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Did you know that Ernest Hemingway was a spy during WWII while he was in Cuba? This novel imagines just what Papa was up to between the fishing and the drinking in the early days after Pearl Harbor. Dan Simmons’ The Crook Factory is a fun but not fast paced novel of suspense.
Category Archives: Debbie
Everybody’s Fool by Richard Russo (2016)
This sequel to Richard Russo’s 1993 novel Nobody’s Fool is set ten years later in the dying mill town of North Bath, New York. “Sully” Sullivan, hero of the first book, is mostly retired now after having his OTN bet pay off. His hapless sidekick, Rub, is at loose ends without Sully to tell him what to do every minute of the day.
Police Chief Douglas Raymer, a minor character in the first book, who considers Sully enemy number one, moves front and center. Raymer is a sad sack who sees himself as everybody’s fool. Still miserable over the accidental death of his wife who was on the verge of leaving him, Raymer is too morosely self-absorbed to see what is right in front of him. Funny and sweet, Everybody’s Fool is a book for those who are more interested in character than plot.
The Children by Ann Leary (2016)
A rambling Connecticut lake house is the refuge for widowed Joan and her two grown daughters, bipolar concert violinist Sally and near-recluse Charlotte. Charlotte spends her days in the attic working on her very popular, but thoroughly fictional, mommy blog and hooking up with neighbor Everett whenever she can. Into this sheltered environment comes beloved stepbrother Spin with his too-good-to-be-true fiancée, Laurel. Is Laurel all she says she is, or do her lies rival the stories fabricated by Charlotte about her completely adorable but fictional children? A little quirky and humorous, Ann Leary’s The Children provides a glimpse into how the “other half” lives.
Paradise Sky by Joe R. Lansdale (2015)
This is a good addition to the genre of humorous tall tale westerns. Something of a cross between Little Big Man and The Sisters Brothers, Joe R. Lansdale’s Paradise Sky is the story of Nat Love, a black man, set shortly after the end of the Civil War who must flee his Texas home and takes off to the Wild West. As a story of a black man in 19th century America, there are, of course, sad moments, but Nat’s darkly ironic tone make for a read that hits many emotions from laugh out loud to frown in sadness or exasperation.
Is Fat Bob Dead Yet? by Stephen Dobyns (2015)
I’ve read other suspense novels by Stephen Dobyns, but Is Fat Bob Dead Yet? was quite a surprise. This is a comic caper novel with a good deal in common with Elmore Leonard or even a Coen Brothers movie. Connor Raposo, a young man at loose ends, finds himself involved in a shady phone scam in New London, Connecticut. A motorcycle gang, bumbling detectives, and Elvis lookalike in witness protection combine for a funny romp.
Come Hell or Highball by Maia Chance (2015)
This book hits all the right notes of humor, setting, and character. In 1923, Lola Woodby, a New York society matron in her early 30s, is now a penniless widow with a dog, a Swedish cook, and a serious addiction to cinnamon buns and highballs. Talking like George Raft, if George Raft were actually talking in 1923, Lola and cook Berta go about wheedling their way into high society weekends, speakeasies, and shady businesses in order to retrieve a missing reel of film, and make the dough to pay the rent on their seedy apartment. I look forward to Lola’s next adventure.
Check out Maia Chance’s Come Hell or Highball today.
The Ways of the World by Robert Goddard (2015)
“Max” Maxted is a WWI veteran and former POW who plans to open a flight school on the family property. When his father dies under mysterious circumstances in Paris at the peace talks, Max is determined to get to the bottom of it. Although by the end of the book many questions are answered, more have arisen to make us early anticipate book two of this trilogy. What was Max’s father really raising money for? What is the secret of Max’s birth? Will his pill of a brother and sister-in-law get their comeuppance?
The Ways of the World by Robert Goddard is a throwback to those 1930s and early forties movies, often, but not always by Hitchcock, where an innocent man gets pulled into a web of espionage and hidden societies. Think The 39 Steps, The Lady Vanishes, or Ministry of Fear.
Missing Reels by Farran Smith Nehme (2014)
Ceinwen Reilly is a transplant to the Big Apple where her minimum wage job at a vintage clothing shop funds her classic movie habit and her propensity for dressing like a 1920s film star. When she gets wind of a long missing silent movie directed by a mysterious, long forgotten German director and starring her elderly downstairs neighbor, Ceinwin becomes determined to track down the missing reels.
If you love old movies and romances with Englishmen named Matthew, this is the book for you. If not, many of the allusions to old movies might leave you bewildered. Interested? Find a copy of Missing Reels by Farran Smith Nehme today.
A Star for Mrs. Blake by April Smith (2014)
In April Smith’s latest novel, Mrs. Blake takes advantage of a Canadian program to send mothers who had lost their sons in the recent war to go to France and see their son’s graves. A Star for Mrs. Blake is a quietly effective novel about a mother coming to terms with the loss of her son in WWI, her own past, and re-thinking all the patriotic trappings that come with any war.
Paradise Sky by Joe R. Lansdale (2015)
In east Texas, shortly after the end of the Civil War, young Willie inadvertently looks at the hind end of a white woman which causes the lynching of his father. On the run and changing his name to Nat Love, he experiences ranching, buffalo soldiering and Deadwood, South Dakota, in its heyday.
As a story of a black man shortly after the end of the Civil War, there are, of course, sad moments, but Nat’s darkly ironic tone make for a read that hits many emotions from laugh out loud to frown in sadness or exasperation. Joe R. Lansdale’s Paradise Sky is a welcome addition to the genre of humorous tall tale western in the tradition of Little Big Man and The Sisters Brothers.