Bone Box is amazingly Faye Kellerman's 24th mystery novel. The Rina Lazarus and Peter Decker series of books that started in New York when a woman was attacked at a mikvah in the novel, Ritual Bath has traveled to California and now has returned to New York, now upstate.
Rina and Peter are happily married, with children and grandchildren, both from their previous marriages and together. Rina still keeps Judaism a relevant and important constant in their ever chaotic lives. Though they have traveled far from a Jewish neighborhood, and added "adopted"
step-children into their lives who are not Jewish, Rina continues to follow the rules of Shabbat and kashrut.
In this novel, the mystery plot has Rina discovering a long buried body on a nature trail in the small college community they live in. This unearths disagreements and long buried relationships at the local colleges as Decker and his young sidekick, Tyler McAdams start re-interviewing students and professors that have been around for more than five years. Kellerman makes this storyline very current with discussions of homosexuality, transgender and the LBGTQ community. Beyond trying to follow the who done it, the reader gets a chance to think about feelings and ideas surrounding the transgender issue.
Also in this novel Kellerman brings back all of Decker's friends and colleagues from the past. It . is nice to see old friends. With a possible missing person in California connected to the case, Peter's old partner, Marge Dunn, is brought onto the case. As the case heats up at home in Greenbury, NY, Decker calls on both Chris Donatti and Scott Oliver to help keep Rina safe and out of trouble.
Incredibly, Kellerman has been able to sustain the characters, making them feel like old friends. She has keep the plots interesting, fresh and diversified to make this reader coming back for each new mystery novel she delivers. Also waiting patiently for the next one after not be able to put the current one down until the very last page.
Friday, June 23, 2017
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Witch Summer Night's Dream
This is the third mystery novel in the Bewitched By Chocolate series, written by H. Y. Hanna.
Hanna is getting better and better at developing the characters in this sleepy, cozy mystery series.
Even though the reader does have to suspend belief to agree to the reality of magic, Hanna does not make the story too unbelievable.
The young woman Caitlyn has come to this small English village to find out about her birth parents and is now living with her Grandmother. She is involved also with her aunt and cousin. Her adopted cousin Pomona, who was the daughter of her adoptive mother's sister also plays an important role in her life. Caitlyn seems a little bit immature though when she talks about her romantic interest in James Fitzroy, who is the Lord of the Manor in this small village. Not only is he described as handsome but his family owns the businesses throughout the town. So I understand if Caitlyn is a bit tongue tied in front of him at first but now their interactions are at a more in depth level and she should be more relaxed with him. They both seem so naive about romantic interactions.
In this installment of the series, Caitlyn finds a young teen dead in the garden behind the Chocolate Shop. It is almost Midsummer's Eve and Widow Mags has been making a chocolate sauce that seems to be like a love potion. People cannot resist her chocolate covered strawberries. There are three separate love stories going in this plot. Caitlyn is trying to win over James, her cousin Evie has a crush on Chris Bottom, and even Ferdinand the bull on the neighboring farm is having trouble with the cows in the pasture. Bringing in some tourists who are searching for the love potion, one who works for a rival chocolate company and a professor who is fascinated with Shakespeare's play, Midsummer Night's Dream. There are many references to the famous Shakespeare play in the book.
A fun cozy mystery series that engages the reader in both the plot and the characters. It is fun to come back again and again to see how characters that you watch grow are coming along in their fairy tale lives.
Hanna is getting better and better at developing the characters in this sleepy, cozy mystery series.
Even though the reader does have to suspend belief to agree to the reality of magic, Hanna does not make the story too unbelievable.
The young woman Caitlyn has come to this small English village to find out about her birth parents and is now living with her Grandmother. She is involved also with her aunt and cousin. Her adopted cousin Pomona, who was the daughter of her adoptive mother's sister also plays an important role in her life. Caitlyn seems a little bit immature though when she talks about her romantic interest in James Fitzroy, who is the Lord of the Manor in this small village. Not only is he described as handsome but his family owns the businesses throughout the town. So I understand if Caitlyn is a bit tongue tied in front of him at first but now their interactions are at a more in depth level and she should be more relaxed with him. They both seem so naive about romantic interactions.
In this installment of the series, Caitlyn finds a young teen dead in the garden behind the Chocolate Shop. It is almost Midsummer's Eve and Widow Mags has been making a chocolate sauce that seems to be like a love potion. People cannot resist her chocolate covered strawberries. There are three separate love stories going in this plot. Caitlyn is trying to win over James, her cousin Evie has a crush on Chris Bottom, and even Ferdinand the bull on the neighboring farm is having trouble with the cows in the pasture. Bringing in some tourists who are searching for the love potion, one who works for a rival chocolate company and a professor who is fascinated with Shakespeare's play, Midsummer Night's Dream. There are many references to the famous Shakespeare play in the book.
A fun cozy mystery series that engages the reader in both the plot and the characters. It is fun to come back again and again to see how characters that you watch grow are coming along in their fairy tale lives.
Saturday, June 10, 2017
Miles Off Course
Miles Off Course is the third installment in the Rowland Sinclair mystery series. What a fun series of mystery novels written by Sulari Gentill. Though referring to these novels as mysteries is misleading. Each of these books is based on some historical facts and characters, then a story of Rowland Sinclair, a wealthy country gentleman who is uncomfortable with his family's wealth and position has found a group of flamboyant friends who are living in the family home with him. Milton, a frustrated poet, Clyde, starving artist and Edna the sculptor, with whom Rowland is in love, go on adventures to solve murders and expose the underbelly of crime in Australia. Rowland and his friends are on the political left and Wilfred Sinclair, Rowland's brother is on the right. There is always a dust up between the two brothers that creates some intrigue.
This time one of the Sinclair's favorite employees has disappeared and Rowley volunteers at the urging of his brother to look into the situation. taking along his companions they set off into the mountains outside Sydney and get into all kinds of trouble. While it looks like they are just stumbling along, in the end all the discounted pieces fall in place and they always get their man. That is what makes these mystery plots unique. There is never a formula plot of the mystery to these novels. Rowley and his friends just seem to be living their everyday extraordinary lives when things go wrong and suddenly there is a mystery to solve. But it is not always a body, at least not int he beginning.
This time though there is a missing person and they think it could be a corpse they are looking for, when they find their employee, it leads to another mystery and even when they come across a dead body and it looks like that wraps up the case, it is not the end. In the end it all is neatly packaged in a financial dilemma.
I still really enjoy the descriptions of Australian countryside and the colorful characters The writing style and the wonderful way the author sets the scene for the 1930s time period brings the story to life for me. I am getting attached to the characters with each new narrative.
This time one of the Sinclair's favorite employees has disappeared and Rowley volunteers at the urging of his brother to look into the situation. taking along his companions they set off into the mountains outside Sydney and get into all kinds of trouble. While it looks like they are just stumbling along, in the end all the discounted pieces fall in place and they always get their man. That is what makes these mystery plots unique. There is never a formula plot of the mystery to these novels. Rowley and his friends just seem to be living their everyday extraordinary lives when things go wrong and suddenly there is a mystery to solve. But it is not always a body, at least not int he beginning.
This time though there is a missing person and they think it could be a corpse they are looking for, when they find their employee, it leads to another mystery and even when they come across a dead body and it looks like that wraps up the case, it is not the end. In the end it all is neatly packaged in a financial dilemma.
I still really enjoy the descriptions of Australian countryside and the colorful characters The writing style and the wonderful way the author sets the scene for the 1930s time period brings the story to life for me. I am getting attached to the characters with each new narrative.
Monday, June 5, 2017
The Course of Love
Alain De Botton writes what seems to be both a novel and a self help book here, in The Course of Love. We are drawn in by the story of Rabih and Kirstein as they negotiate their meeting, courtship and eventual marriage and family. But as we read about their relationship, in all its intimate details, there is also a running commentary interspersed throughout the storyline. This could almost be the voice of a therapist interjecting a narrative of how each person is contributing to the interactions. How their personal interpretations of each action feed both the good and bad parts of the relationship.
As you read this book you cannot help but put yourself into each situation. You will see yourself siding with or recognizing similarities with one of the two, Rabih or Kerstein. Then you will read the italic commentary and see how if one of the two or both had said what was really going through their minds at the time the conversation could take a different direction or tone. You will wonder if that is possible in your personal relationships. Does this theory work in real life. Can each partner open up and trust their partner with such honesty? Can you even really know yourself to understand what experiences from your past have led you to this moment and reaction in this situation?
Rabih and Kerstein enter into this established practice we call marriage. You meet someone that is attractive to you and you don't want to loose them or be alone anymore so you propose marriage. Botton tells us that marriage is, "a hopeful, generous, infinitely kind gamble taken by two people who don't know yet who they are or who the other might be, binding themselves to a future they cannot conceive of and have carefully omitted to investigate."
While reading the book the reader can relate to the thoughts and feelings this couple expounds while dating and then entering marriage. They have disagreements over the temperature in the bedroom at night. Whether the window should be open or closed. Then they go to IKEA to pick out drinking glasses and cannot agree on the style. At each of these turns the narrator/therapist examines the words not said, the feelings not explored and explains how the discussions would be different if each partner trusted the other enough to be able to share their real feelings and thoughts. The conversations would have a different outcome, the relationship would change.
So in reading The Course of Love, you are reading a novel about two people living life, with all the ups and downs that every marriage with children goes through. You can also read the commentary about love and marriage as if you are in a "course on love", trying to take home the positive lessons to improve your own personal relationship.
As you read this book you cannot help but put yourself into each situation. You will see yourself siding with or recognizing similarities with one of the two, Rabih or Kerstein. Then you will read the italic commentary and see how if one of the two or both had said what was really going through their minds at the time the conversation could take a different direction or tone. You will wonder if that is possible in your personal relationships. Does this theory work in real life. Can each partner open up and trust their partner with such honesty? Can you even really know yourself to understand what experiences from your past have led you to this moment and reaction in this situation?
Rabih and Kerstein enter into this established practice we call marriage. You meet someone that is attractive to you and you don't want to loose them or be alone anymore so you propose marriage. Botton tells us that marriage is, "a hopeful, generous, infinitely kind gamble taken by two people who don't know yet who they are or who the other might be, binding themselves to a future they cannot conceive of and have carefully omitted to investigate."
While reading the book the reader can relate to the thoughts and feelings this couple expounds while dating and then entering marriage. They have disagreements over the temperature in the bedroom at night. Whether the window should be open or closed. Then they go to IKEA to pick out drinking glasses and cannot agree on the style. At each of these turns the narrator/therapist examines the words not said, the feelings not explored and explains how the discussions would be different if each partner trusted the other enough to be able to share their real feelings and thoughts. The conversations would have a different outcome, the relationship would change.
So in reading The Course of Love, you are reading a novel about two people living life, with all the ups and downs that every marriage with children goes through. You can also read the commentary about love and marriage as if you are in a "course on love", trying to take home the positive lessons to improve your own personal relationship.
Friday, June 2, 2017
All Grown Up
"Growing up is hard to do." When do you recognize that you are a grown up? Is it when you move out and get your own apartment, when you get your first job and start supporting yourself? In this novel,
All Grown Up, by Jami Attenberg wrestles with this very problem. Andrea Bern is the protagonist in this novel about growing up. She is a 39 year old, single woman living alone in an apartment in New York City. She dropped out of art school years ago and took a job to pay the rent. She has a series of roommates, lovers and friends who at different times in her life, marry, have children and move on.
She is the child of a feminist mother who works as an activist and a father who died of a drug overdose. Her brother gets married and has a child and moves to New Hampshire. Her mother follows her brother to Vermont to help out with the baby and Andrea feels deserted.
Attenberg writes this book in what seem like connected short stories. It is hard at times to see how they are interconnected. This is a book for the Gen X generation. Maybe a chance for young women to see that the idea of equality between the sexes, sleeping around without commitment does not really work out in the end. Andrea never really seem to find happiness. She is an an example of all the worst behaviors of the youth. Drinking, drugs and free love. Taking a mediocre job to pay the bills and never trying to make a career with her art. She is also very self centered, not being there for her brother and sister-in-law when they need her, and bemoaning the fact that her mother has moved out of the city to New Hampshire.
In the end this reader thinks the message not to be self centered. Being single is different than being unattached. You need other people in your life, you cannot live a happy life all on your own. you also need to extend yourself to others, it cannot be all about you. Andrea is an example of all that can go wrong with a self centered attitude and that is not being grown up.
All Grown Up, by Jami Attenberg wrestles with this very problem. Andrea Bern is the protagonist in this novel about growing up. She is a 39 year old, single woman living alone in an apartment in New York City. She dropped out of art school years ago and took a job to pay the rent. She has a series of roommates, lovers and friends who at different times in her life, marry, have children and move on.
She is the child of a feminist mother who works as an activist and a father who died of a drug overdose. Her brother gets married and has a child and moves to New Hampshire. Her mother follows her brother to Vermont to help out with the baby and Andrea feels deserted.
Attenberg writes this book in what seem like connected short stories. It is hard at times to see how they are interconnected. This is a book for the Gen X generation. Maybe a chance for young women to see that the idea of equality between the sexes, sleeping around without commitment does not really work out in the end. Andrea never really seem to find happiness. She is an an example of all the worst behaviors of the youth. Drinking, drugs and free love. Taking a mediocre job to pay the bills and never trying to make a career with her art. She is also very self centered, not being there for her brother and sister-in-law when they need her, and bemoaning the fact that her mother has moved out of the city to New Hampshire.
In the end this reader thinks the message not to be self centered. Being single is different than being unattached. You need other people in your life, you cannot live a happy life all on your own. you also need to extend yourself to others, it cannot be all about you. Andrea is an example of all that can go wrong with a self centered attitude and that is not being grown up.
The Weight of Ink
The Weight of Ink, written by Rachel Kadish is a story within a story. Though the book itself is weighty the plot moves along at a quick pace so the reader never feels dragged down by the volume.
The story is test of love and the ability to understand yourself knowing when and how to accept love otherwise you are left with loneliness. There are many messages in this novel, of understanding yourself, being able to give yourself to someone and not feel you have forsaken your individuality and of being able to accept love.
The story is written across centuries. Helen Watts is a senior professor at the local college in London when she receives a phone call from an former student. He and his wife are renovating an old house and come across some ancient documents that seem to be written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The University Library purchases the papers and as the librarians work to preserve the precious parchment and ink, Helen and her assistant Aaron Levy, an American graduate student begin to translate the letters and other papers. They are working to uncover information about the author and time period of the work. Their discoveries are incredible and they can hardly believe what they have found. They are translating the writings of a 17th century woman, who is recording the Jewish diaspora from the horrific Spanish Inquisition to the Jews in the city of Amsterdam, who escape to the safety of London. We follow the thoughts and correspondence of Ester Velasquez, as she writes about her life in the 17th century, being a woman and a scholar. She has been orphaned and rescued by elderly Rabbi Moseh HaCohen Mendes. He was blinded during the Inquisition and has also escaped to London, where Ester is his scribe, a position unheard of in this time period, who to engage with the brilliant men of her time writes under an assumed pen name. She tries to communicate with the scholars and the shunned including Baruch de Spinoza.
The novel takes the reader back and forth between Helen and Aaron translating the letters and working to figure out who is writing them and what their positions were. They also are working through their own awkward relationship with each other and their individual interpersonal relationships. Both Helen and Aaron are unlucky at love. Helen let the love of her life get away many years ago. Aaron is at risk of loosing at love because he is unsure of his feelings. Across the century, Ester and her friend Mary are also struggling with feelings of love and marriage. Ester has sworn never to fall in love, Mary is anxious to find true love. Mary asks Ester whether she thinks love is real, "I mean", Mary continued slowly, ignoring Ester;s laughter, "do you think love can be made to happen with whichever man our minds choose - so it's a thing a lady may direct as she pleases?" Ester replies, "Outside control, and so folly to seek." Mary disagrees and says that though it is our of her control, love is not folly but good. Ester says, "It's a danger to a woman even to feel love."
Kadish delivers a weighty novel full of intrigue, historical references and a love story with parallels because relationships have so much in common even centuries apart. Following all the characters and conversations can be complicated, but the reward is sweet.
The story is test of love and the ability to understand yourself knowing when and how to accept love otherwise you are left with loneliness. There are many messages in this novel, of understanding yourself, being able to give yourself to someone and not feel you have forsaken your individuality and of being able to accept love.
The story is written across centuries. Helen Watts is a senior professor at the local college in London when she receives a phone call from an former student. He and his wife are renovating an old house and come across some ancient documents that seem to be written in Hebrew and Aramaic. The University Library purchases the papers and as the librarians work to preserve the precious parchment and ink, Helen and her assistant Aaron Levy, an American graduate student begin to translate the letters and other papers. They are working to uncover information about the author and time period of the work. Their discoveries are incredible and they can hardly believe what they have found. They are translating the writings of a 17th century woman, who is recording the Jewish diaspora from the horrific Spanish Inquisition to the Jews in the city of Amsterdam, who escape to the safety of London. We follow the thoughts and correspondence of Ester Velasquez, as she writes about her life in the 17th century, being a woman and a scholar. She has been orphaned and rescued by elderly Rabbi Moseh HaCohen Mendes. He was blinded during the Inquisition and has also escaped to London, where Ester is his scribe, a position unheard of in this time period, who to engage with the brilliant men of her time writes under an assumed pen name. She tries to communicate with the scholars and the shunned including Baruch de Spinoza.
The novel takes the reader back and forth between Helen and Aaron translating the letters and working to figure out who is writing them and what their positions were. They also are working through their own awkward relationship with each other and their individual interpersonal relationships. Both Helen and Aaron are unlucky at love. Helen let the love of her life get away many years ago. Aaron is at risk of loosing at love because he is unsure of his feelings. Across the century, Ester and her friend Mary are also struggling with feelings of love and marriage. Ester has sworn never to fall in love, Mary is anxious to find true love. Mary asks Ester whether she thinks love is real, "I mean", Mary continued slowly, ignoring Ester;s laughter, "do you think love can be made to happen with whichever man our minds choose - so it's a thing a lady may direct as she pleases?" Ester replies, "Outside control, and so folly to seek." Mary disagrees and says that though it is our of her control, love is not folly but good. Ester says, "It's a danger to a woman even to feel love."
Kadish delivers a weighty novel full of intrigue, historical references and a love story with parallels because relationships have so much in common even centuries apart. Following all the characters and conversations can be complicated, but the reward is sweet.
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
The German Girl
The German Girl written by Armando Lucas Correa is the story of the privileged life of young Hannah Rosenthal, growing up in Berlin. She is twelve years old in 1939. She has lived a charmed life, going to school and meeting with her friend Leo Martin. As the restrictions imposed on the Jewish citizens of Berlin her world is closing in on her. Her parents are secretive and her mother stops leaving the house. She sneaks out to hear their parents plans from her friend Leo.
Finally plans are made to leave Germany on the last ship sailing, the SS St Louis, a transatlantic journey to Cuba. Everything has been sold to obtain passage on this ship for Hannah, Leo and many other families. As history has recorded while the ship is our at sea, rumors start to circulate that Cuba will not be receiving the passengers, or the costs will increase to be able to land there. Though life on the ship has all the trappings of a luxury crossing, the refugees future is uncertain.
Juxtaposed with this story is the life of Anna Rosen, living in New York City, who on her twelfth birthday receives a package of photographs of people she has never met. Finally, after years of not having any connection to extended family, Anna is about to meet up with her father's past. Anna and her mother fly to Havana, Cuba to meet Aunt Hannah and find out about the mysterious past of her father's family.
Tying together Hannah's story of leaving Berlin during World War Two, with her life growing up in Cuba at the time of its revolution, until Anna Rosen comes to hear the story of her family's history in New York City, after the September 11th tragedy. All these events pulled together by the generations of one family, based on a true story.
Well written from the perspective of two young voices, really giving the reader the feelings of how young pre teen girls would interpret the deprivation they were experiencing and how it would affect their personal lives.
Finally plans are made to leave Germany on the last ship sailing, the SS St Louis, a transatlantic journey to Cuba. Everything has been sold to obtain passage on this ship for Hannah, Leo and many other families. As history has recorded while the ship is our at sea, rumors start to circulate that Cuba will not be receiving the passengers, or the costs will increase to be able to land there. Though life on the ship has all the trappings of a luxury crossing, the refugees future is uncertain.
Juxtaposed with this story is the life of Anna Rosen, living in New York City, who on her twelfth birthday receives a package of photographs of people she has never met. Finally, after years of not having any connection to extended family, Anna is about to meet up with her father's past. Anna and her mother fly to Havana, Cuba to meet Aunt Hannah and find out about the mysterious past of her father's family.
Tying together Hannah's story of leaving Berlin during World War Two, with her life growing up in Cuba at the time of its revolution, until Anna Rosen comes to hear the story of her family's history in New York City, after the September 11th tragedy. All these events pulled together by the generations of one family, based on a true story.
Well written from the perspective of two young voices, really giving the reader the feelings of how young pre teen girls would interpret the deprivation they were experiencing and how it would affect their personal lives.
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