My husband, Earl Carstens, and I spent most of May in Italy. Congratulations to our daughter, Mimi Carstens, who graduated with her master’s degree from John Cabot University in Rome. As well as celebrating graduation, we traveled around Italy with her. I loaded up my Kindle in preparation for time on airplanes and trains, and I’ll share some of those titles in this column.
First, let me warn you - wherever you are - not to read the end of Jeneva Rose’s “You Shouldn’t Have Come Here” at bedtime. To be fair, the story had been plodding along. It seemed safe enough to finish up the book and start new in the morning. How was I supposed to know it was suddenly going to do a 180 and go tearing off in directions I could not have anticipated? If you like a surprise ending, this is the book for you! Just don’t read the ending at bedtime, especially if you’re sleeping in an unfamiliar place like an Airbnb.
I know I reviewed Tana French’s “The Searcher” in 2021, but I reread it because her follow-up novel, “The Hunter,” was published in March. As I said then, if you like a good police procedural, you need to read Tana French’s books. Her “Dublin Murder Squad” series is fabulous, as are her newer Cal Hooper books. In “The Searcher,” Cal is a retired Chicago police officer who has moved to the Irish countryside for some rest and relaxation. However, once a cop, always a cop. Before he knows it, he is searching for a young man who has gone missing. He quickly learns that his sleepy new home may not be as peaceful as he believed, and there are warnings under all that blarney. Over the next two years, Cal has settled in to his new home and understands it better when someone comes along to disrupt the equilibrium of the entire town. In “The Hunter,” police from Dublin come into the small town of Ardnakelty to solve a murder. Will the town point them toward Cal as a suspect? Cal knows that it’s possible, but he also knows that is the least of what’s going on around him.
I almost stopped reading Jesmyn Ward’s “Salvage the Bones” several times. It’s the story of a poor Mississippi Gulf Coast family with few resources. Through bad luck or poor choices, the scant resources they do have are eroded, until Hurricane Katrina makes landfall and wipes everything away. (Just a quick reminder - Hurricane Katrina did not hit New Orleans; it hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The weather system that Katrina was part of lingered over the area, bringing torrential rain and devastating flooding to New Orleans. As bad as New Orleans was affected, people often forget that Mississippi actually received Hurricane Katrina’s full Category 5 force.) While I may not have agreed with every choice the Batiste family made, I do believe they were good people, and I would have welcomed them getting a “win,” even a small one. I realize that Ward’s version is nearer the truth of surviving in poverty in 2005, and even in 2024, where there are not always happy endings.
The ending of “First Lie Wins” by Ashley Elston was happy. I guess. None of the main characters were dead. As far as we know. And, none of them were in jail. It seems as though some may have been getting their love-lives on track. It’s definitely a case of “no honor among thieves,” and it will have you unwilling to trust anything any character says. This was a Reese’s (Witherspoon) Book Club title, so you know it was driven by a strong female character. I can 100 percent see this adapted for TV. As I was reading it, I decided I could never be a con-artist. There really is an art to it, and it takes a lot of work. In the end, my biggest question was, “Did the lawyer ever get paid?” Surely!
Ciao!
First, let me warn you - wherever you are - not to read the end of Jeneva Rose’s “You Shouldn’t Have Come Here” at bedtime. To be fair, the story had been plodding along. It seemed safe enough to finish up the book and start new in the morning. How was I supposed to know it was suddenly going to do a 180 and go tearing off in directions I could not have anticipated? If you like a surprise ending, this is the book for you! Just don’t read the ending at bedtime, especially if you’re sleeping in an unfamiliar place like an Airbnb.
I know I reviewed Tana French’s “The Searcher” in 2021, but I reread it because her follow-up novel, “The Hunter,” was published in March. As I said then, if you like a good police procedural, you need to read Tana French’s books. Her “Dublin Murder Squad” series is fabulous, as are her newer Cal Hooper books. In “The Searcher,” Cal is a retired Chicago police officer who has moved to the Irish countryside for some rest and relaxation. However, once a cop, always a cop. Before he knows it, he is searching for a young man who has gone missing. He quickly learns that his sleepy new home may not be as peaceful as he believed, and there are warnings under all that blarney. Over the next two years, Cal has settled in to his new home and understands it better when someone comes along to disrupt the equilibrium of the entire town. In “The Hunter,” police from Dublin come into the small town of Ardnakelty to solve a murder. Will the town point them toward Cal as a suspect? Cal knows that it’s possible, but he also knows that is the least of what’s going on around him.
I almost stopped reading Jesmyn Ward’s “Salvage the Bones” several times. It’s the story of a poor Mississippi Gulf Coast family with few resources. Through bad luck or poor choices, the scant resources they do have are eroded, until Hurricane Katrina makes landfall and wipes everything away. (Just a quick reminder - Hurricane Katrina did not hit New Orleans; it hit the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The weather system that Katrina was part of lingered over the area, bringing torrential rain and devastating flooding to New Orleans. As bad as New Orleans was affected, people often forget that Mississippi actually received Hurricane Katrina’s full Category 5 force.) While I may not have agreed with every choice the Batiste family made, I do believe they were good people, and I would have welcomed them getting a “win,” even a small one. I realize that Ward’s version is nearer the truth of surviving in poverty in 2005, and even in 2024, where there are not always happy endings.
The ending of “First Lie Wins” by Ashley Elston was happy. I guess. None of the main characters were dead. As far as we know. And, none of them were in jail. It seems as though some may have been getting their love-lives on track. It’s definitely a case of “no honor among thieves,” and it will have you unwilling to trust anything any character says. This was a Reese’s (Witherspoon) Book Club title, so you know it was driven by a strong female character. I can 100 percent see this adapted for TV. As I was reading it, I decided I could never be a con-artist. There really is an art to it, and it takes a lot of work. In the end, my biggest question was, “Did the lawyer ever get paid?” Surely!
Ciao!