The Black Wolf

 Ok the long awaited second novel installment of Louise Penny,  The Black Wolf finishes the storyline started in The Gray Wolf.  

In true Penny fashion this is a beautifully written novel with a mystery to solve, tension building and some incredible prose. She writes these mystery novels so incredibly you want to underline or copy out so many of the quotes about life and relationships.  

Amazingly in this novel she has come up with an unusual premise that I do not think could really happen but it mirrors so closely some of the outrageous things that are happening now in the United States.  The plot of this book is that there are people at the top of both the United States and Canada who are corrupt and are plotting to take control of the governments and companies for personal gain.

Using social media to pit the US andCanada against each other, to create chaos and throw both countries into war with each other. Killing people who are trying to stop them or sound the alarm.  It is a little scary to read as it is so close to reality and yet it is so well written that you cannot put it down.

In the best way possible the reader will enjoy the suspense and the closure when all the pieces fall into place and the guilty parties are stopped and good guys win.  It is always nice to know that even if real life is unsettled and we do not know the outcome yet, a book will have a satisfying ending.

The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes

 I love books written in multiple voices from different time periods, where the stories all connect in the end.  The Lost Story of Eva Fuentes, written by Chanel Cleeton is that style of novel.  

Taking the reader back to 1900 Cuba we meet Eva Fuentes, a young school teacher living through the revolution in Cuba as the country frees itself from Spain's rule.  As Cuba becomes involved with the United States a group a school teachers are sent to Harvard for a summer of learning and community building. A showing of goodwill between the two countries.  Eva is among the group spending her first summer away from Havana.  She meets a young man and the reader follows her experiences that summer.  When she returns to Cuba she writes and publishes a book.

Next we are introduced to Pilar Castillo, a librarian living in Havana in the 1960s as Fidel Castro is coming to power. She is a newly married woman whose husband has recently been imprisoned for subversive activity by the regime.  She finds a way to fill her days and make a difference by reading and saving books.  Pilar is asked by her neighbor ,who is fleeing the country, to hold onto and return a book to her friend.

Finally in 2024, in London, the reader meets Margo Reynolds, a young woman who has started her own company finding lost and rare items for people.  Mostly art and artifacts, it gives her a good feeling to see people reunited with their possessions or family heirlooms.  Her most current client has asked her to find a very rare and long lost book. Reconnecting with her ex husband to work on this case of finding the book, Margo and Luke also can reexamine their relationship.

A quick entertaining interesting plot and some interesting history of Cuba and the rise of Fidel Castro.

A Complete Fiction

 RL Maizes has written another book, even better than her other terrific novels and short stories, Other People's Pets and We Love Anderson Cooper.

In her newest novel,A Complete Fiction, Maizes brings us into the world of publishing, also into the life and mind of the writer.  I could not help wondering throughout the novel if this scenario has happened to an author or that it is a problem that worries writers when they send in a script to a publishing house.

In a quite entertaining way Maizes covers the very serious subject of the #metoo movement.  Talking about sexual abuse and how it affects the victim and also by extension the family of the abused. The subject is the topic that propels the plot forward of two authors writing a story of someone being abused in the workplace.  Each story is different but there is one theme that is the same in both novels, the viewpoint of the attacker.  

When R J Larkin who has written a novel based on her sister's personal experience  has made the rounds of publishers but has not been accepted for print finds out that George Dunn who read her manuscript has written a similar book, she accuses him of plagiarism on social media.  The internet blows up with opinions both for and against each author in a back and forth that threatens to unravel each person's life and their book deals.

Looking at the subject of #metoo and deciding who has the right to tell someone's story.  How far should an author go to have their work published?  It is something to wonder about when you read a book, is this story autobiographical?  Have the names and circumstances been altered enough for anonymity? 

Then there is the world of publishing, how much of an advance publishers offer and what the legal ramifications are about plagiarism accusations and making sure the facts are correct if accusations are made. 

In the end of this fast paced entertaining novel authors, friends and family all come out having learned incredible lessons.  

Behind the Trigger

Behind the Trigger, is a spy novel written by an Israeli novelist and a former intelligence officer under the pseudonym Yariv Imbar.

Developed as a psychological thriller the tension and suspense starts immediately on page one and continues to build as the story develops. Your heart will start beating faster as Irit, a skilled Mossad agent, wife and mother does not follow protocol during an espionage operation.  Irit loves her job going on overt missions, this time to set up a listening devise in a hotel room to spy on the conversations of a senior Syrian security figure.  Making a split second decision that brings her face to face with the target's wife changes the course of both their lives.

Fiercely dedicated to her job and trying to balance life at home with her husband and children she is being asked to leave her comfort zone and take on a dangerous assignment.  Irit befriends Noor, the wife of the senior Syrian weapons engineer who Mossad has been tracking.  Mossad takes advantage of the women's budding friendship to recruit Noor to help them track her husband. 

The plot engages the reader in the lives of Noor and Irit.  Noor is caught in an abusive marriage, struggling with shame and the loss of multiple pregnancies.  She is in need of a friend.  Irit is recruited to fill that role to achieve their mission, but finds that she becomes more involved than just as an agent.  The relationship becomes personal as Irit begins to face her own demons, memories of her own past emotional pain, resentments and secrets.  As the women become closer the danger becomes more real.  Noor setting up her husband for the Mossad and Irit putting her own life in jeopardy.  

On the surface this is a powerful thriller, highlighting the work of special forces,  surveillance techniques and the risks involved.  Under the surface it examines psychological feelings and fears.  Looking at women and their marriages. Each feeling inadequate in their lives, looking for validation and acceptance. The life of a woman in the Israeli secret service, balancing family and career.  The life of a woman and their personal feelings of value in the face of motherhood, controlling men taking advantage of abusive power.

The characters are well developed and the reader will be drawn in with compassion and fear for the women and anger at the men. Exploring the themes of friendship and love. What makes a marriage work and what are the risks to keeping a marriage together?  How far a person will go to save another.  How long a person can bury their own trauma or personal history before it affects their current life. This is a very satisfying story.

Death at the Sign of the Rook

 Death at the Sign of the Rook, by Kate Atkinson was for me a very confusing mystery novel.  This is the nest in a series of books that feature the detective Jackson Brodie.  He is now an ex-detective from the police department. He still ends up working with his previous partner though now she is relunctant to get involved with him, Reggie.

From what I could follow there are two mysteries involving missing artwork removed from the wall of two difereent country homes.  Each thief seems to have ben a caregiver to an elderly lady dowager who is now dead.

Could there be enough evidence to prove the two thieves are one and the same? Reggie starts to look into the possibilities, reluctantly helping Jackson.

Now involve quite a number of ancillary characters to muddle the works and a snow storm. It is a complicated and confusing plot to follow.

I did not enjoy it

The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah

 Jean Meltzer has a come up with another loveable romance novel in The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah.

This is the newest of Jean Meltzer's romance novels.  She has taken the genre by storm and built a wonderful Jewish romance following.  I have never been a romance fan, but Jean has captured my attention with her delightful novels.  She has perfected the novels by including Jewish connection to the stories in just the right balance.  This time it is a take off on A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens bringing eight ghosts to her work-a-holic protagonist, Evelyn is visited by eight ghosts leading up to the TV special she is producing while reconnecting with her ex husband.  Can she see the error of her ways before the end of Hanukah and rekindle the candles of true love?

The Impossible Fortune

 Richard Osman is on a role.  His newest book in the Thursday Murder Club series is The Impossible Fortune.  I, for one, am glad he has continued to write this series because not only are the books great, I am enjoying the television series based on the books.  Though the first one changed the ending of book one which I thought was a mistake.

This time the gang is back together and they are celebrating Joyce's daughter's wedding.  Joanna as finally found love with Paul.  At the wedding Elizabeth is approached by Paul's best man asking for some help with a problem. After the wonderful celebration Elizabeth shares the news the next day with the rest of the Thursday Murder Club and things get started.

The best man goes missing and then of course there is a murder.  Elizabeth and Joyce get started investigating with their partners in detection, Ron and Ibrahim.  The cast of characters grows in this mystery and there are some red herrings laong the way to distract you.  But in the end so many loose ends are all tied up in a neat bow.

The writing style is terrific.  Osman writes from multiple points of view and each is so unique and the voices are so consistent and clear. You can really tell the different personalities of the characters by their voices.  Another fun read.

The Busy Body Book Club

 The Busybody Book Club is written by Freya Sampson is one in a long line of her light easy reading cosy novels.  Tihs is the onlly one I have read so far.

This plot focuses on a small book group made up of members of a small town community center.  Nova Davis is the young woman hired to lead the center's book discussion group.  She really needs this job.  She has recently moved to the town and is living with her fiancé and his family as they prepare for their wedding.

The members of the group are an ornery bunch and have trouble agreeing on the monthly book selections. After one member leaves the meeting in a hurry and disappears the group finally starts to act as a team.  Money is missing from the director's office, Michael has disappeared and a dead body was discovered in his home.  

The book group gathers to make a plan and try to find the money and Michael before the police do.  Mabel is an Agatha Christie fan and tries to use what she has learned from reading the Jane Marple mysteries to help solve the mysteries at hand. As the characters slowly trust each other and reveal their secrets the reader can see why each person likes a different genre of books.  Arthur loves a good romance and thinks there might be a mystery woman involved.  Ash is a teenager who thinks dark forces are at play because he is a sci-fi fan.

An entertaining sweet mystery that brings people together, bonding over their book choices.  So many book recommenddations , along with humor, and a little romance.

The Baker Street Letters

 Just found another cute mystery series this time written by Michael Robertson.

I just finished book one, The Baker Street Letters which I thought was a stand alone mystery novel, but I have now realized it is the start of a series.  There are seven books in all so I will be busy reading my way through them for a while.

The Baker Street Letters is a n interesting concept for a mystery series.  We meet two brothers who are lawyers sharing the office space at 221b Baker Street.  The famous address of Sherlock Holmes in London, England.

The brothers have leased the space with an agreement to file all the letters that are sent to Sherlock Holmes and send a form letter in reply.  Of course Nigel Heath the younger of the brothers decide to investigate a case that has been described in one of the letters addressed to Sherlock Holmes.  He boards a airplane for Los Angeles, Ca to investigate.  His brother Reggie finds a dead body and with a fear that his brother is involved somehow, follows Nigel to America.  

Following a real life historical event, a fire that took place during construction of a subway in Los Angeles in 1997 the time frame is set and the other novels will follow during that same time.  Reggie works hard to solve the mystery of where his brother is and who is responsible for the dead bodies left in his wake. 

We get to know the brothers and their relationship dynamics which keeps the reader engaged.  Reggie and Nigel are both likable characters and so is Laura who at first seems to be a love interest that may come between the brothers. 

This will be a fun series to watch the characters develop and how they interact.

The Great Divide

 

The Great Divide written by author, Christina Henriquez.

Henriquez brings the history of the Panama Canal to life in this well developed story.  It focuses on the people  whose lives were affected by the building of a canal in Panama to link the shipping lanes together.  How the changes changed the lives of the people whose lived there, the workers who came there looking for wealth and power.  Following the personal lives of a variety of people we see the hard times, the struggles, the triumphs of the Panama Canal project.

We meet characters from the United States who go over as doctors, engineers and site bosses.  They come from a variety of backgrounds and are looking for fortune or  fame.  There are characters that come from the islands, Jamaica, Barbados and Panama looking to make money and go back to lead easier lives on their islands.

Ada is a young girl who leaves home to find work in Panama to help raise money for an operation the local doctor tells her family her sister needs. Living a very poor life she hopes to quickly raise the money needed and return.  John, a research sccientist who hope to find the cure for maleria, goes to study and treat maleria in Panama.  Bringing his wife along, he is also hoping to escape his own demons.  Also many young men who came to put in the hard work, hoping to return to their islands wealthy enough to find a wife and a home. 

Also there are characters who show the feelings of the Panamanians, those who did not welcome these outsiders coming to change their land and life in Panama.

The conditions are treacherous and the dangers are very real.  It is an amazing and personal look at how this new canal would change the landscape.

Tree Spirits Around the World

 If you are looking for a wonderful book to read with a child, this is the perfect selection.  Tree Spirits Around the World written and photographed by Louise Wannier is an extremely unique and creative concept for a book that will fascinate both adults and children.

As a grandmother (Safta) Wannier created a magical book that explores photographs of trees and encourages the reader to use their imagination to see different animals in the photographs.

To help the reader, illustrator, April Tatiana Jackson has used her imagination to create beautiful drawings of animals that could be in each of the plants.  Using an overlay with the animal drawings layered over each tree we can see the tree come to life.

The photographs in this book were taken in various countries of plants native to that country. The animals are also native to the country.  

The book is beautifully composed and the idea is very unique. I will go back and find the first book, Tree Spirits. 

Kills Well With Others

 Kills Well With Others is the newest addition to the Killers of A Certain Age mystery series.  Deanna Raybourn is on a roll as she continues to bring four women of a certain age along for a exciting murder in the name of justice.

The premise of this series is four women assassins who are passed their prime in life but are ready to quit working yet. They work as a team and are assigned murders by the Museum, an organization that kills in the name of justice.  The targets are only people who are a menace to society.  Murder for a good cause, to make the world a safer place.

The characters are very relatable.  Each struggling with what to do with retirement.  Not ready to say their are not useful anymore, trying to hold onto their self worth.

Using clever disguises they go undercover and search out their targets.  The disguises are perfect and the descriptions of the places around the world they travel are colorful.  

The plot this time is that someone from the past is out to get them and they are both trying to figure out how to protect themselves and also find the culprit and disarm them.  There is a mole on the inside of the Museum and an angry villain.  There is reference to artwork stolen by the Nazis from the Jews during World War II.

All this leads to an interesting plot and a fun mystery novel.  Enjoy the read.

The Daughter of Auschwitz: My Story of Resilience, Survival and Hope

 Tova Friedman was four years old when her family was moved to a Jewish Ghetto in Poland and just six when they were forced into a cattle car bound for Auschwitz concentration camp. Tova is one of the youngest survivors of the horrendous death camp.  As time passes and the survivors of the Holocaust atrocities are fewer and fewer Tova feels it is her obligation to tell her story.  She must keep sharing her experiences so that the world will not forget what happened in World War II Germany and Poland. 

The story is told from Tova’s perspective with the help of author Malcom Brabant, a war reporter, whose detailed research helped Tova remember her experiences with meticulous detail.

Tova tells the story from the perspective of a young girl of twelve talking to a classmate.  This makes the story easier for young readers to understand and relate to the details.  We meet Tova when she comes to New York City and is starting her new life in America.  It is difficult at first adjusting to a new language and trying to fit into school.  She has never played with other children or had any friends before.  She dresses very differently and the school counselor even suggests she cut her long hair to look more American.

Tova Friedman was an incredibly lucky person.  She explains the many times she was saved by ingenuity, or just good luck from the jaws of death.  Her mother had many clever and good sense advice and ideas that helped them both live through the many horrible situations they faced. Her father also survived and they found each other after the war, traveling to the United States together.

Now Tova is in her eighties and has four children and eight grandchildren  She travels around the country telling her story and talking to young people about prejudice and anti-semitism.  She and her grandson Aron have a TikTok channel to reach a larger audience.  

This book has a strong message about being Jewish even in the face of adversity. The Jewish holidays are mentioned and food laws of kashrut. Judaism is integral to the story.  This is not a book that would exist without the Jewish component.  It is a great book for all young people to read, Jewish and non Jewish to understand the horrible consequences of hatred and prejudice.

This is an important memoir that will continue to honor the victims of the Holocaust and keep the atrocities that happened there fresh in our minds so that they will never be repeated again.

Max in the House of Spies

 Max in the House of Spies is a tale of World War II by Adam Gidwitz.  Gidwitz is also the Newbury Honor-winning author of The Inquisitor's Tale.

Max is an eleven year old boy living with his parents in Berlin, Germany in 1939.  Because his family is Jewish his parents are becoming aware that it is not safe for them to continue living in Germany.  They take the brave and proactive step to send their son, Max on the Kindertransport to England.  Max is leaving his parents and his country behind for the first time in his life. He is placed in a Jewish home in London.  

We follow Max as he adapts to his new life. He meets bullies at school and learns to defend himself and the brothers who he is living with. Max has some unusual abilities. He can make a working radio from the junk at the bottom of a trash can.  He also has two immortal creatures living on his shoulders.  Berg and Stein represent good aand evil and only MAx can see them.  They are his constant traveling companions as he negotiates his new life in England.

Max is also quite the genius and finds creative ways to get out off trouble and maybe even cause a little trouble.  His antics and talents come to the attention of the British Intelligence Service.  They are ready to train him as a spy and send him back to Germany to help the war effort.

This is the kind of story that will interest young readers. It will build confidence in the reader who feels small and wishes they were able to fight the bullies, also the reader who feels out of control and dreams of taking charge.

An entertaining for both adults and pre teens.

The Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club

Author, Martha Hall Kelly who also wrote Lilac Girls just gave me a good surprise with this new novel.   I thought this book would be more of a beach read about women on the Vineyard for the summer, but it is not that at all.

The Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club is a historic novel about American troops training on the Vineyard during World War II.  To set the scene we meet Mari Starward, a young woman in search of answers.  In 2016 she travels from California to the Vineyard after the death of her mother.  She found a name in her mother's belongings that leaves her with questions that send her east.

When she meets the reclusive Elizabeth Devereaux on her waterfront farm the past comes to meet the present.  Devereaux, a famous painter sets up their easels and as they paint begins to tell the story of the Smith sisters.  Telling the story of their experiences during 1942 on that very farm.

It is an interesting story of American troops, German U boats, friendship and love.  The intrigue of spies and risk taking.  Entertaining and compelling...

Heart of the Stranger

There are teachers, clergy or others who have made a lasting impression on our lives.  Their words or actions have made them seem like giants in our memories. Sometimes there are books that stand out in our memory .  Ones we recommend and quote long after we have closed the cover.

Angela Buchdahl is one of those people and her book, Heart of the Stranger is one of those books for me.  I have watched her conduct religious services at Central Synagogue in New York City through the magic of zoom and livestream. I have heard her sing, the voice of an angel.  I have heard her speak on occasion, with incredible wisdom and feeling.  So I was interested to read her book.

This is both an interesting look at her life and a powerful book in which she shares her thoughts and ideas. Growing up in an immigrant family coming to America from South Korea.  She was in many ways a minority in her Tacoma, Washington home.  She was raised Jewish, attending Temple Beth El in Tacoma, Washington, which her great-grandparents had assisted in founding a century before. 

Her mother, Sulja Yi Warnick,is a Korean buddhist and her father, Fredrick David Warnick, an Jewish American of Reform Ashkenazi descent.  At the age of 16 Angela became interested in the rabbinate. 

Interestingly, Angela was of such a strong character that each of the challenges in her life became incentives for her to conquer, push past and move ahead.  In this book she shares with her readers her insecurities, a feeling of not belonging and the setbacks as she travels to Israel, teaches at Jewish summer camps and attends rabbinical school.

She pushed back against the negativity, she fought back against her own self doubts, she found mentors who encouraged her and she found support from her mother and father to continue until she became the first Asian woman rabbi to lead one of the largest most influential synagogues in the world.

This is the story of the making of a rabbi, but even more it is the story of a mother/daughter relationship.  A mother who puts family above all else. The story of finding yourself and the pride that brings you.  But not only yourself, but your mother and other family and friends who have believed in you.  

Buchdahl's personal journey is a part of what makes her resilient and empathetic to all, embracing the notion that we are all bound to a larger mission and the healing power of community.  

Within this book Buchdahl has written both a memoir and a spiritual guide.  Her enthusiastic and joyful personality has created meaningful, upbeat worship.  Her belief in the power of faith and gratitude makes her a voice to listen to as she does not shy away from difficult topics or conversations.  She has faced some of the hardest challenges in recent history.

Angela Buchdahl is an American reform rabbi. She was the first East Asian-American to be ordained as a rabbi, and the first East Asian-American to be ordained as a hazzan (cantor). In 2011 she was named by Newsweek and The Daily Beast as one of America's "Most Influential Rabbis", and in 2012 by The Daily Beast as one of America's "Top 50 Rabbis". Buchdahl was recognized as one of the top five in The Forward's 2014 "Forward Fifty", a list of American Jews who had the most impact on the national scene in the previous year.

Happy New Years

The friendship of women from your past are sometimes so important that you work hard to keep those people in your life.  Sometimes those relationships are the ones you can pick up where you left off even after a long passage of time. Some women have a yearly reunion and others keep in touch randomly.  In Happy New Years the characters all keep in touch through letters. 

We meet Leah Zuckerman as she is finishing up at the Teachers College hoping with her fellow classmates to find work teaching school in Israel. Summoned to the principal's office, Leah is offered a position teaching in a school in the United States.  As she leaves Israel she decides the best way to stay in touch with her classmates will be through letter writing.  She proposes they all write a New Year's letter each Rosh Hashanah updating each other on their lives during the year.

Happy New Years by Maya Arad, is a very multi layered look at Leah Zuckerman's life, through her New Year letters.  Each year she writes to the group as a whole with news of her life, then adds an even more personal look at her life when she shares more information in her letter to Mira, the one friend in whom she confides the deeper darker secrets to.

Leah's life is full of ups and downs as she is the last of her group to get married and have children.  She goes through a number of job and career changes always in pursuit of the American dream.  We follow as Leah reinvents herself many times, going through marriage, divorce, relationships and work ups and downs in a life lived to the fullest.  

This is a story that covers a fifty year span of time and historic events both in the US and in Israel.  Leah experiences all that life in America has to offer and the consequences of all her choices.  Choosing in her letters to present a certain narrative, she struggles with her ability for reinvention and self-delusion.  She also struggles with the accepted norms of her time.  

She raises two sons, giving them everything she thinks they need to be successful. Then she struggles with her inability to control how their lives turnout.  Ari, who becomes a substance abuser and does not finish college. Yonatan, who is successful in business but not in love. 

As she writes her New Year's letters, putting a positive spin on her life, trying never to show jealousy about the news of her classmates and their successes, we see the author, Arad, showing us the more subtle story of women's behavior toward one another,  judging and misjudging each other. The competition between women more than the support of one another.

Women of a certain age, who grew up in the 1960s, will find so many references that are nostalgic.  In her letters she mentions making Yonatan and Ari fit in with their friends she buys them Levi's and Nike sneakers.  There will be many ideas and concepts that they will be able to relate to.  Leah writes to her friends about being invited to party where they are selling storage containers and later she starts selling these Tupperware containers herself at home parties. 

 Leah also writes about the difficulty of negotiating between motherhood, romance and work balance.  The book brings back for the reader memories of the prejudices and challenges of the time and how things have progressed as she lives into the 21 century.

The Last Death of the Year

 Sophie Hannah, who is the official Agatha Christie appointed author, has published her newest Hercule Poirot Mystery, The Last Death of the Year.

Hannah who has been writing her own mystery series was honored by the Christie family and estate to be the designated author to continue writing the Hercule Poirot  series of mysteries.  She has done a great job continuing to bring us the wonderful detective Poirot's life and murders that he continues to solve.  

This time Poirot and his friend, Police Investigator Edward Catchpool, are visiting a Greek Island for New Year's Eve in 1932.  Though Catchpool is enjoying swimming off the island of Lamperos after a difficult Christmas with his mother, this is not just a vacation, there will of course be a murder to solve.

Gathered on the island is a unusual group of guests.  This small community has come together to form a possible cult or religious group.  They are all attracted there by the idea that they will be forgiven any sins they have committed and do not have to reveal their past.

Using the theme of New Year resolutions the group decide to play a game after dinner writing their resolution for the new year, putting it in a bowl and having everyone guess who wrote which resolution.  

The most threatening resolution someone makes to perform "the last and first death of the year."  Now Poirot reveals to Catchpool why they were invited to this weekend party.  Someone's life had been threatened.  

Poirot and Catchpool must get to work and solve the last death of the year before anyone else can be killed.  They must investigate all the guests and also some of the members of the Lamperos community to see who could have been angry enough to commit murder.

An entertaining mystery though maybe not quite as intricate as Agatha Christie would have been.  

Ink Ribbon Red

Author Alex Pavesi has written a new mystery novel, Ink Ribbon Red.  

Using the mystery within a mystery theme, Pavesi keeps the reader guessing which is reality and which is fiction throughout the novel. The reader is introduced to six friends together for a weekend at a country house.  The friends have a web of thin strands that interconnect them to each other.  Each has a secret to protect. 

They come together for a yearly gathering this time to celebrate Anatol’s 30th birthday.  He introduces a game he invented called “Motive, Murder, Death”.  He asks each person to write a short story about one of the other friends committing a murder of someone else in the group.

This is the confusing part of the book, where the stories each character is writing are mixed in with what is happening between the characters at the get together.  The author purposely has blurred the lines between what is reality and what are the stories being created.  Using the unreliable narrative keeps the reader guessing until the end.

The Busybody Book Club

 The Busybody Book Club by Freya Sampson adds another clever cute mystery to the new genre of elderly persons solving mysteries. It seems to be a growing trend.

Thhis time we meet Nova Davies, a young woman who has taken on a position at the area's community center as an activity director.  New to the area, living with her fiancé and his parents, she is looking forward to her upcoming wedding.

When Michael, one of the book club members disappears, Nova and the other members resolve to solve the mystery of his disappearance.  Leading the charge is Phyllis, an Agatha Christie fan, who imagines herself as Miss Marple.  

With many twists, turns and discoveries Nova finds her job in danger, her wedding on the edge.  But around the last corner the answer to the mystery may be within reach.  Can this small group of unusual characters save the day?  They come together seeing strengths in each other and themselves they didn't realize before. 

Bringing together a group of lonely individuals to create a group of friends, this is a entertaining mystery novel with a satisfying end.

Vera Wong's Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man)

 Second book even better than the first!!!  So Vera Wong's Unsolicited  Advice for Murderers was an interesting first mystery novel by Jesse Q. Sutanto.  I enjoyed reading it but was not sure I was looking forward to another book about Vera Wong. 

But now I am hooked and I am already looking forward to another in this series.  Vera Wong has grown on me.  Her cute word plays and obvious misunderstanding of the English language and especially any new saying and clever sayings of the Gen Y group of young people.  

Also though the mysteries are clever and the writing style is wonderful, there is something very endearing about Vera Wong.  It is what the people she meets feeel about her.  They are not sure why but they fall in love with her and are willing to do whatever she asks of them.  Well by the end of book two I also feel that wasy about Vera.  I was crying real tears as the sad and lonely characters in this book found love and acceptance.  How so many people from different backgrounds come together to eat the mouthwatering food and tea that Vera prepares in her restaurant.

Malice Aforethought

Author, Avree Kelly Clark, surprised me with this very interesting novel, Malice Aforethought.

Very intriguing story of two women killed in New England and how the police and town officials went about solving the crimes and finding the killer.  Written as a novel but in the style of a police procedural ... this is a captivating plot with interesting characters.  The reader is caught up in the mystery and concerned about how the criminal will be caught.  There is no scientific DNA discovery ability at this time.  Timeline and the ability to travel between locations along with personality assessments ments become very important to the evidence and in determining guilt or innocence.

This is a story that takes place in New Hampshire which in itself is interesting.  It is written as a novel but follows true facts about women who were killed in neighboring towns.  Thinking of the period it takes palce in, it is interesting to see how they solve the crime without all the modern forensics that are at our disposal today.

The Retirement Plan

 The Retirement Plan by Sue Hincenbergs.  It is an entertaining beach read about marriage and relationships. 

Very relatable to those of us of a certain age who have raised children with a group of friends. The kids have flown the coup and now the four couples are still friends.  The men all fish together and share drinks over barbeque.  The women are all best friends and share their confidences.  

But every person has a secret they are not sharing, not with their friends or with their spouses .  It is hard to keep those secrets without impacting your relationships.  When one of the husbands, Dave,  is found dead in his  driveway everything goes sideways.  Then men are worried someone is after them, they reach out for protection.  The wives see that Dave’s wife collects a big insurance claim and looks like she is set for an exciting future.  That gets the other wives thinking, maybe they want to take out a hit on the remaining husbands.

Food for thought, about marriage, your relationships, trust and love.  

Deep Lake House

 Deep Lake House by DJ Geribo, written from the point of view of the house itself, this slim novel follows the guest who have come and stayed there over the years.  A guest house that welcomes guests for a week or two at a time.  Looking at the guests who have stayed there in each decade, from the 1890s to present day.  Some families return year after year, some only come once.  The house watches the family dynamics and intereactions as it ages in place.

A Swim Back Home

A Swim Back Home by Denise Sawyer, has an interesting storyline about a woman who is trying to hold onto a childhood interrupted. Her parents moved from her childhood home in NJ to MA and she has always regretted it. It has made her a hoarder. 

When she experiences an accident in her swimming pool, she feels like she is time traveling back to her childhood. Now an adult in a her 11 year old body, she is back in her NJ home.

 A different concept makes for interesting reading and also brings in a rare scientific phenomenon that was something this reader had never heard of before.

The Spy Coast

 The Spy Coast , the first in a new series by Tess Gerritsen.  This was a mystery novel about a former CIA operative named Maggie Bird, who has retired to a small town in Maine.  She is enjoying retirement as chicken farmer and living a quiet life on the beaten pat.

When a young woman shows up at her door looking for another operative from the past, Maggie is not happy to have been found.  This is the beginning of a run for her life.  Now she has to figure out who is looking for her and why.  She and a few other friends from the past gather for a book discussion group and call themselves the Martini Club.  When things get really dangerous for Maggie, they gather together behind her to help save her life.

This seems like the beginning of a new series of cases the Martini Club will be able to start solving, keeping their hand in with the talents they used in their former lives.  They are also getting to know the new police chief in town,  Jo Thibodeau.

Maggie has to return to her past and confront her ghosts and some of the horrible things that happened to her as worked in the field for the US.  It is a matter of who you can trust and who is out to get you, to save themselves.

Fair Play

 I am going to admit something right here and now.... I did. not get what was happening in this book at all.

There ... maybe it is just me but Fair Play by Louise Hegarty was very confusing and though I finished it I was not sure what was happening for the whole second half of the story. I read to the end hoping it would all make sense by the end but alas no such solution was offered.

The plot starts out like a group of old friends who get together every New Year's Eve and spend the night in an AirBnB with a mystery themed party.  As the friends arrive you get a description of each character and how they fit into the group.  Then dinner is served the aprty begins and the scripted mystery party starts.  Of course one character plays the victum and the others figure out the solution.  

The next morning there is an actual guest who turns up dead.  That was totally what I expected.  But then somehow the plot seems to change and the characters that were there now some are the same names and some are different.  The relationships seem altered and a detective, a copy of Hercule Poirot with his sidekick show up to help the police with the murder.  

Here is where the two stories got so muddled I am not sure what was happening.

Then the ending, the detective comes back six times with six different solutions to the murder. Each chapter labeled "The Solution"," Another Solution", etc...

So in the end I am not sure what to say but if you read this book and understand the plot ...cacll me and explain it to me.

6:40 To Montreal

 Another fabulous story plot by Eva Jurczyk.  The story twists and turns at just the right moments.  Just when you think you have it all figured out there is another fact revealed that sends the plot in a new direction.

The story of Agatha, a writer in a slump, is on the 6:40 train.  She has the day planned out, when the train gets stuck in a snow storm.  There are only a few people on this train car.  The reader gets to know each of the characters very well. The first victim is a shocking surprise, then it is like sharks smelling blood in the water.  In a closed car mystery, the murder must be one the people in the room and Jurczyk is practiced at pitting one against another.  Will the train make it to its destination before there are more bodies?  Only time will tell. 

The Eight Heartbreaks of Hannukah

 Jean Meltzer has made writing Jewish romance novels a genre all its own.  She is becoming prolific in her writing and has also started promoting and encouraging other writers who write Jewish related romance to come together and share in her limelight.  She has created a community of writers and readers.  The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukah is her latest novel. 

The Eight Breakups of Hanukah is a clever take-off on A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.  Dickens brings Ebenezer Scrooge three ghosts, past, present and future to helpl cure him of his negative attitude toward Christmas and the people in his life.

Evelyn Schwartz uses work to escape any personal relationships because they make her uncomfortable.  She is a work-a-holic and her marriage with David, a doctor, ended two years ago.  But now the week before her Christmas special is supposed to air, the most important work event of her life, David shows up at the studio as the doctor on call.  As Evelyn negociates between her need to excel at work and her growing feelings of love toward David returning she is visited by eight ghosts, one for each night of Hanukah,  They each take her on a trip back to relive different moments in her relationship with David.  

This is an entertaining plot with lots of secrets revealed with each ghost's visit.  A clever way to tell the back story of David and Evelyn's relationship and what led to the  breakup.  Can the eight heartbreaks teach Evelyn a lesson in time?

This is Not a Game

 This is Not A Game a new locked room mystery by Kelly Mullen.  Very entertaining and lighthearted mystery with a fun plot and good twist ending.

Creating a grandmother and granddaughter detection team, as an unexpected winter storm captures a party of suspects in a mansion after a murder occurs.  Grandmother, Mimi is invited to an unusual party at her neighbors with a threat of extortion.  Mimi does not want to go alone so she invites her granddaughter, Addie to accompany her.  Addie fresh from a breakup with her boyfriend and work partner after he takes the rights to the video game they created together decides to join her grandmother at the party.

People start getting murdered,  the house is snowed in and police cannot get there until the storm ends.  In the meantime Mimi and Addie start searching the house for clues and interviewing the other guests. Mimi wants to encourage Addie to see the talnt she has that has been squashed by her ex.  Addie wants to help Mimi avoid being accused of being the killer.  This is a great chance for Addie to use her great deduction skills in real life, not just in a video game.  

The Case of the Missing Maid

 The Case of the Missing Maid is an interesting book written by Robert Osler.  This was an unusual mystery novel.  In 1898 Harriet Morrow is looking for new employment.  She is a young woman of twenty living with her school age brother.  Her parents are both dead.  She is leaving the bookkeeping job she had and applying to work for a detective agency as a female operative.  She is hired by the Prescott Detective Agency on a trial basis.  Dressed in a skirt with men's shoes and a bowler hat, she rides a bicycle as she searches for a missing maid.  This is her first assignment and she is determined to show her prowess at finding the maid.  

This is an entertaining book with some interesting character traits for the protagonist, Harriet.  At a time in history when being different was not looked on favorably, Harriet dresses different, and wants a more exciting job than most women are able to obtain.

She travels in new circles as she looks for the missing maid and learns some things about herself she was not sure of,  She also overcomes some of her naivety, and finds other people who are feeling similarly.

This mystery was a fun novel to read and I liked the way the author brought in other lifestyles that were not truly accepted in the early 19th century.

Typewriter Beach

 Typewriter Beach is the newest book in the Meg Waite Clayton collection.  What a wonderful historical novel.  This is another time stamped novel with paralllel plots taking the reader back and forth between 1957 and 2018.  In '57 Isabella Giori arrives in Carmel in the dead of night to quietly wait out a mistake she made while filming her first movie picture.  As she waits in the cottage owned by the studio so they will keep her under contract and loan her out to Alfred Hitchcock she meets Leon Chazen who is a writer.  He has been blacklisted accused by others in the  McCarthy Senator and his communist surveillance of the movie industry.  

2018 Gemma Chazen comes back to Carmel to spread her grandfather's ashes and empty his cottage.  She meets Sam who is living across the way.  He is working on creating computer games and was friendly with Leon.  Also living in the cottage next door is Isabella an aging movie star.  As their lives all start to interconnect we learn the back story that brings us to the three characters in Carmel now.

Secrets are revealed,  friendships are made, love develops and is recognized. A beautifully told story that captures the views and beliefs of the time period.  The seriousness of the red scare and the unfair way women were treated in Hollywood.  The characters are especially well developed.

The Stolen Queen

 The Stolen Queen by Fiona Davis is the latest of this author's fabulous historical novels. 

Taking the historical story of the rediscovery of Hatshepsut, the female pharaoh of ancient Egypt.  Using some of the real facts about the mummy of Hatshepsut and her discovery by mummy by Egyptologists Elizabeth Thomas and Christiane Deroche, Davis creates a wonderful novel around the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Also incorporated is the fashion icon Diana Vreeland, editor in chief of Vogue magazine, who also was known for creating the Met Gala between 1973-1989.

Using those historical tidbits as background Davis builds her novel around 1939 when anthropology student Charlotte Cross goes on a coveted dig in Egypt and falls in love and the all experince ends in tragedy.  Then in 1978 as Cross is working for the Met as the associate curator of the Department of Egyptian Art a an artifact comes across her desk that brings all her memories back from her time in Egpyt.

Also young Annie Jenkins a 19 year old is so excited when she lands a job working as Diana Vreeland's assistant for the Meet Gala.  When things go wrong, Annie must find a way to save her job, the event and recover the stolen queen, a valuable artifact stolen from the museum.

Annie and Charlotte team up to find the stolen statuette and find themselves helping each other.  Charlotte will have Annie by her side to help her face the demons of her past and Annie will have Charlotte there to help Annie clear her name and help her start over working at the Met. 

Such an entertaining novel, you can just picture hot desert sun, the hush of the tomb as the archeologists uncover Hatshepsut and other important finds.  Also the glamour of the Met Gala and the nononsense attitude of Diana Vreeland is palpable.

How to Share an Egg

 How to Share an Egg was a delightful memoir written by Bonny Reichert.  

Though there were no recipes in the book, which I was hoping for, I always find them an added bonus, this was an interesting memoir about what it is like to grow up the child of a Holocaust survivor.  We each grow up through both nature and nurture and it is always fascinating to try and figure out what the combination is that makes us who we are.  

Bonny is the child of a father who was a Holocaust survivor. He escaped the war and tries to down play the experience he went through to his children.  He always tries to have a very positive outlook on life.  He looks for the good in every situation.  He tells his children to be happy and not take things too seriously, not to work too hard.  

But Bonny takes on the guilt of having a wonderful, safe and happy life knowing that her father suffered in his early years.  She has trouble enjoying the present and feels guilty about her father's past.

This is the story of how she and her father relate to each other through food.  There is a family restaurant business and Bonny finds the way to communicate with her father best is through recipes of foods he remembers from his childhood before the atrocities of the war.  This is the unfolding of Bonny's life and where se finds herself fitting in.  We hear parts of her father's story and the family does go back to Poland and taste some memorable foods together.  

The reader will have to find their own recipes so they can taste the foods recreated in the book.  But you can always share an egg.

All This Could Be Yours

 Wow, what a fun look behind the scenes at the life of an author on the road. As author Tesse Calloway becomes an overnight sensation with her new novel, her life becomes a nightmare, of feeling stalked by someone from her past.  

Tesse leaves her corporate job behind to support her husband and two young children as a successful book author.  But she finds out life on the road publicizing your book from bookstore to bookstore is a hard life.  Away from home, missing the routine family adventures takes a toll.  Then add in a person who may know the secrets you are hiding from your past and the pressure intensifies. 

All these ingredients make for a twisting and mind bending psychological thriller that keeps you on the edge of your seat and reading late into the night.  It also makes a reader wonder what secrets this author Hank Phillippi Ryan may be hiding from her readers.?  Should we be following her social media and trying to suss out some secrets?

The Women

 The Women by Kristin Hannah is another fantastic novel.  The Nightingale was one of my all time favorites and The Women comes close.  I had been putting it off until my book discussion group put it on their list for this month.  That forced my hand and I am glad it did.  

This is a wonderful plot of a young woman coming of age in the sixties during the Vietnam War.  Living with her Republican family on Coronado Island in California.   It is at a time when going to war was still a patriotic act.  When her brother signs up and joins the Navy the family is very proud of him.

But when Jamie goes off to Vietnam as a nurse facing all the horrific horrors of young soldiers who are wounded her family is not as excited and supportive.

Coming back after her tour of duty she is not welcomed back with support and happiness.  She is suffering from PTSD even though that was not known at the time.  She is afraid to tell other people what she is suffering, thinking she is the only one.  

This novel beautifully handles the topics of war and the horrible way veterans were received back in the US.  The trauma they suffered.  Other topics raised are sacrifice, heroism, love and understanding.  There were so many incredible stories there were from that period in history .  The research and interviews the author did were very comprehensive and give the characters a realistic perspective.

Incredibly touching and poignant.

Marble Halll Murders

 Anthony Horowitz is probably one of the best mystery authors around.  Definitely on my favorites list and as soon as his newest novel comes out I am putting everything else aside to read it.

Horowitz has an incredible background having written for many of the television shows I have enjoyed. He wrote episodes of Midsommer Murders and Foyle's War.  He also wrote scripts for Agatha Christie's Poirot TV programs and also the Alex Rider middle school books.  Then there are the fabulous series he is writing now.  Two of them.  Magpie Murders and The Word is Murder.   

Each of these new series are so well written; they are funny, captivating and you never can guess where the plot is taking you.  One series is written about a mystery writer who has been writing a cleever very popular mystery series. The plots are a story within a story, the author tells the story and the editor is reading the story and living her real life.

In this latest book, Marble Hall Murders, the editor is working with a new mystery author.  This author is trying to continue the series of a dead author.  When the editor and the author clash over edits and rewrites they part ways.  But the editor cannot seem to separate from the author, her future is tied to this relationship.  Either shee finds a way to resolve things or she may not ever work in the business again.

Of course there are intriguing  questions about all the relationships between the characters, and there is a murder or two.  The writing is phenomenal and always very insightful.

Songs of the Broken Hearted

 

Author Ayelet Tsabari brings us her latest masterpiece of writing in Songs for the Brokenhearted.   Though the voice may sound similar to her nonfiction book, The Art of Leaving with essays about her family and their lives as Yemeni Jews in Israel, this time she has fictionalized the storyline.

It is critical that we read books by Israeli and Jewish authors both to give them a voice and for the powerful message we send that these books are important.  But it is also amazing to read books written by Israeli and Jewish authors because they always teach us something new, some new historic knowledge or a new perspective on news that we grew up with but may not have looked back at lately.

Songs for the Brokenhearted does all of that and more.  This is the story of many Yemeni Jews immigrating to Israel in the 1950s living in an overcrowded immigrant camp in Rosh HaAyin.  They are living under harsh conditions, not accepted by the Israelis as full citizens, looking for work and learning a new language.  Following the narrative of Yaqub, a shy young man who is trying to find his promised golden future we learn about how hard it was for these immigrants to get settled.  He meets the beautiful Saida in the camp but his love for her cannot be acted upon because she is already married.

Then we meet Zohara, a young thirty year old woman who is returning to Israel from New York,  for her mother’s funeral.  Zohara is at loose ends, confused, angry and not sure she is following the path she really wants.  She had left to study in the United States and felt she had escaped the life of poverty and embarrassment of having an illiterate Yemeni mother.  Growing up surrounded by Ashkenizi she always wished her skin was lighter and that her father was still alive.

Coming back now to Israel and trying to get along with her older sister, Lizzie, who Zohara thinks does not understand her, she finds she may have been wrong about quite a few things.  . She may have misunderstood her mother and the relationship her parents had.  She finds out her mother was a beautiful singer of Yemeni women’s songs.  This is an important part of the Yemeni culture that Tsabari weaves throughout the narrative.

Tsabari also brings in a little known harsh historic fact that nurses in the camps were taking Yemeni children away from their families and giving them up for adoption.  They were telling the parents their children had gotten sick, were taken to a hospital and then the nurses told the parents the child had died.  

Also setting Zohara’s story in 1995 the historic events of the Oslo Accords and the association of Yizak Rabin plays a large role in this novel. Zohara’s nephew, Yoni gets caught up with a group of Israeli reactionary young men who attend rallies and protests.  Tsabari sets out viewpoints from the different sides of the political argument around peace in the Mideast during this time period.

The book is beautifully written about a very emotional time in everyone’s life when a loved one’s life ends and you not only re-evaluate yourself and your relationship to that person, but also find out secrets about their lives.  The book follows multiple romantic plot lines and also the relationship between sisters, and friends.  It is interesting to read about historical facts that have led to where Israel and its neighbors are now. A time when a hope for peace in the Mideast was really thought to be an imminent possibility.

The Serpent Bearer

 A romantic World War II spy novel, with buried family secrets, dangerous German criminals and a love story.  In The Serpent Bearer, author Jane Rosenthal, creates a novel that spans time from the war years to present day.   We learn the story of Solomon, Solly, Meisner, who travels from Spain to Mexico and ends up in a small Jewish community in North Carolina where he raises his daughter, Isabelle.  

Now, in his dotage, Solly reminisces about the past revealing his family secrets and the exciting life he led as a spy during World War II.  At the same time Izzy is becoming aware that there was more to her father’s history than she knew. The version of her parents' love story she had grown up hearing may not have been the whole story.

Sitting in his assisted living apartment, all the memories come flooding back to Solly.  First, his narrow escape when the building he was in was bombed during the Spanish Civil War.  Then, as a young Jewish lawyer, in South Carolina, he was recruited to go to Mexico during World War II to spy on suspected Nazi activity there.  Sent by the COI, the newly created government department to gather foreign intelligence, Solly agrees to go hoping to find his lost love interest and answers to what happened in Spain. 

This should be a simple mission Solly thinks, “He’d been so cavalier, so full of bravado, thinking what the hell, Solly - go to Mexico, have a look around, listen in on some radio communications, report back, win Estelle’s hand in marriage and come home, victorious, free. A hero. What a fool.”  page 225

The mission brings him back in contact with people he worked alongside in Spain, who he had thought were his friends. What had happened to them? Why had they not tried to find him? Now he sees that the people he thought he knew may not be who he thought they were.  He begins to wonder if the woman he loved really is who she says she is. As he encounters Nazi operatives and Jewish refugees, Solly is finding out who is a true comrade and who is a subversive.  

Wonderfully detailed descriptions of the landscape, buildings and locations, bring the reader right into the action. The Serpent Bearer is a story of intrigue, danger and bravery. Bringing the reader some interesting history of Nazi activity in Mexico within a plot abundant in gripping action scenes, near death experiences and unselfish love. 

The Little Goat

 Passover is one of the most celebrated of the Jewish holidays. It is a holiday observed in homes around the world. There are many different Haggadot, offering a variety of ways to put together a seder.   Families build on generational customs or create their own traditions to commemorate the spring holiday, when the Israelites left Egypt and started their journey to the promised land.  

In Dara Horn’s new graphic novel, One Little Goat, she brings her memories of family seders to teen readers. They will definitely be able to relate to the teenage angst of being caught at the dinner table for many hours with elderly relatives and younger cousins and siblings. 

Using themes and references to the Passover seder, Horn creates a witty, funny story about what can happen if you never find the Afikoman, the dessert without which a seder cannot end.

Bringing to life the goat from Chad Gadya, the song sung at the end of the seder about a father buying a goat for two zuzim, our protagonist is able to be the hero and find the missing matzah after six months of being stuck at the Seder.

The goat takes the “wise child” on a journey meeting characters from the many seders throughout history. They travel back in time and see his parents as children at their family seders, in the USSR, 1981, as refuseniks. Then back in time past the Holocaust and seder in the Warsaw Ghetto.  Back to the 1300s and creation of the Bird’s Head Haggadah.

They visited Rabbi Don Isaac Abarbanel, Nachman of Bratslav, and even Dona Gracia Nasi in Constantinople in 1556, during the Inquisition.  

Then the Goat takes the child who now is becoming wiser further back in time to meet Rav and Shmuel in the third century, known as great Amoriam, great Jewish scholars.  The Rabbis, Eliezer, Joshua, Elazar ben Azaria, Akiva and Tarfon make an appearance before the Goat takes the child to the night his ancestors left Egypt. 

This is a very clever way to tell the Passover story and explain its importance to older children.

It is a very timely story showing how throughout history Jews have been strong and resilient continuing their traditions even in the face of adversity.  Bringing home the message how special and magical maintaining our Jewish connections can be.

The Greatest Lie of All

 Author, Jill Cantor newest novel is titled  The Greatest Lie of All.  This is a twisting maze of tangled lives.  Amanda Grant is a young actress ready for a new challenge.  Leaving a relationship when her partner cheats on her, she is asked to star in a biopic  about the famous Gloria Diamond, a famous romance writer who had told her own tragic romance story in a memoir.  Now they are going to bring the story to the screen. Gloria is having second thoughts as the filming begins.  Amanda is trying to understand the person whose life she is going to represent.  She is having trouble getting to know Gloria.  

There are so many different surprises as we get to know Amanda, Gloria and even her son, the handsome lawyer, Will.  In alternating chapters we learn about Gloria’s life and Amanda’s past, how in the end lives overlap.

Marble Hall Murders

 Anthony Horowitz does it again with the third installment of the Susan Ryeland mystery novels.  

This time the novel is titled Marble Hall and it so cleverly picks up right where the second book ended.  Susan Ryeland reminds the reader that Atticus Pund, the great detective was murdered and Ryeland’s life also almost ended as the last novel came to a close.  She had moved to Greece with her boyfriend and was going to start a new life.

But now she is back in New York and having just moved into a new apartment by herself she is looking for editing work again with a new publisher. She has realized that she needs to live in New York and work in publishing, the quiet island life is not for her.

The first job to come along is a new young talent who is writing a conclusion novel with the protagonist being Atticus Pund.  He has an idea to continue the series even though the original author is dead.

But all is not as it may seem and Susan gets mixed up with the writer and his family and strange things start to happen.  Life and fiction start to overlap and the secret to an old murder and a new murder may be revealed in the script that is being written.

Twisty and tangled plots run through the novel with a story within the story and characters that blur the lines of fiction and “fiction”.  I may have solved part of the mystery as I lay awake last night after reading to just before the reveal chapter, but then there was of course another twist that I was not expecting… 

Horowitz is a master of the craft and again brings an entertaining, incredibly well written mystery that there are quotes to underline and ideas to think about long after the book is closed.

 Anthony Horowitz is probably one of the best mystery authors around.  Definitely on my favorites list and as soon as his newest novel comes out I am putting everything else aside to read it.

Horowitz has an incredible background having written for many of the television shows I have enjoyed. He wrote episodes of Midsommer Murders and Foyle's War.  He also wrote scripts for Agatha Christie's Poirot TV programs and also the Alex Rider middle school books.  Then there are the fabulous series he is writing now.  Two of them.  Magpie Murders and The Word is Murder.   

Each of these new series are so well written; they are funny, captivating and you never can guess where the plot is taking you.  One series is written about a mystery writer who has been writing a cleever very popular mystery series. The plots are a story within a story, the author tells the story and the editor is reading the story and living her real life.

In this latest book, Marble Hall Murders, the editor is working with a new mystery author.  This author is trying to continue the series of a dead author.  When the editor and the author clash over edits and rewrites they part ways.  But the editor cannot seem to separate from the author, her future is tied to this relationship.  Either shee finds a way to resolve things or she may not ever work in the business again.

Of course there are intriguing  questions about all the relationships between the characters, and there is a murder or two.  The writing is phenomenal and always very insightful.

The Storied Life A J Fikrey

 Gabrielle Zevin has written a delightful sweet story about a bookstore owner. The Storied Life of A J Fikrey, follows the widower book seller as he adjusts to the loss of his wife, the love of his life.  He had fallen in love and moved to Alice Island where she grew up and they opened a bookstore there. 

It is a ferry ride away from the mainland and relies on the tourist trade for their largest profits. Now he is depressed, drowning his sorrows in liquor and hoping to retire with the sale of a first edition Edgar Allen Poe book he found at a garage sale.  

Then the book is stolen and a baby girl is left in his store.  These two events completely change the course of his life. He must stay and continue to run the bookstore.  He cannot bring himself to send the little two year old girl over to the foster system.  He decides to keep her and bring her up as his own.  

All these changes in his life also change him.  He becomes a much more pleasant person.  Making friends, loving Maya, the child.  He even will be open to finding love again.  OF course there is a side story of his sister in aw who is in a terrible marriage.  The police chief becomes a reader and friend, he also had a bad marriage.

Such a wonderful examination of relationships, how to be a friend, a parent and  a good lover.  How to take care of yourself and change to the best you.

The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store

 

This month I read a book that was written by the author, James McBride, who explains that he is the child of a black Reverend father and a white Jewish mother, whose family sat shiva for her when she married.

His first book was The Color of Water, which told the story of his upbringing as a mixed race child in a large family.  This time McBride brings us a novel which looks the horrible truths about race and prejudice squarely in the face.  He adds some beautiful prose that brings humor and offers the reader hope.

This novel takes the story of the Jewish immigrant in the 1920s who came to the United States and settled in the South, opening a grocery or dry goods store.  These Jews lived shoulder to shoulder with their Black neighbors.  This is the story of one little town, Pottstown, PA that is home to Moshe Ludlow and his wife, Chona, who live above the Heaven and Earth Grocery store.  Chona grew up in the store and continues to run the store after her marriage,  Moshe manages the Jewish Theater and brings in both klezmer music and then books the popular Black performer swing artist , Chick Webb.  The Jewish families are move off the Chicken Hill neighborhood to the center of town, changing the dynamics of the area.   Chona refuses to leave and the author explains,”Chona, for her part, saw them not as Negroes but as neighbors”

So Moshe and Chona stay and live side by side with their neighbors, when Chona is asked to hide Dodo, young black child who is deaf and thought to be dumb, after being in an accident with his mother.  Now the authorities are looking to take him away to an institution and Chona agrees to hide him.  She becomes quite attached to him and puts her own life at risk to save his.  

Chona had never been one to play by the rules of American society. She did not experience the world as most people did. To her, the world was not a china closet where you admire this and don’t touch that. Rather, she saw it as a place where every act of living was a chance for tikkun olam, to improve the world. The tiny woman with the bad foot was all soul.”

When things go wrong and Dodo is taken away the townspeople and Moshe work together to get Dodo back from the horrific conditions in the state hospital.  The various characters in the book overcome the class and color divide to rescue Dodo.

This is a story of race, religion and color blindness.  It is the story of the immigtrant Jews from the shtels of Europe and their effort to find the American dream.  It is the story of coming together,  finding our common ground and seeing that despite all our differences we can live side by side.

McBride says in an interview, “What I tried to do in this book is show how people simply excused a lot of those differences, set them aside for the moment, and got to the business of finding the meal that would feed us all. I just wanted to show in this book that we have gotten along very well. We have got to stick together and deal with the reality of where we are. We’re in deep water, and we will end up in deeper water if we don’t pay attention.”

This novel shares a message that  is so relevant for the times we are now living in.   

Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder

 Pomona Afton Can So Solve a Murder by Bellamy Rose turned out to be a fun entertaining romantic mystery novel.   I had downloaded it and was not sure I would read it.  Then looking trough my pile for something quick and light I thought ok give it a quick try.

It did not disappoint.  If you like a romance novel this is fits the genre and adds a mystery to the plot.  Pomona is a spoiled brat.  At the age of 20 something, she lives in a hotel that her family owns.  She has all the money, clothes and wait staff she could every want.  She does not work, left college and just parties and posts online.  She is an influencer, sharing her lifestyle to viewers for ratings.  

Then her Grandmother is murdered and all te money and luxury living is pulled out from under her.  She has to go out and live like the average person in New York.  Her childhood nanny sets her up as the roommate with her son, Gabe.  Gabe helps Pom get a job in the coffeeshop he manages.  

Pom starts to learn what it is like to really be a caring human being. She learns to actually care about other people, not just take advantage of those around her for her own gain.

Of course Pom and Gabe start to work together to find out who killed her grandmother.  There is light suspense, romance and humor.  A good book for a snowy day or a beach read.

Murder Takes a Vacation

 Laura Lippman gave me a great surprise with her newest book, Murder Takes a Vacation.

A fun entertaining mystery novel that brings the reader a new and greater perspective on Mrs Blossom who has been a small side character in previous books as assistant to Tess Monaghan.  

We meet the quiet, unassuming Mrs Blossom is feeling unsettled after following her daughter to Arizona when she was widowed ten years ago.  When her son-in-law announces he is taking a job and his family to Tokyo, she decides to move back to Baltimore.  

One day she finds a winning lottery ticket in a parking lot and her life is changed.  With the vast windfall she decides to take a cruise and bring her friend Elinor along.  The plan is made to meet at the cruise and Mrs Blossom will fly ahead to tour Paris for a few days before the cruise. Of course things start to become questionable almost immediately.  She meets the handsome Alan at the airport and he says he will assist her through the flight and to her hotel.  Just as she is feeling a spark of romance, Alan turns up dead.  Then another younger gentleman shows up on the scene, Danny.  He is very courteous, making Mrs Blossom feel better when she hears about Alan's death.  Surprisingly Danny also is on the same cruise she and Elinor have booked.  

Mrs Blossom tries to figure out who killed Alan and find answers to more mysterious facts that begin to appear as the ship cruises down the Seine.  We find out that Mrs Blossom who as an elderly full figured woman, was an assistant to another Laura Lippman character,  PI Tess Monaghan.  Mrs Blossom was good at her job because , she says, people don't notice older, heavy women.  She was invisible. She has always been able to use that too her advantage.  This time it seems she is being followed and her life may be in danger.  

A fun twisty mystery that keeps youo guessing all the way to the end.

The Goddess of Warsaw

 Lisa Barr one of my favorite authors has done it again.  The Goddess of Warsaw does not disappoint even though you may feel you have read too many Holocaust and WWII books.  Ok that was what I was feeling and I should not project that on you.  I was going to take a quick flip through this book and return it to the library when I got totally sucked right in.

This is the story of Bina Blonoski is a conglomeration of te women who lived through the Warsaw Ghetto and the Holocaust.  She is the fictional character who represents the powerful woman who wanted to fight back and not sit by while the Nazis were killing the Jews of Poland.

Bina, her husband Jakub and his brother Alexander are living in the Ghetto and become involved with a group that is planning the uprising. Jakub is a writer and wants to record the story of their lives in the Ghetto for future generations to see what happened in Poland in 1943.  Bina and Alexander follow the leader of the resistance, Zelda to fight back wen the Nazis enter the Ghetto to kill or take the remaining people to concentration camps.  

We follow lives of the people in the Ghetto, learn about where they came from and background of their lives before the war.  Then we follow Bina as she survives the war and becomes the famous Hollywood actress, Lena Browning.  Author Barr gives the reader a picture of how the years of living through hell can affect a person for life.  When she learns about Operation Paperclip, her past comes back to haunt her and the assassin, spy that is locked deep inside comes back to her as she deals out a justice of her own.

So well written and engaging you will not want to put it down.