 |
Book
Reviews, Book Lover Resources, Advice for Writers and Publishers |
| Home / California Bookwatch |
California Bookwatch
Table of Contents
Reviewer's Choice
21st Century Paradigm Shift
Carol E. Leutner
MegaShift Publishing
9798218585556, $3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/21st-Century-Paradigm-Shift-Thrive-ebook/dp/B0DTZQ5X8B
Carol E. Leutner's 21st Century Paradigm Shift offers a powerful twist on the idea "Everything is a brand," linking discussions of Newtonian and quantum physics with the observation that capitalism's paradigm is not set in stone, but can be shifted to redirect human nature.
The greed commonly associated with capitalism need not become humanity's lasting legacy to the world.
A broader understanding of such paradigms is required for survival and adaptation -- thus the cross-disciplinary connections presented in Leutner's book are not just thought-provoking, but essential reading, because we are all caught in a paradigm.
First, it should be noted that while 21st Century Paradigm Shift: What It Is and How to Thrive In It offers a blueprint for surviving modern social, political, and economic shifts, this doesn't translate to the book's pat categorization -- or easy adaptation.
It analyzes a myriad of weighty problems that demand revised thought processes: "The Newtonian paradigm through which we view reality and future options does not provide an escape hatch from this pressing dilemma. One reasonable response is to change the paradigm not because it is moral, in our self-interest, or necessary for our survival. No, we need a new paradigm that changes the narrative about who we are as homo sapiens in the natural world..."
A revised paradigm built on quantum physics can help us do this. Scientific discoveries have proven that reality is fundamentally multi-dimensional, relational and that the observer influences outcomes. These three principles of quantum physics create a new frame work for understanding the linked and existential crisis of our time and Leutner applies them throughout her analysis.
Leutner's review of economic, scientific, and philosophical disciplines could reach non-academic readers, but will especially attract and enlighten academics with backgrounds in science, math, or history. Such audiences will more easily accept that science, itself, is a paradigm whose model is subject to fluctuation and interpretation. Discussions unleash a "torrent of controversy, doubt, and backlash" about ancient to modern history, revising inherent European-centric prejudices as new perspectives are gleaned from cultures around the world.
Contrasts between different ways of viewing intersections between science, economics, and history require of readers an interest in such thinkers as early economist Adam Smith, who is among those portrayed in a different light: "...the human characteristic of self-interest not only drove economic movement like gravity drove the planets, but it also fit with the second Newtonian precept. Nature can be unraveled by breaking it into its smallest indivisible unit. For scientists, the atom was the basis for experimentation and analysis. For Smith, the smallest unit was an economic man, who could be measured as a unit of toil and even substituted for a unit of capital."
Leutner probes the roots of present-day social, political, and scientific crises, considers the threat of too-fast technological changes, and then explores their incarnation in daily life and social systems.
This encourages dialogues between readers and thinkers who would better understand their subconscious emotional reactions to modern events: "We are deeply worried and confused because we no longer know whom to trust or what to believe. Is the future being written without us?" What will it take to survive the future? Rewrite old paradigms to evolve better paths and sustainable alternatives not just for mankind, but the planet. How is change recognized and then enacted? Via writings like this. "We see ourselves as globally connected," Leutner writes. But not necessarily species-connected, she adds: "We don't see ourselves connected globally as one species, where trust and cooperation are needed to survive."
Keys to survival and transformation are clearly outlined, linking disparate issues such as climate change to loftier paradigm analysis: "Unless everyone urgently participates in correcting the climate trajectory, humanity's future is bleak. Separating humans from nature was perhaps the scientific paradigm's greatest metaphysical flaw."
21st Century Paradigm Shift thus serves as a historical revision, a deep reflection, and a call to action that will prove particularly thought-provoking for college-level group discussions: "Do the actors understand that they have the power and responsibility to create an economic playing field that is respectful, balanced, and sustainable -- one that Mother Nature would approve of?"
Librarians interested in surveys that link paradigm shifts of the past to what is happening now (particularly books packed with material suitable for contemplation and debate) will find 21st Century Paradigm Shift highly recommendable to a broad audience. Leutner's wide-ranging survey of how humanity got to where it is today and the possible paths it can choose for its future creates a scholarly yet accessible, thought-provoking read.
21st Century Paradigm Shift should be on the reading lists and bookshelves of anyone interested in long-term adaptation strategies and the far-ranging consequences of consumer, political, lifestyle, and economic decisions.
More so than most books connecting science, philosophy, economics, and history, 21st Century Paradigm Shift encapsulates important, eye-opening revelations: "...the capitalist economic system that dominates the planet today... is constructed on a Newtonian view of reality that the universe operates as a machine and is knowable through mathematical calculation. Centuries of applying this metaphysical worldview to economic relationships has corrupted moral and humanitarian values once considered sacrosanct. For example, almost all new SUVs are advertised as a form of escape, and escape brings joy. Home warranty protection is promoted as a warran-chi, like in tai chi. Insurance takes on a spiritual quality. Connect the dots - all of life, from toilet paper to happiness, has been reduced to a commodity. Everything is a brand."
The Music Shelf
A Guide to Jazz in Japan
Michael Pronko
Raked Gravel Press
9781942410379, $19.99 Paperback/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Guide-Jazz-Japan-Michael-Pronko/dp/B0F5NJDLX2
A Guide to Jazz in Japan explores the vibrant jazz scene in Japan, reviewing over forty clubs and hundreds of musicians to capture the influences, history, nuances, and atmosphere of jazz music in Japan.
While some may think this guide would be perfect for destination travelers who love jazz (and, it is!), a bonus lies in how Michael Pronko weaves jazz notes with an overall history of music culture in Japan to create observations and insights unavailable elsewhere.
One example lies in the contrasts between neighborhood jazz clubs which are mainstays of the Tokyo and Yokohama jazz scene and more corporate, business atmospheres whose jazz is equally powerful but presented quite differently.
Pronko's personal love of his subject is evident in how he describes these experiences in a manner that brings to life not just the jazz music, but the atmosphere purposely cultivated to support and present it: "These small clubs are usually run by jazz fanatics, so they give top priority to the music, but also to providing an intimate human experience with the music. No club owner is in it for the money, but these neighborhood clubs are hives of friendship, interaction, and devotion to music. They are clubs in the sense of being a collection of like-minded individuals, as much as a space to hear music."
Contrast this with the section on 'Corporate-International' clubs and how they achieve their goals of presenting top-quality jazz music under very different conditions: "The clubs in this section have nothing particularly Japanese about them. You can reserve, order, and pay in English. Their websites are translated perfectly into English. If you were blindfolded and dropped into one of them, you wouldn't know what country you were in. That sounds critical, but because of their large scale and corporate stature, they bring in world-class music and present it in near-perfect conditions. You can see most of their monthly lineup at any other similar club in any city around the world. And yet, it still feels Japanese."
Readers receive more than a travel guide's usual outline of places to go and things to see. Through Pronko's eyes, they get to experience the options and shifting atmospheres of Japan's jazz scene in an intimate, revealing way that eludes most traditional music guides.
Another plus lies in how Pronko covers the changing history of these areas and jazz music presentation in general, weaving these observations into the overall jazz and cultural scene in a way that will satisfy historians as well as those seeking a music guidebook: "When Japan's economy moved into the so-called bubble years of the 1980s, jazz clubs were often a place for socializing in the evenings. With land prices and the stock market soaring, company expense accounts were generous, and salarymen used them for entertaining clients, often lavishly. Living here and going to hear jazz in the late 1980s, I was always a bit startled by salarymen spending their evenings at jazz clubs. Drinks flowed freely, and that was after dinner and before more drinks before catching the last train home. Jazz clubs proliferated, with many offering a "bottle keep" system, where customers could buy a bottle of whiskey from the club, write their name on it, and then buy ice and mixers each time they came. That kept customers coming back and kept the jazz clubs full."
The result goes beyond suggesting clubs and venues to visit. It integrates jazz music into Japanese culture so seamlessly that jazz aficionados who must remain at home will still feel and enjoy the currents and climates of Japan as it represents and experiences music. Filled with the specific places and their access information that makes for a perfect guidebook and paired with the cultural insights of how jazz and Japan interact to create engrossingly creative music,
A Guide to Jazz in Japan is very highly recommended. It will reach libraries seeking Japanese travel guides and jazz music explorations, patrons and readers looking for both destination and armchair reads, and historians interested in absorbing the nuances of jazz over the decades of its appearance in and support by Japanese culture. Riveting, personal, informative, and practical, A Guide to Jazz in Japan is everything a guidebook, history, and music celebration should be.
The Biography/Memoir Shelf
Brotherton's Travels: Memoirs
Greg Boyd
Coyote Arts
www.coyote-arts.com
9781587750540, $34.95
https://www.amazon.com/Brothertons-Travels-Memoirs-Greg-Boyd-ebook/dp/B0F5LRPC9R
Brotherton's Travels: Memoirs will appeal to readers of memoirs, adventure travel, and philosophical reflection alike. It presents a thoroughly engrossing account steeped in facets that move from DIY asylums to paradise, creating sweeping stories that can't help but be a draw.
Greg Boyd embeds his memoir with a lively, descriptive, confessional, experiential tone that draws from its opening lines: "Call me Brotherton. It's how I sometimes think of myself. He's my double, my alter-ego, a character who sometimes appears in my books. A silent film comedian, a sleight of hand huckster, a failed artist, a literary trickster, he surfaces under various guises and names: George Body, Edouard Jouvret, Aristide Nambuli, and, of course, Brotherton. Yet despite these fictions, Brotherton really does exist, albeit as a family history lost to deception several generations ago. It's complicated, but what I'm trying to say is that while Brotherton is not my name, it could or even should have been."
The flowing story moves from this confessional to flashbacks about childhood, growth, literary education and connections, and various incarnations of other Greg Boyds which become associated with his life in unexpected ways. The romp through his life and literary evolution moves into forays into the worlds of book publishing and teaching as he makes mistakes, chooses new paths in his career, and moves within and outside of civilization, both unintentionally and purposely: "Though dangerous to walk alone in the wilderness, it felt good to get away from civilization. Coming home again made me appreciate the love and companionship I sometimes took for granted, as well as the comfortable life I had."
The diversity of these journeys and self inspections enhance a free-flowing memoir format that moves back and forth in time, grasping different incarnations of Greg Boyd and his alter ego, Brotherton. Cross-cultural encounters prove particularly enlightening reading: "When people in Spain talk to me about the United States, they generally view it as a progressive and moderate society. Like most American citizens, Spaniards seem to know more about our myth-making than our actual history. Consequently, they don't understand much about our politics. Though we hate to admit it, the United States of America has a history of institutionalized racism, intolerance based on twisted religious beliefs, gun violence, and political corruption fueled by greed and irresponsible, under-regulated capitalism. Those influences continue to deeply affect and undermine our society. Unless we face the past honestly and commit to change, the United States will never escape the toxic legacy of "The Lost Cause."
His travels overlay marriage, medical conundrums, family-rearing, and more, immersing readers in different journeys through absurdity, cultural ironies, and counterculture encounters. Libraries and readers appreciative of a wide-ranging journey that takes the time to explore how literary and social roots develop from unexpected encounters will appreciate the diversity of Brotherton's Travels: Memoirs. It thoroughly reflects the challenges and conclusions of a soul raised in New York state who becomes immersed in 1970s Southern California culture.
Packed with eye-opening moments, Brotherton's Travels: Memoirs is a highly recommended winner for libraries adding to travelogue and biography collections, as well as book clubs looking for vivid, exciting writing.
From the South Side
Larry Klimas and Anthony F. Siciliano
Independently Published
9798862509878, $39.99 Hardcover/$14.99 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/South-Side-memoir-Larry-Klimas/dp/B0CJXDKMQC
From the South Side is a memoir of growing up to become a musician -- but embedded in this personal story of family, community, and culture is the immersive draw of building a band that eventually became the first white jazz and rock band on the predominantly all-Black Motown Records label.
Why choose From the South Side from the myriad of "we built a band" memoirs already on the market? Because this band experience is uniquely successful: "We started in a garage in Bridgeview, Illinois and did what many bands did during that era, playing high school dances, then night clubs, before going on the road. What set our band apart from countless others, is that we eventually signed a recording contract with Motown Records and recorded our first album in Detroit, at the legendary Hitsville U.S.A. recording studio."
Larry Klimas and Anthony F. Siciliano bring readers into the joy of musical growth and discovery. They entered the business world as kids, learned hard lessons from their supportive families about taking responsibility for their choices, and became part of a social and cultural movement that propelled their band Puzzle (it held several names; but this is what it wound up with) to the doorstep of fame.
The authors root their observations, experiences, and growth processes amidst the tumult of the 1960s and 1970s. The setting helps readers absorb influences on the band's evolution - more strongly than many similar memoirs. This cements the connections between band members and the ideals that directed their sound.
They also cultivate a unique voice in this book, exploring their relationships and professional evolution in a compelling manner that embraces influences, goals, and experiences with the music industry during these times: "After the gig, every night, we hung out listening to new music. We talked about playing original music and having our own sound. Jake had great musical taste and had his finger on the pulse of the artists he loved. The Beatles, Chicago, Crosby, Stills and Nash, James Taylor. Jake turned us on to more obscure artists like Harry Nilsson. Looking back, a career like Nilsson's might have been a more comfortable fit for Jake. Writing songs and making records but not going out and performing. But Jake was in a band, and most of us were his best friends. He was the tide, and we were the boats."
The memoir's "you are here" feel can't be beat. Anyone who loves pop and rock music, or once aspired to participate in it (or in a band), will find From the South Side thoroughly engaging. The fact that the band made history through their connections and achievements, and that it's captured here for the world to read and remember, makes for an important review of these heady musical times.
Libraries seeking memoirs that offer bigger-picture thinking about the growth of popular music in this nation, the ambitions and dreams of young band members who joined together to affect and reflect the times, and achievement in a demanding music industry milieu will relish From the South Side. Its ability to connect the dots between personal and professional achievements, its reflections on the 1960s and 70s music world, and its candid, vivid tales of clubs, recording studios, and musician connections and adventures makes for an absorbing winner that's hard to put down: "It wasn't until after finishing the album that Ralf told me he discovered a great place to practice... I took my horn case from the van while Ralf grabbed his trumpet case and a six-pack of Coors. We walked up a dirt road about a half-mile before seeing the entrance to a cave.
"A cave Ralf? I'd rather practice in the fucking parking lot."
He smiled and said, "Trust me, Lorenzo. You're gonna love this."... When we came out of the cave we were in Bronson Canyon... Ralf set his case on a giant boulder, pulled out his mouthpiece and buzzed it for a few seconds before putting it on his trumpet and blowing. What a sound! Natural reverb. I got my sax out. I will never forget the incredible feeling I experienced -- well before the first beer and joint. Over the next few years, Ralf and I went up to Bronson Canyon countless times and played millions of notes into the walls of the canyon."
My Pretty Baby
Wendy B. Correa
She Writes Press
www.shewritespress.com
9798896360049, $17.99 Paperback/$12.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/My-Pretty-Baby-Seeking-Healing_A/dp/B0DWLPCHJS
My Pretty Baby: Seeking Truth and Finding Healing - A Memoir reviews Wendy B. Correa's turbulent childhood and her adult mandate to heal from her past. It joins other similar-sounding stories -- albeit, with a difference.
Correa's journey away from a dysfunctional home led her to explore all manner of possibilities for her life, from Buddhism and yoga to Native American spirituality, AA programs, and musical worlds. There, she met Joni Mitchell and other musicians while honing her own special abilities. Eventually she moved to Aspen, where she became a radio DJ, assisted writer Hunter S. Thompson, and met her future husband, setting the foundations for building her own family in a revised manner.
Hers is not a linear journey, however. Often lured back into her origin family's dysfunctional ways, Correa must not only create a new life for herself, but figure out how to field the ongoing influences of the past. These moments of return to past connections not only differentiate Correa's journey from others, but creates thought-provoking contrasts between enlightenment, ideals, and the realities of interacting with dysfunction on a very different level.
The hopefulness and idealism which sparks some of her desires to reconnect are particularly insightful, as when Correa, after an encounter with Siddha Yoga traditions, feels she is strong enough to handle her family: "That summer of 1981, at twenty-five years old, I decided it was time to visit my family. I hadn't been home in several years, and I was thinking the visit would be a good chance to catch up - I especially wanted to see my adorable nieces, who wrote to me often. I was hopeful that my newfound skills would help me to feel less bothered and more peaceful around my family, no matter how they decided to act. I may have been overly optimistic."
Her experiences reflect more than just instances of personal growth, but impart insights into how to handle forces that have influenced her psyche and which emerge from very different choices and perceptions. This vision gives My Pretty Baby a compellingly novel flavor in comparison to other memoirs of dysfunction and recovery, inviting readers to consider not just flawed psyches, but how choices such as vision quests may not just provide answers, but raise questions:
"You can learn a lot about yourself by asking questions and listening for the answers," he told us. "Who am I? What do I believe in? What do I stand for? What have I accomplished so far? Am I in the right place and in the right job? Am I a role model to anyone? Why am I here? What is the purpose of my life? How do I fulfill my potential? Ask yourself these questions while you are on the hill. Then be quiet and listen for the insight and the answers."
Libraries seeking memoirs about personal transformation will find that Correa's life, packed with musical encounters, cultural revelations, psychological growth, and insights into handling dysfunctional forces in the world, is thoroughly compelling. It will be easy to recommend to patrons and book clubs alike, whether reading groups stem from spiritual, psychological, or literary circles.
Filled with a flavor of discovery that is delivered in different forms through a life that weaves through many disparate environments, My Pretty Baby offers a journey not just through one woman's choices, but the music, mindfulness, and meanings that result in a better, more peaceful life: "I've spent a lifetime striving to put together the pieces of my family puzzle. To cut through the Gordian knot (the unsolvable, troubling enigma) believing that if only I knew when, why, and what, I could save my family and make it whole again. Now, I can accept that there are some answers, some solutions, I will never have."
Squirrel Pie: A Memoir
Deborah Brannigan
DartFrog Plus
www.dartfrogbooks.com
9781965253397, $25.99 hc
9781965253403, $15.99 pbk / $5.99 Kindle
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FG1SWNB9
Squirrel Pie: A Memoir addresses subjects common to many memoirs -- family trauma, emotional abuse, and the legacy handed down to future generations. From a mother's mental instability, which resulted in absences from the home as she recovered in a mental health facility, to a father's alcoholism, Deborah Brannigan's candid story of her own poor choices in leaving home for a familiar scenario of alcoholism and abuse mirrors similar stories of many middle-class children.
What differentiates Brannigan's memoir from others is its focus on how she turned away from these familiar relationships and impacts to achieve a better life. Brannigan traces the roots of encounters which led her to not only break free, but come full circle to accept her family's past, love her mother, and build her own family from healthier foundations. Moreover, her unique voice describes a host of dramatic, eye-opening personalities and encounters to power a memoir filled with revelation and reflection: "I look out the window at the telephone poles marching by in perfect staccato time, imagining I'm in a virtual film strip and these are the frame breaks. Will the movie ending be happy, tragic, or unremarkable? Happy seems optimistic and unlikely, while tragic implies something sudden and unforeseen. That fits better than unremarkable, which hints at long, drawn-out misery. I am not interested in that."
Libraries that choose Squirrel Pie for their collections will find it an astute, thought-provoking account that considers such subjects as personal responsibility, growth, guilt and redemption, and how individuals can grow healthier even from roots in dysfunction and poor choices. Readers will especially appreciate how Brannigan confronts her past and describes moments not just of anguish, but hope: "In seconds, our giggles build to a roar, and we fall against each other. The invisible wall of disappointment, hurt, and frustration built over the previous days crumbles in an instant." The result is a heady ride through family relationships, a kidnapping, murder, and an interstate FBI manhunt that lead, surprisingly, to her freedom.
Remarkable in its outcomes and discoveries, Squirrel Pie is engrossing, unexpected reading that portrays an outcome possible not just for the author, but for all her readers.
The General Fiction Shelf
Closer
Miriam Gershow
Regal House Publishing
https://regalhousepublishing.com
9781646035892, $20.95 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Closer-Miriam-Gershow/dp/1646035895
In 2015 in the small town of Horace, Oregon, white students taunt a Black boy in the library, causing a disruption that spreads throughout the community and fractures many a long-standing relationship.
In Closer, guidance counselor Woody, student Lark Stevenson, mother Stefanie, and others find themselves in the center of a struggle that tests their lives and resilience when a student's suicide changes everything. Miriam Gershow creates a thoroughly compelling story that shifts from the viewpoints of Woody, Lark, and the others whose lives are affected not just by their choices and actions, but by the politics of an era when Obama was president and the past and future of America is changing.
She portrays vivid community and personal interactions that stem from and are impacted by these larger political experiences emerging within the dialogues, perceptions, and encounters between family and community members: "Deborah was holding forth on the detestable Republican candidate for president, newly announced. Everything from Deborah was a shout. Alison, his Al, was nodding to Deborah, who said: "Not that I'd vote for Hillary. She's a crook and she should've left Bill as soon as he stuck his bleep bleep in that intern."
These influences on the town's youth embrace social and political perceptions, adding depth to topics of racism and bullying. Gershow traces these ideas from adult thoughts and discussions to their incarnations in young people who struggle with these issues in their own separate ways.
Astute dialogues between characters bring to light the various manners in which prejudice emerges from assumptions and perceptions: "You haven't met him yet?" Stefanie said, turning to Derek. "Sometimes it seems like Livvy is trying to move in! Doesn't it?"
"I wouldn't, no, I wouldn't say - " Derek said.
Something faltered in Susan's face.
"Fair warning," Stefanie said. And then in a stage whisper, as she leaned over Susan's desk: "He's Black."
As the dance between parents, children, and social circles continues, Gershow creates a powerful saga of desperation, adaptation, change, and historical undercurrents which buffet one small town with old and new ideas. Libraries seeking a story of transformation and challenge that explores both young adult and adult culture will find it easy to recommend Closer to a wide age range.
Replete with thought-provoking psychological profiles, twists, and experiences, Closer epitomizes small town America and the contemporary forces and changes that can fracture or draw people together. Book clubs that choose Closer for discussions of these social conundrums will find it encourages thought-provoking discourses and lively debates.
Candlewood
Evelyn Ann Casey
Three Towers Press
c/o HenschelHAUS Publishing Inc.
www.henschelHAUSbooks.com
9798990820326, $18.95 Paperback/$8.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Candlewood-Evelyn-Ann-Casey/dp/B0DVBKWG7C
Candlewood's powerful blend of Christian faith and romance, documenting a young female priest's coming of age in 1970s America. It will attract readers from its opening atmospheric lines: "RAIN GLANCED OFF MY SHOES like spilled secrets. A June downpour in Minnesota's St. Croix Valley left the street a blur of wet shadows. For the first time since graduating last year, I stepped off the curb in front of old St. Gabriel's arched wooden doors and crossed over to attend prayer group at the Campus Ministry Center."
Evelyn Ann Casey employs the first person like a sword of discovery, revealing new parish member Meg's special challenges as a woman of faith fielding the attention of males who dominate the parish. They offer her both unexpected adversity and love from their positions of male privilege.
Simmering under the cloak of faith and selfless effort is an underlying thread of ambition that influences both her choices and the political perceptions she harbors about the men who comprise her world: "When Ruth said she could use some help setting up starter plants for the garden she was planning, Darren clarified that he meant help with the upcoming Holy Week liturgies. To me, it seemed he was angling for a bigger stage for himself, not satisfied with his chapel duties across the street."
When power plays out on a stage of both attraction and control, it can prove daunting and seemingly uncontrollable -- especially when forbidden love enters into the mix. Under such conditions, where is God?
The journey Meg undertakes as she settles into her chosen world and navigates its barriers and opportunities introduces themes that one might expect from a much more seasoned writer. And yet, this debut novel effortlessly considers many complex moral, ethical, and social conundrums that simmer under cloaks of parish life and group dynamics.
Christian readers, in particular, will be drawn to the many ways Meg comes to question not just her world and the men who surround her, but her strong belief in God: "Is this how love affairs between priests and nuns, and other women, play out? Would God ask them to submerge their human love to show His love? It didn't seem to be working. God was not who I saw when I looked at these people. I saw brokenness, loneliness, fleeting moments. A high price to pay, no matter how noble the aspiration... It wasn't that I didn't see any happy, healthy priests and sisters. I saw many. I believed someone could choose to show their gratitude for God's steadfast love by putting themselves entirely, viscerally, bodily in his service. Rare, but not unknown. Others, like bachelor uncles and maiden aunts lived their lives and did their work. These people taught me in grade school and college. But I also saw men and women, too many, neither happy nor healthy. They hid a part of themselves, an open sore, a wound that never healed."
Powerfully rendered, unique in its portrayal of Meg's psyche and concerns, and filled with material suitable for book club debate, Candlewood will appeal to a wide audience, from those interested in women's issues and the 1970s to Christians attracted to stories of parish life, rules, and challenges. Candlewood is a highly recommended, vivid read.
Libraries and readers will find Candlewood thought-provoking, enlightening, sometimes troubling, and always relevant to the beliefs and actions of Christian leaders and groups navigating modern times.
A Second Innocence
Ron Morin
Independently Published
9798309815463, $18.99 Paperback/$4.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Second-Innocence-Ron-Morin/dp/B0DWKFVGHK
A Second Innocence follows the isolated lives of four individuals who have very different ways of hiding from the world -- and themselves.
At first glance, Raphael who becomes a priest, Daphne who serves a twenty-year sentence for murder, Jordi who is an artist of moderate renown, and Angela who has epilepsy caused by an inoperable tumor seem to have little in common. But as shared perspectives and experiences draw them together, readers receive a story of flawed individuals who grow into a new, more positive awareness about the world and their place in it.
The opening lines of the prologue succinctly condense what each of these characters represents, however differently they appear: "...not sure what went wrong; they only knew when it went wrong, and they wondered if their underlying fear had been what caused the problem in the first place."
The mirror Anne and Bill hold up to themselves after they summon the courage to tell their twenty-one-year-old son Raphael that he's adopted shatters their world. In reaction, Raphael flees to Europe. New truths and revelations will resonate in the lives of Angela, Jordi and Daphne when they interact with Raphael's natural goodness.
The "second innocence" referred to in the title evolves from a new acceptance of flawed people and lives that nonetheless hold riches beyond limitations and ugliness. There's no better time for A Second Innocence to appear than now.
With varied themes of murder, depression, death, and emotional entrapment, readers might initially think the story will be difficult to absorb emotionally.
However, within with these conflicts and confrontations lies discovery, hope, and redemption: "In the heat of my hope for grace, the grief in my heart began to thaw."
The result is an unexpected journey towards different forms of belief that ultimately prove fulfilling.
Libraries that choose A Second Innocence will discover that its strength lies in building emotional connections between seemingly disparate experiences that contributes to this overall feeling of hope and grace. Filled with diversity, different forms of anguish and revelation, A Second Innocence is compelling reading that will reach all kinds of audiences and book club discussion groups with its message of optimism against all odds. It is highly recommended as a path to hope in a world of postmodern angst.
A Second Innocence discovers its strength in building an emotional experience that leads to the overall feeling of grace.
Jerome v. God
Jeffrey Melvin Hutchins
Pisgah Press, LLC
www.pisgahpress.com
9781942016984, $25.40 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Jerome-God-Jeffrey-Melvin-Hutchins/dp/B0F4M93FKW
Jerome v. God is a novel about the extraordinary Jerome Light, a non-believer who gets worked up about so-called miracles and decides to legally confront the mysterious ways of God in court -- especially when a sinkhole opens up right under his house. Coincidence? Probably not.
Jeffrey Melvin Hutchins cultivates a wry sense of ironic humor as he reveals Jerome's mission to confront his world in novel ways. He reviews Jerome's psyche in a compelling manner that considers not just motivations behind choices, but the reasons for his disbelief and angst: "Jerome had a peculiar ethos: He wanted never to appear weak in those areas where he could possibly have some hope of being courageous or strong."
Family impact leads to Jerome feeling like a pariah for his obsession and perseverance while curious courtroom processes and confrontations show readers that more is at stake than a singular legal pursuit of justice or proof. Jerome's supposedly simple case attracts widespread attention from special interests, portending impacts even Jerome hadn't seen coming: "I've been approached by other interests. There may be others jumping in to this case."
"What?"
"Don't worry; I'm still your lawyer. But we're going to need a lot of help for the appeals, especially if we win. If you think this case is tough now, wait'll you see what the wrath of God's agent looks like if he loses."
"I don't get it."
"Several organizations have offered to file amicus briefs in support of our case. And we're going to need their support. I mean, ultimately, this thing could go to the U.S. Supreme Court."
The result is a fine dance between legal, spiritual, and moral processes which is simply a delight to follow. It weaves unexpected developments into a seemingly staid life that spill over into bigger questions about God.
Libraries and readers looking for thought-provoking, sometimes hilarious, and often pointed stories about fate, God, self-determination, and legal system flaws will welcome Jerome v. God. It sports thought-provoking and engaging characters and, most of all, features a court case that reaches for the stars and winds up grasping the unexpected.
Filled with provocative ways of identifying good and evil, Jerome v. God is worthy of high praise and promises much fodder for book club discussion: "Gideon Calhoun trades in people's fear. He is a multimillionaire because people fear the Lord their God and want someone to protect them and tell them how to live. Yet when that God he serves acts to destroy someone's life, Gideon Calhoun says it has nothing to do with him! And then he asks for more money. In fact, he had the temerity to mention the sinkhole hitting the Lights' house and then ask for donations to his church! He would reap benefits from someone else's tragedy, and yet he says he has no responsibility. That's just wrong. That's just wrong."
The Historical Fiction Shelf
The Gimirri Invasion
Colleen M. Story
https://colleenmstory.com
Midchannel Press
9798992617214, $18.95 Paperback/$28.95 Hardcover/$7.95 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Gimirri-Invasion-Midas-Legacy/dp/B0F6N4ZWXJ
The Gimirri Invasion, a sequel to Colleen M. Story's The Curse of King Midas, returns to the world-building scenario of the first series title to expand a journey fraught with historical figures from 696-700s BC. The Cimmerians that threatened King Midas's kingdom are profiled in a fast-paced historical saga that proves vividly atmospheric, flavored with a range of character experiences.
Story takes the time to develop multifaceted scenarios and characters, adding many personal touches and concerns to her sweeping historical saga. This invites even non-history readers to consider the rule of King Midas and the special challenges he faces from invaders and family members alike.
The dilemmas of daughter Zoe and others who either align with or confront the King's vision of how to preserve his kingdom lend personal, reflective insights into these struggles: "Zoe went to her room, but all she could do was pace back and forth. This decision was so wrong. How could her father not see it? With one hand on her hip, she thought it over again and again, but in the end, felt powerless to change anything."
Elanur Savas, who has escaped King Sargon II's city of Durukin, dreams of reuniting with her brother, King Midas, in his grand castle, yet struggles with various forces as she, Little Bird, and Zoe make important decisions that impact their present and future.
Dark underworld goddess Katiah is present both at the beginning of and through the story's progression. She reveals insights and the unexpected impacts of choices which fly in the face of repressive family forces: "That horrible man," Katiah resumed. "He took everything from me. I should have left him to die on that plain. Instead, I had to save him, take care of him, keep him safe."
Libraries that appreciated the vivid historical fantasy blend of myth and pre-Roman Empire affairs that made The Curse of King Midas such a powerful work will want to add The Gimirri Invasion to their collections, while newcomers lacking this background will still find this sequel a vivid, engrossing story. Readers seeking fiction that rises past any hint of dry historical fact to embrace vivid characters, shifting perceptions, and the intimate interplays of myth and reality in ancient times will find The Gimirri Invasion thoroughly absorbing, unpredictable, and powered by strong forces that represents an incredible page-turner.
The Bootlegger's Bride
Rick Skwiot
Blank Slate Press
c/o Amphorae Publishing
www.amphoraepublishing.com
9781943075935, $18.95 Paperback/$9.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Bootleggers-Bride-Rick-Skwiot/dp/B0DJGC9PL5
Twelve-year-old A.J. Nowak's life with his aunt and uncle has been predictably supportive. He obeys them easily, fearful of being sent back home to live with his mother after his father's death in the war. But when he discovers a body under the ice of the frozen lake he's ice skating, everything changes, sending him on a lifelong journey.
The novel moves back and forth in time, from the late 1920s to the 1950s, as events unfold. These fluctuations are included in chapter headings that make their transitions easy to understand as Hazel Robinson, A.J., and others face a blackmailer, unexpected truths, and indications that revenge may be in order.
From gangs to trust fund influences, the efforts of a single mom to protect her son, and the legacy left by dangerous associations that result in A.J.'s recruitment in a deadly affair, Rick Skwiot spins a complex yarn that involves generations of a family in events that impact their legacy and place in the world.
As an evolving adult, A.J. struggles with his bootlegger father's legacy and his mother's self-destructive ways. The question becomes one of not just survival and life purpose, but unshackling himself from the past.
Skwiot creates a story that develops different characters in thought-provoking ways. The plot is particularly strong in how its connections between past choices and present lives play out, creating bonds and dysfunction that emerge from and buffet the persona of a boy who must acknowledge these family ties to overcome them.
The vision of a "wandering warrior" who searches for the meaning and place called 'home' is particularly evocative, tying together many threads of intrigue and discovery to create a story not just memorable, but thoroughly compelling.
This is why libraries should consider The Bootlegger's Bride a top pick for their collections. It embodies and embraces world's events from the 1920s to the 1970s that impact and grow its protagonist, propelling him in new directions. Packed with mystery, intrigue, psychological twists and turns, and many different kinds of discovery, The Bootlegger's Bride's world is easy to enter and hard to leave.
Bethlehem Road: Stories of Immigration and Exile
Judy Lev
She Writes Press
www.shewritespress.com
9781647429980, $17.99 Paperback/$12.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Bethlehem-Road-Stories-Immigration-Exile/dp/1647429986
Bethlehem Road: Stories of Immigration and Exile opens with a hard-hitting preface: "I went up to Jerusalem in 1967 and stayed thirty-eight years."
Bethlehem Road's vivid historical fiction stories are a product of these years and experiences through the eyes of twelve characters, most of whom wind up immigrating to Jerusalem in the three decades following the 1967 Six-Day War.
The contrasts in their lives, expectations, perceptions, and worlds is impeccably done and proves so immersive that the book is hard to put down. Take the story opening the collection, "Ingathering of an Exile."
The tale opens with a loving father's letter to his nomadic son, who has chosen to travel to New Zealand, progressing through his memories of the '67 war and its lasting impact as generations of experience are traversed and embraced. Judy Lev excels at illustrating cross-cultural connections in a manner that brings Jews, Arabs, and all manner of immigrant experiences to life: "...he's lucky because after the War of Independence, the state put him and his wife into an apartment on Bethlehem Road with some other family, and he tells me how Baka was Arab, but after the war the state filled it with Jews from all over, and how the state gave him a falafel shack as compensation for the eye and how he raised three kids on falafel balls, tahini, and pickles. The pickles his wife made."
Under her hand, Bethlehem Road's diversity and peoples blend their lives, perspectives, experiences, and hopes and dreams in a manner both reflective and enlightening, yet powerfully commanding and challenging. These individual lives draw together the identity crisis and adaptation processes facing immigrants of all ilk and color, layering their experiences with loss, diversity, and change. The manner employed to do so illustrates ways they grow both apart and together, united by hopes, dreams, the impact of violence, and the knowledge of being different. From neighborhood personalities to military and social clashes, an explosion heard by the narrator broadens its impact to fuel the lives and stories of those who have lived with explosions, both emotional and physical, most all of their lives.
Atmospheric revelations bring these people and the narrator to life. More importantly, they each address some of the diverse reasons why an individual would want to be an immigrant and enter a new world, as captured in the very first story: "As I walked down Rehov Yehuda to Ulpan Etzion on Gad I kept thinking of the stories those people told me in the waiting room, about their explosions and my own. I thought about the people on Bethlehem Road. They were like so many actors on a stage, playing their parts every day. I was an observer, walking by, applauding this, struck by that. As I approached the ulpan, I looked down at my hands. No shaking. They smelled like sweet cheese. The idea crystalized. Everyone saw it but me, maybe because I was only twenty-one or maybe because of the tensions of the war, I don't know. At that moment I wanted to come home, to Israel. I wanted to be a player, an actor on the stage, to take part in the miracle, not just watch from the sidelines. I knew Jerusalem, not Chicago, would be home. I knew my parents and my grandparents would be devastated, but my gut told me I wanted to stay in Israel. I wanted to join the victims struggling to be heroes. I wanted to build a new life in an old language. I wanted to forfeit the expected trajectory and to dive into the unknown."
Rich in its comparisons of diverse lives and astute in its portrait of peoples under siege in many different ways, Bethlehem Road is a top recommendation for all kinds of libraries and readers, from those interested in building collections of Jewish experience, literature, and history to others looking for literary blends of memoir and cultural insights into immigrant experiences. It also goes without saying that book clubs will consider Bethlehem Road a terrific kick starter for discussions about Israel, Jewish lives, immigrant choices, experiences, and observations, and more.
The Literary Fiction Shelf
In the Company of Strangers: Stories of Going
Fred Anderson
Palavr Publ
9781736845448, $12.99 Paperback/$1.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Company-Strangers-Drifters-Dreamers-Long/dp/1736845446
In the Company of Strangers: Stories of Going takes readers on a journey into the past, reliving diverse experiences via short works and one novella. This disparity is reflected in a broad cast of characters, from a modern-day Hollywood cowboy whose nomadic life holds an important difference to a treasure hunt in the French Quarter that connects not just individual lives, but adventure and growth which propels characters into unpredictable, novel arenas.
Take "Anna Cabana," for example. The story opens with a thought-provoking reflection: "Everyone likes to think they came of age in a unique and fascinating place and time. They didn't, but Lev Wroblewsky did." Lev is riding a San Francisco trolley when a lady is hit by the train he is on. The deceased is artist Anna Cabana. As he reads in the newspaper about the tragedy of her death and comes to view Anna as a person rather than a body on the tracks, Lev confronts the mystery surrounding her death, choices, and the surprising beginnings of a new relationship.
Politics, San Francisco stories and culture, and the intersection between witness Sky Wilson's life and the artistic Anna Cabana weave thought-provoking moments of intersection and connection. These steep readers in San Francisco's heyday while introducing insights that force Lev to confront his own choices and their consequences: "When Sky walked away, Anna Cabana dissolved. She made an impetuous decision. A very bad choice. This was all guesswork, of course, the kind of background and motives people ascribe to unknown tragic figures. But it was riveting. Maybe this was why he was in San Francisco -- maybe this was what his movie was about."
Contrast this scenario with "Seven Snow Whites: These Are Their Stories." In this fairy tale, the seven are young women from Vassar College. Their connection: "The women in The Group and the dwarfs with Snow White are all characters in a story, but each also stands for something, a single trait or a set of characteristics." What do two young men having fun in New Orleans in the early 1970s have to do with The Group and its Snow White incarnation? Plenty.
As Gail, Diana, Rachel, and other characters come to life and grow, Fred Anderson contrasts lives, personalities, and connections in a thought-provoking manner that ties together seemingly disparate personalities with revelations that prompt them to change: "I wish I could just say that's-six-months-of-my-life-I'll-never-get-back and move on. In fact Joey-boy gave me a valuable lesson: I can't be someone to someone until I am someone to me."
Filled with reflective moments, characters whose life encounters transform them, and environments that batter carefully erected, strong emotional barriers, In the Company of Strangers: Stories of Going is especially highly recommended for literary library collections that appreciate short works embedded with powerful reflective forces.
Realistic, engrossing, and filled with surprising contrasts between seemingly disparate lives, In the Company of Strangers: Stories of Going also deserves recommendation to book clubs interested in tales where Americans change in response to the politics, pressures, and the connections of their times.
The Romantic Fiction Shelf
Dances with Pucks
Debbie Charles
Independently Published
9798890444103, $5.99 eBook/$17.99 Paperback
https://www.amazon.com/Dances-Pucks-Texas-Tornadoes-Book-ebook/dp/B0DTNZZ8Z9
What is the difference between a fling and a deep relationship? Sometimes the answer lies in how attraction combines with life ambitions in novel ways, as is portrayed in Dances with Pucks. Blend romance with hockey and ballroom dancing for a sense of this vivid representation of the love that develops between Cam and Christina.
They hold different passions before they meet, only to find their set courses in life and career changed by what at first seems a steamy but likely a brief encounter. Both have fallen into hockey from very different circumstances. Each has a different background, interests, and passions -- and yet, against the backdrop of hockey, they meet and grow together against all odds. Readers seeking a steamy romance won't be disappointed in the dance between these two.
Debbie Charles crafts a delicate balance between professional interest and passion which comes alive both inside and outside the bedroom. She employs the first person and shifting viewpoints to emphasize the differences and similarities between these characters, as well. This translates to a hot read in different ways as Austin, Texas heats up in summertime and political and hockey playing goals assume center stage.
Charles takes the time to build the political arena and its different influences on each character's goals: "I'm certain either Buzz or Gabe will be our Captain, and I want to impress them. I tug on my protective pads and switch sticks. As I do, I sneak a glance up at the suites. A couple are lit, and I can only hope members of management or even one of the owners (preferably the guy, Greg Donovan, who seems to be the face of the Donovan family owners) are watching, so I can impress them too. I'm determined to have the starting goalie position by the end of training camp."
Sexual encounters are tempered by emotional overlays to give the story a gritty appeal of connection as the characters delve into relationships in different ways: "Has no one worshiped this woman the way she deserves? No matter, I'm here to remedy that." Exercise, personal, and sexual discovery blend in a story replete with unexpected developments as Cam and Christina embark on a workplace affair, only to uncover deeper connections than either anticipated. Set against the backdrop and development of the Texas Tornadoes NHL team, fans of sports and emotional ties will relish the different ways this romance evolves.
Libraries accepting novels with powerful characters will find Dances with Pucks fits the bill, while romance readers who like engrossing dances between characters' pasts and reshaping their future will love how the story's characters develop.
Replete with hockey and dance references and realistic experiences, Dances with Pucks creates a winning game between two already-strong individuals whose shared interests prove too inviting to resist - and too involving to stop reading about.
Charlotte's Control
Maggie Sims
Independently Published
9798890444046, $4.99 / $17.99
www.books2read.com/CharlottesControl
Readers of Regency romances and tales of passion will embrace Charlotte's Control's vivid saga of 30-year-old widow Charlotte, who finds her newly unwed status places her in an uncomfortable position between both women younger or older than she, who are seeking mates.
William Stanton, heir to the Earl of Harrington and barely twenty, is attracted to this lovely young widow, but other forces at work, both politically and socially, thwart his infatuation. Nonetheless, the two consummate their passion in an affair which holds unexpected complexity as they begin to realize the ways in which each can bring them their hearts' desires even as age and status differences seem destined to drive them apart.
Author Maggie Sims deftly juxtaposes the lives of these very different individuals, creating many nuances that prove steamy, compelling, and surprisingly unexpected. Of special note is the age difference which creates boundaries of status and questions about family that they may be unable to overcome.
Another satisfying feature is how measured and logical Charlotte is about her status, her age, and the potential for a lasting romance with William: "I am willing to have the same arrangement as last summer. But we need to set an end date. At some point you need to find a more suitable girl to marry. I know you have many responsibilities already heaped on you, but heirs are important. You'll need to consider them soon."
"I want to consider them with you."
"I can't."
"Don't you mean 'shan't'?"
"No. I mean I cannot. William, do you know how long I was married?" She raised her hand to caress the heart pendant that hung on a chain around her neck.
"Uh, I believe it was close to ten years?"
"Yes. And what is the next thing anyone says about my marriage, when you hear others talk about it?"
He thought. She could see when it registered."
Passionate scenes sparkle throughout, but these practical revelations about the impact of a love connection when conflicting values permeate heirs and family status make Charlotte's Control vivid, reflective reading. The result is a spicy romance story that is satisfyingly sexual, packed with unexpected thoughts about age and family, and peppered with the traditional atmospheric embellishments that make for a truly engrossing Regency romance. Regency romance readers are in for a treat, and will find Charlotte's passion and practicality as attractive as younger William's experiences of love.
The Mystery/Suspense Shelf
A Casebook of Crime
Andrew & John McAleer
Level Best Books
www.levelbestbooks.us
9781685128944, $16.95 Paperback/$5.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Casebook-Crime-Thrilling-Adventures-Detective/dp/1685128947
A Casebook of Crime: Thrilling Adventures of Suspense from the Golden Age of Mystery is a short story and novella collection featuring the adventures of 1920s London investigator Henry Von Stray, packaging them in a series of engrossing encounters with baffled Scotland Yard investigators, bankers, fraudsters, spies, and more. This whimsical juxtaposition of cases will attract detective fiction readers who enjoy colorful investigative characters as much as the puzzling crime scenes they investigate -- especially those familiar with the atmospheric trappings of the Golden Age of detective fiction writing.
Of course, private detective Henry von Stray sports an equally powerful and affable sidekick: Professor John Dilpate, who narrates von Stray's exploits in the Watsonian tradition. This dynamic duo combines their talents to prove a formidable force against crime.
Readers familiar with the detective genre may find von Stray a familiar-sounding name. That's because son Andrew has taken his father's (Edgar winner John McAleer) original stories and added more elements of action and intrigue to create new adventures in keeping with his father's legacy, expanding the von Stray persona and legend into new cases and times. The same blend of humor and puzzle-solving conundrums provides newcomers and prior fans with stories filled with twists and turns that are satisfyingly unpredictable, flavored with the tones and approaches of the past.
Take 'The Case of the Illustrious Banker'. Scotland Yard is not above tapping the renowned prowess of von Stay and Dilpate for a puzzle they can't seem to solve. How can a bank president have been murdered behind locked doors? There's no escaping the crime scene - but somehow, the perp has managed the impossible. Or, has he?
In 'The Big Push,' von Stay and Dilpate battle the disguising forces of Mother Nature as they race against time to solve a crime in a "hopeless endeavor" that introduces all manner of social conflict and possibilities. This case, unraveled in a multi-part series of chapters that edge ever closer to the truth, also excels in atmosphere and character descriptions, flavored with a classic touch of McAleer wry humor: "When we arrived on the ground floor and were greeted by Sir Ambrose, I was flabbergasted. I couldn't believe this was the same young man we had met earlier. When he had leaped out of the motorcar, he had scampered for the front door in such a hurry I hadn't noticed his change of attire. He now looked every bit the working fisherman from head to foot. A tattered wool sweater, battered trousers, and scuffed rubber Wellies stretching up to his knees. I regret to say the odor of the day's catch completed his attire."
Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts will delight in how these step-by-step cases evolve with increasing suspense, complexity, and discovery.
The result is hard to put down, thoroughly engrossing, and representative of the best of Golden Age approaches to impossible clue-solving and intrigue. A Casebook of Crime also includes the classic who done it 'A Little Birdie Tells Von Stray' and a clever caper story, 'Von Stray and the Five-Fingered Fraudster.'
Libraries seeing popularity with Sherlock Holmes-style books will want to direct patrons to this even more compelling crime-busting duo, while readers seeking immersive, delightful forays into impossibilities and unexpected problem-solving approaches will relish the adventures and discoveries packing A Casebook of Crime.
Mai Tai Malice
Tanya Westlake
Impractical Press
9798985642582, $16.99 Paperback/$2.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Mai-Malice-Kalliope-Brooks-Mysteries/dp/B0D8SW9VPP
Mai Tai Malice places amateur sleuths Kalliope Brooks and Tess Russo in another dilemma that requires them to step out of their familiar Florida milieu when a beloved Gasparilla Parade turns deadly and Kallie is jailed as a suspect. Her whole family is attending the pirate-themed drama, which includes a huge pirate ship sailing up the river into Tampa to present a pirate threat of invasion -- complete with noisy cannon firings and a flotilla of accompanying boats. The mayor gives up the key to the city, as has been planned. And then the unexpected sails into town.
Author Tanya Westlake crafts a tale that features the trappings and appeal of a cozy mystery, yet takes place in the bigger Florida city of Tampa. This approach lends depth and attraction to the family and political relationships under consideration, bringing to life both Tampa and Kallie's celebration and connections: "Are you sure you don't want to stay with us, Mister B?" Tess asked, when the parade had finished, and they were leaving their enclosed seating section. "I included you in the dinner reservation."
"He and Anna have a date," Kallie replied with a smile.
"It's not really a date; we're just fixing dinner together at her house, but - "
"Sounds romantic," Tess observed, adding to Kallie, "I'd ditch us, too."
"We'll walk you back to the trolley, Dad."
"Thanks for thinking of me, Tess. We'll all have to come back down here for dinner someday when it's not so crazy."
They walked back up the street through the teeming crowd, dodging left and right to avoid pirates of all sizes. Some were singing or dancing, some stumbled, and others seemed tired and bound for home too."
Atmospheric descriptions profile both Kallie's world and that of the Tampa mystery and history she's stumbled into: "There were still a lot of tourists in town for Gasparilla season, she noticed. Even though the largest parade was over, there were still a lot of events planned in the next month - dozens of parties and huge charity events, plus a fifteen-kilometer race and a music festival. Add to that the State Fair, the huge Strawberry Festival in Plant City, and football and ice hockey - plus the beautiful weather, and this was the busiest tourist season of the year in the Tampa Bay area."
The Florida embrace is hot, muggy, and thoroughly powerful as Kallie and Tess root out the possibilities of whodunit, exposing gory details of thievery, drugs, and those who harbor false alibis for different purposes. Phone threats, wrong leads, and interpersonal clashes add realistic drama to the story which will particularly delight those who enjoy mysteries that simultaneously play out on personal, political, and social levels. Westlake is particularly powerful in wielding the sword of Kallie's self-determination and inner voice. This keeps her character both realistic and engaged in puzzles that keep readers on their toes: "Don't look guilty. Don't look behind you. Don't look scared. But don't walk blindly into trouble, either."
Libraries seeking a cozy mystery that translates to bigger city problems and personal dilemmas will relish Mai Tai Malice's special ability to place these two women in circumstances that test their abilities and, possibly, lie outside their control. Readers can be prior Kallie and Tess fans or newcomers to their actions and investigations. Either way, the compelling blend of personal and perp revelations is riveting, packed with satisfying twists readers won't necessarily see coming, and is cemented by Florida's community and color. The result is a deep sip of trouble and tension that is exquisitely well detailed and thoroughly engrossing.
Miss Understood and the Case of the Missing Locket
Melissa G. Wilson
Networlding Publishing
https://networlding.com
9781959993360, $8.00 Paperback/$3.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Understood-Missing-Locket-History-Stories/dp/1959993364
Miss Understood and the Case of the Missing Locket follows Grace Underwood to a small island, where she is to be a teacher. Nothing about this venture promises excitement, yet somehow Grace falls into a situation in which her teaching ambitions cross over into supernatural realms when one of her students claims to be communicating with the ghost of a Civil War soldier's son. Good thing she attended Mrs. Pink's History Mystery School, because she'll need all the historical research and investigative skills she can muster to uncover the truth behind a strange locket and a family torn asunder by a past war whose impact resonates into modern times.
Author Melissa G. Wilson crafts a compelling children's story from the start as Grace journeys to the island which is to be her new home and Ashley engages with the ghost to uncover clues: "But it was the old steamer trunk that really caught Ashley's imagination. It looked just like a treasure chest from one of the pirate stories she loved to read. "I wonder what's in that trunk?" she said to Charlie, her voice hushed with excitement.
"Just a lot of old junk," said the little ghost with a shrug. "Books and things. Go ahead and open it, if you want. See for yourself." Kids attracted to detective sagas, mysteries, and stories of ghosts and discovery will all find Miss Understood and the Case of the Missing Locket compelling reading.
The history component and research insights are nicely embedded in the mystery to keep young readers on their toes and thoroughly engrossed. A wide age range will relish this story, from advanced elementary into middle grades and even early high schoolers. One of its strengths and attractions lies in how its characters interact through the ages, bringing past concerns to life in present-day dilemmas.
Libraries seeking historical mysteries that sizzle with discovery, quandaries, and memorable characters who face unpredictable circumstances and outcomes will relish Miss Understood and the Case of the Missing Locket. Think Nancy Drew - but with much more historical allure to its problem-solving savvy and its engrossing twists. This makes for exceptional, highly recommended reading.
Morgan's Landing
Linda Griffin
The Wild Rose Press Inc.
https://wildrosepress.com
9781509261307, $2.99 eBook/$6.95 Audible
https://www.amazon.com/Morgans-Landing-Linda-Griffin-ebook/dp/B0DZY1YR6V
Cozy mystery readers seeking a story packed with intriguing small-town twists will delight in the surprises presented in Morgan's Landing, where a small-town teen's disappearance involves an investigator whose own son may be a suspect. Several adults could be involved in Julie's disappearance, but Detective Jim Brady knows his son is hiding something. What this secret has to do with Julie is something he's forced to investigate in the course of uncovering a truth which turns out to be as unpredictable as his son's moods.
Author Linda Griffin's story delves into a family's life, the truths they deny or accept, and the dilemma faced by a father who finds his long-time role as a member of the police force conflicts with his equally important role as a father: "You're talking about our son -- our fourteen-year-old son. I'm almost sure I know who took her, but even if I didn't, I would know Colin wouldn't - and couldn't - have done it. He's a kid, Frances."
"And I've been telling you for a long time that something is wrong with him, but you don't listen."
"Stop it! There is nothing wrong with him." His relationship with Colin receives both challenging blows and encouraging moments of intimacy as Jim fields a range of questions, both in his heart and from the community, and gains new perspective on his son's maturity process: "Jim felt the need to take his son in his arms, to hold his face against his chest, but he couldn't do that anymore. Colin was almost a man, nearly as tall as his mother, his voice deepening, the little boy in him almost gone. Jim stopped on the sidewalk. "Colin? You do know how much I love you, don't you?"
The boy ducked his head, embarrassed. "Yeah, Dad."
These personal insights and elements are powerful strengths in a story that builds increasing tensions between father and son, community issues, and new possibilities. Mystery readers seeking a cozy mystery immersed in blossoming interpersonal relationships as well as impressive intrigue will find Morgan's Landing chooses directions and twists that are delightfully difficult to predict.
Libraries and readers seeking cozy mysteries that draw with personal conundrums and lace small-town experience with bigger-picture thinking will welcome Morgan's Landing's outstanding ability to create a thoroughly immersive plot. Filled with insights and unexpected moves, Morgan's Landing is a winner that revolves around a police officer and father's search for a truth that may prove to hold different, powerful impacts on dissimilar levels.
The Truth About Anton Van Zyl
John Constable
www.john-constable-author.com
Troubador Publishing Ltd.
9781836281948, $14.99 Paperback/$1.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Truth-About-Anton-Van-Zyl-ebook/dp/B0F1YB5MST
The Truth About Anton Van Zyl is a mystery (and the second in the Sol Nemo series) that swirls around mentally troubled PI Sol Nemo, who takes on a case involving political bigwig's missing son-in-law Anton Van Zyl.
This crosses the troubled line he must draw between political and criminal special interests. Sol is well aware this case will be trouble before he even interviews his client: "As soon as I realized where Moti lived, I should have turned the car around and headed for home."
Gritty description and dialogue fuels the plot with a noir-style atmosphere from the start: "I think for not much more than the price of a match, he'd have slugged me into the middle of next week. But he decided against and instead gave me a look that would have vaporised granite. Looks are like words though: they don't break bones."
Despite Sol's background of working for Detective Services for years, his nose for trouble leads him into dangers he is both uniquely equipped to handle and ill prepared to analyze properly. Mystery readers who enjoy detective procedurals that operate outside of the law while probing both perp and investigator psyches will relish the dance John Constable develops. Events flow compellingly between the perp, a wide cast of suspicious characters and situations, and flawed detective Sol, whose ability to elude investigative agencies, including state security, is tested as his latest case unfolds. Sol navigates uncertain terrain as his search pulls him deeper into a major conspiracy that tests his resolve and his abilities.
Constable's ability to create a edge-of-your-seat page-turner filled with unexpected twists and turns also enters into personal territory as Sol becomes involved with advocate Moses, hits a brick wall in the original search for Anton, and finds himself tackling a completely different scenario than he'd first envisioned or been hired to probe. Sol is a likeable character despite his shortcomings. His persistence and conclusions power an engaging mystery. The tension is well-developed, a wide cast of characters introduce new possibilities that test Sol's decisions and quest for evidence, and the question of what he's going to do with the information he does find injects a heady sense of discovery and conundrums mystery readers won't see coming. Libraries seeking a mesmerizing story of truth, deception, the unexpected consequences of decisions, and a detective's escapades and confrontations as he edges ever closer to what revelations about Van Zyl will do to his world will find The Truth About Anton Van Zyl outstanding.
Deft and realistic in its descriptions and characters, compelling in its shifting situations, and filled with colorful moments of angst and discovery, The Truth About Anton Van Zyl is a standout winner.
Winter
H.N. Hirsch
Pisgah Press, LLC
www.pisgahpress.com
9781942016960 $22.95
https://www.amazon.com/Winter-Mystery-H-N-Hirsch-ebook/dp/B0F92ZZ8XM
Winter is the fourth in the Bob & Marcus gay murder mystery series, continuing the theme of a couple who apply their skills as the college professor and lawyer to simultaneously solve mysteries and build their relationship.
UC-San Diego Professor Marcus George is drawn into a murder investigation when he discovers the body of an outspoken colleague in a faculty office, impeccably dressed to kill... or be murdered.
From the start, Bob and Marcus are joined in an effort to uncover the truth, united not just by their relationship, but their joint involvement when a quick stop on campus reveals the impossible.
As is common in life, Bob is also facing a crisis involving a family tragedy and an approaching milestone birthday. It's not the best time for a murder investigation... but maybe it's exactly what the couple needs in order to move beyond familiar routines and issues and into an extraordinary probe of personalities, motives, and problems.
The trouble is that Professor Silver was not heartily embraced by many. His personality and presentation has always injected trouble into campus relationships and politics alike, even though Marcus admits that academic gossip is often wrong:
...there were a lot of people who disliked Chuck Silver, even hated him, both at UCSD and elsewhere. He was an intellectual bomb-thrower and loved a good fight. Loved it too much, Marcus often thought. And there were always rumors that Chuck had affairs, but Marcus never knew if the rumors were true or just typical academic gossip. Chuck was an academic high-flyer, and that meant people talked about him. Academic gossip could be vicious and not always accurate. It was one of the things Marcus disliked about his profession.
Readers anticipating a simple series of quandaries about the perp's identity will be especially satisfied to see the injection of moral and ethical quandaries that lead Bob and Marcus to re-examine their own ideals and decisions.
This special blend of intrigue, relationship and personal values examination, combined with a setting firmly rooted in California culture, embraces many interesting subplots. H.N. Hirsch takes the time to present ordinary gay family life experiences as well as tense encounters, creating a delightful interplay between personal and professional developments that impart a sense of relief from action-packed scenarios:
Bob and Marcus built a fire and listened to some old jazz records, with Zelda at their feet. Bob laid his head in Marcus's lap on the couch.
"Come on, old man, let's go to bed," Bob said after a while, pulling Marcus up from the couch. "I'm going to ravish you."
This heightens character authenticity as the probe evolves a series of interviews with California socialites (and possible perps), considers campus politics, and edges closer to a truth which will surprise not just Marcus and Bob, but their readers.
Hirsch's blend of the gay lifestyle with investigative quandaries and unexpected outcomes gives Winter a multifaceted feel fully in sync with previous Marcus and Bob experiences.
Prior enthusiasts of the couple will find their latest challenge continues to buffet their relationship, grow their personalities and values, and immerses them academic intrigue that draws the duo into danger.
Libraries seeking mysteries that embrace gay lifestyles and the dynamics of interpersonal relationship growth will welcome this powerful Marcus and Bob story into their collections.
Readers need not hold prior familiarity with the couple in order to fully appreciate the many ways they are forced to confront family, each another, and suspicious elements in the community that enhance the story's tension and discovery.
Packed with unexpected twists, a host of characters who each hold their own special interests and possible connections to events, and family life that moves in different directions, Winter is a thought-provoking saga that draws from the start and concludes with a cliffhanging bang portending further dilemmas.
A Witch Awakens
Ellis Elliott
Hawkshaw Press
c/o Current Words Publishing LLC
https://currentwordspublishing.com
9781957224473, $15.99
https://www.amazon.com/Witch-Awakens-Circle-Mystery-Mysteries/dp/1957224479
A Witch Awakens is a 'Fire Circle Mystery' steeped in an Appalachian backdrop and traditions. It delivers a punch with the hard-hitting story of Cece Chagall, who moves back to her hometown of Eureka Grove in search of peace, only to find herself involved in a murder.
Cece is forced to become involved in an investigation foreign to her career as an artist and teacher, but burrows into the mystery surrounding her connections to the town's elders, women who seem to harbor supernatural connections, and backwoods mountain history. These elements merge in a dangerous manner.
Cece's unexpected visions emerge from endeavors she is familiar with, such as dollhouse construction: "Cece walked behind the table in order to see the interior of Nana's dollhouse, which, given her attention to detail, always promised to be even better than the exterior. In an instant, her previously fuzzy-feeling head cleared into hyper-focus. Filling her mind's eye, and crowding everything else out, was a scene of a staircase with the distinct scent of something stale and molded. And then, as quickly as it came, it was gone."
These visitations ground her in familiar territory while pushing her to accept that her skills may include more artistic pursuits alone. Her realization creates a dangerous milieu as Cece realizes that the murder and threats may be emerging as a response to her return, though they already were components of a community that she'd never known about or accepted.
Cozy mystery and private eye investigative strengths appear side by side as Cece examines her town with new visions and insights and learns from Hazel new truths that will lead her to step into a very different role in her life: "What you've got is a knowin'. It's a powerful part of where you come from and who you are. Once you accept it, you'll understand it better. Our family's women just were born with better antennae, that's all. We pick up things other folks can't."
"But what if I don't want it? What if I don't want any more weird in my life?" Cece said, her voice faltering.
"You are neither strange nor weird," Nana said, her volume rising defiantly, "and you never have been. The fact is the more you work with your intense peculiars, the more you'll feel in control."
Author Ellis Elliott does an outstanding job of making Cece's character not just accessible, but compelling. Readers will readily relate to her new challenges and the mandate to revise her perceptions of not only her roots and hometown, but herself. Also powerfully rendered are special interests and threats that emerge from these newfound realizations, forcing Cece to choose actions and directions she'd never thought about before as she redefines her identity.
Libraries that choose A Witch Awakens for its promise of a cozy mystery hometown experience will find so much more offered via Cece's evolutionary process. It's highly recommendable to a wide audience beyond the usual cozy mystery 'whodunnit' reader. Readers seeking vivid, engrossing stories that weave supernatural overtones into issues of murder, discovery, and transformation will relish the combination of realistic characterization and community awakening that make A Witch Awakens a vibrant, thoroughly immersive experience.
Losing Austin
Michael J. Bowler
Independently Published
9798988611066, $4.99 eBook/$12.99 Paperback/$18.99 Hardcover
https://books2read.com/LosingAustin
https://www.amazon.com/LOSING-AUSTIN-Michael-J-Bowler-ebook/dp/B0DYZ9FSGV
When temperamental brother Colton is accused of killing his older brother Austin, he is consumed with confusion, guilt, loss, and rage: "I made my big brother disappear. Not like a magician makes an elephant disappear, but I did drive him away, and he did disappear." Nobody will believe that Colton didn't have something to do with this.
This survey does not focus on outside assumptions and judgments, but is delivered in the first person as Colton expresses his anger and anguish, embarking on a search for the truth which eventually leads him into the murky world of other missing kids.
Many novels have considered missing children from different angles, but Bowler creates a truly compelling voice from the perspective of a brother who is both a suspect and a victim of loss and guilt. The story's setting (the affluent community of Mill Valley in Northern California) is nicely portrayed, realistic, and cements the mystery of a child's disappearance in a supposedly safe community setting.
From the start, Austin has been different: "Even when I was old enough to understand that my big brother was "different," he'd never spoken a single word and hated being touched." This adds further intrigue and emotional complications to the story of a family that has adjusted to two very different brothers, only to lose one of them (well - both, really, as the story reveals).
As the family adjusts to an impossible unresolved situation, Bowler does an exceptional job of capturing just how this puzzle impacts all involved: "Dad didn't believe everything Alysse had told us, but he still considered the abduction scenario a "possibility." Sure, kids vanished all the time and their bodies weren't discovered for decades. But the idea that Austin was still alive and aboard some alien ship somewhere was better than picturing him moldering away in an unmarked grave, so Dad clung to that feeble tendril of hope."
As a drive to make things right unfolds confessions, discoveries, and revised relationships, the novel takes many surprising twists readers won't see coming. Those who have digested other stories of intrigue and psychological anguish over a missing child will find Losing Austin far more complicated and satisfying than many just because of its elements of unpredictability.
Help and revelations come from unexpected sources as Colton seemingly finds answers, only to discover they raise even more questions about relationships, love, and resolution. Libraries seeking novels about loss, discovery, and growth will find Losing Austin offers a potent, fresh viewpoint on losing an older child that involves its readers in deep psychological and social inspections.
Powered by the realistic, flawed, likeable character of Colton, the novel is quite simply gripping, often surprising, and hard to put down.
The Fantasy/SciFi Shelf
Love & Murder
Katie Christine Bishop
Black Heron Press
https://blackheronpress.com
9781936364466, $18.99 Paperback/$14.99 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Love-Murder-Katie-Christine-Bishop/dp/1936364468
Why would a murder story appeal to fantasy readers? When it's not about murder... at least, not in the usual sense. Murder and Love are two cats whose intelligence allows them to comment upon the world and the human condition. Their differences and connections, described in the opening lines of the story, also reveal powerfully atmospheric writing: "She was black, and he, an indecisive tawny combination of taupe and gray with a few wispy white strands in between. Each was what the other was not; each was what the other wanted to be. Regardless, they were one and the same - a seamless pair of pampered house haunts indebted to their inscrutable feline forms." The interplay of emotion and philosophy is absolutely delightful: "And there it was: love and murder.
It was the beginning -- their beginning. It was how they'd come to know their world. And he, Murder, hated it, detested the slightest thought of it, railed at what it meant, seethed about how it made him feel."
But, this is more than a story of Love, Murder, or mystery. It probes the impulses of cats, people, and the murky moral waters which lie beneath behaviors and their outcomes, all the while injecting vivid scenes with thought-provoking life. This translates to scenarios which aren't what one might initially think: "The old woman fell to her knees at the scene of the massacre, crying and holding the little girl's severed head in her hands. "You've ruined it! You've ruined everything!"
As Orange Devil, the Beater, and other animals make their appearances, author Katie Christine Bishop crafts a tale that is not quite a cat story, most decidedly not just about adversity, and which will delight readers with its noir atmosphere and playful attention to the predicaments of both "kept cats" and those who live on the streets and outdoors.
At any given point, readers may pause their pursuit of Love & Murder for deeper reflections about human impacts on animals and life, the ulterior motives of both, and battles in which the war has already been decided and won. "If we live in the shadows," Murder's lips mouthed his own words as she spoke them, "how long until we too are shadows?"
Libraries and readers looking for literary delights that purportedly present sci-fi scenarios from animal perspectives, but enlarge the life-viewing platform to embrace deeper philosophical, social, and moral issues will find Love & Murder compelling, rich, and hard to put down. It is highly recommended for reading groups seeking novels replete with deep connections and reflections, as well as individuals seeking vivid stories of survival that operates on many levels.
Uplifting, engrossing, and deserving of slow reading (if only because the alluring story must eventually, sadly, conclude) Love & Murder is a top recommendation that both defies pat categorization and tantalizes the heart and soul.
The Assassin, the Traitor, and the Prophecy
Jeff Altabef
https://www.jeffaltabef.com
Evolved Publishing LLC
https://evolvedpub.com
B0DYP8PBQ2 $5.88 eBook
https://www.amazon.com/Assassin-Traitor-Prophecy-Kingdom-Fantasy-ebook/dp/B0DYP8PBQ2
The Assassin, the Traitor, and the Prophecy is the first book in a 'Four Kingdom' fantasy series. It introduces Cassara, a young Wingless Magic Shaper and Master Assassin whose hatred for the Wingots who enslave her people fuels a dangerous endeavor. Tasked with saving a Wingot Prince when a seer predicts his death, Cassara is placed in an impossible position that pits her beliefs and hatred against a mission that leads her to associate with and discover more about this prince than she wanted to know. Jeff Altabef creates an engaging story based on an intriguing female character whose training forces her to look beyond assumptions and prejudices from the start: "He nods. "How do you know those two behind the Wingots are Blood Traitors?"
"They're both armed with daggers inside their coats and no one else has a weapon."
"And the townspeople? What of them?"
I shake my head. "Fear, thick and acid smelling. They'll do nothing."
"Right, and what else? What else do you hear? I'm not training you to be ordinary, or am I wasting my time with you?" Deeper-level thinking carries the story into more complex territory than the usual fantasy about repression and confrontation - a notable, delightful component of a tale that compliments action with insight: "Isn't there something we can do?" I ask.
"I'm doing something rather important." He glares at me. "I'm teaching you both a lesson, Little One. Remember this feeling. This is what it feels to be helpless. One day we will rise up and seek our revenge. One day, but not this day. On that day you will remember this feeling and realize we fight so we never have to feel it again."
First-person reflections, experiences, and insights develop a personal foray into adventures that many readers won't see coming. Those temped to align with Cassara's initial perceptions of what is good or evil in her world will find thought-provoking intervals of conflict that force them to acknowledge the borders between right and wrong may be murkier than imagined: "The Resistance is real. My father is an authoritarian ruler, harsh, unjust, and not just to the Wingless. He's made many enemies among the Wingot lords who are not his favorites. They'd like to dethrone him. That's the way it works. Those out of power want power."
In juxtaposing the lives, prejudices and perceptions, and objectives of two very different individuals and showing how their vast differences can work to bring them (and their people) together, Altabef crafts a story that is vivid, unexpected, and delightfully action-packed. Libraries seeking fantasies that evolve not just kingdoms and conflicts, but ideals of employing magic and power in novel ways will find The Assassin, the Traitor, and the Prophecy easy to recommend to patrons who love action tempered by psychological insight. Readers who choose The Assassin, the Traitor, and the Prophecy for its promise of heady reading will especially relish how enemies come to better understand not only their disparate visions and experiences, but their relationship with one another in the bigger scheme of what evolves from their choices.
The Poetry Shelf
Tracing Bodies
Virginia Watts
Old Scratch Press
c/o Current Words Publishing LLC
https://currentwordspublishing.com
9781957224596, $9.99
https://www.amazon.com/Tracing-Bodies-Virginia-Watts/dp/1957224592
Tracing Bodies is a poetry collection steeped in everyday experiences that will prove especially attractive to non-poetry readers who seek immersive, accessible descriptions delivered in free verse. "Snake 1" opens the collection, capturing Virginia Watts's hard-hitting attention to juxtaposing nature and personal experience:
"As the story goes
my grandmother's grandfather
was the county jail keeper
small town, deep mountains
ring of clanking keys
volunteers who delivered hot meals
In the jail yard an ancient tree
held up a wood plank swing
where my grandmother played
pushed her doll or pushed it empty
not much of a story until the first gift fell
from a fourth story cell
landed like a bird feather
at a little girl's feet
pencil drawing of a black bear cub
so realistic she kissed it
transfixed by its friendly, shiny eyes"
Watts continues to blend "you are here" moments of revelation and discovery with a special thread of personal insight in a Proust-like manner. Her approach places readers in the position of not just observing life moments, but experiencing them vicariously. Forged in hometown encounters, the collection is ripe with experiential draws that keep readers not just engaged, but literally walking the path of description and emotion:
"My purple snow boots
punch holes through the ice-crusted sidewalks
that loop the Catholic church and Parish School
on my way to Daniella Sabatini's tenth birthday party
strolling the side of my hometown
where the families live who built this town
generations who toiled inside a factory
opened a grocery store, shoe shop, restaurants
birthed squalling babies and baptized them"
Take the poet's writing and walk these roads, explore this town, and feel life past and present as she reflects on her world, inspects lives through observation and revelation, and immerses readers in big and small life experiences that truly matter. Libraries seeking contemporary free verse poetry collections that are exceptionally strong in their atmospheric approach to daily living will find Tracing Bodies an excellent acquisition.
Vivid in its connections and reflections and filled with both personal experience and reflections, Tracing Bodies provides a wealth of insights that are delightfully experiential and emotionally evocative. They're highly recommended even to those who think they won't like or understand poetry. Here is a door to what modern free verse can achieve, accessible to not just literary readers, but to all.
James A. Cox, Editor-in-Chief
Midwest Book Review
278 Orchard Drive, Oregon, WI 53575-1129
phone: 1-608-835-7937
e-mail: mbr@execpc.com
e-mail: mwbookrevw@aol.com
www.midwestbookreview.com
Diane C. Donovan, Editor & Senior Reviewer
12424 Mill Street, Petaluma, CA 94952
phone: 1-707-795-4629
e-mail: donovan@sonic.net
Copyright ©2001
Site design by Williams Writing, Editing &
Design