Category Archives: Fiction

Review: Summerland, by Elin Hilderbrand

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Summerland
Elin Hilderbrand

Product Description/Synopsis (from Amazon.com):
A warm June evening, a local tradition: the students of Nantucket High have gathered for a bonfire on the beach. But what begins as a graduation night celebration ends in tragedy after a horrible car crash leaves the driver of the car, Penny Alistair, dead, and her twin brother in a coma. The other passengers, Penny’s boyfriend Jake and her friend Demeter, are physically unhurt – but the emotional damage is overwhelming, and questions linger about what happened before Penny took the wheel.

As summer unfolds, startling truths are revealed about the survivors and their parents – secrets kept, promises broken, hearts betrayed. Elin Hilderbrand explores the power of community, family, and honesty, and proves that even from the ashes of sorrow, new love can still take flight.

My Thoughts:
Summer just wouldn’t be summer without a new book from Elin Hilderbrand, and her latest novel, Summerland was exactly what I needed this year.

I should confess that my introduction to Hilderbrand’s Nantucket came about two years ago when I was browsing in Half Price books with my husband and many visiting relatives. I found her first seven novels there, took them home, and spent most of April reading them before boxing them up and sending them to my mother in Mexico.

This year’s read, Summerland seemed a little more poignant than previous novels, mainly because it opens with the death of a teenager. As well, a good chunk of this novel actually takes place in Australia, where one of said teenager’s friends is ushered by his depressed mother and well-meaning father.

Nevertheless, Hilderbrand works her magic, and gives us slices of summer at the beach like no other can (although Ann Rivers Siddons and Dorothea Benton Frank certainly have their own charm). As always, her female characters are well developed, though not without flaws, and her male characters aren’t quite as rich (though, in this novel, the men we meet are better developed than they have been so far).

While I am always happy to have a new Hilderbrand novel on my summer reading list, one thing that always disappoints me is the fact that her various novels don’t seem to occupy the same version of Nantucket, but separate versions that exist separately for each book. Still, her work is always entertaining.

Goes well with…lemonade and homemade berry pie.

Review: Solid by Shelley Workinger

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Solid
by Shelley Workinger

Product Description/Synopsis (from Amazon.com):
Clio Kaid may be 17 and just beginning the last summer before her senior year, but her life is anything but typical.

She’s just discovered she was genetically altered before birth and is now headed to a top-secret Army campus to explore the surprising results of
the experiment.

Follow Clio and the other teens as they develop fantastic super-abilities, forge new friendships, find love, and uncover a conspiracy along the way.

My Thoughts:

I love science-fiction, and I love YA novels, so when I received an email from author Shelley Workinger asking if I’d be willing to work Solid (book one of the Solid trilogy) into my summer reading schedule, I said I’d love to. I hadn’t anticipated, at the time, that it would take me nearly a month to get around to reading it. I finally finished Solid on Sunday night, and my only disappointment is that it was only the first book of three. By the time this post goes live, I’ll have already purchased book two from Amazon, and set an alert to let me know when book three is available.

As to book one, however, I found Solid to be engaging and interesting, with teen characters who reminded me a bit of my own teen experience (though we didn’t have ipods or laptops to worry about.)

Clio Kaid, the lead character is delightfully snarky, but realistically awkward. I like that. I like that she’s not perfect, that she makes social gaffes and even that she regretted her choice of spaghetti on her first day on campus because of the potential for making a mess in front of a cute boy. As someone who cannot EVER wear white when going out for pasta or sushi, I totally related to that concern.

Author Workinger kept a good pace going in her story, bringing in new characters when necessary, but never glutting the plot with too many new names to learn. While the choice of lead antagonist was a little predictable, it would probably be less so to younger readers, and it served the need of the story: setting up the continuation of the series.

Bottom line: while Solid is very much the first book in a trilogy, it is also satisfying in its own right, and I look forward to seeing more from these characters, and this author.

Goes well with a plate of spaghetti, as long as you’re not wearing white.

Review: Morgan Hall, by Bo Briar

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Morgan Hall
by Bo Briar

Product Description/Synopsis (from Amazon.com):
Love never dies, and revenge never sleeps in Morgan Hall…

Morgan Hall, a desolate country estate, has been in Lady Christie Morgan’s family for almost 400 years. A family cursed by eternal tragedy, and now Christie is the last Morgan.

Apparitions appear, sparking a chain of horrifying occurrences involving Christie and the two men who love her: Anthony Longfield-Lothian and Tristan Ely.

A saga of mystery and sordid family history weaves intrigue for the passionate love triangle. Past and present war as the secrets of three aristocratic families unfold – resurfacing in a spine-chilling mystery of passion and lust, ghostly happenings, and blood-curdling murders.
Emotions run high as their world spins wildly out of control. Are they all cursed to repeat the grizzly past? Does sweet revenge claim its prize?
Morgan Hall.

My Thoughts:
There are times when a gothic thriller is the perfect thing to read, and I was lucky enough to read the bulk of Bo Briar’s modern gothic Morgan Hall on a murky, moody, rainy August morning that perfectly complimented the book.

Why do I call it a “modern” gothic? Because while Morgan Hall has all the requisite elements of a classic gothic – huge old manor houses with disturbing histories and some disrepair, orphan heiresses with tragic pasts, unrequited love, stormy weather, ghostly apparitions, and creepy housekeepers, it’s actually set in a time not too far removed from today, and the characters all have cars, computers, and cell phones (not that the latter ever work reliably). In fact, about the only thing missing is someone hiding behind a billowing curtain.

But don’t assume that I mention this because I didn’t like the book. In fact, I enjoyed it immensely. Sure, Christie Morgan’s behavior was often frustrating to my feminist sensibilities, and true, I didn’t quite buy the instant-love between Christie and Tristan (the best friend of Christie’s lifelong friend and ‘kissing’ cousin Anthony), but when an author is spinning a good story, the willing reader overlooks minor things like that, just as the good audience member engages in willful suspension of disbelief when watching Harry Potter and friends soar around on broomsticks to play Quidditch.

And make no mistake, Bo Briar spins a good story. Her descriptions of place, whether she’s talking about the afore-mentioned manor houses (one of which was a castle) or just describing modern London or a pub in York, are so vivid that when she wrote about gusts of wind or rainwater puddling in the street, I found myself looking outside to see if my weather was the same. I felt like I was walking through the corridors of the titular Morgan Hall with Christie Morgan.

As well, Briar knows how to set a tone. In my “I finished this book” tweet, I mentioned that Morgan Hall is wonderfully moody, but what I didn’t say was that, while reading the first part of the novel late at night, I had to insist that my husband come to bed RIGHT NOW because her writing worked with my over-active imagination to give me goosebumps.

I read across many genres. I love science fiction and contemporary literature, but I also love good mysteries. While I don’t read a lot of gothic fiction, when I do, I always enjoy the pleasantly shivery feeling of being just a little bit scared. Briar’s book gave me that feeling – I put aside my disbelief in some of the plot elements (like Christie, Andrew and Tristan all having inherited big old houses, or the three of them platonically sharing a bed) but was involved enough in the story to worry when Tristan turned out to be less – and more – than he seemed, and to worry for Christie when we learned what jeopardy she was in.

There are perfect times and places for gothic fiction. I was lucky enough to read Morgan Hall over a late August night and a rainy August morning, but even if you read this in the bright sunshine of a happy summer day, I think you’ll find this tale both compelling and just scary enough to make the hair rise on your arms.

Goes well with shepherds pie and a tall glass of hard cider.

Review: You Can’t Shatter Me by Tahlia Newland

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You Can’t Shatter Me
by Tahlia Newland

Description/Synopsis (from Amazon.com):

Sixteen year old Carly wants to write her own life and cast herself as a superhero, but the story gets out of control when she stands up to a bully and he turns on her. His increasing harassment forces her to battle flying hooks, giant thistles, doubt dragons and a suffocating closet. Dylan, a karate-trained nerd who supports her stand, turns out to be a secret admirer, and while he struggles to control his inner caveman, Carly searches for her own way to stop the bully. An old hippie shows her an inner magic that’s supposed to make her invincible, but will Carly learn to use it before her knight in shining armour risks all in a battle with a fire-breathing dragon?

This heart-warming magical realism story will inspire and empower teens and adults alike.

My Thoughts:
I’m turning 42 on Friday, but I still love young adult (YA) fiction. In fact, I firmly believe that YA offers some of the most empowering stories and empowered female characters available in modern literature. I also believe that Tahlia Newland’s fiction is some of the best YA on the market, so when she asked if I’d read and review You Can’t Shatter Me, of course I said yes.

I was not disappointed.

In fact, I was awed.

Newland refers to this story as an example of magical realism, and it is. Sixteen-year-old Carly imagines herself a green lycra-clad superhero, flying from her bedroom window to mete out justice to bullied kids in her school, and uses her vivid imagination to visualize personal problems as doubt dragons to be slayed, while dealing with the very real torment of being the target of a bully herself.

Dylan also uses his imagination in powerful ways, seeing words as tangible objects that can harm or heal, and learning to conquer the former and boost the latter.

Both teens recognize that at some point each of us has to take a stand and become the writers of our own scripts, the authors of our own futures, and the breakers of our own paths.

Newland excels at weaving meditation techniques, including guided imagery, into the narrative without making it seem forced. Instead, she gives Carly an aunt who is part aging hippie/part guru, and who teaches her niece how she can make herself emotionally strong by sending love and light to the universe – even to people who mistreat her.

While You Can’t Shatter Me could have been a preachy diatribe against bullying, in Newland’s deft hands, this novel is an absorbing, educational read, that both satisfies and gives hope to adults and younger readers alike.

Goes well with a picnic lunch on the beach.

Retro-reading: STTNG: A Time To…

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It’s no secret that I revel in escapist reading from time to time. Between January of this year, and the beginning of July, I’ve been re-reading the Star Trek: The Next Generation – A Time To… series, a collection of nine novels, the first eight of which are in pairs, that span the time between the last two Next Gen movies (Insurrection and Nemesis).

The specific novels are:
STTNG: A Time to be Born, by John Vorholt
STTNG: A Time to Die, by John Vorholt
STTNG: A Time to Sow, by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore
STTNG: A Time to Harvest, by Dayton Ward & Kevin Dilmore
STTNG: A Time to Love, by Robert Greenberger
STTNG: A Time to Hate, by Robert Greenberger
STTNG: A Time to Kill, by David Mack
STTNG: A Time to Heal, by David Mack
STTNG: A Time for War, A Time for Peace, by Keith R.A. DeCandido

You can read them individually, I suppose but they’re better savored as a whole collection, and while each of them have great moments, together they give a really plausible picture of how Starfleet reacted to the events of First Contact and Insurrection, explain why Data says in Nemesis that he has no feelings after two and a half films worth of emotion chip issues, and set-up the wedding of Will Riker and Deanna Troi, and their move to the U.S.S. Titan.

It’s no secret that I’m a great fan of Keith DeCandido’s work, so it should come as no surprise that his book, the last in the series, is my favorite. His take on the canon characters is always spot-on, but he also adds a political background – think “The West Wing in Space” – that I maintain would be an awesome series in and of itself (he revists the political aspect of the United Federation of Planets in a subsequent novel, Articles of the Federation).

Star Trek novels are my comfort-books, and I often read them when my day job has me so exhausted that I don’t have the brain power for reading deeper fiction, or writing my own stuff. There’s a ten-year span of TrekFic that I think of as the “DeCandido Years” where continuity was followed and all of the writers used some of the same original characters. These are, in my opinion, the best of the genre, and the A Time To… books are the best of the era.

Review: Five Fables by Christine Cunningham

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Five Fables
by Christine Cunningham

Product Description (from Amazon.com):
Christine Cunningham is spinning a few tales, five to be exact, ranging from the whimsical to the twisted. Why read one good story when you could read five?

1. Sweetest Release: Sometimes the world conspires against you when all you need is a bathroom.

2. Tic-Tac-Toe: Can a boy protect his mother and sister from the shadow in the yard?

3. Happy Birthday: Find out why you’ll never want to sing the song Happy Birthday to your child again.

4. Story Shopping: Things go awry when an author has no story to write.

5. Tarantula: Saving your best friend from your mother isn’t easy to do.

My Thoughts

True confession: I like to read short stories in the bathroom, because you can finish them in one visit without any body parts going numb. As a kid, my favorite bathroom books were two red hardcovers (the dust-covers long since gone missing) from Reader’s Digest that were compilations of pretty much every fairy tale ever written, in the original pre-Disneyfication versions.

Christine Cunningham’s collection of short stories, Five Fables was my bathroom book for part of this month, and I enjoyed every bit of her writing. “Sweetest Release,” which is from the point of view of a dog, made me laugh loud enough to frighten my own dogs. “Tic Tac Toe” balanced cozy hominess with a taste of suspense. “Happy Birthday” was delightfully creepy. “Story Shopping” spoke to the writer part of my soul – the part that doesn’t write in cafes, but simply observes others (and sometimes uses them as improv characters), and “Tarantula” made me grin despite the title (I hate spiders).

Cunningham has a wry voice and does well with tiny plot twists and last-minute zingers. I enjoyed her work immensely. This book was one I requested as a review copy, and I was not disappointed, except in that this is only volume one.

Ms. Cunningham if you read this: MORE PLEASE

Goes well with: Quilted Northern. Or a glass of lemonade and goldfish crackers, if you’re NOT reading it in the bathroom.

Review: Cougar of Spirit Lake

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Cougar of Spirit Lake
by Linette Eller

Product Description (from Amazon.com):

Appearing at the foot of the bed where the beautiful woman is giving birth to a daughter, the huge cougar sits quietly because he knows all that is to be and sees all that is. Yet this is only the beginning of the long trek for the mystical giant cat and the girl as she grows into womanhood.

You will be taken on a journey through love, the supernatural, mystery, intrigue and murder. Traveling from the Ohio River Valley in the 1800’s to the majestic Rocky Mountains and Spirit Lake, the mysterious lake where Winter Woman waits patiently. Winter Woman who is Legend, as is her son, the handsome, sensuous Chief, both knowing without knowing and sharing the mystic power of the Cougar of Spirit Lake.

My Thoughts
I picked this book to read because even though I’m allergic to domestic felines, I’m a strong LEO, and love anything remotely to do with big cats. I was intrigued by the paranormal romance aspect of the story, as well as the rugged landscape.

Although the opening chapter made me re-think my choice of reading material for a minute – it was awfully similar to formulaic romances for a few pages there (not that there’s anything WRONG with those novels) – but very quickly I was hooked on the story, and not at all disappointed. Eller’s female characters are strong, vital, interesting women, and the men in their lives are fully-realized, and not the cardboard cut-out types of men who populate so many romances.

And then, of course, there’s the Cougar, but I can’t elaborate about that without spoiling the story.

Trust me on this: read this book, you will love it.

Goes well with: cheese enchiladas and sweet tea.

Review: The Bookie’s Son

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The Bookie’s Son
by Andrew Goldstein

Product Description (from Amazon.com):
The year is 1960 and the place is the Bronx. All twelve-year-old Ricky Davis wants to do is play stickball with his friends and flirt with the building super’s daughter. But when his father crosses gangster Nathan Glucksman and goes into hiding, Ricky has to take over his father’s bookie business and figure out a way to pay back his debt—before the gangsters make good on their threats. Meanwhile, Ricky’s mother, Pearl, a fading beauty of failed dreams, plots to raise the money by embezzling funds from one of her boss’s clients: Elizabeth Taylor. Fast-paced, engrossing and full of heart, The Bookie’s Son paints the picture of a family forced to decide just how much they’re willing to sacrifice for each other—and at what cost.

My Thoughts:
The Bookie’s Son came to me from the publicist, who described it as a “coming of age” novel, which it is, in that protagonist Ricky Davis, whom we first meet when he’s borrowing his grandmother’s false teeth to play-act with (and what kid hasn’t been tempted to do the same?) goes through a lot of life lessons, including his Bar Mitzvah, over the course of the book, but to me, it read like a dark comedy as well, because even though the situations were often grim (Ricky watches his father collect debts on behalf of a crimelord, etc.) they’re treated with an all-too-human sense of humor.

That balance of humor and drama is one of the things that makes this novel sing, but another is the author’s use of language. I grew up in a culturally Catholic, New Jersey Neopolitan family. It’s a culture that speaks with a very specific rhythm, enhanced by the use of Italian terms and local slang. Goldstein’s book is set in the Bronx in the 60’s, in a Jewish family, but that, too, has a very specific linguistic rhythm, which can be difficult to capture on the page. And yet Goldstein has, to the point where the reader – or at least this reader – can hear that slightly nasal Bronx accent, hear the faint Eastern European accent in the Yiddish words, hear the kids using their street language among themselves, and slightly better language at home…and you are there. There among the clattering dishes, ringing telephones, guys (most likely in scary plaid pants) calling to place bets…sure, his descriptions are good, but it’s use of language that really puts you in the scene.

I have to confess, that it’s Ricky’s MOTHER I was most drawn to – maybe because I’m a woman, or maybe because I want to know more about the process that makes a person willing to sacrifice herself (not her life, but her SELF) for others. Sure, she’s drawn a bit like a comic character, and in other hands her job as the assistant to a theatrical lawyer who handles clients like Elizabeth Taylor and Marilyn Monroe would be written for pure hilarity, but in Goldstein’s hands, she has this lovely pathos to balance the preposterous-ness, and comes across as vibrant and interesting.

While I wouldn’t necessarily have chosen this book from the shelf in a bookstore, I’m really glad I crossed paths with it, because The Bookie’s Son is a great story about people who are as real as any of us, leading gritty, funny, earthy, HUMAN lives. Also? It can’t be said enough: the dialogue is to die for.

Goes well with: blue Jell-o, or a chocolate egg cream, but not together because that would be gross.

Review: Wyndano’s Cloak

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Wyndano’s Cloak
by A.R. Silverberry

Product Description (from Amazon.com):
Jen has settled into a peaceful life when a terrifying event awakens old fears of being homeless and alone, of a danger horrible enough to destroy her family and shatter her world forever. She is certain that Naryfel, a shadowy figure from her past, has returned and is concentrating the full force of her hate on Jen’s family. But how will she strike? A knife in the dark? An attack from her legions? Or with the dark arts and twisted creatures she commands with sinister cunning? Wyndano’s Cloak may be Jen’s only hope. If she can only trust that she has what it takes to use it…

My Thoughts:

While I haven’t been part of the target demographic for YA for decades, I still read a lot of it, because it tends to have such wonderfully written female characters – strong, smart young women that are not found as frequently in contemporary adult fiction. When I find such a story that is also set in a rich fantasy world, I’m usually completely happy. That was the case with A.R. Silverberry’s Wyndano’s Cloak, which I not only read in a single night, but stayed up reading (by Kindle-light) in the dark into the wee hours – something I rarely get to do anymore.

What I liked about Silverberry’s world is that while it’s a fantasy setting, he didn’t make it too farfetched. Like some of my other favorite fantasy works, the people speak in contemporary (though not slangy) English, they drink coffee (actually he had me at coffee), etc. Yes, it’s clear the world in question is based on a Renaissance setting, and that the darker Plain World is a much gritter version of a similar period, but it was completely its own place as well, and in fantasy, that’s important because the world is a character in its own right.

Protagonist Jen, and the other young women in the story – Bit and Pet – were all great girls with unique personalities, and their own journeys. I liked that they could be strong, and bright in individual ways, and yet still retain girlhood. Not all active girls are true tomboys, after all, and not all fashionistas are insipid fools.

The male characters were also well-drawn. Jen’s father, Jen’s brother – both privileged men with distinct personalities – and Blue, the trickster, who reminded me a bit of Gavroche from Les Miserables was a winsome rogue.

Jen’s mother was more a presence than a real character in some respects, but her presence was felt, and Naryfel – what a great name! – was a perfect witch/hag character, but with complexity that made her more than a storybook villain.

While the plot of Wyndano’s Cloak was a combination of a Hero’s Quest and “How do we get back home,” Silverberry’s treatment of two standard fantasy themes was unique and compelling. I’d happily read more of his work, in this world, or in any others.

Goes well with: a latte and a chocolate croissant.

Review: Tides of Love

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Seaswept Seduction: Tides of Love
by Tracy Sumner

Product Description (from Amazon.com):
He left all he loved behind…

Will he be able to return and win her heart?

An earth-shattering secret revealed in his recently deceased mother’s diary causes harsh words between Noah Garrett and his brother. Desolate and totally bewildered, Noah leaves Pilot Isle and has no contact with his family or even Elle Beaumont, the girl who has been his shadow all through childhood. Now, ten years later, Noah is a renowned biologist and returns to Pilot Isle to head up a research lab. Coming back home opens up old wounds and uncovers buried feelings. Hoping to have a few days to cope with all the old emotions welling up within him, Noah really isn’t ready to face anyone yet. However, it’s just his luck that the first person he literally bumps into is Elle. The only difference is, Elle is no longer a thin red headed mischievous imp who is constantly in trouble and always needing to be rescued. This Elle is a gorgeous, passionate young woman who sets Noah’s blood on fire.

Marielle Claire Beaumont has loved Noah since she was a child. As a sad little girl who’d recently lost her mother and couldn’t speak English, Elle met Noah when he saved her from taunts at school. Ever since then Elle has loved Noah unconditionally and followed him around like a little puppy. Her world was shattered when he left so suddenly. His silence all these years has been very difficult, and Elle is stunned when she slams into him so unexpectedly. It’s not long before she’s disrupting Noah’s life again as sparks of passion fly in every direction between the two.

My Thoughts:

I actually got this book at the end of February, but haven’t been able to post the review til now because my sites were hacked. Apologies to the author for the delay.

I’ve been reading a lot of books about women on boats, lately, so it seems only natural that I shifted to women on beaches. While I don’t read a huge number of romance novels, or historicals, I enjoy both when done well. Based on my recent reading of Tides of Love Tracy Sumner does them well.

Marielle-Claire (Elle) Beaumont is a smart, feisty young woman, but she’s also written in a manner that doesn’t make her seem jarringly out of period. She’s curious about sex, and appropriately innocent of certain facts, but not so naive that she doesn’t understand the theory. I like that she admits she wants love, that she knows herself that well, and I also applaud the author’s choice to give her not just the means for an education but the desire for one.

Likewise, romantic lead Noah, while prickly and clearly suffering from childhood trauma and innate sensitivity, is well-drawn as a scholarly, reasonably type in a place where sheer physicality rules the day. It’s a classic trope, but it’s one that works, and in this novel, it works especially well – as does the mystery of his real-world romantic experience.

The background characters were also nicely written. The teaser chapters attached to the back of the book show that there’s a sequel that focuses on one of Noah’s brothers, but all the of the townsfolk were interesting people I’d enjoy reading more about.

In reviewing a romance novel, you have to take a moment to discuss the sex scenes. Sumner’s writing in these scenes was a nice balance – not too clinical, not too comical, not too florid. While I’m personally opposed to sex on the beach (sand just should not go in certain places), I had no problem believing the passion that drew these two characters to it.

The plot itself is also decent. Yes, it’s obvious that Elle and Noah will eventually end up together, but we know that of every romance novel pair. What we don’t know is the specific journey, and with her attention to history and careful dialogue Ms. Sumner’s Tides of Love leaves nothing lacking.

It’s light reading. But it’s very satisfying light reading.

Goes well with: a tuna sandwich and lemonade; picnic blanket optional.