Book Club

[smoky22]

Hi @maximillian .  Thanks for the review on The Forgotten Room.  I love the Pendergast series by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child so this one by Lincoln Child intrigued me.  I looked it up and it's part of the Jeremy Logan series.  It sounds like s series I'd like. 

[smoky22]

I read The Midnight Library by Matt Haig.  A Good Morning America Book Club pick: 

Between life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices . . . Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets.

I didn't love it but I gave it 4 stars.  The author's heart is in the right place.  I don't usually rate books on that criteria but it makes sense to me in this case.

[CANDLEQUEEN]

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@CareBears wrote:

Just finished Mr, Nobody by Catherine Steadman. this was truly a psychological thriller, and so much happening at the end of the story, again I could not read fast enough!  The story starts out when a man is found soaking wet, walking down a beach with no memory of his name, or where he lives, and this is where the story takes the reader into a twist of events that you will never see coming!

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@CareBears This is going on my TBR list as well, sounds like my kind of book!

[FindingMyJoy]

I'm continuing on with Louise Penny's mystery series. I finished A Great Reckoning and Glass Houses . 

A Great Reckoning had 2 interesting storylines - 1 set at the training school and the other revolving around the history of Three Pines. The history storyline was actually more interesting for me due to the person murdered wasn't a good guy at all so I didn't care much about who killed him. There was also a very good twist at the very end that helped give the main character closure. 

Glass Houses did too much jumping back and forth in time that I sometimes lost track of where they were in the story. A few spots seemed to drag on and on so I did skip some pages but the last couple chapters were a rush of activity. I don't usually read the author's notes or acknowledgements but both of these books had a sad update on her husband. The author mentioned how it was almost therapeutic to escape regular life to go to Three Pines the setting of the story and the quirky characters. I have found reading this series to be helpful to me. I look forward to the town's story lines to escape from the horror of real life 2020. 

I then took a little break from this series to try a fun cozy mystery that was based on a Halloween plot to get me in the holiday spirit...ummmm that book just annoyed me from early on with just obnoxious characters that I gave up and put it on the pile of books to return to the library. The book is part of a series so there are some who must enjoy it, but it just wasn't for me. I'm still looking for a good Halloween mystery to finish the month on a high note!! I have a couple other books from library and am hopeful 1 will fit the bill. 

[smoky22]

I read Piranesi by Susanna Clark (she wrote Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell 16 years ago). Almost impossible to review, Piranesi is a beautiful, but initially confusing, journey through a labyrinthine, alternate world.    One reviewer called it a "twisty mystery inside a metaphysical fantasy." I loved the writing even when I had no idea what was going on.  5 stars.

I learned later, there was a historical figure Giovanni Piranesi, who was famous for his fictitious and atmospheric drawings called Piranesi's Prisons, that are reminiscent of the M.C. Escher drawings.  The book Piranesi has the same sort of atmospheric feel to it.      

[SXMGirl]

I just finished The Birthday Mystery by Faith Martin.  This is the first book of a new series and the first book that I have read by her.

Jenny Starling is a traveling cook and amateur detective, who has been hired to cater the twenty-first birthday of upper-class twins, Alicia and Justin.  When she arrives at the parents' country home, she finds a large police presence due to the drowning of the young gardener.  

The party goes on as planned, but during the champagne toast, another person dies.

The English village mysteries are my favorites.  One note, however, is that this book was previously published as Birthdays Can Be MurderI, under Faith Martin's pen name, Joyce Cato,  

[CareBears]

Just finished Being Knowm by Robin Jones Gunn, I enjoyed this book.  To summarize a group of women get together for girl nights and days, to talk about life, to support one another and offer wisdom and advice, not to be judged!  It also shows that a marriage is constant work of communication, and growing together!

[smoky22]

I just saw the Goodreads Choice Awards are up for the opening round.  Seems like a strange mix of books and a lot I haven't read.  But for best fiction there is Fredrik Backman (Anxious People) and another one of my favorites, Emily St. John Mandel (The Glass Hotel).  Hard for me to choose between them.

And I was happy to see Piranesi in the Fantasy category.   

I always wonder who gets to pick the first round of books.  There is a space for write ins, though, if you think something else should be on the list.    

[SWEET]

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@smoky22 wrote:

I just saw the Goodreads Choice Awards are up for the opening round.  Seems like a strange mix of books and a lot I haven't read.  But for best fiction there is Fredrik Backman (Anxious People) and another one of my favorites, Emily St. John Mandel (The Glass Hotel).  Hard for me to choose between them.

And I was happy to see Piranesi in the Fantasy category.   

I always wonder who gets to pick the first round of books.  There is a space for write ins, though, if you think something else should be on the list.    

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I did one write in and skipped over a bunch of categories that I didn't read.

[SWEET]

Just finished Here We Are (nf) by Aarti Shanani about her Indian family living in Queens and the problems they go through and how she got involved in deportation activism due to her father and other immigrants. It was a very well-written poignant memoir.

Onto something lighter for the first time in a while or it seems.  A Palm Beach Scandal by Susannah Marren. I read the first in  this series and enjoyed it.