What are you reading the week of September 2, 2023?

I'm sorry, I took some vacation time and forgot all about starting the new thread.

I considered starting it but got diverted myself.

Be that as it may, I've finished up Fegelein's Horsemen and Genocidal Warfare and Cult of the Machine. I'm currently working on The Making of the Middle Sea (this will take awhile) and Ion Curtain.

Added Numbers Don't Lie to the rotation.

>1 fredbacon: Happy Vacation Time!

I'm still reading The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson, but I only have a little over 100 pages to go, so next Saturday I might finally have a new book to share with you all for a change.
My book club met Friday to discuss and we all loved it and think it should be required reading.

Greetings all! I'm about 80% through the very good Ghost Season a novel about a village at the crossroads of civil war in Sudan by Sudanese-American author Fatin Abbas.

Bones: An Alex Delaware Novel
Jonathan Kellerman
4/5 stars
When several murdered prostitutes and a young pianist are found in L.A.'s Bird Marsh preserve, Detective Milo Sturgis contacts his friend and colleague - psychologist Alex Delaware to help him on the case.

starting this audio via Libby ~

None of This Is True: A Novel by Lisa Jewell

>3 PaperbackPirate: Thank you! I'm afraid that it's back to work tomorrow.

Lethal Range by Ryan Steck

The Cat Who Saved Books– Sōsuke Natsukawa
Digital audiobook narrated by Kevin Shen
3***

This is a modern fairy tale and coming-of-age story that explores the long-lasting effects books can have on us.

Rintaro Natsuki is a bookish high school student who is still grieving his grandfather’s passing and dreading the required closing of his grandfather’s bookshop. The shop has been Rintaro’s refuge for so long he can hardly imagine leaving it, but he must. Entering the shop to begin the final sale before closing and moving away to live with an aunt he’s never met, Rintaro is startled to hear a voice. It is a large tabby cat, who introduces himself as Tiger., and who demands Rintaro’s help to rescue books. And thus, the adventure begins.

I really enjoyed this fantasy read. Rintaro is a great character, somewhat lost and needing to find his path on life’s journey, he is a person any reader can relate to. As Tiger leads him on their adventures in the mazes, Rintaro finds his inner strength; he shows loyalty and courage, inventiveness and determination. The final task is one he must do alone, and he finds the reserves of courage that he needs to accomplish that task. He also finds peace, in recognizing that he need not be alone, for there are others who care for him and for whom he cares.

Of course, set in a bookshop, the fable is full of literary references, which I greatly enjoyed.

Keven Shen does a fine job of voicing the audiobook. I loved the voice he used for Tiger!

Fallen Women – Sandra Dallas
3***

When wealthy New York socialite Beret Osmundsen learns that her estranged sister was murdered in a brothel, there is nothing for her to do but go to Denver and seek answers. The last she knew her sister Lillie was living with their aunt and uncle, Varina and Judge John Stanton. When she arrived in Denver, Beret meets Detective Mick McCauley, who is skeptical but eventually teams with Beret to solve the case.

Dallas is well-known for her historical fiction, focusing on women in the 19th and early 20th century. She’s tackled the Civil War, migration to the great plains, early settlers in Colorado, and the growth of the Church of Latter-Day Saints. Some of her works include a mystery, and this is one such.

What I like about her novels is the clear evidence of lots of research into the time and place. And I really appreciate how she brings these everyday women and the challenges they faced; I cannot imagine enduring the loneliness, grime, and very real dangers they faced.

Here she gives a very realistic view of 1880s Denver and the brothels that flourished there, including the different “classes” of sex workers, from those who plied their trade in back alleys and doorways to those, like Lillie, who worked in the higher-class establishments. Dallas also gives us a peek inside the upper-class salons and dinner parties at nouveau riche mansions.

There are several twists and turns and efforts at misdirection, but I guessed the culprit pretty early on. The actual mystery plot isn’t all that well executed, in my humble opinion, but the historical detail and some of the characters really kept my interest up.

I finished the very good Ghost Season by Fatin Abbas, a novel about a small Sudanese village more or less on the front of the civil war that ended up splitting the country in two in 2011. We experience the feared renewal of fighting after a long layoff through the eyes of five disparate but intertwined characters, all of whom are believable and well drawn, as is the book as a whole. You can find a longer review on my 50-Book Challenge thread.

Next up for me will be another "classics" hole fllled, as I decided to finally read Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe. However, my pleasure reading will be slowed down b¥ the fact that I've just started auditing a class on Latin American History at Columbia University and will have quite a bit of reading to do for the course.

From the library--both are YA novels:
Reign: American Royals IV by Katharine McGee
New and finale installment of the best-selling series.

A Multitude of Dreams by Mara Rutherford
A young princess and a commoner make a horrifying discovery about the kingdom.

Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex
Mary Roach
4/5 stars
I have read several books by Mary Roach who writes about non-fiction subjects and she is never boring. This book talks about all things surrounding the science of sex. Very interesting! Science

Doc by Mary Doria Russell just finished another western, True Grit by Charles Portis

Uncommon Type: Some Stories – Tom Hanks
Digital audiobook narrated by the author.
4****

The stories in this collection are connected in that each story features a typewriter in some way. Sometimes the reference to the typewriter is so minor you might miss it if you blink. Other times the typewriter is central to the plot. There are a few characters who appear in more than one story, but those stories don’t necessarily form any sort of cohesive arc, although the basic personality and interests of each character are consistent throughout.

The stories are varied, from tender romance, to science fiction, to contemporary drama. Some are contemporary, some historical, some set in the future. They vary, too, in the emotions they evoke: tenderness, humor, awe, compassion. Among the plots are a funny romcom between best friends, a young actor who gets caught up on the hoopla of the film he’s helping to promote, a man who time travels back to the New York World’s Fare in 1964, and just can’t imagine leaving the charming woman he meets there, a veteran warms to the present with his family on Christmas Eve while memories of war haunt him, four friends travel to the moon in a spaceship they built in their backyard.

Clearly, Hanks is a gifted writer, and I look forward to reading more of his works. I’m a great fan of short stories and I loved this collection, but I’d love to see what he does with a full novel.

Hanks narrates the audiobook himself. I cannot think that anyone would do it better. The last story is a sort of movie script, and he gets help from a cast of friends, including Peter Scolari and Cecily Strong.

Just finished The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger. ****

The new thread is up over here.