Virginia was adopted as a young girl by a quiet couple and goes to live with them in a remote manor house on the outskirts of a huge marsh. It is a solitary upbringing since the only neighbors were the well-off Deering family and both her parents weren't too keen on Mr. Deering and his loud demanding ways. Virginia just didn't like nor trust him. When a German plane crashes in the marsh, Virginia's dad goes to save him never to return. In his place, a secretly forbidden visitor joins Virginia and her mother at Salt Winds. This creates as many problems as it does joy. Told in alternating time periods by Virginia, this classic Gothic tale is as dark and mysterious as the landscape of the marsh.
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A college town is suddenly in the middle of a plague which literally makes people lay down wherever they are and go to sleep. Ground zero looks to be one of the college dorms but soon the whole town is affected and infected. Students, families, faculty, the elderly and the young - all will be touched and their lives affected. This is a subtle coming-of-age, horror, love story with a moral message about the haves and have-nots. The characters are meaningful and normal enough that we identify with them but their situation is so horrific you can't help but ask yourself what you would do in their place. Who would you save and what lengths you would go to keep your family safe. COMA meets THE ROAD, this is one thriller you should not miss but you will miss sleep.
Some people are just not meant to be together so they get a divorce but then there is the kind that just can't let go either. A wife sees her husband with another woman and enraged, confronts them only to have the husband wandering around with a gunshot wound, his wife dead and their house burnt to the ground. Fast forward to the husband years later- and tragedy strikes again. Bad luck or a bad guy?
This thriller moves with breakneck speed and you really never get a solid footing for who the bad guy is. This is not the run of the mill bad relationship story - toxic and intense! One thing is for sure- divorce has got to be easier than this. Darby is on her way home from college when she is caught unaware by a snowstorm and is stuck at a rest stop with half a wiper, no cell reception and no hope for a snowplow or leaving until morning. If this wasn't bad enough she peers inside a van and sees a little girl in a cage. There are four others in the rest stop with her at least one is a kidnapper and may know that she knows it. Heart pounding excitement and edge of your seat thrills that don't let up until the last page. How can one small unassuming college girl stand up to a ruthless kidnapper in the middle of nowhere armed with a pocket knife and her wits? Plan on staying up late to finish this one. Doing the right thing has never been this hard or dangerous but you will cheer Darby on.
The third installment of the Winternight Trilogy is just as powerful as the first. Vasya has grown from the timid little girl who takes care of the old mythical beings, talks to horses and fall in love with the magic of the forest to a formidable warrior woman and witch.
She has taken on the task of unifying Russia and trying to have a world where the old faith and new religion can coexist. First, she must help save Moscow, her family and make her way back to her beloved Winter King who will risk all to save her. The twin spirits of the Winter King and the Bear are magical and yet act as men and Katherine Arden has a gift of getting her readers to not only care about the warring humans but also the mythical spirits of old and creatures from fairy tales. This is one of the finest blends of fairy tale and history out there and will appeal to any reader from fantasy lover to the Russian classics. I hate to see this series end - magical as the first snow and memorable as a first kiss. The world is a bad place where you must be strong to survive, fear strangers and only trust your family - this is what sisters Grace, Lia and Sky have been told their whole life. There is only danger, disease, and death outside the family island compound so they must never let anyone (especially men) in and never leave. When their dad goes away on a supply trip and doesn't return the girls and their mother are even more vigilant in their efforts to be pure and away from the toxic world outside. The arrival of two stranded men and a boy will turn their secluded world upside down. This dystopic, survivalist world where one man attempts to have total control over his family and the strict secluded way the girls are brought up echoes the themes in HANDMAID'S TALE and VOX. These three young women are starved for affection and love but taught to fear men - it is not difficult to see how at odds this will make them and the possibilities for disaster are endless. This will be a great choice for book clubs - the discussion material is as endless as the sea that makes up their world.
Hugo Marston works in security for the U.S. Ambassador to France is seriously dating a French woman, he thinks and is once again embroiled in a murder mystery in which his girlfriend may be implicated. While we follow Hugo as he sidesteps the French Inspector who doesn't want his help, hunts down the possible suspects to get his girlfriend off the hook and attends a variety of official events, we marvel at how he never loses his cool, breaks a sweat or steps in mud - he may just be the Texas version of James Bond. Always entertaining and a love letter to Paris, this series remains strong.
Hedy Kiesler, better known as Hedy Lamarr, was an intelligent, inventive thinker whose ideas went largely unnoticed because her exotic beauty and screen talent overshadowed her private life. At a young age in Austria, she married a controlling arms merchant and crossed paths socially with European royalty, Mussolini, and lastly with Nazi officials. Unaware that there was a brain inside her beautiful head, she was able to listen in and gain insight and information that could aid in taking down the Nazi regime. Escaping that disastrous marriage, Hedy fled to Hollywood where once again her life was controlled by powerful men. Behind the scene, she used all the information she had overheard years before and worked to solve a scientific dilemma of how to control torpedos. Once again, her hard work was rewarded by men who only saw the beauty, not the brains. Once again, Marie Benedict shows us the life of a strong woman who left center stage to others to take the bows. A brilliant mind that was disregarded because of her beauty and sex. This is historical fiction at its very best - book clubs will jump at this captivating look at the woman behind the woman we knew as Hedy Lamarr.
There is something about Swedish authors and their storytelling that I love. They make you cry, laugh and get angry by doing one simple thing - sharing a life. 96-year-old Doris is at the end virtually alone and in pain, she lives for the weekly Skype conversations with her great niece in the states. In the meantime, she goes through the red address book that she has had since she was a girl and writes down all about how the people in it are connected to her. It is an incredible account of a full life - one of good luck and bad, love and love lost and more adventures than Doris could have ever thought possible. Gut-wrenching and achingly beautiful, her story is at last shared. This is a multiple tissue box book that is a joy to read. Doris is everyone's version of the perfect Grandma. As soon as you put the book down you will want to reach out to an elderly relative or friend and ask them to write down their story. You may just have a Doris of your own.
Martin is an almost washed up journalist who is dealing with PTSD and is sent to write about a really remote town in the Australian drought-ridden outback that has experienced a brutal multiple murder by a priest. The imagery of this area is so barren, dusty and miserable that it is hard to imagine anyone wanting to live there - they are banged-up mentally and physically. Martin is just as banged-up and takes to the town especially the young bookstore owner. As he probes for answers about the murderous priest there is more violence. He is both a hero and a villain, taking turns to rat someone out and rescue someone else in the same breath. The drawback is that Martin is no "Jack Reacher" and this town is an unpredictable environment to conduct a sensitive murder investigation. The upshot is that he can't fix the town until he fixes himself. There is so much action, violence, and subplots that it is easy for the reader to get bogged down. Every horrible thing that you can think of from gun-slinging priests to rape, kidnapping, motorcycle gangs, paternity suits, false identities, and post-war trauma - this book has it all.
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