Summer 2024 — Hooked on Books

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• Lies Make Perfect
• By Ellie Banks
• ISBN #: 978-1335009371
• Canary Street Press; Original edition (June 11, 2024)

A Mother’s Love in a Desperate Situation

Where are Poppy and Zach, and why can’t Poppy’s mom, who happens to write about abductions and missing people, find her daughter? Ellie Banks’ latest novel, Lies Make Perfect explores the struggles that Margo Box goes through as she searches for her five-year-old daughter, Poppy, who was abducted by her father, Zach, six months earlier. Margo’s loss is fueled by guilt and aggravated by the fear that she let her career take priority over her daughter during an afternoon in the park. Yet she feels there’s hope. In her gut she doesn’t believe that Poppy is gone.

She finds a letter in a secondhand book, placed in the Little Free Library nearest her home, suggesting a potential clue in the old disappearance of her high school friend, Sarah, who left with her teacher when she was only seventeen. Are there similarities between these two cases??

Margo experiences overwhelming anguish, yet many readers will identify with the power of her losses. Second romances, lost children, and a big picture Margo can’t quite see all conspire to keep the reader engaged in this contemporary thriller about loss, love, and moving beyond anguish. Seeing the story through the eyes of a writer is a perk for those of us who write, or anyone trying to step back and look at a problem from an analytical point of view.

Though the book asks questions about lies that catch up with it, it’s a mother’s love in a desperate situation that will keep you turning pages. It’s also about living happily ever after despite the complications to get there. In Ellie Banks’ skilled hands, this is a fast-paced story driven by characters who need to find answers if they’re to live in peace.

Want to escape the problems of the world for a while? Read Lies Make Perfect. 

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• Street Corner Dreams
• Written by Florence Reiss Kraut
• ISBN #: 978-1647425913
• She Writes Press (November 14, 2023)

Can Morty Find His Way Back?

How do you overcome fear? How do you keep going when fate turns your world upside down? What makes a woman a mother? These are the questions that Florence Reiss Kraut explores in Sweet Corner Dreams. This is the story of Jewish immigrants in Brownsville, New York and the gangs that run the streets, intimidate the shopkeepers, and take away the freedoms so many people came to America to find. How evil are they? How can they be handled? By the end of the story you’ll have some ideas.

Golda and her sister head for America, yearning for independence, but her sister dies giving birth to a boy named Morty. Golda abandons her dreams of freedom instead of putting Morty in an orphanage and marries her widowed brother-in-law. Could she have had both? In the late thirties in Brooklyn it probably wasn’t possible, and even if it was, she would have needed money to achieve her dreams. While she was able to earn a bit with her embroidery that looked like paintings, she saved it all for her sister’s son’s education. At least that’s what she thought she was doing. 

Morty wanted to be a good man, but in Brownsville at that time Jewish and Italian gangs demand protection money f and enticed youngsters with the promise of wealth. During the Depression, Ben is faced with financial ruin and he makes a dangerous, life-altering choice. Morty tries to save his father by getting help from a gangster friend, but the situation only worsens. Forced to desert his family and Anna, the woman he loves in order to survive, and later threatened by the gang lord he works for, Morty is desperate.

Will he ever find a safe way back? And how will he be received if he gets there?

In Ms. Kraut’s capable hands, we discover a well-structured tale of choices, loss, and ultimately… Wait! That would be a spoiler. I promise her story will keep you turning pages as the conflicts deepen and the character’s struggle with right, wrong, disappointment, eternal optimism, and faith. You’ll empathize with their plights, and maybe you’ll be grateful that you’re living now.Set in the Jewish culture, this is a novel that enlightens and entertains. Add this to your reading list. You won’t be disappointed.

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• Don’t Let the Devil Ride
• Written by Ace Atkins
• ISBN 13: 978-0063293380
• William Morrow (June 25, 2024)

Who is Dean McKellar and What Is He Hiding?

How well do you know the people you love? What about your partner? Are you sure? Addison McKellar asks herself those questions and more when her husband, Dean doesn’t come home and she can’t reach him in Ace Atkins new thriller, Don’t Let the Devil Ride.

Addison McKellar’s imperfect marriage is a vague imposition until her husband vanishes. Worse still, his friends and colleagues dismiss her pleas for help. Even the police are unconcerned, but as the weeks pass, she becomes increasingly concerned. When she talks to her father, he suggests that she contact his old friend, legendary Memphis PI Porter Hayes.

Together Porter and Allison discover that her husband, Dean, was never the hardworking business owner and family man he pretended to be. But who was he? And where is he now?

As they look at the connections between a hook-handed mercenary, one of Elvis’s former leading ladies, and a man posing as an FBI agent, they feel like they’ve fallen through the looking glass until they realize that Dean was committed to a program of international intrigue with the bad guys. Tension heightens when  Porter and Addison realize they aren’t the only ones looking for Dean.

Apparently, he infuriated some killers who’ll come after his family to even the score. What is a woman to do? How can she protect her family? And how could she have married this man without having a clue.

In Don’t Let the Devil Ride thrilling adventure meets domestic drama meets deceit, lies, and breath-taking suspense. You get to watch her unscramble her life, if she can, and perhaps you’ll wonder about your own. On the other hand, you might become secure as you realize what strong relationships you have. In Ace Atkins’ skilled hands, this tale springs to life. Whether you have a taste for gritty Southern noir, well-crafted wit, or international travel, you’ll find yourself turning pages far into the night as his imagination sparks your own.

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• But You Look So Normal: Lost and Found in a Hearing World
• Claudia Marseille
• ISBN # 978-1647426262
• She Writes Press (May 14, 2024)

 

Thriving Despite the Odds

Ever wondered what words sound like to those who cannot hear them? I began to get a clue with Claudia Marseille’s description when she said, “My brain was buzzing with all the new information I was able to take in with the hearing aid; I wasn’t only hearing new sounds, I was learning what things were called.”

Imagine you’re mainstreamed in school and the teacher talks while she writes on the blackboard. Imagine having to fake your responses in a group by imitating others because you were embarrassed to say that you were hard of hearing. Imagine a world in which you were unable to hear the other end of a conversation on the phone. This was Claudia Marseille world in But You Look So Normal. The title is taken from a line spoken by a high school teacher who was shocked when she told him she was hard of hearing, a term that was still popular in the 1970s.

When Claudia’s parents finally had her hearing tested, she was already four. Maybe they didn’t realize that her lack of speech came from the fact that she couldn’t hear.

Despite her severe hearing loss, mainstreamed her, because they wanted her childhood to be as normal as possible. Her first hearing aid, with a battery pack and a cord into her ear, made here self-conscious. That was all that was available to her. Because she was surrounded by the noise of chaos or silence, she worked hard to learn to lipread, and even though she succeeded, there were times she couldn’t hear. She loved reading though, and she had perfect pitch which is extremely rare in those with a hearing lose.

She copes with bickering parents, a strange psychoanalyst father who expresses more love for his projects than his daughter and a Jewish mother who survived the Holocaust in Munich. As a young woman brought up without religion, she explores her Jewish identity in a kibbutz and freely tells people about her hearing problems. She’s coming into her own, following her unique path, and she takes us along to experience a different way of being in the world.

Claudia emerged from her social isolation and eventually opened herself to a life of creativity and genuine love. Her story will inspire you whether you’re deaf, know people in the Deaf community, or want to open yourself to a world you have not experienced.

NOTE: This originally appeared with other book reviews at storycircle.org.

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• After Annie
• Written by Anna Quindlen and Reviewed by Karin Cooper
• ISBN- ‎ 978-0593861844
• Publisher: ‎ Random House – 304 pages (February 27, 2024)

How Many People One Woman Can Affect

“Quiet was soothing. Silence was terrible.” Anna Quindlen

On a typical winter evening, Annie, a mother, wife, and best friend, dies suddenly “…right before dinner.”  The anchor of all the lives Annie is attached to unmoors.  Four children, ages six to thirteen, are confused, angry, and desolate. Ali, the oldest, immediately assumes the daily responsibility of her three younger brothers while navigating the challenges of adolescence. Bill, Annie’s regular guy husband, a plumber by trade, can’t fix the cracks around him. Anne Marie, a lifelong best friend, battles to overcome the loss, desperately fighting against the pull of old habits threatening to consume her once more.  The lives of family and friends move through the seasons. Each season is a reminder of change in grief and coping. 

The Browns live in a small house where Bill spent his childhood, in the same small town where Annie and Bill have always lived. The ordinariness of their lives belies the powerful impact decent people can have on a community. Annie remains an ever-present figure in the lives of the characters. Ali is the primary caretaker for her brothers until Bill finally recognizes he needs to put aside his grief and do more for his suffering children. A former high school girlfriend catalyzes Bill’s realization and measurement of the love he could never understand with Annie. Anne Marie balanced on the edge of sobriety amidst her business success, knowing that another slip into drugs would cost her the friendship she cherished with Annie. A final ultimatum from Annie made this consequence clear. However, death ultimately severed their friendship.           

Ali finds comfort in Miss Cruz, a school counselor, as she grieves her mother’s death. Miss Cruz helps the family through their healing process and advises them to keep discussions about their mother and family open. Anne Marie’s downward spiral into drugs and reckless sex ends realizing the loving details and simplicity of life cherished by Annie are the threads that will always connect them.

A year of seasons passes. The children are growing and emotionally coping. Anne Marie has a baby girl. Bill’s business develops. He can buy a bigger house that Annie always wanted. Moving out of their home where it all started and ended, Annie is still tethered to their lives. Accepting and comfortable with his role and responsibility, the tie to his great love is left to be discovered someday in a note at the bottom of Annie’s hope chest declaring her great love for him. 

A prize-winning journalist and novelist, Anna Quindlen’s novel is a reminder of how many lives are touched by one person. A frequent theme in Quindlen’s writing is the heart-broking loss of a mother’s death. Most notably her 1994 novel, One True Thing. A master artisan, any writer can learn particularly from her skill of details from her novels and journalism.

Karin Cooper has taught college composition and English courses for over 20 years. She also is a freelance content copy editor.  With a writing resume of plays and education essays, recent writing interests and challenges are developing middle-grade novel about a young Angolan boy rescuing a pangolin. Ms. Cooper has reviewed for us before, and she does a great job. Thank you, Karin. 

If you’d like to review books for us, use the Contact Button on the home page to let us know.

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• This Familiar Heart: an improbable love story This Familiar Heart: an improbable love story
• By Babette Fraser Hale
• ISBN: 978-0975272756
• Winedale Publishing (April 2, 2024)

Letting Love Happen

Are you lucky enough to have found the love of your life? Or are you still seeking the perfect match? No matter where you are on the love and relationship spectrum, you’ll find a lot of wisdom in Babette Fraser Hale’s This Familiar Heart: an improbable love story.

Written in her own voice as well as her deceased husband’s Babette Fraser Hale explored her life with Leon Hale, who wrote about rural Texans for many years in his popular column for The Houston Post and the Houston Chronicle. He was her teacher before he became her partner.

He was a country boy—a Texas cowboy. Unlike him, she was a child of privilege who’d been educated abroad and was struggling in her career while raising a young son. Since he was significantly older and so different, no one expected their relationship to work. They were wrong.

As they progressed through an extensive and sometimes argumentative courtship, they discovered they had important traits in common. They were bound together by their interest in writing, their need for acceptance and approval, and the way they complemented each other despite superficial differences. They married eight years into their relationship and stayed together for life.

When Leon Hale died following complications encountered during the Pandemic, acute grief and severe doubt threatened Babette’s understanding of their marriage. As she worked her way through his papers, she questioned whether he’d been the man she thought he was. Had he kept secrets? Had she truly known him or had he been a different person when he went away? She wrote her way through her uncertainties and the result is The Familiar Heart.

You must know a person well to write in his voice, and Hale’s knowledge of Leon comes through loudly and clearly. In writing that is sometimes frank and sometimes lyrical, she explores the distortions that often follow the death of a partner. Her analyses shine with insight and she gives readers hope for our own lives.

If you like books that look deeply at love, relationships, and the ways we live our lives, this one’s for you. Special thanks to Judy Alter for pointing me in the direction of this book.

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• Once a Homecoming Queen
• By Joan Moran
• ISBN: 978-1956851663
• TouchPoint Press (February 5, 2024)

Gritty and Authentic

When seventy-five-year-old Francine  Reynolds-Richelli-Freeman falls a second time while dangerously drunk again, her adult daughter takes insists she go to rehab in Joan Moran’s Once a Homecoming Queen. Francine rebels. She loves to drink with her friend Ida and has no interest in getting sober until Ida, who promised she would never drive drunk, takes that risk, crashes her car, and dies. That hurts and angers Francine before it sobers her up. Group therapy and AA meetings help. So does Francine’s dark humor.

Like many alcoholics in the process of getting sober she goes through resistance, cravings, and plots to escape group therapy and the rehab system. One day she discovers she likes the lack of hangovers, and when she’s released from treatment, she agrees to do some volunteer work at a local women’s prison to keep her mind off the cravings.

When the prison transfers her out of meetings and into the their pharmacy, she meets Doc, who sees the worthwhile side of her and offers her a chance to go with him to the Calgary Stampede Rodeo, where he’ll relive his glory days. He knows she has liver disease, appreciates her redeeming qualities, and wants to care for her.

This is an honest, gritty look at what alcohol can cost an individual and her family, but it’s also a story of redemption. It’s well told, believable, and authentic. I feel for Francine and occasionally I wanted to ring her neck, but in the end, I applauded her. The book shows that it’s never too late to deal with your problems and find peace one day at a time.