The Boy Born Dead

Nonfiction by David Ring, David Wideman, and John Driver

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This was an interesting true story about David Ring, a young man with cerebral palsy who became a great speaker and evangelist. It's told in a surprising way, through the point of view of David Wideman, a boy who befriended him when the two were teenagers. The result is a very readable story that, I think, would have been less compelling told from just David Ring's viewpoint.

So the writing credit should really go solely to the "ghostwriter" John Driver, in my opinion, because he conducted the interviews of both boys, made the artistic choice to change point of view and make the story ten times stronger than a first-person account would have been and... oh yeah, DID THE ACTUAL WRITING of the book. But such is the fate of ghostwriters, I suppose.

Spell or High Water

Fiction by Scott Meyer.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This is the sequel to Off to be the Wizard, which I read recently and really enjoyed. The sequel was less fun, maybe because the novelty of the first story has worn off for me, or because I spent much of the book in the throes of "Oh-No-I-Can't-Look Syndrome,"** worrying about the characters making bad decisions that would come back to haunt them.

It was a pretty fun book, but I'm unsure about pursuing the series further.

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

(see Harvesting the Heart by Jodi Picoult)

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

The Darkest Time of Night

Fiction by Jeremy Finley

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/

As a little girl, Lynn was terrified of the woods behind her house and had been strictly forbidden by her father to enter them. This makes sense, of course, but it's less understandable that she still feels the same way at age seventy when her grandsons plan a campout near those same woods, and she goes into a full on panic. But when eight year old William disappears during that camp out it seems that Lynn may have had a real reason for her fear.

This was a strange book, but it was exciting and had a pretty good conclusion.

Pursuit

Fiction by Joyce Carol Oates

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/

This book... I just don't know. It starts with a young newly-married woman who inexplicably throws herself in front of a bus. Or maybe it's an accident.  Then it goes into her confusing backstory while she's(maybe) in a coma in the hospital. It was as creepy as I'd expect from Joyce Carol Oates, but way too convoluted and not absorbing enough.

I also read by this author Daddy Love

Buried

Fiction by Ellsion Cooper

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This is the sequel to Caged, which I read recently, part of a new series about a female FBI agent who catches serial killers. The first book was really extreme in its plot, I thought, with the creepy detail of victims being held in a cage and the surprise ending when the killer is someone you never suspected.

This story goes even further over-the-top, I thought, so I seriously wonder where the author can go from here.

It's an exciting mystery thriller with plenty of gory detail.

Quantum Coin

Fiction by E.C. Myers

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This is the sequel to Fair Coin, a great sci-fi novel I read recently. It's a great conclusion and answers a lot of questions I had about the ideas behind the first story. Also I liked the characters a lot, so it's always fun to see what happens next for them.

I think I'd say you MUST read the first book first on this one.

Also I don't like the cover pictured above; my copy had a better one that matched the first book. --->

Image from https://www.goodreads.com

Triple

Fiction by Ken Follett

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/

This was an exciting spy novel based on a true story about the Mossad in 1968. It was very good.

I also read recently by this author: Jackdaws

Little

Fiction by Edward Carey

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This was an interesting story about a diminutive servant girl in eighteenth-century Switzerland and France with special talents. I enjoyed it a lot because I liked the characters, but it was a bit odd.

Off to be the Wizard

Fiction by Scott Meyer

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

I can't really explain this book, but it was really good.

It begins with a nerdy guy called Martin in modern Seattle who discovers that he can somehow manipulate reality through his computer, and then ends up having to pretend to be a wizard in medieval England.

Yeah; you just have to read it to understand. There's a sequel and I'm totally getting it.

Murder is Easy

Fiction by Agatha Christie.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

This is one of Agatha Christie's stories that does not use a serial detective, such as the ubiquitous Poirot, although there is a main character (Luke Fitzwilliam) who is a retired police detective, and he does eventually solve the case. Perhaps she was thinking of trying to make him a recurring character, but I think he's supposed to be a one-off. Luke is a good character; instead of a know-it-all detective type who reveals all in the last chapter, he seems to sort of stumble into the solution just in time.

It's a good mystery.

I also read recently by this author: And Then There Were None

Hunger

Subtitled: A Memoir of (My) Body
Nonfiction by Roxane Gay

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/

This is definitely a memoir of the author's body, and hers alone. I think she's trying to make a statement about women in general and our love-hate relationship with our own fat-thin bodies, and I get that, but it doesn't really fly well. It's mostly a navel-gazing type of book, which is not my favorite style. Even though the navel she's gazing at does look quite a lot like my own, as a "woman of size" in a world that tells me to take up less space.

Really the only interesting thing in this book is what she says about the (annoyingly frequent) claim that inside every fat woman is a skinny woman trying to get out: "Yes; I ate that skinny woman. She was delicious but unsatisfying." HA!

The Cellar

Fiction by Minette Walters

https://www.barnesandnoble.com

In this disturbing story, fourteen-year-old Muna lives a terrible life in the home of the Songolis, an immigrant family who have to hide her identity from the British police in order to report their son's mysterious disappearance. Under local police scrutiny, Mr. and Mrs. Songoli have to suspend Muna's beatings and attempt to treat as if she were a daughter.

But Muna is not their daughter; she is an orphan girl whom they have treated as a slave ever since they'd stolen her seven or eight years ago in their native country, somewhere in Africa.

This was a fascinating book, but very very dark.

I also read recently by this author: The Turn of Midnight

Caged

Fiction by Ellison Cooper

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/

A young girl's body is founded caged up in the basement of an abandoned D.C. house, and it's up to Sayer Altair, an FBI agent to find out who put her there, and how to save another girl in the same predicament who may still be alive.

This was an exciting thriller!

The Last Romantics

Fiction by Tara Conklin

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/

This story begins in the future, but it is a story of the past. Specifically, it's about the past of a poet named Fiona Skinner, and her brother and sisters growing up in the eighties after their father's untimely death.

It was a really good character novel.

I also read recently by this author: The House Girl