Book Reviews by vicki rock

Leah has been reading all kinds of advice since the death of her stepmother, Jean Kovacevic. Jean really hasn’t been her stepmother in years. She left Leah’s father, Dave, when Leah was 10. While they previous talked on the phone, they haven’t had contact in four years.

Jean lived in the fictional town of Sevlick in the southern Allegheny Mountains. Jean turned to sculptures because of her terrible childhood and bad marriage. She made giant sculptures welded from scraps of metal. She called them Manglements.

A man named Elliott Hounslow calls Leah to tell her of Jean’s death. He says he and Jean were living together. Leah, her husband, Gerardo, and son drive to rural Pennsylvania from their Long Island City home. Jean left the Manglements to Leah.

Chapters alternate between Jean and Leah’s points of view. This starts out well, but when becomes political, goes downhill. The first sign of trouble comes at a gas station when a woman berates Gerardo, who is from Peru. That seems forced as the real conflicts are between the characters.

Corazon, Donita, and Angel are Filipina domestic workers—part of the wave of women sent to Singapore to be cleaners, maids, and caregivers.

Corazon Beautista had retired back to the Philippines, but returned to Singapore under mysterious circumstances. The odd thing is her wealthy employer, Elizabeth Lee, hasn’t asked her to cook or to clean since she’s been back. Ma’am Elizabeth is planning an extravagant wedding for her daughter Jacqueline.

Donita is just out of her teens. This is her first time in Singapore, and she’s had the bad luck to be hired by Mrs. Fann, who is very picky. Donita has a boyfriend.

Angel works as an in-home caregiver for an elderly employer. Angel is sad after a recent breakup. She’s alarmed when her employer’s son brings in a new nurse who may be meant to replace her.

Then Flordeliza Martinez, a Filipina maid, is arrested for murdering her female employer. The three women don’t know the accused well, but she could be any of them.

Shocked into action, Donita, Corazon, and Angel will try to piece together the mystery of what really happened on the day Flordeliza’s employer was murdered. After all, no one knows the secrets of Singapore’s families like the women who work in their homes.

It’s rather melodramatic and isn’t much of a mystery, but it does highlight how domestic workers are sometimes treated. It is slow-moving, but it does pick up towards the end.

On November 12, 1975, Miranda Larkin, 10, comes home from school to find her house eerily quiet. Her mother isn’t there. Nothing is out of place and there is no sign of a struggle. Her mom’s purse is in its usual spot in the front hall.

So begins a mystery that will span a lifetime. What happened to Jane Larkin? She was only 39 when she disappeared. Investigators suspect Jane’s husband of killing her. A criminal defense attorney near Boston, Dan Larkin would be an expert in covering a murder.

But no evidence is found linking him to a crime, and the case fades from the public’s memory. Jane’s three children—Alex, Jeff, and Miranda—are left to be raised by a man who may have murdered their mother.

Fast forward almost 20 years. Jeff Larkin asks Phil Solomon, a childhood friend who is a novelist, to meet with Miranda. Phil does, then calls Detective Tom Glover, who was the lead investigator in 1975. Phil decides to write a book about the case.

When a construction crew finds Jane Larkins’ remains, the investigation starts up again. The children, now grown, are forced to choose sides. Do they believe their father killed their mother? Is there another explanation for her death?

The writing is outstanding. The characters and dialogue are real. It is told from several points of view and has a surprising ending. “All That Is Mine I Carry With Me” will be on many best books of the year lists. William Landay is also the author of “Defending Jacob,” another excellent legal thriller. He is on my list of must-read authors.

Wyoming Game Warden Joe Pickett is hunting for a wounded elk cow that was hit by a car. He knows that a snowstorm is coming. It has been a brutal winter.

Pickett finds the elk, but he also sees a vehicle parked in a remote area. The land is owned by Michael Thompson, a telecom billionaire. He then finds a body. The driver’s license in the man’s wallet identifies him as Zhang Wei. He is a University of Wyoming professor who has been missing. He was with the College of Engineering and Applied Science.

Since the storm is getting severe, Pickett heads for home, but calls Sheriff Scott Tibbs. Then his boss, Director Rick Ewig, tells him that Governor Colter Allen called to tell them to back off an investigation.

Meanwhile, Nate Romanowski owns a falconry company, Yarak Inc. One of Joe and Marybeth’s daughters, Sheridan, works for him. Geronimo Jones, another falconer, approaches Romanowski about cryptocurrency mining. Romanowski is then approached by Jason Demo, head of Keystoners, a group of local militant activists that is demanding that Wyoming secede from the union.

This is the 23rd in the character-driven series. Topics include crypto currency mining and air space over private land. The plot isn’t as good as others in the series and it gets bogged down in political issues.

Bodie Kane is a successful film professor and podcaster in Los Angeles. She is separated from her husband, Jerome.

As a teenager, she spent four largely miserable years at The Granby School, a New Hampshire boarding school. She was a scholarship student from a small town in Indiana. Her brother, Ace, accidentally killed their father. Ace, a drug abuser, died two and a half years before Bodie started Granby. Following the deaths, their mother had a mental breakdown.

In 1995, Bodie’s classmate, Thalia Keith, was murdered. Bodie and Thalia were briefly assigned as roommates. Now, years later, the circumstances surrounding Thalia’s death and the conviction of the school’s athletic trainer, Omar Evans, are the subject of online speculation.

Then a friend who Bodie hasn’t been in contact with in 20 years sends her a link to a video of a school production of “Camelot” in which Brodie was stage manager and tech director and Thalia acted. That is important because of the medical examiner’s estimation of Thalia’s time of death.

The Granby School invites Bodie back to teach a two-week course. When Bodie meets with her students and asks their ideas for podcasts, one of them, Britt, wants to focus on Thalia’s murder. Britt thinks Evans was wrongly convicted. Bodie finally admits to herself that she wants Britt to look at the case with fresh eyes because the story she knew had never felt right.

This is a mystery and a coming of age novel about violence towards women and media coverage of those crimes. It is also about the Me Too Movement and how memories get distorted over time.

It is well plotted and well written. I was torn between racing to see how it ended and reading slower because I didn’t want it to end. Although it’s early in the year, I know this will be on many best of the year lists.

Rebecca Makkai’s book, “The Great Believers,” was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award in 2018.

In the aftermath of World War I, former battlefield nursing sister Bess Crawford agrees to travel to Yorkshire to help a friend of her cousin Melinda through surgery.

The surgeon insists that Lady Beatrice must have a home health nurse because she has a heart condition. She is the Dowager Countess de vere Linton. But circumstances change suddenly when news of an accident reaches them. Lady Beatrice’s grandnephew, Gordon Neville, was injured.

She asks Bess to go to Scarfdale and the Neville family who had gathered for their mother’s birthday. Lillian Taylor, Lady Beatrice’s companion, accompanies Bess. When they arrive, Gordon tells them that there is a dead man upstairs and that he killed him.

Gordon then says he and Frederick Caldwell, a long-time friend, were looking for missing sheep, when he started to fall down a cliff. Caldwell tried to stop his fall, but they both went down the hillside. Frederick was still alive when they brought him to the house, but he died.

The local constable sends for a more experienced investigator. Inspector Wade arrives. He believes it was murder. Mark Caldwell, Frederick’s brother, tells Bess that Gordon killed Frederick for revenge because Grace, Frederick’s wife, jilted Gordon. Then the police order everyone to remain in the same house until the inquest is completed.

Bess’s investigation uncovers a complex web of secrets. Charles Todd writes complex characters and excellent plots. This is the 13th in the series. Todd also writes the Ian Rutledge series. I read both of series and I highly recommend them.

Los Angeles Homicide Lt. Milo Sturgis asks psychologist Dr. Alex Delaware to come to the scene of a murder. Sturgis doesn’t give Delaware any details ahead of time, but wants him to talk with Melissa Gornick.

Gornick arrived at her job as personal assistant to photographer Donny Klement and found he had been shot three times. His father is Victor Klement, a billionaire, who was married six times and had one child with each wife. The adult children barely know each other.

The victim had recently received media attention for his latest project: images of homeless people in their personal “dream” situations, elaborately costumed and enacting unfulfilled fantasies.

There are some, however, who view the whole thing as nothing more than exploitation, citing reported $100 payments and Klement’s avoidance of any long-term relationships with his subjects.

Sturgis wonders if a homeless person killed Klement or did a half-sibling lash out? Then there are more murders related to the case. As Sturgis says, “This case is like running through a house of mirrors.”

This is the 38th in the series. You’d think that Kellerman would be out of ideas, but the plots are fresh. The characters, even minor ones, are well-defined. The issues of mental illness and drug and alcohol abuse among the homeless are handled with tact. This is a good installment in the series and can be read as a stand-alone book.

London Detective Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Doug Cullen are in a pub on a rainy November evening. Kincaid sees a woman and assumes by her clothes that she is a doctor.

Sasha Johnson, a trainee doctor, leaves the pub and hurries through the evening crowd in the historic Russell Square. Out of the darkness, someone jostles her. A moment later, Sasha stumbles, then collapses. She has been fatally stabbed.

Kincaid and Cullen are called to the scene. Kincaid immediately calls in his wife, Detective Gemma James, who has recently been assigned to a task force on knife crimes which are on the rise. Along with her partner, Detective Sergeant Melody Talbot, Gemma aids the investigation.

But Sasha Johnson doesn’t fit the profile of the task force’s typical knife crime victim. Single, successful, career-driven, she has no history of abusive relationships or any connection to illegal drugs or gangs. Tully Gibbs, a potter, was her flatmate. Sasha was to meet Tully’s brother, Jonathan, at the pub, but he didn’t show. Sasha’s brother, Tyler, works for Jonathan.

This is book 19 in the series. Deborah Crombie’s books are richly layered and character-driven. I like how the main characters and their family have changed over the books. This also has a complex plot with enough twists to keep readers engaged. This is one of my favorite series.

Hannah is among those evacuated from a boarding school during a snowstorm. The bus careens off the road, trapping her with other survivors. Hannah is a medical student.

Meg, a former police officer, is in a cable car stranded high above snowy mountains, with five strangers and no memory of how they got on board.

They are heading to a place known only as The Retreat, an isolated former ski resort now functioning as a research facility for a deadly virus.

Prior to boarding, they all agreed to give up their phones to protect their destination’s location so they have no way of calling for help.

Carter is employed at The Retreat. As their generator begins to waver in the storm, something terrible is happening. The dangers faced by Hannah, Meg, and Carter are each one part of the puzzle. There are plots within plots which finally comes together. There is a plot twist near the end.

I had difficulty keeping track of the characters and the plot is dark and violent. It is heavy on the apocalypse side of things. I liked C.J. Tudor’s novel “The Chalk Man,” but this one wasn’t for me.

Australian federal investigator Aaron Falk specializes in financial crimes. He and his friend, Greg Raco, a sergeant with the state police, are at the Marralee Valley Annual Food and Wine Festival.

When organizers are closing the festival grounds, a baby stroller is found. The baby, Zoe Gillespie, six weeks old, is in the stroller, along with her mother’s ID. Her mother is Kim Gillespie, 39.

Police call Kim’s husband, Rohan, who is at a restaurant with his parents. People search, but Kim isn’t found. Greg’s brother, Charlie, is Kim’s ex-partner. They have a 17-year-old daughter, Zara. Kim was being treated for postpartum depression, so people believe she took her own life although her body isn’t found.

A year later, Aaron is back for Greg and his wife Rita’s son’s christening. Since it is the one-year anniversary of Kim’s disappearance, the wine festival organizers allow a public appeal for information. Six years earlier, Dean Tozer was killed in a hit-and-run accident, and his teenage son Joel thinks there’s a connection between the cases. As Aaron looks into Kim’s case, long-held secrets surface.

The character development is well done. The atmosphere of small-town Australia is as much a character of this story as the people. Dual storylines can be tricky, but both stories weave between the past and present with fluidity. “Exiles” is the third and final book in the Aaron Falk series. I’ve enjoyed the series, which includes “The Dry” and “Force of Nature.”

Josephine Wright is happy to be home in West Mills, North Carolina. It is 1976 and West Mills is still segregated.

She moved back from New York City to retire and to marry a childhood sweetheart, Olympus “Lymp” Seymore. She did secretarial work in the English department of Flatbush College.

Soon after Jo arrives, Lymp’s son, Nate, drives up. He tells her that siblings Marian, Marva, and Lazarus Harmon were found shot to death in their home. They were Lump’s half-siblings and people are pointing at him as the murderer.

The crime is the first reported murder in the area in decades. Marian was a doctor and her receptionist, Angela Glasper, found the bodies. People start harassing Lymp. Nate is his only alibi. But the sheriff and district attorney are saying the murders were a drug deal gone bad. And the authorities don’t seem to be interested in making an arrest.

Others had problems with the Harmons. Eunice Loving, owner of a grocery store, argued with Marian the week before. Marian also had an argument with Ted Temple, the shopping center landlord. Savannah Russet, Temple’s daughter, threatened Marva.

Jo knows police won’t investigate thoroughly because the victims are Black, so she starts asking questions herself. As Jo begins to question those who might know the most about the Harmons' deaths, she starts to discover a pattern of racial incidents, homophobia, and questionable medical practices.

“Decent People” is a very well-written, character-driven novel. The plotting is skilled and the pacing is good. I never would have guessed who the murderer was. I haven’t read anything by De’Shawn Charles Winslow before, but will watch for his future books. This is my first five-star read of the year.

Song Yan wakes one night to a voice asking for help. The voice seems to be coming from an orange mushroom. The voice says he wants to be remembered. She is convinced that she is dreaming.

Song Yan lives in a Beijing apartment and teaches piano. She gave up on her own career as a concert pianist many years ago, but her husband Bowen, an executive at a car company, has long rebuffed her pleas to have a child.

Bowen’s father died a month earlier, and his mother comes to live with them. She is from the southwestern Chinese region of Yunnan. She campaigns for a grandchild. Bowen’s mother reveals that they gave up a daughter, Boyan, and she is now regretting it. Ruya, Song’s friend, tells her that she met a woman who was Bowen’s first wife. Song Yan didn’t know he was married before.

As tension in the household rises, it becomes harder for Song Yan to keep her calm demeanor, especially since she is troubled by dreams of a doorless room she can’t escape, populated only by a strange orange mushroom.

Then a parcel of mushrooms native to her mother-in-law’s province is delivered seemingly by mistake, Song Yan sees an opportunity to bond with her. They cook together.

When a letter arrives in the mail from the sender of the mushrooms, Song Yan’s world begins to tilt further. Summoned to a house that sits in the middle of the city, she finds Bai Yu, a once world-famous pianist who disappeared ten years ago. He wants her to help him find the proof of his life through his music. She comes to realize that things are not as simple as she thought.

This is a surreal and dreamlike novel and some of the plot points aren’t resolved by the end. This novel isn’t easy to get through, but it is captivating. Ultimately, it is a story about choices, relationships and the meaning of life.