The Glass Forest by Cynthia Swanson
In 1960, 21-year-old Angie and her older, handsome husband
Paul Glass are living what she views as a deliriously happy, ideal life in
Wisconsin with their young son. A call
from Paul’s seventeen-year-old niece Ruby is disturbing enough when Ruby tells
Paul her mother, Silja, has left her and her father, but then she tells Paul
his brother Henry, her father, has killed himself. At Angie’s insistence, she and their son
travel with Paul to Stonekill, NY to assist Ruby with the final arrangements,
but when they arrive at the custom made glass home at the edge of the forest,
Angie sense a darkness filled with secrets, but just what the repercussions of
these secrets will have on their lives is more than Angie can fathom. As Henry Glass’s story and that of the entire
Glass family is revealed, a less than perfect story unfolds. Told partly in flashbacks, mainly through
Silja’s past as a young immigrant in New York City, the narrative explores
social change and mores of World War Ii and beyond, including and especially
women’s roles. Using bright-eyed,
optimistic, at times naïve women, who may be troubling to some readers, the
Glass’s story unfolds. In the end, each
woman shows they are much more capable, and much stronger than anyone gave them
credit for being.
The Hush by John Hart
Johnny Merrimon and Jack Cross have been best friends for
their entire lives; now, in their early twenties, each has taken a different
path since the events of ten years ago that shook not only their friendship,
but the entire North Carolina town: Jack is a newly minted attorney working at
a high-powered firm and Johnny is living off-the-grid on 6,000 acres of land he
owns, Hush Arbor. The Hush has been in
his family for generations and Johnny has come close to losing it several times. The Hush holds secrets, many evil, and Johnny
has learned to live along side of it, respecting its powers. When a local businessman/hunter who has been
trying to buy Johnny’s land is found dead, Johnny is arrested as the suspect,
but released when the medical examiner testifies that there is no way a single
human man could have inflicted such damage to another man. Embroiled in a court battle of his land,
fighting for his freedom and keeping the secrets of the Hush, Johnny turns to
the one person he feels his can trust about all: Jack, putting Jack in an
impossible situation, testing their friendship in a way that has never been
done before. John Hart is a master at
evoking the Deep South with its folklore and many heinous acts that were
committed over the years and the scars left on the descendants.
Force of Nature by Jane Harper
When two groups of colleagues set out on a corporate retreat
in the Australian wilderness, the five men emerge within the allotted time, but
the women are late, and when they arrive at the end of the trail, one woman,
the one with the only cell phone and working flashlight, missing. Each of the women has a different version of
what happened to Alice Russell in the woods.
Federal Agent Aaron Falk and his partner Carmen Cooper travel south from
Melbourne when they learn the name of the missing woman who has been an
informant for Falk and Cooper regarding a possible money laundering
scheme. Has someone learned of Alice’s
cooperation with authorities? Does this has something to do with her daughter
and the daughter of her colleague, both of whom has been involved in a high
school bullying incident, or as crazy as it sounds, does this have something to
do with a long dead serial killer who was in the area at one time and whose son
has vanished and is presumed to be still alive.
It quickly becomes clear that Alice did not have any fans in the group,
but did someone hate her enough to murder her or was this a tragic
accident. Cleverly told, the plot shifts
between the investigation and the weekend in the wilderness. Complex characters must depend on one another
for survival in the rugged wilderness and during the investigation if they are
to stay away from suspicion.
Asymmetry by Lisa Halliday
This debut novel feels familiar at first but by the end is
like nothing you’ve ever read before. The
first part, “Folly”, tells the story of Alice, a young New York editor, and her
deepening relationship with a much older, award winning author, Ezra
Blazer. As their relationship grows,
Alice finds herself surprised by the joy she finds in it, during the time the
Iraq War is beginning. The second
section “Madness” is Amar’s story. Amar
is an Iraqi-American man who, at the end of 2008 has made a detour to London on
the way to visit his brother in Kurdistan.
As Amar sends the weekend detained in a holding room in Heathrow, his
story is told in flashbacks. Amar cannot
imagine why he would be detained: to him, his life has been very banal and he
poses no threat to anyone. The third
section of the novel, brings the two narratives together as Ezra is interviewed
for a BBC program using the music he would bring with him were he stranded on a
desert island as a springboard for conversation. Lyrica and startling, humanity and our
relationships to each other, ourselves, our environment, and the world at large,
are viewed from many different angles, focused through different lenses,
creating a changing perspective with the slightest shift.
Only Child by Rhiannon Navin
First-grader Zach Taylor knows that to do during a lockdown
drill at his school, but when a gunman enters the school and kills his friends,
teachers, and older brother, there is no way anyone could be prepared for what
happens next. Even as a town buries its
dead, Zach’s mother Melissa looks for justice for her young son, holding the
parents of the shooter, long time members of the school community, responsible
for their son’s actions. As Zach watches
his mother’s grief turns to anger, what remains of his family fall apart, and
tries to deal with his own feelings of loss, he turns to books and art to heal
his grief, his anger, and his heart, he begins to demand, in the way only a
six-year-old could, the same of his parents, showing them the way out of their
grief, finding that it is possible to still live, to show love and compassion,
have empathy for others even with their acute loss. This heartbreaking story is told through
Zach’s eyes in an authentic voice with an honesty that only a child’s view
could bring to this tragic situation where there are no easy answers, only
healing and forgiveness.
As Bright As Heaven by Susan Meissner
After the death of their infant son in 1918, Thomas and
Pauline Bright decide to move their three daughters Evelyn, Maggie, and Willa
from the family tobacco farm in Quakertown, PA to Philadelphia where Thomas
will be his uncle’s assistant undertaker and where they hope they will be able
to offer their daughters the chance for a better life. As the family slowly assimilates into their
new home, they watch young men leave to serve in the Great War, and then in
horror as thousands die from the Spanish flu.
Drawing on strength they never knew they had, the young women fight to
keep their family together, and alive, and to save the orphaned baby they take
in and grow to love as their own. In the
years following the war and the flu, the family rebuilds its life and faces new
challenges, and truths, as each member reassesses what is most important to
them and how much they are willing to fight to keep what means the most to
them. This detailed and nuanced look at
a family living not only within itself but within its extended family, the
society of a large city, and the tragedy of war and pandemic, reaffirms the
resilience of human nature and the willingness to continue to try and live,
even to make life better, under the most dire of circumstances.
Summer Hours at the Robbers Library by Sue Halpern
This homage to libraries illustrates the draw of libraries
and how they become what each user needs at just the right time. Kit, a librarian, has come to Riverton, New
Hampshire, where no one knows about her past, the bad decisions she made, and
the tragedies she endured because of those decisions and the decisions of
others; she is able to come to work, lose herself in the books and quietness of
the library, and forget her past. All
that is about to change:
fifteen-year-old Sunny arrives to perform court ordered community
service after stealing a dictionary and must spend the summer working at the
Robbers Library. Sunny is home-schooled
by her off-the-grid parents and has lived a less than traditional life, has no
friends her own age, but is curious about the world beyond what her parents
teach her, and eager to challenge some of their ideas. Rusty, an unemployed Wall Street trader, has
come to Riverton hoping to regain some traction in his life. This trio is thrown together at first, and
then drawn together, each taking stock of how their lives have unfolded
bringing them to this point, and how they can rebuild their lives, making their
own decisions to determine their futures.
This novel, populated by delightful and eccentric characters, is a true
love song to libraries and all they offer beyond books.
The French Girl by Lexie Elliott
Ten years ago, six Oxford university friends spend a week in
a French farmhouse. Everything seemed to
be perfect until Severine. The girl next door showed up, causing the tensions
that already existed between the six friends to flare up, especially for Kate
Channing and her now ex-boyfriend Seb.
No one has seen nor thought of Severine since she disappeared on the
last morning the friends were in France, seen on CCTV getting on a bus. Ten years later, her body is found in a
filled in well behind the farmhouse and the French police have come to England
to ask more questions of the five remaining friends, Theo having been killed in
Afghanistan. Kate has lost touch with
Seb, has had occasional contact with Caro and Tom, and has remained close with
Lara and now finds herself at the center of a murder investigation threatening
everything she has including a business she has been building, and even
possibly her freedom. As Kate begins to
spend more time with her once close friends she wonders if one of them could be
a murderer; as secrets begin to emerge, the kaleidoscope shifts shoring a much
different picture of the life Kate thought she has and the past she
remembers. Thoughtful with slow building
tension this debut will slowly draw you into this tangled web of relationships
and hold your interest until the very end.
The Storm King by Brendan Duffy
Fourteen years ago, Nate McHale left his hometown of
Greystone Lake in the Adirondacks and never looked back. Now a successful surgeon in Manhattan, he is
happily married, has a delightful three-year-old daughter, and has all but put
the tragedies and crimes of his teenage years firmly out of his head, leaving
them firmly in the past. But the lake
has a way of giving up all its secrets eventually; a body has just been found,
and Nate is making his way home, just ahead of a major hurricane, to attend the
funeral. Reunited with his high school
best friends, Nate realizes the sins of their teenage years are being revisited
by a new generation, and some of their secrets were not a secret as they
thought. As the hurricane bears down on
the Northeast, Nate’s past comes crashing into his present, and he must face
what he left behind fourteen years ago before the past destroys them all. Taut and fast-paced, the plot picks up steam
and strengthens like a hurricane, lulls as the eye of the storm passes over,
and then builds to a final feverous pitch.
There are surprises with each new page, and no detail is wasted with all
loose ends woven together to create a final, sinister picture of tormented
lives, and, as the storm ends, a glimmer of redemption for anyone who seeks it.
Sunburn by Laura Lippman
Polly and Adam are just passing through Belleville,
Delaware, Polly with plans to head west, Adam, with no discernable plans. They are magnetically drawn to each other and
find themselves staying in this town for one steamy summer, each lying to the
other, and perhaps themselves, about their pasts and their futures, but
together for this moment. As the summer
unfolds and someone dies, it becomes unclear in the murky heat, if this is all
part of a plan or just happenstance from a series of seemingly unrelated
incidents. As Polly’s and Adam’s stories
are revealed, it becomes even more unclear what each is looking for, from life
as well as from the other, and their relationship becomes increasingly
dangerous the more entangled they become with each other. Where will it all end and who will be left
standing is just one of the many mysteries that is slowly revealed in this
psychological suspense novel told in the best noir tradition by one of the best
crime novelists writing today.
The Queen of Hearts by Kimmery Martin
Emma Colley, a trauma surgeon, and Zadie Anson, a pediatric
cardiologist have been best friends since they met at a pre-med camp in high
school. Roommates through college, they
both continue to be big parts of each other’s busy lives in Charlotte, NC, harboring
secrets from their third year residency, shared, and individual, but most
involving Nick Zenokostas. The friends
think their secrets can stay hidden in the past and from each other, but when
Nick reappears in their lives, the two women must closely reexamine their
pasts, their shared history, and what, if the secrets they each hold, are
revealed, the consequences will be and whether their friendship can
survive. The narrative is told from both
Zadie and Emma’s points of view, in both present time and during their critical
year of residency, as each considers the choices she made and how those choices
affect each personally and professionally.
Warm and wise, at times humorous, at times heartbreaking, Martin’s debut
novel is full of live and love.
The Driest Season by Meghan Kenny
Kenny’s debut novel, which expands on her prize winning
short story of the same title, is a coming of age novel that is exquisite in
its quietness, as it tells the story of not-quite-sixteen-year-old Cielle and
how she copes with and tries to reassemble her life in 1943 Boaz, Wisconsin on
her family farm after she finds her father hanging in the barn. The farm has been suffering from wide-spread
drought and is under threat of being lost now that there is no one to farm
it. Cielle takes every occurrence and
action very much to heart from her first kiss to a horse-riding accident, her
father’s last cup of coffee being discarded and washed, to her sister’s
boyfriend joining up and leaving for war, and tries to reorder it all within
her life as she burgeons from a young girl in to a young woman while holding
fast to all she cherished as a child, with the new knowledge that things change
in an instant and as they do, we nor the world around us can ever be the same
again.
No comments:
Post a Comment