While I very much enjoyed this book, anyone uncomfortable with lesbian/gay love affairs and sexual situations might not. The dialogue reminded me of Hemingway and the settings were described so beautifully as to make me fall in love with Italy. The rich descriptions of the artwork had me looking up pieces online to view them so critical were they to the story. I did find the book a bit challenging to read at times. It started off strong, then felt a bit muddled until the story hit its stride about page 100 and then the characters really grabbed my heart. The last 50 pages were struggle for me. I approached them eagerly, thinking they would be as well woven and interesting as the previous pages. Unfortunately, I did not find that to be the case. The last chapter seemed forced, out of place, awkward. It felt as if the author had more to say and never wove these details into the body of the story and just tacked them on at the end. This section pulled the emphasis away from what she built over 300(?) or so pages and left me unsatisfied. However, the bulk of the book was a beautiful story. I would have rated it much higher without the last clumsy chapter and much lower if not for the main section of the book and the beautiful writing.

I enjoyed The Gifts, it pulled me quickly into the Victorian era and spun a story from which I could not disentangle myself. The Gifts speaks to the power of women to chart their own destiny in the face of societal norms and oppression and despite the established entitlement of men. It celebrates the intelligence and resiliency of women and the added strength we can find when women help each other. Those who enjoy historical fiction with an added touch of magic will be enthralled. I would recommend The Gift for book clubs, as there are many nuances to discuss. Those who enjoy reading books where women are not ancillary to the plot but fully developed, interesting, characters would also enjoy this book.

Two Feathers is a young Cherokee horse rider who is at the center of the story. The setting is the 1920s at the Glendale Park Zoo. Verble’s skillful depiction of the Park Zoo creates a mesmerizing backdrop on which to parade her characters. The Park Zoo itself becomes a part of the story, from the catalpa tree to the buffalo pens the Park is a living entity. The animals, performers, employees and zoo keepers all serve to enrich the story. When Two Feathers Fell From the Sky is a story of friendship, romance, murder and mysticism. There are ghosts that visit the park and they too have a vital role to play. This is also a story of race and class and of a time where boundaries were firmly set . However, Verble provides a glimmer of hope for shifting viewpoints as she provides her lessons in history. I really enjoyed this book and would love to read more about Two Feathers and her adventures.

These Toxic Things has such a clever premise that I dove right into it. However, by the halfway mark I had figured out most of the plot and more importantly I was sick of the main character. Mickie Lambert constantly borrows and stains her mom’s clothes. She drives a hand me down Mercedes because she wrecked her dad’s car, so mom
and dad bought another car and gave her the Mercedes. . She lives in a garage apartment behind her parent’s house. She has received threatening notes, and texts and has been followed but she just can’t remember to set her alarm system. She quit a good job working at her dad’s company to join a start up
company her new boyfriend runs. Her new job requires her to photograph objects and type in details with a bit of research. It takes her days and days to accomplish anything. She only works a few hours a day before running out to party with her friends. The story takes a long time to get moving and it almost bored me to death. The best parts center around Beautiful Things , the curio shop and it is here that the book shines. Unfortunately, too much time is spent with Mickie and her drama and her whining and dining ( pun intended) . There were plot maneuvers that annoyed me such as days and days of rain in LA to prolong the construction of a fence. I loved the premise , the set up was so clever and many of the characters were really interesting but Mickie Lambert needs a rewrite. She’s too annoying and immature by half.

Henkin created characters and a storyline that will follow you long after you turn the last page. This is not a flashy story. It is a story that seems filled wth real people who are dealing with the seemingly random unfairness of life as best they can. Morningside Heights delves into the complexities of relationships and shows how an illness of one family member impacts every family member. The characters are not tidy and neither are their lives; they are messy and at times they flail through the story. However, these characters are so well written that I wonder, when many years pass, and I am old , if while remembering this story I will mistakenly believe that I knew them.

This is a quiet book. The story of a single mother’s struggle to be a good parent while dealing with poverty and limited resources. It reminds us of the importance of community and belonging. It asks the reader to define the meaning of home and explore what it means to have a home and be at home.

While the descriptions of the native beauty of the U.P. are spellbinding, more striking are the searing descriptions of the poverty in the region. The glaring juxtaposition of the local residents’ poverty to the wealth of the tourists is jarring.

Airgood skillfully takes the pulse of her readers by allowing characters to voice opinions with which many readers may agree. This provides a cathartic moment and then she steps back and allows the story to quietly flow forward.

Tin Camp Road is full of real characters whose stories will capture not just your interest but your heart.

Reading Candlish’s The Other Passenger is comparable to watching a long far off train making its way to a collapsed trestle over a 1,000 ft drop, you know disaster is coming but you are powerless to stop it. There are twists within twists and an ending worth the wait. There were times in the last two hundred pages where I stopped to catch my breath, wishing the end would come sooner, almost as if I just couldn’t take the stress of the process anymore and I had to know the outcome that second. The pacing reminded me of the steady slow single drip from a rooftop after a lull in the rain, then proceeding to a faster drip as the rain picks up and culminating in a full torrent as the storm blows in. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys being held in suspense.

In All The Little Hopes Leah Weiss uses historical fiction as the vehicle for an engaging coming of age story. She deftly weaves the themes of friendship, home, family, acceptance, forgiveness, belonging, and justice in a story set in rural North Carolina during WWII. From a tobacco farm to the forests near Mount Mitchell this story is rich and compelling and filled with characters from whom it is impossible to remain detached.
WWII, a local POW camp filled with Germans, a mystery of missing men, the tragedy of sacrifice and loss, the power of words, both spoken and left unsaid, and an undercurrent of spiritualism fill the story with sumptuous layers to explore and enjoy.

Of Woman and Salt is a series of stories that graphically depicts the struggles of women and their daughters against the brutalities of men and society and there is little subtlety. It spans 1866-2019 and bounces back and forth throughout the book. There are several characters in the story and I found some more compelling than others and I labored at times to wade through the other vignettes. I use the term “ vignette” intentionally as some of the best characters are presented in small, vibrant, memorable sketch like chapters. I lost interest in Jeanette and did not find much of her narrative as gripping as others in the book, unfortunately, her story is the most developed. I would have enjoyed a broader portrait of Maria Isabel, Dolores, and Carmen. I often found it distracting and awkward to keep track of the time period, other authors used this technique with more skill. Rita Woods, in Remembrance, floats back and forth throughout time but does it seamlessly.
The writing in Of Women and Salt varies. Gloria’s section reads in an almost free flowing poetic style, while other sections are written in a more traditional format. The links between the characters seems forced and Garcia didn’t develop the stories enough to make the women as knowable as I would have liked. I felt very unsatisfied when I finished the book. Many of the “secrets” never really erupted to the characters, and only the reader is privy to them and so there is no denouement, no grand awakening or reveal and therefore no transition in many of the relationships. There were too many tantalizing strings left not pulled.
Of Women and Salt provides starting points for discussion, particularly of the crisis at our border, and that may be it’s strongest attribute. For me it was more a series of vignettes strung together in a tenuous connection that left me wanting more than 204 pages could provide.

Thank you to BrookBrowse for providing me with an ARC of The Narrowboat Summer. I had eagerly awaited this book as I had so enjoyed Anne Youngson's Meet me At The Museum. Fans of that book may be disappointed, as this book did not meet my expectations. In her new novel Ms. Youngson offers a view of life traveling the canals of England. The story revolves around the accidental meeting and blossoming friendship of three women who are all faced with pivotal moments in their lives offering a chance for introspection and growth. There are some lovely telling scenes and some notable quotes but the most fully developed character in the book is the canal and while its descriptions are lyrical and detailed the characters while initially interesting often come across as inauthentic, flat and difficult to know. For example, a woman who worked in a male dominated field and is the only woman on the top floor laments that she feels sorry for men. She criticizes " the idea of diversity, the constant challenges to the notion that being a man required and even mandated certain patterns of behavior, they were instead of liberated, cast into a darkness where the rules were not yet clear enough for them to be sure they had read and interpreted them correctly ." This did not mesh with the image of a woman who has worked hard to be successful in a male dominated profession, and it seemed too forced and weirdly placed. Other characters while perhaps more believable, were unfortunately, not fully developed and this coupled with an abrupt ending left me unsatisfied. I wanted to know more about Sally than just a few cliché revelations, there seemed to be so much more to her than just the glimpses we were given. The Narrowboat Summer offered such an interesting setting and premise but the lovely, lingering and vivid, details were all about the setting- the canal, the boats, the landscape while the characters remained in the background as fuzzy objects in black and white.

This book is composed of brain burning, gasp inducing scenes that will stay with you forever. One day in Paris, four main characters, mystery upon mystery and it all unwinds and just when you think it's over,,,, it really isn't.
The Paris Hours is not a long book but it packs one heck of a punch. The writing is beautiful and thought provoking. Humans are human no matter where they are from, where they live, or their station in life. Their paths often intersect as do their secrets, sometimes with disastrous results.

As a fan of gothic mysteries I was excited to receive a copy of Catharine House. Unfortunately, a nominal plot is surrounded by sparse character development, silly dialogue, and repetitive descriptions. The main character although more fully developed than the others was unlikable. The use of stereotypical characteristics to make her appear as edgy as possible was overdone. Her behavior in several instances did not align with someone who was portrayed as being a somewhat savvy survivor. While the back story of any resident of Catherine House was forbidden, the inability to know the characters was a liability to the reader. The lack of character development prevented me from having any connection to them, and therefore, I had little interest in what happened to them. Thomas spent an inordinate amount of words describing the dusty chandeliers, creaky doors, broken windows, flocked wallpaper and the worn velvet on the chairs. While this aided in creating the gothic setting it is a shame she didn't provide her characters with such detailed treatment.

As I read I felt I was trudging through a sludge of sex, alcohol and stupidity with a group of teens and twenty somethings who were so vacuous I could barely tolerate reading about them. Perhaps I am not the target audience for this book as I am an adult with a college degree and a college student of my own, however, my college senior read it also and decided not to finish it.

The gratuitous revelations of various and constant sexual liaisons, as well as scenes that seemed meant to shock the reader were boring and silly. If you removed all the repetitive references to drinking, having sex, sleeping and the constant refrain of "smelled of sweat" , this 309 page book would be reduced less than 200 pages. Removing all the superfluous descriptions of the house and grounds and you're left with a 100 page predictable, low interest mystery. I wasn't thrilled, engrossed or frightened , but I was bored beyond belief.

Having read The Readers Of Broken Wheel Recommend, I was eager to read The Pine Away Motel and Cabins. However, this book was more than I expected and when I finished it I wasn't left with a feel good residue. While the story traffics in lost love, missed chances, second chances and friendship, it is also a darker exposé on the treatment of the LGBTQ community by a group of Evangelical Christians in small town Oregon. It is a well written story with some uplifting and amusing moments but there are also many ugly and depressing scenes that play out as the storyline unfolds. This tension in the story provides opportunities for meaningful discussions in book groups and separates it from typical light-hearted fare. Bivald's characters are well drawn and some of them provided comic relief and much needed warmth. Others I despised so much I hoped for retribution or a magical transformation and was disappointed when neither happened. This allegiance to reality elevates this book from a mere candy coated snack to a full course meal. There are existential questions that permeate the story and engaged readers will find themselves ruminating over these days after they finish reading. This isn't a feel good, fairy-tale book, in places it is a sad depiction of reality. On page 197, Henry is speaking about illusions and says, "...but life takes them away from us one at a time." This is part of a telling passage concerning illusions which is a major theme in the book. Like life, this book takes away our illusions one at a time.

The Big Finish surprised me. I thought I knew where the story was going but it took me so many places I didn't expect to go. I read this book quickly as I was immediately moved from the role of passive reader to involved reader by the laugh out loud dialogue. I soon learned that beneath this snappy dialogue ran a poignant shadow that dogs the characters from beginning to end. Fossey's characters are richly drawn, so human in their failures and goodness that you will care deeply about them and you will skip to the last page to see if they get the gentle landing they deserve. I was so drawn into the story and invested in the outcome that I did indeed sneak a peek at the ending. Fossey has managed to write a book that has elderly people in it, that deals with aging and all the sadness and loss that entails and yet somehow the book is not a depressing book, it is a funny, hope filled, and life affirming read. I enjoyed The Big Finish very much, it is a truly good story and I found many great topics that would be perfect for my book club discussion. In short, The Big Finish is an uplifting book with a character driven story. It is a story about growth, goodness, pain and aging and what lays beyond us all.

Inland captivated me from the beginning. It is that rare story, one that once I reached the end I wanted to go back to the beginning and start again. There are so many pieces that Obreht provides that lay there waiting, and yet somehow are carried along within the writing, some barely noticed until almost silently they click one by one into place. The story is taut and I had the feeling as I was reading that I was watching a locomotive racing toward a herd of sheep on a track and no way to stop it. I couldn't wait to finish but was forced to read the last 40 pages in small fits and starts as the tension was crushing. Secrets play a role in the story and choices can have far reaching impacts. There is unleashed fury in the book and reality of the consequences of choice. This is a tightly written story with a small but very distinctive cast. The harsh landscape is a key player in the book and Obreht is such a skilled writer you can feel the parching of your throat and I found myself reading with a glass of water by my side. Nora, the frontierswoman and a key character is multi layered, in fact, there isn't a simplistic character in the entire book. Inland is a western but it is also a story about the search for and need for a home and the strength and courage within us to overcome even the worst days and move forward while carrying those horrible experiences with us.

I loved this novel. It is funny, so funny I laughed out loud. It accurately and lovingly reflects how music truly entrances and collects musicians even before they become musicians. It is also brutally honest about musical prodigies, success and failure, dreams and reality. It is unpredictable and weaves a mystery, both past and present in an atmosphere that is ordinary yet chillingly creepy. It is also a coming of age story with characters so fully developed they rise off the page and follow you from room to room, leaving you to wonder of their futures beyond the book. Its mystery takes actions of the past and rolls them into the future almost like the skipping needle on an old record, turning endlessly then bumped into the next track dragging that skidding noise along with it.