Book Review: Her by Harriet Lane

Title: Her
Author: Harriet Lane
Enjoyment Rating: **
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: I think there was some swearing and maybe some sex, too. And the end is disturbing.

Nina and Emma don't seem to have much in common when they meet on the streets of London. Although they're close to the same age, Nina is almost free from the responsibility of mothering her nearly-grown daughter, and her home and career as a successful painter make her enviable. Emma, on the other hand, is having her second child on the wrong side of forty, and she's still finding her footing in her career and her marriage. You'd be more likely to find some sticky crackers than an original painting in her home. Yet somehow the two women are drawn to each other and develop a friendship.

I found Her on my Kindle just after finishing the Whitney books and threw myself into it in an attempt to read something new and cleanse my palate. Imagine my surprise when after reading a few pages, the story started to sound vaguely familiar. I skipped to the end, and, sure enough, I'd read and finished it a few months earlier. Basically, this book was so forgettable that I couldn't remember I'd read it. The ending was both predictable and almost unimaginably horrible, challenging the reader's conception of Nina all the way through. In fact, the final act of the book makes the rest of the book feel completely unbelievable-- I'm not sure that any seemingly sane woman would exact vengeance in the way Nina does in the final pages of Her, especially after she and Emma have spent the last year building a relationship.

Book Review: A Dangerous Place by Jacqueline Winspear

Title: A Dangerous Place (Maisie Dobbs #11)
Author: Jacqueline Winspear
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Audible
Content Alert: some violence, incredibly sad, Maisie Dobbs fans the world over will feel betrayed

I think I finished my review of the tenth Maisie Dobbs novel by making the desperate (and untrue) pronouncement that if Maisie and James didn't get together in the eleventh, I would quit reading the books. Winspear knows how to quell an adult temper tantrum-- Maisie and James do, in fact, marry and conceive a child in the first chapter of A Dangerous Place. But I won't spoil more than five pages for you to let you know that Winspear doesn't give them a happy ending raising a baby on a farm in Canada, safely away from the bombs that will drop on London during World War II. No, Winspear's Maisie isn't made out for domesticity, it seems, and her aging uterus isn't destined for motherhood, since Winspear bumps off James (yes!) and the baby (I know!) in one fell swoop. Months later, after recuperating in India (natch), Maisie finds herself mentally unfit to make the final leg of her journey back to England and stops in Gibraltar, a British garrison town on the Southern tip of war-torn Spain, where she works to solve the murder of a Jewish photographer and finds herself drawn into the political intrigue of the place.

As far as Maisie Dobbs mysteries go, this one was fine. Winspear knows how to work a setting, and her description of Gibraltar had me searching plane tickets on Expedia. Winspear does a nice job explaining the situation in Spain without it feeling like a textbook, and she does a similarly nice job with her the Sephardic Jewish characters. But I was reeling after the first chapter and needed time to mourn myself. I feel like Maisie suffers from the Murphy Brown problem-- could Maisie have a baby and still be Maisie? Can she solve crimes if she's pumping breast milk? I can't imagine Winspear wanting Maisie to be the kind of mother who leaves her baby with a nurse or nanny all day, and James was never the kind of man who would have wanted his wife to be in that position. So Winspear dodges that bullet by cutting Maisie off at the knees and taking both husband and baby. Can Maisie ever just be happy? I'm not sure. Winspear has effectively said that she will never be a mother, and based on what's coming up in European history in the coming years of the novel, I would say that peace and happiness aren't on the horizon any time soon.

Has anyone else read A Dangerous Place? I'm dying to talk with someone about it. Not the mystery, so much as the bomb of James's death.

Book Review: Death on Blackheath by Anne Perry

Title: Death on Blackheath (Charlotte and Thomas Pitt #29)
Author: Anne Perry
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Audible
Content Alert: violence, Victorian discussions of extramarital affairs

When servants discover that a maid has gone missing and there's blood and hair on the steps of the London home of Victorian naval expert Dudley Kynaston, Thomas Pitt of Special Branch is called in to protect the interests of Britain. While the local police work to see if the missing maid is indeed dead, Pitt tries to uncover a traitorous conspiracy involving Kynaston.

This is the first of the 29 Charlotte and Thomas Pitt novels I've read, and I was a little surprised to see Charlotte getting top billing, since she seems to be such an accessory in this novel. Apparently, early on in the series, the pair solved crimes together, but these days Charlotte raises their teenage kids. I listened to this book at the same time I listened to the newest Maisie Dobbs book, and although I was incredibly frustrated with Winspear's narrative choices, I can see why it's hard to write a historical novel in which Victorian (or later, in Winspear's case) women have the kinds of career options that modern women have.

That said, I loved Death on Blackheath. Once I understood that Pitt was never going to concern himself with whether or not the maid was actually dead and was only interested in what was going on that concerned national security, the book became downright fascinating. I was very surprised by the ending (although in retrospect, I guess I shouldn't have been), and was impressed by the way that Perry created so many complicated characters (both the suspects and the detectives) and wrote about all of them with a deftness that shows why she is one of the preeminent mystery writers of our day.

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: Wedding Cake by Josi S. Kilpack

Title: Wedding Cake (A Culinary Mystery #12)
Author: Josi S. Kilpack
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
Content Alert: Some violence

In the cozy foodie mystery/Mormon Lit world, the marriage between Sadie and Pete has been as eagerly anticipated as that of Jim and Pam or Luke and Laura. Sadie Hoffmiller was annoying and meddlesome way back when Kilpack started it all with Lemon Tart, but she's grown on us, and we were rooting for her and her fiance, the former detective with whom she had all of those run-ins early in the series. Wedding Cake is, in many ways, a satisfying ending ending to a series that spanned more than 2,400 pages and half a decade. Kilpack nods to the key players in past mysteries (it actually reminds me a little bit of what Matthew Weiner is doing as he wraps up Mad Men right now). But the book has to be more than a retrospective of past cases, and Kilpack digs deeper into a story from Sadie's past when a stalker reappears and tries to ruin Sadie's big day.

I haven't read every book in the series, but I've read enough to be excited for Wedding Cake, and in many ways it was the perfect end to Sadie's story. The books really grew on me over the years, especially as I grew to have more of an appreciation for the cozy mystery genre, and I loved watching Sadie grow and change as a character over the course of the novels. The book was ultimately more violent than I had expected, and the wedding scene in particular was pretty shocking, but the book as a whole definitely met my expectations, and I wiped away a little tear as I read the last recipe and closed the book.

Book Review: The Good Girl by Mary Kubica

Title: The Good Girl
Author: Mary Kubica
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Audible
Content Alert: sex, language, violence

The fact that Mia Dennett, daughter of the prominent Chicago judge, is missing is national news, but on the home front, the only people who seem to care are her mother and Gabe, the detective assigned to the case. We know that Mia isn't dead-- she's been kidnapped by Colin, who was supposed to snatch her and turn her over to the bad guys who hired him. Mia and Colin end up spending the fall and winter hiding out in a summer cabin in Northern Minnesota, while Gabe tries to track them down.

The Good Girl has some qualities in its favor-- the narrative alternates between before Mia is found and after she returns, which requires the reader to put in some effort to construct the story in a linear fashion. But (like Gone Girl, to which the story is compared), the story relies on a twist. I figured out what that twist would be the first time Mia alludes to it during her capture, and that made the ending a whole lot less satisfying. That, and Stockholm Syndrome. It's an entertaining read, and I enjoyed listening to it, but I wish I'd been kept guessing a little longer.

Book Review: The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

Title: The Girl on the Train
Author: Paula Hawkins
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Audible
Content Alert: swearing, sex, vivid descriptions of domestic violence

The Girl on the Train is the it book of the moment. I've heard it called "The Next Gone Girl" several times. My husband called me from the bookstore on Valentine's Day to see if I had read it, apparently because there was a huge stack of books on display, and not because of what the book says about the enduring power of married love. But I'd finished the book earlier in the week, and he was back to the drawing board, trying to find me something I hadn't already read.

Over the last few years, Rachel has been in a slow descent. First, she couldn't get pregnant. Then she started drinking a little more than she should. Then she learned that her husband was cheating on her. Then she moved out to a rented room even further from London and the pregnant girlfriend moved into her house, which Rachel had to pass on the train to work every day. When she got fired for drinking too much, she continued to go into the city each day, and peering into her old home and the home four doors down, where "Jess and Jason," the perfect couple she liked to watch from the train window, lived. Then Jess disappeared, and Rachel's life gained a purpose-- find Jess.

The Girl on the Train is a thriller, and Hawkins does a lovely job unfolding some of the surprises of the story in the early parts. The middle part of the story felt a little boring-- I think it would have been a better story if it were 50-75 pages shorter. The narration of the audiobook is fantastic, with three women taking the roles of Rachel, the new wife Anna, and "Jess." I figured out the whodunit part of the story about halfway through, and sometimes I wanted to fast-forward to the inevitably gruesome conclusion. It's a good story, but one that does not benefit from the comparison to Gone Girl, because it raises the expectations too high.

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: The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf

Title: The Weight of Silence
Author: Heather Gudenkauf
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Audible
Content Alert: lots of violence, child sex abuse

The Weight of Silence is another book that was being offered as one of the Audible deals of the day, and I decided to buy it despite not knowing much about it (this must have been during the time when I was ignoring all of my favorite podcasts, allowing them to keep downloading until they filled the memory of my iPhone and I was left with over 120 podcasts on my to-listen list-- I'm slowly digging out, but I still have more than 80 TED talks to wade through). Anyway, Calli Clark is seven, and she hasn't spoken for three years on the morning she disappears from the quiet street on which she lives in a quiet Iowa town. Calli knows the woods that surround their town, so her mother Antonia isn't initially worried, but Calli's best friend Petra is also missing, and the secrets of the girls, their families, and other people in the town come to light for readers as the story unfolds.

The Weight of Silence is a hard book to listen to. As a mom, my greatest worry is that something traumatic will happen to one of my children, and this book is a fictionalization of my fear. Add in an abusive, alcoholic father, several other characters with questionable backstories, and some terrible things happening in the woods, and it becomes something that's hard to listen to. However, it's a compelling story-- once I got started I had a hard time turning it off. I needed to hear the resolution to the story, which is not an altogether happy one.

Book Review: A Circle of Wives by Alice LaPlante

Title: A Circle of Wives
Author: Alice LaPlante
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Kindle
Content alert: Some talk about child sex abuse, but I don't remember anything else, not even a sex scene, which surprises me in a book about a guy with a whole bunch of wives.

Palo Alto doesn't see many murders. Detective Samantha Adams is far more accustomed to looking into bike theft than solving violent crimes. But there's the dead body of John Taylor, a renowned plastic surgeon, on the floor of his room at the Westin, and everyone's conception of the do-gooder surgeon, who takes on difficult cases with disfigured children, changes abruptly when it's revealed that his widow, Deborah, is really only one of three women who called John their husband (not to mention the one who called him her fiance). But which one killed him?

I loved Alice LaPlante's novel, Turn of Mind, when I read it a few years ago, so I was eager to get my hands on this story too. I think Circle of Wives works well as an exploration into the characters of Adams and the three wives, but as a murder mystery it fell a little flat. I read the story on my kindle and couldn't believe that the end was actually the end of the story-- it felt like there were lots of loose ends that weren't tied up, and there wasn't much resolution with Adams, the PoV character for much of the novel.

Book Review: Rocky Road by Josi Kilpack (Whitney Finalist 2013)

Title: Rocky Road
Author: Josi Kilpack
Enjoyment Rating: ****
Source: Digital Copy
This book would be rated: PG

In Rocky Road, the tenth of Josi Kilpack's culinary mysteries, Sadie Hoffmiller travels to St. George, Utah, for a bachelorette weekend before her upcoming marriage to Pete Cunningham. And while she was expecting a fun getaway with a girlfriend, she's quickly roped into solving the disappearance of a local doctor. Kilpack does a wonderful job with the southern Utah setting (I was in town a week after I read the novel and had fun picking out the places she mentioned) and also in showing how Sadie is changing as her work as a private investigator affects her. The mystery is a decent whodunit too. Some of the secondary characters are painted with fairly broad brushstrokes. And I finally know definitively that Sadie is not a Mormon without ever talking about the church (which is what I thought in the early days of the series), since she spends a lot of time with the Mormons in St. George.

I think it's fairly common for authors to have a great idea for a first novel, then string that story out into a series of sequels that get progressively less successful. I'm not sure if these authors rest on their laurels and get lazy, or if they find themselves less inspired as the stories wear on, but I get the sense that they're cashing in on early success. I've read six of the ten culinary mysteries "starring" Sadie Hoffmiller, and Kilpack is not resting on her laurels. Sadie has come into her own as a character over the course of the novels. She has developed and deepened and changed, and her motivations for solving crimes are more mature than they were ten books ago. Her relationship with Pete is also progressing in a satisfactory direction. And I feel that Kilpack has grown more self-assured and confident as a writer through this extended exploration of Sadie. Her writing keeps getting stronger and stronger, and I'm sad that this series is approaching its conclusion.

Book Review: Deep Cover by Traci Abrahamson (Whitney Finalist 2013)

Title: Deep Cover
Author: Traci Abramson
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
This book would be rated: PG-13 for violence

I believe that Traci Abramson has had a finalist in the mystery/suspense category every year that I've read the Whitney finalists. And almost every year, her book has been one that has been hard for me to finish. Most of the books were from the Saint Squad series (about Mormon Navy Seals), and I was happy to see that Deep Cover would be a departure from the series. Kelsey Weber returns to her home in Virginia after being pulled out of an assignment where she spent several years working undercover as a governess in the home of a Muslim extremist in the Middle East. She finds that her parents are on a mission, her family believes that she has pulled away from them and the gospel for selfish reasons (she can't divulge the nature of her work), and she's being pursued/protected by Noah, a handsome FBI agent who her parents befriended while she was gone.

Pretty soon, Kelsey and Noah end up on the same interagency task force to thwart a terrorist attack, and (surprise, surprise) the feelings they've started to develop for each other get complicated when Noah realizes that Kelsey hasn't been forthcoming about the nature of her work with him or her family. And then the nature of their work itself starts to drive the narrative. I'm happy to say that Abramson's writing has come a long way since I started reading her work four years ago. While her secondary characters are still relatively undifferentiated, both Kelsey and Noah are rounded and complicated, and the book deals with interesting Mormon cultural issues in addition to the main plot surrounding the terrorist plot. I will say that I absolutely hated the last chapter, from a feminist POV, but overall, I am delighted to say that Deep Cover was an Abramson book I enjoyed.

Book Review: Finding Sheba by Heather B. Moore (Whitney Finalist 2013)

Title: Finding Sheba
Author: Heather B. Moore
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
This book would be rated: PG-13 for violence

In Finding Sheba, Heather Moore draws on her expertise as an author of historical fiction and turns her attention to historical thriller. In this novel, the discovery of the lost tomb of the Queen of Sheba throws archaeologists, rich guys, and the tenuous peace of the Holy Land into peril.

Finding Sheba is another book where the Segullah readers had strong and dissenting views. As someone who read all forty books, I tend to judge a book quickly. If the story and the characters don't grab me in the first hundred pages, I'm likely to start skimming. Finding Sheba is a complicated story with lots of main characters. Although the book is an "Omar Zagouri Thriller" (which says to me that there will be/have been others), Omar initially appeared to be a secondary character, since the story opens with a dead American college professor, his protege, Jade, and her French contact in Egypt, Dr. Lucas Morel. I thought they would be the main characters, with the Omar and Mia story acting as a side story. I felt that the double romance, coupled with the puzzle of who killed Dr. Lyon and the main issue of the tombs felt a little heavy for a single story. Dr. Morel felt like a creepy, untrustworthy character, and I kept expecting him to turn out to be a bad guy, so the conclusion to his part of the story felt unrewarding. The story took a long time to get off the ground, which is bad for the contest and impatient readers like me, but I trust my colleagues, who say that the book is richly-layered and rewarding for those who persist.

Book Review: A Spy for a Spy by Jordan McCollum (Whitney Finalist 2013)

Title: A Spy for a Spy (Spy Another Day #2)
Author: Jordan McCollum
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
This book would be rated: PG-13 for violence

In A Spy for a Spy, Talia no longer has to keep her profession a secret from Danny. And instead of dumping her, Danny has decided to marry her. The problem? Talia is terrified. She can fight bad guys without fear, but she's seen all of the marriages around her fail, and so she's spinning her wheels about wedding planning. Danny, once again, is impatient. To make matters worse, Talia's new boss, Brand, is the only real boyfriend she ever had before she met Danny. And he's no less of a jerk now than he was five years earlier.

Talia soon has reason to suspect that Brand might be an agent gone rogue, willing to sell off secrets to  the highest bidder. Most of the action of the novel, when Talia isn't off trying on wedding dresses or avoiding trying on wedding dresses, she's following Brand around (he's the least suspicious CIA agent ever because he never seems to notice). There seems to be a lot more romance and a lot less mystery or suspense in this novel, and I missed the puzzle aspect of the story. I also find myself a little more frustrated with Danny's character in this story, since he doesn't seem willing to cut Talia a break, and continues to be impatient with her work and lack of interest in planning a wedding. I guess that's what happens when a traditionally raised Mormon boy marries a CIA agent?

Book Review: I, Spy by Jordan McCollum (Whitney Finalist 2013)

Title: I, Spy (Spy Another Day #1)
Author: Jordan McCollum
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Digital Copy
This book would be rated: PG-13 for adult situations and violence

Jordan McCollum's I, Spy is the first book she wrote for the Spy Another Day series (there's actually a short story that takes place before the actions in I, Spy, but it was published later). The novel, which was one of two in the series that is a Whitney finalist, centers on the actions of Talia Reynolds, a CIA agent working undercover in Ottawa, Canada. In fact, her actual profession is so secret that  even her boyfriend of a year, Danny, thinks she's a lawyer (she did, in fact, go to law school-- it's part of her cover).

In I, Spy, Talia and her co-worker, Elliott, are put on the case of a Russian aerospace executive. A couple of problems become evident: first, Elliott is distracted because his wife is due to deliver their baby any day; and second, Danny is getting increasingly impatient with the number of times Talia has to cancel their dates due to work. The opening scene of the book draws readers in immediately, and I found myself enjoying the first two-thirds of the novel quite a bit (despite thinking Danny is a whiner). I loved Jennifer Garner in the Alias series back in the day, and the books remind me quite a lot of the series (Talia is always getting dressed up in some getup to get ready to meet someone). The last third of the novel felt like one extended conclusion, with lots of action and violence and threatened violence and plot twists and, quite frankly, it dragged a bit for me. But overall, a fun read, and I was happy to delve into the sequel after reading this.

Book Review: The Twelve by Justin Cronin

Title: The Twelve
Author: Justin Cronin
Source: Audible for iTunes
This book would be rated: R for violence, language, sex-- you name it
Enjoyment Rating: ***

One of the first Audible books I ever listened to was Justin Cronin's The Passage, which is the prequel to The Twelve. The books are about a dystopian world in the near future and about 80 years into the future, when the planet has been overtaken by genetically-engineered vampires. Until listening to The Passage, I was not a fan of dystopian/horror books at all, and I was surprised at how much I liked that book. Cronin developed great characters, fractured his characters in an interesting way, and wrote a book that was enjoyable to read, despite all of the death.

So I was excited for The Twelve. Like its predecessor, it's well written with great characters. But there are SO many characters that it was a little hard to follow. Cronin doesn't pander to his audience by refreshing the back story, so I spent the first hundred pages or so trying to figure out who all the characters were (it had been several years since I read the first installment).  And then it was a lot more death and killing. Audible chunks its books into easily downloadable segments, and this book had four chunks, each 6-7 hours long. By the fourth one, I was hooked by the story, but it took a while to get me there. I'm not sure if I'll invest another 26 hours in the final installment of the story when Cronin finishes the trilogy.

Book Review: The Phantom by Jo Nesbo

Title: The Phantom
Author: Jo Nesbo
Enjoyment Rating: ***
This book would be rated: R- for lots of drug use, language, violence
Source: Library copy
Books I've read this year: 122

You know after you've read a whole bunch of books about the same character, they all start to blend together? Like it's hard to remember if the Triwizard Tournament happened in the fourth Harry Potter book or the fifth? That's how I feel about Jo Nesbo's Harry Hole books. I finished this book a few weeks ago, and it took a few minutes for me to stop and figure out the plot, because this story folds into the one before it in a way that makes it hard to separate them.

At the beginning of The Phantom we see Harry Hole returning from Hong Kong, where he has lived for the last few years after quitting the Oslo police force. But he's not coming back for a vacation (no, that's so not Hole's style), he's back because Oleg, the boy who is the son Harry never had (he's actually the son of Rakel, the love of Harry's life, but they are both too messed up to have a long-term functioning relationship), has been arrested for murder on drug charges. While he knows that Oleg's life had gone off the rails since he went to Hong Kong, Harry doesn't believe it's possible that Oleg actually murdered his friend and fellow dealer. So Harry returns to Oslo to sort things out.

The Phantom was an entertaining read that I busted through in a few days. I felt that it was more predictable than some of Nesbo's other stories (I figured out who one of the baddies was way earlier than Harry did, go me!), and it also had more pathos. But I've decided that it's hard to read so many books about someone who is emotionally kind of bankrupt, and who has opportunities to actually talk about hard things, but refuses to do so. I'm sure I'll read the next book (if there is a next one-- the ending was kind of nebulous to this story), but I feel that the books no longer pack an emotional punch for me. 

Book Review: Broken Harbor by Tana French

Title: Broken Harbor
Author: Tana French
Enjoyment Rating: *****
Source: Audible for iTunes
Books I've read this year: 103

A few weeks ago, Ed and I decided to move my boys down to a bedroom in the basement. It was a big job that required multiple IKEA visits, innumerable trips up and down the stairs, and several recharges of our drill. My friend Blue was kind enough to give up all of one day to help me put together beds, which was a lifesaver. But even when she wasn't there, I enjoyed my time in the basement, screwing furniture together, because I had Broken Harbor to keep me company. I believe that Broken Harbor is French's fourth novel, and I keep waiting for her to write one that doesn't resonate with me. It hasn't happened so far.

In Broken Harbor, Scorcher Kennedy is a detective who has always followed the rules. His past has taught him that messing up, stepping into the gray area, just isn't an option for him. When he and his new partner are called to a murder case in Brian's Town, an hour from Dublin, Kennedy immediately remembers the place as Broken Harbor, where he summered with his family as a child. Now it's a rundown housing development, a casualty of the downtrodden economy. And it's just about the grayest place in all of Ireland.

Kennedy finds a husband and two children dead, and a wife at death's door. And he's forced to confront his own demons as he tries to unravel what really happened in this house where life, to all outside observers, appeared to be picture perfect.

Book Review: Dark Places by Gillian Flynn

Title: Dark Places
Author: Gillian Flynn
Enjoyment Rating: ***
Source: Kindle for iPad
Books I've read this year: 94

Dark Places is right. On the one hand, I've had so much fun reading Gillian Flynn's three books this summer. They were all terrifying and put a human face on evil in a way I hadn't seen before. I mean, the people in her books are crazy. Specifically, Flynn writes some really freaky women-- women who kill, women who don't know how to grow up, women who destroy and seem not to have souls. And because of that, I'm also sort of glad to get a break from these devious and damaged characters.

In Dark Places, Libby Day is the only member of her family who survived when her brother killed her mother and two older sisters more than twenty years ago. Or at least that's how the story goes. When Libby, who has never had to grow up, get a job, or take care of herself (she's been living on donations her whole life) comes to the end of her gravy train, she finds that she can finance her lifestyle by hiring herself out to a group of people who believe her older brother, Ben, to be innocent. As Libby delves deeper into the story for the first time, she's surprised at what she finds.

I love the style of narration in Dark Places. It alternates between chapters of what happened on the day of the murders (from several different points of view) and chapters of what happens in the present day as Libby starts sleuthing, and the stories connect in the final chapters.