Megan Miranda

Fiction 2016/ 371 pages

Corrine Preston goes missing ten years ago from a small town of Cooley Ridge in North Carolina.  When our narrator, Nicolette Farrell, returns home from her life in Philadelphia to help her brother Daniel cope with the needs of their aging father, another young woman, Annaliese Carter also goes missing.  What and who connects these two missing girls?  Is it Daniel?  Is it Nic’s high school boyfriend Tyler?  And what do Jason and Nic have to do with it? And what about Nic’s father, Patrick, who has dementia?

The author, Megan Miranda, tells the story backwards, day by day for 15 days, which is an interesting methodology.  It works!  It is helpful to simply trust the author, that you are reading information in the right order.

If someone else has read this, I would love to chat with you.  I am a bit confused ... about the ring (rings?) and the pregnancy test, and the burying of Corrine …

This is a fun mystery (even if I am a bit confused!)  I read it camping, and it was great for sitting by the motorhome.

August 2023

Douglas Preston & Lincoln Childs

Fiction 2009 | 448 pages

“It takes a certain amount of guts to start a novel by killing off a popular recurring character, but no one has ever accused this writing team of lacking guts.” From David Pitt

Pendergast, the FBI special agent who frequently takes on personal assignments on a freelance basis, teams up with New York police lieutenant Vincent D’Agosta to solve a crime that has ties to the supernatural. Apparently these two characters are regulars in the Preston/Childs books.

In the opening pages, a murder is committed by a man who, 10 days earlier, was pronounced dead and then buried. But the eyewitness is sure it’s the same man, and footage from a security camera appears to confirm it. How does a dead man commit murder? And why this particular victim?

I cannot fault the writing of these two prolific and successful writers.  It is a sharp, fast-paced, hard core murder mystery.  However, I had great difficulty in finishing this novel because of the subject matter:  Vodoo, reanimated dead people, animal sacrifice.  I found the content rather repulsive, though again, the mystery itself is exquisite.

As such, I slogged my way through to the end, but find I cannot recommend it.

August 2023

Rev. Jane E. Vennard

Nonfiction 2013 | 176 pages

Regular readers of the Dusty Shelves blog know that I have been exploring spiritual texts for a while now, often with disappointment.  Fully Awake and Truly Alive is the first of many books that I can unequivocally say I enjoyed and found within its pages significant value. It is a book about spiritual practices ... creating actions you can take, perspectives you can hold, thoughts you can align.  The author, calling upon and gently integrating Christianity, Buddhism, the Koran, the Veda, Torah teachings, and a wide range of spiritual tomes and teachers, presents eight practices that you can engage in right now.  Chapters include practices such as silence, rest, community, and service.

Kathy and Leslie and I read this book together, and all three of us liked it and found actions to honor and include in our lives right now.  This is a great book, if you are on a spiritual path.

August 2023

Maggie O'Farrell

Fiction 2022 | 352 pages

A spectacular and delightful book!  Lucrezia de'Medici, at the untenable age of 13, is married off to the Duke of Ferrara, Alfonzo.  The setting is Florence Italy, in the 1550s.  While this sounds as though it might be tepid and boring, it is neither!  This delicious, rich, textured novel, based on historical fact, is a page-turner.  I read it in two days camping (and yes, I also kayaked and hiked.)

The dashing Duke Alfonzo is intimate and caring to Lucrezia one minute, and brutally cruel the next. He has a personality that is either sociopathic, or he has dissociative identity disorder.  Lucrezia, who, in her soul, is independent, creative, and not easily controlled, sits for a court artist during the first year of your marriage, who paints her portrait according to the desires of her husband.  Hence, the marriage portrait.  She attempts to learn the role of a very young Duchess, which is challenging and seriously rubs against her own personality and values. There is vivid description of the servants who serve her, and how they endear themselves to her.

Life in court is described with detail and pizazz, but it is not the center of this novel. The center is Lucrezia and her personality. The 1550’s was not a good time to be a woman – there are not many options open to women.  O’Farrell’s depiction of Lucrezia is deep and detailed.  You gain a great sense of life in Renaissance Florence, and the difficult prescribed roles played by both women and men, as well as Lucrezia herself.

I definitely recommend this book as an engaging read.

July 2023

David Baldacci

Fiction 2023/ 432 pages

I have not been reading much of the “psychological thriller/mystery” genre lately, so perhaps what I am about to type is not very relevant, but once again, I found the mystery, it’s development, and it’s resolution, overly complex.

Mickey Gibson, a single mother with two young children, and a former detective, now works for ProEye, doing investigative work from the comfort of her computer screen in her home.  When someone allegedly from ProEye asks her to go visit a client, she does so, and finds him dead; murdered.  Harry Langhorne (aka Daniel Pottinger) was a former mob account in Witness Protection.

And then she receives a call from a brilliant unnamed woman with a hidden past and hidden motives, who wants Mickey to track down the killer, and the circumstances and people surrounding Langhorne’s death and what is reputed to be an untold fortune, held somewhere.  While she is strong-armed and intimidated by this woman at first, eventually her competence and brilliance wins and the two women become unlikely partners in solving the complex crimes.

Though there are characters which seem to add unnecessary complexity to the story, Baldacci, as the stellar writer that he is, writes the denouement with page-turning, thrilling skill.  If you like this genre, I think you will enjoy Simply Lies.

July 2023

Ore Agbaje-Williams

Fiction 2023 | 192 pages

The story is about a woman, her husband, and the woman’s best friend, who spends way too much time at the couple’s home.  Reviewers call it “very funny” and “astute” and “bold, brilliant satire.”

I found it shallow, not credible, and essentially boring, though I did read it in its entirety.  It is written in three sections … each in the voice of our three different characters, about a single afternoon and evening in the couple’s home.

I find it not so much irritating as distance-creating, that the three characters are always referred to as “my wife” and “my husband” and “my wife’s friend” and “my friend”.  This has a way of keeping the characters in relationship with each other, and not exploring the depth in any of them. An odd literary technique I think …

Dumb ending.  Read something else!

June  2023

Anthony de Mello

Nonfiction 1992/ 184 pages

This is another book that is allegedly about spirituality but seems more about psychology.  That being said, I found some useful perspectives, such as exchanging a concept or idea about something or someone and replacing it with reality.  I also resonated with the admonishment to view emotions as though they are outside of you.  He talks about the difference between “I am depressed” and “there is depression.”  Interesting psychological and emotional advice, but somehow it does not make the link to spirituality for me.

June 2023

Julia Watts

Fiction 2018 / 289 pages

I often enjoy, as you know, teen novels.  This one is a little too teen ... a little too simplistic.  But still, it is such a delightful story, I gulped it down!

Libby (short for Liberty) and her family are devout conservative patriarchal Christians. At 16, she is the oldest of six children (Patience, Justice, Faith, Charity, and Valor are her siblings, with #7 on the way ). They are home-schooled, live under the loving but highly controlling rules of their father, never socialize with anyone outside of their church, and spend their days insulated in their family, studying, reading the Bible, preparing food, playing games together.

And then the Forrester family moves in next door, in their rural community. Zo is Libby's age, and suddenly Libby is exposed to blue jeans and shorts, atheism, vegetarians, equal decision-making between parents, questioning, thoughtful consideration of life, lifestyles, values, and culture.  Libby makes a gender-fluid friend in Zo.

Of course, you know what is going to happen as Libby actually does become liberated.  But the journey is interesting, especially as both sets of parents try to be good neighbors to each other, even though their belief systems are diametrically opposed.

This is a fun, if easy, read.

June 2023

Barbara Kingsolver

Fiction 2022 / 560 pages

Demon Copperhead is Barbara Kingsolver’s retelling of Charles Dicken’s David Copperfield. This is the basis of many reviews … was this a brilliant idea on her part, or inappropriate, baffling, and unwarranted?  Since I read David Copperfield in high school, approximately 55 years, and don’t remember one word of it, I am not entering into the debate at all.  I take Demon Copperhead as a new and original literary work.

Demon Copperhead is born Damon Fields in 1988 in southern Virginia to a teenage mother addicted to gin, amphetamines, and Vicodin.  A troubling attitude earns him he name Demon and bright red hair gets him “Copperhead.”  Demon’s father died before he was born, and when his mother ODs on Demon’s 11th birthday, Demon becomes a ward of the state.

Thus begins this gritty and depressing book, as Demon is moved from untenable living situations to even worse living situations.  The book is a series of unrelenting tragedies, with occasional minor victories on Demon's part that keep you rooting for him.  There is abuse, an excessive amount of illegal and addictive drug use, and sex way too early.  People continue to disappoint hm, but some, like his boyhood friend Maggot, and he new friend Angus, stay as close as they can.

The context, the social message, is about the incessant poverty in Appalachia, and how people survive it, or don't. High school football and, at last, a decent foster home to live in, provide Demon with a respite of success.  Until his knee is badly injured and opioids take over his life and his well-being.  It is rather amazing to learn about how much effort it takes to score illegal or legal addicting drugs.  As Demon is a budding artist/writer, this book also looks at how the artist's consciousness is built.

But for all the difficulties our main character faces, sometimes with astounding weakness of spirit, sometimes with profound resolve, it is, after all, written by Barbara Kingsolver, who is an extraordinary writer. From a New York Times review:  "Kingsolver’s prose is often splendid. There is the 'dog-breath air of late summer,' the guy with 'wrongful' eyebrows,  the man who makes his way down a staircase 'like something dumped out of a bucket.' Episode by episode she persuasively conveys the mind of a teenage boy."  While Demon Copperfield drags a bit in the middle, as many long books do, I keep reading and it keeps intriguing.  I am giving it three hearts because, while it is definitely a good summer read, it is NOT a light beach read!!!

I do recommend it! My high-school friend Mary and I decided to read this book together before my upcoming visit to her cabin.  I will be intrigued to hear what she has to say!

June 2023

Robert L. Weber & Carol Orsborn

Nonfiction 2015 / 233 pages

My friend Kathy and I are exploring books on developing and affirming our spirituality in our latter years.  The Spirituality of Age is our first choice, and I must say I am disappointed.  I would like to re-title it The Psychology of Age.  It is filled with psychological advice, perspective, and counsel, that ties very loosely to spirituality, in my mind.  This is the major contribution of Robert L. Weber, PhD, a former Jesuit and clinical psychologist.  Carol Orsborn, PhD, has her doctorate in History and Critical Theory of Religion.  With her degree, and Weber’s former vocation as a Jesuit, the book is replete with religious and bible references that, try as I may to translate into secular experience or ignore, became tedious and boring.  Furthermore, the entire book is about the lives and stories of Weber and Orsborn.  There is nothing I find quite as irritating as an author telling his/her story because they are so egotistical to think it alone informs others.  A story here and there to elucidate a point is welcome.  But this book is almost 100% their stories.  Yawn me to death!

HOWEVER, my conversation with Kathy was enlightening!  She was less critical and gleaned some useful pieces from this book.  We had a good conversation about one of the questions incited by the book ... What does mature spirituality look like?  The words we used, for us, included acceptance, being present, spaciousness, quiet, prayer and meditation, being in nature, and being in our bodies.  A good question from the book we are both pondering is “What does the divine want to awaken in you now?”  My current answer is gratitude and clarity.  We also spoke about letting go of old beliefs AND creating new ones.

I think the most profound part of our discussion was around loss, and how loss contributes to our sense of the spiritual.  Health issues, loss of strength and stamina, and of course, the loss of very important people (and pets) in our lives, has raised a question for us, i.e., how to be with loss as part of our spiritual practices.

All in all, we had a great conversation, even though I am not enamored of the style of writing of these two authors.  For those of you who are tracking my posts on Buddhism and on spirituality, please note that Kathy and I are next reading Awareness by Anthony de Mello, and will discuss it in late June.  We invite you to read along if you wish!

June 2023