The Correspondent

This epistolary novel by Virginia Evans was a engaging read with it's slow evolution of secrets and relationships. It would be a spoiler to name all the characters with whom our 73-year-old protagonist exchanges a voluminous number of letters and emails, but they include a best friend, a neighbor, numerous famous authors, a stalker and her ex-husband. Sybil is going blind from a hereditary disease and fears losing the ability to continue her correspondence as well as the sense of permanence the letters gave her. She never knew her real mother, who put her up for adoption when Sybil was 14 months old. Her adoptive parents also adopted a boy, Felix, who Sybil considers her brother. Sybil pursued a career in law, both privately as a distinguished attorney and as a lowly clerk to her law partner when he was appointed as a federal judge, because the law was orderly, "black and white." That's also part of why she writes letters, to put her thoughts in order and be absolutely clear about what she wants to say. But it is also how she develops her relationships, finds her place in the world, comes to terms with her past, and discovers an unexpected future. 

Publishers Weekly calls the book a "charming debut" and concludes, "As the years go on, Sybil's relationships brim with tension waiting to be released, and the detailed connections between each character are brilliantly mapped through the correspondence. It adds up to an appealing family drama."

 Kirkus writes this summary and review "A lifetime’s worth of letters combine to portray a singular character. Sybil Van Antwerp, a cantankerous but exceedingly well-mannered septuagenarian, is the titular correspondent in Evans’ debut novel. Sybil has retired from a beloved job as chief clerk to a judge with whom she had previously been in private legal practice. She is the divorced mother of two living adult children and one who died when he was 8. She is a reader of novels, a gardener, and a keen observer of human nature. But the most distinguishing thing about Sybil is her lifelong practice of letter writing. As advancing vision problems threaten Sybil’s carefully constructed way of life—in which letters take the place of personal contact and engagement—she must reckon with unaddressed issues from her past that threaten the house of cards (letters, really) she has built around herself. Sybil’s relationships are gradually revealed in the series of letters ... Perhaps most affecting is the series of missives Sybil writes but never mails to a shadowy figure from her past. Thoughtful musings on the value and immortal quality of letters and the written word populate one of Sybil’s notes to a young correspondent while other messages are laugh-out-loud funny, tinged with her characteristic blunt tartness. Evans has created a brusque and quirky yet endearing main character with no shortage of opinions and advice for others but who fails to excavate the knotty difficulties of her own life. As Sybil grows into a delayed self-awareness, her letters serve as a chronicle of fitful growth. An affecting portrait of a prickly woman."

Evensong

I have not previously read anything by Stewart O'Nan. This is a story without a plot line, rather a series of vignettes revealing the inner and outer lives of 4 aging women who are key players in an organization called the Humpty Dumpties in Pittsburgh. Publishers Weekly offers this good summary and review: O'Nan...once again finds extraordinary resonance in the lives of ordinary people. In Pittsburgh, 89-year-old Joan Hargrove, leader of the Humpty Dumpty Club, a group of elderly women who help each other out, lives the "nightmare" they all share when she falls down a flight of stairs and breaks her leg. With Joan recovering in the hospital, it's left to other club members to fill the void: Kitzi delivers prescriptions to Gene and Jean Sokolov, brother-and-sister hoarders who live with a houseful of cats, and slowly becomes enmeshed in the siblings' lives; Susie, a divorcee, takes care of Joan's cat and finds romance with a retired postal worker who plays in a bluegrass band. Meanwhile, Emily, a recurring character in O'Nan's fiction, is having trouble with her sister-in-law, who is showing the first signs of dementia. The drama here is strictly low-key (a funeral is the emotional high point), but O'Nan proves that he has no peers when it comes to evoking the quotidian challenges and routines of daily life. It's a bittersweet celebration of the twilight years. " 

Kirkus closes their review with these positive comments: "This frank depiction of people nearing the ends of their lives might sound bleak, but O’Nan’s brilliantly rendered characters refuse to be pitied, matter-of-factly accepting loss and physical decline as they go about their days quietly sustained by their faith and commitment to service. Unsentimental yet deeply moving: more wonderful work from the versatile, masterful O’Nan." There are excerpts from multiple review sources here. 

 What left me dissatisfied was the difficulty in figuring out the relationships (besides HD membership) between the primary characters and between them and many of the secondary characters as well as the lack of resolution for some of the crises facing the group.  It was also a challenge at times to know who was speaking in the dialogue exchanges. Apparently there are previous installments that deal with the Maxwell family: Henry Himself and Emily Alone. Seems like it might be advisable to read these before tackling this one. That being said, the characterizations are poignant and rich, the characters' struggles all too real and familiar. His writing merits further investigation.

Furever After

This is the 16th entry in the Magical Cats mystery series by Sofie Kelly. I read the first two books, Curiosity Thrilled the Cat and Sleight of Paw and enjoy both the plots and the characters.  These are cozy mysteries with the added element of two cats who are anything but ordinary house pets. Owen can disappear at will and Hercules can walk through walls, doors, etc. Of course they are very smart and often have to help their owner, librarian Kathleen Paulsen, solve mysteries by providing clues.  In this book she is getting ready to marry Detective Marcus Gordon and the story focuses a lot on the strong network of friends that Kathleen has formed in her small town of Mayfield. When she finds a dead body in the library, she feels compelled to try and figure out why the victim, ne'er do well Will Redfern, was trying to steal a painting from the library. It turns out the painting was part of a high profile theft some years ago and was never recovered. How did it end up in the library and why would someone kill Will Redfern? Our protagonists are put in mortal danger before the wedding and their union surprisingly comes with a bonus. 

The Briar Club

This historical novel by Kate Quinn had me from the first chapter. I previously read her book The Alice Network, which was also based on some actual people as well as actual events-- the reason I love historical mysteries.  This one is set in Washington D.C. in the early to mid-50's, during the height of McCarthy's "red scare" terror campaign. Several women who live in a down-at-the-heels women's boarding house are converted from strangers passing in the night to a tightly knit group of friends by the actions of one woman, Grace March. We are provided chapters from each woman's point of view with information about their histories, their dreams and their insecurities. Nobody is fully who they appear to be and the characters are ones you will cheer for--for the most part. Also the two children in the house, Pete and Lina, mistreated by their mother and apparently abandoned by their father, are taken under Grace's and then everyone else's care. We know from the beginning that a murder or two has been committed--this current situation is being narrated by the house itself--and the rest of the book provides the backstory to the present events. Wonderful characters, rich settings, and a twisty surprise at the end. Highly recommended.

Here is Publishers Weekly's summary of plot and characters: "when widowed 30-something Grace March arrives at Briarwood. She meets Fliss, a harried new mother; Bea, a former pro baseball player; Claire, a file clerk for Sen. Margaret Chase Smith; Nora, an employee of the National Archives; and Arlene, a secretary for the House Un-American Activities Committee who’s fully embraced the hysterical rhetoric of her boss, Sen. Joseph McCarthy. As the women bond, clash, and pursue various romantic entanglements, they remain committed to holding weekly dinner parties in Grace’s room. As Quinn gradually steers the narrative back toward the violent opening scene, she elegantly explores issues of race, class, and gender, and brings the paranoid atmosphere of McCarthy-era Washington to vivid life."

 

The Bandit Queens

I highly recommend this debut novel by Parini Shroff, a practicing attorney in the Bay Area. She takes on some serious themes--caste, spousal abuse, gender discrimination--with what some reviewers have called "laugh-out-loud humor;" whereas, I would say with absurd or dark humor. Set in a poor (east) Indian village, Geeta has become a pariah ever since her abusive husband, Ramesh, disappeared 5 years before. Everyone believes she did away with him to become a "self-made widow." She turns her reputation to advantage as it keeps away unwanted advances from men and she has now joined a small group of women with a microloan to run their own businesses. But even the group members believe she is a successful murderer and so Farah comes to her asking for assistance in killing her abusive husband. That request is followed by a similar one from Priety--all of which pushes Geeta in scary directions. She takes inspiration from the legendary Phoolan Devi, known as the Bandit Queen, who took revenge on those who had degraded and hurt her. She makes an unlikely friend, the widowed village supplier of illegal liquor, Karem, but then costs him his biggest customer, a gangster in a neighboring town. Then, low and behold, her "dead" husband, now blind, reappears in town and wants to reunite with her. At occasional risk of life and limb, she solves her loan group's problems, sends her husband packing, and begins her re-integration into the village life.

Publishers Weekly concludes their review: "Shroff deals sharply with misogyny and abuse, describing the misery inflicted as well as its consequences in unflinching detail, and is equally unsparing in her depictions of mean-girl culture in the village. Readers are in for a razor-stuffed treat." Library Journal asserts that "This is a deeply human book, with women surviving and overcoming in their culture while still remaining a part of it." Kirkus opens their review with "Bonds of sisterhood are forged through murders." And, though not uniformly laudatory, goes on to say, "Still, if you can lean into the melodramatic slapstick nature of it all—villainous characters who pause midvillainy to explain that their nicknames are works in progress; characters who pause mid–hostage situation to wish each other a Happy New Year—the novel will reward you with occasional witty one-liners, tender moments of deep female friendship, and salient truths: 'Because we’re middle-aged housewives. Who’s more invisible than us? We can get away with murder. Literally.'” Readers will appreciate—if not quite be riveted by—this tale of the strength of women in impossible situations."

In a lengthy review, The New York Times opens with “'Women were built to endure the rules men make,' Parini Shroff writes in her debut novel, The Bandit Queens, which covers a litany of grim realities in rural India: ... This might sound depressing, but Shroff manages to spin all of the above into a radically feel-good story about the murder of no-good husbands by a cast of unsinkable women."

I'm including Booklist's review in total because it captures several important points. "Shroff's debut is a darkly hilarious take on gossip, caste, truth, village life, and the patriarchy. Geeta's abusive drunk of a husband disappeared five years ago, leaving her alone and destitute in a small village in India, where rumor has it that she did him in. Her reputation as a woman who "removed her own nose ring" protects her from various unpleasant attentions, and it's not long before other women in her microloan group seek her assistance removing their nose rings. Inspired by Phoolan Devi, "the Bandit Queen," who fought for the rights of women in India, Geeta engages the help of a handsome widower (and black-market liquor purveyor) and takes on a gangster from whom she steals a dog. Geeta inadvertently manages to facilitate a couple of husband disposals before her own spouse reappears, hoping to reconcile with her. As one of her beneficiaries tries to blackmail her and her long-estranged, childhood best friend becomes a source of support, Geeta endeavors to take her life back. A perfect match for fans of Oyinkan Braithwaite's My Sister, the Serial Killer (2018) and clever, subversive storytelling."

NPR's interview with author Parini Shroff is here.

The Queens of London

This is the latest of Heather Webb's 10 historical novels, this one centered on England's first all-female gang of thieves. The queen of the gang, Alice Diamond or, as she's known on the streets, Diamond Annie, has her own perspectives on justice and loyalty and isn't afraid to mete out punishment to anyone who crosses the line, male or female. The gang is called the Forty Elephants and they focus on shoplifting from high-end clothing stores, selling on to their fences, and dividing the money equally. With a different point of view is DC Lilian Wyles, one of the first women officers at the Met. She is trying to break free of the restrictive "women's work" --catching orphans--and is also trying to protect her women colleagues' standing in the police by being the best detective she can be. Catching the head of the Forty Elephants would certainly go some way towards convincing the higher ups that women are a valuable addition to the force.

Into the mix comes Hira, a young girl whose East Indian mother and English father have just died of cholera in India. Hira has been living with a wealthy but negligent uncle in Mayfair and she finds out that he plans to send her to a miserable boarding school for poor and delinquent girls in the north of England. She runs away into the seedier districts of London with absolutely no idea of how to survive. Befriended by a small scruffy dog, she is living in an empty flour barrel in an alley, trying to avoid the gangs of boys and the police, who would return her to her uncle. Alice finds her and uncharacteristically takes pity on the girl; she brings Hira home but warns her to stay out of sight of the abusive father of the family. She also introduces Hira to the Forty Elephants as a messenger and lookout, but Hira hates the thieving and violence she witnesses. On one of their jobs, Hira meets Dorothy, a kind sales woman at one of the department stores who offers the obviously hungry child her lunch. When Ruth, Alice's closest friend in the gang, is killed by her abusive boyfriend, Alice decides she must do more to protect her crew and starts scheming to buy a building that can be a safe house for all of them. But that's going to take more money than their usual shoplifting hauls provide. 

Booklist says of this book, "With engaging characters and strong women protagonists, Webb's page-turning historical work speaks to the challenges that women faced in the 1920s and the fortitude they needed in order to succeed in society led by men." Historical Novel Society also praises the book. "Queens of London is a whirlwind adventure through the streets of the Elephant and Castle neighborhood in early 20th-century London...And after only the first few pages you’ll be reading as much because you care about the characters as you will for the plot."

The author kindly provides notes and research sources so you can find out who and what events are based on actual persons/events and who/what is  fictional. I have to admit that for a significant part of the book, my sympathies were with the criminal gang.  

Killers of a Certain Age

My sister sent me this book written by Deanna Raybourn and I really liked it. Booklist says "Imagine if the Golden Girls were trained as elite assassins and you'll have some idea of the delights and thrills filling the pages of Raybourn's latest...a fun, exciting romp that celebrates the everlasting bonds of sisterhood." Billie, Mary Alice, Helen, and Natalie were all recruited in their early 20's to train at the Museum, an elite network of assassins originally created to hunt down Nazis. They were the first women recruits and they worked effectively--sometimes with others, but often alone--for forty years, ridding the world of bad people. They are ready to retire and their employers have graciously offered them an all-expenses-paid cruise to honor them. Or, as they soon figure out, to get them permanently out of the way. But apparently the powers that be have significantly under estimated just what effective assassins they are as they begin to hunt down the members of the Board that issued the termination orders.

Publishers Weekly calls it an "uproarious contemporary thriller...Colorful regional details and vividly portrayed secondary characters flesh out this rollicking tale. Fans of Helen Tursten and Richard Osman will relish watching these badass women in their 60s (“no one notices you unless you want them to,” Billie observes) swing into action. Raybourn has outdone herself." I have been a fan of Richard Osman's "Thursday Murder Club" series set in an English retirement community, and I just finished reading Helen Tursten's two books featuring 88-year old Maud, a very appealing anti-heroine. Being of a certain age myself, I enjoy seeing all these elderly characters taking charge of things, when those around them are prone to dismiss them. The introductory "Author's Note" sets the tone of what is to follow. "Some of the dates are misleading; some of the names are lies. I'm not trying to protect the innocent. I'm trying to protect the guilty. You'll understand soon enough." Many reviewers found the book to be "smart," "witty," "original," and "delightful" with "sophisticated story lines," high-flying action," and "sharp dialogue." Kirkus concludes it is "a compelling, complex mystery."

Camp Zero

This is another science fiction book by an author I have not previously encountered, Michelle Min Sterling. Kirkus offers this summary:

"It’s 2049, and 25-year-old Rose accepts a dangerous assignment from Damien, her master-of-the-universe boss, who promises that she and her mother will be set with income and housing for life in a precarious, ever warming world if she succeeds. On her mission, she’ll continue as a sex worker alongside five other women while keeping an eye on Damien’s interests in a new, secretive project. Meanwhile, Grant Grimley just wants to escape the reach of his family’s vast wealth, a legacy created from centuries of extraction. He accepts a teaching job that guarantees to get him off the grid. Rose and Grant, both Americans, arrive at a camp in the Canadian wilderness, a frigid frontier of sorts, where a renowned architect seeks to build a refuge from climate catastrophe. Not too far off, a group of women—American soldiers and scientists—is creating a sanctuary of their own to survive an imperiled planet. It's a smart setup. The author has imagined an array of futuristic ideas stemming from our present, including a next-generation smartphone that’s implanted as a chip behind people's ears at birth and a Floating City off Boston’s shores where the elite live in bliss while the rest of the population deals with worsening hurricanes and wildfires." They are not ringingly positive about the book but do conclude by saying, "the book has a soul that generates momentum. It’s committed to the bonds of family, the ones we are born into and the ones we choose, as a way forward in an increasingly chaotic world. A love letter to what communities of women can accomplish when they work in concert."

There are several plot lines and hidden motives of the characters that are revealed as the narrative moves forward. The Toronto Star concludes their review by praising the author's "powerful storytelling, the vividness of her vision, and her creation of a world which will likely haunt your dreams."

The Witch Haven

This is the debut novel by Sasha Peyton Smith and I enjoyed this well plotted, well characterized and atmospheric story of a young woman coming into her  magical powers in early 20th C New York City. The protagonist, 17-year-old Frances Hallowell, is toiling away in a dress maker's sweatshop as the book opens. Working late one night, the shop's owner, drunk and abusive, comes to the shop and attacks her, only to end up dead with a pair of scissors--Frances' of course--embedded in his neck. But Frances, who is mourning the death of her recently murdered brother, the subsequent loss of her mother to an insane asylum, and hence her home, has absolutely no idea how they got there from across the workshop. When the police come to investigate, Frances is the obvious suspect, but, just as she is about to be hauled away to jail, two women in nurses'capes, driving a battered old ambulance, show up. They declare Frances has been diagnosed with TB and is being taken to Haxahaven Sanitarium. Thus is Frances introduced to a haven for women with witching powers, where she makes friends, makes enemies, and figures out that Haxahaven is a prison of sorts as well as a shelter.

When Frances starts receiving dream messages from a former friend of her brother's, Finn, she discovers ways to practice larger magic than the director of Haxahaven allows. And he promises to help Frances find and avenge the murder of her brother. The magic is not limited to women in New York City; an exclusive men's club also shelters and cultivates their members' powers, and the head of that organization wants Frances to join her powers to his in order to control the city. 

Kirkus calls the book "intriguing" in it's examination of pushing back against the limited roles allotted to women. Publishers Weekly calls the book "gritty" but also "affectionate" in it's treatment of grief and empowerment. Booklist calls it "spellbinding" and says it offers a "feminist twist" to the "familiar vibes of a magical boarding school."

The Paris Library

The author, Janet Skeslien Charles,  uses the American Library in Paris (ALP) as the centerpiece of this historical novel, where Charles actually worked as a programs manager for a time. Based largely on actual people and events, the book introduces us to the dedicated staff and loyal subscribers (patrons) of the ALP during the Nazi occupation of Paris. Told mainly from the POV of Odile, a young woman who has to fight her father to take a job at the ALP in 1939, and of Lily, a teenager in rural Froid, Montana in the 1980's. The book is about friendship, human failings, and the role that libraries and books played in sustaining the morale of war prisoners and hospital patients as well as those living under German occupation. When Odile gets the job at the ALP, it is a dream come true for her. Her aunt had been bringing her to the library since she was a child and that was where she learned to speak English. Her twin, Remy, is a law student who falls in love with one of Odile's colleagues, the children's libarian, Bitsi. When the Germans draw closer to Paris, Remy enlists, with Bitsi's support, which, for a time, strains the relationship between Odile and Bitsi. Eventually they come to be like sisters, bonded by their mutual love for Remy, who is wounded and imprisoned by the Germans. Odile also befriends the American wife of a British diplomat, who feels lost in a country where she has no friends and does not speak the language. Margaret becomes an indispensable volunteer at the ALP.  Odile is in love with, and eventually engaged to, a police officer, Paul;  one of the main secrets that is not revealed until the very end is why Odile is now living in Montana, the widow of American husband. Odile has kept to herself since her husband's death, but befriends Lily, whose mother has died, and tries to help Lily not make some of the same mistakes that Odile feels she has made. "The answers unspool in this well-plotted and richly populated novel" according to the New York Journal of Books.

Kirkus calls the book "an intelligent and sensuously rich novel of a young woman's coming-of-age." Publishers Weekly says it's "a delightful chronicle of a woman’s life in WWII-era Paris and rural 1980s Montana."

An absolutely must-read is the Author's Note which details what happened to several of the main characters after the war. The author's website also provides some wonderful archival materials to learn more about the actual people who staffed and supported the ALP.

Payback's a Witch

This book by Lana Harper was just pure entertainment. Harper (pseudonymn for Lana Popović) has written several YA witchy novels, but this is her first novel targeted to adults. Emmy Harlow is a witch coming home to fulfill familial obligations in the magical town of Thistle Grove, IL (near Carbondale!!). She has been living in Chicago for the last 9 years, ever since the handsome scion of the Blackmoore family seduced her and then dumped her when they were in high school.  Moving away from the town meant that she eventually lost her magical powers, which emanate from Lady Lake on a hill outside Thistle Grove. The town was founded by four powerful witches, who are also the ancestors of the four magical families that still live there: the Harlows, the Blackmoores, the Thorns, and the Avramovs. Once a generation, the scions from each family--except the Harlows-- come together to compete in a series of magical challenges, the Gauntlet of the Grove. The winning family of the Gauntlet, for which the Harlows have traditionally served as Arbiters and record keepers, not only get the trophy, but accrue greater magic, wealth and influence. The Blackmoores have won so many times that they are now the richest family in town with an entertainment empire pandering to tourists seeking supernatural and horror thrills. The fortunes of the remaining families, especially the Thorns and Avramovs, are waning. Add to that, the  man who broke Emmy's heart, did the same to her best friend Linden Thorn and to the scion of the Avramovs, gorgeously dangerous Talia. Talia and Linden come to Emmy with a proposition; they want to make sure the Blackmoores do not win this tournament. As Arbiter, Emmy cannot be partial, but she can guide them to stay within the Guidelines of the The Grimoire, which controls the behavior of the magical families. Emmy and Talia ignite a passionate sexual relationship as Emmy continues to struggle with whether or not she wants to return to her "real life" in Chicago or re-embrace her magic, her family, her friends, and her home. Some sexually explicit descriptions are included.  

Publishers Weekly calls this "a queer rom-com that bewitches from the very first page...[the]magical joyride manages to feel both vibrantly current and timelessly mystical while avoiding the typical queer rom-com stereotypes."
Kirkus also raves, "the author’s writing shines in the small moments, particularly in the lush language used to capture the enchanting, autumnal atmosphere of quaint Thistle Grove and its supernatural allure. Readers are sure to fall under the magic spell of Thistle Grove and its inhabitants."

We Were Never Here

I read another book by Andrea Bartz, The Herd, and was intrigued by the premise of this one. Once again, Bartz laser focuses in on relationships between women, both of whom come from unhappy or even tragic family situations and have bonded on this basis since they met in college. They are both now in their 30's. Every year since graduating from college, Emily and Kristen have gone back packing to exotic locales. Kristen has moved from Milwaukee to Australia a couple years ago and Emily misses her a lot, so these trips are now a time to reconnect. On a recent trip to Cambodia, Emily hooks up with a guy who attacks her when they get back to her hotel. She is fighting him off when Kristen arrives, bashes him over the head and kills him. They agree to dump the body into a river in order to avoid dealing with the legal system there, but Emily is traumatized and Kristen stays in touch with her every day to help her cope and eventually get back to some semblance of normal life. That is all background. When the book starts, they are traveling to out-of-the-way places in Chile. This time it is Kristen who attracts attention and goes off with a guy. When Emily returns to their hotel, she finds Kristen standing over the dead body of the man and Emily agrees, once again, to skirt the authorities and help get rid of the body. It's Emily who seems most distressed by this death and keeping silent about it, especially with her budding romantic partner, is eating her alive. Kristen decides to move back to Milwaukee but becomes ever more possessive and controlling of Emily. Their relationship deteriorates when Kristen shows Emily a picture of the dead man from Cambodia taken when he and Emily were drinking together. She had promised to destroy all the evidence and it's clear she is using it to threaten Emily. 

Publishers Weekly calls the "book riveting."Kirkus offers a very positive review: "Bartz's latest thriller is full of twists and turns as Emily discovers new things about the friend she thought she knew so well. The dread creeps up slowly on both Emily and the reader as more and more comes to light and the truth slowly reveals itself. Up to the unexpected climax and beyond, Bartz’s writing will keep readers on their toes, questioning everything and looking for hidden meanings in every communication between Emily and Kristen...the overall plot is exhilarating. A slow-burn thriller that gradually suffocates both the protagonist and the reader—in a good way."

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 Talented Miss Farwell

Becky Farwell is good with numbers and so, after her mom is gone, she takes over the accounting for her father's farm machinery business. And she learns how to make a profit. Then she goes to work for her hometown of Pierson, Illinois in the accounting office and works her way up to comptroller. Here, too, she finds a way to make a profit--for herself. This novel by Emily Gray Tedrowe is perhaps an homage to Highsmith's The Talented Mr. Ripley, and also a haunting examination of obsession. For Becky discovers, quite by accident, that she has an eye for art. And, after a rocky start, she uses her ill-gotten gains from embezzling town funds to start buying an art collection. She always intends to make enough money to pay back every penny--her justification for siphoning off the much needed funds for maintaining the town's infrastructure. As with many obsessions, however, nothing is ever enough. She barely manages to survive the financial recession that renders her collection worth less than she paid for it and comes roaring back, moving into the New York market and making even more money. She remodels her father's old barn into a high tech art gallery that no one ever sees, where she stores her growing and constantly evolving collection. But we all know it must come tumbling down one day. When the town finds out that the woman they had admired for years is the worst kind of betrayer, they think her best friend must have been in on the scheme all along. This book is partly inspired by the true story of a woman who stole over $50 million from her small Illinois town. Publishers' Weekly gave this a starred review, concluding that her "unusual plot and Tedrowe’s spirited execution of it make this one sing."Although I did sort of marvel at Becky's ability to keep so many balls in the air, I never really liked her and I only kept reading because I really wanted to know how it turned out.

Survivor Song

This only slightly speculative thriller by Paul Tremblay takes place in contemporary Massachusetts, which is under quarantine due to the outbreak of a particularly virulent varient of rabies. Rather than dying in days or weeks, symptoms--loss of mental capacities, aggressive biting behavior, and death--occur within hours. When the husband of 8-months-pregnant Natalie returns from a fraught trip for groceries, an infected neighbor attacks them; Paul is killed and Natalie is bitten before she fatally stabs the crazed man. Natalie turns for help to her oldest and closest friend, pediatrician Ramola Sherman. Fighting panicking people who jam the road to the hospital, Ramola gets Natalie to a hospital for a vaccination, but it's not clear whether they made it before the virus has reached Natalie's brain. When an attempt to evacuate Natalie to a maternity hospital for delivery is thwarted by more infected victims storming the hospital, Ramola begins a desperate attempt to get Natalie to safety. The tension comes from the numerous obstacles they face--infected animals and people attacking them, roving armed bands of militia--as well as the uncertainty about Natalie's and her unborn child's future. Obviously a somewhat hyperbolic scenario of what we are currently facing with the COVID pandemic is depicted in the hysteria and violent reactions of the population. A fast read with well developed characters. All but the last chapter of the book takes place in the mere span of a few hours, and you know how it will end because the author warns you ahead of time. But it's a compelling ride.

NPR concludes their review by saying, "Survivor Song is a small horror story. A personal one. A fast and terrible one that is committed beautifully to the page. It goes on, piling banal complication on top of the awful terror of time running out, and crushes you in the most surprising of ways — with a look, a line, a touch, a memory, an inevitability that you saw coming from page 1. It exists in a pandemic world where all choices are bad ones. Where things unravel faster than you can possibly believe. Where happy endings are transactional: they come with a cost. Because Survivor Song isn't a fairy tale. It's a horror story."

The NYT notes the prescience of the author  writing something that sounds remarkably like our current situation: “In the coming days,” the narrator tells us, “conditions will continue to deteriorate. Emergency services and other public safety nets will be stretched to their breaking points, exacerbated by the wily antagonists of fear, panic, misinformation; a myopic, sluggish federal bureaucracy further hamstrung by a president unwilling and woefully unequipped to make the rational, science-based decisions necessary; and exacerbated, of course, by plain old individual everyday evil.”

 

The Golden Cage

Prolific writer of psychological thrillers, Camilla Lackberg is a new author for me. She might better have titled this book Revenge for it spends the first half of the book making the case for why the protagonist Faye so elaborately executes in the second half of the book.

We are constantly getting dark hints about Faye's upbringing in a small town as the daughter of a poor family. We learn her brother committed suicide, her mother is dead, and her father is in jail. She can't get out of town fast enough when her father goes to jail. She heads to the place she's always dreamed of, Stockholm, and proceeds to leave her past behind, or does she. She gets into the prestigious Stockholm School of Economics, where she excels. But when she meets and then marries her exact opposite, a man born with a silver spoon in his mouth, she drops out of school to support him and a friend in starting their own business. With Faye's excellent guidance, the business grows beyond their wildest imagining they become wealthy and then become parents of a daughter. But husband Jack becomes increasingly distant, shutting Faye out of all involvement with the business. And then she comes home unexpectedly to find him with another woman. In spite of her seminal role in the business's success, he cuts her off without a penny. 

You'll probably begin to guess how things turn out early on, but won't know the full extent of Faye's machinations until the very end. The Washington Post notes, "the lure of The Golden Cage lies in the moral ambiguity of its heroine..."  Reviewer Maureen Corrigan goes on to observe that Lackberg's prose, at least in translation, is not particularly elegant. And, in fact, I often found her writing, even of the sex scenes, boring. But you will certainly want to find out how Faye gets payback. The New York Times offers a favorable review with more detail about plot and character. Kirkus calls this "A deliciously inventive thriller brimming with sex, secrets, and scandal." And Publishers' Weekly gushes, "The poignant insights into women’s capacity for self-sacrifice, multidimensional characterizations, and celebration of female ingenuity will resonate with many. Läckberg reinforces her position as the thriller queen of Scandinavia." I wouldn't turn down another of her books if offered, but I wouldn't bother seeking one out either, so I guess that puts me in the minority.