The Rot is a YA fantasy story that reads like a Norse myth. The story combines fantasy with a young adult love story in the classic hero’s quest. The protagonist is Hirka, a now-sixteen-year-old girl, who is different from everyone else she knows: she was born without...
The Final Strife by Saara El-Arifi is an amazing fantasy/fiction/scifi novel that is the first in a trilogy. This first book is an exciting read for many reasons. The world-building is excellent. A lot of time is spent delineating the various racial groups that...
A Bride’s Guide to Marriage and Murder is the fifth in the entertaining Countess of Harleigh cozy mystery series in which readers follow both the exploits of the heroine, Frances, the Countess of Harleigh (an American bride) and her romance with George Hazelton, her...
I finished The Actual Star a couple of days ago and have had to consider how to write this review. I definitely have a love-hate relationship with this book. It was not an easy read; however, I found it fascinating and thought-provoking, enough so that I discussed it...
The first book in this series, Our Child of the Stars, lingered on my Kindle for far too long. Having read it and loved it, I wasted no time devouring its sequel, Our Child of Two Worlds. Like its predecessor, it is a gem of a book, an underlying quiet, emotional...
The Lava Witch, by Debra Bokur, is the third in the Dark Paradise Mystery Series, but it reads well as a standalone novel. I like it enough to consider going back and reading #1 and #2. There are enough hints as to the background of Kali Māhoe, a detective with the...
The Midcoast, Adam White’s debut novel, is a small town with dark secrets family saga. He tells the story of Andrew, who as a teenager, worked for Ed Thatch, a down-and-out lobsterman. Andrew leaves for college. Later as a coach and teacher, he and his family return...
Gail Meath brings a legendary Spanish woman to life in this historical women’s fiction, Agustina de Aragón. The novel is based on the life of Agustina Raimunda Maria Saragossa, the Spanish Joan of Arc. The novel appears well-researched and to accurately depict the...
The Memory Keeper of Kyiv is the second book I’ve read recently (the other being The Doctor's Daughter by Shari J. Ryan) dealing with genocide. The Memory Keeper is particularly apt these days as Putin invades the Ukraine. The Memory Keeper deals with Holodomor, the...
In the current surge of books written about the Post-Impressionist painter, Vincent Willem Van Gogh, author Debby Beece presents a somewhat unique view. She writes of the triad formed by Van Gogh himself, his brother Theo, and Johanna, Theo’s wife, seen primarily from...
Elektra follows three different women through the Trojan War. First are Clytemnestra and Elektra herself, a mother-daughter duo that demonstrates the tragic interconnection between their fates. Cassandra, the “mad” daughter of King Priam and his wife, Hecuba, is...
The Doctor’s Daughter is World War II fiction at its best. It shows how families can be divided by war and by political beliefs—and even misconceptions. The point of view alternates between the two protagonists, Sofia Amsler and Isaac Cohen, though Sofia's story...
I started out not liking Optic Nerve, an “autofiction” book, feeling it read as the rather self-indulgent memoir of a neurotic woman. However, I soon changed my mind. The author, María Gainza, is an Argentine art critic, and her insights into herself and the paintings...
Rewrite the Stars is about a failing marriage—one that is complicated by the husband’s post-Afghanistan PTSD. Sadie and Theo are watching their true love and dream marriage dissolve, and they must decide whether to give up or dig in and retrench. Sadie, a working...
Truth and Other Lies is an impressive debut. Author Maggie Smith juggles two genres (coming-of-age and mystery), three nuanced female characters, and multiple difficult topics. The youngest of the three women, Megan Barnes, returns to Chicago after losing her job and...
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