Tag:

Women

Review

The Vacancy in Room 10

by Brian Kenney

The Sycamores, the brilliant setting for this tale of two young women, is a run-down motel, converted into apartments, on the edge of Santa Fe. The residents—whose lives spill out throughout the building, from the balconies to the pool—are a fascinating lot who love nothing more than getting into one another’s business. Broke and thrown out of her ritzy home by her partner, who technically owned everything, Cass ends up the Sycamores’ handyperson, unclogging toilets in exchange for rent. Throw in a side gig slipping married men roofies, photographing them near naked, then threatening blackmail, and Cass has just enough money to get by. Until she accidentally murders very much the wrong guy. Alicia’s route to the Sycamores is more convoluted. Her painter/husband rented one of the units as his studio, but one day—with no real warning—he calls her up, confesses to a murder, then shoots himself. Alicia moves into her husband’s studio to cozy up to the other residents and try to discover the truth behind her husband’s death. This thumbnail sketch only hints at the depth and complexity of this thriller, in which both women take enormous risks, with help from the neighbors, to learn the truth about the lives they’ve lost. Recommended for readers who like a strong, sophisticated thriller with a dynamic plot and unforgettable characters.

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Review

Day One

by Henrietta Thornton

There’s a moment in this story of an English village school shooting when a mother tries to call for her son. “[T]he space left by her inhale was filled with elbows, shoulders, and no words came out,” a description that’s just one of the shivers readers will get from Dean’s unflinching look at horror. But the book’s not really about the shooting itself, though that awful event gets its share of pages. Nor is it about the shooter, though he too gets his due, in a section that readers should know includes a horribly accurate look at a verbally, emotionally, and physically abusive man. Rather, Dean puts her magnifying glass on what happens after, when those who question everything except conspiracy theories move in with their claims that the massacre never happened and the victims never existed. A split-second decision by someone from the small town is later blown up by the right wing and adds interesting shadows to the killer/victims dichotomy. Those who wanted Alex Jones ground to dust will be intrigued by this fuller look behind his kind of rabid cruelty, and fans of Dean’s Girl A and of psychological thrillers are also a great audience for this. A realistic and absorbing look at media gone wrong and the lives it scorches.

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Review

You’d Look Better as a Ghost

by Brian Kenney

Here’s a trend out of the U.K.: fun-loving, female serial killers. From doing away with the relatives (Mackie’s How to Kill Your Family) to offing abusive husbands (Casale’s The Best Way to Bury Your Husband) British women are ignoring old school, female solutions like poison or a tumble down the staircase and packing some heat, or, in the case of You’d Look Better as a Ghost, relying on a hammer to the back of the head. Claire, our serial killer and hero, is always planning her next kill, typically of someone who crossed her, starting back in childhood with her murder of her mother, who made Joan Crawford seem like Mother Theresa. Today the 30ish Claire is mourning (a real emotion!) her father’s death, while plotting the murder of Lucas, an arts administrator who rejected one of her paintings. But no sooner is Lucas diced and planted in the back garden—it makes you think twice about the Chelsea Flower Show—when one of the ladies in Claire’s weekly bereavement group let’s on that she knows all about Claire’s special hobby, and if she wants to live, Claire has to give in to blackmail. Is threatening a part-time, but highly successful, serial killer ever a good idea? That would be no. Witty and sophisticated, funny and fast-paced, this dark masterpiece is pure pleasure.

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Review

Village in the Dark

by Henrietta Thornton

Readers last visited the remote Alaskan town of Point Mettier in Yamashita’s debut, City Under One Roof, (Please note-the link is to a prior firstCLUE review) a title that perfectly describes the town that consists of a single apartment building with 205 residents, stores, and even a bar inside. This time, we are reintroduced to Cara Kennedy, a former Anchorage PD detective, as she’s having her husband’s and son’s bodies exhumed. She can’t stop suspecting foul play even though everyone is fed up that she won’t accept that they died of a hiking accident—she’s even lost her job because of her suspicions. But she’s now found a photo of her dead loved ones on a gang member’s phone. There’s no explanation for it, and her investigation is forcing her to visit the remote village of Chugach, with a trip through Point Mettier the only way in. Other wronged women are simultaneously facing pain and their paths are destined to meet: Ellie, owner of the Cozy Condo Inn in Point Mettier, gets a devastating call just as Kennedy’s on her way. We also meet Mia, a former Chugach resident who’s trying the outside world for the first time, meeting fears yet forging her way. These are fascinating characters and circumstances, and the story that brings them together and sees them struggling against inner demons, and very real danger, is gripping. For readers who enjoy offbeat tales and wilderness thrillers as well as for fans of the author’s debut.

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Review

Neferura

by Brian Kenney

With a doctorate in Egyptology, it would have been easy for Malayna Evans to have fallen down the bottomless hole of historical detail. But instead, this is a beautifully balanced novel, rich in the experiences of life in the backstabbing court of Pharaoh Hatshepsut while also focused on the engaging and ultimately tragic life of her daughter, Neferura, princess and high priestess of Kemet. Neferura lives to support the people, but she is often distracted by court machinations, especially those of her misogynistic half-brother, Thutmose, who wants to end her mother’s rule, become Pharaoh, marry Neferura, and produce an heir. Neferura’s interior thinking is powerfully engaging, and setting the novel largely among women, whose struggles to lead are always under scrutiny, is incredibly refreshing. But Neferura’s own story feels nearly revolutionary: to survive, she befriends the wisewoman, a much-tattooed priestess of sorts, who is in touch with a network of women who devote themselves to supporting Neferura, even to the point of risking their own lives. Add to this several standout characters, such as Neferura’s life-long tutor who helps guide her actions, and you have a cadre ready to protest their princess. Powerful and poignant, this is a treat for fans of historical mysteries.

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Review

That Night in the Library

by Henrietta Thornton

You know those cute programs where kids leave their teddy bear for a library sleepover? This is nothing like that. Instead, staying in the library overnight are student workers who have just completed a tough interview process for the one permanent job on offer in the university’s rare-books department (Jurczyk is mining a setting similar to her 2022 The Department of Rare Books and Special Collections), a toxic workplace if ever there was one. Also attending is non-student Ro, along because he can provide the drug, acid, that will kickstart a ceremony that student Davey has meticulously planned. Davey has invited Ro and five others to re-enact a Greek tradition around the Persephone myth, in which intoxicated pilgrims face either death or the thing they most fear, in order to conquer the fear. The tortured inner voice of narrator Faye, the shyest library employee, is used to wonderful effect by Jurczyk to chronicle a frenzied, terrifying night in a locked room—the library’s basement cage—that starts with a killing. The ending here is a shock, and along the way the author delivers chills that are packed with narcissistic venom and choking claustrophobia. This will be a hit with those who enjoyed Jurczyk’s previous work. If you like myth retellings, try one of the many versions of the Irish Tír na nÓg story, which mirrors elements of the tale of Persephone.

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Review

The Deepest Lake

by Willy Williams

Noted for her historical and speculative fiction (The Spanish Bow; Annie and the Wolves), Romano-Lax ventures into suspense territory with this atmospheric, entertaining thriller about a grieving mother investigating her daughter’s mysterious death. Three months after her 23-year-old daughter was presumed to have drowned in Lake Atitlán, Central America’s deepest lake, Rose arrives in Guatemala. Although a six-week search failed to recover Jules’s body, Rose is unsatisfied with the official investigation’s conclusion. She wants to learn more about her daughter’s final hours and why Jules, who had a lifelong fear of water, was last seen swimming in the lake. A key but uncooperative witness is Eva Marshall, the best-selling memoirist and Jules’s literary idol, for whom the aspiring writer had just started working as a personal assistant before her disappearance. Frustrated with Eva’s refusal to schedule a visit or a phone call from Rose and her ex-husband Matt, a determined Rose signs up under her maiden name for an upcoming memoir-writing workshop taught by the charismatic Eva at her Guatemalan lakeside retreat. “Rose has no ambitions whatsoever as a memoirist, not even the tiniest desire to be published.…But you do what you must, after you’ve already tried everything else.” Despite the glamor and natural beauty of her surroundings, Rose senses something off both in Eva and in how she runs her workshop. Did Jules uncover a dark truth that led to her death? While crafting a taut tale of suspense, Romano-Lax also turns a gimlet eye on the sometimes-toxic writing-workshop industry and the social media demands that turn authors into marketers and branders. In spite of an epilogue that feels a bit forced, the author has written a satisfying tale about the sometimes-strained but always unbreakable bonds between mothers and daughters.

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Review

Someone Saw Something

by Jeff Ayers

A parent’s worst nightmare comes true for news anchor Corina and her family in Mofina’s gripping thriller. Six-year-old Gabriel is playing in Central Park with his older sister when he vanishes after going after his model airplane. Initial searches show no evidence of how he disappeared, nor any witnesses to the abduction. With no ransom demand, the police and investigators are baffled. Since Corina is a celebrity, the case brings out some sympathetic thoughts, but those are few. Most of what Corina reads online are vicious attacks and conspiracy theories regarding Gabriel’s true origins that make her life, and that of her family, a living hell. It doesn’t help that her husband and daughter have secrets they don’t want the world to discover. Mofina intelligently crafts the story by never showing Gabriel’s whereabouts or who is responsible for his kidnapping, amping up the conspiracy and paranoia. Focusing on the family’s agony and quest for the truth puts the reader directly into the story, and the final payoff is terrific. Mofina is a number-one bestselling author in Canada—as he should be in many other countries.

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Review

Lenny Marks Gets Away with Murder.

by Henrietta Thornton

Prepare to fall hard for Lenny Marks, the awkward, overthinking, lonely character in Mayne’s emotional debut mystery. Helena, or Lenny, is an Australian primary-school teacher. She’s fine in the classroom, as her self-discipline means she sticks religiously to lesson plans. She also gets along well with kids, but the same can’t be said for her interactions with colleagues, whom she mostly ignores, except for Ashleigh and Amy. These are the women whom Lenny has decided will be her friends—social workers and a kind former foster-mom having long encouraged her to speak to others and get out more. (Meanwhile, Asheigh and Amy say things to Lenny like, “I love that you don’t care what you look like”). But she’s trudging along mostly fine until the letter. It arrives at the school from the state parole board and sets Lenny into a spin while Mayne, tantalizingly, lets us into the full, shocking story of Lenny’s early life. Be ready for some very sad moments, including scenes of domestic violence toward children. I just adore this character and this book and will be thinking of Lenny for years (once I finish crying). Mayne’s captivating work might bring you back to an old Oprah’s Book Club favorite, Wally Lamb’s She’s Come Undone.

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Review

Two Dead Wives

by Henrietta Thornton

This sequel to Woman Last Seen (2022) publishes the day after Christmas, but it’s far from your traditional holiday read. It does, however, provide more than ample entertainment for days off and/or fuel for thinking away interminable events. The main thought provoker is: how does a woman manage to be married with kids in one family while also married to someone else? How are the two husbands and the kids supposed to feel now that Kylie, also known as Kai and Leigh, the bigamist whom they thought they hated, has gone missing? And what’s the second husband to do, accused as he is of Leigh’s murder, when he knows he didn’t do it and nobody even knows if she’s actually dead? Leave this one up to the kids, who are sick of the media firestorm around them, not to mention tired of their mother’s best friend who has moved in just a little too quickly and whom they know visits Dad’s room at night. Philosophical questions quickly give way to a thrilling investigation and final pages that will keep readers on edge and rooting for justice.

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