What I'm Reading

Emily Joyce is a writer who can’t seem to write anymore. She wrote a bestselling novel and accepted a large advance to write a follow up book. Then, somehow, six years went by without said follow up book materializing. Now she’s surviving on a dead end job and just hoping that Morningstar, the publishing house, has forgotten about her.

But then Morningstar decides they need a ghostwriter and that Emily is going to have to repay them by being one. So Emily ends up interviewing a famous athlete who may or may not have killed his wife.

This was an exciting thriller with several surprises. I love this author!

I also read recently by this author: Rewind

The Last Word

Fiction by Taylor Adams

Emma Carpenter is house sitting for the winter in a lonely beach home on the Pacific coast. She is grieving deeply, escaping through binge-reading, and flirting with suicide. But when a murderer comes after her, she will discover that she doesn’t really want to die. Still, she might be killed anyway…

This book had twist after twist after twist. I loved it!

I also read by this author: Eyeshot

Sunday, March 29, 2026

Murder in Disguise

Fiction by Mary Miley

This is a mystery set in the 1920’s. Jessie Beckett is a former vaudeville child performer and is now working as an assistant script girl for a Hollywood studio. When her friend Barbara’s husband is murdered, Jessie investigates.

This was a lighthearted story with some surprises.

Saturday, March 28, 2026

The Break Up Artist

Audible Original Fiction by Erin Clark and Laura Lovely

Zelda is a wheelchair user and an assistant in an advertising firm. She is hoping to move up into a more creative role as soon as she can, but her boss seems uninterested in promoting her. Besides that, she’s still reeling from her mother’s death and her father’s hasty remarriage. She needs an outlet, and she finds it in the role of The Break Up Artist, anonymously writing scathing letters for people who want to quickly end their relationships.

But what happens if she actually meets a real person who has been on the receiving end of one of her angry missives? And what if it’s a good looking guy she just might fall in love with?

It’s obvious what will happen here; still this story was engaging and had some funny parts. It’s a pretty good straight romance.

I also listened to recently by Audible Originals: The Kaiju Preservation Society

Wednesday, March 25, 2026

Lady in the Lake

Fiction by Laura Lippman

This was a slow-moving mystery story set in the late sixties. The characters were believable but not always sympathetic. It was okay but not great.

I also read by this author: Dream Girl

Saturday, March 21, 2026

Life and Other Inconveniences

Fiction by Kristan Higgins

Emma London is doing fine nowadays with her teenage daughter Riley, although some thought Emma would never survive when she first became pregnant as a teenager herself. Chief among the naysayers was Emma's wealthy grandmother Genevieve London, who had raised Emma since the age of eight. After over fifteen years of silence, however, now Genevieve is suddenly calling to ask Emma to come home.

Emma is proud to have never needed her grandmother's help, and she is unprepared when the old woman might need help herself. Will she forgive old hurts and try to repair their relationship?

This was a really good character story with some romance.

I also read by this author: Pack Up the Moon

Friday, March 13, 2026

The Stranger in Her House

Fiction by John Marrs

This was a very exciting story that kept making turns I didn't expect. Most of the characters were rather terrible people but you couldn't help being sympathetic to some of them anyways.

I also read by this author: You Killed Me First

Wednesday, March 11, 2026

The Program

Fiction by Gregg Hurwitz

This is apparently #2 in the Tim Rackley series, which I wasn't aware of when I picked it up. I didn't need to have read The Kill Clause (the first book) to understand this one; however I do think reading this one might have ruined the prospect of reading the first one by giving everything away...

In this story ex-state trooper Tim Rackley is tasked with trying to rescue a girl called Leah from a cult. It's kind of upsetting to read; I don't like to think that a cult could really suck normal people in like that.

This was an exciting story but very dark.

I also read by this author: The Survivor

Tuesday, March 10, 2026

All The Lies

Amazon Prime Kindle Fiction by Nicola Sanders

Amy used to be a dance teacher, but now she is only Jason's wife. Since their marriage, Jason has taken control of every aspect of Amy's life, watching her every minute and trying to catch her deceiving him. She had foolishly signed over all of her money to him to "invest" for her; now she has no resources and no way out. Even her mother takes Jason's side in their arguments, refusing to believe that Amy is being abused.

When her mother offers her a ticket to a cruise ship vacation, Amy is desperate to take it and try to get away. Her mother means for the trip to be for both Amy and Jason, but Amy tells her husband that she'll be traveling with her mom and is relieved when he believes her. Or does he?

This was an exciting story with several surprises! (And one over-the-top twist at the end that I don't 100% buy.)

I also read by this author: Don't Let Her Stay

I also read (FREE!) from Amazon Prime Kindle: The Sideways Life of Denny Voss

Sunday, March 8, 2026

Everyone is Watching

Fiction by Heather Gudenkauf

Five people are competing in a reality show called "One Lucky Winner," each hoping to win a prize of ten million dollars. But this competition is long on hype and short on details; no one knows what exactly the competitors will be required to do or how they have been chosen. And the challenges will be streamed live at unexpected times, not recorded and aired on a schedule.

Supposedly these things are meant to make the show different and exciting, but also they serve to keep everyone guessing and the contestants off-balance. But it quickly becomes clear that there is something strange going on behind the scenes....

This was a fast-paced an exciting story, but the plot was WAY over the top. I couldn't help but think it stretched the reader's willing suspension of disbelief to the breaking point. And I felt like the characters were less likeable and believable than they could have been. Still, it was pretty fun to read.

I also read by this author: This is How I Lied

Thursday, March 5, 2026

The Unsinkable Greta James

Fiction by Jennifer E. Smith

Greta James is a successful independent rock artist with one hit album and another due to come out soon, but the death of her mother several months ago has put her into a bit of a tailspin. Now her brother Travis is urging her to go on an Alaskan cruise, of all things, in order to accompany her dad. It was supposed to have been an anniversary trip for her parents and their couple friends, and Travis thinks it's a bad idea to let their father go alone. Although Greta has never had the greatest relationship with her dad, she agrees to go, hoping they can learn to get along without Mom as buffer.

This was a sweet story about mending old relationships and maybe forging new ones.

I also read by this author: Fun for the Whole Family

Tuesday, March 3, 2026

That Summer

Fiction by Jennifer Weiner

When Diana was fifteen she went to spend the summer on Cape Cod as a mother's helper for a professor her parents knew at home in Boston. She had hoped to have fun and maybe even find love, but she came back broken and depressed, refusing to tell her parents what had happened to change her.

More than twenty-five years later another woman named Diana, this one nicknamed Daisy, is navigating a particularly difficult stretch of motherhood with her own fifteen-year-old daughter and wondering why she feels dissatisfied with life. Then she meets the other Diana, and discovers that maybe what she really needs is a friend.

But the reader can tell that there is something else going on under the surface of the friendship between these two women, and eventually a secret will explode to the surface.

This was a good story with great characters and I liked the realistic nature of the plot and resolution. Still it got a little heavy-handed and Big-Issue driven at times.

I also read by this author: Big Summer

Sunday, March 1, 2026

Never

Fiction by Ken Follett

This book took over a week to read, which is a long time for me. It's pretty dense prose and complicated; every word needs to be understood with no skimming. I've read other books by this author, mostly historical fiction, and those were all good enough for me to devote the time to this one.

In this novel, the author takes the events that led to The Great War, or World War One as it became called, and modernized them into a slowly escalating world crisis that ends up making war inevitable. But in modern times, we have nuclear options available, and World War Three doesn't end well for anyone.

This was a good story with great characters, but it was chillingly easy to see how the USA and China, in particular, could be maneuvered into war even with moderate and decent people in change, which in general we never have...

I also read by this author: Circle of Days

Sunday, February 22, 2026

Fun for the Whole Family

Fiction by Jennifer E. Smith

The four Endicott siblings grew up together more or less normally, until Gemma, the oldest, was 12. At that point their mother Frankie disappeared from their lives to pursue Art, leaving them with a dad who worked all the time and only reappearing for summer visits. For the next seven summers, Frankie would take them on a whirlwind road trip, darting randomly around the country with the vague goal of eventually visiting all fifty states.

As adults the siblings remained close until a big fight blew a hole in their relationship. Then Jude, the youngest of the kids, makes a big effort to get everyone back together in North Dakota of all places. Secrets will soon come out...

This was a really well-written bunch of characters. I really liked this book.

Friday, February 20, 2026

The Survivor

Fiction by Gregg Hurwitz

At the beginning of this book, Nate Overbay has climbed to the eleventh floor of a bank building and is preparing to jump off a ledge when he sees a robbery in progress through the window. Will he give up on his suicide plan and try to intervene? So begins an exciting thriller with lots of surprises...

I also read by this author: Tell No Lies

Thursday, February 19, 2026

The Color of Light

Fiction by Karen White

I had some trouble getting interested in this story; I'm not sure why.

Wednesday, February 18, 2026

The Wondering Years

Nonfiction by Knox McCoy

This was a fun and funny memoir about the author's life and faith journey.

Tuesday, February 17, 2026

The Sideways Life of Denny Voss

Amazon Prime Kindle Fiction by Holly Kennedy

At the beginning of this story, Denny Voss is arrested when he tries to take a sled full of firearms and ammunition over a snowy hill in his small town of Minnesota. Although Denny is a full-grown man, he is developmentally delayed and like a child in many ways; therefore he is unable to explain what he is doing to the police officers who swoop in to stop him from taking the weapons any farther.

Indeed, even the reader is mystified about the sled full of guns. (The psychologist examining him in jail asks him what could have been a better choice to make, and Denny ventures, "Call the police station and tell them I was coming?" Um, no...)

Once Denny is in custody, things get worse. A man in town was recently murdered, and it was one of the guns Denny was transporting that killed him.

This was a really good story with great characters, and a few surprises as well. I will definitely look for more by this author!

I also read (free!) from Amazon Prime Kindle: The Taken Ones

Sunday, February 15, 2026

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe

Fiction by Fannie Flagg

I had read this novel years ago, but I thought I'd try it on audio book. It was doubly good with the Southern lady narrator!

I also read by this author: The Whole Town's Talking

Wednesday, February 11, 2026

The Undoing Project

Subtitled: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds
Nonfiction by Daniel Lewis

The titular Friendship that Changed Our Minds was between two Israeli psychologists, Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky in the middle of the twentieth century. While these men were pretty interesting and their work very interesting, this book itself was not all that interesting.

Although the author gave a lot of information about both men (and a lot of extraneous information, including irrelevant things about his previous successful book Moneyball ), the book didn't read like a story about people. I don't like stories that aren't about people.

I think I would have done better just to read their psychology papers.

Monday, February 9, 2026

The Coworker

Fiction by Freida McFadden

Natalie's coworker Dawn is a bit of a weirdo, but since Dawn is in accounting and Natalie is in sales, they don't have to interact too much. Except one day Dawn doesn't show up to work, which never happens because she's punctual to the point of obsessiveness, and Natalie gets concerned. Soon it turns out that Dawn is missing, and may even be dead! But why do the police think that Natalie might have done something to Dawn?

This was an exciting story with good characters and several surprises. Thanks to my sister-in-law for recommending it!

I also read by this author: Ward D

Saturday, February 7, 2026

What We Can Know

Fiction by Ian Mc Ewan

This was a strange story. The premise is that Thomas Metcalfe is a historian in the year 2119 and he specializes in the period of 1990 to 2030. He is particularly interested in an event called the Second Immortal Dinner which took place in 2014; it was a dinner party where several people of literary importance were in attendance.

(Incidentally I couldn’t believe there was ever an actual First Immortal Dinner, but I looked it up. On 28 December 1817 some painter had a bunch of people over to his house in London, including Keats and Wordsworth. Of course, in real life it's just called The Immortal Dinner. So it's not such a stretch to imagine that there could be another dinner so aggrandizedly labeled, I guess.)

The beginning of the book, the futuristic part, was a little slow and draggy. I almost gave up, but part two of the book, in which we switch narrators and discover the real events of the past, is really good.

I also read by this author: On Chesil Beach

Wednesday, February 4, 2026

The Opposite of Everyone

Fiction by Joshilyn Jackson

Paula Vauss was born in Alabama while her sixteen-year-old mother was in juvie. Her mother Kai wanted to name her after a Hindu goddess, but nobody listened to that. As soon as Kai turned eighteen and was released, she retrieved Paula and set out on a weird itinerant lifestyle that eventually landed her in grown-up jail and sent Paula to foster care.

Now Paula is an adult and working as a divorce lawyer. She sends her mother money but hasn't spoken to her for fifteen years. But as the reader knows, the past will often come back to haunt you...

This was a really good story with great characters. I loved it!

I also read by this author: With My Little Eye

Sunday, February 1, 2026

Like Mother Like Daughter

Fiction by Kimberly McCreight

NYU student Cleo came to her parents' apartment on a Sunday evening to have dinner with her mother she finds the place empty. Dinner is burning on the stove and there is broken glass and blood on the floor. Cleo realizes her mother is missing, so she calls the police and she calls her father (who is supposed to be on a business trip).

When the police arrive they are openly suspicious of Cleo's father, who apparently has been back in New York for hours, although he told Cleo he was just getting off the plane when she called. And, as the reader slowly discovers, neither he not her mother has been completely honest with Cleo about a lot of things.

This was an exciting mystery story with good characters and a surprises ending.

Thursday, January 29, 2026

Behind These Four Walls

Fiction by Yasmin Angoe