Palisades Park
by Alan Brennert
Dive Right In (2/27/2013)
Go ahead, stick your toe in and test the water. I guarantee after the first few pages you will want to dive right into Palisades Park. It is a sensory pleasure! Brennert brings the sights, sounds and smells of the amusement park to life. While I have never been to Palisades, I live near Ocean City, MD, and the descriptions of the vendors, rides, attractions and people make me nostalgic of the Ocean City Boardwalk & Pier. I found myself googling images and history of Palisades as I read, and was amazed how thoroughly Brennert wove the facts into his bit of fiction. I highly recommend this wonderful story!
Cloudland: A Crime Novel
by Joseph Olshan
Brrr....Chill out with this psychological tale of suspense (3/13/2012)
Cloudland is a good psychological suspense novel. Olshan does a wonderful job setting up the story. I could feel the cold and snow, and sense the isolation of Cloudland, the remote village in Vermont where some of the crimes take place. The pacing of the book is slow and deliberate. I felt myself gradually making a path to towards the denouement and going back and forth with who I thought was the killer. The author did an excellent job of building suspense and pulling the reader into the story. I was, however, bothered by some of the dialogue. There were instances when I thought, people just don't talk that way. I found this mainly with the character of Catherine. Despite this, I liked the book overall and will try another Olshan book in the future.
Outside Wonderland: A Novel
by Lorna Jane Cook
Through the Looking Glass (2/23/2011)
Siblings Alice, Griffin, and Dinah, named for characters out of "Alice in Wonderland" lose first their mother in a freak accident, then their father. We get a small glimpse of them in their younger days before the story fast forwards to the adult siblings. All appear successful on the surface, but are struggling with relationships, and perhaps the unresolved issues of growing up without their parents. For the most part, the characters were likable; however I found them a little too cliche, and one dimensional. I wish they had been developed more fully. I would have liked to have had a few more glimpses of their childhood.
I looked forward to the parents perspective of their children's lives as they caught sight of them from heaven. I liked to think of these scenes as their view of earth "through the looking glass." The dialogue in these interludes was idyllic and the best parts of the novel.
This was a pleasant novel, easy to read. I give it 3.5 stars.
Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter: A Novel
by Tom Franklin
Ssss....Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter Slithers Up On the Reader Like a Snake in the Grass (11/11/2010)
Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter slithers up on the reader like a snake in the grass or in the deep, dark woods of Mississippi. The story uncoils itself in alternating turns from past to present through the voices and memories of former childhood friends, Silas and Larry. The setting and dialogue are deeply evocative of the rural south, and the racial relationships are finely drawn. There are some surprising twists and turns along the way, which will cause the reader to question what they think they know. Hmmm, who's the bad guy? Is it black on yellow, or yellow on black? An excellent mystery, but an even better character study!
The Nobodies Album
by Carolyn Parkhurst
Revealing! (6/7/2010)
This was a winning combination of family drama and murder mystery. Octavia Frost is a bestselling novelist, whose career takes off after a family tragedy. With several novels under her belt, Frost thinks she has come up with a revolutionary idea to create an anthology of the last chapters of all her novels, but with different endings. Is it really her novels she wants to rewrite or her own history?
Frost's rock-star son, Milo, has been estranged from his mother; but a murder accusation forces them to confront their issues and reconcile their past. Their relationship is slowly revealed and pieced together out of the pages of Octavia's novels.
Parkhurst alternately mixes Octavia's stories with the present. It was a wonderful way to develop Octavia's character and demonstrate how a person's words and actions are not always a true indication of their feelings and intentions. So often, people wish they had said this or done that, after the fact. I loved how Parkhurst made me question how we reveal ourselves to others and if we could rewrite parts of our past, would it be worth it. Not only was this a well-written and layered family drama; but it was also a great mystery.
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