Lying Next to Me

 Fiction by Gregg Olsen

https://www.audible.com

Adam and Sophie, along with their three-year-old daughter Aubrey, take a weekend trip to a lakeside cabin. But while Adam and little Aubrey are out boating, Sophie is abducted by a stranger. The whole event happens right on the shore in broad daylight!  Now it is up to sheriff's detectives Lee and Montrose to find out what has happened to Sophie...

This was a good-enough mystery story but a little too slow to be a great thriller.

The Prince and the Troll

 Amazon Prime Kindle Fiction by Rainbow Rowell.

https://www.amazon.com

In a world like ours, but just a little more fairy-tale-ish, a young man called Adam drops his phone off a bridge... and someone retrieves it. There's someone who lives in the mud under there. Is she an enchanted girl? A mermaid? A troll? Adam starts to talk to her, and learns that maybe she is just a person, like himself.

This was a nice little story that I downloaded for free with Amazon Prime Reading. I enjoyed it but it was too short.

I also read recently by this author: The Attachments

The Rose Code

 Fiction by Kate Quinn

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

During the second world war there was a place in England called Bletchley Park where British civilians worked around the clock deciphering coded messages from the enemy. I saw the movie Imitation Game about this subject; it focused on the codebreaker Alan Turing. This book is about some of the women who worked there; it is fictional but the characters are based on real people from that time.

This was a very good historical novel!

American Girl

 Audible Original Fiction by Wendy Walker

https://www.audible.com

This audiobook was decent in some parts and terrible in others. It does have a lot of positive reviews on audible.com, so apparently some people like it, but I did not.

Problem number one: they apparently couldn't decide if it should be performed as a traditional audiobook or as a full-cast drama. Most of the story is narrated regular-book-style from the point of view of the main character, who is supposed to be autistic but doesn't think like any real autistic person (major problem number two). Then every once in a while, randomly, there will be a scripted scene performed by the main character and one other character.  One of these is an unfortunately cringe-y love scene with a lot of heavy breathing and kissing noises (problem number three).

Add to all that a wildly unrealistic ending, and I just can't give this any thumbs-up. I only finished listening because I was on a road trip and could not escape. I'm sorry...

I also listened to recently by Audible Originals: Discordia

The Surrogate Mother

 Fiction by Freida McFadden

https://www.amazon.com

Abby is a career woman who longs to be a mother but can’t get pregnant on her own. Monica is her assistant at work who offers to be a surrogate mother. 

Sam is Abby’s husband… who Monica wants to steal. This last bit is pretty obvious from the beginning, which gives the reader a bad case of “Oh-No-I-Can’t-Look-Syndrome.” ** Sometimes I can get past that syndrome and still enjoy the story but when it's heavily laced with "Geez-Catch-A-Clue-Already Syndrome," **** it's just too much

This book was okay but I had a lot of trouble getting past the predictability of the Evil Monica. (Hence the strong desire for main character Abby to CATCH A CLUE already!) To be honest, I skipped about 200 pages and read the ending. 

I also read by this author: Brain Damage

**Oh-No-I-Can't-Look Syndrome

(See also The Last Thing She Ever Did by Gregg Olsen)

That's when you know a main character is making a major error in judgement that's going to have huge and terrible consequences.

****Geez-Catch-A-Clue-Already Syndrome

(I'm making this one up right now but I'm sure I'll find more examples later.)

This is when the main character's stupidity is SO obvious that you can no longer identify with/make excuses for them. 

The Last House on Needless Street

 Fiction by Catriona Ward

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This was another book that I hated but I can’t explain why without spoilers. (See also: I’m thinking of ending things.)

The story starts out with a creepy man and his cat, and a missing girl that he might have abducted. Then the sister of the missing girl tries to find out for herself for sure if he is a kidnapper. Except they are all crazy: the man, the sister, even the cat! Everything in this story is crazy.

Dying Breath

 Fiction by Wendy Corsi Staub

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

Cam Hastings has been haunted for years by many different visions of frightened children, hiding in small spaces or attacked by strangers. Then one day she recognizes a boy on a missing child poster and realizes that her visions are somehow real. How can she cope with seeing terrible things that she can’t stop from happening?

This story was good but not great. I felt like it got bogged down in too much internal monologue. Still, the plot was good and the ending was a surprise. 

I also read recently by this author: The Butcher's Daughter