Books Read in July 2025

 

Another month where every book was a very good read. I finished seven books in July. Two were short story books; that is unusual. Four were crime fiction, including one espionage thriller. And one science fiction story in a military setting. At the end of July I had only read 12 books for my 20 Books of Summer list. It is now mid-August (unbelievable!) and I have only read two more. So I don't think I will finish all 20 books for the challenge. We'll see.

Fiction

Five Tuesdays in Winter (2021) by Lily King

I started this book of short stories in December 2024. I read the first four stories and I liked them all; you can check out my thoughts on those stories here. In July, I read the remaining six stories in the book. Many of those stories are slice-of-life stories. I especially liked the characterizations; the stories were serious but ended on an upbeat note. Check here for my thoughts on the last six stories.

Olive, Again (2019) by Elizabeth Strout

Olive, Again is the follow-up book to Olive Kitteridge.  It is a very good book but not an easy read. Olive is in her seventies in this book. She is widowed and has a tenuous, troubled relationship with her son and his family. This is described as a novel composed of interrelated short stories. Only seven of the thirteen stories are directly about Olive and her life in Crosby, Maine. The other stories take place in the same area or nearby but Olive is not the main focus. See my thoughts here.

Science Fiction

Ninefox Gambit (2016) by Yoon Ha Lee

Ninefox Gambit is a military science fiction/science fantasy/space opera novel. I did not know a lot about the book going in, although I assumed it was a space opera because of the cover illustration. The world building was very complex and confusing for me, but the writing was very good and pulled me into the story. I loved the ending. See my thoughts here.

Crime Fiction

At Bertram's Hotel (1965) by Agatha Christie

This is a Miss Marple mystery with a huge cast; the plot can be confusing, but it is an entertaining story set at a lovely hotel. Chief Inspector Fred Davy is a Scotland Yard detective who does most of the detecting. See my thoughts here.

The Amateur (1981) by Robert Littell

Charlie Heller is a cryptographer for the CIA. When his fiancée, Sarah Diamond, is murdered by terrorists at the American Embassy in West Germany, the CIA decides not to pursue her killers. Heller is determined to find them and kill them himself. So this is a revenge thriller. Heller has none of the necessary skills, but he forces the CIA to train him. Nothing in this book is predictable; the story was compelling and I enjoyed it very much.

The novel has an interesting history; the story was first written by Littell as a screenplay, and was made into a Canadian film released in 1981. Shortly after that, the novel was written based on the screenplay. Recently another film adaptation was released starring Ramie Malek.

The Murder of Mr. Ma (2024) by John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan

Reading this book was a no-brainer for me. I will try anything written by S.J. Rozan. I was a bit uncertain about a book that she co-authored but still, it seemed like a safe bet. 

The two protagonists of the book are fictionalized versions of Judge Dee Ren Zie and Lao She, a Chinese academic and author. I have never read any of Robert van Gulik's Judge Dee mysteries, but my husband has. The story focuses on their investigation into the deaths of Chinese immigrants in 1924 London.

I was very happy with this book. It felt like an adventure story as much as a mystery, and was a lot of fun to read. John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan have come together in a great writing partnership and you can read about that at CrimeReads and Mystery Fanfare. The second book in the series is already out and I will be reading it.

A Death in Tokyo (2011) by Keigo Higashino, translated by Giles Murray

This is the third book in the Tokyo Police Detective Kaga series to be translated to English from Japanese. I have read the two previous books that are available in English, and they all work well as standalones. Detective Kaga is not part of the homicide division, but he often works with the homicide detectives when the case in in his district. He works in an intuitive way, and follows up painstakingly on every detail. In this case a prominent business man has been murdered; he is found at the base of a statue on a bridge, but that is not where the murder took place. His wife and two teenage children don't know why he was in that area of town. It is a very complex case, and has an interesting and complex resolution. 

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken by my husband at the garden center during our last visit. We enjoy both buying plants and supplies and viewing the variety of plants and pots and decorations on display. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

At Bertram's Hotel: Agatha Christie

 

Description at Goodreads:

Miss Jane Marple has checked into Bertram's Hotel in London for a much-needed vacation. The last thing she expects is that this elegant establishment, known for its service and old-world charm, could be embroiled in scandal. But after a series of strange events—including the disappearance of a fellow guest, the arrival of a notorious celebrity bad boy, and finally, a shocking murder—she finds herself drawn into a multifaceted mystery.

This portion of the description at Goodreads is an accurate description, but later there is an implication that Miss Marple gets involved in the investigation, which is not accurate. Miss Marple observes useful pieces of information, and along the way she does reveal her thoughts to the reader on many of the events. The real investigator in this mystery is Chief Inspector Fred Davy, who has noted the connection of many of the guests at the hotel to various crimes in the area, and the story works more as a police procedural than is usual in a Miss Marple novel. All of that worked very well for me and I had no complaint. Fred Davy was a great character.

There are a lot of coincidences in this story; for example, Miss Marple runs into various guests at the hotel in the city of London who seem to be in questionable relationships. 

At Bertram's Hotel is a later book in the Miss Marple series and it didn't measure up to other books in that series for me. However, it was a fun read, with some humor.  I like books set in hotels and Bertram's Hotel was lovely. There were several interesting characters, so overall I liked it and I plan to finish the series. 

Short Story Wednesday: Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout

Olive, Again by Elizabeth Strout is the follow-up book to Olive Kitteridge.  It is a very good book but not an easy read. Olive is in her seventies in this book. She is widowed and has a tenuous, troubled relationship with her son and his family.

This is described as a novel composed of interrelated short stories. I would quibble about considering this a novel, since only  seven of the thirteen stories are directly about Olive and her life in Crosby, Maine. The other stories take place in the same area or nearby but Olive is not the main focus. I am going to briefly summarize some of the stories, but there are several of them I don't want to discuss because it could impact the reading experience.

The first story, "Arrested," focuses on Jack Kennison, a man near Olive's age that she met near the end of the previous book. He is a widower and has been estranged from his daughter for many years because she is a lesbian. He drives to Portland, and on the way back to Crosby, he is stopped by the police for speeding.

In "Labor," Olive attends a baby shower and ends up delivering a baby when one of the pregnant guests goes into labor. Two days later, she calls Jack Kennison and they meet again after she had been avoiding him for a while.

"Cleaning," the third story, focuses on a 14-year-old girl who makes money cleaning houses. This is a complicated story. Kayley regularly visits an older woman at a nursing home. The only connection to Olive in this story is that Olive also visits a friend at the nursing home and she has a supportive conversation with Kayley, who is the younger sister of some of Olive's students when she was teaching. 

Next is "Motherless Child," and it is an important story. Olive is the focus; she has invited her son Christopher and his wife and four children to visit her in Crosby. She has not seen them in several years, and she is not prepared to host four young children, but they all muddle through. In this story and others in the book, Olive realizes that over the years, she failed both her son, Christopher, and her first husband, Henry, in many ways. Patricia Abbott reviewed this story at her blog.

In "Helped," the main character is Suzanne Larkin, who returns to Crosby to handle business details when her father dies in a fire in his home. An excellent and moving story. Olive shows up in this story only peripherally.

Cindy Coombs, a former student of Olive's, is the center of the sixth story, "Light." She has cancer and Olive takes the time to help her out at the grocery store when she has problems, and later visits her at home.

"Exiles" is a story about Jim and Bob Burgess; Jim lives in New York and he and his wife visit Bob and Margaret, who live in Crosby, Maine. I enjoyed this one a lot, but it does have what I consider a major spoiler for Strout's book The Burgess Boys.

Although I have liked all of the books I have read by Elizabeth Strout, I found Olive Kitteridge to be the most challenging. All of the stories in that book were depressing, and I could not read more than one story a day. Olive, Again was different. I was prepared for the tone of the stories and the issues addressed showed the changes in Olive. Although many of the stories were very serious and sometime sad, I enjoyed the read much more. 

Ninefox Gambit: Yoon Ha Lee

Ninefox Gambit by Yoon Ha Lee is the first book in the Machineries of Empire trilogy. This is the summary of the book at the author's website:

Kel Cheris, a disgraced captain of the hexarchate, is given the opportunity to redeem herself by recapturing the formidable Fortress of Scattered Needles from heretics. Cheris requests—and receives—a single devastating weapon to aid her in her task: the revived, near-immortal traitor, General Shuos Jedao. Feared throughout the stars and undefeated in battle, he is the perfect weapon. But Jedao is gripped by a madness that saw him massacre two armies in his first life—one of them his own. Preserved for his brilliance and tamed by his handlers, no one knows how long his good behaviour will last. Cheris must work with the mass murderer to destroy the heresy and save the hexarchate—before he destroys her…

A tale of math, madness, and massacres in outer space.

My Thoughts:

This is a science fiction book and specifically a military space opera. In many ways, it feels as much like fantasy as science fiction. Here the reader is dropped into a universe where the scientific laws that govern the universe are based on a "calendrical" mathematics system that seems more like magic. There are groups of heretics who refuse to follow the accepted mathematics systems. However, there is no attempt to explain all of this to the reader. For at least the first third of this book I had no idea what was going on.

On top of that, there were no characters that I cared about or could invest in. 

At the point that I was about to give up on the book, I read a review that called this book "brain-breaking" but also said to just hang in there and it would be worth it. That reviewer was right and it was worth reading. I finally caught onto the general idea of what was going on, and was hoping that the author was going to give me a satisfactory ending. And I did get it. I was invested in the two main characters; the ending was amazing. That is good, because I already have a copy of the second book in this series, Raven Strategy. 

So, if you like science fiction, you might want to try this series, or at least read a few reviews of the book to get other opinions.

Additional notes:

I have read military science fiction before; John Scalzi's Old Man's War series is an example. But those stories are remarkably easy to read compared to this one. 

Apparently there are a lot of science fiction books / series that start out like this series, throwing the reader into an imaginary setting with little explanation. Readers are divided on whether they like that or not. And now I can think of mystery novels (with sort of a science fiction or fantasy flavor) that are this way too. For example, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton.

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Publisher:   Solaris Books, 2016
Length:      384 pages
Format:      Trade paperback
Series:       Machineries of Empire, #1
Setting:      Outer Space
Genre:       Science Fiction 
Source:      On my TBR since 2020.

Books Read in June 2025

 

I read six books in June, and all of them were from my 20 Books of Summer list. I liked all the books; four of them were upbeat and fun; two of them were more serious and somewhat depressing.

Fiction 

Table for Two (2024) by Amor Towles

This is a short story collection. There are six stories plus one 220 page novella. The short stories are all set in New York City. See my post on some of the short stories here.

In the novella, "Eve in Hollywood," Towles returns to a character in his first novel, Rules of Civility. I did read that book, but I don't think you need to have read it to enjoy the story. "Eve in Hollywood" is set in the Golden Age of Hollywood, and it features Olivia de Havilland as a character. I enjoyed the novella very much.

The Burgess Boys (2013) by Elizabeth Strout

I have read four books by Elizabeth Strout, and I have rated all very highly, but they are always difficult reads, with hard to like characters and family difficulties. This one is my favorite so far. My review here.

Fantasy / Time Travel

Oona Out of Order (2020) by Margarita Montidore

I read this book because I like time travel books and this one was on a list of "time loop" novels (the film Groundhog Day is a good example of a time loop). In this book, Oona jumps from one year to another year in her life, randomly. I liked it. I have been thinking about it off and on since I read it. But it can be frustrating. My review here.

Crime Fiction

Death by Accident (1998) by Bill Crider

This book was my first read for 20 Books of Summer. The Sheriff Dan Rhodes series by Bill Crider is set in a small town in Blacklin County, a fictional county in Texas. It is a cozy series; Sheriff Rhodes solves crime mostly with his intuition and avoids computers where possible. Death by Accident is the 9th book in the series. See my review.

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone (2022) by Benjamin Stevenson

This story takes place at a remote ski resort in Australia, where Ern Cunningham's family is having a family reunion. They are coming together because Ern's brother is getting out of prison, after having killed a man. Family relationships are strained. Shortly after the majority of the family arrives, a man's frozen body is found near the resort,  and the weather begins to get very bad, threatening to snow in all the guests.

This is a very unusual mystery. Ern Cunningham, who is narrating the story, writes books about how to write mysteries. The books starts with a list of classic rules for mysteries as published by Ronald Knox in 1929. So it is a traditional fair play mystery, but of course there is lots of misdirection in the clues, and for the most part the author kept me fooled for most of the book. I enjoyed the book, although I sometimes got frustrated with the repetition of the "rules." I liked it enough so that I will read the next one to see how it goes.

A Death in Summer (2011) by Benjamin Black

This is the fourth book in the Quirke series written by John Banville, under the name Benjamin Black. Quirke is a pathologist in Dublin, Ireland in the 1950s. He often is called in to examine dead bodies before they are moved, and to perform autopsies. Inspector Hackett will sometimes seek his advice on crimes, when he thinks the case is tricky. I like the slow pace of the writing and the emphasis on the characters as much or more than the crime investigation. I like the continuing characters. This one was about a sordid subject, and depressing. Yet I will persist and read more of them. 

The photos at the top and bottom of this post are recent pictures of plants in our back yard patio area. The top photo is of a cuphea plant (on the left) and a blue sage plant that are hummingbird attractors. They have been doing a good job of attracting hummingbirds and bees.

The two photos below are closer shots of blue sage plants. We have two other pots of those plants in the back. I love the little buds on the blue sage. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

Oona Out of Order: Margarita Montimore

This story starts on New Year's Eve 1982; at the stroke of midnight, Oona will turn 19. She expects to be making a decision about whether to go to school in London the next year or stay in Brooklyn and tour for a year with the band she and her boyfriend are in. But when midnight comes, Oona is jerked out of her current situation. She awakens in a lovely house, in her 51st year. She is appalled to see how old she is, and that she is overweight. 

Oona is living one year of her life at a time, but out of order (hence the title). She has awakened in 2015. Fortunately, there is a man waiting there for her to explain the situation, and she is living in a gorgeous home. The man is Kenzie and he introduces himself as her personal assistant and friend. She freaks out and he does his best to calm her down. 

After that, every year at midnight on New Year's Eve, the same thing happens; Oona either jumps ahead to a future year or goes back to an earlier year that she has not experienced before.  It makes poor Oona very cranky to be jerked off to a different year in her life every New Year's Eve.

This is a time travel book, but there is no explanation of why this phenomenon is happening to her, thus it is more fantasy than science fiction. I enjoyed this a lot while I was reading it; I gave it five stars, and I still think it deserves that rating, but I am pretty generous with my ratings. So as far as entertainment value goes, it did very well. 

Family is a recurring theme in this book. Of course, I loved that part of it. Most of the time I liked Oona's mother Madeleine and Kenzie better than I liked the lead character. Oona is often bratty and immature. She may look older at times but she hasn't had that many years of actual living to mature. 

I was frustrated that not that many years in Oona's life are covered. In a way, each year was approached as if it was a short story and you are getting a glimpse of her life. But because she has no memory of any year that she leaves behind... the reader sometimes knows more that she does. 

In summary, I liked the premise of this book and it was fun and the writing was well done. As with many time travel books, I was confused at times. It was 340 pages long and it was the rare book that I wish was much longer.

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Publisher:  Flatiron Books, 2020.
Length:      336 pages
Format:     Trade Paper
Setting:      New York City
Genre:       Fantasy / Time Travel
Source:     I purchased my copy in 2024.

The Burgess Boys: Elizabeth Strout

In a short prologue, the Burgess family is introduced, focusing mainly on the two boys, Jim and Bob. They both have legal careers and left their home town of Shirley Falls, Maine, to pursue their careers. Bob has always been the lesser brother, the one who plods along but did not succeed spectacularly like his older brother. But he also is the one who every one likes, who is nice and kind and thinks well of people.

Then an incident happens in Shirley Falls, Maine, where Susan, their sister, still lives. Susan's nineteen-year-old son, Zach, commits a crime and the Burgess boys feel like they have to go back to their home town to help her. Jim is going on a vacation with his wife and another couple and he drafts Bob to go and help. But Bob doesn't handle the situation very well and Jim is bent out of shape.

I like books about families and this is a very unusual family. There is a tragedy in their past which has affected all of the relationships in the family. The children's father was killed when they were all under ten years of age; although he was only four years old at the time, Bob was blamed for his father's death and it has affected his self-image, to put it mildly. The dynamics within the family are strange. Jim, the older brother, is needlessly cruel to his brother, taunting him mercilessly. Most of the time this just rolls off of Bob. Susan is Bob's twin, but she is also often disparaging of Bob and his abilities. 

The rest of the story is about how Zack's problems are handled, and the effects these events have on all of their lives.

My thoughts:

• I liked how parts of the story are told from the point of view of characters outside the main family:  Abdikarim Ahmed, a member of the Somali community in Shirley Falls, who testifies against Zack at his hearing; Bob's ex-wife, Pam, who left him because they could not have children;  and Helen Burgess, Jim's wife, who is having problems with an empty nest after her children leave home.
• The majority of the characters in this book are unlikable, but I continued to be interested in reading about all of them. This was partly due to the author's writing style, but also because I was sure that I was going to learn more about them and be able to figure out why they were so disagreeable or unappealing. 
• Coincidentally, the two fiction books I read prior to this one were kind of downers, and this one continued that trend. Unexpectedly, this book probably had a more optimistic outcome towards the end than those books. And certainly this one was more upbeat than the other books by Strout I have read (Olive Kitteridge, My Name is Lucy Barton, and Anything is Possible). 
• This was a compelling read but not an easy read. My description above leaves so much out. That is intentional, so as not to spoil the reading experience. The novel is very rich with important themes and topics.

John Grant wrote a very detailed review of this book in 2019, which can be read either at his blog, Noirish, or on Goodreads.

Death by Accident: Bill Crider

The Sheriff Dan Rhodes series by Bill Crider is set in a small town in Blacklin County, a fictional county in Texas. It is a cozy series; Sheriff Rhodes solves crime mostly with his intuition and avoids computers where possible. He and his second wife are in their fifties. He loves Dr. Pepper in glass bottles and junk food for lunch, which his wife disapproves of. Death by Accident was published in 1998.

Two men die mysteriously in or near Clearview, Texas – one explodes, and the other is found drowned in a swimming pool. Sheriff Dan Rhodes cannot prove that those occurrences are not accidents, but he can feel it in his bones. He quietly investigates this theory, talking to people who knew those who died. Not long after these deaths, a third man is killed in a hit and run. A hit and run is a crime, but the death could have been an accident. Nevertheless, three unexplained deaths in such a short time convinces Rhodes that he is on the right track.

Often these books have a subplot going on. In Death by Accident, there are issues related to the competition between two historical societies in Clearview – the Clearview Sons and Daughters of Texas and the Clearview Historical Society. The Sons and Daughters group maintains the site where the swimming pool-related death took place. The other group wants to physically remove a historic building from that site. Sheriff Rhodes doesn't really think that anyone in those two groups is plotting murder, but there is a lot of mayhem and subterfuge going on. Because Rhodes has only a small staff, all of this keeps him busy. Along the way in this story Rhodes adds a new dog to the family and acquires an Edsel that needs to be refurbished.

I only have 16 books to go to finish this series. The last book in the series was published in 2019, so I imagine that Rhodes has to start using computers sometime along the way. We'll see. But I continue to enjoy police procedurals and other mysteries that were written at a time when technology was not so prevalent. And Dan Rhodes is one of my favorite fictional sheriffs.

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Publisher:   St. Martin's Press, 1998
Length:      277 pages
Format:      Hardcover
Series:       Sheriff Dan Rhodes, #9
Setting:      Texas
Genre:        Police Procedural
Source:      I purchased my copy.

Dust jacket painting by Alan Dingman.

A Summer Challenge: 20 Books of Summer 2025

It's almost time for 20 Books of Summer. This is my tenth year of participating in this reading challenge. The event was previously hosted by Cathy at 746 Books. When she decided to stop hosting last year, Annabel from AnnaBookbel and Emma from Words and Peace took up the mantle.

The challenge is very flexible. You don't have to aim for 20 book but can also opt for 15 or 10. Here are some of the rules...

• The #20BooksofSummer2025 challenge runs from Sunday June 1st to Sunday August 31st
• The first rule of 20 Books is that there are no real rules, other than signing up for 10, 15 or 20 books and trying to read from your TBR.
• Pick your list in advance, or nominate a bookcase to read from, or pick at whim from your TBR.

For more information and the place to sign up, check out this post at AnnaBookBel. There is also a book bingo card, which is new.

I love to make lists of books to read, so I would start with a list whether I plan to stick with it or not. However, I do plan to stick with my list, and here it is...

At Bertram's Hotel | Agatha Christie   (mystery)

The '44 Vintage | Anthony Price   (spy fiction)

State of Wonder | Ann Patchett    (fiction)

Before Your Memory Fades | Toshikazu Kawaguchi   (fantasy / time travel)

The Burgess Boys | Elizabeth Strout   (fiction)

Olive Again | Elizabeth Strout   (fiction)

Table for Two | Amor Towles    (short stories)

The Murder of Mr. Ma | John Shen Yen Nee and S.J. Rozan   (mystery)

A Death in Tokyo | Keigo Higashino   (mystery)

A Death in Summer | Benjamin Black   (mystery)

Death by Accident | Bill Crider   (mystery) 

The Amateur | Robert Littell   (spy fiction)

The Killing of the Tinkers | Ken Bruen    (mystery)

Mrs. Dalloway | Virginia Woolf    (classic, fiction)

Oona Out of Order | Margarita Montimore   (time-loop fiction)

Pesticide | Kim Hayes   (mystery)

The Day the World Came to Town | Jim DeFede (nonfiction)

Perplexing Plots | David Bordwell   (nonfiction)

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone | Benjamin Stevenson   (mystery)

Ninefox Gambit | Yoon Ha Lee   (science fiction)

Birdcage: Victor Canning

Birdcage is about the machinations of a British intelligence agency, referred to as "Birdcage" because its offices are in Birdcage Walk in London. There is very little oversight of this covert security group and the agents are generally amoral, although they believe that their mission is important to the welfare of the country. In reality, the higher ups are just trying to protect the government in question which they serve blindly.

This story is set in Portugal, Gloucester, and London. A young nun leaves her Portuguese monastery, feeling that she has betrayed her vows. She attempts to drown herself in the sea but by some miracle is rescued at the last minute. The man who rescues her is a regular guy, easygoing and not ambitious. 

We soon find out that the nun's real name is Sarah Branton, daughter of Lady Jean Branton, a former agent for the Birdcage group. Lady Jean is dead, but the Birdcage agents are keeping an eye on Sarah to make sure that she doesn't have damaging information about their group.

This is the fifth book in a very loose series about the Birdcage group. Especially in the first few books in the series, it is hard to see any connections between the books; there are no repeating characters for example. The tone is the same, and the department is unnamed in the early books. But as the series continues some of the agents feature in multiple books. However, my point here is that though I may be reading them as a series, they easily can be read as standalone books. 

It only recently occurred to me that this series often has a psychological / romantic suspense plot running through it. In fitting with the espionage aspects of the story, the outcome of these romantic plots are entirely unpredictable; sometimes there is a happy, optimistic ending ... sometimes not. This one is even more obviously of that type, since Sarah Branton and the man who rescues her quickly develop a bond and a growing attraction to each other.

I enjoy the glimpses of nature, and especially birds, running through all the stories. The sense of place is very prominent. I think this might be distracting to some readers, but it is one of the elements that keeps me coming back for more. The stories in this series can be very dark.

Victor Canning is one of my favorite authors. He wrote a lot of books starting in the 1930s and through the 1980s, some general fiction, some children's fiction and some spy fiction. I have stuck with his spy fiction or mystery novels so far, but I want to try some of his general fiction too. 

Today I was reading about Canning's life, and discovered that he was friends with Eric Ambler, another espionage author whose books I enjoy. This information was in a book by John Higgins, A Birdcage Companion. Per Higgins' website:

In 1940 he enlisted in the Army, and was sent for training with the Royal Artillery in Llandrindod Wells in mid-Wales, where he trained alongside his friend Eric Ambler. Both were commissioned as second lieutenants in 1941. We get a glimpse of Canning in those years from Eric Ambler's autobiography, Here Lies Eric Ambler.

 -----------------------------

Publisher:   Heinemann, 1978
Length:       233 pages
Format:      Hardcover
Series:       Birdcage books #3
Setting:      Portugal and the UK
Genre:       Espionage fiction
Source:      Purchased in December, 2023.

The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry: Gabrielle Zevin

 

As the story opens, A.J. Fikry is a widower. His wife died 21 months earlier and left him to run their book store on Alice Island, Massachusetts. The book store is not doing well. And then his prized possession, a very valuable copy of Tamerlane, is stolen. Shortly after that, a small child, two-year-old Maya, is left in A.J.'s store, and that event changes his life forever.

Now this sounds like it could be a very smaltzy novel (and maybe for some readers it is) but because it is set in a book store and because the author is Gabrielle Zevin, I decided to give it a chance. I had not even read a book by Zevin at that time, so I don't know why that influenced my decision.

I loved this book. It is a book about books; the protagonist is the owner and manager of a book shop. There are many mentions of books of all types. The characters also talk about the types of books they like and why. 

A.J. is very prejudiced in his likes and dislikes at the beginning of the book, and in some cases will not purchase books for his book store unless he likes them. 

He is exceptionally rude to the new sales representative from Knightley Press, Amelia Loman. He gives her a long list of types of books he does not like. She tells him...

"Do you want my opinion?"

"Not particularly," he says. "What are you, twenty-five?"

"Mr. Fikry, this is a lovely store, but if you continue in this this this"—as a child, she stuttered and it occasionally returns when she is upset; she clears her throat—"this backward way of thinking, there won't be an Island Books before too long."

Each chapter begins with a review or description of a short story, sort of like diary entries, with notes. I loved that element of the book. The first chapter begins with a mini-review of "Lamb to the Slaughter" by Roald Dahl. There were 13 chapters, thus 13 stories. I have only read three of the stories, and most of the others I would like to read someday.

It turns out that I enjoyed the book just as much for the development of the relationships in the book and the look at a community on a small island. A.J. Fikry is the focal point of the story, but other characters and their relationships are also important, and more and more about these characters is revealed as the story continues.

There is a lovely scene when A.J. meets Officer Lambiase after the death of A.J.'s wife. A.J. tells Lambiase that they are characters in a novel:

My wife and I,” A.J. replied without thinking.  “Oh, Christ, I just did that stupid thing where the character forgets that the spouse has died and he accidentally uses ‘we’.  That’s such a cliché.  Officer” – he paused to read the cop’s badge – “Lambiase, you and I are characters in a bad novel.  Do you know that?  How the heck did we end up here?  You’re probably thinking to yourself, Poor bastard, and tonight you’ll hug your kids extra tight because that’s what characters in these kinds of novels do. ”

They begin to discuss books they have read and Lambiase reads mostly crime fiction and especially likes Jeffrey Deaver's Lincoln Rhyme series. Over time, Lambiase and A.J. get to know each other better, discuss books they like, and Lambiase begins to enjoy different types of books and other genres. 

This book has humor and some mystery and a bit of romance, and I am very glad I read it.

-----------------------------

Publisher:  Abacus Books, 2015 (orig. publ. 2014)
Length:      306 pages
Format:      Trade paperback
Setting:      USA, Massachusetts
Genre:        Fiction, Books about Books
Source:      I purchased my copy in December 2023.

It's Almost Time for 20 Books of Summer 2024

 

This is my ninth year of participating in the 20 Books of Summer reading challenge. The event is hosted by Cathy at 746 Books. 

The event is very flexible. You can go for 15 Books of Summer or 10 Books of Summer if 20 is more than you want to commit to. Check here for more about the challenge or to sign up.

This year, 20 Books of Summer starts June 1st and ends September 1st. One of the things I like about this challenge is that it goes for three months only. Some years I have read all 20 books from my list, sometimes not. 

Here are my 20 books...

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (1908)

The Madonna of the Sleeping Cars by Maurice Dekobra (1925)

The Lady in the Lake by Raymond Chandler (1943)

A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie (1964)

War Game by Anthony Price (1976; 205 pages)

In the Midst of Death by Lawrence Block (1976; 185 pages) 

Birdcage by Victor Canning (1978; 233 pages)

Skeleton-In-Waiting by Peter Dickinson (1989; 154 pages)

The White Lioness by Henning Mankell (1993; 440 pages) 

Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi (2003; 153 pages)

Dark Fire by C. J. Sansom (2004; 500 pages)

The Dead Fathers Club by Matt Haig (2006; 336 pages)

A Symphony of Echoes by Jodi Taylor (2013; 327 pages)

A Great Reckoning by Louise Penny (2016; 389 pages)

A Cast of Falcons by Steve Burrows (2016; 384 pages)

A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers (2016; 364 pages)

Tales from the Café by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (2017; 192 pages)

Redhead by the Side of the Road by Anne Tyler (2020; 178 pages)

Family Business by S. J. Rozan (2021; 288 pages)

The Lonely Hearts Book Club by Lucy Gilmore (2023; 352 pages)

Books Read in August 2023

I read nine books in August and completed all of the books on my 20 Books of Summer list. I did not review them all, but did better than usual in that area. I read four nonfiction books, although three of them were shorter books. All of the books I read in August were very good.

Graphic Nonfiction 

Number One is Walking: My Life in the Movies and Other Diversions (2022) 

by Steve Martin, Drawings by Harry Bliss

This is a short and entertaining graphic memoir, in which Steve Martin, star of many films and currently starring in the TV series Only Murders in the Building, tells selected stories about his career in the movies. That portion of the book is supplemented by cartoons drawn by Harry Bliss. This book was his second collaboration with Harry Bliss; the first was A Wealth of Pigeons: A Cartoon Collection.

A Fire Story (2019) by Brian Fies

Brian Flies tells the story of his and his wife's escape from the Tubbs fire that engulfed their home in Santa Rosa, and their experiences following the fire, with all their possessions gone. My review here.

Nonfiction / Letters 

84, Charing Cross Road (1970) by Helene Hanff

I loved reading this very brief book of letters between Helene Hanff in New York City and Frank Doel in London, starting in October 1949. My review here.

Nonfiction / History

Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory (2010) 

by Ben Macintyre

This is an extremely well-written history telling the story of Operation Mincemeat, a plan to deceive the Germans related to the next target that the Allies planned to attack. Sicily was the most obvious target, but intelligence agents wanted to convince the enemy that the attack would be on Greece or Sardinia. My review here.

Science Fiction

The Last Colony (2007) by John Scalzi

This book is the third in the Old Man's War series; the first two books are military science fiction, which I did not think I would like, but I did. This entry in the series was an interesting combination of a story about the colonization of a planet and the resulting effort to protect the planet from a group that wants to annihilate it. I rated The Last Colony higher than the other two, but I read the first two books ten years ago. Maybe I am a more generous grader of books now (which I would just as soon not do anyway), or maybe I liked the emphasis on people and relationships in this one.

Crime Fiction

The Mulberry Bush (2015) by Charles McCarry

This is the last novel that Charles McCarry published before his death in 2019. It is a standalone spy story about a man whose main focus is getting revenge for his father, a spy for the CIA whose career ended in disgrace. Now the son has succeeded in getting a job with the CIA and is bent on avenging the wrong that Headquarters did to his father. My review here.

Sleep and His Brother (1971) by Peter Dickinson

This is the fourth in a series about Jimmy Pibble. In the first two books, he was a Scotland Yard detective; now he has been forced into retirement. His wife is a volunteer for a charitable institution and asks him to look into a problem they are having. There are vague supernatural elements, which is not surprising since Dickenson was a well-known author of fantasy books. The book is very short, around 200 pages, but very dense, not an easy read at all. I loved the story and the writing.

The Doomsday Carrier (1976) by Victor Canning

This was another short book, under 200 pages, and the fourth book in a loose series called the Birdcage books. They all revolve around a covert security group in the UK, a branch of the Ministry of Defense. A chimpanzee has escaped from the facility where it had been infected with plague bacillus, with the goal of creating an infectious carrier of the disease after a three week incubation period. The story follows the chimpanzee as it continues to elude capture, and two people who hope to catch it and return it to the facility before it becomes contagious. Concerns are addressed about the ethics of doing this kind of research and the dishonesty of government officials in trying to keep the truth from the public.

A Man's Head (1931) by Georges Simenon

There are 75 novels featuring Inspector Maigret, and each of those that I have read is different. Maigret often behaves strangely, at least for a policeman of his rank. In this case, Maigret arranges the escape of a condemned murderer from prison. The man, Joseph Heurtin, was convicted of having killed a rich American woman and her French maid. Maigret is sure that Huertin could not have done the crime, even though the proof of his guilt is strong. He plans to have the man followed once he escapes, and see if he will lead the police to the real culprit. Maigret gets very personally involved in this one. An alternate title for this book is A Battle of Nerves, which is definitely an accurate description. The Maigret novels are always good reads, brief, and usually with some humor.

Currently reading

For my Classics List, I am reading I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith; I have read about half the book. This book is the starting book for Six Degrees of Separation in October, and is on my Classics List. 

The annual Planned Parenthood Book Sale started on September 15th. We have been to the book sale several times since it started, and will go again on Sunday, the last day of the sale. I have bought way too many books, so maybe I won't find too many more to buy.

The photos at the top of this post are of the Silver-leafed Princess Flower plants in our front flower beds. Last month's photos showed the first purple blooms on the plants. The photos in this post show the plant in full bloom. 

The photo immediately above is a flower on our Butterfly bush. The plant has done very well and gotten taller than we expected.

Photos taken and processed by my husband. Click on the images for the best viewing quality.