⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I remember reading Ray Bradbury as a kid and being totally captivated. That rush of immediate childish wonder - of starry nights and worlds out there to be discovered - and lurking in the sidelines, the terror of the unknown, the darkly magical, and just what could be out…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Devastating in its quiet truth, “Brother” is a book about love, about hope, about wanting the best for your family and the future, and the insurmountable odds that may make the ordinary, the safe, and the comfortable completely out of reach. Michael and his brother, Francis, live with their…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ What a hoot! “Dragon(e) Baby Gone” is a side-splitting, rollicking ride of urban fantasy mayhem - a glimpse into a world where illegal magic can at best be loosely controlled as “extra-planar” creatures, teeming with malevolence and greed, and aided by extraordinary powers, seep across the earthly planar divide…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 I am a fast reader. It will typically take me a day, perhaps two, to read a book, obsessively finding the time to squeeze in more reading for a book that I am particularly enjoying. This book, “The Ballerinas”, broke my pattern apart. Hooking me from the very…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Meticulously researched, “October Storms” tells the tale of Louise Hawkes, a young woman living in central Illinois in 1897, with her two young children, Randall and Becca. The history of the time period comes alive beautifully in the author’s carefully detailed descriptions of the hardships, lifestyle, and communities that…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Easily one of my all-time favorite detective series, Book 11 in the Simon Serrailler series, “A Change in Circumstance” is every bit as wonderfully engaging as its precedents. Detective Chief Superintendent Simon Serrailler, a complex man who is something of an emotional enigma, has an exceptionally close relationship with…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 Fascinating and heart-breaking, this wonderful immersive look at the true-life experiences of a gypsy gospel child, raised in the deeply restrictive Pentecostal faith by ordained pastor parents, both of them musically talented, who practice their faith primarily through the participation and organization of traveling musical revivals that celebrate…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️+ Devastating and brilliant, I read this book heart-first: caught up in the mystery of grief, love, loss and yearning and their impact so primal that it causes us to act in ways we arguably have no absolute control over at all. The story is told in two voices: Nell,…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ The gang is back - the second in the series featuring Clay Wolfe, Professional Investigator (because that happens to be what they call it in Maine); his partner, the beautiful and extremely capable Baylee; retired octogenarian and solicitor Gene, who also happens to be Clay’s Grandpops; and a posse…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “He hadn’t planned to say this thing, but it came upon him suddenly gargantuan and magnificent, like a whale breaching the glittering surface of the sea. “ Delicately laced with story intertwined with story, so authentic they appear to burst forth as if with a will of their own,…