Tuesday, July 31, 2018
Bitter and Sweet
Sandra Feder uses the title, Bitter and Sweet, “to acknowledge duality in everyday life. Judaism and Jewish teaching provide many wonderful ways to recognize that life holds some of both.” She has written a delightful story of young Hannah who has to move and leave her friends and house behind. She thinks there things will only be unpleasant in her new home. She discovers that there are both bitter and sweet things in her new home, Shabbat wine is sweet, and she makes a new friend. She finds out that you have to sweeten the bitter yourself. Wonderfully illustrated by Kyrsten Brooker.
The Amazing Adventures of Aaron Broom
The Amazing Adventures of Aaron Broom, is a wonderful story of a 12 year old boy
growing up during the depression years in St Louis.
The book is written by A.E. Hotchner, who at the age of 100 has written this
adventure story based on his youth. Hotchner is the noted biographer of Hemingway,
Doris Day and he is the founder, with Paul Newman, of Newman's Own.
growing up during the depression years in St Louis.
The book is written by A.E. Hotchner, who at the age of 100 has written this
adventure story based on his youth. Hotchner is the noted biographer of Hemingway,
Doris Day and he is the founder, with Paul Newman, of Newman's Own.
This fun mystery novel is a whodunit to find out who the jewel thieves are that have
implicated his father in their heist. With his father in jail, his mother in a sanitarium with tuberculosis, he finds ways to be very resourceful to try and stay one step ahead of child welfare services and uncover the real culprits in the robbery. Despite seeing the real killer flee the scene, Aaron can't do much to help in the moment. Undaunted, he enlists an unlikely band of friends and helpful adults to clear his father's name, including a world-weary paperboy, an aspiring teen journalist, a kindly lawyer, and a neighborhood friend with a penchant for baking. And as they dig into the details of the case, these unconventional detectives reveal a cover-up that goes much deeper than a jewelry-store heist gone sour.
implicated his father in their heist. With his father in jail, his mother in a sanitarium with tuberculosis, he finds ways to be very resourceful to try and stay one step ahead of child welfare services and uncover the real culprits in the robbery. Despite seeing the real killer flee the scene, Aaron can't do much to help in the moment. Undaunted, he enlists an unlikely band of friends and helpful adults to clear his father's name, including a world-weary paperboy, an aspiring teen journalist, a kindly lawyer, and a neighborhood friend with a penchant for baking. And as they dig into the details of the case, these unconventional detectives reveal a cover-up that goes much deeper than a jewelry-store heist gone sour.
Wednesday, July 25, 2018
The Girls in The Picture
Have you ever realized that you change your behavior depending on who you are spending time with? There are different types of personalities. The people who are helpers and those who are takers. those who are insecure and need constant reassurance. When you find your best friend it is usually someone who compliments your personality and needs. But, if you are masking your true self to be friends or circumstances change and you change over time, that can stress the friendship.
This novel, explores the relationship of two such friends, Mary Pickford and Frances Marion.
Author, Melanie Benjamin has taken the research and facts she was able to unearth and written an entertaining and compelling story about how Mary and Frances became friends and how much they needed each other all through their lives.
I really loved this novel, which tells the story of Mary Pickford the Queen of Motion Pictures and her best friend Frances Marion, the best scenarist, or film writer of early motion pictures. Wonderfully imagined are the conversations between the two women, which show how their friendship ebbed and flowed over the years as Hollywood went through its infancy of silent films to talkies and through WWI. Mary marries her prince charming, Douglas Fairbanks and rides out a turbulent marriage. Melanie Benjamin captures the times and the characters in such realistic clarity.
They were the only girls in the picture. Mary Pickford and Frances Marion became fast friends because they were both driven in their careers at a time when other women were not. They were willing to give up their personal lives, love, marriage, and children to move their careers ahead. They were willing to stand up to the male run world of big business and Hollywood. Refusing to use the casting couch to get ahead. Yes, the casting couch was a well known situation all the way back to the early days of Hollywood and silent movies. What would these women think of the #METOO movement that took so long to stand up to the chauvinism of the men in charge.
They have been through quite of bit of history together. Their single years, the start of their careers, their marriages and the loss of their husbands. At the end Mary hides away in her bedroom. Frances avoids her for a number years, but in the end she cannot stay away. They have a pull on each other.
Frances confronts Mary and they have a discussion that ends unpleasantly.
Frances leaves and realizes that they see the past from different viewpoints, "When I thought back on all those years, those golden years, that was how I remembered it. At least - that was how I chose to remember it; I knew now that Mary remembered something different. Something darker.
Something closer to the truth? No just a different truth; ...like a movie shot from a different point of view... We remembered these identical experiences differently, but that didn't make them any less truthful."
To me that sums up the story of many relationships, between friends, spouses, and even in business.
These are powerful words to recognize in all our everyday interactions.
This novel, explores the relationship of two such friends, Mary Pickford and Frances Marion.
Author, Melanie Benjamin has taken the research and facts she was able to unearth and written an entertaining and compelling story about how Mary and Frances became friends and how much they needed each other all through their lives.
I really loved this novel, which tells the story of Mary Pickford the Queen of Motion Pictures and her best friend Frances Marion, the best scenarist, or film writer of early motion pictures. Wonderfully imagined are the conversations between the two women, which show how their friendship ebbed and flowed over the years as Hollywood went through its infancy of silent films to talkies and through WWI. Mary marries her prince charming, Douglas Fairbanks and rides out a turbulent marriage. Melanie Benjamin captures the times and the characters in such realistic clarity.
They were the only girls in the picture. Mary Pickford and Frances Marion became fast friends because they were both driven in their careers at a time when other women were not. They were willing to give up their personal lives, love, marriage, and children to move their careers ahead. They were willing to stand up to the male run world of big business and Hollywood. Refusing to use the casting couch to get ahead. Yes, the casting couch was a well known situation all the way back to the early days of Hollywood and silent movies. What would these women think of the #METOO movement that took so long to stand up to the chauvinism of the men in charge.
They have been through quite of bit of history together. Their single years, the start of their careers, their marriages and the loss of their husbands. At the end Mary hides away in her bedroom. Frances avoids her for a number years, but in the end she cannot stay away. They have a pull on each other.
Frances confronts Mary and they have a discussion that ends unpleasantly.
Frances leaves and realizes that they see the past from different viewpoints, "When I thought back on all those years, those golden years, that was how I remembered it. At least - that was how I chose to remember it; I knew now that Mary remembered something different. Something darker.
Something closer to the truth? No just a different truth; ...like a movie shot from a different point of view... We remembered these identical experiences differently, but that didn't make them any less truthful."
To me that sums up the story of many relationships, between friends, spouses, and even in business.
These are powerful words to recognize in all our everyday interactions.
Saturday, July 21, 2018
The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
This is another in the Flavia de Luce series of mystery novels. Flavia is a young girl, age 12, from an upper class British family who is always struggling to relieve the boredom of her empty days. She solves crimes along with the help of Dogger, her trusted assistant, the family's loyal servant. She also has two older sisters. Flavia, who describes herself as a expert chemist, loves to solve the crimes she comes across with her passion for poisons.
In this novel the plot revolves around a body Flavia happens upon as Dogger takes her and her sisters on a boat ride. As she dangles her hand over the side of the punt she happens to feel what she thinks might be a fish under the water, but pulls up something much more exciting, a dead body! Flavia is off and sleuthing.
This is a clever concept for a mystery series. Using a young child as the narrator and assisted by the adult servant, who really is leading the investigation. Also the use of different chemical descriptions both in the actual crime and in the investigation of testing different substances for chemical reactions, makes this a little bit of a different type of mystery.
By Alan Bradley
In this novel the plot revolves around a body Flavia happens upon as Dogger takes her and her sisters on a boat ride. As she dangles her hand over the side of the punt she happens to feel what she thinks might be a fish under the water, but pulls up something much more exciting, a dead body! Flavia is off and sleuthing.
This is a clever concept for a mystery series. Using a young child as the narrator and assisted by the adult servant, who really is leading the investigation. Also the use of different chemical descriptions both in the actual crime and in the investigation of testing different substances for chemical reactions, makes this a little bit of a different type of mystery.
By Alan Bradley
Friday, July 13, 2018
Holy Ceremony
Author Harri Nykanen has written a intriguing mystery of dirty secrets uncovered as the reader is taken through twists, turns and misdirection along with Lieutenant Ariel Kafka of the Helsinki Violent Crime Unit. This is the third case that Ariel Kafka is solving in this series, but you don’t need to have read the first two to enjoy reading about the strange goings as the Lieutenant try’s to uncover a murder.
Reijo“Reka” Lauren is being investigated after a dead woman is found in his apartment. The woman its turns out that Roosa Nevala is found with a biblical verse scratched into her skin on Lauren’s apartment floor. But when the coroner, Dr Esko Vuorio tells Kafka that he has seen this body before the confusion begins. Vuorio says, “For the first time in my career, the same person has been killed twice..or to be exact, not killed, but killed herself twice...”. He explains further, “Thsi woman was found dead in her apartment yesterday. Had downed a vial of sedatives I went to the scene myself.”
Kafka is one of two Jewish police working in all of Helsinki. He is a dedicated policeman always easy-going, with a wry sense of humor, assuming the best in people. When his partner uses some anti-Semitic slurs he tries to overlook them, but it is hard to forget.
As the investigation proceeds the biblical clues lead Kafka to the Christian Brotherhood of the Sacred Vault, a group students at Daybreak School created years before. The intricate plot uncovers many secrets from the Sacred Vault which seem to have far reaching consequences, as other members start turning up dead.
After you read this mystery, you may even want to go back and read more about Lt. Ariel Kafka in Behind God’s Back and Nights of Awe.
Reijo“Reka” Lauren is being investigated after a dead woman is found in his apartment. The woman its turns out that Roosa Nevala is found with a biblical verse scratched into her skin on Lauren’s apartment floor. But when the coroner, Dr Esko Vuorio tells Kafka that he has seen this body before the confusion begins. Vuorio says, “For the first time in my career, the same person has been killed twice..or to be exact, not killed, but killed herself twice...”. He explains further, “Thsi woman was found dead in her apartment yesterday. Had downed a vial of sedatives I went to the scene myself.”
Kafka is one of two Jewish police working in all of Helsinki. He is a dedicated policeman always easy-going, with a wry sense of humor, assuming the best in people. When his partner uses some anti-Semitic slurs he tries to overlook them, but it is hard to forget.
As the investigation proceeds the biblical clues lead Kafka to the Christian Brotherhood of the Sacred Vault, a group students at Daybreak School created years before. The intricate plot uncovers many secrets from the Sacred Vault which seem to have far reaching consequences, as other members start turning up dead.
After you read this mystery, you may even want to go back and read more about Lt. Ariel Kafka in Behind God’s Back and Nights of Awe.
Secrets and Shadows
Looking back to the Holocaust from the perspective of current day and how it has affected the lives of those who lived through it. Here again is a novel with a different viewpoint of this horrific time in our history. Roberta Silman has approached two interesting subjects, The Holocaust and Taking Down the Berlin Wall. Through the lense of a marriage that is also faltering she builds up the individuals who are affected deeply by these historic events.
Paul Bertram has lived the past 50 years of his life hiding his childhood experience in war torn Germany and escaping Europe and coming to America. Not even his parents and sister know all the secrets he is keeping. He has worked hard to become a model citizen, successful lawyer, husband and father. Playing the role of the man he thinks he should be has been difficult and taken a toll on his family.
Now it is 1989 and the Berlin Wall is being dismantled. He feels that this may be his last chance to rectify the wrongs he has committed and the important people in his life he has alienated. His children are angry at him and his wife has divorced him. He has been through a succession of affairs that are not satisfying him. So he asks his ex-wife to accompany him to Germany to help him work through the past and maybe save the future.
Eve is shocked by the phone call from her husband asking her to join him on a trip to the new Germany, but after realizing she still has feelings for her ex husband she accompanies him to revisit the city of his childhood.
Paul did not realize how difficult the return would be, “I didn’t know what to expect, I was so anxious to get here I hardly thought about what I would find...”. They are on the street where his childhood home still is. He is very shook up as he looks down the tree lined street. Eve suggests he take some deep breaths. He has trouble speaking as he says, “It looks so harmless. Like an ordinary well-heeled neighborhood. Exactly as it looked when I was eight or nine. Unbelievable, not a single blemish.”
Paul and Eve tour through Berlin exploring the city and confronting the past. As Paul looks for a chance for redemption, Eve faces the fact that part of their marital problems were her fear of pushing Paul to answer the questions of his past.
They work together finding out the love means accepting your partner including all their flaws. Helping each other through discovering who they were when they were young and now who they are after maturing.
Silman has written a novel that brings to life the fear and suspense of trying to live in Berlin if you were Jewish during the Great War. Hiding in Berlin, Paul describes was different than hiding in other places, “I guess that was the difference between Berlin and other places. Berlin was not a city that could become a cage, it was too big, too spread out, its citizens far too independent. That’s why it was possible for so many people to hide there.”
She also clearly delves into the complexities of marriage. Eve remembers someone once telling her that, “Marriage is like a minefield.” But she wonders, “What if a marriage is layered, like a palimpsest, on top of a war, which has minefield after minefield? And what if it is your marriage?”
This is a wonderful novel about both individually working through your demons and finding out if the marriage you thought was finished can be renewed on a different level of understanding.
Keeps the reader thinking through out the story.
Paul Bertram has lived the past 50 years of his life hiding his childhood experience in war torn Germany and escaping Europe and coming to America. Not even his parents and sister know all the secrets he is keeping. He has worked hard to become a model citizen, successful lawyer, husband and father. Playing the role of the man he thinks he should be has been difficult and taken a toll on his family.
Now it is 1989 and the Berlin Wall is being dismantled. He feels that this may be his last chance to rectify the wrongs he has committed and the important people in his life he has alienated. His children are angry at him and his wife has divorced him. He has been through a succession of affairs that are not satisfying him. So he asks his ex-wife to accompany him to Germany to help him work through the past and maybe save the future.
Eve is shocked by the phone call from her husband asking her to join him on a trip to the new Germany, but after realizing she still has feelings for her ex husband she accompanies him to revisit the city of his childhood.
Paul did not realize how difficult the return would be, “I didn’t know what to expect, I was so anxious to get here I hardly thought about what I would find...”. They are on the street where his childhood home still is. He is very shook up as he looks down the tree lined street. Eve suggests he take some deep breaths. He has trouble speaking as he says, “It looks so harmless. Like an ordinary well-heeled neighborhood. Exactly as it looked when I was eight or nine. Unbelievable, not a single blemish.”
Paul and Eve tour through Berlin exploring the city and confronting the past. As Paul looks for a chance for redemption, Eve faces the fact that part of their marital problems were her fear of pushing Paul to answer the questions of his past.
They work together finding out the love means accepting your partner including all their flaws. Helping each other through discovering who they were when they were young and now who they are after maturing.
Silman has written a novel that brings to life the fear and suspense of trying to live in Berlin if you were Jewish during the Great War. Hiding in Berlin, Paul describes was different than hiding in other places, “I guess that was the difference between Berlin and other places. Berlin was not a city that could become a cage, it was too big, too spread out, its citizens far too independent. That’s why it was possible for so many people to hide there.”
She also clearly delves into the complexities of marriage. Eve remembers someone once telling her that, “Marriage is like a minefield.” But she wonders, “What if a marriage is layered, like a palimpsest, on top of a war, which has minefield after minefield? And what if it is your marriage?”
This is a wonderful novel about both individually working through your demons and finding out if the marriage you thought was finished can be renewed on a different level of understanding.
Keeps the reader thinking through out the story.
Wednesday, July 11, 2018
The Symphony Heist: A Tale of Music and Desire (Lieutenant Lowell Mystery) (Volume 2
Not one of the better mystery novels I have read. Written by Kameel Nsar, this will not be a book I recommend.
The mystery itself was weak and the writing style was clumsy. The sentence structure was awkward.
I had high hopes for this book. I love mysteries, music and the Boston Symphony.
I appreciate the idea of using music and symphonies as chapter titles but describing everyone
with musical numbers was difficult to follow. Also if you do not know the piece of music the author is referring to it is hard to know what the description means. I did go back and listen to a number of the musical titles that were referenced in the book.
Kameel Nsar has written another mystery about the Isabel Gardner Museum Heist, but I do not think I will be reading that one.
The mystery itself was weak and the writing style was clumsy. The sentence structure was awkward.
I had high hopes for this book. I love mysteries, music and the Boston Symphony.
I appreciate the idea of using music and symphonies as chapter titles but describing everyone
with musical numbers was difficult to follow. Also if you do not know the piece of music the author is referring to it is hard to know what the description means. I did go back and listen to a number of the musical titles that were referenced in the book.
Kameel Nsar has written another mystery about the Isabel Gardner Museum Heist, but I do not think I will be reading that one.
Bonbons and Broomsticks
Bewitched By Chocolate book 5 in the series that features Caitlyn Le Fey who has returned to England found out that her mother is the daughter of a witch, known as, The Widow Mags. The Widow runs a chocolate shop in the small town and Caitlyn now lives with her and is learning how to make the most delicious chocolate. The way it is described in the book makes me wish that either there was a recipe in the book or that there were samples to purchase. It sounds heavenly.
Of course in each of the books there is a murder and the people of the town usually suspect the Widow or her daughter, Bertha, who is also Caitlyn's aunt and her cousin, Evie who has trouble when she attempts to cast a spell. Caitlyn always tries to help solve the mystery and her American cousin, who she grew up with in America, Pomona shows up on the scene to assist her.
There also is a love interest, which is developing extremely slowly. Lord James Fitzroy, who is the handsome owner of the Huntington Manor. The Lord of the Manor is the major landowner in the small village and did I mention handsome and single. He seems to be drawn to Caitlyn but so far neither of them knows how to move this relationship into a romance. They are friends and keep tripping over their words when they are together, all the signs of young people in love.
In this mystery there seems to be a story about a huge black dog that is supposed to haunt the woods and the lonely dark country lanes at night. There are few attacks and some people end up dead as Caitlyn and others are trying to figure out who to catch the Black Shuck, or monster dog.
These are light entertaining books where if you are willing to suspend your disbelief and accept the power of magic you can enjoy these mystery novels and even get a surprise at the end.
Of course in each of the books there is a murder and the people of the town usually suspect the Widow or her daughter, Bertha, who is also Caitlyn's aunt and her cousin, Evie who has trouble when she attempts to cast a spell. Caitlyn always tries to help solve the mystery and her American cousin, who she grew up with in America, Pomona shows up on the scene to assist her.
There also is a love interest, which is developing extremely slowly. Lord James Fitzroy, who is the handsome owner of the Huntington Manor. The Lord of the Manor is the major landowner in the small village and did I mention handsome and single. He seems to be drawn to Caitlyn but so far neither of them knows how to move this relationship into a romance. They are friends and keep tripping over their words when they are together, all the signs of young people in love.
In this mystery there seems to be a story about a huge black dog that is supposed to haunt the woods and the lonely dark country lanes at night. There are few attacks and some people end up dead as Caitlyn and others are trying to figure out who to catch the Black Shuck, or monster dog.
These are light entertaining books where if you are willing to suspend your disbelief and accept the power of magic you can enjoy these mystery novels and even get a surprise at the end.
Paving the New Road
Looking for a fun mystery that takes you into the heart of the Germany during World War One, than look no further, you have found it; Paving The New Road, Sulari Gentil. This is the fourth book in the Rowland Sinclair Mystery series. You really should start out with the first book in the series and work your way through. It is so enjoyable and the characters do develop with each installment of their life story.
Sulari Gentill has done again. I love having discovered this fun mystery series, “A Rowland Sinclair Mystery”. Rowland and his friends are off again on another adventure. Of course there is danger afoot and they get in over their heads. This mystery series is different than the typical who-nun-it. This is more a storyline that involves Rowland, Edna, Milton and Clyde in escapades that throw them in the path of danger. In the end a mystery has been uncovered and solved, but only because they have stumbled on the answers. This time they are actually sent to Germany to keep the New Guard leader, Eric Campbell from meeting Hitler and while they are there maybe they could solve a murder. This plot line is based on real people and occurrences of the beginning of Hitler’s rein of terror. The year is 1933. Danger surrounds our motley crew, a bohemian wealthy artist, along with his friends a Jewish poet, a gorgeous sculptress and a Communist painter.
The main players in this series are of course Rowland Sinclair, a the bohemian heir to the family estate and fortune along with Wilfred who is the conservative, wealthy, influential, older brother. Rowland really is unconventional and has turned the stuffy grand parlor of the mansion with its high ceilings and large windows into his art studio. Here he paints the beautiful, Edna, the sculptress, who also lives in the mansion along with their other friends, Clyde Watson Jones, a painter, and Milton Issacs, a poet. To the chagrin of the family housekeeper, Mary Brown, Rowland has taken in these strays to live with him and follow adventures with him.
The location is Australia with a historical look at the country and its politics in the 1930s. We have now arrived at 1933 and Hitler is beginning to make trouble for the world. As New Guard leader Eric Campbell, the man who would be Australia's Fuhrer, is in England meeting with Britain's Fascist leader, Sir Oswald Mosley, word comes to the unofficial Old Guard back in Australia that Campbell is planning to move onto Germany next and meet with Hitler himself. It is decided that Rowland and his friends will go to Germany and try to stop that meeting from happening.
When the friends find out that their contact person in Germany has been killed they are now searching for a murderer as they also try to stop the meeting Campbell thinks he has set up with Hitler. Things get complicated but Edna, Milton and Clyde are always there to cause a bit of trouble and in the end save the day.
Adding more interest to this mystery is the setting of Germany leading up to the war, when one of the main characters is Jewish and gathering of art work in Germany from local Dada artists of the time. Also added to the intrigue is the story of a young woman photographer they meet along the way and befriend when she seems to be having romantic troubles. She in the end turns out to be Eva Braun who is in love with a man she calls Mr. Wolf. So many different tangents to follow, it keeps you caught up til the end.
Sulari Gentill has done again. I love having discovered this fun mystery series, “A Rowland Sinclair Mystery”. Rowland and his friends are off again on another adventure. Of course there is danger afoot and they get in over their heads. This mystery series is different than the typical who-nun-it. This is more a storyline that involves Rowland, Edna, Milton and Clyde in escapades that throw them in the path of danger. In the end a mystery has been uncovered and solved, but only because they have stumbled on the answers. This time they are actually sent to Germany to keep the New Guard leader, Eric Campbell from meeting Hitler and while they are there maybe they could solve a murder. This plot line is based on real people and occurrences of the beginning of Hitler’s rein of terror. The year is 1933. Danger surrounds our motley crew, a bohemian wealthy artist, along with his friends a Jewish poet, a gorgeous sculptress and a Communist painter.
The main players in this series are of course Rowland Sinclair, a the bohemian heir to the family estate and fortune along with Wilfred who is the conservative, wealthy, influential, older brother. Rowland really is unconventional and has turned the stuffy grand parlor of the mansion with its high ceilings and large windows into his art studio. Here he paints the beautiful, Edna, the sculptress, who also lives in the mansion along with their other friends, Clyde Watson Jones, a painter, and Milton Issacs, a poet. To the chagrin of the family housekeeper, Mary Brown, Rowland has taken in these strays to live with him and follow adventures with him.
The location is Australia with a historical look at the country and its politics in the 1930s. We have now arrived at 1933 and Hitler is beginning to make trouble for the world. As New Guard leader Eric Campbell, the man who would be Australia's Fuhrer, is in England meeting with Britain's Fascist leader, Sir Oswald Mosley, word comes to the unofficial Old Guard back in Australia that Campbell is planning to move onto Germany next and meet with Hitler himself. It is decided that Rowland and his friends will go to Germany and try to stop that meeting from happening.
When the friends find out that their contact person in Germany has been killed they are now searching for a murderer as they also try to stop the meeting Campbell thinks he has set up with Hitler. Things get complicated but Edna, Milton and Clyde are always there to cause a bit of trouble and in the end save the day.
Adding more interest to this mystery is the setting of Germany leading up to the war, when one of the main characters is Jewish and gathering of art work in Germany from local Dada artists of the time. Also added to the intrigue is the story of a young woman photographer they meet along the way and befriend when she seems to be having romantic troubles. She in the end turns out to be Eva Braun who is in love with a man she calls Mr. Wolf. So many different tangents to follow, it keeps you caught up til the end.
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