Bridge of Gold

  Bridge of Gold is an entertaining history lesson about the building of the Golden Gate Bridge during the Gold Rush era. Imagine constructing a 1.7-mile suspension bridge in the 1930s without modern equipment? To set the footings, divers wore clunky suits that weighed hundreds of pounds with heavy copper helmets. It’s mind blowing to me. As I read, I stopped many times to do online research. San Francisco’s famous fog and rocky coastline make for a deadly combination. There are an estimated three hundred wrecks in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and the adjacent Greater Farallones National Marine Sanctuary. Fascinating. But I digress. Bridge of Gold is a […]

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The Madness of Crowd

  Louise Penny just keeps getting better. The Madness of Crowds is number seventeen in her Chief Inspector Armand Gamache series, and I am now just one book away from being caught up. So many books to read, too little time! As always, she’s composed a multilayered novel with the diverse, well-drawn characters I’ve come to love. It’s best to read her books in order, but she does a fine job referencing events from previous books to keep new readers in the loop. The Madness of Crowds is about man’s inhumanity to man (or woman’s inhumanity to woman, whatever the case may be). Chief Inspector Gamache’s winter holiday is interrupted […]

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Messenger of Truth

  Once again, Maisie Dobbs did not disappoint. I love historical mysteries, and author Jacqueline Winspear gets extra points for having the detective be a woman, which in 1931 would have been unprecedented. It was a 2006 Agatha Award Nominee for Best Novel—always a good sign. (Incidentally, Louise Penny has won the award seven times.) Nicholas Bassington-Hope was commissioned to paint war propaganda after sustaining injuries in combat. On the night before the opening of his exhibition at a celebrated Mayfair art gallery, he falls from a scaffolding to his death. The police rule it an accident, but the dead man’s twin sister suspects foul play. Where is the painting […]

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Fox Creek

  Another fabulous novel by Edgar winner William Kent Krueger! Fox Creek is the nineteenth installment of the Cork O’Connor series and my twenty-first book by this talented writer. Do I enjoy his work… you bet as we sat here in Minnesota! In Fox Creek, Cork races against time to save his wife Rainy, Ojibwe healer Henry Meloux, and a mysterious woman from violent mercenaries. Dolores Morriseau has come to Henry for guidance. When men fill the woods trying to capture her, Meloux leads them to safety deep in his beloved Boundary Waters Canoe Area. Well over 100 years old, he must do his best to outwit the mercenaries who […]

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Dark Intercept

  The day before Navy SEAL Jedidiah Johnson is set to retire, he receives a frantic call from his estranged childhood friend. David’s daughter, Sarah Beth, has been kidnapped off the streets of Nashville in broad daylight. The police have no suspects and no leads. The only clue: the body of a dead priest left behind at the scene. David and his wife, Rachel—Jed’s first love—are desperate for help. The police don’t appreciate Jed’s interference in their investigation, but he is determined to find Sarah Beth. Soon he experiences dark memories, voices in his head, nightmares, and visions, and someone tries to kill him. He’s saved by an ancient group […]

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The Mystery of Mrs. Christie

  In December 1926, novelist Agatha Christie and her husband Archie have a vicious argument about his unfaithfulness. On that frigid night, she vanishes. Investigators find her abandoned car on the edge of a deep pond, her fur coat still inside. Her daughter and unfaithful husband have no idea where she is. English officials unleash an unprecedented manhunt to find her and are joined by people all over the country. She reappears eleven days later, claiming amnesia. Marie Benedict wrote the book in a dual narrative: one story line is from Archie’s point-of-view as he contends with the media circus, the other from Agatha’s as she describes their relationship in […]

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The 6:20 Man

  I’ve read twenty-seven books written by David Baldacci, some I gave two stars, some earned five. I’m thinking four stars is just right for The 6:20 Man. Every day without fail, former Army Ranger Travis Devine boards the 6:20 commuter train to Manhattan, where he works as an entry-level analyst at Cowl and Comely, the city’s most prestigious investment firm. He gazes out the train window at the lavish homes of the uberwealthy, dreaming about joining their ranks. Then one morning Devine receives an anonymous, untraceable message which reads: “She is dead.” Sara Ewes, Devine’s coworker and former girlfriend, is found hanging in a storage room of his office […]

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Carrie Soto is Back

  I’ve never been much of a tennis fan, although I took the obligatory tennis lessons at Wesley Park several summers through community ed and then married into a tennis crazed family of jocks. Despite my lack of athleticism, Carrie Soto is Back was engrossing from start to finish. Author Taylor Jenkins Reid delivers another ace. When Carrie Soto retires from tennis, she is the best player the world has ever seen. She has shattered every record and claimed twenty Grand Slam titles. But six years later, she sits in the stands of the 1994 US Open as Nicki Chan ties her record. At thirty-seven years old, Carrie comes out […]

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Overkill

Former Super Bowl MVP quarterback Zach Bridger is shocked to receive a call from the hospital about his ex-wife, Rebecca Pratt, who is on life-support following a violent assault. He hasn’t seen her since their volatile marriage fell apart five years earlier—why does he still have medical power-of-attorney? Zach must make an impossible choice: keep her on life support or pull the plug. Unable to decide, he walks away, and her vegetative state continues. Two years later, Rebecca’s attacker gets an early release from prison. State prosecutor Kate Lennon is determined to put him back behind bars. But that would take a murder charge, and the only way to do […]

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October 2022 Picks and Pans

  Hello fellow book lovers! For me, October was a month filled with reading variety: historical fiction, contemporary fiction, historical mystery, thriller, Christian fiction (and straight-up-fiction, of course). Most of my books were advance reader copies from publishers, but I enjoyed catch-up books in a couple series. My total isn’t very impressive this month… I started reading Shogun by James Clavell, which comes in at staggering 1,140 pages, but I didn’t finish. It’s a slow read and a definite time suck. Not sure if and when I’ll finish it. I turned on comments for this post… I’d love to hear your thoughts on these books! I’ll be transitioning to video […]

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