Category Archives: feminist fiction

Collateral Damage, by J.A. Jance****

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Collateral Damage is the 17th book in the Ali Reynolds mystery series by J.A. Jance. My thanks go to Net Galley and Gallery Books for the review copy; this book is for sale now.

As fans of the series know, Ali is married to B. Simpson, and together they run a small but increasingly prominent cybersecurity firm called High Noon, appropriately named given their Arizona home base. In this installment, B. is on his way to the airport when he’s run off the road. He and the man driving him are badly injured, and the police take the lazy way out, assuming that Ali is behind the crime. Who could better benefit from his death? The business is worth a lot of money, not to mention B’s fat life insurance policy. Soon Ali and her trusted High Noon employees investigate, assisted once more by Frigg, the nearly sentient AI that can go where no one is supposed to go, and find out things that aren’t legally obtainable.

Jance is a veteran mystery writer, and she’s produced bestselling novels for decades. This time around, the novel is better than what most authors can do on their best days, and yet it’s not Jance’s most riveting story. The pacing is on the sedate side, and it’s not until we are well and truly at the climax that it feels urgent. I suspect this is because the story’s protagonist, Ali, and the other repeating characters that I have enjoyed so much over the past few years are sidelined here. Once Frigg ferrets out the critical information that suggests that the crime is the work of a longtime serial killer, Ali provides the cops whose unsolved cases are involved, and we mostly follow them, alternately with the baddie.

A side note, but one worth mentioning: Jance has a couple of long-running series that are set in Arizona, and there have been times when I’ve reported that I dislike the tinge of stereotyping that I have seen in the way her Latinx and Black side characters are depicted. I feel as if she’s turned that around here, and having registered complaints in the past, it’s only fair to recognize that this time, she’s done well.

Fans of the series will want to read this in order to enjoy continuity between the last, Unfinished Business, and whatever she writes next. For new readers, I advise beginning the series with number 11, Clawback. Going back to the first entry—which of course, you can do—requires reading the series before it develops into a strong vehicle. If you start the series here instead, you will have the information you need to move forward, and the quality is as uniformly excellent as any other series I have read.

I recommend this book to Jance’s readers, and I recommend it to new readers as suggested above.

Swamp Story, by Dave Barry*****

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Dave Barry’s new novel, Swamp Story, should come with a warning label: Danger. Do not read in area where explosive laughter is not permitted. Fans of Barry’s will be pleased to hear that this is possibly the best thing he’s ever written. Readers new to Barry will want to read more. This book will be available to the public May 2, 2023.

My thanks go to Net Galley and Simon and Schuster for the invitation to read and review.

Our protagonist is Jesse, a lovely person that has made a huge mistake. She feel hard for Slater, a young man with a smokin’ hot body, a limited brain, and a solipsistic world view. Now she’s stuck in a cabin in the Everglades with him and his camera wielding buddy Kark, and oh yes—their baby, Willa; not to mention all of the flora and fauna that live here:

“Kark! You need to get this!”

“What?” said a voice, as hoarse as Slater’s, maybe hoarser.

“Big fucking snake,” said Slater. “I mean big.”

The snake slid forward another two feet, directly toward Jesse and Willa. Jesse saw that she now no longer had the option of even trying to run past it.

“Slater!” she said, trying to keep the panic out of her voice, not wanting Willa to pick up on it.

Slater held up his hands in a Calm down gesture.

“It’s cool,” he said. “This’ll be good. Good footage.”

“Good footage?” said Jesse. “Are you—”

“Goddammit, Kark,” yelled Slater, “get the camera out here!”

“OKOKOK,” said Kark, emerging from the cabin, holding the video camera. ” Fuck. The battery’s dead.”

Things appear to improve for Jesse when she stumbles across a cache of gold bars hidden in the glades, but this proves to be a mixed blessing, as some truly bad men learn of her good fortune and seek to take it from her, using any means necessary. However, the first such men, Billy and Duck, are not only evil, but also hilariously bumbling at times. And then, of course, there are the others.

Meanwhile, the owner of Bartle Brothers Bait and Beer decides to give his languishing business a shot in the arm by manufacturing an internet hoax. The Everglades Melon Monster is a sketchy, low budget creation whose star is an inebriated fellow wearing a Dora the Explorer head, and yet, somehow it works. Now it seems that everyone is descending on the Everglades, and almost every person that arrives is “batshit crazy.”

I’m not telling you how this thing ends; you’ll need the book for that. Don’t wait for the movie. You can thank me later!  As for me, I’m off to order a Bartle Brothers Bait and Beer tee shirt.

Hang the Moon, by Jeanette Walls*****

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Jeanette Walls is the author of outstanding memoirs, most notably The Glass Castle. Her new novel, Hang the Moon, is brilliant, and you should read it. My thanks go to Net Galley and Scribner for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

Sallie Kinkaid is born and raised near the turn of the twentieth century in a tiny backwater in Virginia, daughter of its wealthy scion, “Duke” Kinkaid.  Her mother has died, and Duke has remarried, and now Sallie has a younger half-brother, Eddie. Sallie is a daredevil, given to occasional recklessness, whereas Eddie has a gentler, more introverted nature, with a love of learning and music. But one day, hoping to awaken some more adventurous aspect of his personality, Sallie takes Eddie out for a ride in her cart, and he is injured. Just like that, Sallie no longer lives with her father; she is cast out to live with an impoverished aunt, and there she remains for nearly a decade.

Sallie is a young woman when she returns, and now she must navigate the shoals of local politics, keeping clear of Duke’s sometimes unpredictable temper.  Duke owns nearly every property in the county, and he is deft at doling out favors and keeping the local peace, always in a way that works to his own advantage. Sallie has a hundred questions, some longstanding, and others that develop as she works for her father. However, questions are discouraged in the Kinkaid home. An aunt tells her, “Honey, there are some rocks you don’t want to look under.”

When the local economy is shaken by the unthinkable, Sallie must make some hard choices as she comes into her own. Moonshine has long been an unofficial, yet pivotal way that the local working class makes its living, and when feuds erupt and the government attempts to intervene, Sallie must choose sides. As she comes into her own, she discovers some hard truths about the family she thought she knew. Walls is at her best here, with a strong, resonant setting, a clear, credible plot, and unforgettable characters. This is the sort of book that one comes back to. Highly recommended.

Livid, by Patricia Cornwell*****

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I really enjoyed this, the 26th entry into the Kay Scarpetta series. From time to time, people publish unhappy reviews, but for me, it never gets old. In this one, a terrorist attack is made locally, and it’s associated with an attempt on the life of the U.S. president, who is in town at the time it occurs. Kay is, of course, the chief coroner, and she’s forced to perform the autopsy on someone she knows.

The ending isn’t satisfying, and with any other author, I’d knock off the last star. But with Cornwell, I know from experience that when she does this, it’s because it isn’t really over. This will come up again, if not in the next book, then in another soon after it.

Because I couldn’t get the galley, I checked out the audio book at Seattle Bibliocommons. The audio is kind of a mixed bag. I like how the narrator voices the protagonist, and she also does recurring character Pete Marino well. I thought it was wrong to read the voice of Lucy, Kay’s badass adult niece, with a higher pitched voice than any of the other characters. She is a daredevil that doesn’t suffer fools, and if anything, her voice should be lower in pitch than Kay’s. I also thought she made the judge a bit too languid sounding, which is at odds with the things she says. In short, if you are a reader that enjoys both audiobooks and print ones, go with the print. If you like only audiobooks, then go ahead.

If you haven’t read this series, I do suggest you begin with the first and work your way up. I might not have enjoyed this one so much if I didn’t know the characters.

Kunstlers in Paradise*****

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4.5 stars, rounded upward. My thanks go to Net Galley, Henry Holt Publishers, and Macmillan Audio for the review copies. This magnificently quirky novel is for sale now.

Julian Kunstler is kind of a mess. He’s a twenty-something New Yorker whose girlfriend has just dumped him. He has no job, and he doesn’t want one; at least, not the low-paying, entry-level variety of jobs for which he is qualified. He takes himself home to his parents who have been paying his way, confident that they will understand his plight and increase his allowance. Instead, he hits a wall. What are your plans for the future, Julian? (None.) What do you plan to do for money? (Get it from you.) Just as a dramatic situation has begun to unfold, they hear from his 93 year old grandmother, Mamie, who lives in Los Angeles. She wants him to come to stay with her awhile; she needs assistance. He’s not so sure that he wants to go, but when his parents insist, he gets on that plane. Once there, the pandemic strikes, and he is trapped in lockdown with his grandmother and her elderly companion, Agatha.

Mamie has always been fond of Julian, and although she does need a driver for doctor appointments and the like, what she wants, more than anything, is to tell her life story. Most of it, anyway. It begins in Austria, as Jewish artists like her father, a successful composer, are being pushed out of public life by the Nazis. (Here, I emit a small moan; I am heartily sick of Holocaust stories. Happily, we don’t stay there long, and this story is worth it.) She goes on to describe the shock she experiences in suddenly being transplanted into a completely different climate, language, and culture, and much of Mamie’s story is droll. And Julian, who never would have sat still for these tales had they come from his parents, listens. At first, he listens impatiently, assisted by Mamie’s generous liquor collection. As time goes on, he begins to listen with greater patience and understanding. And by the end of a year’s time, he listens with genuine interest. His own exile from New York is pale, after all, in comparison to the exile his predecessors endured.

The most dynamic character is, of course, Julian, but through Mamie’s stories, we see how life has already changed her. Agatha is enigmatic until the book is nearly over, and I love what Cline does with her, too.

If I were to change one thing, I would edit down the material about the genius composer friend that emigrates from Austria and is close to the family. This reviewer was a music major once upon a time, and if this part of the narrative is a bit much for me, then probably many others will feel the same. Of course, if the reader comes to the book with a deep interest in Schoenberg, then it may prove quite satisfying.

I am fortunate to have access to both the digital print galley and the audio version, and reader Jesse Vilinsky is hands down the funniest, most skillful voice actor I have ever had the pleasure to hear. Cline’s book is very good, but in the hands of Vilinsky, it is infinitely better. Her interpretations of Mamie and Julian are spot on, hilarious at times, moving at others. The way she voices Agatha is absolute comic genius!

For those that love quirky humor and historical fiction, this book is highly recommended.

The Wonders, by Elena Medel***

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Elena Medel is a Spanish award winning poet, and this is her debut novel. My thanks go to Algonquin and Net Galley for the invitation to read and review.

I am initially excited to be asked to read a work of fiction that “brings a half century of the feminist movement to life,” but in most regards, the magic has escaped me. I suspect part of this may be cultural, and/or a matter of translation, because the style is very different from North American and British novels. A single paragraph may last for pages, and there are vast swaths of internal monologue that leave me checking the page count.

And yet, there are some fine moments here. I can’t recall having seen a novel that demonstrates so decisively what happens to a woman that is not given the choice to terminate a pregnancy, or what kind of life the child is likely to have. We begin with Maria, who is completely disinterested in her baby, and almost immediately leaves her with her mother, parenting only by sending money home as she is able. She works the night shift, facing danger and harassment constantly.

Her daughter Alicia is not only disinterested in motherhood, but never develops human attachments. She takes joy in hurting other people, physically and emotionally, from an early age. She makes no true friends, and she doesn’t want any. Her character chills me to the bone.

Although it isn’t an enjoyable read for me, I recommend it to a niche audience, those that have a particular interest in international feminist literature. It will be available to the North American public tomorrow, March 1, 2023.

When the Moon Turns Blue, by Pamela Terry*****

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Once in a while the odd thing happens,

Once in a while the dream comes true,

And the whole pattern of life is altered,

Once in a while the moon turns blue.

The tiny Georgia hamlet of Wesleyan is preparing to bury one of its own, and Mother Nature is preparing to cover the entire town in ice. But nobody—well, almost nobody—knows that a source of local tension is about to go nuclear, as someone is planning to topple and destroy the statue of a Confederate general in the park inside the boundaries of Old Man Griffin’s land. “The fight was just getting going good, and now somebody’s declawed the cat.”

This riveting, curiously charming and sometimes hilarious novel is the second by Pamela Terry, whose outstanding debut novel was The Sweet Taste of Muscadines. This one may be even better. My thanks go to Net Galley and Random House Ballantine for the invitation to read and review. This book is for sale now.

With the death of Harry Cline, we find ourselves at his funeral, a massively attended affair. But his wife, Marietta, develops a disabling, blinding migraine, and although they have been on the outs for years, Butter, her (former) best friend, comes to the rescue. By the time they’ve snuck out the side door of the church, we already know at least a little about both women, and now we want to know everything.

With just two novels published, Terry has already proven herself to be among the best authors when it comes to character development. Soon we’ll meet others—Marietta’s obnoxious brother, Macon and his beleaguered wife Glinda, who will have a large part in this story and is one of my favorite characters, as well as a host of others, who have smaller roles but are each so unmistakably established that it’s no work at all to keep track of them. But perhaps her finest achievement here is in creating a masterpiece that is ultimately a feel good book, despite the use of a red hot real world controversy within its pages.

I generally read several books at a time, and this one is the one that I saved for bedtime, because I wanted to be able to read it uninterrupted, and it is the one I wanted in my head when dreams came. It didn’t let me down.

This inspirational work of Southern fiction stands shoulder to shoulder with the finest classics, To Kill a Mockingbird and Fried Green Tomatoes. I wholeheartedly recommend it to you.

The Sweet Spot, by Amy Poeppel*****

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“Brood parasites, like certain birds, intentionally lay their eggs in the nests of other birds.”

Amy Poeppel is fast becoming one of my favorite authors; she wrote Small Admissions, Limelight, and Musical Chairs, and I read and loved them all. Her new novel is The Sweet Spot, and it is destined to become one of the best books of 2023. My thanks go to Net Galley, Atria Books, and the author for the review copies.

One of the aspects of Poeppel’s writing that sets her apart is her ability to create female characters that are so dynamic, so well developed that I feel as if I know them. Here we have four that span a wide range of ages and income levels, yet somehow wind up forming an unlikely sorority. The first, Lauren Aston-Shaw is an artist, and she’s in the midst of moving into a brownstone in New York City’s famed Greenwich Village, along with her husband, children, and large dog, Bumper. The boxes are only partially unpacked when she receives a mostly-delightful surprise: a prominent businesswoman and influencer has decided to place a massive order of Lauren’s handmade porcelain for her boutiques. The house is already in a state of happy chaos, and it’s about to be more so.

During a conversation with Felicity—the retailer in question, who is pregnant—Lauren makes an offhand remark, which Felicity interprets as an engraved invitation to break up the decades-long marriage of the baby’s father, Russell. Miranda, the spurned wife, learns of Lauren’s role and decides, in a fit of grief and rage, to burn Lauren’s life to the ground. Miranda, then, is our second of the four women.

Olivia, our third main character is one of Felicity’s employees. She is in her twenties, low on the management chain, but she is ambitious, hardworking, and determined to climb; that is, until she becomes a casualty of Miranda’s rampage. Olivia is also the beloved daughter of Dan, who runs The Sweet Spot, a neighborhood bar located in the lower level of the brownstone currently occupied by the Shaw family. Dan is a lovable, level-headed sort, and through his eyes, we see the drama unfolding between Lauren, Miranda, and Felicity through a more objective lens.

The novel’s promotional blurb tells us that these are the women that the story is about, but I would add one more. Evelyn is Lauren’s mother; they have a complicated relationship. But under the strain of the sudden and unexpected increase in work, Lauren reaches out and begs her mother to come assist her with the children until she has things in hand. Evelyn can only stay for a weekend; she has so many social obligations back home. And yet, a weekend grows to a long weekend, and then to a week. Evelyn is far too interesting to be considered a side character; she is our fourth main character.

Despite her despair and fury, Miranda finds herself caring for Russell and Felicity’s baby; it is supposed to be for a couple of hours, but in the solipsistic way of the wealthy and entitled, both parents depart for the West Coast without making childcare arrangements, and Lauren and Olivia find themselves also assisting as hours turn to days, and then to weeks.

This story has everything I want in a novel, and when I got a go-to-bed-and-die flu virus, I curled up in bed and spent my waking time there reading it. I’ll tell you from experience that it’s good for what ails you. The plot is deftly managed, and that is no small feat given its complexity. The pacing never flags and no balls are dropped (except possibly Russell’s.) The dialogue sizzles. But the thing that turns a good novel to a great one is Poeppel’s insight into the human condition. Her level of perception is what makes the characters shine, and it’s also what makes the entire book drop-dead funny. Lastly, Amy Poeppel is one of a very few authors that can write a feel-good story that never insults the reader’s intelligence.

Admit it. You need this book! Happily, it will be available to the public January 31, 2023, and you can pre-order it now. Highly recommended.

Mad Honey, by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan*****

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Mad Honey is the joint endeavor of bestselling author Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan. My thanks go to Net Galley and Random House Ballantine for the invitation to read and review.  This book is for sale now, and I recommend it to you.

The hallmarks of Picoult’s work are immediately evident. She frames her story around a particular area of interest, and so when one of our main characters, Olivia, is a bee keeper, I figure I am in for an education with regard to bees and honey; I am not wrong. Of late, Picoult has also used some of her fiction to promote social justice causes, and that’s here, too; I did a quick search on Boylan, her co-author, and learned that Boylan is one of the first transgendered Americans to write a bestseller, and this is the other focal part of Mad Honey, which features a trans character.

We have Olivia, then, the bee keeper, and her son, Asher, who is the light of her life. She took Asher and fled an abusive marriage, and enjoys her new life. She is close to Asher, and they talk openly and often; yet, there are things that Asher isn’t telling his mother, and she doesn’t see that.

Then there’s a new girl in town, Lily Campanello, a cellist, and Asher falls for her. Later, Lily is found dead, and suspicion falls on Asher. Olivia stands behind her son, and yet a corner of her mind has doubts. What if, when push comes to shove, Asher is his father’s son after all?

It’s tricky to write fiction that focuses on a controversial topic, and the critical ingredient is characterization. If the characters feel real to us, the story flows and the message becomes an integral part of their lives. We can’t reject the theme without rejecting the character. But it would take a true Grinch to step away from Olivia, Asher, and Lily. I want what’s best for the characters, and so I’m not focused on the authors and what they have chosen to discuss within this framework, but on the story. The writing flows like melted butter, smooth and inviting, and later, the suspense ratchets up almost unbearably, and I have to know what becomes of Olivia and Asher.

Because I am a bit behind, I check out the audio version of this novel at Seattle Bibliocommons.  There are multiple narrators, but the one that resonates most for me is the reader voicing Lily. I say this, despite the fact that she butchers the pronunciation of place names in the Pacific Northwest. Eugene, Oregon is not hard to say. Siuslaw and Willamette are trickier, but there’s only one pronunciation for each, and the reader should have done due diligence.

And now that I’ve said this, I can urge you to get this book and read it. For those unfamiliar with trans people, there’s some good information, and the story is a compelling one. There’s a twist at the end, and I would probably have left that out, as it doesn’t add much, although I can also see the reason it is included. Nevertheless, this is a story worth your time and money, whether as an audiobook or in print.

On Spine of Death, by Tamara Berry****

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The By the Book mystery series began earlier this year with Buried in a Good Book, and I knew right away the series was going to be a winner Author Tamara Berry is on a roll, with On Spine of Death, the second in the series, already on the shelves. Tess Harrow is our protagonist, and her teenaged daughter, Gertrude, helps more than she hinders, while also keeping us entertained.

The premise here is that while renovating and remodeling her late grandfather’s hardware store, multiple sets of human remains are unearthed. It’s hard enough to be accepted into a small town, but now half of its denizens are convinced that her granddad was a serial killer! Now Tess is on a mission to find out whose bones those are, and how they got there.

There are tropes here that usually make me cranky. We’ve got the hot-for-sheriff trope, and the must-clear-my-name (or that of a loved one) trope, but it’s testament to Berry’s authorial chops that I don’t think about either of them much until the book is over. Her droll humor and nicely turned out characters keep the pages turning. This is a series that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and that’s just what I need sometimes.

I recommend this clever little cozy mystery to anyone needing a break from the world around us, along with a good chuckle, and I look forward to the next in the series.