My review of Live to Tell by Lisa Gardner

In Lisa Gardner’s newest entry into her D. D. Warren series, Live to Tell, D.D. is investigating a brutal and heartbreaking crime. An apparent murder-suicide has occurred in one of Boston’s neighborhoods, and the father, who is a suspect, is barely alive in the ICU. Mostly written off as a murder-suicide, Detective Warren believes that there is more to this case. Investigating this tragedy will bring D.D. to a pediatric psych ward, where she meets Danielle Burton. Danielle is a nurse who specializes in the care of severely disturbed children and is the survivor of a family murder much like the one D.D. is looking into. The anniversary of her family’s violent deaths is fast approaching, and when D.D. and her partner arrive at the hospital, Danielle fears the past is being repeated.

One of my personal hallmarks of a successful book is if, after I finish it, it sends me off to google. After completing Live to Tell, I was googling like a mad woman. I found the basis of the book, severe childhood mental illness both frightening and fascinating. We’ve all heard the phrase, “he/she was just born bad”, but I’ve never really thought before what it would mean to have a child with an illness like this. And after reading this novel, I have a new found respect for the pain a mother must go through when her child looks at her and says in a sweet clear voice, “I’m going to kill you with a knife while you sleep.” Imagine, having to lock up your knives, after counting them to make sure your sweet faced little 7 year old hasn’t taken one. It’s just incomprehensible to me.

I’ve read the first two books in this series, but somehow missed the third one. I enjoy Gardner’s writing and I’ll make an effort to read The Neighbor, the one I missed. I didn’t have any trouble with what was going on, I think this book could stand very well on its own. Every book in the series, builds the characters a bit more, showing us the complex people they are, but never in a “smack us over the head” with it. And like getting to know someone in “real life”, the characters are added to in such a way, that if we miss a book, we can pretty much figure it out as we go along.

Gardner, as usual, never disappoints. Never pedantic or boring, Lisa Gardner knows how to write a good thriller. If you’re a fan of the the genre, Live to Tell is a don’t miss entry!

(Review copy provided by LibraryThing and the Early Reviewer program.)

My rating:

Another Two-fer: Cemetery Dance and Fever Dreams

Synopsis from Fantastic Fiction website:

Cemetery Dance

William Smithback, a NY Times reporter, and his wife Nora Kelly, a Museum of Natural History archeologist, are found brutally attacked in their apartment on the Upper West side of Manhattan. Eyewitnesses claim and the security camera confirms the killer seen leaving the building was the strange, sinister man who had previously occupied Smithback and Kelly's apartment---and who had died horribly in it exactly one year ago.

Captain Hayward leads the official homicide investigation, while Pendergast and D'Agosta undertake a private quest for the truth. Their serpentine journey takes them into a part of Manhattan they never imagined could exist: a secretive and deadly hotbed of Obeah, the West Indian Zombii cult of sorcery and magic. And it is here they find their true peril is just beginning.


Fever Dream
At the old family manse in Louisiana, Special Agent Pendergast is putting to rest long-ignored possessions reminiscent of his wife Helen's tragic death, only to make a stunning-and dreadful-discovery. Helen had been mauled by an unusually large and vicious lion while they were big game hunting in Africa. But now, Pendergast learns that her rifle-her only protection from the beast-had been deliberately loaded with blanks. Who could have wanted Helen dead...and why?

With Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta's assistance, Pendergast embarks on a quest to uncover the mystery of his wife's murder. It is a journey that sends him deep into her past where he learns much that Helen herself had wished to keep hidden. Helen Pendergast had nursed a secret obsession with the famed naturalist-painter John James Audubon, in particular a long-lost painting of his known as the Black Frame.

As Pendergast probes more deeply into the riddle-the answer to which is revealed in a night of shocking violence, deep in the Louisiana bayou-he finds himself faced with an even greater question: who was the woman he married?

Yep, another “two-fer” review, and I swear I will get caught up someday. I always read the newest in Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child’s Pendergast series. And as usual, these books moved the series along. The problem I have, and it’s probably mine alone; the result of failing memory in my feebling middle age, is that I tend to not remember details that I think were probably specific to a previous book. For example, the character of Constance, Pendergast’s ward. I remember there was something important about her, but for the life of me, I just can’t remember what it was. And since her character shows up in the typical enigmatic fashion in Fever Dream, I was irritated with myself. I wish the authors would somehow figure out a way to refresh my memory, but then I suppose that all the smarter readers who are without memory problems would complain that the authors are re-hashing too much. There’s probably no solution that would please everyone. Maybe I’ll go Wikipedia her…

Cemetery Dance was okay, no real bolts of lightning or any WOW moments, but, as I said, it moves things along. I suppose the whole voodoo thing was interesting and I did like the historical aspect of the book that dealt with the shadowy weird religious cult on Manhattan island, and thought it would be so cool if it were true. I Wikipedia'd like crazy and couldn't find anything about it though, so alas, it too was a fiction. (In a novel, fiction, huh...who would've thunk it?? Oh brother..I am such a dope..) Fever Dream was slightly better, the back story of Pendergast’s wife was an interesting change from the “catch a crazy bad guy in unique and tricky ways” fare that the books usually give us. Sadly, in neither book, do the authors recapture the “page turner” effect that the first book in the series had on me. They’re okay books, but the characters are starting to feel a bit stale to me. I suppose I’ll keep reading them, out of habit. But I’m really interested to read the new series these authors have planned which will introduce a whole new character, Gideon Crew. I’ll be looking for that book next year.

(Review copies provided by Grand Central Publishing)

My ratings:

Cemetery Dance:

Fever Dream:

Dark Time: Mortal Path by Dakota Banks: a promising beginning to a new series

In 1692, Susannah Layhem, who is a healer and purveyor of herbs and natural healing stands accused of witchcraft. Subsequently convicted and while awaiting her execution, she delivers her stillborn baby, alone and frightened in a filthy jail cell. She is burned at the stake, but as she dies, she is confronted by a demon named Rabishu. She is filled with anger and bitterness and accepts his offer of eternal life, in exchange for her obedience. Susannah becomes the “Black Ghost”, the personal assassin of Rabishu. Over the years, Susannah slowly regains her conscience and when Rabishu orders her to kill a baby, she discovers a way to nullify her pact with him. If she can save one life for every life she has taken over the centuries, she can become free. But if she should fail, unspeakable and never-ending punishments await her.

(Another entry in my--I've got to get caught up category. It seems like I didn't have time to write reviews, and yet, I kept reading....I'm getting close to being caught up, and it's been fun to go back through the books I've read and be reminded of what I liked about them. I might just take a walk down memory lane with my whole bookcase, just for the fun of it!)

Dark Time Mortal Path, a debut novel by Dakota Banks is an inventive and engaging novel. A bit gruesome in places, the idea behind the book is clever and original. This book is the first in a planned series and given the open ended idea of “saving a life for each one taken” and since we really aren’t privy to the number of lives the protagonist has taken, it might be quite a prolific series. The second book in the series, Sacrifice is coming out on August 31, and it will be added to the “teetering tower o’ to-be-read books”.

(Review copy provided by the publicist)

My rating:

After by Amy Efaw: A Darn Good Teen Read (even for an "older teen" like me)

From www.amyefaw.com

Who would leave her own baby in the trash to die?

Certainly not someone like Devon—straight-A student, soccer player with Olympic dreams, more mature than her own mother. But desperation and panic drove her to do what most people can’t even imagine. Now Devon’s in a juvenile detention center charged with attempted murder. If she’s tried as an adult, she faces life in prison.

Does Devon deserve that punishment? Your answer depends on whether you believe her story—that she didn’t even know she was pregnant. Was she buried in a denial so deep that she was unable to register the seemingly obvious signs of pregnancy? Or were her actions the result of a more devious, premeditated plan?

In my never-ending quest to get caught up, for cryin’ out loud, here is my review (finally) of Amy Efaw’s young adult novel After. (Which I read last October…yep…I said OCTOBER. I’m so ashamed……sigh….)

Being an, *ahem, slightly more “mature” woman, I don’t read much young adult or teen fiction. (Oh yeah, Twilight cured me of that urge….) But I picked up After mostly because of the subject matter. Not only did it seem timely, since it seems like even with Safe Harbor laws, there are still babies found in dumpsters all over the country, but like everyone else, I wondered how a girl DO such a thing.

Efaw addresses those questions very well in this book. Although we find Devon’s behavior incomprehensible, we are slowly lead to the place where we can understand it. The book is an empathetic study of the expectations that we and all of society often place on our teen-aged daughters. I had an appreciation for the person that Devon was trying to be, and by the end of the novel was almost saddened by the outcome. It was refreshing, in this day of, “it’s not my fault..” to see a character assume the burden of personal responsibility.

After is a well-written and interesting book. The subject matter begs for a follow-up discussion when your teen reads it, and it is well worth the time spent to read it yourself.

After is available now in hardcover and will be available in paperback in December of this year.

(Review copy provided by Viking)

My rating:

Moms will LOVE Cowboy and Wills by Monica Holloway (so will everyone else!)

From Barnes and Noble
The day Monica learns that her lovable, brilliant three-year-old son, Wills, has autism spectrum disorder, she takes him to buy an aquarium. It's the first in a string of impulsive trips to the pet store to buy animals as a distraction from the uncontrollable, crushing reality of Wills's diagnosis. But while Wills diligently tends to the growing menagerie, what he really wants is a puppy. And one Christmas, when Wills is six, Cowboy Carol Lawrence joins their family.
Like all dynamic duos, Cowboy and Wills complement each other perfectly. Wills is cautious, fastidious, and irresistibly tenderhearted. Cowboy, a rambunctious golden retriever, is overeager, affectionate, and impulsive. And from the moment Cowboy enters their lives, Monica sees her son step a little farther into the world.
Soon, the boy who could barely say hello to his classmates in kindergarten is sharing stories of his new "sister" Cowboy during morning circle. Children crowd around them at the park, and instead of running away, Wills, holding Cowboy's leash in his sweaty fist, proudly answers all of their questions. With Cowboy, he finds the courage to invite kids over for playdates, overcomes his debilitating fear of water to swim along beside her in the family pool, and, after years of gentle coaxing, Wills finally sleeps in his own bed with Cowboy's paws draped across his small chest.
Through it all, Cowboy is there, dragging him toward other children, giving him the confidence to try new things and the courage to face his worst fears. And when Cowboy turns out to need her new family as much as they need her, they discover just how much she has taught them — about devotion, about loyalty, and about never giving up.
Sometimes it's what you don't know to hope for that saves you. For Monica, her husband, Michael, and their son, Wills, salvation came in the form of a puppy with pale blond fur, chocolate brown eyes, a fondness for chewing the crotch out of underpants, and a limitless capacity for love.

(A quick apology…I read this book waaay back in January and then got further behind than a one-legged man in a butt-kickin’ contest. I adored this book and can’t believe I’m just now reviewing it. *Hangs head in shame……And, although I am terribly behind on reviews, I sometimes find it much harder to review a book that I love. I finished the last couple of chapters sitting on the counter in the laundry room so my family wouldn't see me crying like a little girl. It's easy, fun and, yes, maybe even a little mean, to be snarky and slam a bad book. But it's not simple to describe and evaluate a book as good as this one.)

I’m not much for non-fiction, and yet it seems like when I finally read a non-fiction book, I’m often surprised by how wonderful it is. Cowboy and Wills is one such book. Even though we see the struggles that this family go through, this book deals with it in an unflinching, straightforward manner, with humor and grace.

Over the next year, as Wills slowly navigated the preschool mine field of noises and messes and crowded hallways, my animal fixation persisted. With every new problem Will encountered, I bought a new pet. We now had six more hermit crabs and two more hamsters. I cruised Petcos the way drunks frequent bars.

I loved this book. Wills is shown to us as the adorable sweet little boy he is, a child on the autism spectrum. But Holloway doesn’t define Wills solely by his diagnosis. Rather than focusing on what Wills is unable to do, she opens the world for him in ways he can connect. Cowboy and Wills is a delight, as I suspect Wills himself is. (And it's a keeper, one of the permanent residents on my bookshelf). I loved Monica Holloway’s unflinching and wry style and thanks to Cowboy and Wills, I now have her first book, a memoir, Driving with Dead People on my Sony Reader.

(Review copy provided by Sneak Attack Media)

My rating:

Cue the applause for Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson

One beautiful morning, Rose Mae Grandee got her Pawpy’s old gun from the box she’d hidden in the closet and went to shoot her husband, Thom, while he was on his morning run. All because a gypsy at the airport told her to. I’m not kidding. And as absurd as this sounds, it is the beginning of a really good book. Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson is the story of Rose Mae, a beautiful young woman, who has been beat down by the men in her life since she was a child. From an abusive father to rotten boyfriends to cruel husband, Rose Mae has come to the place where she must change or die.

It’s hard to understand how women end up with such abusive men, and I’m sure that Rose Mae is a compilation of most women who end up in this situation. Beaten down to the point of believing that they aren’t of any value, it’s the rare woman who stands up and re-discovers herself. This is a page-turning account of one such woman. We are privy to the fear and pain of the abusive life that Rose Mae has endured, and cheering her on every step of the way in her escape from it. Along the way, Rose interacts with realistic characters, some a bit offbeat, but all are well portrayed and believable. Certain plot devices might seem a little contrived, but surprisingly, it didn’t bother me. (And contrived stuff usually drives me crazy…) I was rooting for Rose Mae all the way through the book, and enjoyed the heck out of seeing her become the woman she had been hiding her whole life.

Backseat Saints was a book that I picked up to glance through for a minute, just to determine it’s position in my “teetering tower o’ to-be-read books” and before I knew it, I had read three chapters and it was time to get dinner started. (Yup…that’s a spaghetti sauce stain on page 84.)

(Review copy provided by Grand Central Publishing)

My rating: