Book Review: A Song for Issy Bradley by Carys Bray

Title: A Song for Issy Bradley
Author: Carys Bray
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Death of a child, some mild language

One morning, four-year-old Issy Bradley wakes up feeling sick. Her dad is gone being the bishop of their ward in England, and their mom, busy with a birthday party for one of her four children, is preoccupied and doesn't register the seriousness of her daughter's illness, and by the next day, Issy, the baby of the family has been lost to spinal meningitis. In the following weeks, each member of the family deals with their grief in separate ways-- one brother hoping for a miracle, another turning to petty crime. Their mother, Claire, is wracked by guilt and finds herself unable to function, while their father, Ian, functions beautifully, never taking a step back from his role as the shepherd of his family and his ward. He must endure, especially when everyone else seems to be falling apart.

I feel pretty conflicted about A Song for Issy Bradley. The story is gripping, and Issy's death definitely hooks the reader into wanting to read more. Bray does a lovely job with the pacing, and I appreciated seeing multiple perspectives throughout the story. However, the adult Mormon characters, which the exception of Claire, all feel like caricatures. There's Ian, whose singular focus on living the letter of the law often results in completely ignoring the spirit of the law and making the people in his family resentful. The stake president, who isn't as ardent as Ian, comes off as a hypocrite. The members of the ward seem either needy or nuts. It's no wonder the family is in a state of spiritual crisis. These aren't the Mormons I know-- the Mormons I know, for the most part, are complicated and genuinely trying to do their best, but aren't nearly as inflexible as Bray presents them in the novel. While I really liked the story (and loved the ending), and strongly identified with Claire's character, ultimately I felt that Bray spent too much time grinding her ax to write with nuance in A Song for Issy Bradley.

Book Review: Drop Zone by Traci Hunter Abramson

Title: Drop Zone (Saint Squad #8)
Author: Traci Hunter Abramson
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Violence

Damian is the newest member of the Saint Squad, a group of Mormon Navy SEALs. However, he's not Mormon and untested by the group, and they leave him at home with the wives when they go out on a mission. However, when the Saint Squad finds itself in trouble, Damian and Paige, a nurse who's now working as an administrative assistant to one of the SEALs wives, go undercover in Venezuela to find them. Along the way, they both have experiences that deepen their faith as well as their interest in each other as they work to uncover a mole and return the boys home safely.

I haven't been the hugest fan of Abramson's Saint Squad books in the past, primarily because they are all so similar-- one of the members of the squad finds a woman and they fall in love over the course of a harrowing mission. While I can buy one whirlwind romance, Abramson has now written eight, and at this rate, the members of the Saint Squad and their wives are more likely to belong in a PTSD therapy group than a group of Navy SEALs. That said, I think her writing is getting better, and obviously audiences want this story or she wouldn't keep writing it. I think she does a nice job with what she sets out to do in Drop Zone, but I prefer her books that aren't part of the series better.

Book Review: Tomorrow We Spy by Jordan McCollum

Title: Tomorrow We Spy (Spy Another Day #3)
Author: Jordan McCollum
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: violence

Talia and Danny have finally tied the knot and when Tomorow We Spy opens, they're on their honeymoon in Paris, half a world away from Talia's job as a CIA operative in Ottawa. But it's not too hard for a spy to track down another spy, and before Talia and Danny can even visit the Louvre or kiss on top of the Eiffel Tower, they are sucked into a mission, this time with Danny (an aerospace engineer by day) as the operative being sent into Russia. Talia, being Talia, is jealous and nervous for her new husband, so she insists on posing as his translator so she can keep tabs on him, and then when they realize they have been double crossed, she has to work to keep them both alive.

Oh Talia, I had such high hopes for you as a character in I, Spy. I loved your voice and thought it was refreshing that you were a little neurotic. But lady, you're just as neurotic two books later (or is it five? It depends on whether or not you've read all of the prequels). In order for a series of books to satisfy me as a reader, I like to see a character grow and change, and I would especially expect to see growth when Talia marries Danny, but she's just as insecure and jealous in this book as she was in the first book. It's cute for one book, but wearing after a bunch of them.

Book Review: Eve: In the Beginning by H.B. Moore

Title: Eve: In the Beginning
Author: H.B. Moore
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: A clean read

You know the story: man, woman, God, serpent, fruit. HB Moore's novel Eve: In the Beginning, fleshes out the story (get it?) of the first few chapters of Genesis. Moore does a really nice job with Eve's mindset and the relationship between Adam and Eve, especially once Lucifer enters their lives and Eve starts to think about making the choice to have more wisdom and knowledge. While I think Eve's character is pretty fantastic, because the book is from her perspective, we don't see a lot of Adam's thought process, and while this is a 'historical" novel, one of the things I value most about historical fiction is being able to learn about a bygone era or a culture I don't know much about, this book is pretty remarkable in its absence of culture-- instead Adam and Eve are the culture makers. It's still worth a read as an insight into Eve's motivations.

Book Review: Deadly Alliance by A.L. Sowards

Title: Deadly Alliance (Espionage #3)
Author: A.L. Sowards
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: War-related violence

Idaho farm boy Peter and his team of Allied soldiers have only just returned from a dangerous mission behind enemy lines. One of the men is still in the hospital, and Peter has been enjoying just a few hours of time with his girlfriend Genevieve (an OSS spy), when he's sent out on another mission to destroy a bridge in Nazi-occupied territory. However, they're dropped hundreds of miles away on a suicide mission and declared missing. Genevieve is determined to find him, or at least what happens to him, and she soon becomes a target herself.

Although Deadly Alliance is the third (and final?) novel in Sowards's Espionage series, it feels and functions like a stand-alone novel. Sowards does a nice job getting new readers up to speed with complicated characters and relationships, and with the complexities of alliances during the end of WWII. There was plenty of action, just enough love, and lots of nice, detailed storytelling to keep me reading.

Book Review: Still Time by Maria Hoagland

Title: Still Time
Author:  Maria Hoagland
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: A clean read

Alyssa's life seems full enough with her four growing children, her part-time gig teaching aerobics, and everything else that comes with being a full-time stay-at-home Mormon mom in her forties. When the family travels from Texas to Idaho for her father-in-law's funeral, they are shocked to see her mother-in-law struggling with Alzheimer's. Alyssa and her husband uproot their family to care for her, and Still Time centers on the everyday events that result from that decision.

The fact that Hoagland chooses to write about the mundane events in a regular life is the double-edged sword of Still Time. Hoagland tackles the internal dialogue that runs through the minds of SAHMs, and Alyssa seems to represent the mindset of the typical Mormon mom. I could identify with her, but at times I didn't want her to represent me, if that makes any sense. The book was at its strongest when it slipped into the voice of Alyssa's mother-in-law. At first these POV shifts confused me, but eventually, they became my favorite part of the novel. I enjoyed seeing her try to hold on to the things she could remember, and the points of connection she might have with Alyssa if she were only well enough to do so.

Book Review: A Plentiful Rain by Elizabeth Petty Bentley

Title: A Plentiful Rain
Author: Elizabeth Petty Bentley
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: A clean read

Ellis's youth was shaped by his family's relationship with his disabled sister, and his adulthood was marked by a family tragedy. Now his father and sister are both engaged and moving on with their lives, and they worry about Ellis, a never-married fortysomething opthamologist who is something of a Mormon iconoclast. He meets Cassie, a young doctor, at a singles activity, but gradually finds himself falling for her older sister, Hera, a recovering alcoholic who is investigating the church.

There is a lot to like about A Plentiful Rain. Although the book is the second book in a series (the first, presumably deals with the fire and the sister), it feels like a stand-alone novel. I also identify with the characters, and really like both Ellis and Hera. I think that there need to be more honest, interesting, flawed characters in Mormon literature. But the narrative arc of this story is primarily just conversion-- Hera's conversion to the gospel and Ellis's gradual transformation from cynicism to faith. For a novel to move me as a reader, I'd like to see more of a plot than conversion. However, I like where Bentley is going with her characters in this novel

Book Review: My Name is Bryan by Stacy Lynn Carrol

Title: My Name is Bryan
Author: Stacy Lynn Carrol
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: A clean read

Bryan is a recent high school graduate with his whole life ahead of him when he's paralyzed in a cliff jumping accident on a church-sponsored camping trip. Despite these challenges, Bryan forges ahead with his life, marrying, going to college, having children and a successful career, all while bound to a wheelchair with diminishing use of his hands.

Stacy Lynn Carroll says that My Name is Bryan is "based on a true story," but the book includes photos of Bryan (who is Stacy's father-in-law) and his family. It feels a lot more like a biography in narrative form than something that is "based on" a true story. I remember being in my MFA classes and my professors saying that writers who try to write fiction based on real life have a hard time changing how things really happened, even when it makes a story better. This is a case where I feel like the author is too close to the source. She doesn't take risks with the story or the narrative and seems to have the audience (family) in her sights at all times. This story is inspirational and the mechanics of her writing are fine, but I think it would have been a better read for me if I knew what it was (a family story) when I went into reading it.

Book Review: To The Mountain: One Mormon Woman's Search for Spirit by Phyllis Barber

Title: To the Mountain: One Mormon Woman's Search for Spirit
Author: Phyllis Barber
Enjoyment Rating: *****
Source: Digital Copy

After Phyllis Barber and her husband raised their sons as traditional Mormon parents living in Salt Lake City, the pair divorced, and Barber divorced herself from the LDS Church too. To the Mountain is a series of beautiful essays, delving into the child-rearing years, the years away from the church, and the experiences that led her back to the Mormon faith.

This collection of essays is all the good things-- honest, literary, real. It may be uncomfortable for some rank-and-file Mormons in some places, but I loved seeing the variety of experiences that enriched Barber's spirit, and appreciated that those things could be seen in a holistic way that enlightened her life as a Mormon, too. I see this book not just as a collection of essays, but as a journeying piece, in which Barber seems to come to a sense of peace.

Book Review: Hemingway on a Bike by Eric Freeze

Title: Hemingway on a Bike
Author: Eric Freeze
Enjoyment Rating: *****
Source: Digital Copy

We all know that Ernest Hemingway aspired to be the most masculine man of the twentieth century. When I think of Hemingway, I think of those Dos Equis commercials about the most interesting man in the world. Hemingway threw himself headlong into bullfighting, deep sea fishing, large game hunting, drinking, womanizing, and generally being larger than life. Think of him as  an AJ Jacobs who oozes machismo. Essayist Eric Freeze seems takes inspiration from a vision he has of Ernest Hemingway riding a road bike through Paris, but his essays meander through themes of spirituality, masculinity, francophilia, parenting, home repair, and popular culture.

This is a fantastic collection of essays-- one that seems to work as a cohesive whole (I read the book in one sitting) since it feels vaguely chronological (even if it's not), but I would imagine that a more leisurely reading would be even more fruitful. The collection as a whole is sweet, quick-paced, and a little daring. I think Hemingway would approve.

Book Review: Way Below the Angels by Craig Harline

Title: Way Below the Angels: The Pretty Clearly Troubled But Not Even Close to Tragic Confessions of a Real Live Mormon Missionary
Author: Craig Harline
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Although Harline claims to be way below the angels, this was a clean read

Craig Harline writes about his mission to Belgium in the 1970s. This is a book about a regular boy, with the normal kinds of delusions of grandeur and fits of self-doubt, who goes on a regular mission, where things are boring and hard and he doesn't baptize a lot of people, but he still has a pretty good experience. What I appreciate about Way Below the Angels is the fact that Harline is so normal-- most other missionary narratives I've read have the characters/protagonists converting zillions, or else they end up falling in love with someone or escaping from the mob (or all three). This is a guy whose mission experience was mixed and probably pretty similar to most missionaries' experiences, and I appreciate the honesty with which he tells his story. Also, it's funny, which is always a plus.

Book Review: Hippie Boy by Ingrid Ricks

Title: Hippie Boy: A Girl's Story
Author: Ingrid Ricks
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Paper copy
Content Alert: physical and mental child abuse, neglect, implied adultery

In her memoir Hippie Boy, Ingrid Ricks writes about the years of her life when her mother's religious zealotry, her stepfather's abusiveness, and her traveling salesman father's ability to shirk responsibility all weighed heavily on her. Ricks could turn the story into a heavy-handed "woe is me" kind of tale, but she doesn't do that. Instead, Ricks works to see the perspectives of both of her parents (not excusing them, but also not condemning them). The book deals a lot with power-- religious power, abuse of power, abdication of power, absence of power, and how they play out in the lives of the Ricks family. She tells an engaging, empowering, and ultimately hopeful tale.

Book Review: Field Notes on Language and Kinship by Tyler Chadwick

Title: Field Notes on Language and Kinship
Author: Tyler Chadwick
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Paper copy

I've been writing reviews for days now, and I've saved my review of Field Notes on Language and Kinship until the end, primarily because I'm not sure how to classify it. In the book, Chadwick responds to, or is inspired by, many of the poems in Fire in the Pasture, the poetry anthology he edited. This is a really creative book, with essays, poems, literary criticism, and thoughts on life thrown in the mix. And by "thrown in," I think I mean, "carefully considered." This book is such a delightful mix of things, and it shows how one work of art can work to inspire readers to create others.

Book Review: Fire in the Pasture, edited by Tyler Chadwick

Title: Fire in the Pasture: 21st Century Mormon Poets
Author: Tyler Chadwick
Enjoyment Rating: *****
Source: Paper Copy

I'm teaching Literature of the LDS at BYU Salt Lake this semester. When I agreed to teach, I felt pretty confident in my ability to talk about essays, short stories, novels, film, and even drama, but I knew that I'd need some help with poetry. I asked friends for recommendations on what text I should use, and the universal response was Tyler Chadwick's Fire in the Pasture, which is an anthology containing several hundred poems by modern Mormon poets. Several hundred poems still felt daunting, and since the world of Mormon Lit is pretty small, I took a chance and emailed Chadwick, explaining my situation, and within a day, he emailed back with a list of the poems he'd recommend I use with my students. We had a great discussions about baby blessings, baptisms, missionary experiences, teaching Primary, laundry, canning fruit, wedding night jitters, and boob jobs. This collection is full of great poems that my students found relatable and funny and meaningful, and I can't wait to spend more time with it.

Book Review: Sense and Sensibility: A Latter-Day Tale by Rebecca H. Jamison

Title: Sense and Sensibility: A Latter-day Tale

Author: Rebecca H. Jamison

Enjoyment Rating: ***

Source: Digital Copy

Content Alert: A clean read

Poor Elly and Maren have the weight of the world on their shoulders. Their father's software company went bankrupt, and he died shortly thereafter. Elly has coped by throwing herself headlong into work (for the rival company to her father's, which happens to be owned by her ex-fiance), while Maren can't seem to get out of bed. When the family has the chance to move from California to Maryland, it might be the solution to their financial turmoil, and both girls might even find love.

I think I've made it clear in the past that I am not big on Jane Austen remakes. In my opinion, what makes Austen's books enduring classics is the cultural commentary they provide, and not simply the romance (I mean, seriously, I'm not sure I'd want to end up with any of Austen's heroes, even Mr. Darcy). What I love when I read Austen is the way I get a window into the world in which she lived. And if a modern revision of the story doesn't do that, then the book doesn't work for me. However, this version of Sense and Sensibility does work. Jamison's story tackles hard things-- she writes about mental illness, women in STEM, mental health issues people can have when they return from war and multicultural marriages, all set against the backdrop of Mormon culture. There were certain plot details I didn't love (a death late in the novel seemed a little too convenient), and Maren's character drove me a little crazy (but then again, so does Marianne Dashwood's character), but overall I enjoyed the story, and think the modern adaptation was a pretty successful one. 

Book Review: Spy by Night by Jordan McCollum

Title: Spy by Night
Author: Jordan McCollum
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: A clean read with some violence

If you've read the Spy Another Day mystery/thriller books by Jordan McCollum, you won't be surprised to see Talia and Danny appearing in this prequel, which is the story of how the couple fell in love. Talia is a CIA agent working undercover as a lawyer in Canada. Danny is an aerospace engineer whose mother wants him to reunite with his crazy former fiance. The two met at (where else?) their LDS singles ward, and Talia isn't sure if she's willing to be vulnerable and let anyone else in, even if it's for a chance at love.

One of the things that makes Spy by Night unique is that McCollum tells the story from Talia and Danny's perspectives. While the Talia chapters focus mainly on tracking down a Russian spy ring, it's Danny's chapters that talk about how the couple falls in love. This is pretty unique in the romance genre (usually we get the girl's perspective) and I found it interesting and refreshing. I was not interested in the spy story at all, however. I think that knowing what happens to the couple after the events in this novel might be detrimental to this story-- I like Danny so much in this story, but find him a little whiny and tiresome in the other Spy Another Day books. All in all, a solid read, and fun to read one of these novels with a bit more romantic bent than the others.

Book Review: Paso Doble by Moriah Jovan

Title: Paso Doble
Author: Moriah Jovan
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Language, a little violence, and lots of super sexy sex

Victoria is a Mormon college professor who returned to Spain, where she served her mission, partly to get away from her wealthy, stifling family, and partly to be able to watch the Spanish matador she fell in lust with during those mission days.

Emilio is an underemployed Chemistry PhD who supports his stepmother, brothers and sisters by working as a matador, but who pines for a jazz singer in a local club who (like Sia) he doesn't see, only hears. He also wants to teach at a university, but can't seem to get a job. Through their mutual acquaintance, Sebastian (the hero of another of Jovan's romances), the two come together, and wow, fireworks happen.

I've read a couple of Moriah Jovan's romances in the past, and I was both surprised and delighted to have the chance to read this one. These are not your typical "clean" romances favored by Mormon housewives. But maybe they're the kind of romances Mormon housewives should be reading. Jovan creates larger-than-life characters who encounter everyday kinds of problems. For example, Victoria and her bishop have several discussions over the course of the novel about how, if she wants to marry in Spain, she will likely marry outside the church. This is increasingly true for Mormon women throughout the world, and Jovan's treatment of the subject is something I haven't seen in Mormon fiction before, let alone in romantic fiction. Furthermore, Jovan doesn't shirk from sexy scenes. Holy cow, I feel like I'm getting an education every time I read one of her books, and I don't think that's a bad thing. These aren't books that every reader will love, but I certainly do.

Book Review: Lined with Silver by Roseanne Evans Wilkins

Title: Lined With Silver: An LDS Novel
Author: Roseanne Evans Wilkins
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Paper copy
Content Alert: violence, but otherwise a clean read

Sondra is a successful family attorney, rising up the ranks of her Utah firm, when her sister Nikki, asks Sondra to act as a surrogate for the embryos Nikki and her dying husband, Brad created before his chemo. Sondra wants to help her sister, but she's worried about what her clients will think of a pregnant unmarried attorney representing them, so she takes a trip away for the weekend to think about her options. On the flight,  she reconnects with Zack, a boy she crushed on all through high school. He has his own reasons to want a quickie marriage, and less than 24 hours later, they are legally husband and wife. But will love come for these two as well?

This book was one I wanted to skim, but I felt like a rubbernecker at a bad accident and just kept reading. Very few books offend me, but this one did. From the "An LDS Novel" tagline to the unedited feel of the book to the girl who feels like she has to be married to be a surrogate for her sister because of a judgy culture to the absolutely horrendous ending (okay, so I'm going to spoil it here and just say that Wilkins solves the problem of Sondra's growing affection for the babies she's carrying and her worries that she won't be able to hand them over to their parents by KILLING OFF the parents in an accident). Then the last chapter of the book focuses so much more on the romantic resolution than on the death of those characters. Lined With Silver was just a trainwreck of a book, albeit one I took a bit of a secret pleasure in watching.

Book Review: All the Finer Things by Stephanie Connelley Worlton

Title: All the Finer Things
Author: Stephanie Connelley Worlton
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Domestic abuse

Megan lives in a penthouse apartment, has beautiful clothes, a gorgeous car, an adorable baby, and she's married to one of the most prominent plastic surgeons in Southern California. But her husband also abuses her regularly, and one night, after a particularly bad beating, she takes her baby and the cash she's stockpiled and makes a run for it, landing in a sleepy small town where her Audi and her designer jeans make her pretty conspicuous.

That doesn't sound so bad, right? And the premise of the story is pretty good-- a spoiled rich girl who has to make it on her own in a small town. But every single character is painted with incredibly broad strokes. The evil husband is badder than bad-- he's not just abusive, but adulterous, alcoholic, and gambling addicted, and possibly interested in murder. Megan is a spoiled rich girl who allowed everyone else in her life to make her choices for her (first her mother and then her husband) until she had a child. Ammon, the love interest, is almost too good-hearted to be true. A little more nuance would have gone a long way with this story.

Book Review: Before the Clock Strikes Thirty by Aubrey Mace

Title: Before the Clock Strikes Thirty
Author: Aubrey Mace
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: a clean read

When Shannon is ten, a gypsy reads her fortune-- before she turns thirty she will marry a man who she meets at a wedding. Shannon becomes somewhat obsessed with weddings, and when she's a BYU student, she reconnects with Nathan, who embarrassed her at a wedding many years ago (he doesn't remember this happening, and she doesn't remind him). But Nathan's not so bad this time around. In fact, they become BFFs, and he makes it his mission to take Shannon to as many weddings as possible so she can find her one true love. Of course, he's right in front of her the whole time.

This story is cute, if predictable (is it even a legitimate criticism to say a romance novel is predictable-- isn't that part of the genre?). I read two BYU romances in a row, and while I think these stories definitely have their appeal, and I was a BYU bride myself, they also make me cringe a little bit. It makes me sad that Shannon is so eager to fulfill the fortune teller's promise when she's still so young. I did like the "friends before lovers" aspect of this story, and though that the story of how they met at BYU (involving fainting and lots of pizza) was pretty charming.