All about the books we love

Trouble the Water by Wendy Vogel

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is one I got from the author at Ohioana book festival and I found it engaging (which sounds better than I liked it because whoo boy the subject matter. Let me spool out a laundry list of content warning in no particular order. Religious cult, religious trauma, religious based misogyny, religious based homophobia, externalized and internalized homophobia, rape/murder of disabled children, domestic violence, other murders and there is probably some I'm forgetting.

Naomi has returned home to the farm where her father ran a cult, Jesus' Cleansing Waters after her abusive, alcoholic husband is killed in a car accident, bringing with her, her disabled daughter Leah (spina bifida). Her mother has sold off most of the farm, part to a chicken/turkey factory farm (and her father's second in command stole the money and ran off to KY) and part to a developer making McMansions with disregard as to how a factory farm stinks.

The only part of her father's legacy left is Aunt Betty (hands down my favorite side character), Naomi's mom and her brother Nathan. Naomi hopes to go back to college now that her husband is gone but in the meantime is working at Kroger running a cash register. Her brother is a long haul trucker (or was) and Leah is attending the Snowflake Academy for disabled children.

One of Leah's friends goes missing and she's not the first disabled girl to do so. One had gone missing last year. On top of this mystery Naomi starts dating a Kroger Chef who is huge into helping to man search parties and tip lines. As this relationship slowly creeps forward, Naomi tries to work through a lifetime of religious trauma, deal with the growing realization her mother is developing dementia and reconnecting with her old childhood friend JP.

Kudos to the one smart thing Naomi did. She not only sent her daughter to her other grandparents' home about 4 hours away and then asks them to keep Leah because it's not safe (by now a third child is gone) And smarter yet of the author to put a time line on this, the grandparents have a trip they can't get refunded on so we know that Leah will be back in time for the climax where she doubtless will be a target.

Also into this mix there's the faceless girl ghost wreathed in smoke who keeps visiting Naomi, 'Weebla' who leads her around to some clues as to who she is and what is happening.

If I'm honest there are only three real suspects in this and given how it ended I'd have almost rather the most obvious one was the killer. The ending is rushed and very awful subject matter wise (more so because if you watch enough ID Discovery you've heard of real cases like this). Overall I found it, as I said, engaging.



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The Strange Tales of Oscar Zahn, Vol. 1: A Graphic Novel by Trí Vương

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is exactly as the title suggests: strange. Oscar is just animated clothing and a floating skull and his companion (for parts of the story ) is an old woman versed in the supernatural. That is what Oscar does now, helping spirits find rest as he himself is somewhere between life and death, filled with an entity he calls ectopus (a paranormal ectoplasmic octopus in appearance)

As Oscar solves cases and helps people (Oscar is a sweet guy) we slowly see the backstory of his relationships with others and how he ended up the way he is. The stories include a haunted house (heartbreaking), spirits from a world war, the spirits of the drowned and most interesting, a woman he had (in her eyes) wronged. She's also a very interesting character once we get into her backstory.

The art is appropriately eerie and I would definitely like to see more of this.



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Silent Evidence by Clea Koff

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I liked this series opener. A bit about the author, she is a forensic anthropologist like the main characters and like Jayne was part of the UN team investigating the mass graves in Rwanda so there is that professional air to this. That said, this book touches on some gruesome stuff so CW serial killers, female victims, dismembered body parts, stalking and PTSD

Jayne and Steelie are friends and partners at the Agency 32/1. Both women specialize in finding missing persons mostly by culling through coroner reports etc. They are contacted by FBI special agent Scott Houston and his partner Eric who are potentially in trouble with their bosses because their former boss thought Scott was getting too close to the victim pool back in Georgia (sex workers) and is raising conduct issues with his new boss.

Scott and Eric are now in the Los Angeles area because a van got rear ended and drove off, leaving a pile of body parts on the highway. They know Jayne and Steelie and engage the ladies to help them prove these body parts are part of their case back in Georgia which they do willingly.

The clues laid out in this were very well done (again Koff's profession is a huge help in this as she knows from direct experience) There is a good deal of empathy for the lost and forgotten especially on Jayne's part. Into this we have another former coworker, Gene, who shows up briefly and vaguely insults their work. We have Jayne and her PTSD and paranoia (which in this case is justified as someone is watching her) and we have the hints of romance between Jayne and Scott (if I have a quibble with the book it was how heavy handed that was sometimes)

Overall the mystery was very good. I liked the characters a lot. I was a bit more iffy on the ending but it wasn't a deal breaker. It just felt a bit too Hollywood in my opinion. I'm looking forward to more in this series.



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The Ten Worst People in New York by Matthew Plass

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This was a 3.5 read for me but I didn't round up mostly because of the construction of the narrative. The idea is simple. Ricky Talon, talk show host, put out a Ten Worst People in NYC list and two of the people 'committed suicide', only FBI agent Alex Bedsford doesn't think so and she begins to investigate along with her partner Pat.

Enter also Jacob Felles, a young British filmmaker who has been summoned to NYC by his brother in law Floyd because his estranged sister, Elizabeth, is in trouble. She has a history of mental health issues and violent outbreaks, only when Jacob gets there he learns his adventure loving, eco-activist sister is no longer with her coke addicted husband. She's also not wanting to talk to jacob but he's on a mission to save her.

Naturally these two plot lines are going to dovetail when it appears that maybe Elizabeth is involved and someone is definitely putting Jacob in the frame for the killings in spite him not being in the States for the first two (as there are more once he gets there) And if that was all the points of view we had this would be an easier read. Instead we have many different chapter with different povs including being in the heads of the ten worst people just as they are about to be killed (and it's second person pov which I hate).

These short chapters with multiple povs made this feel choppy. I would have liked to spend more time with Alex (with her knee pain and the loss of her husband at a relatively young age) and with Jacob who wants to save his big sister. I think that was a missed opportunity.

I did like the twists though. One I predicted, the other I did not so the mystery side of it was satisfying. I just wished it wasn't so choppy. It's a debut book so the potential is there.

I received this book in a Goodreads Giveaway.



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Murder by Cheesecake by Rachel Ekstrom Courage

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I scrambled to toss my ring in the hat for this one when I saw it pop up on Netgalley and was lucky enough to get an arc. I couldn't imagine how the author was going to successfully marry GG and Murder, She Wrote, basically. The answer was, not entirely successful. This was a 3.5 read rounded up.

Let me deal with the characterization first. I think Sophia and Blanche were pretty spot on (though Blanche is relatively easy) and none of this was nearly as funny as I would have wanted it to be. Dorothy was much more of a sad sack than I'm used to, about being alone and wanting a date for the wedding of one of Rose's 'nieces.' Rose was actually more intelligent/had more agency than we often see her as she arranges this wedding last minute. However, there are so many St. Olaf traditions that was worked into this that they aren't funny; they're annoying and Rose is too trying to enforce them on her young niece.

Now for the wedding and the murder. The hotel in St Olaf suddenly couldn't be used so Rose had everything shifted down to Miami vs oh I dunno going there to the next town over with a hotel which is silly enough (and not in the fun way) but now expects to pull off all the St Olaf traditions like the welcome tuna tea ceremony, riding a donkey, riding an ostrich etc etc etc because she firmly believes this is the only way for the wedding to be happy. (the bride and groom wanted to elope especially since his family runs a chain of hotels in Miami and are the type to take over everything in a miserable way). This was not funny or enjoyable. Honestly I think it would have been nicer to see her niece want a beach wedding with the St Olaf traditions because it was still all that work to do.

Part of this is making a ton of cheesecakes and stuffing them in the family hotel freezer. Hold that thought.

And then there's Dorothy trying to go on a video date which ends badly. Two guesses who the dead guy in the cheesecake is.

I think the balance of this needed to work better. It's way too heavy on the St Olaf wedding traditions and not enough about setting up the red herrings and clues. Dorothy was a bit depressing. Rose was a bit annoying. Sophia was the most amusing. Blanche was just sort of there. The police are not looking much further than Dorothy.

Don't get me wrong it wasn't horrible but I'm not sure it was entirely successful either.



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A Grim Reaper's Guide to Catching a Killer by Maxie Dara

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I have such mixed feelings about this, solid 2.5 stars rounded up. I wanted to love this. The premise is 100% my thing but I have rarely wanted to throttle a main character this much. The first line in the blurb tells you about all you're going to learn about the protagonist too: Kathy Valence is forty-two, mid-divorce, and pregnant with her ex's baby.

She has the emotional depth of a mud puddle and maybe unresolved childhood trauma or something (like I said she is shallow in all caps) She has the Midas touch but in reverse according to her father who calls it the Sadim touch. OMFG. So she believes she messes up everything. She's divorcing mostly because she thinks she's messed up her marriage (why? who knows). She's sucked at every job because she always messes up except being a SCYTHE agent where she is functioning as a psychopomp. This she is good at. Basically she's just sad and dull and whiney. You hear about her Sadim touch so many times in the first 40 pages you want to throw the book and if I didn't need this for a really bizarre reading challenge prompt I'd have given up.

Connor is a teenaged boy whose soul she needs to collect but he's not there. This has never happened before and no one, especially her rather short tempered boss, has heard of this before. When Kathy finds Connor he refuses to go because he's been killed. She assures him this isn't possible as there is a murder division of SCYTHE and they would have come for him, not her. He's insistent that not only was he killed but someone from SCYTHE did it.

Oddly enough, Kathy believes him but she only has 45 days to figure this out or he'll become a ghost which is bad news. On one hand great way of setting a clock on the events to give it urgency but on the other, weeks go by with nothing happening so maybe it would have been better with lesser time?

Connor has 100o times Kathy's personality and it says all you need to know about the fact that this 17 year old has lived more and is far more interesting than the 42 year old Kathy. She makes one bad choice after another to the point she starts toeing the too stupid to live line which is such a deal breaker for me. For example, in order to get close to a suspect, she pretends to love the same video game with Connor instructing her on how it went but he never finished it. Instead of just telling the other person oh yeah I'm still working to finish it, she tries to fake it and is instantly caught. Come on, now. Really?

Her mentor Jo is also a much more exciting character. Her soon to be ex is rather a bland dude too but at least smarter about things than she is and he gets drawn into the mystery.

There were other things that made me side eye this is no one knows she's pregnant but it turns out (becomes important later) that she's 8 months pregnant and no one has noticed? Granted it's hard to tell in some women but she hasn't spoken to work about this? Is she planning to drop maternity leave on them after the fact with no preparation?

The best part of this is Connor and how he does get her to learn to live a little and for her to believe she might be able to be a mom (especially after castigating her for how unhappy she is about this pregnancy in the light of his own unhappy childhood). Granted the tag line admits to the fact that Kathy doesn't know how to live. The end was much better than the rest of the book but again, she makes really foolish choices.

I wish I had liked this more but I'm not sure I'd even get book two out of the library.



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The Lost House by Melissa Larsen

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Thank you to Netgalley for the arc of this. Sometimes I rate higher than I really feel and this is one of those times because I thought it was well written and didn't deserve dragged down by my personal issues. But holy crap I couldn't stand Agnes and it took me awhile to realize why she annoyed me so much. Partly it's because she's such a sad sack (with reasons) or that I don't like unreliable narrators (which she is) but also because like Agnes I suffered a leg injury that left me learning how to walk again and joints filled with synthetic tendons, pins and screws through the knee. I could have been Agnes and I see in her a dark reflection of me (I avoided the narcotic dependence she has but that might be down to the fact the nursing home cold turkeyed me when they sent me home vs me being stronger than Agnes)

Agnes, against the wishes of her father, Magnus, has gone to Iceland where he was born because Nora, a true crime podcaster, is doing the story of the Frozen Madonna, a young mother found with her drowned baby frozen in her arms and she, herself, had her throat cut. This is Agnes's grandmother and her Aunt Agnes for whom she was named. Einar, her grandfather was the only suspect which was why he left Iceland to raise her father in California. Agnes believes in her grandfather's innocence (but does her father) and wants to go to Iceland to the farm house her father grew up in just to prove her grandfather innocent.

Once there, she's swept up by the charismatic Nora and meets her host, Thor who was a bit older than her father and now owns the family property. he remembers the case. Ingvar who was her father's age and has a prospective on the man she's never seen and then there's Oskar, Lilja and Asa, the latter of whom has gone missing, making a counterpoint for the old Frozen Madonna case with a fresh horror as she disappeared after being at the farm house.

Nora, and with her Agnes, is drawn into that case as Agnes has to face that everyone in Bifrost believes her grandfather is the killer and she might have to admit he is.

I did guess both mysteries but there is a big twist in one of them I didn't see coming and was thrilled by. In fact the last quarter of the book is probably the best part. I did like the book. The mysteries are well done. Agnes' vacillating emotions feel appropriate. What didn't work as well for me is it does get a bit repetitive about Agnes' injury, how her girlfriend left her, how she wants her pills but it's not like I don't think about my old injury often so maybe it shouldn't bother me (but it did, it felt a bit much)

But my biggest quibbles surround Nora. It felt like a few things fell off the radar. At one point Agnes and Nora come into a piece of evidence that should have been turned over to the police (and there are reasons it wasn't story wise) but we don't know why Nora didn't do it. Worse, Nora starts fading out of the story around the halfway point. She does need to be elsewhere for the ending to work but that was easily handled but it felt odd that slowly but surely she goes from being a main player to nearly nonexistent (yes it's Agnes' story but Nora starts with a large role)

Still this is a well written book with interesting mysteries and well worth the read.



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Devil's Food Cake Murder by Joanne Fluke

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This was just bad. I've only ever been so-so on this series, though the first ones were pretty good but over the years it's become more about the recipes and less about the plot. And in this case, what plot? Half of it was about Hannah dithering back and forth between Mike (of the wandering eye) and Norman (the man who just brought his ex back into his dental practice). Honestly I'm with Norman, he built a house for her and she still can't make up her mind, time to cut bait.

Every scene had food in it. Every. Scene. (except the one where she goes looking for evidence and the ones that follows where she's inevitably caught by the killer) Look I get that she's a baker and this is a food themed series but every scene? Even when they find the body Grandma Knudson has to mention the cookies Hannah is bringing for Bible study, who does that? Worse (and this is when I should have thrown this book into a wall and stopped reading it) Hannah's mother at dinner (naturally because FOOD) asks her doctor friend who did the autopsy if the murder victim had time to enjoy Hannah's yummy cake first. OMFG.

As for the plot, Mike is on the look out for a jewelry thief from the big city and Grandma Knudson is suspicious of the temporary pastor filling in for Bob (on his honeymoon) because she knew Matthew as a boy along with his cousin, Paul (who has a criminal record). She thinks he might not be Matthew. The back cover blurb tells us Matt's fate (which takes over 100 pages to happen because the rest is them eating and recipes) so basically from chapter 3 on I knew the entire plot (I was right) because this was as clear as the plastic wrap Hannah puts over her cookie trays.

It ends on a cliffhanger for her personal life, one I could careless about because her love triangle is wearisome. This was utterly skippable.



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Wormwood by Susan Wittig Albert

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I used to read this in order but as years went by not so much so I plopped into this one having missing major life events. No problems since it brings you up to speed but doesn't belabor the point. China needs a break according to her friends and family. Her friend Martha has just the thing: helping her at a herb workshop in a Shaker village in Kentucky. Martha's Aunt Charity had bee a Shaker there but left for reasons the family never knew and she'd like to learn why.

However, that wasn't all Martha wanted. She waits until they're on the road to tell China that Rachel Hart is now CEO and president of the board running the village (a clear conflict of interested, though she inherited ownership) and she thinks Rachel is up to something illegal. China reluctantly agrees to help.

It's told in dual time lines, China's and Aunt Charity's from the early 1900s as the Shakers were fading out as a religious group. I'll be honest I was not nearly as captivated by the Shakers are Albert clearly was when she researched this. Also I'm not a fan of the dual time frame trope so I was bored with a lot of that (which is sad because I am a history buff)

It takes over a third of a book before there is even a mystery. Turns out Martha was right about embezzlement going on and someone has killed to stop the investigation, one of Martha's friends being the victim.

At least China is aware she can't quite go bumbling into this because law enforcement might frown on it and thankfully the book steered away from the Andy Fife level of incompetence we usually see given to rural cops (but it did toe the line). The mystery wasn't bad. The end was unbelievable...for both mysteries (though Charity's wasn't much of a mystery). Was not a fan of how that wrapped it.

Still over all it wasn't bad and I still like China as a sleuth.



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The Lone Star Lonely Hearts Club by Susan McBride

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


2.5 read rounded up because I hadn't read the first two which might have helped but I found Andy to be so obnoxious I rather hated her. Andy is the titular Deb drop out and her mother, Cissy, is the millionairess. And I had to hear about how much Andy hates that world, how she is so much happier in her non-wealthy job (but no doubt has a trust fund) and her lawyer boyfriend (who mom is upset she won't marry even though, gasp, she's 30) SO many times I was shocked I was only 30 pages in.

Andy is also terribly judgemental to, upset that the old women waking their friend, Bebe, who had passed on as she wanted with a big blow out party and spends the next 70 pages treating her mother like a child because her mother insists a) Bebe was very healthy in spite of being 70 and b) slept nude so why was she found dead in a nightie? She must have been murdered. Even after the next death (100 pages in) everyone is still treating Cissy like she has dementia and needs a nap.

I just was not impressed with this. Also it has SO many pop culture references in it that it's eye rolling and many were 20 years out of date even when this was published in the early 2000s. I doubt I'll look for more of it.



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