⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 With a story-telling style (and hints of magic) reminiscent of Ray Bradbury, and populated by darkly flat-affect characters straight out of Patricia Highsmith, this set of short stories is interesting, unusual and intriguingly compelling. Each of the stories features a story spun around a main protagonist (and in…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ With an interesting (and very socially intermingled) cast of police characters, this Scottish crime book, the first of the new DC Jane Renwick series, is off to an intriguing start. Part procedural police mystery, and part what-do-police-officers-do-in-their-social-lives, this story begins with a emotional wallop and the psychological suspense never…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ “You give up traditions at your peril. One day you’ll look back and not remember who you are.” Imagine it’s 1909, and you, a Jewish teen accompanied by your family, survivors of the Russian revolution at a terrible cost, land in NYC to begin a new life. And so…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 What happens when a life-time of learned defenses suddenly stop working? This is a story about revenge, misogyny, rage and the sort of evil that keeps you awake at night. But at the heart of it, this is really a story about love. About guilt. And most of…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 Inspired by true events beginning in 1944, and populated with characters who are composites of real-life heroes and villains, this meticulously researched and wonderfully evocative novel is WWII at its most chilling. With WWII instead of the Cold War fueling the fear and desperation-driven machinery of war-time counter-intelligence…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Spellbinding. Poignant. Inspirational. Brimming with the naturalism of Barbara Kingsolver and the authenticity of Anne Tyler, this book reached and filled a Covid-fueled paucity I wasn’t fully aware of. “What was there to be afraid of in this place where everything was as you saw it - naked and…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 Historical fiction at its absolute best. This fascinating foray into the beginnings of the Scottish Reformation tells the fictional tale of Bethia and her brother Will, children of a wealthy merchant who are caught up in the activities surrounding the historical seizure of St. Andrews castle and the…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1/2 “It was impossible to tell a pauper from a prince in this city”. Jamie Buckby, the narrator of our story, is a strange and unsettling character. A self-proclaimed provocateur, Jamie is arrogant, his humor skirting a definite edge, his relationship with his long-time lover Clare shuttered and cautious.…
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ A mind-blowing, insightful, and transformative look at what we want; why we want it; and what we can do to want more, or less, or want differently. The main theme provided by the author is that the vast majority of us live our lives wanting the things, (behaviors, lifestyles,…