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August 2024 |
Murder by the Bookend: 08/31/24
Murder by the Bookend by Laura Gail Black and Susan Boyce (Narrator) (2021) (August 2024) is the second book in the Antique Bookshop mystery series. Jenna Quinn is hosting a party at her bookshop in honor of her reopening the shop. After the party a local librarian is found murdered by one of the glass bookends he won at Jenna's event. Here's another mystery with a shallow pool of suspects. The murderer can only be one of a half dozen people, all who were present at the party. From that list, there are three who get the most traction, so much so that some of Jenna's friends suggest that the murder was done in the fashion of Murder on the Orient Express (1934). Much of the book is spent with the three obvious suspects, although it takes Jenna forever to realize it. One is loud and spoiled, and written as if they were an escapee from a Kate Carlisle mystery. The other is henpecked and trying to keep things under control. The final one plays the part of the grieving, jilted lover. All three of them are caricatures more than actual characters. Ultimately the mystery is tied up in book thefts from the library. Jenna gets her friends involved in her sleuthing with the encouragement of her police officer boyfriend. Never before have I read a mystery where the amateur sleuth does nightly stakeouts. Jenna, is the second main character after Goldy to get hit on the head multiple times in the course of solving a mystery. At least this time head injury results in bed rest, but it still didn't seem like a plausible scenario. The final disappointment to this mystery was its climax. It's another mystery that only comes to an end because the murderer decides to go after the amateur sleuth. Although Jenna had some ideas she wasn't close to piecing together the clues. The murderer could have stuck with their plan and gotten away free and clear. Three stars Comments (0) Tik-Tok: 08/27/24
Tik-Tok by Candace Robinson and Amber R. Duell (2021) is the conclusion of the Faeries of Oz romance series. It ends with the relationship between Tik-Tok and North, the daughter of Tin. They meet because of a twenty year old prophesy involving a woman with portal magic. North happens to fit the bill and that's why Tik-Tok kidnaps her. This final volume has two things that set my teeth on edge: kidnapping and revenge. Although North seems willing to help once she's kidnapped her agency is tied up in a need to survive and a need to get home. Where is the romance in that? Then there's Tik-Tok, here a broken man turned pirate from another dimension. He has a golden mechanical arm, something he did to himself to make the prophesy come true and to protect himself from magic. Tik-Tok has lived free and clear of his abusive father, the single survivor of a horrific event, and all he needs to do is live his life to its fullest and leave his father festering in the other dimension. There's no need to open the portal except to get revenge. Now in all fairness to the source material, Tik-Tok, the original mechanical man, does in fact go through a portal. It's a tunnel that goes through the center of Fairyland to a place not on the official Oz and surrounding areas map. It is a charred wasteland, one inhabited by a dragon. The other thing that irked me all the way through the series is the way the men in the books often end up sounding like Ferengi erotica with the over use of "female" as a noun. It also further removes the women of the books from their agency. Like the original Oz books, these Fairies of Oz books have titles that aren't about the protagonists of the volume. Here the titular characters are the romantic interest of the main character, even though these books are written in alternating POV chapters. With the exception of Ozma, all the titular characters are male. In this last book, Ozma and Jack have are the parents of a newborn and it's only logical to assume Jack is the mother. (It's not stated in this volume, and I can't recall if the baby is mentioned in the previous volume).
Like the previous books and the series that inspired them, Tik-Tok sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. Tik-Tok and North as a couple (33) travel to a utopia (FF) (the other dimension) via the labyrinth (99) as represented by the ways in which Tik-Tok and North both have to transform themselves to open the portal. Three stars Comments (0) A Cup of Flour, A Pinch of Death: 08/26/24
A Cup of Flour, A Pinch of Death by Valerie Burns and Jasmin Walker (Narrator) (2024) is the third book in the Baker Street mystery series. Maddy is enjoying her new life running Aunt Octavia's bakery but her new life might be threatened by the ghosts of her past. Maddy is under suspicion again by Trooper Bob who thinks she's killed the woman who broke up her engagement. It doesn't help that her body was found in the bakery. Of course, now, Maddy and her irregulars know about the tunnels. There's probably an entire network of them. At the crux of things is Aunt Octavia's notes about someone who was up to no good. Of course Octavia is dead, murdered before the first book. But whatever evil was out there is still trying to keep Octavia silent. The solution to this novel ties up loose threads from the previous two. This type of ending is hard to pull off but it works here. It works because of clues sprinkled throughout the previous two books. An observant, genre savvy mystery reader will have seen the connections. It justifies hunches I had in book one. My only worry is that this book so tightly wraps up the series that this one might be the last one. If it isn't, the fourth book will have to be very different than the first three. Or perhaps longer mysteries stemming multiple books might become a feature of this series. Five stars Comments (0) Spanish Dagger: 08/24/24
Spanish Dagger by Susan Wittig Albert (2007) is the fifteenth book in the China Bayles mystery series. This time, while helping a papermaker harvest yucca (Spanish dagger) China discovers the body of Ruby's ex-boyfriend. China decides to investigate while Ruby is out of town caring for her elderly mother. These books are so hit or miss for me. I think as I get older and have read more mysteries by a younger and more diverse set of authors I am losing more patience with older mystery series. There are things this series does that set my teeth on edge. I hate how chit-chatty China is with her audience, having to re-explain every last detail of her life, her friends and Pecan Springs in every damn book. These intros grow with each new volume. Fifteen books in, it took about twenty pages or so for China to settle down and get back to living her life rather than handholding us through the story. Then there's the gender essentialism that's present is mysteries by Boomers. China is one of these characters who has to constantly quip about how manly her man is. Yes, so virile and rock hard. Blah blah. Focus on the task at hand, the solving of the mystery. Or running your shop. Or anything other than re-informing me at how he's the perfect example of masculinity. Give me the duck painting, egg scrambling husband from Fargo (1996) over McQuaid any day. The next book in the series is Nightshade (2008). Three stars Comments (0) There Are No Ants in This Book: 08/22/24
There Are No Ants in This Book by Rosemary Mosco and Anna Pirolli (Illustrator) (2024) is a picture book introduction to ten species of ants. You weren't expecting a book about an ant-free picnic, were you? That's what the main character is hoping for but doesn't get. One by one, a different kind of ant appears at the edge of the page. Instead of going right for the picnic food, they introduce themselves and their defining features. Then the afterword has longer descriptions with more accurately drawn illustrations of each kind. Of course with a book promising none of something, there's bound to be dozens or even thousands of that something. That's the case here, but only after the main character has been introduced to the picnic crashes and come to accept them. There's also one surprise character at the end to keep young readers on their toes. I think this book would do well during story time. Five stars Comments (0) DON'T TOUCH THAT!: A Sci-Fi and Fantasy Parenting Anthology: 08/20/24
DON'T TOUCH THAT!: A Sci-Fi and Fantasy Parenting Anthology edited by Jaymee Goh (2022) is a crowd funded anthology of science fiction and fantasy short stories that feature stories about parents doing their best in extraordinary times. The collection has twenty-one stories and I've included the list below. I am glacially slow at reading short story collections. This book took fifteen months to finish. In the past I've written individual reviews of each story as I work my way through a book. This time, though, I'm just going to leave you with general impressions. They're all good. There's a nice balance of sub genres. Each one is just the right length to read one before bed.
Five stars Comments (0) Hitting the Books: 08/19/24
Hitting the Books by Jenn McKinlay and Allyson Ryan (Narrator) (2018) is the ninth book in the Library Lover's mystery series. The library is a witness to a hit and run and checked out materials in the abandoned car are the only clues. Lindsay, though, doesn't believe for an instance that the two persons of interest have anything to do with the crime. This particular volume feels out of character for both the main character as well as the Jenn McKinlay's oeuvre of mysteries. McKinlay writes genre savvy characters who love to use quotes from the things they love whenever they see a connection. They are always seeing connections and using those moments to inform how they go about solving mysteries. Except in this volume when the connection glaringly blatant and it hurts to see so many missed opportunities. After Lindsey delivers a bunch of audiobooks to the injured woman she looks back at the house and sees a woman in an upstairs window. The injured woman is engaged to the wealthy man who owns the house and is already acting as a mother figure to his grown daughter. Even though the circumstances leading up to the scene are different, I caught the Jane Eyre reference. I waited for Lindsey to notice too or even one of her library staff or her bookish friends. Nope. Nada. Zilch. Of course, had she made the connection and pushed harder, the book would have taken a very different path. I might have even been shorter. Instead, Lindsey spends much of the book distracted by her doubts over her decision to cohabitate with her boyfriend. She also stresses over babies and not wanting any of her own. The tenth book is Word to the Wise (2019). Four stars Comments (0) Puzzleheart: 08/18/24
Puzzleheart by Jenn Reese (2024) is one of those delightful books from the subgenre of "sentient house." In adult horror these houses are often the villain, but in middle grade, they are awkward, goofy, well meaning characters often pushed to extremes by the humans who live with them. That is the case here as the house will end up nearly destroying itself to save the woman he loves and their own hard earned memories. Perigee and their dad arrive at Puzzleheart at the start of a blizzard. They've come to visit Grayson's mother at a time when the family of two are struggling to stay financially and emotionally afloat. Like the house from The View from the Very Best House in Town by Meera Trehan (2022), Puzzleheart was built to be extraordinary. This house has puzzles built in and the ability to shift pieces of its architecture around as needed. It also, deep in its heart, has a reset button just in case things get out of hand. The house was designed to be a B&B escape room experience but that never happened. Before the place could open for business, Grayson's father died. Grayson's mother has grieved every since and retreated more and more into herself, leaving the house in growing desperation to fix her. The majority of this book is set during the blizzard while Savannah Eklund (the grandmother) is providing shelter to a neighborhood girl whose mother is on the mountain rescue squad. While she's out saving people from the snow, her daughter, her cat and the cat's kittens are all sheltering at Puzzleheart. Lily, being about Perigee's age become fast friends and to save the house and themselves, set off to solve mysteries of Puzzleheart as the house begins one last ditch effort to get Savannah to regain her love of puzzles. The journey Perigee and Lily take to solve the mysteries of Puzzleheart puts this novel on the Road Narrative Spectrum. For reasons that are beautifully revealed through the puzzles the travelers are in a Scarecrow / Minotaur dichotomy (99). Both Lily / Perigee and the house believe they are the protectors (scarecrows) and the other is the minotaur (monster/ villain). Their destination is home (66). Perigee needs a new home. Lily wants keep Perigee safe as a form of sympathetic magic to make sure her mother will come home safe at the end of the blizzard. Puzzlheart itself wants to be Savannah's home — a place she loves living in, rather than a prison that reminds her constantly of her dead husband. Their route is the maze (CC) in that Puzzleheart does some very dangerous things to protect itself. The puzzles that make the house unique are also the means for resetting the house and potentially erasing all of its memories. To protect itself, Puzzleheart risks bodily harm to Savannah's family as well as structural harm to itself. Five stars Comments (0) The World of Oz: A Fantastic Expedition Over the Rainbow: 08/17/24
The World of Oz: A Fantastic Expedition Over the Rainbow by Allen Eyles (1985) was released as promotional material for Return to Oz (1985). It is a comprehensive survey of the Oz books, films, plays and the people responsible for them. Although the book is only 96 pages, they are multi-column, small typeface, dense pages. The book begins with Baum's biography, followed by an annotated bibliography of the fourteen books Baum wrote the the series as well as various adaptations made of each volume: silent films and plays, with illustrations of how major characters in each were portrayed. There's of course a section devoted to the MGM film which is compared and contrasted with two versions of The Wiz. Were the book newer, it would have included the most recent version too. The section that interested me most was the one on the post Baum books. These are the ones written by Ruth Plumly Thompson, John R. Neill, and others. I am a few volumes shy of starting Thompson's books. Eyles is a bit dismissive of her contribution to the series, something I disagree with based on the one of hers I have read, Speedy in Oz (1934). Sprinkled throughout the book are descriptions of how characters and books were adapted into Return to Oz. Of course this book is enthusiastic about the project and hopeful for it being the launch of a new series of Oz based films. That didn't happen for reasons I might cover in a different post. Four stars Comments (0) Closely Harbored Secrets: 08/16/24
Closely Harbored Secrets by Bree Baker and Thérèse Plummer (Narrator) (2020) is the fifth book in the Seaside Cafe mystery series. Everly Swan finds the president of the neighboring Roanoke historical society murdered during the annual haunted Charm ghost walk tour. Her name is scrawled next to the body, making her a person of interest again. More disturbing, though, is the appearances of a pirate who appears to be following her. While Everly doesn't believe in ghosts she is off-put by the threats left behind by her "ghostly" stalker. She's also afraid these events might escalate into something life threatening, as has happened with the previous murder investigations she's been tangled up in. As with the previous books, Everly's ultimate situation, the one where she's once again fighting for her life and needing a rescue, comes down to situational awareness. Everly, while nervous about situations is still woefully bad at reading people. She can't tell when she's so obviously being scammed or groomed or worse. Although Everly's friends and family seem aware at her failings at reading people, they have so far done very little to protect her. Everly's inner circle need to stage an intervention. But if they did, the mystery would be much shorter! The sixth book is Partners in Lime (2021) Four stars Comments (0) Who's Got the Apple?: 08/14/24
Who's Got the Apple? by Jan Lööf, Ole Risom and Linda Hayward (Translators) (1974) was originally published in Swedish as Sagan om det röda äpplet, or the tale of the red apple. The English version is vaguer about which apple as there are two: the red one, and a green one. The entire book is set during the events of April Fools' Day. The man on the cover wants to buy a juicy red apple to eat. Unfortunately the green grocer only has the one he's growing for himself and decides to play a trick on the customer. He gives the man a wax green apple and tells him to set it out so it can ripen. The man goes home and does just that, leaving the fake apple on a window sill overlooking the town. And then a series of events spiral out of control resulting in the fake apple being knocked off the sill and landing in the garden. Meanwhile the real apple is taken after a traffic accident knocks a hole in the green grocers wall. Although there is a linear set of events just relating to the apple, there is an entire side plot involving a thief. Observant readers will see how the two plots will come together and result in the switching of the fake apple for the real apple as well as the man's cat being blamed for a bite being taken out of the now "ripe" apple. Five stars Comments (0) Missing White Woman: 08/13/24
Missing White Woman by Kellye Garrett is about a romantic weekend to New York going horribly wrong. Breanna's new boyfriend planned everything and all she has to do is let herself in to the AirBnB he's rented. Things start to go wrong when the code doesn't work. Now I'm going to be upfront and say by the close of the first chapter I had a pretty good idea how things were going to unfold. Even with knowing the big picture it was still a rollercoaster ride. Breanna has gotten herself into the middle of something that threatens to destroy her life, or worse, take her life. The day Breanna arrives her mother sends her a text about a white woman who has gone missing near her. She's understandably concerned for her daughter's safety. White women don't go missing and when they do, Black people get blamed even though they rarely have anything to do with it. On the romantic front, things aren't what Breanna expected either. Ty keeps getting called into phone meetings. He doesn't have the time for her and he's losing his temper. Already, this should have been enough for Breanna to book it, but she trusts Ty and decides to stick it out. The day she expects to finally be spending with Ty she instead finds a dead white woman at the bottom of the stairs in the AirBnB. Ty is missing and Breanna is now the person of interest. She's also the target of a social media lynch mob. The mystery part of this book is easy to solve. There just aren't enough characters involved to complicate things. Instead, it's the social media mob thats makes the book a nail-biter. Five stars Comments (0) Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill: Volume 2: 08/12/24
Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill: Volume 2 by Ren Eguchi, MASA (Illustrator), and Kevin Chen (Translator) (2017) continues the adventure of Mukouda Tsuyoshi aka Mukohda, his two familiars, and his skills of isekai DoorDash. The focus is on how Fel and Sui's hunting prowess are the way that Mukohda becomes incredibly wealthy and levels up despite failing to take any quests. Although it's never mentioned, I have to wonder at the overall effect Mukohda's hunting has on the the isekai environment. His familiars regularly take down top tier predators, or entire herds of monster creatures. Even more troubling is the genocide Mukohda et al are responsible. They're sent to kill eight goblins and to cut off an ear on each kill as proof. (Scalping, anyone?). Goblins are monsters, sure. And they're dangerous, sure. But they're also sentient and have complex societies as demonstrated by the entire village Mukohda, Fel and Sui take out. On a more interesting note, Mukohda starts to use his DoorDash skills to become a merchant by importing shampoos, soaps, and other toilet products. This part of the on-going series is frankly more interesting than the mass slaughter/eating of various monsters. Four stars Comments (0) Knot the Usual Suspects: 08/11/24
Knot the Usual Suspects by Molly MacRae and Emily Durante (Narrator) (2015) is the fifth book in the Haunted Yarn Shop mystery series. Kath and her knitting club decide to take a break from making hats for newborns to yarn bomb Blue Plum during Handmade Blue Plum. A man Kath meets while measuring the city hall columns is later murdered, the first of two murders. Both murders try to pin the deed on the knitting club with evidence left behind. Kath, though, knows it's none of them because she and the others have kept careful records of what they've made and what materials they used. Geneva the ghost is on the outs with Ardice which adds some tension to the TGIF dynamics. The other difference with this book is Geneva's mystery has been solved, so she's not trying to make assumptions about her death based on the current murders. The main focus of the book was on the ins and outs of yarn bombing a town center. Keeping the focus on the creative act of social disobedience was a good distraction from the blatant solution to the murders. I was honestly surprised at how long it took Kath to piece things together. All I can guess is she was too preoccupied with the yarn bombing to put two and two together. Pacing wise, I think it would have made more sense to solve the mystery sooner and have the Handmade Blue Plum events play out after. The sixth book in the series is Crewel and Unusual (2019) Four stars Comments (0) Christa Comes Out of Her Shell: 08/10/24
Christa Comes Out of Her Shell by Abbi Waxman, Jesse Vilinsky and Jonathan Todd Ross (Narrators) (2024) is about a family coming together after the husband, presumed dead, returns after twenty-five years. Christa Liddle after a tumultous childhood and teenage years has earned her PhD and is studying sea snails on a small island nation near the African continent. Her life is turned upside down when she's summoned back to Los Angeles after her father's appearance in Alaska. I was surprised when the novel started on the fictional island of Violeta. Given how little a role the island ultimately plays in the novel, I don't understand the need for a fictional island. Why not pick a real place? Mostly, though, the book is about Christa being forced back to Los Angeles to deal with the fallout of her presumed dead father. Before he vanished, Jasper was a wildlife celebrity and he and his daughters would do shows about wildlife and celebrity appearances with animals. After he disappeared, Christa's mother took over the roll and forced her, the youngest child, into the business. Now, though, she's a no nonsense, socially awkward post-doc who prefers to work alone. She's back into the middle of the celebrity life and into a family that has changed during her absence. She's also falling in love with a man who knows her past demons. Christa Comes Out of Her Shell reminds me of The Neapolitan Sisters by Margo Candel (2022) but with a healthier family dynamic. Christa's mother and sisters have been to therapy and they have worked through issues that Christa has run from. Their willingness to change helps Christa finally begin truly healing. Five stars Comments (0) Big Frog, Little Pond: 08/09/24
Big Frog, Little Pond by George Mendoza and Peter Parnall (Illustrator) (1971) is about a pond full of small frogs who have to contend with a noisy neighbor. It's also a matter of opposites: big frog in a little pond, little frogs in a big pond. I was attracted to the picture book because I recognized Peter Parnall's artwork on the cover. He did the illustrations to Byrd Baylor's Everybody Needs a Rock (1974). The story I think is ultimately about marginalized people needing to work together to out maneuver the extremely privileged. After each individual frog having their song drowned out by the bullfrog's constant belching, one of them gets the idea that they should go to his pond and sing together to drown out his noise and maybe chase him away. For the younger set, the story would be about how to deal with a bully. A bully-frog. Peter Parnall's illustrations though are the star of this book. He uses irregular shapes with bold outlines. He also uses color sparingly, making where and when he does count. Four stars Comments (0) City of Grit and Gold: 08/08/24
City of Grit and Gold by Maud Macrory Powell (2017) is historical fiction set in Chicago in 1886. Addie, a young Jewish immigrant witnesses her family torn apart by a TB outbreak and worker unrest. The book is clearly written to teach about that particular time period. It's designed to deliver the most melodrama as possible in as short of a page span as possible. Although the protagonist is on the cusp on being a teenager, the novel doesn't read like a middle grade novel. Save for the opening scene before Addie has to help fetch a doctor, the scenes just don't feel like they are from her POV. She's in them but she's not living them. Two stars Comments (0) Advocate: 08/07/24
Advocate by Eddie Ahn (2024) is a graphic novel memoir about working as an environmental justice lawyer for a nonprofit in San Francisco. For anyone working in nonprofits, this book hits hard. Eddie Ahn was born and raised in Texas. His parents emigrated from Korea and made a living running a small grocery / liquor store. He covers life working in his parents store as a child and compares it to the sorts of things he's had to do to make ends meet and serve his community in San Francisco. Ahn draws with a clean line and uses color sparingly but effectively. If you know the Bay Area, especially San Francisco, you'll recognize the places he depicts. An interesting side note, Ahn had some of his artwork selected for decorating utility boxes in San Francisco. He and I have that in common, although mine are going up in the East Bay. Five stars Comments (0) Death With All the Trimmings: 08/06/24
Death With All the Trimmings by Lucy Burdette and Laura Jennings (Narrator) (2014) is the fifth book in the Key West Food Critic mystery series. Hayley Snow is befriended by the latest big name chef to open a business in Key West, Edel Waugh. When Waugh's new restaurant is the target of arson and her ex-husband's body is found in the rubble, she's the prime suspect. Hayley is once again in the middle of an investigation. On the job front it looks like Hayley will be back to cleaning apartments as Key Zest is up for sale. Hayley's boss wants to retool everything and has investors willing to give her the green light. All of this drama is set against the backdrop of Christmastime. Although Key West is on the other side of the nation from where I grew up, it shares some things in common: decorated palm trees and boat parades. My one quibble with the mystery is how few characters there are. Everyone ends up being interconnected in ways that frankly seem a tad too convenient. It also opens up questions as to why the person ultimately orchestrating everything didn't make a move in earlier times. Why snap now? The sixth book is Fatal Reservations (2015). Four stars Comments (0) The Sleepwalkers: 08/05/24
The Sleepwalkers by Scarlett Thomas (2024) continues my trend of reading thrillers or horror novels set in villas. So far it's not turning out to be a satisfying trend. Evelyn and Richard, on the outs after a chaotic wedding come to a tiny Greek island for a honeymoon arranged by Richard's mother. The villa they're staying at was the site of a drowning by married couple the year before. Richard and Evelyn seem to be haunted now by the "sleepwalkers." In previous books by Scarlett Thomas, there's always been something otherworldly at play. These events come into focus through the fixation of the main character that often involves programming, mathematics, cryptography or similar. This time, Evelyn is a mystery writer and her observations, while genre savvy don't bear fruit in a satisfying fashion. What Sleepwalkers did is make me want to read two other books instead, Moon-Spinners by Mary Stewart and Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson (2018). Three stars Comments (0) Clifford the Big Red Dog: 08/04/24
Clifford the Big Red Dog by Norman Bridwell (1963) is a classic of American children's picture books about a girl and her ginormous dog. The book spawned a long series of books as well as two animated series. The last time I read the book was nineteen years ago and I was the mother of a preschooler. A lot has happened since then and my feelings for the book have mellowed. When I was reading it to my oldest (then only child) I wasn't a fan. I have become more of a literal reading and more willing to accept the unexpected and the exaggerated in ways that I didn't nearly two decades ago. I like a bit of magic or nonsense in my fiction now. The other thing that's changed, is Coraline, my own big (fox) red dog. She's an English lab, and while not as tall as Clifford, she's the same general shape and temperament. Clifford, then, is about how we adjust to our pets. How we learn to live with the big ones (or small ones). How we love them and how they love us. How even when they do what comes naturally (like picking up oversized shoes, in Clifford's case) we accept them unconditionally. Five stars Comments (0) The Secret Language of Birds: 08/03/24
The Secret Language of Birds by Lynne Kelly (2024) is a companion piece to Song for a Whale (2019). Nina opts to spend the summer with her aunt who runs a birding summer camp in rural Texas. Her interest in birding begins when she's left behind on a road trip because she was distracted by a heron. Nina who hadn't planned on hanging with any of the campers is befriended by a cabin of three who call themselves the Oddballs. On a night when they're signing their names in the ruins of the old infirmary, they're scared by a giant bird. Like Song for a Whale which starts with the protagonist's problem and pivots to an endangered animal, this one switches gears from Nina feeling like she doesn't fit in anywhere, to a pair of Whooping Cranes. Nina and the other Oddballs take it upon themselves to watch the birds and report their activities to the organization tracking them. Whooping Cranes were common in Texas a hundred years ago, as evidenced by the century old doodles left in the infirmary. Now, though, they are rare, save for a recent, tiny over wintering population. This novel imagines the girls finding a breeding pair. Endangered birds are banded and the migrating ones are fixed with trackers. The back half of this novel centers on discovering the identity of the female bird, one who has neither band nor tracker. Given how few birds there are, it's extremely unlikely that a bird would be unknown. And that's where Iris comes in. It's a chance for Nina and her to make amends. It's a chance for her to expand her skills with audio files. It's a way for Nina and her camp friends to help a pair of birds and expand scientific knowledge. Of course, like with the first one, there are consequences to working in secret away from the adults. But like the first book there's a happy ending for the birds and the girls.
Like Song for a Whale, The Secret Language of Birds sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. Here the travelers are marginalized (66), namely the Oddballs. Their destination is the wildlands (99), namely the nesting area at camp. Their route their is the cornfield, or more specifically the tkaronto (FF) as represented by the swamp. Five stars Comments (0) July 2024 Sources: 08/02/24
The theater practice days and other preparation for Kay's trip to Scotland kept me busy.
In July I read 24 TBR books, up from the previous month's 19 TBR. One book was published in July. Seven books were for research, and one was a review copy. None were from the library. My ROOB score for July was -3.88, up from the previous month's -4.26. It was an average July.
I predicted a -4.3 and was too low. For August, I'm going with -4.0.
My average for July improved from -3.19 to -3.24. Comments (0) It's Not Like It's a Secret: 08/01/24
It's Not Like It's a Secret by Misa Sugiura (2017) is a YA sapphic romance. It begins with Sana Kiyohara reading a text to her father while helping her mother navigate during a road trip. It appears to be from a mistress and it's a secret she keeps tucked away until things finally hit a boiling point after her family relocates to San Jose, California from somewhere in Wisconsin. Sana has to deal with culture shock - of California vs Wisconsin - as well as her own family struggles as a Japanese-American trying to abide by the expectations of her traditional, rural Japanese parents. In the midst of all of that she has feelings for a Mexican-American girl in her high school and the two eventually end up dating. The breaking point for Sana is the weight of two secrets: her girlfriend and her father's mistress. It seems she is forced to exist under rules that don't apply to her father. But the ultimate irony is that of course, her mother knows about the affair. Her mother also has other opinions on things that are contrary to what she usually tells Sana. My one quibble with the book is the way the high school teens break up into ethnic groups as their default friend groups. Having just seen my two children go through high school in the Bay Area, these cliques don't exist. Maybe it's different in South Bay (we're in East Bay) but the de facto cliques seemed unrealistic. This family and high school drama sits on the Road Narrative Spectrum. The Kiyoharas are a family (33) of travelers. Their destination is a better home life (66). Their route there is through the cornfields (FF) (as mentioned on the road trip chapter). Four stars Comments (0) July 2024 Summary: 08/01/24
July was the final run up to the HHS theater trip to the UK to perform at the Fringe Festival. Kay's schedule plus trying to work on my paintings kept me busy. It was also the month that Claire moved home and Judy and Charlie visited.
I read more books in July, 24, up from 23. Of my read books, 16 were diverse and six were queer. I reviewed 25 books, two more than the previous month. On the reviews front, 16 were diverse and seven were queer.
I have 1 book left to review of the books I read in 2023, two books from June, and 19 from July of the 153 read in 2024. Comments (0)
1997-2025 Sarah Sammis |
