Tag Archives: working class protagonist

King Sorrow, by Joe Hill*****

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Arthur Oakes is in a jam. He is a student at Rackham College in Maine, and to make ends meet, he has a work-study position in the library’s rare books collection. But he finds himself unexpectedly being blackmailed into stealing books from that very place, a nightmare of epic proportions; the solution proves to be an even greater nightmare. He and his friends summon a dragon to get rid of the blackmailers, but now the dragon won’t go away.

My thanks go to NetGalley and William Morrow for the review copy. This outstanding tome is for sale now.

This author has no doubt learned to take comparisons between his writing and that of his mega-famous father, Stephen King, in stride. My own impression from reading both is reaffirmed here: he’s every bit as good and perhaps, at times, better. His father has mellowed in his old age, and he’s become reluctant to kill his most sympathetic characters. Hill, however, has no such compunctions. It increases the suspense to know, while reading, that he actually might do that.

Arthur has become involved with a townie, Gwen Underfoot, whose family has cleaned for the family of his friend, student Colin Wren, for generations. Add in some other friends, Alison Shiner and the twins, Donna and Donovan—clever of Hill to insert some D&D into a dragon story—and we have a cabal.

One of the earliest points of interest for me is that nobody in this circle of friends seems to doubt for a moment that the effort to summon a dragon will be successful. I had expected self-conscious eyerolling, but their approach is well researched and oddly businesslike. King Sorrow arrives with a vengeance, and he does not disappoint! The saga that unspools from there is an epic one, over 800 pages, so those that like to hurry through short novels will need to steer clear or adjust their thinking. As for me, never at any point did I see anything that resembled padding. There is never a slow moment, and while at the outset I made a point not to read this story too close to bedtime, lest it affect my dreams, once I reached the story’s climax there could be no stopping till the journey was completed.

I don’t read a lot of horror these days; most grandmas don’t. But when I make an exception, I want it to be damn good, and this book qualifies. Highly recommended to those that appreciate things that go bump in the night, and especially dragons.

Over Yonder, by Sean Dietrich*****

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Sean Dietrich has written another fine novel, Over Yonder, one full of quirky characters, weird yet oddly credible situations, and a whole lot of heart. My thanks go to NetGalley and Thomas Nelson Books for the review copy. This book is for sale now.

Dietrich has been writing for a long while, but this is just the third of his books that I’ve read. As I begin this one, I develop a niggling suspicion, wondering whether this author uses a formula. This would be a sad discovery, because till this point, I have greatly loved his work. And so the question I have to answer before I can do much else is whether that’s true, or whether he is writing unique stories using a signature style. Here is what I am seeing: each story focuses on a girl—teen or child—who’s down on her luck, possibly facing a crisis, with no adult that will help her or advocate for her; an older man dealing with misfortune of his own such as a fatal or serious illness, and who is otherwise isolated and in need of redemption; and a chance meeting of the two in a small town in the deep South.

I suppose, after reading this third one I am inclined—as you can see from my rating—to say this is a signature style rather than a formula. I hate to be played. If I felt this was a formula, I would feel annoyed and my review would not be generous, but that’s not what happens.

Caroline is 17 and pregnant. Her boyfriend, Tater Bunson, is at the wheel of his ’93 Honda.

“Caroline stared out the lace-like cracks of the passenger window’s single bullet hole at downtown Knoxville…her hair was the color of a carrot. She was ninety-four percent freckles. Her small, upturned nose, full cheeks, and cherub face brought to mind a character from the highly successful Cabbage Patch Kids product line…Tater spun the wheel right. The car made a sound not unlike a Folgers can of rocks falling down a public stairwell. The spiderweb crack on the passenger window came from a .22 caliber bullet that had passed through the glass during Tater’s last heated disagreement with his mom.”

Woody Barker used to be a priest. He has a houseboat and a bad heart, and not much else. He can qualify for a heart transplant, but only after he quits smoking, and it’s not going well. He’s lonely; he had hoped to pick up with his ex-wife once he got out of prison, but now that he’s out, he sees that she has a boyfriend, and it looks like he’s out of luck. Then an old girlfriend summons him to her deathbed. She wants him to meet his 17-year-old daughter. Who? What??

Dietrich’s wry humor and visceral figurative language are out in force here. Highly recommended to those that enjoy strong Southern fiction with deeply developed characters.

The Maid’s Secret, by Nita Prose****-******

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Molly the Maid is back for the third installment of Nita Prose’s excellent and wildly successful series. My thanks go to NetGalley and Random House Ballantine for the review copy. This book will be available to the public April 8, 2025.

As in the first two books, we find Molly employed at The Regency Grand Hotel; she’s been promoted to Head Maid as well as Special Events Manager. She is engaged to chef Juan Manuel, a lovely fellow that helped fill the void in her life when her beloved Gran died. But everything changes when Brown and Beagle, art appraisers famed for their reality television program, come to do a show at The Regency Grand. Along with all of the “polishing to perfection” that is necessary for such a massive event, Molly decides to bring a few of her late grandmother’s trinkets along; you never know, maybe one of them will be worth something.

Oh, it most certainly is!

Once her rare and valuable object becomes public knowledge, Molly’s life changes completely. She no longer has privacy, which she holds dear; strangers are constantly in her face seeking autographs, and the press won’t leave her alone. Meanwhile, we are apprised of the circumstances leading up to this startling discovery. Gran comes to us from beyond the grave—so to speak—in the form of a diary that Molly didn’t know she kept. Chapters in this book alternate between the present day in Molly’s life, and the past, as told in epistolary fashion by Gran.

I wasn’t a big fan of this method, and I’m still a bit ambivalent, which is where the half star off the rating went. It seems like a lazy way to go about telling a story. However, if an author must use this method, it’s hard to imagine it being done better.

Of course things don’t go smoothly following the discovery of the heirloom; if they did, then there would be no novel. But I will leave the conflicts and resolution to the reader to discover.  As for me, I found the series of events, and the ending, believable enough for our purposes, and I enjoyed the story greatly, despite my misgivings about Gran’s storytelling method.

Recommended to those that enjoy the series; this book may be read as a stand-alone, but will be better enjoyed if you can read the first, second, or both earlier books first.