SMSA (Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts)
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New Book Highlights
ANIMAL STORIES
| Thyvold, Hans Olav | Good dogs don’t make it to the South Pole |
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BIOGRAPHY
| Day, David | Maurice Blackburn |
| Fermor, Patrick Leigh | More dashing |
| Frenkel, Francoise | A bookshop in Berlin |
| Molloy, Shannon | Fourteen |
| Turnbull, Malcolm | A bigger picture |
A bookshop in Berlin / Francoise Frenkel
In this riveting memoir, rediscovered nearly 60 years after its original publication, Jewish bookseller Frenkel documents her harrowing experience escaping Nazi persecution in WWII France. Born in Poland in 1889, Frenkel fulfilled her dream of opening a French-language bookstore called Le Maison du Livre in Berlin in 1921. She fled to Paris after Kristallnacht on Nov. 10, 1938, and escaped Paris in 1940 when the Germans occupied the city. Seeking refuge in Southern France, Frenkel experienced threatening situations while Nazis were “hunting” humans and was smuggled from one safe house to another. She witnessed children being separated from parents and Jews being shipped to camps; while trying to sneak into Switzerland in 1942, she was arrested and held in a French detention center. She was tried for attempting to illegally cross the border and acquitted, and in 1943 successfully found her way into Switzerland, where she began writing her memoir, No Place to Lay One’s Head. After the war—and the book’s publication—Frenkel returned to Nice. Frenkel, who died in 1975, writes that it is “the duty of those who have survived to bear witness to ensure the dead are not forgotten.” Frenkel’s remarkable story of resilience and survival does just that, and will truly resonate with readers. (Publishers Weekly, 26 September 2019)
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GENERAL FICTION
| Adiga, Aravind | Amnesty |
| Baldacci, David | Walk the wire |
| Barry, Sebastian | A thousand moons |
| Bohjalian, Chris | The red lotus |
| Bollen, Christopher | A beautiful crime |
| Cho, Nam-ju | Kim Jiyoung, born 1982 |
| Erdich, Louise | The night watchman |
| Fowler, Therese | A good neighbourhood |
| Giacobone, Nicolas | The crossed out notebook |
| Givney, Rachel | Jane in love |
| Hendricks, Greer | You are not alone |
| Hinton, Hilde | The loudness of unsaid things |
| Jennings, Luke | Killing Eve: Endgame |
| Katsu, Alma | The deep |
| Kennedy, Douglas | Isabelle in the afternoon |
| Lette, Kathy | Husband replacement therapy |
| McCall Smith, Alexander | The architect’s mother |
| McCann, Colum | Apeirogon |
| Montimore, Margarita | The rearranged life of Oona Lockhart |
| Offill, Jenny | Weather |
| Pham, Vivian | The coconut children |
| Richell, Hannah | The river home |
| Rijneveld, Marieke Lucas | The discomfort of evening |
| Rollins, James | Last odyssey |
| Russell, Kate Elizabeth | My dark Vanessa |
| Shriver, Lionel | The motion of the body through space |
| Steel, Danielle | The numbers game |
| Stuart, Douglas | Shuggie Bain |
| Swift, Graham | Here we are |
| Trollope, Joanna | Mum and dad |
| Tyler, Anne | Redhead by the side of the road |
| Washburn, Kawai Strong | Sharks in the time of saviours |
| Woods, Stuart | Hit list |
A thousand moons / Sebastian Barry
Barry’s mournful sequel to Days Without End focuses on Winona Cole as she navigates the dangers of Reconstruction-era Tennessee and carries the memory of her dead Lakota family. Surrounded by ex-rebels too disgruntled by the Union victory and abolition to “breathe the air of peace,” Winona has a hard time telling criminals from law enforcement in formerly-Confederate West Tennessee, as rebels regain the right to vote and black men freed from slavery find their newfound rights attacked. After Winona and former slave Tennyson Bouguereau are inexplicably beaten, she thinks back on her warrior mother and wonders what bravery and justice mean to an impoverished, Native woman that the local whites see as “closer to a wolf than a woman.” As Winona rides out with the Freedmen militia to avenge the attacks, she narrowly cheats death, leading her to a spiritual experience that connects her with ancestors. In Winona, who sees both the beauty and the piercing loss of her world, Barry has created a vivid if didactic heroine. This earnest tale will stay with readers. (Publishers Weekly, 7 February 2020)
Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 / Cho Nam-Joo
Cho’s spirited debut offers a picture of rampant sexism in contemporary South Korea through the experience of a frustrated, subjugated, 33-year-old housewife. At a gathering with her husband Jung Daehyun’s family, Kim Jiyoung suddenly speaks up to her father in law, questioning the cultural expectation that she bend over backward to serve them. A distressed, apologetic Daehyun insists to his parents that “she’s not well,” and coaxes Jiyoung to see a psychiatrist whose report on Jiyoung forms the novel, offering insight on the challenges she’s faced. Jiyoung grew up in Seoul as a middle child with an older sister and younger brother, and learned from her grandmother to accept that boys receive special treatment. At her school, she is punished for eating lunch too slowly despite being given much less time than the boys. While the psychiatrist recognizes how sexism has shaped Jiyoung and reflects on his privilege as a man, he concludes his report without resolving to offer support and validation. While Cho’s message-driven narrative will leave readers wishing for more complexity, the brutal, bleak conclusion demonstrates Cho’s mastery of irony. This will stir readers to consider the myriad factors that diminish women’s rights throughout the world. (Publishers Weekly, 16 December 2019)
Oona out of order / Margarita Montimore
In Montimore’s whimsical second novel (after Asleep from Day), a woman experiences the unsettling effects of time travel. In Brooklyn on New Year’s Eve, 1982, the day before college student Oona Lockhart’s 19th birthday, Oona is more interested in the rock band she has just joined, and particularly its guitarist, Dale. As the ball drops, Oona feels an odd sensation (“Escalating heat stirred within her as particles scrambled to escape and rearrange, but not now and not here”), and then finds herself in the body of her 51-year-old self in 2015, surprised to be living in a brownstone instead of the SoHo loft she’d imagined sharing with Dale. There, a personal assistant recites a message from Oona’s younger self explaining that she will be bouncing around in time through all the years of her life, hitting each only once, always making the change as the new year begins. As the years flash forward and back, Oona comes to life as a reckless club kid, a grieving older woman, and a wife who has no memory of her husband. Montimore sustains the concept by rooting the story in Oona’s relationships, employing sparkling humor as Oona struggles to make sense of each year’s new circumstances. This witty, fantastical exploration of life’s inevitable changes is surprising and touching. (Publishers Weekly, 19 February 2020)
Sharks in the time of strangers / Kawai Strong Washburn
From its opening pages, this debut novel juxtaposes the realities of life for a working-class Hawaiian family and the mysticism of the Native culture that shapes them, with surprising results. Augie and Malia and their children—sons Dean and Nainoa and daughter Kaui—find their lives forever changed when, during a boat tour, little Noa falls overboard and is rescued by sharks, unharmed, as witnessed by a boatload of passengers. It’s an echo of old legends that is reinforced a few years later when the boy heals an accident victim’s injuries (although his mother offers an origin story that suggests he was marked by the old gods from conception). Noa’s gift is a source of both wonder and cold hard cash, not to mention a baffling burden for a kid. In chapters narrated in turn by each member of the family, the siblings grow up, Dean and Kaui always feeling they are in their brother’s shadow, all of them balancing on the edge of poverty. Dean is a talented athlete, Noa and Kaui top students, and Augie and Malia manage to send all three to the mainland for college. But with the family fractured, all of them struggle, and only some find redemption. Washburn’s prose is lush and inventive; a native of Hawai’i, he portrays the islands and their people with insight and love. He skillfully creates distinct voices for each of his narrators: resentful Dean, wisecracking Kaui, happy-go-lucky Augie, and Malia the true believer: “The kingdom of Hawai’i had long been broken—the hot rain forests and breathing green reefs crushed under the haole commerce of beach resorts, skyscrapers—and that was when the land had begun calling. I know this now because of you.” That ”you” is Noa, sweet and bighearted and wrecked by his unasked-for powers. Their stories go in unexpected directions, from hilarious to heartbreaking. Striking style, memorable characters, and a believably miraculous premise add up to a beautifully crafted first novel. (Kirkus Reviews, 15 January 2020)
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HISTORICAL FICTION
| Chater, Lauren | Gulliver’s wife |
| Halls, Stacey | The foundling |
| Hornby, Gill | Miss Austen |
| O‘Farrell, Maggie | Hamnet |
| Smith, Wilbur | King of kings |
Miss Austen / Gill Hornby
Sister of the more famous Jane, Cassandra Austen emerges as a figure in her own right, a woman who, although disappointed in love, finds fulfillment in her devotion to her sister, both in her lifetime and beyond. “Poor, beautiful Miss Austen, condemned to eke out a sad life with nothing to do but care for others and control the temperament of her difficult sister” is the comical opinion of Jane Austen herself on her sister, Cassy, at least according to Hornby (All Together Now, 2015, etc.), whose animation of the close relationship between the siblings is the driving force of her new novel. Denied marriage and children after the death of her fiance, Cassandra becomes a model of duty and self-sacrifice, watching over her family generally and Jane in particular as keeper of the flame and guardian of her reputation. This role will include destroying any evidence detrimental to Jane’s future status, such as letters revealing a fragile, depressive side to her character. It’s on this mission that Cassy, in 1840, decades after her sister’s death, visits the Kintbury vicarage to sift through a stash of Jane’s correspondence. As Cassy reviews these letters, so the story flashes back to earlier episodes—of sisterly delight; of anxiety about the future when the Austens must leave their home after Mr. Austen’s retirement; of trips to Bath and the English coast; of meetings with potential suitors. All this offers Hornby the opportunity to observe the marriage market, women’s lot, and men’s dominion—though with a heavier satirical hand than Jane Austen’s—and also to suggest that members of Austen’s own circle might have inspired some of her characters. Cassy herself never quite convinces and the business of the book can seem scattered, but the evocation of the sisters’ closeness is solid. A nicely judged fictional resurrection joins the tribute library accumulating around a literary icon. (Kirkus Reviews, 1 February 2020)
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MYSTERY
| Adler-Olsen, Jussi | Victim 2117 |
| Bannalec, Jean-Luc | The killing tide |
| Box, C. J. | Long range |
| Casey, Donis | Forty dead men |
| Cavanagh, Steve | Fifty fifty |
| Chapman, Julia | Date with danger |
| Childs, Laura | Lavender blue murder |
| Cleeves, Ann | Killjoy |
| Coben, Harlan | The boy from the woods |
| Donohue, Rachel | The Temple House vanishing |
| Fields, Helen | Perfect kill |
| Finch, Paul | Hunted |
| Foley, Lucy | The guest list |
| Fox, Candice | Gathering dark |
| Gardiner, Meg | The dark corners of the night |
| Gentill, Sulari | Testament of character |
| Gleason, Colleen | Murder at the Capitol |
| Horst, Jorn Lier | Death deserved |
| Johnstone, Douglas | A dark matter |
| Jones, Tanen | The better liar |
| Kepler, Lars | Lazarus |
| La Plante, Lynda | Buried |
| Lackberg, Camilla | The gilded cage |
| Lloyd, Sam | The memory wood |
| Margolin, Phillip | A reasonable doubt |
| May, Peter | Lockdown |
| McCall Smith, Alexander | The talented Mr Varg |
| Moore, Graham | Holdout |
| Oswald, James | Bury them deep |
| Patterson, James | 20th victim |
| Reichs, Kathy | A conspiracy of bones |
| Solomon, Burt | The attempted murder of Teddy Roosevelt |
| Young, David | Stasi winter |
The guest list / Lucy Foley
Set on a remote island off the Irish coast where a massacre once occurred, this entertaining if uneven mystery from Foley (The Hunting Party) opens just after the high-profile wedding of Will Slater, the star of the reality TV show Survive the Night, and Julia Keegan, an online magazine editor. During the reception, the lights go out, prompting a “scream of terror,” which turns out to have come from a server, who reports having seen a lot of blood. Flashbacks from various perspectives, including the bride and her sister, the maid of honor, recount what preceded the server’s grim discovery—a body. Meanwhile, Julia is on edge after having received an anonymous note warning her not to marry Will, because he’s not who he seems. Foley defers disclosing the murder victim’s identity until quite late, but she undercuts the suspense with obvious indications of who it is. The tension of the setup isn’t quite matched by the reveals, though the nicely creepy setting compensates somewhat. Readers seeking thrills will find plenty. (Publishers Weekly, 12 March 2020)
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NON FICTION
| Allen, Liz | The future of us | 304.60994 ALLE |
| Baird, Julia | Phosphorescence | 152.42 BAIR |
| Brown, Brene | Braving the wilderness | 158.2 BROW |
| Darby, Andrew | Flight lines | 598.33 DARB |
| Farrow, Ronan | Catch and Kill | 331.4 FARR |
| Lewis, Helen | Difficult women | 305.420941 LEWI |
| Mayor, Thomas | Finding the heart of the nation | 994.01 MAYO |
| Mosley, Michael | Fast asleep | 613.794 MOSE |
| Overington, Caroline | Missing William Tyrrell | 364.1540994 OVER |
| Piketty, Thomas | Capital and ideology | 305 PIKE |
| Wear, Andrew | Solved! | 303.484 WEAR |
Phosphorescence / Julia Baird
Phosphorescence, by the always wonderful Julia Baird, is a masterful mix of science and psychology journalism, personal development book and memoir. The book takes as its jumping off point the idea that the very human experience of awe and wonder is good for you – good for your health, general wellbeing, ethics, and your spirit too. The book is, in some ways, a reaction to Dr Baird’s own medical ordeal. After being diagnosed with cancer several years ago, she has gone through a number of extremely traumatic surgeries to remove a tumour that ended up being the size of a basketball lodged in her abdomen. One gets the impression that this experience turned the author into a philosopher – and not in a bad way. At times the book seems to be trying desperately to communicate greater wisdom to the next generation (two chapters are addressed directly to her two children). It wasn’t a surprise to learn that she wrote parts of the book between surgeries and while recovering from her last, without knowing for sure whether she would recover. Phosphorescence is a surprise and a delight wrapped in a frankly gorgeous cover. If you liked First, We Make the Beast Beautiful by Sarah Wilson or Any Ordinary Day by Leigh Sales then this book will find a special place on your bookshelf (and in your mind) for years to come. (Booktopia, 3 April 2020)
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SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY
| Barbery, Muriel | A strange country |
| Buettner, Robert | Orphan’s journey |
| Hendrix, Grady | The Southern Book Club’s guide to slaying vampires |
| Larkwood, A. K. | The unspoken name |
| Lawrence, Mark | Girl and the stars |
The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires / Grady Hendrix
When Patricia Campbell, a bored, housewife in 1990s Charleston, S.C., sighs, “Don’t you wish that something exciting would happen around here?” she all but invites the chilling horrors that soon enmesh her and her friends in this clever, addictive vampire thriller from Hendrix (We Sold Our Souls). Patricia is one of a clutch of local women who assuage their ennui by forming a book club to discuss pulpy true crime chronicles. Their lives are upended by the arrival of James Harris, an outsider who easily ingratiates himself into their community, bringing an influx of money and good fortune to the town. Patricia alone finds Harris’s lack of traditional identification and sensitivity to daylight peculiar. When people begin to disappear, she struggles to convince her friends that Harris is more sinister than he appears. Hendrix draws shrewd parallels between the serial killers documented in the book club’s picks and Harris’s apparent vampire persona, loading his gruesome story with perfectly-pitched allusions to classic horror novels and true crime accounts. This powerful, eclectic novel both pays homage to the literary vampire canon and stands singularly within it. (Publishers Weekly, 6 January 2020)
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New additions to eBooks at SMSA
EBOOKS
| Animal stories | Leaver, Kate | Good dog |
| Biography | Porter, Linda | Mistresses |
| Biography | Turnbull, Malcolm | A bigger picture |
| Biography | Watson, Pamela | Gibbous moon over Lagos |
| Historical novels | Benedict, Marie | Carnegie’s maid |
| General novels | Bates, Sonya | Inheritance of secrets |
| General novels | Belle, Kimberly | Dear wife |
| General novels | Brown, N. M. | The girl on the bus |
| General novels | Buist, Annie | The long shadow |
| General novels | de Juan, Jose Luis | Napoleon’s beekeeper |
| General novels | Disher, Garry | The sunken road |
| General novels | Hamer, Cassie | The end of Cuthbert Close |
| General novels | McPhee-Browne, Laura | Cherry Beach |
| General novels | Melchor, Fernanda | Hurricane season |
| General novels | Meyerson, Amy | The imperfects |
| General novels | Raabe, Melanie | The shadow |
| General novels | Steel, Danielle | The wedding dress |
| General novels | Swan, Karen | The hidden beach |
| General novels | Wetzel, Maike | Elly |
| Historical novels | Everest, Elaine | Wedding bells for Woolworths |
| Mystery | Black, Cara | Three hours in Paris |
| Mystery | Gilbert, Victoria | A murder for the books |
| Mystery | Harris, C. S., | Who speaks for the damned |
| Mystery | Jackson, Lisa | Envious |
| Mystery | Pachter, Josh | The misadventures of Nero Wolfe |
| Mystery | Tursten, Helene | Hunting game |
| Mystery | Winslow, Don | Broken |
| Non fiction | Baird, Julia | Phosphorence |
| Non fiction | Hill, Jess | See what you made me do |
| Non fiction | Kondo, Marie | Joy at work |
| Non fiction | Mask, Deirdre | The address book |
| Non fiction | O’Toole, Fintan | Heroic failure |
| Science fictionand fantasy | Barbery, Muriel | A strange country |
Carnegie’s maid / Marie Benedict
Andrew Carnegie’s impetus to take up philanthropy is explored in this excellent historical novel. Benedict (The Other Einstein) begins with Carnegie’s letter to himself from December 1868, in which he pledges most of his fortune “for benevolent purposes.” The story then turns to farmer’s daughter Clara Kelley, who travels in steerage from Ireland; upon landing in Philadelphia in 1863, she is mistaken for an identically named fellow passenger who has died during the passage. Desperate to improve her family’s fortune, she assumes the other Clara’s place as a lady’s maid to the formidable Margaret Carnegie, mother to brothers Andrew and Tom. Clara’s education and sharp wit allow her to carry off the deception and, indeed, her intellect brings her to Andrew’s attention. She earns his respect and even affection, but differences in status make any prospect of a relationship unlikely. While there are elements of Cinderella, Benedict doesn’t let herself or her characters stray from historical realities. The true reason for Carnegie’s transformation from industrialist to builder of libraries for all remains a mystery, but Benedict’s imagination supplies a delightful possibility. (Publishers Weekly, 9 October 2017)
Three hours in Paris / Cara Black
In October 1939, American Kate Rees, the heroine of this riveting standalone from bestseller Black (the Aimée Leduc series), is living with her naval engineer husband and baby daughter at Scapa Flow, the Royal Navy base in Scotland’s Orkney Islands. After her husband and daughter die during the German U-boat attack on the battleship Royal Oak, Kate becomes obsessed with defeating Hitler. Her rifle skills, learned as a girl hunting in Oregon, earn her a place in a British intelligence operation to assassinate Hitler. In June 1940, with little training, she parachutes into Paris, where Hitler is making a brief visit. Kate gets Hitler in her crosshairs, but her shot misses and she goes on the run. Hitler orders the regular German police and the Gestapo to catch the sniper within 36 hours. Despite numerous obstacles and the realization that no plan was made for her safe return, Kate is determined to make her way to London. Black keeps the suspense high throughout. (Publishers Weekly, 10 February 2020)
Who speaks for the damned / C. S. Harris
At the start of Harris’s solid 15th whodunit featuring aristocratic Regency sleuth St. Cyr (after 2019’s Who Slays the Wicked), St. Cyr is astonished to learn from Jules Calhoun, his valet, that Nicholas Hayes, an old friend of Calhoun, has been fatally stabbed at a London tea garden. St. Cyr believed that Hayes, an earl’s son, had died a few years after being convicted of murder and transported to Australia 18 years earlier in 1796. Calhoun reveals that Hayes, who managed to return to England by stealing a dead man’s identity, got in touch with him and asked for his help, but didn’t specify what for. St. Cyr delves into the related questions of why Hayes took the step of coming to London at the risk of summary execution and who was responsible for his murder, which inevitably require probing the crime that led to Hayes’s being sent to Australia—the killing of the wife of a French count. Once again, Harris weds a twisty plot with convincing period detail. This long-running series shows no sign of losing steam. (Publishers Weekly, 3 February 2020)
Hurricane season / Fernanda Melchor
Melchor’s English-language debut is a furious vortex of voices that swirl around a murder in a provincial Mexican town. The story opens with a group of boys discovering the body of the Witch in a canal. The Witch is a local legend: she provides the women of the town with cures and spells, while for the men she hosts wild, orgiastic parties at her house. Each chapter is a single, cascading paragraph and follows a different townsperson. First is Yesenia, a young woman who despises her addict cousin, Luismi, and one day sees him carrying the Witch from her home with another boy, Brando. Next is Munra, Luismi’s stepfather, who was also present at the Witch’s house; then Norma, a girl who flees her abusive stepfather and ends up briefly settling with Luismi; and lastly Brando, who finally reveals the details of the Witch’s death. The murder mystery (complete with a mythical locked room in the Witch’s house) is simply a springboard for Melchor to burrow into her characters’ heads: their resentments, secrets, and hidden and not-so-hidden desires. Forceful, frenzied, violent, and uncompromising, Melchor’s depiction of a town ogling its own destruction is a powder keg that ignites on the first page and sustains its intense, explosive heat until its final sentence. (Publishers Weekly, 4 November 2019)
The misadventures of Nero Wolfe / Josh Pachter
The 18 pastiches and parodies in this superb anthology from Pachter (The Misadventures of Ellery Queen) honor Rex Stout’s iconic sedentary sleuth. The contributors, who include such notables as Loren Estleman and John Lescroart, succeed in emulating Archie Goodwin’s narrative voice and poking gentle fun at Wolfe’s array of idiosyncratic quirks. The standout is Lawrence Block’s “As Dark as Christmas Gets,” which offers a new case for Leo Haig, a Wolfe wannabe who keeps fish instead of orchids and dreams that his success as a detective will one day land him a coveted dinner invite to Wolfe’s home. Haig is called in by a man resembling the Mysterious Bookshop’s Otto Penzler after an unpublished Cornell Woolrich manuscript disappears during a Christmas party. Authorized pasticheur Robert Goldsborough is represented by the opening chapter of his first Wolfe novel, Murder in E Minor. Other highlights include a new translation of a French pastiche, “The Red Orchid” by Thomas Narcejac, one of the coauthors of Vertigo. This will appeal to Stout devotees and more casual fans alike. (Publishers Weekly, 24 February 2020)
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AUDIOBOOKS
| General novels | Beyda, Emily | The body double |
| General novels | Carr, Robyn | Sunrise on Half Moon Bay |
| General novels | Joshi, Alka | The henna artist |
| General novels | Keneally, Tom | The Dickens boy |
| General novels | Maher, Kerri | The girl in white gloves |
| General novels | St. James, Simone | The Sun Down Motel |
| General novels | Strout, Elizabeth | Olive Kitteridge |
| General novels | Yu, Charles | Interior Chinatown |
| Mystery | Andrews, Donna | You’ve got murder |
| Mystery | Crombie, Deborah | All shall be well |
| Mystery | Day, Maggie | Murder on Cape Cod |
| Mystery | Fox, Candice | Gathering dark |
| Mystery | Gardiner, Meg | The dark corners of the night |
| Mystery | Graham, Heather | Final deception |
| Mystery | Kubica, Mary | The other Mrs |
| Mystery | Parker, Robert B. | Angel eyes |
| Mystery | Pierce, Blake | A trace of murder |
| Mystery | Redmon, Lissa | The secrets they left behind |
| Mystery | Schellman, Katharine | The body in the garden |
| Mystery | Taylor, Elena | All we buried |
| Non fiction | Hvistendahl, Mara | The scientist and the spy |
| Science fictionand fantasy | Hendrix, Grady | The Southern Book Club’s guide to slaying vampires |
The body double / Emily Beyda
The nature of selfhood, reality, and power struggles in human relationships lie at the center of Beyda’s eerie debut. The nameless heroine, living in a small, unnamed town, once had dreams of being in the movies and mistakenly thought that working in a movie theater would bring her closer. Years later, she feels defeated and trapped in the job working concessions, but too exhausted to make a change. Salvation comes from a surprising place: a smooth operator named Max offers her the dream job of impersonating superstar Rosanna Feld, who has had a nervous breakdown. Flown on a private plane to Los Angeles, the narrator is taken to an apartment building where she’s essentially a prisoner. By painful inches, she’s transformed into a credible Rosanna: punishing exercise regimen, restrictive diet, even cosmetic surgery to change the contours of her face. The only person she sees is Max, and she slowly surrenders to his control. In turn, he becomes more affectionate with her. But as she gains confidence as Rosanna, successfully facing the public and even Rosanna’s friends, the dynamics of their relationship changes. Beyda favors a slow-burning, deliberate pace, but her psychological thriller weaves a shroud of menace and anxiety. This auspicious debut will get under the reader’s skin and stay there. (Publishers Weekly, 11 November 2019)
All shall be well / Deborah Crombie
Written with compassion, clarity, wit and precision, this graceful mystery amply fulfills the promise of Crombie’s debut novel, A Share in Death. “Morphine coats the mind like peach fuzz,” thinks Jasmine Dent, a 50-year-old spinster born in India who is dying in London of lung cancer. Her death resembles suicide but leaves her friend and neighbor from the flat above, Scotland Yard Supt. Duncan Kincaid, uneasy. The postmortem he orders reveals an overdose of morphine, prompting him and his sergeant, hot-tempered, copper-haired Gemma James, on a thorough investigation. Suspects include 30-ish, disheveled Meg Bellamy, a timid friend with whom Jasmine had considered suicide, and the downstairs neighbor known as the Major, a veteran of the Muslim-Hindu clashes in Calcutta in 1946 and an avid gardener with whom Jasmine had often sat “like two old dogs in the sun.” Others include Meg’s stunningly handsome, bullying beau Roger, who urged that she help Jasmine end her life; Felicity Howarth, Jasmine’s faithful home-care nurse who slaves to keep her brain-damaged son in an institution; and Jasmine’s weak-willed brother Theo, owner of a village junk shop who has failed at every venture he’s tried. Helped by Jasmine’s journal and a visit to a mental hospital, the clues finally click into place to reveal the culprit. Meg makes a decision that promises hope for two people, while Gemma and Duncan, both unlucky in love, move closer to each other. (Publishers Weekly, 3 January 1994)
The dark corners of the night / Meg Gardiner
Narrator Hillary Huber brings her trademark blend of measured intensity and thoughtful characterization to this third installment in Meg Gardiner’s Unsub series. FBI behavioral analyst Caitlin Hendrix is tasked with hunting down a new and disturbing serial killer, the self-styled “Midnight Man.” Unlike most killers, the Midnight Man targets entire families, murdering parents and leaving traumatized children as witnesses. Huber’s restrained pacing adds to the building tension as Caitlin, burdened with her own memories, struggles to make sense of this twisted killer. Huber adeptly gives voice to a range of characters, conveying Caitlin’s resolute determination and the Midnight Man’s chilling and increasingly unhinged ruminations. Huber’s crisp style complements Gardiner’s staccato prose, further contributing to this audiobook’s unsettling atmosphere. (Audiofile 2020)
The scientist and the spy / Mara Hvistendahl
This fascinating and well-researched study from Hvistendahl centers on Robert Mo (aka Mo Hailong), who, as an executive for the Chinese agribusiness DBN, routinely engaged in spying. In a somewhat bumbling scheme, Mo and others from DBN spent weeks driving through central Iowa, stealing corn seeds from farms that used proprietary seeds by giants Monsanto and DuPont Pioneer and shipping them to China. In 2011, a call from a farmer to a sheriff’s deputy to report three Asian men in an SUV hanging around a field sparked a two-year FBI operation that crisscrossed the country and involved an informant consulting for DBN. The stakes were high, Hvistendahl notes, as intellectual theft was costing American companies millions, but, according to the author, there was also racism in the FBI, which had long tracked Chinese scientists in the U.S. Ultimately, only Mo paid a price, pleading guilty to theft of trade secrets and spending three years in prison. His sentence served, he’s currently awaiting deportation to China. Those looking for insights into the current tensions with China will be rewarded. (Publishers Weekly, 18 November 2019)
The henna artist / Alka Joshi
Joshi’s eloquent debut follows a sought-after henna practitioner in postindependence Jaipur, India. Lakshmi Shastri survives a harsh childhood in rural Ajar by running away from an abusive, arranged teenage marriage. Determined to make something of herself, Lakshmi parlays her talent for original henna designs and herbal remedies into a successful business, offering henna to high-caste women and discreetly selling contraceptive tea to men with mistresses, including a man named Samir. After her estranged husband tracks her down years later, in 1955, with Lakshmi’s just-orphaned, 13-year-old sister, Radha, Lakshmi is surprised to learn she has a sister and devastated by the death of their parents, who were shamed after her departure. Lakshmi had saved to bring them to Jaipur, hoping to earn back their respect. Instead, Lakshmi takes in Radha, whose carefree interest in boys threatens to damage Lakshmi’s reputation and years-long struggle for independence. When faced with Samir’s vengeful wife, Lakshmi must come to terms with the effect of her actions on others. And after Radha becomes pregnant, Lakshmi gains an opportunity to put her family first. Joshi’s evocative descriptions capture India’s sensory ambience (horse-drawn tongas, pungent cooking fires and incense, and colorful saris), drawing readers deep into her moving story. Joshi masterfully balances a yearning for self-discovery with the need for familial love. (Publishers Weekly, 6 January 2020)
The girl in white gloves / Kerri Maher
Hollywood-royalty-turned-actual-royalty Grace Kelly is the subject of Maher’s second novel (after The Kennedy Debutante, 2018). The narrative traces Kelly’s life from her days as a young actress in New York, hungry for Broadway success, to her memorable turns in Hitchcock films and her Academy Award for The Country Girl (as well as her many discreet love affairs along the way), to her fairy tale wedding to Prince Rainier of Monaco in 1956, a marriage that ultimately leaves her feeling trapped and deeply unhappy. Kelly is a difficult subject for a novelist, given her public perception as an enigmatic ice queen, and Maher paints a portrait of a lonely woman desperate for the warmth of a loving family of her own and the stability this would offer, whose fixation on this fantasy leads her to trade a successful, fulfilling career for a dissatisfying marriage. Kelly still occasionally feels frustratingly inscrutable to the reader, but Maher’s portrayal of this Hollywood icon is largely convincing, and there is much to relish about this well-researched, riveting tale. (Booklist, 1 January 2020)
Angel eyes / Robert B. Parker
Bestseller Atkins’s routine eighth Spenser novel (after 2018’s Old Black Magic) takes Robert B. Parker’s PI from his native Boston to Hollywood, in search of 23-year-old Gabby Leggett, an aspiring actress whose mother grew concerned after not hearing from her for over a week. Spenser is aided by old friend and colleague Zebulon “Z” Sixkill, who’s filling in for Hawk as Spenser’s partner and muscle. The pair pursue obvious leads from Gabby’s personal life, including questioning her former boyfriend and current agent, Eric Collinson, who’s less than cooperative and denies having any knowledge of her whereabouts. Her latest lover, Jimmy Yamashiro, the president and CEO of a major movie studio, won’t disclose Gabby’s current location, but reveals that she’s been trying to blackmail him. Before long, Spenser and Z are menaced by the requisite gun-toting thugs, and Spenser must call in another old ally for help. This by-the-numbers effort will appeal most to Parker devotees. (Publishers Weekly, 23 September 2019)
The secrets they left behind / Lissa Redmond
Small towns can carry big secrets. When the FBI urges her to assist them with a baffling case, Buffalo NY, patrol officer Shea O’Connor poses as college student Shea Anderson. Over holiday break, three college freshmen had disappeared, inconceivably leaving behind purses and cellphones. The tight-lipped townspeople of Kelly’s Falls is heartbroken and fearful. Twenty-three-year-old Shea recently completed another brutal assignment for the FBI that nearly killed her and is reluctant to take on another case, but the victims and their families deserve answers. Under the pretense of being the niece of the obstinate chief of police, Shea comes to know these people, finds friendship, and even begins to fall in love with the brother of one of the missing girls. As she nears the truth, danger hovers in unlikely places in this seemingly perfect little burg. While the conclusion is unnecessarily protracted, Redmond (A Cold Day in Hell), herself a retired cold-case homicide detective from Buffalo, demonstrates her experience and delivers a well-crafted, pulsating mystery with a sobering twist. Fans of small-town mysteries will enjoy. (Library Journal, 3 April 2020)
Interior Chinatown / Chris Yu
Joel de la Fuente gives a spectacular performance filled with drama, theatrics, and razzle-dazzle that beautifully showcases Charles Yu’s satire of Asians in America, told in a funky screenplay format. Willis Wu’s life unfolds like a movie in which he is “Generic Asian Man.” Each night he returns to his crowded Chinatown highrise hoping that the next day will bring him closer to the role of “Kung Fu Guy.” De la Fuente’s fluid segues between American and Chinese accents, storytelling, and evocation of the inner screenplay of Wu’s mind are lively and authentic sounding. Wu’s family history, the struggle for Asians to break out of the social roles in which they have been cast, and glimpses of how they see themselves are revealed with engaging animation. De la Fuente’s interpretation of this poignant narrative results in dynamic storytelling. (Audiofile 2020)
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New Books for May 2020
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