The Librarian of Crooked Lane

The Librarian of Crooked Lane
by C.J. Archer
Rating: ★★★
isbn: 9781922554208
Series: The Glass Library #1
Publication Date: January 1, 2022
Pages: 275
Genre: Fiction, Mystery, Paranormal
Publisher: Self-published

Librarian Sylvia Ashe knows nothing about her past, having grown up without a father and a mother who refused to discuss him. When she stumbles upon a diary that suggests she's descended from magicians, she's skeptical. After all, magicians are special, and she's just an ordinary girl who loves books. She seeks the truth from a member of the most prominent family of magicians, but she quickly learns that finding the truth won't be easy, especially when he turns out to be as artless as her, and more compelling and dangerous than books.

War hero Gabe is gifted with wealth, a loving family, and an incredible amount of luck that saw him survive four harrowing years of a brutal war without injury. But not all injuries are visible. Burying himself in his work as a consultant for Scotland Yard, Gabe is going through the motions as he investigates the theft of a magician-made painting. But his life changes when he unwittingly gets Sylvia dismissed from her job and places her in danger.

After securing her new employment in a library housing the world's greatest collection of books about magic, Gabe and Sylvia's lives become intwined as they work together to find both the painting and the truth about Sylvia's past before powerful people can stop them.

A thoroughly average read that wasn’t a waste of time, but definitely was the perfect library loan. I would have been displeased had I bought this, but as a library loan I can forgive a lot. And there are quite a few things requiring forgiveness.

First off, the synopsis implies this book is a lot more involved than it actually is. After securing her new employment in a library housing the world’s greatest collection of books about magic, Gabe and Sylvia’s lives become intwined as they work together to find both the painting and the truth about Sylvia’s past before powerful people can stop them.
But sometimes the past is better left buried… Um… no. I mean, yes, they’re searching for the painting, but there is no search for Sylvia’s past beyond occasional speculation, and there are no powerful people trying to stop them. There’s an attempted kidnapping at the beginning that’s never explained, but perhaps that’s part of a series arc? And the ‘magic’ isn’t really anything of the sort. It’s described as magic and apparently spells are used, but as near as this book comes to explaining it, ‘magicians’ are merely people who are extraordinarily gifted at their chosen craft and are obsessed with it. Which doesn’t strike me as all that magical.

For all of that though, the writing was good, and way better than average for a book that was apparently self-published. While the writing lacked sophistication and polish, it was far better edited and copyedited than your average big publishing house efforts. The plotting of the mystery was very well done too. I feel like, had the author had a big publishing team pushing her, this could have easily been a 4 star read.

This was a fast read that Libby informs me took just a few minutes over 4 hours to finish. If my libraries have the second book, I’d be happy to read it, and might enjoy it more now that my expectations have been adjusted by book 1.

Flying Solo

Flying Solo
by Linda Holmes
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781399707787
Publication Date: June 28, 2022
Pages: 304
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Hachette Books

Smarting from her recently cancelled wedding and about to turn forty, Laurie Sassalyn returns to her Maine hometown of Calcasset to handle the estate of her great-aunt Dot, a spirited adventurer who lived to be ninety-three.

Alongside boxes of Polaroids and pottery, a mysterious wooden duck shows up at the bottom of a cedar chest. Laurie's curiosity is piqued, especially after she finds a love letter to the never-married Dot that ends with the line "And anyway, if you're ever desperate, there are always ducks, darling."

When the mysterious duck disappears under suspicious circumstances, Laurie feels compelled to figure out why anyone would steal something worth so little -and why Dot kept it hidden away in the first place.

Suddenly Laurie finds herself swept up in a righteous caper that has her negotiating with antiques dealers and con artists, going on after-hours dates at the local library, and reconnecting with her oldest friend and her first love .

Desperate to uncover her great-aunt's secrets, Laurie must reckon with her own past and her future-and ultimately embrace her own vision of flying solo.

This is one of those books that I enjoyed, but should have loved. It has all sorts of elements that resonate with me, and it was well written to boot. If I were to use a fishing metaphor (and I am), I’d say the hook caught, but failed to set, leaving me with an enjoyable ride that I was able to shake off when finished, without lasting effects.

The MC is a 40 year old who has always known she doesn’t want kids of her own, and after a cancelled engagement, is coming to realise she doesn’t want to get married either; she cherishes having her own space and not having to share it with anybody else. But coming back to her hometown reunites her with her high-school boyfriend as they and her BFF try to figure out the mystery behind the wooden duck.

I like what the author was trying to do here, with the romantic dynamic, but I’m not sure … I think she might have written herself into a corner, and her attempt to extricate herself from that corner left the ending unsatisfying. It’s probably the most realistic ending in Real Life, but in fiction it left me wishing for a better resolution. The plot about the duck was fun, and I enjoyed how they did the research and followed the clues, though as a long time mystery reader, some of it felt a tad clumsy. Nothing that made me cringe, but these characters weren’t investigators, so their awkwardness was probably quite realistic.

All in all, it was a great library read; I enjoyed the story, but I’m not going to wish I owned a copy of my own. I’m glad I read it, but I’ll be happy to return it too.

First failure for LT’s (new) Recommendation engine

Oh my god, this book was soooooo bad. I grabbed it from the library because it had a fire-breathing unicorn and was billed as a comedy, and it started off with potential, but just crashed and burned after about 20% of the way in. The writing was awful, the characters were shallow and the story was just ridiculous.

Truly, the most awful thing I think I’ve ever read.

1/2 star of awful.

Bookish People

Bookish People
by Susan Coll
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781400234103
Publication Date: August 2, 2022
Pages: 336
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Harper Muse

A perfect storm of comedic proportions erupts in a DC bookstore over the course of one soggy summer week—narrated by two very different women and punctuated by political turmoil, a celestial event, and a perpetually broken vacuum cleaner.

Independent bookstore owner Sophie Bernstein is burned out on books. Mourning the death of her husband, the loss of her favorite manager, her only child’s lack of aspiration, and the grim state of the world, she fantasizes about going into hiding in the secret back room of her store.

Meanwhile, renowned poet Raymond Chaucer has published a new collection, and rumors that he’s to blame for his wife’s suicide have led to national cancellations of his publicity tour. He intends to set the record straight—with an ultra-fine-point Sharpie—but only one shop still plans to host him: Sophie’s.

Fearful of potential repercussions from angry customers, Sophie asks Clemi—bookstore events coordinator, aspiring novelist, and daughter of a famed literary agent—to cancel Raymond’s appearance. But Clemi suspects Raymond might be her biological father, and she can’t say no to the chance of finding out for sure.

This big-hearted screwball comedy features an intergenerational cast of oblivious authors and over-qualified booksellers—as well as a Russian tortoise named Kurt Vonnegut Jr.—and captures the endearing quirks of some of the best kinds of people: the ones who love good books.

I don’t know what to say about this one; it’s a departure of sorts, while also being right in my wheelhouse. I liked it, but I’m not sure why I liked it. I read it digitally, and I feel like my comprehension suffered a bit too, so that maybe I’d have gotten more out of it if I’d read a printed copy.

Bookish People is a snapshot of one very chaotic week in a DC bookstore. It’s written in 3rd person present tense, which I found a bit jarring at first, and it centers around 2 female characters, the owner of the store, recently widowed, and the events manager, with occasional forays into the head of a Ted Hughes-like poet who is having his own personal crises. The rest of the staff orbit around these two women and add their own eccentricities to the mix.

It’s billed as comedy, and it’s definitely humorous, but I didn’t find it to be laugh out loud funny. There are times that the humor feels tinged with a manic sort of panic that dampened any desire on my part to giggle, although there was a scene with a turtle and a Roomba that made me smile broadly.

If you’re looking for a story with a beginning, a middle and an end, this book will frustrate; there’s very little resolution to any of the conflicts and the only HEA is the turtle’s. But it is a very well-written vignette of a sort, of a crazy week in a bookshop.

Bloomsbury Girls

Bloomsbury Girls
by Natalie Jenner
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9780749028046
Publication Date: January 1, 2022
Pages: 411
Genre: Fiction, Historical
Publisher: Allison & Busby

One bookshop. Fifty-one rules. Three women who break them all.

1950, London. Bloomsbury Books on Lamb’s Conduit Street has resisted change for a hundred years, run by men and guided by the manager’s unbreakable rules. But after the turmoil of war in Europe, the world is changing and the women in the shop have plans.

As the paths of stylish Vivien, loyal Grace and brilliant Evie cross with literary figures such as Daphne Du Maurier, Samuel Beckett and Peggy Guggenheim, these Bloomsbury girls are working together to plot out a richer and more rewarding future.

Straight up general fiction, with a strong ‘female power’ theme, Bloomsbury Girls feels a wee bit modern-day-feminist in a few places, but it really isn’t (or else I’d have DNF’d it). This is, however, an accurate enough portrayal of the emerging shift in gender dynamics that took place after WWII, when women were less inclined to give up their jobs or their independence, and the painful adjustment this meant for so many men raised in one world-view and then thrust into another.

I thought Jenner created a realistic cast of characters for such a time; the women came from different backgrounds – one aimed for a traditional family, another embraced her independence, and the third a former servant trying to find her footing in a culture that would have been out of her grasp only a decade previously. The men, too, were a mixed lot, and with not a little irony folded in. Some of them found women’s new roles refreshing and empowering to everyone, while others were ambivalent, and yet others fought against it with everything they had. I like this much better than the recently popular trend of making all men evil and all women down-trodden and oppressed, which is so unrealistic it drives me more than a little nuts.

Overall, I found this to be a gentle read, with likeable, well fleshed out characters. The cameos by real historical characters added a bit of flair here and there, and nicely highlighted that in the 50’s there were more than a few powerful women around, willing to offer friendship and mentoring to others. Of course, their actions here are fictitious, so perhaps they weren’t as altruistic in real life, but nevertheless, it makes the story work.

I enjoyed this and would recommend it to anyone looking for a palette cleanser between reads, or an amuse bouche between favourite genre reads. It’s not going to change your life, or keep you on the edge of your seat, but it did keep me turning the pages, interested in what was going to happen and how it was all going to work out.

(Note: this is the author’s second book, and is apparently in the same world as her first The Jane Austen Society with character overlap. It reads as a stand alone, but there are enough references to said previous book that the connection is obvious. I might have to give that one a go soon.)

The House on Tradd Street (Tradd Street, #1)

The House on Tradd Street
by Karen White
Rating: ★★★
isbn: 9781984802163
Series: Tradd Street #1
Publication Date: January 15, 2018
Pages: 374
Genre: Fiction, Paranormal
Publisher: Penguin Random House

The brilliant, chilling debut of Karen White's Tradd Street series, featuring a Charleston real estate agent who loves old houses—and the secret histories inside them.

Practical Melanie Middleton hates to admit she can see ghosts. But she's going to have to accept it. An old man she recently met has died, leaving her his historic Tradd Street home, complete with housekeeper, dog—and a family of ghosts anxious to tell her their secrets.

Enter Jack Trenholm, a gorgeous writer obsessed with unsolved mysteries. He has reason to believe that diamonds from the Confederate Treasury are hidden in the house. So he turns the charm on with Melanie, only to discover he's the smitten one...

It turns out Jack's search has caught the attention of a malevolent ghost. Now, Jack and Melanie must unravel a mystery of passion, heartbreak—and even murder.

My first Project LibraryThing Recommendations read and from the rating it would seem it’s not off to a great start, but that would be unfair. While I definitely had problems with the book, I enjoyed it enough to continue on with the series.

A couple of inaccuracies in the book description: chilling … not so much, and Melanie most certainly does not love historical homes. The book starts off with her having a passionate hatred for them that is simply childish, and while there are a lot of ghosts and haunted house action, I read this book at night, with the lights off, while alone in my temporary bed and not once did I feel chilled from anything other than the ridiculous weather we’ve been having. As an example of another ghost story author, Simone St. James’ books manage to put me at the edge of my seat at least once, whereas even the malevolent ghosts in Tradd Street failed to raise even a single goosebump.

I don’t really hold that against the book though. What I did have a problem with was Melanie’s emotional immaturity and stubborn refusal to grow up. I’m trying not to judge the book too harshly for this however, because she’s supposed to be emotionally stunted. Her mother abandoned her at the age of 8 and her father is a raging alcoholic, so she’s text book accurate. As someone blessed with a happy upbringing, I just found her text book behaviour tedious. I’d like to think I’d be more patient in RL with Real People.

Now, as to the story itself – it was pretty good! I enjoyed the plot involving Melanie inheriting an historic mansion and the funds to renovate it – I loved the mystery she was left with, determining what happened to the former mistress of the house, reputed to have run away with another man, and I loved, loved, loved the added search for historic treasure. The ghosts were fun, even if they failed to raise hair, and the story would have been a lot less interesting without them.

So, in spite of the problems – and anecdotal evidence from others’ reviews indicates that Melanie doesn’t grow up in a hurry – I’m looking forward to continuing with this 5 book series, and I’ve already added the first book in the spin off series to the future TBR list.

Under Lock and Skeleton Key (Secret Staircase Mystery, #1)

Under Lock and Skeleton Key
by Gigi Pandian
Rating: ★★★½
isbn: 9781250804983
Series: Secret Staircase Mystery #1
Publication Date: March 15, 2022
Pages: 343
Genre: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Minotaur Books

An impossible crime. A family legacy. The intrigue of hidden rooms and secret staircases.

After a disastrous accident derails Tempest Raj’s career, and life, she heads back to her childhood home in California to comfort herself with her grandfather’s Indian home-cooked meals. Though she resists, every day brings her closer to the inevitable: working for her father’s company. Secret Staircase Construction specializes in bringing the magic of childhood to all by transforming clients’ homes with sliding bookcases, intricate locks, backyard treehouses, and hidden reading nooks.

When Tempest visits her dad’s latest renovation project, her former stage double is discovered dead inside a wall that’s supposedly been sealed for more than a century. Fearing she was the intended victim, it’s up to Tempest to solve this seemingly impossible crime. But as she delves further into the mystery, Tempest can’t help but wonder if the Raj family curse that’s plagued her family for generations—something she used to swear didn’t exist—has finally come for her.

I have enjoyed Gigi Pandian’s work ever since I first picked up a Jaya Jones mystery, but it’s always been a hard-won enjoyment. There’s just something about her writing that I can’t quite put my finger on, whether it’s characterisations, or tone, I don’t know. Usually, by the mid-way point I’m over it and enjoying the story. This one was more of a struggle from beginning to end.

Some stream of consciousness thoughts: I love the premise of secret passageways, hidden rooms … who doesn’t? I’m not so much a fan of the stage magician stuff. I love magic and illusions, just not the usually seedy backstage stuff. I found the ‘curse’ in the Raj family a non-starter; I just didn’t buy into it from the start and the drama Pandian tried to build out of it just continued to fall flat. I like the cross-over of characters that takes place between this series and Jaya Jones and I liked most of the new characters too. The ‘tension’ between the two BFF’s also felt manufactured. Basically, whenever Pandian tried to drum up drama in the story, it backfired (for me). I thoroughly enjoyed the veiled references to gargoyle’s (Adrian!), and the introduction of an escape-artist bunny called Abra was a nice change of pace as a series mascot.

The plot was very well done, if maybe a tad … I don’t know; I just know when the denouement came I felt nothing. Not surprise, not annoyance, not disbelief. Just … nothing. But it was well crafted, and I had no hint of where things were going. Her use of a magician’s misdirection in the plot was a tad heavy handed, but really only in retrospect.

Overall, it’s not a bad mystery, even though I’m making it sound like it might be. This is, I think, Pandian’s first mainstream, big-publisher book, and perhaps I feel like she tried a tad too hard, but in spite of that, I will gladly read the second book in the series.

Semicolon: The Past, Present, and Future of a Misunderstood Mark

Semicolon: The Past, Present, and Future of a Misunderstood Mark
by Ceclia Watson, Pam Ward (narrator)
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9780062917935
Publication Date: July 30, 2019
Genre: Non-fiction
Publisher: HarperCollins

The semicolon. Stephen King, Hemingway, Vonnegut, and Orwell detest it. Herman Melville, Henry James, and Rebecca Solnit love it. But why? When is it effective? Have we been misusing it? Should we even care?

In Semicolon, Cecelia Watson charts the rise and fall of this infamous punctuation mark, which for years was the trendiest one in the world of letters. But in the nineteenth century, as grammar books became all the rage, the rules of how we use language became both stricter and more confusing, with the semicolon a prime victim. Taking us on a breezy journey through a range of examples—from Milton’s manuscripts to Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letters from Birmingham Jail” to Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep—Watson reveals how traditional grammar rules make us less successful at communicating with each other than we’d think. Even the most die-hard grammar fanatics would be better served by tossing the rule books and learning a better way to engage with language.

Through her rollicking biography of the semicolon, Watson writes a guide to grammar that explains why we don’t need guides at all, and refocuses our attention on the deepest, most primary value of language: true communication.

Another great recommendation from the Irresponsible Reader. I’m an unapologetic user of the semicolon and really have never understood why it was such a divisive mark. This short-ish (about 4 hours on audio) history / essay on the mark cleared up some of that for me. People really do get weird about trying to codify every last possible detail.

Watson balances on a fine line between ‘yes! rules are necessary for clear communication’ and ‘no! throw out the rules and let your flag fly your own way!’ concerning punctuation in general. She includes convincing arguments for both sides – but I’m still falling on the prescriptivist side of things. I’m not fussed how someone uses punctuation, as long as they DO use punctuation, and in such a way as to clearly communicate their message. My resentment stems from writers (and I’m using that term to loosely encompass anyone trying to communicate in a written form, whether it’s text messages or novels) who make me work overly hard to parse the meaning they’re trying to convey. I’d like to know if they’re inviting people to eat grandma, or inviting grandma to eat and I’d like to do so without breaking a sweat.

The narrator does a fantastic job with this book, and I highly recommend it for anyone who enjoys the occasional dip into linguistic nerdism.

Chasing Venus: The Race to Measure the Heavens

Chasing Venus: The Race to Measure the Heavens
by Andrea Wulf, Robin Sachs (narrator)
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9780307989659
Publication Date: May 1, 2012
Genre: Natural Science
Publisher: Random House Audio

On June 6, 1761, the world paused to observe a momentous occasion: the first transit of Venus between the earth and the sun in more than a century. Through that observation, astronomers could calculate the size of the solar system—but only if they could compile data from many different points of the globe, all recorded during the short period of the transit. Overcoming incredible odds and political strife, astronomers from Britain, France, Russia, Germany, Sweden, and the American colonies set up observatories in remote corners of the world, only to have their efforts thwarted by unpredictable weather and warring armies. Fortunately, transits of Venus occur in pairs: eight years later, the scientists would have another opportunity to succeed.

Chasing Venus brings to life the personalities of the eighteenth-century astronomers who embarked upon this complex and essential scientific venture, painting a vivid portrait of the collaborations, the rivalries, and the volatile international politics that hindered them at every turn. In the end, what they accomplished would change our conception of the universe and would forever alter the nature of scientific research.

Before starting this book, I’d read two of Wulf’s books. The first was about Alexander von Humboldt, and natural history, so I was inclined going in to love it. The second one was about the birth of Romanticism; a subject I’m less interested in, but it included von Humboldt and Goethe, so again, I was inclined to really enjoy it.

Chasing Venus was the acid test of Wulf’s writing for me, because space bores me silly. Yes, the stars are pretty to look at, and I urge everyone to find access to some dark corner of the world in which to view the Milky Way, because … wow. And the Auroras are definite bucket list musts. But beyond that, the planets, constellations, black holes, etc … eh, don’t care.

I hadn’t even intended to read this one, but it showed up as available in audio at one of my libraries and I gave in to curiosity – could Wulf make the race to watch the transit of Venus in the 1700’s interesting to someone like me?

Turns out she can … sort of. Did I care about will they/won’t they question of success at getting the measurements? No, not really. But Wulf totally sucked me in to the drama and adventures of those men who rushed to the far corners of the globe (‘rush’ being a highly relative term in the 1700’s) in the often vain hope of seeing the transit of Venus, and not dying in the process from disease, war, or boredom.

I listed to this on audio and I thought the narrator did a terrific job, BUT, my American tin-ear for accents made some of the names really difficult to comprehend, coming from an British accented narrator and many of the names being French. This got better as the book progressed, but I do think I’d have probably gotten a bit more out of this book had I read the print version.

Finlay Donovan is Killing It

Finlay Donovan is Killing It
by Elle Cosimano
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781472282248
Series: Finlay Donovan Mystery #1
Publication Date: February 9, 2021
Pages: 359
Genre: Mystery
Publisher: Headline Review

When struggling crime writer and single mum Finlay Donovan accidentally finds herself employed as a local hit-woman, she suddenly finds herself living the life of crime previously reserved for her characters.

'It is a widely known fact that most mums are ready to kill someone by eight-thirty AM on any given Monday. . . ' Finlay Donovan, single mum and floundering crime writer, is having a hard time. Her ex-husband went behind her back to fire the nanny, and this morning she sent her four-year-old to school with hair duct-taped to her head after an unfortunate incident with scissors.

Making it to lunch with her literary agent is a minor victory but, as she's discussing the plot of her latest crime novel, the conversation is misinterpreted by a woman sitting nearby as that of a hit-woman offering her services to dispose of a 'problem' husband.
And when the woman slips Finlay a name and a promise of a large sum of cash, Finlay finds herself plotting something much bigger than her novel.
And, after all, they do always say: write what you know. . .

Finlay Donovan really is killing it . . .

I’ve seen this title thrown around a few sites, but honestly, the cover turned me off because it was such an obvious knock off of Where’d You Go, Bernadette? that it felt like the publisher was trying to ride some coat-tails. But Irresponsible Reader sang its praises in one of his posts, and I decided to give it a try.

At first, I thought maybe I’d run up against my first IR recommendation dud, because I don’t enjoy reading about people who are hanging onto life by a thread, and Finlay is definitely a big, hot mess at the beginning of this book. But I kept reading, because I couldn’t figure out how the author was going to pull off a protagonist mother-of-two who kills for money and still call the book a comedy.

When the answer to that started becoming clearer, the book started to click for me, because the deeper Finlay found herself in it, the more interested and invested I became. Coincidentally, the less of a hot mess she became. The introduction of the nanny-partner also helped, because her pragmatic personality was one I could identify with (although she takes her pragmatism further than I ever could).

What I was left with was a very well written, well plotted mystery that entertained me. Cosimano gets the bonus points for pulling off a very-plausible-for-fiction explanation for all the events that take place, and for dovetailing it all nicely together at the end.

This is the first of at least 3 books (so far) and I’m definitely interested in reading the next one. Thanks again to Irresponsible Reader!