl Mountain and memories are long.  This novel follows the life of the Docherty family.  Rory has just returned from the war, minus one leg.  He lives with his grandmother, the woman who raised him after his mother was sent to the insane asylum.  His grandmother was a prostitute but now makes her living seeing to the ills of the mountain folk.  Rory makes his living running moonshine for the man who rules Howl Mountain.

But that life is tough.  He has to outrun the federal and local revenuers weekly on his runs.  He has to match wits and motors with the other men who want to take his territory.  Falling in love with the daughter of a snake-handling preacher wasn't in his plans, but that's what's happened.

This was my first novel by Taylor Brown but it definitely won't be my last.  I was familiar with the landscape of the Appalachian mountains as I grew up in Southwest Virginia and the first spirits I ever drank was moonshine as my best friend's father got some every Friday night when the paychecks came.  Taylor Brown is an author raised in the South and he gets it right.  There's a ton of difference between reading a book set in the South written by someone who grew up there and reading one by someone who didn't.  This book is raw and tough and it is one of the few that makes me think as a woman that I get some feel for what being a man might be, how protecting his family is bred in the bone and how every day can bring a challenge to his manhood he must rise to.  Suffice it to say, I loved this novel and hope more people read it and discover the author.  This book is recommended for readers of literary fiction.

The Love Story Of Missy Carmichael by Beth Morrey

 

Now that her husband is gone, Missy Carmichael finds herself rattling around a big old house by herself.  Her son has moved with his family to Australia so she only sees her grandson infrequently.  She is at odds with her daughter so doesn't see her at all.  Her friends have drifted away over the years, all busy with their own families and careers.

Missy had been a brilliant student who took a First at university.  But she gave up all thoughts of a career when she met and married her husband Leo.  Leo had a grand career, author of many historical books, always off at conferences and book signings.  Missy stayed home, running the household and raising the children, always sure in the depths of her heart that she loved Leo more than he loved her.

But things can change even in your late seventies.  Missy meets Sylvia who knows everyone and is a decorator.  They start having coffee occasionally and soon Missy also becomes close to Angela.  Angela is a young single mom struggling with raising a young son and Missy is delighted to help out.  Soon she also knows many other people who are friends with her other friends and starts to realize that life is not over.  She also agrees to keep a dog for someone who must flee an abusive relationship and soon the dog is one of the joys of her new life.

I loved this novel.  I'm not sure what I expected but I found a woman close to my own age who is rediscovering herself and finding joy in life.  I've been pleasantly surprised after retirement to find a new community of friends who share interests like reading, playing games or working out at the gym.  Missy finds joy in a time of life that she thought would be more and more closed and restrictive and I loved her openness and care for others.  This is a debut novel and I can't wait to read more by Morrey.  This book is recommended for readers of women's fiction.  

Spook Street by Mick Herron

 

Readers of the Slough House series are familiar with River Cartwright, one of the Slow Horses and his grandfather, David, or OB Old Bastard as River calls him.  OB raised River from the time he was seven and his mother dropped him off at OB's house and never returned.  OB was an operative at M15, near the top and in on everything.  Now in his eighties, he is entering dementia and River is concerned about him.

But that concern ratches up when he goes to visit and finds a body in OB's bathroom.  What to do?  River stashes his grandfather where he thinks he will be safe then goes off by himself to try to discover who wants his grandfather dead and what he can do about it.

In the meantime, there's a new Slow Horse.  Cole doesn't talk but goes about his business with headphones on at all times.  He shares a room with Ho who actually has gotten a girlfriend.  Marcus and Shirley are sharing an office while Louisa has struck up a friendship with River.  Catherine Standish hasn't been back to the office since the last blowup and there's a new office manager.  Of course, Jackson Lamb is there as always, keeping his secrets and stepping in when needed.

This is the fourth novel in the Slough House series.  In this one, we learn more about River Cartwright's  background and about the friendships that evolve among the residents of Slough House.  There's a new head of M15 and lots of machinations and power plays there but it's the Slow Horses that the focus in on.  I listened to this novel and the narration of Gerald Doyle adds so much to the book.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

The Quiet Librarian by Allen Eskens

 

Hana Babic lives a quiet life.  She is a librarian in a small town, a middle-aged woman who is pleasant to everyone but close to none.  She lives by herself in the country where she keeps a few cows and chickens to remind herself of her life growing up in Bosnia.

Back then Hana had another name.  She was Nura Divjak and lived in the mountains of Bosnia with her parents and younger brother.  The family was Muslim but not observant.  When the war started with the Serbians, they hoped that living in the mountains would save them.  But it didn't.  Serbian soldiers drove up one day and killed Nura's family while she watched from a place of concealment.  She made a vow that day.  No matter what it took she would avenge her family.

Nura joined a partisan group after they saw her drive up to a blockade and kill a ranking Serbian officer, one of the men who had killed her family.  The partisans taught her to fight and made her physically fit.  It also led to her first love, another partisan who hoped for a life with Nura after the war.

Since the war, Nura immigrated and became Hana.  Now her best friend from those war years who immigrated with her has been murdered and Hana knows the past is coming for her again.  The detective who informed her of her friend's death suspects Hana knows more than she is telling him and he is correct.  The two begin to have feelings for each other but what relationship can work that starts like this?

Allen Eskens was a criminal defense attorney before he turned to writing.  That probably explains the intricately plotted mysteries he is known for writing.  In this book, he researched by contacting survivors of the Bosnian war in the Muslim community in his area which had been instrumental in helping Serbian Muslim immigrate to the United States.  Hana is a fascinating character and her relationship with the detective is interesting to see develop.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

City Of Thieves by David Benioff

 

Lev is seventeen and has been in Stalingrad for the seige by the Germans during World War II.  Food is scarce if it can be found at all.  He is a night watcher for his neighborhood along with other teenagers from his building.  They see a German paratrooper floating down right outside their building and they go to inspect him.  He is dead and Lev takes his knife.  They are breaking curfew and when Russian soldiers arrive they scurry for cover but Lev is arrested.

As he is sitting in a cell, expecting to be killed in the morning for thievery and breaking curfew, another prisoner arrives.  He is tall, blonde, good-looking and wearing the uniform of the Russian army.  What is his crime?  It turns out he didn't get back to his unit on time and is charged with being a deserter.  

When morning comes, the two expect to face a firing squad.  But instead they face the commander of the troops.  He is willing to give them a chance.  His daughter is about to get married and if they can find a dozen eggs and get them to him before the wedding in three days, they are free to go.

Lev and Kolya take off.  They have many adventures as they move within occupied cities, cities in seige status and behind enemy lines.  Along the way, they stumble upon a house where girls are kept for German officers' pleasure.  They chase rumors of someone who has eggs and Koyla takes time out to find female companionship wherever they are.  The two form a friendship that will endure for their lifetimes.

David Benioff is best known for being one of the showrunners for HBO's Game Of Thrones.  I wish he had written more books because this one was wonderful.  The growing friendship between the two main characters, Lev's journey from being a boy to a man and the history are all engaging.  This book is recommended for readers of literary and historical fiction.

Other Names For Love by Taymour Soomro

 

This novel is set in Pakistan and follows the life of Fahad and his relationship with his domineering father.  His father is wealthy, having carved an estate out of the jungle and mountainous landscape in upcountry Pakistan.  He is a self-man man, revered by the people in the villages nearby but not as much by Fahad who is a sensitive boy.  He wanted to spend the summer at the shore or at home reading books but his father is worried that he is not tough enough and insists that he spend the summer at the estate.

As the weeks go by, Fahad finds himself entranced by the land and the rhythm of life there.  His father suggests that Fahad spend time with Ali, who already looks like a man at seventeen.  Ali teaches him how to drive and shoot a gun.  They spend most days together and an attraction forms between the two.  

Years later, Fahad is living in London, working as a lecturer and living in a committed relationship with a man.  His mother calls and insists he return home.  She says his father is slipping, the money is gone and they are about to lose the house.  He goes home and is shocked to see his formerly dominant father now weakened by early dementia.  His father insists he is on top of things but the reality is that he has neglected the estate and the businesses and things are at a crisis stage.  Can Fahad straighten things out?

Taymour Soomro was born in Pakistan and Fahad's life is much like his.  He attended university at Cambridge and Stanford and has worked as a lawyer, a professor, a rural estate manager and an author.  I listened to this novel and the narrator was wonderful, his voice in particular bringing to life the father and his bluster.  The work explored what it is to be a man and the relationship between fathers and sons, as well as posing the question of what we as adults owe to the family we grew up in.  This book is recommended for literary fiction readers.  

The Tell by Amy Griffin

 

Amy Griffin had what most people would consider a successful life.  She was married to a man who loved her and they had four healthy children.  They lived in Manhattan and money was not an issue.  Amy had a thriving career and got up every morning to run in Central Park at five a.m.  But something was wrong.

Amy grew up in Amarillo, Texas.  She was the golden girl at school, always the top achiever in grades, captains on her sports teams.  She was popular and everyone liked or admired her.  But somehow she has no memories of that time.

After entering therapy after her two daughters confided to her that they felt like Amy wasn't there emotionally for them but had a wall constructed, Amy had a breakthrough.  She suddenly starting remembering things that happened to her in middle school starting when she was twelve.  She was abused for several years by a coach at her school.  He raped her in various ways always on school grounds until she left middle school and even once when she was sixteen.  He was still there and who knows how many girls he had abused before and after.

Amy went on a campaign to have him held accountable legally.  She also started to confide her truth to various people, starting with her husband and continuing with her sister and other siblings, her own children and her parents.  Each was shocked and felt anger and guilt that they hadn't seen anything, hadn't known anything was wrong.  The golden girl was also the best at stuffing down trauma and hiding everything.

Statistics show that sexual abuse of girls is a huge problem.  Some statistics show that one in four girls is sexually assaulted before she is 18 while others show one in nine.  Regardless, it's a rare woman who can't look back to an instance where a man's hands roamed over her body up to violent assault that has long lasting effects.  Girls who are routinely abused find it hard to form trusting relationships as adults as their abuser was likely a coach, a teacher, a relative, someone in their family's circle of trust.  A man who abuses one girl rarely stops there as the more common pattern is serial abuse of many girls.  This book is recommended for nonfiction readers, especially parents and those women who may have experienced this abuse.

No Time Like The Present by Nadine Gordimer

 

The place is South Africa and the time is post-apartheid.  Steve and Jubulile are an interracial couple who met while fighting with the rebels to overthrow the racist government.  Now, they are just another couple trying to live a life.  They have two children a girl and a boy.  Steve is a college lecturer in engineering, Jubulile is a lawyer.  They move to the suburbs where they make friends, some they knew from their rebel days, some new friends.

The couple has different attitudes to the new way of living.  Jubulile was one of the first black women to receive an education and she feels that she needs to take advantage of the opportunities that has afforded her.  Steve has remained closer to his rebel days in his thoughts and is known as the most leftist lecturer at the college.  Eventually, this difference in attitude creates some distance in their marriage.  Jubulile also has differences with her adored father when he continues to support the new head of government because he comes from their tribe even though he has been accused of fraud and sexual misconduct.

Nadine Gordimer is a South African author whose work has won both the Nobel Prize for Literature and The Booker.  She has also had another book longlisted on the Booker Prize.  Her work focused on South Africa both before and post apartheid.  She was also known as an activist and lived and worked during the times of Nelson Mandela's imprisonment and release to become the head of government.  Her work discusses the difficulties of that time and the alienation that both native and white South Africans felt as their country underwent a cataclysmic change.  This book is recommended for literary and historical fiction readers.  

Three Days In June by Anne Tyler

 

This is not how Gail Baines saw her life in her sixties.  She has just been informed that the school where she works is getting a new head and her job has been given to someone else.  She quits on the spot and huffs off home.  Her daughter is getting married tomorrow and she has plenty to do even though she has been left out of the spa day today.  Then her doorbell rings.

She sees Max, her ex-husband, on the porch.  He has a cat with him and he tells her that he can't stay with their daughter as he had planned because her fiancé is allergic to cats.  Can he stay with Gail?  It's the last thing she wants but what can she say?  She hasn't seen much of Max since he moved away after their divorce but she guesses one weekend after all this time won't matter.

Then that night their daughter comes to them in tears.  She found out at the rehearsal dinner that the man she's marrying tomorrow had an affair while they were together.  Should she call off the wedding?  Gail is all for that and is outraged but Max suggests that the daughter go talk things out.  The next morning the wedding is back on and the weekend progresses.

Anne Tyler should be named our author of good feelings.  Reading one of her books is like getting an unexpected bouquet of flowers and her knowledge of people and their quirks is instinctive and forgiving.  Her characters feel like people you've met and their lives are like those of others you've known.  There are surprises along the way and the reader finishes the book with a feeling of satisfaction and that the world is a good place.  This book is recommended for readers of literary and women's fiction.

Has Anyone Seen Charlotte Salter? by Nicci French

 

A party is being held.  It's for the fiftieth birthday of Alec Salter.  Under protest, his four children are there, Niall already out of college and working, Paul still in college, Ollie who plans to take a gap year before college and Etty who still has a couple of years before college.  There is lots of drinking and dancing but one guest is missing.  Charlotte Salter is nowhere to be seen.

She is still missing the next morning.  Etty goes to the family's best friends, the Ackerleys.  They haven't seen Charlotte but the older son, Morgan, agrees to walk with Etty along the river.  They don't find Charlotte but instead find the body of Morgan's father, Duncan Ackerley.  It appears he has jumped from the bridge, a sucide.

The police look into the cases but make no progress.  Thirty years later, everyone comes back to the village.  Morgan is now a successful television presenter and wants to make a podcast about the cases with his older brother.  He wants to interview the Salter children who are back in the village to clear the house and move their father into supported housing.  The Salters want nothing to do with the podcast.  The disappearance of their mother has ruined their lives and they don't want to revisit it.  Will the cases finally be solved?

Nicci French is a husband and wife writing duo who have been known for years as producing some of the best work in the mystery genre.  A book by Nicci French is an automatic buy and read for me as I love their intricate plotting and apt characterization of the people who inhabit the books.  This one is no different.  As the podcast unfolds, secrets that have been held for decades are unveiled and new deaths occur.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.  

The Sewing Girl's Tale by John Wood Sweet

 

In 1793, Lanah Sawyer went out walking with a gentleman.  She was excited, thinking that this might lead to a proposal.  He had told her they would be accompanied by another couple but when they met, he told her the other couple would meet them later and instead he took her to a brothel where he gained entrance, locked her in a room and raped her.  

Lanah was seventeen and living in a Colonial America that prized women's virtue above all.  If they were raped, they were spoiled and their chances of marriage were considered unlikely.  Fathers attempted to make the man marry their daughter, another horrid outcome.  If unsuccessful, the family attempted to hide the crime so that their daughter would not be ruined.

But Lanah Sawyer went another route.  Her stepfather was a boat captain and he and his friends were not fond of gentlemen who often tried to cheat them of wages and tips.  He and Lanah went to a magistrate and filed rape charges against the man, the first rape trial to take place in New York or the country.  Some of the most famous lawyers of the time got involved, including Alexander Hamilton.  Although it took many months, Lanah eventually got retribution but her reputation was stained throughout the new country.

John Wood Sweet is an American author who is also a history professor at the University of North Carolina.  His books have been on early American history and have gained literary prizes.  This book is extensively researched and told in great detail.  The reader will learn about the history of rape charges but also much about New York City and its citizens at the end of the seventeenth century. I listened to this book and the narrator did an excellent job.   This book is recommended for nonfiction history readers.  

The Space Between Us by Thrity Umigar

 

Bhima has had a life of hardship and despair.  She is illiterate and works as a maid and cook in a wealthy Parsi household.  She had been married and had two children.  But her husband is maimed in an industrial accident and can find no other work afterward.  He leaves Bhima to go back to his home village and takes her son with him.  Without his wages, Bhima and her granddaughter are forced to move to the slums.  Bhima's daughter died, leaving her to raise the granddaughter.

Sera is Bhima's wealthy Parsi employer.  She lives in the house she shared with her husband who has died.  Her daughter and son-in-law have moved in with her and her daughter is about to have her first baby.  She says Bhima is almost like family after decades of service, but she doesn't let her sit on the furniture or eat with the same plates and silverware as the family.  She has helped Bhima with the granddaughter sending her to school.

The one bright spot in Bhima's life is Maya her granddaughter.  She is attending university with the help of Sera and has the chance to live an easier life.  When she gets embroiled in scandal, Bhima is furious.  She and Sera decide how to resolve the situation with no input from Maya.  It turns out that neither woman's life is what she thought and that hidden secrets impact both of them.

Thrity Umigar was born in India but immigrated to the United States where she lives.  She was a journalist writing for many newspapers and has written a number of novels that feature India and its people.  In this novel, the relationship between Bhima and those around her are the foundation of the novel.  Her marriage which failed, her loss of her children, her love of Maya and her relationship with Sera each have formed her and make up her life.  She sees nothing wrong with how she is treated by Sera, nor does Sera, both bowing to the strictures of the rigid Indian caste system.  She handles hardship as it comes and is an admirable character.  This book is recommended for readers of multicultural and literary fiction.

Cry Baby by Mark Billingham

 

Two boys are best of friends and love getting together to play.  One is from a wealthy household and goes to a private school, one lives in the projects and goes to a public school.  But both are without their fathers.  The one from money has parents who divorced while the other boy has a father who is in prison.  The mothers, surprisingly, are very good friends and meet regularly at a playground to let the boys play together.  

On this day, while one mother goes to the restroom, the other takes her eyes off the boys while she smokes a cigarette.  The boys run into the woods behind the playground but only one of them returns.  The other boy has disappeared and later witnesses report him being led to a car by a man.

The police are called and DS Tom Thorne heads up the investigation.  Thorne is distracted by his personal life.  His wife has just left him and is pushing him to get the house on the market.  Thorne is a great detective sergeant but doesn't get along with his boss.  He has pulled together a team of men and women who work together well and they all push to find the boy.  Can they save him?

The Tom Thorne series is one of the top rated mystery/police procedural series in the genre.  I've been working on reading them.  While this one is the seventeenth in the series, it is really a prequel in which Tom Thorne is introduced to the reader.  He is a sergeant not a DCI.  He is just recently separated and dealing with the emotions of a upcoming divorce.  He meets his best friend, the coroner who he shares love of football with but he doesn't know the most relevant things about him yet.  The mystery is chilling as always and Thorne is portrayed with the care he always feels for victims while refusing to follow protocol if he has a hunch to follow.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.