More Books I Did NOT Finish

I have become so picky about my reading. Used to be that I would persist in reading a book til the bitter end. But now, if it doesn't grab me after 50-100 pages, I let it go.

Before the Ruins by Victoria Gosling. Publishers Weekly and others gave it rave reviews. Here is what they said: "British author Gosling's stellar debut focuses on four childhood friends--Andy, the bold ringleader; her boyfriend, Marcus; her best friend, Peter; and the creative and enterprising Em. In the summer of 1996, the four, all in their late teens, decide to experience "the apocalypse" that Andy's alcoholic mother believes will happen on June 20 at an abandoned manor house in the Wiltshire countryside that was the scene of a suspicious death and the theft of a priceless diamond necklace in 1936. When they arrive at the manor that day, there's no apocalypse, but they do encounter a stranger, David, in the drive. He knows the new owners, a wealthy family waiting to remodel it. David, flirtatious and a bit older than the others, is immediately drawn to Andy--and to Peter, creating tension between the two friends. In the days that follow, Em finds a suitable, cheap facsimile of the stolen necklace in a thrift shop, and the friends take turns hiding the fake necklace, which the others must find. Some romantic drama ensues, and in the autumn they all go their separate ways. More than 20 years later, Andy and Peter meet on occasion, but avoid talking about what happened at the manor. Then Peter disappears, and Andy resolves to find him. The gorgeous, poetic prose perfectly complements the suspenseful plot."

What Could Be Saved by Liese O'Halloran Schwarz. Again, positive review from Publishers Weekly and others: "In Schwarz's superb sophomore novel (after The Possible World), an American family's young boy goes missing in Thailand and resurfaces decades later. During the Vietnam War, Robert Preston works as a spy for the U.S. government and moves his family to Bangkok in 1972 under the pretense that he's designing a dam. His resentful wife, Genevieve, begins an affair, and after their youngest child, Philip, disappears, the Prestons return to America with their other two daughters. All except Genevieve assume he's dead, and Genevieve repeatedly returns to search for him. Forty-seven years later, Bea is aghast when her younger sister, Laura, travels to Bangkok in hopes of retrieving Philip, having received an email from a man who claims to have found him. The question of whether the man Laura returns with is their brother remains open for much of the book. The sisters are reluctant to press Philip for details about his disappearance and wonder how to break the news to Genevieve, who now has dementia. Schwarz is a remarkable storyteller, juggling many characters, and the seamless alternating chapters narrated by Laura and a servant from the Preston's house in Bangkok gradually deepen the reader's understanding of the past and present. Schwarz's stellar work is riveting from its start all the way to the final horrifying twist."

The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsene Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar by Maurice LeBlanc. I originally became interested because of the Netflix series called "Lupin" that is based on LeBlanc's books and stars Omar Sy. 

Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders. This book has received numerous very positive reviews, is on lots of "Best of" lists, but still, it felt disjointed to continually find out after a conversation who had said what. Meh. Here is Publishers Weekly review: "Saunders's (Tenth of December) mesmerizing historical novel is also a moving ghost story. A Dantesque tour through a Georgetown cemetery teeming with spirits, the book takes place on a February night in 1862, when Abraham Lincoln visits the grave of his recently interred 11-year-old son, Willie. The distraught Lincoln's nocturnal visit has a "vivifying effect" on the graveyard's spectral denizens, a gallery of grotesques who have chosen to loiter "in the Bardo"-a Tibetan term for a liminal state-rather than face final judgment. Among this community, which is still riven by racial and class divisions, are Roger Bevins III, who slashed his wrists after being spurned by a lover, and Hans Vollman, a "wooden-toothed forty-six-year-old printer" struck in the head by a falling beam shortly after marrying his young wife. As irritable, chatty, and bored in their purgatory as Beckett characters, Bevins and Vollman devote themselves to saving Willie from their fate: "The young ones," Bevins explains, "are not meant to tarry." Periodically interrupting the graveyard action are slyly arranged assemblies of historical accounts of the Lincoln era. These excerpts and Lincoln's anguished musings compose a collage-like portrait of a wartime president burdened by private and public grief, mourning his son's death as staggering battlefield reports test his (and the nation's) resolve. Saunders's enlivening imagination runs wild in detailing the ghosts' bizarre manifestations, but melancholy is the novel's dominant tone. Two sad strains, the spirits' stubborn, nostalgic attachment to the world of the living and Lincoln's monumental sorrow, make up a haunting American ballad that will inspire increased devotion among Saunders's admirers." Also reviews from The New York Times, NPR,  The Guardian, The New Yorker, and Kirkus.

The Charmed Wife

Another revisionist fairy tale, this time of the Cinderella story. Written by Olga Grushin, I am not sure how to talk about this book. It is so complex in changing settings, perspectives, time frames, nature of the main characters... I was just left trying to keep up and not particularly impressed with the somewhat didactic lessons offered at the end. Kirkus notes, "This novel occupies an uncomfortable place between realism, postmodernism, and folklore." They conclude that this retelling of the tale is "disappointing." It starts as a fairy tale. Cinderella is 13 years into her marriage with the Prince and has become so disenchanted and angry that she has hired a witch to brew a potion that will bring about his death. She stops short of making the final bargain. In the process of deciding, however, we learn of how her dream of "happily ever after" unravels over the years. Over the course of the book, we move from a land with palaces and beekeepers and shoe-shaped houses in the woods to penthouses in Manhattan and modern houses in the Jersey suburbs. Are the the step-sisters really step-sisters or is that just Cinderella's (Jane's) construction. And just what role does Cinderella/Jane play in the deterioration of her marriage. What remains true throughout most of the book is her love for her two children, but it is not sustaining. Nevertheless, I finished the book (after abandoning several others), hoping to get to a clearer understanding of what the author wanted to say. 

The New York Journal of Books has a more positive take on the book. "Timelines and chronologies and people and places seamlessly shift and morph and nothing is as it seems. That all of this works and ties together is due to Grushin’s facility with language, which is, in many ways, a marvel. It’s the kind of prose that demands you submerge yourself...." but also says, "A reader can get lost in such prose. Conversely, such prose can also lose a reader." I would disagree with the assessment that the shifts are "seamless" but judge for yourself. 

What is remarkable is that Grushin was born and raised in the Soviet Union, but after receiving and accepting a scholarship to Emory University, she decided to write in English. Do read the author interview in the LA Times for some in-depth biographical information and tie-ins to her writing.

Atomic Love

This romantic thriller is set in 1950's Chicago, during the height of the McCarthy era and Cold War. Protagonist Rosalind worked on the Manhattan project but was summarily dismissed due to a report about her emotional instability, written, she is sure, by a colleague and lover who dumped her. According to author Jennie Fields, there was, in fact, a young woman physicist on the Manhattan project --the youngest member of the team--who designed the boron trifluoride counter that gauged the first man-made nuclear reaction. Additional inspiration for characters came from another physicist on the team, Theodore Hall, who, like Weaver in the book, shared "crucial atomic secrets with the Russians while at Los Alamos, and continued to so postwar..." (Author's Note). A final inspiration from her own life was grandfather Dr. Joseph Spring, the Coroner Physician for Cook County during the Al Capone era. He was also well-known for significant contributions to the development of forensic science. He is seen in Rosalind's father, Dr. Joe.   

Rosalind was devastated by the simultaneous loss of her lover and her career. Moreover, she experienced a sense of horror that the work she had been doing was used to kill so many people after promises were made to the team that the bomb wouldn't be used but simply threatened. Her older sister looked after her until she eventually went back to work, behind the jewelry sales counter at a department store. She greatly misses being a scientist, but is fearful of pursuing meaningful work-- too ashamed by the circumstances of her dismissal, and also afraid the negative report will follow her into the job search. When her former lover, Weaver, gets back in touch after years of silence, she finds, to her chagrin, that she still has feelings for him. She is conflicted when she is contacted by the FBI, asking her to renew the relationship and spy on Weaver to find out if he is planning on passing information about the hydrogen bomb to the Russians. To complicate matters further, Rosalind begins to find herself attracted to her FBI handler, a former prisoner of war. 

The book is well written, and although the plot line is somewhat predictable, it is still worth a read. Rosalind is a woman scientist at a time when there were few opportunities for them and you get a good picture of the uphill battle women faced to be taken seriously in the world of work. Other characters are also well developed and the author's obvious love for the city of Chicago shines through her descriptions of settings. 

Kirkus lauds the book as "Atmospheric, historically interesting escapism." Publishers Weekly offers a slightly more mixed review, applauding the discussion of women's social constraints but finding the espionage plot line less compelling. 

Before She Disappeared

This is the 2nd book I have read by Lisa Gardner (see post on When You See Me) and I am once again impressed by this compelling writer.  The protagonist in this stand-alone mystery is Frankie Elkin, a nomadic free agent who scours missing persons websites and then picks a cold case to pursue. Apparently, Gardner was inspired by a BBC article that highlighted an informal community of amateur detectives, dog handlers, pilots, etc. who undertake to help solve old missing persons cases in order to bring some closure to families. 

Frankie has just landed in Boston and, not being a big city girl, is a little overwhelmed by the crowds, the traffic, and the transit system. But she eventually makes her way to the largely Haitian neighborhood of Mattapan. And, in spite of being a recovering alcoholic, her first stop is Stoney's Pub, where she persuades owner Stoney to let her tend bar in exchange for staying in a vacant efficiency apartment on the 2nd floor--which apparently is sparsely furnished but includes a resident homicidal cat, Piper. And then Frankie digs in to find a missing 15-year-old girl, Angelique Lovelie Badeau, who disappeared from school 11 months ago without a trace. Angel wanted to become a doctor, was a bright and dedicated student, so no one believes she just walked away. After convincing the girl's aunt and younger brother that she doesn't want any money from them and that her only goal is to find Angel, Frankie must also convince the local community liaison and the detective who has been working the case. Frankie has found 14 previously missing persons, but not one of them alive; this time, she is determined to change that outcome. It's a dangerous neighborhood of Boston, torn by gang wars and drug dealers competing for turf, but Frankie persists in asking her questions and manages to uncover new leads that move the case dangerously forward.

Publishers Weekly  says, "Frankie...is a nuanced character whose unflinching honesty and lack of self-pity allows the reader to empathize, if not completely sympathize, with her struggles. And cat lovers are sure to fall for Piper, Frankie’s equally dysfunctional feral companion. Gardner pulls no punches in this socially conscious standalone."

The Philadelphia Inquirer concludes by saying that this is a "sharply written, tension-filled yarn full of twists readers are unlikely to see coming. The most compelling element, however, is the character of Frankie, a recovering alcoholic whose obsession with the missing is a penance of sorts for the burden of guilt and grief she carries over a past trauma that took the life of a man she loves."

Black Widows

This murder mystery by Cate Quinn is based on the story of a polygamous man who has been brutally and ritually murdered. The book jacket sums it up this way: "Against the wishes of his family and the laws of the elders of the Mormon church, Blake Nelson has adopted the old polygamous ways and lives alone with his three wives, miles from anywhere, in rural Utah. Blake and his wives kept to themselves-and kept most folks out. That is, until his dead body is discovered. Black Widows is told in the three voices of Blake's very different wives, who hate each other, and who sometimes hated their husband. Blake's dead. Did his wife kill him? And if so, which one?" The three narrators, "First Wife" Rachel, sister-wife Emily, and sister-wife Tina, could not be more different from one another. Rachel is a dyed-in-the-wool Mormon, who met Blake in college and who wants nothing more than to forget her horrifying past, where she was raised in and rescued from a brutal polygamous cult. Emily is just a lost soul, constantly rejected by a hyper-critical Catholic mother; she is a chronic dreamer, snoop, and liar. And Tina is an ex-hooker and recovering drug addict rescued during a stint of rehab by volunteer Blake. The police suspect Rachel, but Emily is the one who confesses. I was surprised to learn who the culprit was. The danger of becoming the next victim of the killer is real for all of them. What is really cleverly done is making Blake a central character in his own right even though he's dead from the outset. With Blake gone, of course the sister-wives all suspect each other, but they have also never really seen or known one another. Moreover, at least two of them haven't really known themselves or what they can become once freed from Blake's control. All that emerges as their pasts, their secrets and their dreams are gradually revealed. The setting is also vividly drawn and its influence on relationship dynamics is significant.

It was a good mystery, well told, with insights into some aspects of the regular Church of Latter Day Saints, but also some disturbing descriptions of sexual abuse of underage girls by cults, so consider before reading. Publishers Weekly provides a brief and positive review. The New York Journal of Books calls this a "rock solid suspense novel." The New York Times laments that the police investigators are unidimensional characters but then gushes "oh, my, can this author draw women!"

 

The Stranger Diaries

Elly Griffiths has written two other series of books that are probably better known in Great Britain than here, The "Ruth Galloway" series and the "Brighton Mysteries." This was her first stand-alone crime novel although she has since published a second book (Postscript Murders) featuring the detective in this book, Harbinder Kaur. The setting is a down-at-the-heels town in West Sussex,where the main factory has closed down and remains abandoned--and possibly haunted, according to locals--at the edge of town, right behind the the small estate houses where high school English teacher, Clare Cassidy, lives with her 15-year-old daughter, Georgie. The school where Clare teaches (based on an actual school that supposedly has a haunted staircase, West Dean College) is built on the estate of deceased gothic story writer R.M. Holland and Clare is in the process of writing a biography of him and teaches his most famous gothic ghost story, "The Stranger," as part of her creative writing class. The eerie atmosphere kicks off when Clare's colleague and gal pal, Ella, is found stabbed to death in her home with a post-it note beside her bearing a quote from "The Stranger."  DS Kaur--of east Indian descent, single, living with her parents, and still in the closet about being gay--is sent to start investigating. Clare decides to keep quiet about an affair between the head of the English department, Rick Lewis, and her friend Ella; we find out later that a friend of Georgie's, Patrick, had a crush on Ella and even stalked her in an amateurish fashion. There are suspects and red herrings enough to keep you guessing, and I never guessed who did it. The story is very atmospheric, characters are well-developed and revealed through their actions, diaries, and their own internal musings. Georgie and Harbinder share the focus as story tellers in alternating chapters. 

A more detailed review and plotline is available from The New York Journal of Books, which characterized the book as "ambitious, evocative, and thoroughly tantalizing ... more than a little unsettling—as all good hauntings should be."   Publishers Weekly says, "Griffiths weaves a tale replete with ghosts, the occult, forbidden desire, and murder." And Kirkus calls it an "immensely pleasurable" read for lovers of British mysteries.

Lore

This fantasy novel by Alexandra Bracken was categorized by the library as a YA read, which might account for the lack of anything except a few hot kisses between the protagonists, but I still found it an enjoyable read. It is a hefty 450+ page book with a cast of characters in the back and maps of New York City of the front and end papers of the cover. I love maps and referred to these often. The story is based on Greek mythology characters although it is set in contemporary times. The premise is that nine Greek gods are forced to walk the earth as mortals for one week every seven years as punishment for some ancient rebellion. During this week, called the Agon, descendants of ancient Greek bloodlines (think Perseus, Odysseus, Achilles) seek out the gods and try to kill them and thereby gain their powers and become "false gods." This allows them to do extraordinary things and accumulate wealth and power in the years between the Agons, and, also, to build up armies of "Hunters" so that they might kill more gods in the next Agon and gain even more power, etc. Lore (short for Melora) has been hiding from the blooded families for the last seven years and wants to have nothing more to do with the Agon until Athena appears at her doorstep, severely wounded, and offers to help Lore kill the man she believes tortured and murdered her family, Aristo Kadmou, aka the false god Ares. Lore agrees and this brings her into conflict not just with Kamou, but with a childhood friend, Castor, saved from dying of leukemia after somehow killing and assuming the powers of Apollo.  Lore battles not only with herself about whether or not she wants to re-immerse herself in the endless violence on the Agons, but with those she thought were her allies. She is a well developed character and this is quite a complex plot with a large cast that will keep you guessing until the end. There is a lot of explicit violence in the story as well as some descriptions of sexual assault, so consider carefully before recommending.

Kirkus recommends it as "a gripping revenge story," and Publishers Weekly applauds the "ambitious worldbuilding and breakneck pacing."