Postingan

Menampilkan postingan dengan label prison

We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker

Gambar
  Click here to buy from Amazon Well this book took me a bit to get through to the end. Mostly because it broke my heart over and over and I had to read it in bits and pieces.  I've heard so much about this book--tons of rave reviews, and even a few friends telling me about it. So I bought it last month and have been reading it since May 1st. Some books I can sail through; others take me a bit. This was a "take me a bit" kind of book. It's heavy. It's not a happy ever after. And even for the first 100 pages, I was wondering if I'd made a mistake and it wasn't a book for me.  But I kept with it, and wow, what a powerful, haunting novel. It's a bit of a thriller, murder mystery, and a family drama all rolled into one. It reminded me of Jane Harper's novels-the desolate feeling I get when I read them.  In a nutshell: Duchess and Robin Radley are two young kids who live with their mother, Star, in the small town of Cape Haven, California. They are dirt...

The Whisper man by Alex North

Gambar
This month has been a tough one for getting through books. I've struggled, when I usually zip through a few a week. I started reading The Whisper Man a few weeks ago, and kept putting it down, picking it up. I just couldn't get my head into a novel about a serial killer of little boys. But this weekend was rainy and gloomy, and I decided to buckle down and finish it. There was much more to it, and the deeper I got into the story, the more gripping it became.  Tom Kennedy and his little boy Jake are moving to the small town of Featherbank to start over after Tom's wife and Jake's mother dies unexpectedly, leaving both in the depths of grief. Jake is a quiet boy; he loves to draw, and is always having conversations with his imaginary friend, a little girl who keeps him company. A new house, a new school; Tom hopes Jake will come out of his solitude and make friends. Tom, a published author, is stuck trying to begin a new novel, but he's suffer...

The Poison Thread by Laura Purcell

Gambar
I started this novel on Saturday and found myself sucked into the story very quickly. Laura Purcell's second offering (after The Silent Companions) is one heck of a ride, combining a Dickensian atmosphere with elements of a horror novel, a thriller, and of women caught in the rigid structure of early Victorian rules and expectations. I simply couldn't put it down.  There are two main characters: Dorothea Truelove, a young, wealthy woman approaching her 25th birthday, and Ruth Butterham, a young woman imprisoned and waiting trial for murder. Dorothea visits prisons to offer comfort to incarcerated women, and it also gives her a chance to explore her obsession with phrenology: a study of human behavior traits expressed through the shape of the skull. Yes, if you have bumps in a certain location, or your skull is shaped a certain way, it shouts to the world exactly who you are: a deep thinker? A worrier? A murderer? Ruth's story is just plain awful. Only sixteen, she's liv...

Taking a Break from Holiday Novels: Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh

Gambar
When someone hands you a book and asks you to read it so they can discuss it, you read the book so you can discuss it. This was a novel that had me at turns disturbed, disgusted, intrigued, and reluctantly cheering Eileen on towards a better life.  Taking place in 1964, and told from a much older Eileen's lens, this is one weird ride. Even when I was completely grossed out, I kept reading--the writing is just that good. Tiny little details that keep you compulsively turning the pages. Are you intrigued yet? Eileen is twenty-four, and living at home with her alcoholic father. The home is completely filthy; neither has cleaned the house since Eileen's mother died years before. Her father is such an alcoholic that he sits in front of the open oven for warmth, drinking bottles of gin all day, every day. He's a retired cop who still has some odd kind of respect from the hometown police force--a polite, turn your head away respect. He's gotten into so much trouble in his drun...

What She Left Behind by Ellen Marie Wiseman

Gambar
I had this novel on my TBR list because I've got a reading group meeting Tuesday to discuss it for our September read. It's a novel I've seen many times on the shelves at my local B&N; I even stocked it on paperback tables, but never wanted to read it. This was my opportunity to do so--and wow, this is not a novel for the faint of heart.  Told in two voices: Clara, a young upper class woman in 1929, and Izzy, a young teen  in contemporary times living with her foster parents. Clara Cartwright is in love with Bruno, a handsome immigrant who came to America to start a new life. Her father, a total asshole (sorry, but he is just horrible!) and her unfeeling mother insist she marry someone that matches her station. When she says no, her father has the police take her to an insane asylum, saying she's crazy. And from there, Clara's life takes just one horrible spiral down after another. At first, she's in a somewhat nice place, but still held against her will and...