The Un-Retirement
The Un-Retirement by Penny Mirren Recent widow and retiree Maggie Lawford is thrilled with her principal role as doting grandmother to precious Alice, but she occasionally considers finding a proper […]
Strangers, A Memoir of a Marriage
Strangers, A Memoir of a Marriage by Belle Burden So many people (women!) have read this book or heard the author interviewed on the morning television shows that this […]
The Ending Writes Itself
The Ending Writes Itself by Evelyn Clarke Six authors are invited to spend the weekend at the isolated island home of the famous author Arthur Fletch. This is a surprising […]
How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder
How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder by Nina McConigley How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder is another COA novel, if defined somewhat loosely. The fish out of water protagonists are […]
O Caledonia
O Caledonia by Elspeth Barker (NCN Book Club Selection May) As you know, I dislike coming of age (COA) novels, and here’s why–they are uniformly grim. In British COA stories, […]
Yankee Doodle Dixie
Yankee Doodle Dixie by Lisa Patton Yankee Doodle Dixie chronicles the adventures of divorcee and professional Southerner, Leelee Satterfield. I was disappointed in this sequel to Patton’s bestselling novel Whistlin’ […]
Cleopatra
Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff My sister-in-law couldn’t put it down; another friend couldn’t put it down fast enough! Two different reactions to Stacy Schiff’s biography of Cleopatra. I take the […]
Being Mortal
Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande Our book club selection this month was Being Mortal by Atul Gawande, author of three bestsellers, Complications, Better, […]
The Jezebel Remedy
The Jezebel Remedy by Martin Clark A Parnassus First Editions Club selection, The Jezebel Remedy isn’t your typical legal thriller. Married for twenty years, Lisa and Joe Stone are also […]
The Beige Man
The Beige Man by Helen Tursten In a departure from most Scandinavian crime novels which feature gloomy, hard drinking, isolated detectives of the male persuasion, Tursten’s Swedish Inspector Irene Huss […]
Killer Ambition
Killer Ambition by Marcia Clark Killer Ambition is the third novel in Clark’s series featuring Los Angeles Special Trials prosecutor Rachel Knight and her buddy Detective Bailey Keller. In a […]
The Arc of the Swallow
The Arc of the Swallow by S.J. Gazan The Arc of the Swallow is the second in Danish author S.J. Gazan’s series featuring Deputy Chief Superintendent Søren Marhauge of Copenhagen’s […]
The Sociopath Next Door
The Sociopath Next Door by Martha Stout Most of us think of sociopaths as serial killers, but sociopaths walk among us and are not all killers, at least not in […]
The Light in the Ruins
The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian In the summer of 1955, Serafina Bettini, the only female detective in the Florence (Italy!)Police Department’s Homicide unit, is assigned the grisly […]
The Exiles Return
The Exiles Return by Elisabeth de Waal If the name Elisabeth de Waal sounds familiar, then you probably read her grandson Edmund de Waal’s book The Hare with Amber Eyes, […]