A Series Of (Un)Fortunate Reviews

The Winter People is the newest release from Jennifer McMahon.  I think I've read one of her previous novels, but it wasn't reviewed here on the blog, and I don't remember which one it was.  This is one of those books of spooky strangeness in which you're not really sure what is happening in some parts of the book because the narrator isn't really sure what is happening.  I'll admit that things sure looked like they were going one way when instead they ended up a different way that was far worse.  Basically cold blooded vengeance visited upon a family by a person who helped raise the family's children pretty much spawned the events that happened in the present.  It was sad because the person took it out on the children--children who had no control over what the adults in the situation were doing. Strange things happen in tiny West Hall, Vermont.  People die strange, gruesome deaths.  People vanish into thin air.  Livestock is murdered.  ...

I finished this book earlier this week.  It's the fourth book by Patti Callahan Henry that I've read.  If you click here , here , and here , you can read the three previous novels that were reviewed on the blog.  I've now exhausted the Henry books available in the local library system.  I may request some of her others from outside the county, but I have a pile of books at home to read (or not read as the case may be) before I do that.  The novel has similar themes to the later novel, Coming Up For Air : relationships, mistaking controlling tendencies for love, keeping secrets from those we love, etc.  There were some parts of this novel that were hard for me to read because I was worried that things would go to hell in a hand-basket before they got better, but they didn't, and I was glad for that. Annabelle has spent the last two years mourning the death of her husband, Knox, a pilot whose plane went down in flames in the isolated wilderness of Col...

So in the last review I had lots of opinions, mostly because I think that book really chapped my ass.  I also have opinions regarding this book, specifically about the two younger sisters who spend about half the book being insufferable, self-centered wenches.  (That's right.   I said it. )   Driftwood Summer is the third book by Patti Callahan Henry that I've read and reviewed on the blog.  You can read the other reviews here and here .  I've become a fan of her books.  This one has family drama--specifically prickly, resentful sisterly relationship drama. Riley's mother takes a tumble down the staircase of the family home and breaks several bones in the process.  As a result Riley's sisters, Maisie and Adalee, must come home to assist with their mother's convalescence as well as the huge, week long bicentennial celebration of the cottage that houses the family owned bookstore.  There's much more riding on this celebration than the fam...

I told you I've been reading.  I had about three reviews backlogged and waiting to be typed up and posted of which this review of The Siege by Stephen White is the second.  I don't normally read books like this... and by books like this, I mean, high stakes thrillers that feel generic.  I put this book in the same category as the conspiracy theory/intrigue/black ops/historical-discovery-of-global-importance-that-will-shatter-all-our-notions-of-history/religion/life-as-we-know-it thrillers that star spies or other former elite special forces operators.  Not that there's anything wrong with those books, they just usually aren't my bag of tea when it comes to reading, and so I tend to shy away from them.  So why I read this one, I don't know except that it's been on my reading list forever, and I thought there must be some reason why I put it there, so why don't I give it a shot because I'm sure it'll be a quick read.  Well.  I read the first 100 pag...

I'm back AND I've been reading!   The Secret Rooms by Catherine Bailey is the latest non-fiction book I've read from start to finish which is something that should be applauded for me.  Non-fiction and I don't always get along.  I'd initially read a review of this book some place, and I thought, hmmm, that sounds interesting.  I added it to my reading list (yes, I have a reading list... it is very long), and recently one of the libraries acquired a copy, so when I saw it pop up on the New Titles list, I requested it.  And I am so glad I did because this book has so much: intrigue, secrets, mystery, cyphers, and more mystery thanks to three deliberately created gaps in the ducal family's extensive historical archive.  But what does it all mean?  And what are the secrets this family is hiding?  And why are they hiding them?  Let me tell you, readers, the lengths this dude went to cover up his secrets...  while he was largely successful ...