Book Review: Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen

Lavender House

by Lev A.C. Rosen (Rosen)

 

San Francisco, 1952. Evander ‘Andy’ Mills has just been fired as a police inspector because they found out he’s gay. His plan is to drink all day and take a permanent bath in the bay, but a high class woman comes into the bar and offers Andy a case: find out who murdered her wife. Irene Lamontaine was the famous owner and scent designer for a large soap business. Her secluded country estate, Lavender House, is home to a found-family of queer people. It’s a place where they can be themselves openly, but big business is always a motive and the relationships among the people living in Lavender House have their tensions.

 

This historical mystery was lovely to read for the setting. The author clearly put a lot of work into researching the San Francisco area of the time. Despite being about a murder, I found it to be a story that moves from despair to deeply rooted hope as Andy discovers a form of community he’s never known.

 

It felt a lot like the film Knives Out due to physical and social setting, except with better human beings.

 

( official Lev A.C. Rosen web site )

 

Recommended by Garren H.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Audiobook Reveiw: The Levee by William Kent Krueger

The Levee

by William Kent Krueger (Compact Disc Krueger)

 

The Levee is a newly-released, but somewhat older title from William Kent Krueger, author of the long-running Cork O’Connor series, set in Minnesota, and the stellar stand-alones Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land. As Krueger mentions in an author afterword at the end of this audiobook, The Levee was a title he’d written many years before, but never done anything with — he’s kept coming back to it again and again, to rewrite and polish what he’d done before. And, finally, during COVID-19 self-isolation periods in the past couple of years, he finally finished it.

 

The Levee has been released only as an audiobook, narrated by J.D. Jackson. It is a novella in length, taking up only 3 discs as a book-on-cd. Based on an actual historical event, The Levee is set during the historic flooding of the Mississippi River in 1927, as four men (a former priest and three convicts ordered to assist him) journey by rowboat through the flood waters to the ancestral home of family, temporarily encircled by a levee built to withstand the flood waters.

 

Everyone in this story has their own motives and emotional connection to the attempt to save this stranded family — some noble and others less so. Krueger’s character-building skills are in full view in this short work, and I was pulled into the story quickly, finding myself invested in the (hopefully) successful outcome of the quest.

 

If you’re a fan of Krueger’s stand-alone novels, mentioned above, I recommend this short “new” work to you. One bonus with this audiobook is that includes an advance preview of Krueger’s forthcoming new novel, The River We Remember (due out in the Fall of 2023).

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Ordinary Grace and This Tender Land, both by William Kent Krueger, or No One Goes Alone, an audio-original novella by Erik Larson.)

 

( official William Kent Krueger web site )

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Book Review: All the White Spaces by Ally Wilkes

All the White Spaces
by Ally Wilkes (Wilkes)

All the White Spaces is historical suspense set in 1919 and 1920 during the age of early expeditions to Antarctica. Jonathan grew up listening to his older brothers obsess about joining one of these expeditions, but they’ve both recently died in the Great War. Jonathan himself feels smothered by his family’s expectations because he was assigned female at birth, so he becomes an expedition ship stowaway.

 

This book follows the conventions of gothic suspense where small things start to go awry, followed by increasing levels of disaster and hardship and unnatural strangeness. As a fan of naval stories and stories about danger and isolation, this was a perfect genre blend for me. If you happen to be familiar with Shackleton’s expeditions, this story is loosely modeled after his 1914 expedition but this is a slightly different world where there is no Ernest Shackleton and Antarctica holds an extra danger.

 

Be prepared for a tough read with lots of death and suffering, including for the sled dogs. It’s also a story that waxes poetic about this desolate winter country. If you weren’t already familiar with the three types of twilight, you will be after reading this book!

 

(Recommended to fans of Moby Dick by Herman Melville. If you enjoy this, another recent read-alike is The Arctic Fury by Greer Macallister.)

 

( official All the White Spaces and Ally Wilkes web site )

 

Recommended by Garren H.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

New BooksTalk Booklist: Recent Historical Fiction - American Subjects

   

In November 2021, Chery B., from the Anderson and Bethany Branch Libraries, presented a new booktalk, at the Bethany BooksTalks series, focusing on a selection of both historical fiction dealing with various time periods in American history.

Check out Chery's list of recommended reads, in this new booktalk booklist on BookGuide at the following link:

Recent Historical Fiction - American Subjects

Book Review: The Three Sisters by Heather Morris

The Three Sisters

by Heather Morris (Morris)

 

Based on a true story, The Three Sisters tells of three Jewish sisters who survive Auschwitz-Birkenau, the death marches across Europe, and then Communist rule in their home of Slovakia. It’s an emotional story that reveals the strength of love between sisters that endure the horrors of the concentration camps, and that goodness can be found even within those walls.

 

The story begins with the three very young sisters making a promise to their father that they will always stay together. Years later the youngest sister, Livia, is ordered by the Nazis to take a train to Auschwitz to “work for the Germans.” Her oldest sister Cibi, 19, goes with Livia even though Cibi was not named on the list. Cibi could hide out and avoid selection; It’s a decision that could easily take Cibi’s life. But because Cibi goes, Livia — one of the smallest girls in their group — is able to survive. Magda, age 17, ducks the Nazi forces for a time, but eventually she also ends up at Auschwitz-Birkenau. The sisters are reunited and find they have to support each other emotionally, as well as physically: those who fell during the death marches were shot on the spot. They also discover upon returning to their homeland that life is not easy under Communist rule and the people of their country still align against the Jews. Eventually the sisters travel to Israel, where they are able to establish a real home, and two still live there today. It is because of the love of the sisters and the kindness of strangers that these sisters survived against all odds.

 

Honestly, the book is not an easy book to read. The horrors that happened to the girls and to others at Auschwitz are difficult to comprehend. Also difficult to read is how some Jews lived while others died. One such example is when two sisters survive a bitter cold night after someone steals their blanket. They stumble outside to quicken their end and freeze to death outdoors. A kind soul convinces them to return and “finds” them a blanket, pulled from another set of girls. In the morning, those girls are found dead.

 

When I considered why I enjoyed this book I think too often we see pressure and stress causing the worst to squeeze out of people, especially during these trying times. So I found it uplifting to see that people can live through great adversity and tragedy and good can still be found.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, or The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris.)

 

( official The Three Sisters page on the official Heather Morris web site )

 

Recommended by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Book and Audiobook Reviews: The Personal Librarian by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray

The Personal Librarian
by Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray (Compact Disc Benedict)

Working in a library, as I do, I tend to flag any new books with “library” in the title, for my personal reading enjoyment. Sometimes they end up as duds, but sometimes you find a gem. This falls into the latter category.

The Personal Librarian is historical fiction, based mostly on historical fact. Born Belle Marion Greener, to black parents, under her mother’s influence, Belle changed her name to Belle da Costa Greene, and as a light-skinned woman of color, managed to pass her self off as “white” in early 1900s society. While working at the Princeton University Library, Belle was encouraged by a nephew of the great financier, J. Pierpont Morgan, to apply for the position as Morgan’s “personal librarian” at the eponymous library he was establishing to house his collection of rare manuscripts and art work. She was hired for the position, despite her young age.

 

This novel, based on what historical records have survived, explores Belle’s life and experiences as she helps J.P. Morgan create one of the world’s foremost libraries, and her efforts to continue their work after his passing, all while she has to conceal her true heritage from the world at large. This is 50% “love letter” to the passion for the preservation of knowledge, and 50% about Belle’s personal life and the challenges she faces maintaining a public persona that differs from her true self.

 

All in all, I enjoyed The Personal Librarian quite a lot. There are lots of great “moments” or “scenes” throughout the book, though in the end I felt that the driving central plot was a bit lackluster. I found Belle’s on-again/off-again relationship with a distant suitor to be a bit tiresome and overwrought. Fans of historical fiction, and of literature exploring the sacrifices made by those of African-American descent in order to fit into a racist and demeaning society, will both find much to appreciate in this one. I listened to the book-on-CD audio adaptation of The Personal Librarian, narrated by actress Robin Miles, and she does a terrific job with this novel.

 

( US publisher’s official The Personal Librarian web page ) | ( official Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray web sites )

 

Recommended on audio by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

When twenty-six-year-old Belle da Costa Greene interviews with J. P. Morgan in 1905 for the position of personal librarian to help collect rare manuscripts and art for his private Pierpont Morgan Library, she has to speak carefully. In part, she is hiding her limited library experience working at Princeton University Library and her teacher’s education. However she also is hiding a much bigger and dangerous secret. Belle is not who she seems. Her middle name is not da Costa and she doesn’t get her dark complexion from a Portuguese grandmother. Belle da Costa Greene is actually Belle Marion Greener. Her heritage is African American and her father was the first Black graduate from Harvard and a vocal advocate of equal rights. Although the book is fiction, authors Marie Benedict and Victoria Christopher Murray create a story of what it must have been like for real-life Belle Marion Greener to work with the out-spoken Morgan, act as an intelligent and witty competitor in a world of men, and all the while keep her true identity protected. Some women celebrate her accomplishments and use her as a model as they fight for equal rights; others would prefer to see her fail. In addition, she has to keep her romantic relationship discreet because of his heritage and her employer’s dislike and competition with the man.

 

As a historical fiction novel, I enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about this strong, clever, and inspiring woman, as well as the rare manuscript and art collection she helped assemble and eventually make available to the general public. Although there was always the underlying threat that Belle might be discovered, I didn’t feel an overwhelming urgency to the story. I didn’t find myself racing to get to the next chapter. Perhaps the two authors felt that it was important to put together a book to educate its reader rather than entice. I will say that if you are a lover of historic fiction, this is one to put on your reading list just to learn about this inspiring woman.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Paris Library by Janet Skeslian Charles or The Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin.)

 

Recommended in print by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find these reviews helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Book Review: The Rose Code by Kate Quinn

The Rose Code
by Kate Quinn (Quinn)

I’ve been reading a lot of historical fiction recently, especially World War II novels. The Rose Code is another World War II novel, but what sets it apart from the rest is that it takes place at Bletchley Park, a location described by a guard as “the biggest bloody lunatic asylum in Britain.” The book brings to life that very eccentric top-secret world, breaking codes and saving lives.

 

If you like World War II fiction, you need to add this book to your must-read list.

 

At Bletchley Park women were often equal to men, which was not the norm in the 1940s. Osla Kendall, not your usual debutante, builds Hurricane planes and eventually takes a job using her fluency in German to help break codes. Osla also gets caught up in a romantic relationship with Prince Philip of Greece — before Queen Elizabeth, of course. Mab Churt is socially climbing her way out of her East End poverty existence, and finds herself working on the code breaking machines while she looks for a husband to make a better life. Beth Finch is the awkward, side-ways thinker who is sheltered and over-protected by her religious mother. But Beth’s side-way thinking and gift for crosswords makes her just the right kind of person for a cryptanalyst. The story details how they lived and loved; overcame obstacles and suffered major losses. Added in the mix is a race against time to uncover a traitor who is using his or her position to sell secrets, no matter what the cost.

 

Although this is a fiction novel, a lot of The Rose Code is based on what factually happened inside Bletchley Park. Some of the characters are based on real people. The character Osla is based on the true-to-life Osla Benning, a Canadian who built planes and worked at Bletchley Park and did have a relationship with Prince Philip. Several characters are combinations of people. Beth is a combination of an unknown codebreaker who had a breakdown and went to an institution and real life Maris Lever, a star cryptanalyst credited with several major breakthroughs. And some minor characters are real people: Alan Turing, Dilly Knox and even Valerie Glassborow, who would become Kate Middleton’s grandmother. Author Kate Quinn even admits in the Author’s Notes that there was a traitor at Bletchley Park selling secrets to the Russians and he was not exposed until years later when he was living abroad.

 

I quickly got caught up in the lives of the characters. In fact, I had to put the book down for a few days after a major loss. But then I found myself racing to the end to discover the traitor and see if he or she was brought to justice.

 

(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Road to Station X by Sarah Baring, The Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin or The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah.)

 

( official The Rose Code page on the official Kate Quinn web site )

 

Recommended by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

Book Review: The Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin

The Last Bookshop in London: A Tale of World War II

by Madeline Martin (Martin)

 

Recently I have been on a kick reading historical fiction, especially World War II fiction, and I was pleased to see this new book by Madeline Martin. I wasn’t disappointed. The Last Bookshop in London not only vividly depicts what it must have been like living day-to-day during World War II, but also how books help us grow, explore new places, and continue to find hope.

 

The story begins in August 1939 when a young woman, Grace Bennett, moves to London with her best friend Viv. After her mother passed away Grace had been living with an unkind uncle and his family, taking care of his shop in the small town of Drayton, Norfolk. But now she is setting off to London for a fresh start with her mother’s friend Mrs. Weatherford and her son Colin. Because her uncle refused to write her a letter of recommendation, Grace is grateful that Mrs. Weatherford has lined up a job for her at a small local bookshop, Primrose Hills Books, where she can work and earn a recommendation letter.

 

But when she shows up the first day for work, it’s not what she expects. The shop is dusty. Books lie everywhere, many are still boxed in the back room. There is no semblance of order. And the bookstore owner, with his nose constantly buried in a book, tells her he doesn’t want her assistance. Lacking courage, Grace returns home dejected. However, the job details are quickly ironed out by the strong-willed Mrs. Weatherford and Grace begins her six-month temp job for Mr. Evans. Grace whips the shop into shape, cleaning out the grime, putting books in order, and creating attractive displays. Not a reader herself, Grace gets ideas on how a bookshop should be organized after visiting the prime book shops on Pasternoster Row.

 

And into the story walks George Anderson. Intelligent and attractive, they hit it off. But then Great Britain goes to war. He is called up as a pilot before they can go to tea. But he leaves her something, The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas. And it changes her life forever. She becomes locked in the book’s grasp and she discovers what it is like to be transported to other places and live the lives and experiences of other people without leaving home. Grace then turns that new love into her work at the bookstore: reading books, recommending books, and helping others in London find that same escape from their troubles through reading.

 

Throughout the book, Grace invests herself in her new community, becoming an Air Raid Precautions (ARP) warden to help during blackouts, then bombings. She reads to fellow Londoners in the local shelter to create a distraction while the bombs drop and the city burns. And when Primrose Hill Books becomes “the last bookshop in London” she even offers other bombed book stores an opportunity to sell their undamaged wares.

 

The author doesn’t overdo it in terms of describing the blood and gore, but she also doesn’t leave out the hardships of war. Characters you come to love in the book fall victim to bombs and fires; and as an ARP warden, Grace isn’t spared the sights of these horrors. In order to keep calm and carry on, she attempts to pack those experiences in a neat box, locked tight and set in a dark, dark corner of her mind where someday she will carry them like scars.

 

I enjoyed and would recommend The Last Bookshop in London because it vividly depicts through imagery and storytelling how it felt to live during wartime in London — how it felt to keep losing everything but yet to carry on. I especially enjoyed the message that hope and a new beginning can always be found for those who look for it. And the book will also strike a chord with avid readers who remember how it felt to discover their first book love.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Lilac Girls by Marsha Hall Kelly, The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah or Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian.]

[ official The Last Bookshop in London page on the official Madeline Martin web site ]

 

Recommended by Cindy K.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!

New BooksTalk Booklist: Susan's Selections - November 2020

  

The Bethany and Gere Branch BooksTalk series returned in a modified format for the Fall/Winter sessions of 2020 -- they were held as Library BooksTalks on Zoom, using the Zoom online meeting software.

Susan S., teen specialist at the Eiseley Branch Library, was the presenter on Zoom on November 20th, 2020. She discussed a number of works she's recently enjoyed, appropriate for adults and teens.

You can see a list of the items Susan discussed at:

Susan's Selections - November 2020

Interested in being added to an e-mail list for notifications about future In-Person or Online Book Talks? Visit our E-mail Groups Sign-Up page to sign up!

Book Review: The Secrets We Kept by Lara Prescott

The Secrets We Kept
by Lara Prescott (Prescott)

I learned so much about author Boris Pasternak and his mistress and muse, Olga Ivinskaya. Olga, who was the inspiration for Lara in Pasternak’s novel Doctor Zhivago, was sent to the Gulag for refusing to divulge what Pasternak was writing about in the book taking him over a decade to write. The chapters alternated between Olga’s perspective & that of two women serving as American spies. Americans worked hard to get copies of Doctor Zhivago to Russian citizens behind the Iron Curtain, hoping to create turmoil by Russians being angry about the book being banned in their home country.

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles or The Revolution of Marina M. by Janet Fitch.]

[ official The Secrets We Kept and Lara Prescott web site ]

Recommended by Jodi R.
Anderson and Bethany Branch Libraries

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!