We have Always Lived in the Castle

Some time back, some person put arsenic in the sugar bowl at dinner and now the whole family is dead except for Uncle Julian, an invalid, who eats very little sugar; Constance, who eats no sugar; and Mary Katherine (aka Merricat), who was sent to her room without supper for misbehaving that fateful night. Constance was the one who was tried for the multiple murders, but she was not convicted. Now the three of them continue to live in the family home, shut away from the resentful and mean-spirited villagers except for Merricat's twice weekly trip to the grocery store. The other wealthy families--for they had money and live in a mansion--occasionally come to call, but otherwise, they are totally isolated. When Cousin Charles shows up, the balance--such as it is--is upset and things begin to go quickly awry. A fire is started by someone in the house, then the fire department puts it out. But the villagers take the opportunity to rampage through the house breaking everything they find. Uncle Julian dies of a heart attack in the melee. Only Constance and Merricat are left. What are they to do?  One of the survivors is the poisoner, but the two nevertheless vow to go on. A totally strange book by Shirley Jackson, who also wrote The Haunting of Hill House. Apparently this has also been performed on stage.

The Bookman's Tale

This novel by Charlie Lovett starts with a mystery and escalates into a thriller. Antiquarian book dealer Peter Byerly has recently lost his beloved wife Amanda to brain cancer. With her, it also feels he has lost his interest in everything else. The book alternates between three time periods and perspectives: the early history of a particular book, the Pandosto, which runs from Shakespeare's time up until present day England; the mid-1980's when Peter met Amanda at college and their subsequent five years of marriage, mostly in America; and present day (mid-1990's) in England. Peter wanders into a used book store and finds tucked into a book a watercolor painting that so eerily resembles his dead wife, he becomes obsessed with finding out who painted it and who the subject of the painting was. In the process he hooks up with Victorian art expert, Liz, and starts to uncover an elaborate plot fueled by generations of enmity between the two families, the Gardners and the Aldersons. At the heart of this story is a book, Pandosto, with margin notes that, if genuine, could settle once and for all whether or not Shakespeare was the real author of all those famous plays. Well written with a great storyline and well-developed characters. A little bit of supernatural in the form of Amanda's ghost keeping an eye on Peter. Well worth the read, especially for those interested in book collecting, Shakespeare, or English literary history in general. A good amount of research went into making this historically accurate--up to a point--which is all summarized in the "Author's Note" at the end.

In the House upon the Dirt between the Lake and the Woods

I did not finish this book by Matt Bell. I would characterize it as magical realism, not a favorite genre of mine to start with, but again I was enticed by glowing reviews. There is too much despair, too little storyline for me here. The description is well crafted. A man and a woman marry, move away from their family and friends to an isolated plot of land. He builds a house and they try to start a family. But time after time, she miscarries. Eventually, her ability to sing things into existence is put to full use as she creates a child. But he knows of the deception--that this being is not the result of their physical union and he begins to destroy the natural world around them while she places a threatening 2nd moon in the sky above. You can read more extended reviews in the New York Times, and at NPR, among others.

How the Light Gets In

After the ending of The Beautiful Mystery, it was ALL I could do not to turn to the last page and see how this installment of the Inspector Gamache series by Louise Penny was going to turn out. But I resisted.  And she kept me on the edge of my seat (figuratively speaking since I mostly read in bed before going to sleep) the entire time, uncertain as to whether Gamache would emerge victorious or go down in flames. The situation looks dire. Francoeur has dismantled the homicide division that Gamache worked for decades to build and has installed every ne'er do well he can round up from the Surete to undermine Gamache's credibility and effectiveness. Although there is a murder mystery that threads through the book, involving the death of the last of a world famous set of quintuplets, the real story here has to do with what evil plot Francoeur is hatching and why it involves destroying both Gamache and Jean-Guy. A former member of Gamache's team, Yvette Nichol, makes a reappearance, and Isabel Lacoste helps hold the whole thing together as Gamache pursues a deadly strategy of deception and double-cross with Francoeur and his minions.  For me, much of the tension came from the apparent contrast between Gamache's integrity and honesty, and how such a person could possibly go up against people who are incredibly dishonest and destructive.
As with previous installments, the town of Three Pines with the attendant cast of characters--including Rosa the duck--provides not only a compelling setting but its own distinctive emotional color as events unfold. There's not a wasted word, not a superfluous character, and this one kept me up nights, drawn on by the lovely prose, the characters that you want to meet on the street, and the compulsion to find out what is going on. If you haven't read the previous books in the series, do yourself a favor and start from the beginning rather than diving in with this one. When I finished, it made me want to go back and re-read the whole series!