Book of the Week: Shady business
A Dream of Death: A Kate Hamilton Mystery By Connie Berry (311 pages, 2019, mystery) Kate Hamilton returns to the Isle of Glenroth, the island in Scotland where she met her late husband, Bill. She is reluctant to return and revisit scenes from her past. But her volatile sister-in-law, Elenor, has asked her to come and help her. Elenor, who has never liked Kate, is in trouble and has no one else to turn to. Elenor runs the Glenroth...
Book of the Week: Add happiness to your life
The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living By Meik Wiking (355 pages, 2017, nonfiction) You may have heard that the Danes are very happy people. But have you heard of “hygge”? It’s pronounced “hoo-ga,” but how you do it is more important than how you say it! Hygge is many things, but it is mainly about comfort and spending time with family and friends. Oh, and cake and candy, candles and staying in with a good book when...
Book of the Week: Woman must find own way and kidnapper
The Spies of Shilling Lane By Jennifer Ryan 355 pages/2019/fiction In Ashcombe Village, England, March 1941, housewife Mrs. Braithwaite takes out her notebook and writes up her thoughts. “How do you measure the success of your life?” Mrs. Braithwaite thinks it has to do with how respected you are, your social standing. But when her cheating husband divorces her, she is ousted from the Women’s Voluntary Service group in the...
Book of the Week: Mystery rife with twists
A Borrowing of Bones By Paula Munier 342 pages, 2018, fiction/mystery Mercy Carr, a military police officer, was shot during her last deployment in Afghanistan. Her fiancé, officer Martinez, was killed. His last words to Mercy were for her to take care of “his partner,” a bomb-sniffing Malinois dog named Elvis. Mercy retired and bought a remote cabin in Northshire, Vt., her hometown. She and Elvis have been healing and taking long...
Book of the Week: Experimental form explores violence
In the Dream House Carmen Maria Machado 2019/272 pages / memoir In The Dream House is a haunting look at psychological abuse and the ways in which it often goes unrecognized, particularly in queer communities. The book focuses on Machado’s own harrowing experience with intimate partner violence and points out how rarely abuse in same-sex relationships is acknowledged and discussed. In The Dream House represents Machado’s effort to...
