Dark Side; Belinda Bauer

Title: Dark Side

Author:  Belinda Bauer

Publication Year: 2011

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Edition: trade

Setting:  England

Source: personal collection

Date Completed: September/2012

Rating: 3/5 

Recommend: unsure

A few years back I read Blacklands, by Belinda Bauer and really thought the author did a great job with her first novel.  Her more recent novel (2011), Dark Side actually takes place in the same little Exmoor village of Shipcott.  This time the story begins with the murder of an elderly woman, a who was confined to her bed and unable to fend off her attacker.  But who would want Mrs. Priddy dead and why?  Jonas Holly the local law enforcement official is initially active at the scene to investigate the murder. Oddly he was camped out on the front steps at the crime scene as times, as if the murderer would come back for some reason. Before long several other people end up dead as well, and Jonas' superior, Inspector Marvel, an interesting odd-duck of a character, brings in a team from another district to take over the investigation and Jonas is left to the sidelines, but not before the killer seems to be getting pleasure by taunting Jonas about his ineptness as an investigator. (I kept thinking what is up with this?). Although Jonas isn't happy about this change in responsibility, he is able to spend more time with his wife Lucy who has MS. I might add that Lucy seems to be quite the character herself,  her husband Jonas armed  his disabled wife with a knife for protection.

The setting seemed chilling and atmospheric at times, and the author did a great job with the pacing of the mystery.  There were several characters who could have been possible suspects --  always a good sign of a well plotted mystery.  I wanted to love this mystery and thought I might early on, but I had some real issues with the way the story ended. It just seemed strange to me. I think the author was either in a rush to wrap up the story, or just didn't think it through thoroughly.  Overall, I would just rate this mystery as okay, IMO, not as good as her debut novel Blacklands.

Mailbox Monday - October 1st

 Mailbox Monday's host for October is Kate at The Parchment Girl.

This weeks new books include:

• Passing On - Penelope Lively (purchase) - A domineering old woman dies in a Cotswold village. Her death "releases" her two middle-aged unmarried children - a spinster librarian and a nature-loving schoolmaster - to make their lives.
• We Sinners; Hanna Plyvainen (Amazon Vine) - The Rovaniemis and their nine children belong to a deeply traditional church (no drinking, no dancing, no TV) in modern-day Michigan. A normal family in many ways, the Rovaniemis struggle with sibling rivalry, parental expectations, and forming their own unique identities in such a large family. But when two of the children venture from the faith, the family fragments and a haunting question emerges: Do we believe for ourselves, or for each other? Each chapter is told from the distinctive point of view of a different Rovaniemi, drawing a nuanced, kaleidoscopic portrait of this unconventional family. The children who reject the church learn that freedom comes at the almost unbearable price of their close family ties, and those who stay struggle daily with the challenges of resisting the temptations of modern culture. With precision and potent detail, We Sinners follows each character on their journey of doubt, self-knowledge, acceptance, and, ultimately, survival.
• NW; Zadie Smith (Penguin Audio) - North West London comes vividly to life in "NW", the new novel by the author of the bestselling "White Teeth" and Man Booker-shortlisted "On Beauty". This is the story of a city. The north-west corner of a city. Here you'll find guests and hosts, those with power and those without it, people who live somewhere special and others who live nowhere at all. And many people in between. Every city is like this. Cheek-by-jowl living. Separate worlds. And then there are the visitations: the rare times a stranger crosses a threshold without permission or warning, causing a disruption in the whole system. Like the April afternoon a woman came to Leah Hanwell's door, seeking help, disturbing the peace, forcing Leah out of her isolation...Zadie Smith's brilliant tragic-comic new novel follows four Londoners - Leah, Natalie, Felix and Nathan - as they try to make adult lives outside of Caldwell, the council estate of their childhood. From private houses to public parks, at work and at play, their London is a complicated place, as beautiful as it is brutal, where the thoroughfares hide the back alleys and taking the high road can sometimes lead you to a dead end. Depicting the modern urban zone - familiar to town-dwellers everywhere - Zadie Smith's "NW" is a quietly devastating novel of encounters, mercurial and vital, like the city itself.
• Frozen Heat; Richard Castle (  Hyperion ) - NYPD Homicide Detective Nikki Heat arrives at her latest crime scene to find an unidentified woman stabbed to death and stuffed inside a suitcase left on a Manhattan street. Nikki is in for a big shock when this new homicide connects to the unsolved murder of her own mother. Paired once again with her romantic and investigative partner, top journalist Jameson Rook, Heat works to solve the mystery of the body in the suitcase while she is forced to confront unexplored areas of her mother's background. Facing relentless danger as someone targets her for the next kill, Nikki's search will unearth painful family truths, expose a startling hidden life, and cause Nikki to reexamine her own past. Heat's passionate quest takes her and Rook from the back alleys of Manhattan to the avenues of Paris, trying to catch a ruthless killer. The question is, now that her mother's cold case has unexpectedly thawed, will Nikki Heat finally be able to solve the dark mystery that has been her demon for ten years?
• The Worst Intentions; Piperno (Europa - purchase) -
  Italy's leading daily newspaper called The Worst Intentions "a dangerous novel." Right from the title, wrote La Repubblica, this daring book "proclaims the furiously bellicose and iconoclastic spirit that drives it."
  Daniel is the thirty-three-year-old heir to the dappled fortunes of the Sonninos, a wealthy Jewish-Italian family whose staggering rise and fall during the years spanning the end of World War II and the beginning of the twenty-first century provides the richly colored backdrop to this remarkable tragicomedy. Daniel has inherited his grandfather's extravagant passions and his father's servility, as well as the excesses of his social class. He is also the victim of a crippling infatuation with Gaia, fountainhead of his erotic fantasies and fetishes.
  This novel will be justly compared to the works of Philip Roth and Saul Bellow. An audacious, sumptuous saga about ritual and liberty, love and war, sex and betrayal, set in the opulent neighborhoods of contemporary Rome.
• Faith Fox; Jane Gardam (purchase) - Faith Fox has led a life full of heartbreak and abandonment, lacking in simplicity and love—and she's not even one week old. She has suffered the unexpected and inexplicable loss of her mother in childbirth; her father, an overworked doctor grown callous with stress, has neither the ability nor the interest to take on the difficult task of raising his child alone; her grandmother, Thomasina, has decided to abscond to Egypt with a retired general rather than acknowledge and accept the loss of her daughter, whom she loved so distressingly well. And so Faith finds herself improbably at the rearing of her father's brother, Jack, an ascetic priest whose current endeavor is an occult "experimental community" comprised mainly of expatriate Tibetans. What ensues is a brilliant comedy of manners that revives the tradition begun by Jane Austen—an endlessly charming passage through the North and South of England that finally gives a major and lavishly gifted award-winning British writer the American readership she so richly deserves.

Hope you had a great week for new books as well.

Sunday Salon - September in Review

We are officially in fall mode, and is there really any better season for cooking hearty meals, baking delicious pies and getting cozy with a good book under our favorite comforter?  I love fall, and the only thing better than fall would be retirement IMO ( 2 more years, I hope).

How was your September was in terms of reading?
Here's what I read in September...

1. Love Anthony; Lisa Genova 3.5/5 (eGalley)
2. More; I.C. Springman - 5/5 (library-kids)
3. Extra Yarn; Mac Barnett - 4/5 (library-kids) 
4. 1-2-3 Peas; Keith Baker - 3/5 (for review-kids)
5. Prisoner of Heaven; Zafron - 4/5 (eGalley - no review yet) 
6. My Brilliant Friend; Elena Ferrante -4/5 (eGalley) 
7. The Good Dream; Donna VanLiere - 4.5/5 (HC/personal copy)
8. The Chaperone; Laura Moriarty -  4/5 (audio/ARC )
9. The Human Bobby; Gabe Rotter - 4.5/5 - trade/personal copy
10. How the Trouble Started; Robert Williams - 4/5 - (eGalley)
11. The Red Pony; John Steinbeck 3.5/5 (audio- no review yet)
12. Dark Side; Belinda Bauer - 3/5 (trade/personal copy)
13. IT; Stephen King - (DNF)- read 1/2 but wasn't feeling IT-ish)
14. A Beautiful Mystery; Louise Penny- 4/5 (audio-no review yet)

I read (13) books, but (3) were illustrated kids books.  My favorite adult books were:  The Good Dream; Donna VanLiere - 4.5/5  and The Human Bobby; Gabe Rotter - 4.5/5.

Right now I'm reading and listening to Winter of the World; Ken Follett (book 2 of a trilogy - excellent) and reading the eGalley, Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. October plans include finishing these (2) books and reading from this list:

• The Panther; Nelson DeMille (releases October 16th)
•  Peaches for Father Francis; Joanne Harris (October 2 release)
• Into the Woods; Tana French
• Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest; Larrsen
• The Forgiven; Osborne
• Cascade; O'Hara
• A Hundred Flowers; Tsukiyama
• We Sinners; Pylvainen

Off to plan some slow cooker recipes for the week, and prepare an evening meal while the hub enjoys an afternoon of football.  I'm also planning of weeding at least (25) books from my collection today to be donated - that always feels good.

Enjoy your Sunday everyone, any plans for October?

Saturday Snapshots - How to tell a Good Book from a Snoozer

Saturday Snapshot

is hosted by Alyce of At Home With Books.

Photos can be old or new, and be of any subject as long as they are clean and appropriate for all eyes to see. How much detail you give in the caption is entirely up to you. Please don't post random photos that you find online.

Good Book (above)

Snoozer (below)

The Human Bobby; Gabe Rotter

Title: The Human Bobby

Author:  Gabe Rotter

Publication Year: 2010

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Edition: trade

Setting: California

Source: personal collection

Date Completed: September/2012

Rating: 4.5/5 

Recommend: yes

So many bloggers raved about The Human Bobby over the past year, that I just had to read it.  It also seemed like a good choice for Carl's RIP VII Challenge, and I am happy to say, it was. There's no horror and it's not scary either. If I had to classify it, I guess I would call it more of a psychological thriller.

In this story Bobby Flopkowski, is a young man whose childhood was marred by the suicide of his plumber father when he was just 15 and the death of his mom  just a few years.  Bobby was smart, and worked hard to make it through medical school. After graduation, his well-to-do medical school friend, Dicky,  invited Bobby (Doc) to join a private pediatric practice in ritzy Brentwood, California. A practice that Dicky's dad had set up for him.  Determined to make a better life for his wife is infant son, they couple soon bought a beautiful home in Beverly Hills and living the good life with his beautiful wife Ava, and little son Jack.

But when Bobby's first girlfriend tracks him down on the internet and comes back into the picture, now more attractive than ever, the reader knows something unsettling is about to happen. Something terrible does happens and Bobby's life and career quickly spiral out of control.  I don't want to reveal too much about what exactly happens, but trust me, it is a great story.  I will say that the novel begins with Chapter 31, and captured my attention from beginning to end. The story was never confusing and had me anxiously turning pages. Often bizarre and even disturbing, The Human Bobby is fast paced and extremely well done. I'm sorry I waited this long to experience it.

I will definitely be looking forward to more stories from this talented author.

How the Trouble Started; Robert Williams

 

Title: How the Trouble Started

Author:  Robert Williams

Publication Year: 2012

Publisher: Faber and Faber

Edition: eGalley

Setting:  UK

Source: NetGalley

Date Completed: September/2012

Rating: 4/5 

Recommend: yes

 

I had a feeling this coming-of-age story was going to be an addictive read from the very first paragraph, which begins like this..... 

 

"The police were involved over the trouble.  They had to be.  But I didn't think of them as the police at first.  As an eight-year-old boy I expected uniforms, flashing lights and handcuffs.  Speeding cars and the glimpse of a gun.  Instead there was this woman in a business suit who drove a grey car slowly and always smelt of coffee.  She told me to call her Tracy, but I never called a grown-up by their first name before and couldn't bring myself to do it.  I tried, but it felt as impossible as saying 'fuck' in front of my mum, or jumping off a wall that was too high.  I teetered on the edge a few times but my brain wouldn't make my mouth form the correct shape and I ended up calling her 'Miss' instead.  'Tracy', she said, the first few times, but after a while she shook her head and gave up."

Early on the reader is pulled into the story, anxious to find out what terrible event occurred in Bowlend Fells, when Donald Bailey was just eight years-old.  We learn the "trouble" involved a little boy from the neighborhood who was just two years old at the time.  The story is told by Donald, now 16, and bit by bit we learn about the turmoil that filled his young life, and what made him an odd-duck, an outcast among his peers.  As a result of the constant taunts and cruel remarks Donald and his mother faced, she found it necessary for them to move to another town for a start fresh where no one will know either of them.

 

After the move, life does not magically become better in their new neighborhood. Lonely and conflicted over "the trouble" that has haunted them all these years, he spends much of his free time at the library after school. It is there that Donald befriends a young boy named Jake. A boy he tries look out for and protect as his mother is other away. Jake is half of Donald's age, and before long "trouble" has found Donald once again.

 

How the Trouble Started was an really addictive read.  Even though I was a bit disappointed by how the story ended, the author did a terrific job on building suspense and engaging the reader. Donald was a terrific narrator and my heart went out to him throughout this well-done coming-of-age tale. This is a book that should appeal to both YA and adult readers.  If you plan to read this one, you might want to avoid reading other reviews as I think several give out "too much information".  Overall it's a very good story, try it.

The Chaperone; Laura Moriarty

Title: The Chaperone

Author:  Laura Moriarty

Publication Year: 2012

Publisher: Riverhead Books

Edition: ARC

Setting:  Kansas and New York City

Source: Shelf Awareness

Date Completed: September/2012

Rating: 4/5 

Recommend: yes 

 

I initially started this book with the audio version, and although I was enjoying the story, I was feeling a bit annoyed by the reader, Elizabeth McGovern's tone, so I  actually ended up reading more of the story with the print version.  Initial frustrations aside, this was a well done historical novel that  held my interest, and was worth sticking with.

In The Chaperone, Cora Carlisle is a 36 year-old housewife from Wichita, Kansas who hopes to start a new life for herself as her son gets ready for college.  Her new role is that of a "chaperone" for a 15 year-old star struck dancer named Myra Brooks who will be training at a prestigious dance academy in New York City.

A fictionalized account of the caretaker's role to dancer Louise Brooks, Cora has her hands full early on from the time the two board to train for NYC back in Kansas. Myra is a know-it-all, smart-mouthed teen who is trying to act and behave much older than she is.  Although some may suspect this is more Myra's story, it's actually more a story about Cora.  A story I found both compelling and pretty fascinating as well.

Cora's early years spent at a Catholic orphanage in NYC, until the time she was sent aboard the "orphan train" to be raised by a farm family in Kansas in the 1920s.  Her new life was not that different from that of many children whose families could no longer support them. Like Cora, these children were shipped from crowded cities to rural farmlands, to be raised or adopted by farm families and required to work hard on the family farms.  Now as  a grown woman she is anxious to find out about her earliest roots to NYC.

Laura Moriarty creates a compelling story, at times both happy and sad. A story about two women who you'll feel like you've become friends with once you finish, because the author does such a good job developing her characters.  Told from Cora's perspective, the story covers an awful lot of issues considering the timeline of the novel.  From homosexuality, the KKK, racial inequality, women's suffrage, the end of prohibition and even a war, the story never gets dry or boring.

This is a book that should appear to historical fiction fans as well as reader who enjoy stories which cover an array of women's and social issues.