I’ve been trying hard to stick with reviewing more comforting reading, but I had a chance to delve into a favorite author’s backlist and took it. I’ve been an Anna Quindlen fan for years and recently decided to try her second novel. Published in 1998, Black and Blue is one woman’s story and the lengths they will go to for their children. Fran is an ER nurse married to Bobby, ... Read More...
Kill Show: A Novel
Sara Parcell is a teenager and gifted violinist who disappears on what seems to be an ordinary day. Within days her case goes national, coming to the attention of an ambitious reality TV show producer desperate to do something bigger than dating competition shows. To that end she reaches out to Sara’s parents to follow her abduction in real-time as a TV documentary. This is the ... Read More...
Notes on an Execution: A Novel
In twelve hours Ansel Packer will be executed. As the time unwinds, three women parse the life of a serial killer. Lavender is his mother, Hazel the twin sister of his wife, and Saffron the police captain involved in his capture. In Notes on an Execution their stories strip the filters from Ansel’s own Auto-tuned portrayal of himself and his life’s Theory, leaving behind ... Read More...
Dear Miss Metropolitan
I was a prisoner for so, so long. Years. How was that humanly possible? Why didn’t anyone find me? How had my page been torn out the book for so long? Sometimes, when I finish a book, the review flies right out of my mind onto the page. Then there are the books that need to marinate, where putting words and thoughts together cohesively takes more time. This is where ... Read More...
When the Stars Go Dark by Paula McLain
Paula McLain is well-known for her historical fiction about women. This month she flips the script on her readers with When the Stars Go Dark, a complex mystery set in 1990s Northern California. There, Anna Hart is a missing persons detective who needs time off after a devastating personal loss. She heads to Mendocino to leave everything behind and hibernate. But on her first ... Read More...
The Holdout: A Novel by Graham Moore
All “guilty” votes had to be alike in reasoning. But all “not guilty” votes could be for different reasons and still reach the same results. Courtroom dramas are a staple in fiction, but they most often focus on the front of the house—victim, defendant, lawyers, maybe even judge. They seldom stray into the mysterious inner world of jurors. Graham Moore changes that ... Read More...
